US Open draws!

Yes, time for some craaaaazzeee predictions!

The men

first quarter: don't see many problems for Djokovic here. 4th round against Gasquet might be good, QF should be against Monfils or Berdych. I'm going with Bird-itch.

The only other notable name in that quarter is Dolgopolov, and he might take a set of Djokovic in the third round, but I don't see him or anyone else doing an upset in this quarter.

second quarter: another brilliant draw for Federer *rolls eyes* I'm not that worried about the early rounds - Tomic might be a problem, but he's just as likely to lose in the first round. Same with Cilic. Federer really should reach the quarterfinal, but that means a match against Tsonga or Fish. Since that 1/8th of the draw has 5, yes, FIVE qualifiers in it, a Tsonga/Fish 4th round is pretty much a given. Unless Verdasco or Llodra suddenly decide to win more than 2 matches in a row.

third quarter: quite a few yummy seeds here. Soderling, Del Potro, Simon, Wawrinka, and Murray. Isner-Baghdatis is a first round, might be good. Del Potro-Simon is a possible 3rd round, but otherwise I can't see any big upsets here. I'm expecting a Del Potro - Söderling and Wawrinka - Murray 4th round, and I'm going with a Murray - Del Potro quarterfinal.

fourth quarter: the one with Nadal. And some other people. Should be a Ferrer-Nadal QF, unless one of the peasants decide to surprise Nadal (not impossible, with his recent lack of self-confidence). Ljubicic or Nalbandian might face him in the third round, if they believe in their chances it might be a 5 setter...but I still expect Nadal to reach the semis.

So, the quarterfinals:

Djokovic-Berdych
Federer-Fish
Murray-Del Potro
Nadal-Ferrer

semis:

Federer-Djokovic
Nadal-Murray

final:

Murray-Djokovic

winner:

Murray

Yeah that's right. Although I'm really not ruling out Nadal, I get the feeling the winner of the US Open will come from the Nadal-Murray match. If it is a Federer-Djokovic semi, I expect another 5-setter, which will leave either man tired for the final (blame this stupid "Super Saturday" thing, ugh). I know a lot of people doubt Nadal's current mental strenght, but at slams he's a different person. Doesn't mean he's invincible, but still.

As for Federer...no, I can't see him winning this, he'll probably have a tough QF, and an even tougher semi, and I just can't see him play 3 great matches in a row. I want him to win, otherwise this will be the first year since 2002 where he hasn't won a slam! End of an era. Unless he suprises everyone here.

As for Djokovic, I get the feeling he'll either win here, or lose in the semi or the final, and then goes on to win the WTF.

Women

Do I really have to do the quarter by quarter analysis, even if we know it's going to be a S.Williams vs. Sharapova final? Heh.

Okay fine. First quarter: Wozniacki might already get Kuznetsova or Hantuchova in round 4. She'll no doubt fluke-win again, but Petkovic will not be that easy. Petko will have to get past Li Na first, but I'm still going with a Petkovic - Wozniacki QF.

Second quarter: a more interesting quarter, with Azarenka, Serena Williams, Schiavone, Ivanovic and Jankovic in it. Azarenka-S.Williams might be a 3rd round, but I don't think Serena is going to have any trouble with her. 4th round should be Williams-Ivanovic. Other 4th round should be Jankovic-Schiavone, I'm going with Jankovic winning that match. So, a Jankovic-Williams QF.

Third quarter: Wimbledon winner Kvitova on one side, Wimbledon runner-up Sharapova on the other side. Bring it on! There are some dangerous floaters in this quarter, but I'm still going with a Kvitova-Sharapova QF, and Maria taking revenge for her Wimbledon loss.

Fourth quarter: probably the most open quarter. Bartoli-Zvonareva would be the logical QF choices, but this quarter also has Venus Williams, Petrova, Lisicki, Stosur and Cibulkova. Zvonareva - V.Williams and Stosur-Bartoli are likely 4th round matches, so let's say...a Zvonareva-Stosur QF?

semis:

Serena Williams -Petkovic

Sharapova - Zvonareva

final:

Serena Williams - Sharapova

winner:

Sharapova. No wait, Serena. On second thought...Sharapova. Maybe. I don't know. Okay, you know what? Sharapova. There.

Anything else? No. Bye.

Pukkelpop is broken

Normally this would've been a review of a fun day filled with music, but fate sure decided otherwise.

I'll try to tell things chronologically.

So, thursday, around 4PM, I get off the train in Kiewit. I'm there because I have a ticket for the Pukkelpop festival for friday, and I'm able to stay with a friend of my mum's, who lives a few kilometers from the site. She's going to pick me up a kilometer or so away from the station, since the festival camping and entrance is basically right next to the station.

So I walk past the entrance, not a lot of people there since the festival already started 5 hours ago. Next to the entrance and close to the main road I was on is my favourite stage of the festival, the Chateau. There was a band playing there, and the bass was really loud and deep. I smiled, looking forward to spending most of friday in that tent, and I was especially looking foward to Planningtorock, knowing that the bass would probably destroy my ears.

