Squidpunch.com

not sure if I will play this one or not - I do have DOA 4 - apparently this time you need to have a partner and list them on your registration form as the person you will be playing Dead or Alive 4 with. As I said I do own the game so if someone needs a partner let me know and I will be around for at least one match each day to get our submissions in

here are all the details:

Registration is required: Register for the Sweepstakes online at http://www.xbox.com/blades before the close of the Entry Period on March 25, 2007 at 11:59 P.M. Pacific Time (PT). As part of this registration process, you will be asked provide your teammate’s Xbox Live gamertag.

NOTE: Please make sure to register with the same Xbox Live gamertags that you and your teammate will use to play Dead or Alive 4 multiplayer sessions on Xbox Live. Otherwise, your entries may be disqualified. In addition, please be sure that your Xbox Live account information including e-mail address, mailing address and phone is all correct and up to date.

The entry period begins at 12:01 A.M. Pacific Time (PT) on March 23, 2007, and ends at 11:59 P.M. PT on March 25, 2007.

You and your teammate will each receive one entry into the Sweepstakes for each day during the entry period that you and your teammate log into Xbox Live on a Xbox 360 system and play a Dead or Alive 4 multiplayer session.

You can only register once and you can’t change/remove your teammate once you have registered. In addition, teammates may not play for more than one team.

Prizes
Prizes in the sweepstakes include the following:

• Grand Prize, up to two awarded: A Blades of Glory warm-up jacket and a collector’s box of Blades of Glory Flakies cereal.
• First Prizes, up to eight awarded: Collector’s box of Blades of Glory Flakies cereal.
• Second Prizes, up to twenty awarded: 500 Microsoft Points.

Winners will be notified by e-mail on approximately April 6, 2007. For complete information on the sweepstakes, including how to enter by mail as well as a complete list of prizes, check out the official rules.

Play and Win Shooter / Gears of War

Well I finally got an achievement last night during my Gears of War session last night. It was one of the pretty simple achievements - Mix it Up - where you just need to be on the winning team of the 3 different game types. It was also brought to my attention that even though I thought I was going to get a 100 kills with a [insert weapon here] achievement, that there is not one for shotgun kills - which was what most all my achievements were based on, and the one I assumed was going to rack me another achievement, so that wasn’t very wise of me I would say. Thanks to Antediluvia for bringing this to light. This concludes the dates that you can recieve an entry in the Play & Win Shooter Contest, and I believe I should get an entry for each of the 3 days . . . winning is a long shot - but it doesn’t hurt to try (and those prizes are pretty smooth).

Shadowrun Beta

I recently recieved my beta invitation to Shadowrun, but haven’t dedicated a ton of time to it as of yet. Of course in the invitation the NDA was restated that not much else can be said except “Yes, I am playing the beta”. So until the NDA is lifted dont expect to hear a ton more about that. You can keep track of my play time on the game in my Live Eye Profile as you can see at the moment I have only played about an hour or so. Over at 360friendspot we have about 62 current live eye members in the beta and being tracked by our tool, you can see an overview of those users at the Shadow Run Beta Profile Page

360Friendspot / LiveEye

Speaking of 360friendspot and The Live Eye, last night I spent a good amount of time updating some queries after seeing a bunch of sleeping records in the SQL Activity Monitor. This was a hope that what might be causing the slowness or hanging of the site was related to SQL table locks - since I was definately getting time out errors and transactions were hanging out here sleeping. If that resolves, or at least partially resolves the performance issues - I am going to be extremely pleased, but also upset that I didnt find it sooner. I am sure there are more things to optimize - but maybe I am at least going in the right direction at this point.

Crackdown All Nighter, and Rumors

Finally - Happy St Patricks day, and look for an update from my all nighter activities at a later date. Achievements and random video goodness will most likely come of it. There is A rumor posted in my comments about this all nighter being a time that they release some new content or the final 100 points - no clue what that user based it on - but I am all for it!

A bit late on releasing the news on this contest - but better late then never I guess you could say. Essentially you just play Gears of War, anytime between March 14 and 16. Each day you play versus mode you get 1 entry into the contest, so play all 3 days (like I plan to do) and you get 3 entries.

The prize is pretty impressive: (worth aproximately $770)

• A Three-Month Xbox Live Gold Subscription Card
• Xbox 360™ VIP Accessories Kit
• Xbox 360 Wireless Controller
• Xbox 360 Play and Charge Kit
• Xbox Live Vision
• Xbox 360 Quick Charge Kit
• Xbox 360 Universal Media Remote
• Xbox 360 Wireless Networking Adapter
• Xbox 360 Wireless Headset
• Xbox 360 Memory Unit (64MB)
• Limited Edition Xbox 360 Aluminum Carrying Case
• Xbox 360 Wireless Racing Wheel
• Xbox 360 HD DVD Player.

I played it a bit last night - and I have yet to recieve any of those online achievements….yeah I suck. I would have played more but about midnight my internet connection dropped right in the middle of a game I was actually winning

view the contest page: Here