Let’s start off with the goods on this car. Now normally I’d laugh at such silly things as soft suspension and an isolated from road noise cabin, but there are days when one’s tush doesn’t feel like taking a beating from race stiff suspensions or maybe hitting a nice bend at 60 miles an hour doesn’t really matter. Yes, yes I should be hanged for even thinking such sacrilegious thoughts, but deep down you know it’s true, rare but true. Besides that soft and posh ride lies a good gem, a 300 hp V8 under the hood that cranks out 295 ft-lbs of torque, yea a little low in regards to today’s more advanced machines but she still is a nice aluminum engine, that while a little lazy at times but will haul ass in a matter of seconds when needed. The 300 horse powered beast also makes a nice mpg of 17-28, depending on how you treat the gas. Exhaust tone wise with the stock pipes is nothing ground breaking as it’s been silenced to death being that it is a luxury car and not a hopped up rat rod, but give it a nice set of new pipes and the 32-valve engine makes a pleasant thumping to the earth. Let’s start with exterior.

The bodywork on this car is nice and classy, in my opinion, it’s no alfa-romeo, of course. There is nothing but subtle line work, compared to the straight and edgey design of the previous years. While it doesnt retain the killer tail fins from the past the deville has a nice set of led tail-lights, the headlamps on the other hand are kind of huge but provide some nice lightage for night-time driving, the front face cares a nice smile and a giant grill and killer hood ornament ringing in it’s heritage. The car sits with a low and passive stance on it’s 16′ shiny alloys wheels. Next let’s talk about the creature comfies.

While GM’s interiors are pretty impressive with today’s new models, a few years ago they weren’t, the Deville is frankly a little plain jane sorta-speak. The dashboard I had was a mono green digital readout, but there is an analog and digital readout available for the DHS and DTS versions which look way cooler and have a nice idiot swoop display when you start it up. The mono green display suffered from poor readout when you had the sun glare reflecting them out of sight. There is some faux wood panel strips all around the vinyl panels which seem like they can crack eventually.  The good news is that the seats make up for this, even though they are covered in a somewhat fakish leather, pleather possibly who knows, or cares being that they are so damn comfortable. Surronding the seats is the amount of space the car gives to the driver and passengers, it could seat five people easy, six a little tight. Mind you I did this test with average sized people, no one above 6-ft unfortunitly. Trunk space is also impressive probably could fit a body or two in there with some luggage. The stock sound system is good, no need to dump in a new sub, unless you want to rattle you trunk.

Heading to drivability. Ok from an enthusiasts point of view the car is smooth really smooth, awesome right?, but the lack of road feel from the steering wheel can be a bit dissapointing, besides the steering feel, the car has the turning radius of a rhino when in tight spots, the car is giant so it is expected. One thing I sort of left out earlier was that the engine powers the wrong axles for you rwd purists, yea I know blashphamy!, but open up the hood and you will see the engine is indeed facing the wrong way, it’s side pointed at you like some upset child in time out. While I was a bit disappointed in the truth, I remebered that the car was for comfy and not for racey. Should the idea of a fwd urks you much I suggest you get a 2005+ Cadillac STS which has the engine facing correctly or pick up a rwd Lincoln Towncar which has a slightly better interior,  but a weaker engine compared to the Deville/STS.

My last point of the car is how cheap these cars can be had today, why get a new SUV when you can pick up a very good Deville for $6,000-$13,000 (depending on milage) some are even built for towing which can make it a great people and functional carrier. There are some problems that you want to keep an eye out for, water pumps go bad, the ckp sensors on early models 2000-02 are poorly made and will cause the car to stall spontaneously if they aren’t replaced, headgaskets while uncommon in these newer models can happen so keep an eye out and sniff for coolant in the exhaust to avoid a big repair bill. A/C problems can also appear out of nowhere to with these cars. As with any airbagged suspension check it out for dragging, while it looks cool it’s a horrible driving experience and a costly repair, unless you want a faux low-rider.

Good luck on your searches should you want one, and I’ll hope you enjoy them as much as I did.

Tis a shame to see GM take a fire extinguisher to the phoenix chicken after it’s return to being an interesting brand again, but what can one do. I guess it’s good for Pontiac to burn out then to fade away like some legendary rockstars, before things might of taken a turn for the worst again. I’ll always remember you Pontiac whenever I’m watching Smokey and the Bandit, and the OG Knight Rider. Now to buy a cheap G8 before the collectors do.

