Bloghammer

Red Baron (1990) Review

2009-08-07T19:29:00.003+01:00

It’s Armistice day, 1918. “Our boys return home!” proclaim the newspapers, alongside pictures of troops marching through London. I smile as I imagine Capt. Frank, my Red Baron alter ego sitting back with a pipe & slippers, recounting tales of his exploits to an adoring crowd.

I signed up (as Frank) for Red Baron’s fully dynamic campaign in 1916. Bob and Fred before him had met their untimely deaths over the trenches, but I knew Frank would be different. Mainly because I’d noticed that if you die during a mission you can hit “restart” and so live to fight another day.

You start your Red Baron career as a lowly 2nd lieutenant but as you fly sorties over the front and score victories you are showered with medals and promotions until at the rank of captain you are given your own personal aircraft (which can be painted) and the command of up to four pilots.

In 1916, however, that was all in the future. Only through flying many, many missions was I to have a chance of becoming a captain. Red Baron has a number of different mission types, all of them varieties on 1.) Escorting a scout or bomber, 2.) Dogfighting and 3.) Shooting up enemy balloons. These missions vary wildly in excitement levels with “Balloon busting” missions being the most challenging and thus the most fun, as you must shoot down balloons while dodging flak and, usually, a squadron of enemy fighters. Escort missions, by contrast, are nearly always dull. You fly behind the (incredibly slow) plane you’re escorting before a couple of enemy fighters drop in on you, shoot the escortee down. Every. Single. Time.

Breaking up the monotony of these missions is the occasional challenge you’ll receive from a rival fighter ace to a one on one duel. The aces are, understandably, very much harder to deal with than most opponents you face and this, madly, is exacerbated by what I can only assume to be a bug. Despite the mission brief explicitly saying “one on one duel” your opponent always turns up with a squadron of friends. As such I shied away from such duels in the early game, just to keep poor Frank alive.

Also helping to keep the game fresh is the transfer system. You’ll occasionally be invited to join a different squadron (when you reach the rank of 1st lieutenant you’re able to request transfers) and this is always a welcome change, since the new squadron will invariably be equipped with a different aircraft and usually be given a different combination of missions. Frank was unlucky enough to end up in a squadron that seemed to be entirely dedicated to escort missions, leading to the deaths of many bomber crews and recon aircraft.

Even with transfers, however, the few mission types do begin to grate, simply because they’ve been seen so often before. Dogfights are always entertaining but the endless patrol the front missions, in which you fly around a bit and *might* happen across an enemy plane get very dull very quickly. This rather inconvenient truth will undoubtedly be left out of Frank’s tales, along with the six months he spent in a prison camp after a semi-deliberate crash landing, from May 1918 to November 1918, just to get the war over with.

79% - Great fun, pity about the lack of variety.

Extreme Gold Mining: The Post-Morteming

2009-02-24T08:03:00.002Z

I don't think I did half bad with Extreme Gold Mining. What I put out from a week's worth of work is still further than a lot of my projects tend to get. It's a question of scale - without a time limit or anyone else involved my ideas spiral wildly out of control.

Until I realised just how tight the time limit was, Gold Mining was set to be a massive sprawling Metroid-esque underground Dwarven city overrun by goblins, with the ability to mine out new passages all with the chance of collapsing and physics for collapsing bridges, rockslides, and so on.

Regardless, this is more a discussion about what failed - the level design. The basic graphics and dodgy looking menu screen I'm not bothered by - the time limit dictated that as much as anything. But the problem with the level is that I had no plan. I plonked down the start and end points, and then tried to fill in the middle section almost at random.

The original aim for the level was to create something which people would replay several times - to test out new routes and to try and get a better score (either by being faster, collecting more gold on the way, or both). It didn't work. There are multiple routes, but everyone ends up stuck on the bottom. And getting back up again requires two frustrating wall jumps and about 30 seconds off your time.

