Games & Gadgets

I don't care how you voted, you have to acknowledge that Barack Obama grasps the importance of the Internet.

He recently released his first presidential address … on YouTube (the novelty of course overshadows what was actually said). But while the presidency just took a big leap forward, it's also about to step backward. The New York Times reports Obama will have to give up his BlackBerry and may have to stop sending e-mails when he becomes president.

It's not a new problem. George W. Bush gave up sending e-mails when he became president, because every piece of the president's correspondence becomes public record.

Obama is still considering whether he will or can use e-mail, according to the story.

The application questionnaire for a job in his administration asks if you have any e-mails, Internet posts or any kind of writing that would be embarrassing to our new president.

Maybe it's only fair. If Obama has to give up his BlackBerry, then his staffers' resume must include, "raised by nuns."

He is a mass communicator. The same man who asked parents to turn off the television and spend more time with their kids bought campaign ads in online video games. He hopes to have a laptop computer on his desk in the Oval Office, another presidential first according to the story.

This will be the first truly modern president. Any politician or political party that can't use the Internet to spread its message beyond sending poorly fact-checked e-mails to my mom will look foolish.

That's change you can already see.

Later Vader

You know that scene in Groundhog Day where Bill Murray tries to escape his perpetual loop of a day by killing himself? Only it doesn't work so it becomes a montage of him killing himself in different ways over and over and over?

That's about what it was like playing Darth Vader on arcade mode in "Soulcalibur IV." I got my metal butt kicked more than 50 times trying to beat The Apprentice. He's a leaner, meaner Jedi with a lot of cheap moves that I won't bother describing here.

"Soulcalibur IV," of course, is a fine game we've reviewed before. It is certainly better than that God-awful "Soulcalibur Legends" nonsense put out on the Nintendo Wii.

After I was able to overcome the profound cheapness of The Apprentice, I got control of the character. I can now use his idiot's-luck button pushing maneuvers to get the better of any number of opponents.

The novelty of having pop characters hang out in a Jetsons-meet-the-Flintstones fashion really lends itself to video games. While video games strive for greater story telling, I'm reminded of all the successful games where the story was ultimately unimportant.

Fighting games resemble the realization of a drunken bar bet over whether Superman could kick the crap out of Sub-Zero from Mortal Kombat.

It's called "Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe," and it hit the shelves this month.