There are plenty of places to get dumplings in Montreal. However, there is one place for amazing dumplings.
Qing Hua Dumpling
1676 Ave Lincoln, Montreal, QC
Tel: (438) 288-5366
A typical dumpling is like a ravioli: meat, veggies or seafood in a dough envelop. And then you have xiao long bao, pork dumpling filled with soup. This is definitely a place for some good dumpling. However, they’re pretty busy, so be ready for 30 minute wait.
Image from Urban Spoon
I haven’t posted in a while, but all this weeding prep is keeping me crazy busy. Still, I’ve also been working on a big project for this blog …
Everybody that knows me knows I love cooking. It’s in my Italian blood. Since I’ve moved out of my parent’s place, I’ve been accumulating a lot of my favorite recipes. I’ve decided to share all my notes on this site.
Note that this is a work in progress. A lot of my notes are in French and I’ve been translating them. Sometimes, they are excerpts of other websites. I’ve tried noting the source on every page.
I’ll tweak every recipe, and try to add some pictures. You can find the recipes with the “cook” menu link at the top of the page. Otherwise, you can browse using this page. Until then, happy cooking.
Playing Battleship against Debra is not a fair contest.
It’s turn 12, I’ve already lost 3 of my ships (including the smallest one) and she is closing in on my 2 other ships.
The game ended about 20 turns latter, my fleet destroyed and the morale of my troops shattered. In my defense, half of her fleet was sunk and I had a good idea where the other ships were. However, there’s no winning against somebody who stares at her board and knows where your ships are, especially when that person has an accuracy rate of 50% with random shots.
On December 26th, 12:01 am, I always rush to my computer to find all the coolest boxing-day deals online, particularly at Futureshop, BestBuy and Amazon. After nearly getting trampled to death at a Futureshop trying to buy a simple keyboard one year, I decided it’s not worth going out on that day. Boxing day is officialy and online event for me.
This year, the deals were pretty unimpressive. Selling BlueRay discs for 10 to 20 CAD is not impressive, especially if they are 12 to 24 CAD during the rest of the year. The same goes for 150 off a 1200 CAD macbook pro. I can get the same discount as a student, or an even better discount from the refurbish store. The only impressive store deal I saw was the 4 Gig Xbox 360 for 129$. That’s an incredible entry price for a console.
However, there was an incredible boost in discount for digital downloads of games. For example, Steam powered is having a massive day-to-day sale on games, with discounts of 10% to 75%, a lot of them being in the 75% category. I purchased Mass Effect 1 and 2 for 19.98 USD. Sim City 4 is currently on sale for 9.99 USD. The list of games on sale is simply incredible.
Similar sales can be found on the iTunes store. For example, most of EA’s catalog is on sale for 99 cents (CAD or USD). I found so many games with this sale. It’s also a bit frustrating to see Mirror’s Edge at 0.99 CAD when I paid 11.99 CAD for it. Don’t get me wrong, I like buying stuff on sale. However, these massive after-holiday sale strategies might hurt the industry in the end, as frustrated shoppers might start waiting after the holidays to get their favorite games at a high discount. One thing is for sure, if a game gets released 2 months before the holidays and I can way to buy it, I will.
If I look back at 2009, it was a bit of a hard year. I had some bad health problems, the girl that I loved left me, and I lost my grandmother. In all, a pretty harsh year. On the other hand, I met a pretty girl at the end of that year 
The year 2010 was a lot kinder to me. I meet a wonderful girl, I got to live out my dreams of living in Asia for a while and visiting Japan, I got a new job that I love and I completed my PhD.
Oh, did I mentioned I got engaged
Yeah, okey, 2010 rocked.
It’s been a long standing policy to separate my blog and private aspects of my personal life. And I plan to keep this policy in place, my personal life is my own, and it should stay that way. However, I have a lot of friends that read this blog, what better way to announce it.
In retrospect, I’ve always been impressed by Gabe in Penny Arcade, who proposed using his comic. Unfortunately, I know my future wife well and I’m sure she appreciate a more traditional approach. I popped the question during a romantic dinner
Anyways, the next time my personal life pops up on the blog again is when I have a kid. Given my current plans, that’s not for a couple of years. Until then, stay tuned for the regular programing of travel news, techno-babel and game reviews.
- Beshiros out.