One day, I'm hoping to go back and fix up the level by replacing it entirely with something that works much better. It needs to be bigger in general, but it also needs to be much easier to move between levels of the mine. Internal lifts might be one way of doing this. There also needs to be a much clearer progression from start to finish.

Currently in beta for the software I used to make this game is the option to compile the code as a web-friendly Java applet. Once this is released I intend to update the game and put out an online version; given the simplicity of the game it seems much more suited to an online environment.

So this proposed list of changes, as I see it, would be:

Replace the level with something properly planned out. The level needs to flow much better and be easier to navigate.
Engine tweaks - Removing the midair slowdown would make jumping while at low speeds easier.
More consistent graphics - Replace all counters and fonts; especially on the title screen.
Original Music - I'd at least want to replace the Kirby tune with something less copyright-tastic. Possibly I need to learn how to make some 8bit/chiptune music.

If anyone is interested, the game was made in Multimedia Fusion 2 (www.clickteam.com). Rather than typing out code, the interface is mouse driven. It gets pretty complex, so I wouldn't say it's an easy alternative to a programming language. But you can certainly be doing fun and interesting stuff with it much faster than you could with most languages out there. Some big indie games have been made in it. Knytt, Within a Deep Forest, Tormishire, Noitu Love, The Underside, A Game With A Kitty. The list goes on, and that's only the platform games.

The next time I get the urge to make something, I fancy doing different things. Some sort of RPG based around procedurally generated content, perhaps...

And thus my brain is back to formulating impossibly large projects again.

Hermit says mean things about: Mirror's Edge

2009-02-17T20:05:00.002Z

Mirror’s Edge was a very good game. Visually stunning, outside of the 2D cutscenes at any rate. And I loved the free-running – the game made control simple, and then could concentrate on making the level design itself interesting and complex.

But I’m not sure I’d want to recommend it to people. Because for every awesome moment of gravity defying jumping there was a section made of utter fail and bullets. Consider this a bit of a rant about MEs combat, as well as some thoughts on what would have worked much better if they’d put a bit more thought into it. I've avoided much talk about the non-combat gameplay or the storyline, as it was the combat that really ruined the experience for me.

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“There’s a murder, Merc!” exclaims Faith over her Bluetooth mobile phone thing. “I’m tracking down the murderer!” More sighs from Merc on the other end. “I’m going to bring this evil murderer to justice!” continues Faith down the phone, while she repeatedly punches a dead police officer in the face. “What’s that, Merc? ’Do some actual delivery work’? No chance, I’m on the trail of a murderer!”

Faith’s moral outrage at the murder of some bloke she hardly knew is hilarious. Not least because by the time you reach the crime scene at the end of level 2, chances are you’ve already killed at least one police officer.

Admittedly it isn’t entirely Faith’s fault. The rooftop speed police take their job very seriously. “There’s someone up here, sarge. They’re running around, sarge! What’ll we do sarge?” “Running? Not on my watch! Shoot to kill, lads! Free doughnuts for the one who takes her down!”

For the first level or so the designers remembered they were supposed to be making a game about running. You’re able to actually escape the police, and it feels like a triumph. Only then Faith’s magical Red-Paint-O-Vision kicks in, highlighting officers with a red glow that means “If you don’t kill this one he’ll shoot you in the back and totally mess up your jump. And then you’ll fall and die and have to go back to that last checkpoint. You know the one. It was way back over there somewhere.”

The game tries to give you a variety of combat options. Disarming opponents sounds like a winner; you steal their gun and knock them out. It’s a non-lethal takedown even Bond would be proud of. When it works, at least. Even if you complete the QTE-style disarm, you have to contend with the painfully long animations. Looking cool and flashy is no good if you end up dead.

Every time Faith disarms someone, she briefly thinks she’s back on her primary school Baton Twirling squad. “I’m gonna win!” thinks 8-year old Inner Faith happily, as the machine gun she’s stolen spins wildly up into the air. Meanwhile, three SWAT men shoot her repeatedly in the face with shotguns. Usually the gun you’ve nicked falls out of the air at just the right time to hit your rapidly collapsing self on the head like a cartoon anvil.