Ok I am a little bias here, since I own one. Sure it may not have the high revving magic of a vtec equipped civic, but I feel it’s got it’s own thing going on. At first glance many would think it looks so ridiculously bland. Correct the base/non mazdaspeed versions are a bit bland in contrast to many of today’s models out there, but one’s gotta think back to that age of 90s when most econoboxes all looked the same and dull. Mazda got off their asses and decided to take some cues from automotive manufacteurs from Europe. Let’s start off with shiny things first, Mazda decided: “Hmm euro cars have a good amount of chrome, not much but a tasteful amount, let’s add that to our car.” Sure enough they did and they lined up on the front of the grille was a strip of chrome with mazda’s flying “M” smack dab in the middle of it. Other bits of chrome included Mazda flying M again aswell as Mazda’s 80s esque font logo to the right of it on the trunk space. You had three emblems signifying that this was indeed a Mazda two M logos and one fonted out, incase you were logo-ignorant.

Now you are probably thinking: so what everyone had chrome, shit cavemen pimped their stone wheel with chrome, and you are right, but remember the Civic, Camry nor most other import ecoboxes sported as much chrome as the Mazda did at that time. Mazda cut back on it’s chrome magic in 2001. The Protege’s body style was pretty interesting nice little curves and a sportive little smiley front bumper (a shame though that today it’s usaully mistaken for a hyundai accent). A negative though is that the car sits a bit high for me on it’s wheels for me (16in steelies base) almost the equivalent of an old person wearing their pants far above their waistline unfortunately. Nothing a new set of wheels and springs can’t fix though.

The Interior of the Protege is pretty good, nice vinyl trimming and cloth for the base models, I sat in similar ecoboxes and felt unhappy with the plastic fantastic interiors, not so with the Protege. You get a nice set of semi-bucket seats that are pretty comfy considering how cheap they look, and a nice vinyl thick steering wheel, which unfortunately flakes after so many years. At night the interior is only lit up by the dash, radio, and HVAC controls which emit a homely green light.

On we go from this rambling to the real digs though. Sporty was the big theme with this car, so I’ll start off with the suspension and steering. For one thing the ride is stiff, I mean ridiculously stiff, you will hear noises and feel bumps on even the smoothest and freshest of roads. I don’t mind this but that’s mainly due to the surprising handling it gives in return. Mazda really followed through with this, the handling was controlled by a lovely hydraulically powered steering wheel that offered some great feel to boot, as if you didn’t get that enough from the suspension.

Now then the negative part of this sporty them. Mazda offered 1.6L a 1.8L and 2.0L engines. The run down: 1.6 is ridiculously underpowered, but offers amazing mpg, the 1.8 offers a microscopic amount of power of the 1.6, and later on the 2.0L which really what you should damn well get. I ended up with the 1.6L and it’s the only real feedback I can give since I live with the damn thing. The 1.6 is mounted to a 5-spd manual, which should be your only option truly if you should just happen to go with the 1.6. Reason for this is the auto version robs power from what ever the poor 1.6L can muster, not to mention you’ll get beat by prius’s and insights and who honestly wants to get overtaken by them.

The 1.6L makes a little dare I say “cute” growl at almost every rpm range and it almost roars at the near top rpms. But among that little throaty tone, lies very little pep. I won’t lie there was a time where it would surprise me with a very brief and light seat pushing acceleration. Aside from the lack of pep, it offers 30-40 mpg depending on how you drive it from my experiences. The fwd transmission is pretty good, it’s hydraulic so there’s a nice soft clutch pedal with little effort to shift through the gears from the shifter. There is a like and hate thing going on with it in the Mazda communities though, some have said the gears are made of glass and that many gears fail. For me it’s a love as I admit I fucked up on it big time learning how to drive stick, not one single busted gear, but a really unhappy clutch that was replaced.

Now I might be unhappy with my 1.6L engine in a straight away, but the handling makes up for it 10X, and I always have little smile leaving the exit corners in this car, happy that I didn’t end up with a Corolla.

Misc stuff/tidbits:

The 1.6L takes to boosting very happily, the price though is pretty steep 3-4 grand for a really good kit sure you may be able to piece together something cheap but for me it just isn’t worth it. Save the money for the MazdaSpeed 2.0L or some other car.

The base model of this car comes with a very decent sound system from the factory, I belive it’s pioneer speakers all around, problem is the stock CD player don’t take to 700mb burned discs all that well.

Problems: Besides a regular corroding battery due to the little protection the cheap terminals provide which is an easy fix, and a cut on a driveshaft’s cv boot there hasn’t been much to complain about it’s almost 130,000 mile life.