I briefly thought of the great gigs I've seen in that tent over the past 7 years. Fat Truckers, Jamie Lidell (in 2005 - nothing but ultra weird glitchy electro), The Rapture, Riton, Los Campesinos!, Health, The Bug, and one of my best live experiences ever, Liars in 2007. Oh yes, I was very ready to add another band to that list on friday.

So I found my mum's friend after a few minutes, we both complained about how hot it was, and went to her house. I was half-planning on going back to the entrance, because you can see the main stage and obviously hear the music from a couple of stages. I couldn't get a ticket for thursday (or for the weekend) since they sold out so early, but on this day I definitely wanted to see Skunk Anansie amongst others.

But I noticed that some very dark clouds were coming in our direction, that was going to be rain for sure. So I stayed inside, went on the pc, and noticed they were doing a live stream of the Skunk Anansie gig. Yay! So I watched it. Towards the end of the gig, it started raining, but nothing that bad. But it started getting heavier, and soon the frontstage was all wet. It was a really heavy thunderstorm, and I was happy I was inside. Kept watching the livestream, until Skin, completely wet, said "we can't go on!" and ran off the stage. It's then that I saw that there were branches and other stuff flying through the air, hadn't seen anything like this at festival, it looked like a hurricane.

After 15 minutes or so, I start reading things on twitter and newssites saying "tent collapsed at Pukkelpop - several injured". First thing I thought was "oh crap, please don't let it be the chateau!" I watched the news at 7, and yes, chateau collapsed, reports of severe damage to other tents, at least 1 dead, several heavy injured. Crap.

Kept following the news, of course some false rumours were spread (aparently there were 6 people reported dead at some point - stupid newssites taking over this rumour as fact). Videos started to appear, there were extra tv broadcasts, and so on. It all became a bit of a blur, and I'm not sure I actually felt anything at that time. But I was still thinking about the next day. If they don't cancel the festival, will I go? Even if it's not the "full" festival? I decided to go bed around midnight.

I had a very uncomfortable night - kept waking up, every time with another Pukkelpop-related dream in my head. It was nothing bad, mostly about what was going to happen on friday. At around 8PM, I took my phone to check some updates. Festival was cancelled. Good.

I think it was only after I woke up properly that I started to realise what happened, and the impact of the events. Dead people, injured people, traumatised people, at a music festival. At "my" music festival. At one of the biggest and best festivals in Belgium, even Europe. A place where people were supposed to have fun. A place where -I- have been having fun for 7 years now.

I decided to go home at that point, I couldn't stay so close to the place of the disaster. It was physically hurting me. So in the afternoon, my mum's friend drove me to the station. Yes, past the festival site again. I felt like I had to do this, to see it for myself. I saw the chateau tent - broken. Several other stages and constructions - broken. The look on people's faces who were coming from the camping, sitting on the side of the road - broken. Crushed.

On the train, I looked for a quiet spot. I got emotional several times, thinking about what happened, and worrying about what was supposed to happen now. What will happen to my favourite festival? Will it still go on in 2012? At the same spot? Somewhere else? Will it still be the same organisation? What will be the financial consequences - both for the organisers, and me, as a ticket buyer?

When I got home, I gave my mum a big hug. She didn't realise at first I was very upset with the whole thing. I still needed to watch the news, and read the stories of the "survivors". I read some nice and true things, but got very upset at people blaming the organisation, and all the "couldn't this be prevented?" questions. If you were actually in that storm (or in my case, near it) you realise this was an extreme, brutal, exceptional storm. I've been at the Pukkelpop site during several storms, but what I've seen on the videos, and experienced myself, it just doesn't compare. So no, this couldn't have been foreseen. And if you have to evacuate 60.000 people because there might be a heavy storm coming... you know that won't be possible.

But on the positive side, the organisation received a lot of support from the locals, bands, and other festival organisers. The people in the neighbourhood of the festival were great as well, twitter was full of people offering festivalgoers a place to sleep, give them food, etc. There was really a great sense of community. From what I hear most of the people who live around Pukkelpop want it to go on next year as well. This was the 26th edition, so it has really become a symbol for Hasselt, Kiewit and even the province of Limburg. And not just that, apart from Wercher it's the biggest festival and attracts a lot of foreigners as well.

Today is about the first day where Pukkelpop hasn't constantly been on my mind actually. I think it's why I decided to finish this post today, I'm not sure I could've done it before. I also saw some footage of Lowlands, the "sister" festival of Pukkelpop that has a lot of the same bands. At first it felt all wrong, but life goes on. Related to that, Foo Fighters (who were supposed to perform at Pukkelpop that thursday) said a few words at the Frequency festival in Austria (see it here). Basically: "every day you wake up is a good day".

And I'm going to end with that. I had more to say, but it's time to move on. Be grateful for what we had, and be grateful for what we have.

Just Cause 2 and Need For Speed Hot Pursuit

The 2 games I played the most this summer, reviewed!

Just Cause 2

Heard some good things about this game, but I was a bit cautious because I generally get bored very quickly in sandbox games. I played the demo until I ran out of time. Then I played it again. And again. So I decided to get the game. Found it very cheap on bee.com (and I got it 3 days after I ordered it - never get stuff this fast from the UK).