Last month, I had the opportunity to visit the Assassin’s Creed art exhibit, right in Montreal. It was pretty impressive.
The gallery featured art from the original Assassin’s Creed, Assassin’s Creed II and Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood. The paintings were digital canvas, a process where a digital image is imprinted on canvas. As far as I understand it, only the first original canvas has
the original value, all other copies are prints.
The work presented there was simply breathtaking. The use of color in some of the pieces was masterful. I only wish I could purchase prints to bring back home. Deb even said she could see a couple of them in the living room.
I found this link, which displays some of the artwork from the original expo in Paris. If I can find a link for the Montreal expo, I will definitively add it here.
Two weeks ago, I told my friends that we were living in a strange time: “We had two good games based on franchises, Batman and Transformers”. He agreed. There we have it, Transformers, War for Cybertron is a Transformers game that isn’t bad. Even more impressive, it’s a Transformers game that is pretty amazing.
The first level just blew me away. The first rule of a Transformers game is that you should be able to transform anywhere. This game implements this to perfection. You never really feel constrained to a given mode, you just pick the mode that seems appropriate at the given moment. It’s hard to describe, but the transformation just feel authentic. It’s the most amazing feeling to speed up a ramp in vehicle mode, jump it, transform in mid air and start blasting in the air, only to come crashing down on your enemy with a crushing attack.
The game was built using the Unreal engine, which is still magnificient despite it’s age. The Transformers character feel strangely remicient of Gears of War or Unreal Tournament 3 characters, with bulky shoulder and broad backs. This look works very well for the characters, and it is my understanding that the toy line is selling quite well. As a side note, I own the Optimus figurine and he’s pretty impressive. He’s also freakishly difficult to transform, as my girlfriend will testify. the scenery around Cybertron is simply breath taking, as you speed down long highways to the next battleground. The game makes you feel how much the planet is ravaged by this savage war.
Being a big fan of Halo and Mass Effect, I find myself sometimes starved for good music. Although these games provide and impeccable soundtrack, I find the moments of high music tension are few and far in between. In TWFC, the music provides a very high tempo and this constant air of danger. The addition of a Stan Bush song is a very nice touch. The sound effects and beyond reproach and provide a completely immersive experience. And no Transformers game is complete without the voice of Peter Cullen as Optimus Prime. I found all of the voices to be highly appropriate, except for Bumblebee, whose voice just doesn’t seem right to me. On the other hand, it’s a lot better than having to talk using only Tv and song quotes.
The game play is quite enjoyable and the pace is good. Like I mentioned for the music, the game keeps you always at a high pace: you are either fighting or facing to the next fight. Although some sections of the game were particularly challenging, the overall challenge level was good. The end of level bosses were, like in many games, impossible to defeat unless a special strategy is used. Luckily, the learning curve of the game is prett good and I neveu had to much difficulty discovering how to defeat a particular boss. The game always provides some obvious visual clue. However, I found myself spending a lot of time looking for ammo, especially during long firefights.
My main complaint is that both of the campaigns feel like mirrors of each other. They each feature one jet level and both center around the destruction of a large boss character. Even the cast seemed mirrored, with the addition of Silverbolt and AirRaid to complement the seeker jets. Although I understand some of this symmetry was done to better balance the multiplayer matches, this seemed to carry over a bit too much to into the single player campaign.
As I’ve mentioned before, I was tremendously impressed by this game. I felt that the single player experience was a bit short, but generating such high-level content is expensive these days. I haven’t had a chance to try out multiplayer, as my live subscription is currently expired. However, I’ve seen some good comments around the net about the multiplayer. Most interesting to me is the Rpg aspect, where a character can be created, customized and leveled up.
This game is a must of any Transformers fan. Fans of shooting game will also appreciate this game, simply for the added intricicaties of Transforming. This game can also provide an alternative for younger kids and shooting games, depending on your views on robot violence. However, people with troubles with Fps or adventure game might find this game a bit difficult.
Transformed WFC beats all expectation, delivering a solid experience.
I know this has been discussed over and over and over and over in the news sites, but all these mandatory installs for console games are ridiculous. It’s been twenty minutes and I’m still not playing the game. First, a 15 minutes update to the game. Then, a 10 minutes mandatory install. It’s a console game, I should be able to play it when I insert the disc.
Anyways, it’s Bioshock: it’s still a good game regardless