So pretty quickly you find disarming a bit hit and miss. As in the police hit Miss Faith in the face a lot while she does it. So you turn to the other part of your arsenal. Fists and feet. Now, usually, if someone punched me in the face or kicked me in the groin, I’d at least get hurt. But either the police are made of steel or Faith punches like a girl.

Most enemies require four or five hits to take them down. And if you try and punch the same enemy too much he gets some sort of temporary invulnerability. Then he smacks you in the face. And by god, do you feel it. None of this “Oh, did you hit me in the face? I didn’t feel a thing”, but more “Oh god you hit me in the face!” And while Faith staggers around like a drunk, all the police are quite free to shoot you repeatedly. It’s a recurring theme.

Eventually, you’ll get your hands on a gun and not die in the process. At this point you’re usually set to get through most combat situations. The dodgy bullet time mechanic is no good for lining up shots or nicking guns like it should be, but it’s handy for retreating to the nearest cover to let your health recharge. Other than that it’s a case of strafing and aiming, hoping the auto aim guides the bullets home before you run out of ammo.

The problem with the combat is that it breaks the flow of the game entirely. Mirror’s Edge is about speed and momentum, but every combat section brings this momentum to a halt as you go through the annoying process of dodgy combat. It gets worse in the second half of the game where the tedium of fighting outweighs the actual fun running sections. By the final level it’s all combat, with obstacles like air vents put in only to ensure you don’t carry weapons from one battle to the next.

It seems clear that the combat was added in later, probably due to some fear that the game wouldn’t do so well without people to kill every five minutes. If anything, the combat has been picked up on again and again in reviews as a real weak point. It adds nothing to the game. With some thought, though, it might not have been so bad.

A loading tip screen suggests stringing moves together with combat. But despite pulling off a flying kick from a running wall jump, it did no extra damage. The officer did his usual stagger, shook it off, and still required a volley of punches to drop. Combining running and combat like this would have diminished that sense of there being two separate games at work in Mirror’s Edge, and perhaps improved the experience as a whole.

From a design point of view, the police shouldn’t be treated as enemies to defeat. They should be seen as obstacles to overcome, just like a string of jumps or a gap to swing over.

Why not give Faith a charging headbutt so she could knock a policeman over and keep going? Or let Faith use that move in one of the loading screens, where she throws one policeman into another and runs off? Why not include boxes or shelves that you can knock over as you run by to slow down any officers running after you? Faith’s abilities should be about delaying her pursuers long enough to escape, not leaving a trail of bodies.

I expect there was some thinking along these lines. But it’s a shame that like so many other games they pushed for a Christmas release. A release date in less crowded times would have allowed for some much needed polish on these frustrating sections, and could well have resulted in better sales. Here’s hoping they take this on board for a sequel.

JavaGame thoughts, written far too late at night and making barely any sense.

2009-02-17T15:09:00.002Z

If I've learned any one thing following the "Make Something In A Week" competition on the CSC forums it is the importance of progression as a gameplay element. It sounds absurdly obvious but, partially due to time constraints, I didn't even consider it during the week I had.

JavaGame is a completely one trick pony, with the simplest excuse for a gameplay mechanic that it is possible to have. I was fully aware of this when I submitted it and expected plenty of comments pointing this out.

I got them, but not quite as I was expecting.

Hehe, a bit too easy to win, Java.
Still fun at first, though -Davik

This comment intrigued me, mainly because it's not actually possible to WIN JavaGame in its current state. You weren't supposed to. The idea was purely that you could select places to rob and gain money from this, the closest this got to being fun was the dilemmas, where you selected an option that, while not being completely random, was never certain to be the right one.

I, mainly for a joke, added Fort Knox to the target list, making it ridiculously unlikely to give you a positive dilemma outcome and giving you some very large amount of money if you successfully robbed it. This was in no way intended to be your goal; I didn't imagine anyone would see it as anything other than a silly addition, much in the same way that they saw the "Spam PCG Chat" dilemma.