I managed to get a willing friend who recently picked up an MX-5 and finally gave in to my constant pestering of allowing me to test driving his car. Keys in hand I observed the car for awhile. Sure it didnt have the NA’s Flippy lights, not so lowered agressive stance, nor the brilliant red and black stripes…but the ’04 Miata had it’s own thing going on. An almost completely black exterior with the head lamps, tail lights and chrome hardware contrasting it, it also sported that nice subtle grin going on in the front (compared to the 2009′s lobo-loony smile). Another thing that I noticed was how low sitting this car was, that was quite a surprise standing here in person in it.  Finally coming out of that daze I opened up the car and sat in it. The top was up, and did it feel cramped inside. A shame it started raining when arrived, my friend wouldn’t let me drop the top, which I thought was sacriligous to keep the top on a miata, if there wasnt a hurricane around. Tops aside, I looked around and found a very simplistic yet functional interior.Two bucket seats, two cup holders, a nearby radio and hvac controls, hazard buttons and that was practically it. Shiny textured black vinyl/plastic trimmings surronded the dash controls and made for nice surrondings. Finally plunging in that key the dash test lights flashed about and the 1.8 mini beast engine growled up. Idling by I noticed how there was a lot of engine noise coming through, I didn’t care though it was fan-fucking tastic hearing that thing’s soundtrack.

Giving my friend a wave off I that I liked it so far and was going off to the streets. Pressing down the clutch and placing in the shifter was as smooth as could be, depress and a touch o gas, and off I went. 2nd,3rd and 4th said their hellos and goodbyes in a matter of secounds. The engine went up 7500-8000 with each good bye. The tone was astonding I was surprised at how awesome a high revving 4-pot could sound, and then the icing on the cake of how it was powering the right axles. Now besides the sounds and great acceleration the car provided, the next fun thing was to show. Handling and steering is phenominal and made me feel like a real race car driver. The steering wheel’s radius was only almost 3 quick turns side to side and it was literally like others before me said, go-kart like. The real fun was just to come as I hit my first long hillyleft corner, downshifting from 4-3 the car roared up to 7-grand and I braked just a bit, nearing the apex and exit I hit the gas and turn the wheel the rear began to turn right deep but all was under control. A smile on my face as to how much control this car let you have.

A little dissapointment short after though in having to return to my friend and handing back the keys, but to this day I save my pennies hoping I too can own one of these.

     Now you maybe thinking this is all good and well, but how the fuck does the game play? The controls are awesome and probably take all of around 15 mins to master. The brush is used via button combo of R1 and the square button or triangle button for pressure sensitivity to control the thickness of the brush’s strokes. The left analog stick guides your brush for you to draw. When out of the paintbrush mode, you use the left analog stick to move about your wolfen god hero and square button to attack. You can beat the game with just doing that and using the paintbrush. There are dodge attacks and taunts (ie: piss on them) you can use, but eh it’s more of a novelty thing. The game is incredibly easy to beat, but fortunately you get some pretty good boss challenges towards the end.

        Many people compared this to Zelda: Twilight Princess since the two came relatively close in release and had very similar game styles. Unfortunately Okami got the cold shoulder with Z:TP’s release…a shame since I didn’t really enjoy Z:TP as much as Okami. (Ocarina of Time/Majora’s Mask are still tops in the series IMHO)  Reasons why? Zelda just seemed like a been there done that sorta thing, while Okami had some pretty good stuff to bring into the table (particularly that awesome paintbrush). While I look forward to the next Zelda game to come out, I can’t say the same for Okami, which due to such low sales on both the PS2 and Wii, won’t be getting a sequel and the closure of it’s studio Clover. A shame due to it being such a good game (and since I want to see what happens next after the game’s ending) but perhaps, Okami should just be a stand-alone, since sequels don’t always equal to games being as great as the first. Pick up the game anyway you can, Okami’s well worth the play-through.

    Audio is also a big detailed piece in this game with a great soundtrack, and awesome sound play. An example: you are climbing up a Colossus, and as you climb higher and higher, the orchastration does to, fall off and it falls down with you. With all these details I was often forgetting that I was playing a game, which is almost rare these days. The game is just so immersing that you feel like your that dude running around shanking these giant behemoths. The controls, are right on par with the graphics. I’m not gonna lie, I had problems first using Argo, due to the controls from Zelda’s Epona, and Dynatsy Warriors’ Horse controls teaching me to push the analog stick forward, but it didnt work like that in SoTC, rather the analog stick was just for steering and the X button was to go forward…a minor setback, but it was quickly remedied within 5-10 mins. ( I actually ended up prefering Argo’s controls to Epona’s) Other than that minor setback the rest of the controls were very easy to learn and grasp within a few minutes aswell.

     I honestly cannot wait to finish this game, I’ll definitely be a little saddened to fight that last Colossus, but this game without a doubt will be unforgettable like countless others have said and told me. If your still preventing yourself from playing this game, you may be missing out on one of the biggest masterpieces, that video gaming history has to offer…(shit there is some more hype for a 4 year old game, but fuckit, it deserves every bit of it.) 

* A shame I haven’t played Ico yet, but SoTC, has definetely sealed the deal for me on that one too. I can’t wait to see what this studio releases next.