So, the full game then. First of all, I have to say something about the graphics. They're AWESOME. Sunsets/sunrises are always pretty special in games, but I've never seen them as beautiful as in this game. It has "God rays" (there's some fancy name for this, but I forgot - anyway it's pretty!) Textures and everything also look great. There is some pop-in, as with most-open world games, but it's only really noticable when you're flying low over the ground with a plane or parachute.

Also, the map is HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGE. I saw a comparison with other games, and it's about 30 times larger than GTA4. You can see it here. The only thing I don't like is that they added an unrealistic amount of scenic variation. You can basically drive from tropical paradise to snowy mountains in a matter of seconds. I would've prefered if it was just a tropical setting, combining the tropical/alpine/desert settings in one map just feels "off". Yeah it's a videogame, but still.

The grappling hook/parachute combo is a lot of fun, and it's my favourite way to cross fairly short distances. It's also the best way to escape 'heat'. Car/plane/boat/bike handling is pretty well done, some vehicles definitely have a unique feel to them. I loved flying sports planes around the island to discover new locations, and it's cool to see the sun rise and set when flying as well. I love exploring the island, there are some random unique locations like the Mile High club (awesome music!), tourist resorts, old temples, etc.

As for the gunplay, it's far from perfect, but I honestly think it's better than in GTA4 (which is about the only non-RPG open world game I've played this gen). It has some crazy weapons as DLC, but just upgrading a SMG or assault rifle already makes you some sort of Terminator.

Anyway, it does suffer from my sandbox fatigue, especially since there are no minigames present, and the missions are all pretty similar (although there are some really fun ones - that "mystery island/bermuda triangle" mission was great). There also aren't any shops or anything, the money is only used for buying weapons or vehicles.

All in all, I'm really impressed with this game. It only has a couple of minor flaws, and like most sandbox games it gets repetitive after a while, but the overall package is great. It's really a must-play, and it's now in my top 3 of games released in 2010.

Oh yeah, there's Just Cause 2 website, where you can link your Gamertag/PSN iD/Steam profile, so you can see all the in-game stats (and there are a lot!) online. Sadly, it no longer works. On the forum I read they'd fix it, but it's been over a month now. Boo.

Need for Speed Hot Pursuit

So this gen, the Need for Speed series has a bit of a "dudebro" image, BUT I remember when Need for Speed was a brand new series on PC. I'm pretty sure I played either 2 or 3 (which was called...Hot Pursuit, believe it or not!) on PC, or at least a demo of it. I played Hot Pursuit 2 on a friend's PS2 (and borrowed the game for a week, I wasn't really into racing games back then but liked this one). None of the other recent Need For Speed sub-series interested me much, but since I always liked the Hot Pursuit games, I had to buy this one. Well, when it got a price drop, but still!

And I'm not disappointed. It's one of my favourite racing games this gen. Lots of content, good graphics (especially on pc, check out some of the pics in this NeoGAF thread), good online, and I quite like that autolog thing. Especially because I can show off my progress to non-gamers like YOU. Looky here: http://hotpursuit.needforspeed.com/uk/autolog/career/Temujinski STATS STATS STATS omg I'm drowing in them. And liking it. Every game should have this, really. Not just the stats, but the ability to take pictures and post them online.

The stats also betray that I'm mostly a copper. Tis true, I like the chase. It's just a lot of fun to pursue and take out those dirty racers!!! It's really why I always liked the Hot Pursuit series over "normal" racers.

One (of two) things I don't like about the game is the difficulty. The Hot Pursuit mode is pretty easy (especially as a cop), but the time trials, rapid responses and stuff were you race against the time are awful. I guess this is party because of reason number 2: visibility. I don't know what this is, but I had this in Burnout as well: I just find it extremely hard to see what is ahead, and when it involves other cars, at what speed they move. I'm probably a minority, but I've seen other people complain about this as well. I think it's because, compared to other games, you can't really see ahead that much. Like, most racing games have about 1/3rd of the screen dedicated to what comes ahead, while I feel that Hot Pursuit and the Burnout series only have about 1/5th or 1/6th of the screen with the road ahead. This...probably doesn't make much sense to a lot of people, but I swear it's true! Also, there are too many lights on screen! That light in the distance...is it just part of the scenery? Is it another car? Is it an indication there's a turn ahead? By the time I figure it out, I've already crashed into it.

I know that part of this is because my brain is stupid, but really, even stupid people should be able to enjoy games like this! And how come I never had this problem, in, say, Outrun 2 or something? It really is something specific to Criterion and how they make their games.

...But other than that, great game! Heh. I had to replay the last three or so rapid responses about 20 times, and nearly threw my controller outside the window...but actually finally getting a merit on all events is so worth it. I'm pretty much done with the cop side of things, but I'm not sure if I'll be so obsessive about the racer side. It actually seems harder overall. And racing is just...racing you know? Hot Pursuit is so much more fun. I really hope they continue making Hot Pursuit games. Rest of the NFS series can die in a fire as far as I'm concerned.

That's it for now. Next update...film reviews! Or, games reviews. Haven't decided yet.