Clearly I was wrong. Both Legandir and Davik took Fort Knox to be your ultimate goal and the reason for playing the game. I had no mechanisms to prevent the player from trying to rob Fort Knox from the start, it was just quite unlikely, though certainly not impossible that they'd succeed. Davik and Legandir both succeeded and said the game was too easy. They expected Fort Knox to be a long term goal, unattainable at first, while individual heists were the short term goals.

Gamers clearly expect their games to have a specific goal, viewable but not attainable from the outset. They assumed that this goal was Fort Knox and were somewhat perturbed that they could rob it from the outset, with nothing to stop them.

Having seen this I'm going to make a small but potentially far-reaching change. I'm implementing a rank system, where the player must meet certain targets, having an amount of gold, for example, to go up a rank. Going up a rank will unlock more "difficult" locations, different cars and more skilled team-mates. The difference now is that while players can see the presence of the locked targets through an entry in the target selection list showing "locked until rank #whatever" they cannot rob this target, the long term goal, unless they fulfill the short term goals first, i.e. getting enough money/successful capers/successful dilemmas to go up a rank.

This is what gamers expect and, I think, will make the game appear to have a lot more substance than it actually has. There's no particular challenge in completing a caper but they will do so to attempt to fulfill the goals they can see in front of them.

In my head I've likened this (fairly minor, really) change to my moving the spawnpoints of dasbooty, which was proof of how a carefully implemented change can completely turn around the feel of a game/map.

Don't get me wrong, JavaGame is never going to be great. It'd just be nice if it could be a little greater than it is currently. :p

Hermit writes pointless stuff about: FEAR

2009-02-16T20:45:00.002Z

Did I just bring bloghammer back from the dead? It would appear so. How apt then that this post starts talking about dead children. Anyways, Cutts asked me over the weekend if FEAR was any good. Given that some folks may not have played it back in the day, I thought I’d throw down some ideas about why it’s still worth playing in this modern day world of STALKER and Far Cry 2.
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No one wants to be the New Guy. The New Guy usually dies. But here you are, freshly transferred into the US Government’s First Encounter Assault Recon (I see what they did there) team. The FEAR team investigates weird happenings, and they want to drop you smack bang in the middle of an event so paranormal it makes Ghostbusters look like a film about a man in a sheet.

Enter Armacham Technology Corporation. These geniuses not only decided that a clone army controlled by a psychic commander was a good idea, but also that the commander should definitely be a raving madman. Inevitably, it’s all gone belly up and Paxton Fettel, professional loony psychic, has got his brainwashed soldier mates to go round and shoot everyone. It’s essentially Order 66 from Star Wars, only the Emperor didn’t eat the dead Jedi afterwards. As far as we know, anyway.

It’s not all bad news though. Basic Training has clearly done a bang up job, giving you awesome gun skills and the ability to kill a man with your fists alone. And your reflexes are off the charts, apparently. You never find out what these charts are, but you’re so far off them you’re almost back on them again. You’ve learned the secret of medkits, and are able to swallow the entire contents of a box in the midst of a firefight in order to cure what ails you.

You’re also the main character, which improves your chances of survival somewhat. And thankfully it’s only your jerk sidekick Jankowski (Pronounced: dick head) that calls you New Guy. You’ve got a name. It’s Point Man. Take that, two dimensional marine characters from every other FPS!

Your FEAR team leader, Betters (As in “I’m Betters than you, Maggot!”) ships you, Jankowski, and your forensic expert Jin off to an abandoned warehouse where Fettel’s signal has been located. The poor bloke got chipped like a household pet. Soon enough though you’re separated from Jankowski, and Jin starts making an awful lot of “I need to go back to base to do some lab work” excuses. And so it falls to you to find out what the fuck (Betters says fuck a lot) is going on.

FEARs genius lies in the way the story and gameplay work around each other. Its very first point of order is to establish why we have to fight our way through hundreds of enemies who look the same. We accept from the off we’re dealing with a battalion of military clones, and can now quite happily get on with the highly entertaining job of killing them in slow motion.

Most fights are very similar on paper. It’s a piece of paper with the word ‘PLAYER’ scrawled in the middle and the word ‘ENEMIES’ at the edge, with a dozen or so arrows drawn from one to the other. The game keeps fighting interesting with the carefully crafted combat areas which allow for a variety of tactics and make for some awesome visual fights.

One such section takes the tried and tested “sniper alley” design, whereby snipers are on the rooftop and in nearby buildings, and it’s your job to get them before they get you. To make it interesting, FEAR replaces the mundane sniper rifle with a laser gun which vapourises all the fleshy parts of the target. It’s the design philosophy all over; why headshot someone when you can turn them into nothing more than a cloud of liquefied organs and a pile of bones?

The enemy radio chatter really makes the AI seem that much smarter. "Flush him out!" they cry as one of them tosses a grenade. "He's trying to flank!" yells another if I try and outsmart them. "He took down the whole squad!" cries that final soldier once I've killed all his buddies. I could just put a bullet in him. Instead I slow down the passage of time itself and leap into the air. The last thing he sees is my boot, as I break the unfortunate clone's neck with a midair scissor kick. That's just how I roll.

When the last enemy drops the place is always in a real mess. It’s that Matrix moment in the lobby but in videogame form. The bullets stop raining and the last few chunks of masonry fall from the walls. Then you run round nicking everyone’s ammo and looking for telephones, only these phones aren’t connected to a guy in spaceship in a futuristic sewage pipe.

The quiet periods between battles are the sections which drive the story; there’s usually an answer phone message or PC data from which you glean a little more insight into Armacham’s totally shady dealings. The plot has been written to work perfectly in bite sized chunks like this; through the drip feed of info you gradually learn the truth, without the plot becoming a bloated mess of conspiracy nonsense. At the end of the game, it does all make sense. Or at least as much sense as a game about an evil girl and clone soldiers can make.

And then of course there’s the matter of the little girl. You’ll be quite happily walking along minding your own business when it all goes weird. Your radio picks up crackly interference when paranormal stuff is going down. When stuff starts to get freaky even Point Man gets a little scared; He’s too manly to scream but he’s not above some heavy breathing exercises.

Alma is essentially that girl from The Ring, if instead of a videotape she’d made a game. Lights go out, stuff falls of shelves and Alma tends to whisper stuff in your ears a lot. That’s in a creepy way rather than an “Awesome, there’s a girl whispering in my ear” way, before you say anything. The game does everything it can to freak you out.

And it works, too. First time I reached “the ladder” must have been about 1 in the morning and I thought it was a good idea to play with the lights off. Had to calm down with some Theme Hospital after that. I don’t want to give away actual examples for fear of ruining their impact, but suffice to say anyone who has played FEAR remembers the ladder in question.

It isn’t a psychological horror by any means. After a while you learn the rhythm of combat to scares to combat, meaning you can almost guess when the next scary bit is coming. And the setpiece nature of the scares means that on replays you’re expecting them. But for shock value the game really does well first time through.

The nasty split between Monolith and Sierra wasn't kind to FEAR's legacy, sadly. Sierra churned out two expansions and various consoles ports. The expansions were perfectly serviceable, but their stories weren’t nearly as interesting. Extraction Point deals with your attempts to get a lift back to base after the first game ends, while Perseus Mandate delves into the origin of the clones some more. FEAR2 ignores these games anyway, and they’re considered some dodgy alternate reality.

So, if like Cutts you’ve never played FEAR, go buy a copy. It’s brilliant. Oh, and if you’re an FPS developer, play FEAR and ask yourself why your melee combat isn’t as awesome as this.

Film update

2008-10-04T20:16:00.002+01:00

My love for the cinema has been brutally savaged by the utter dissapointing messes that were the, completely unfunny and therefore faliures, Tropic Thunder and Pineapple Express. And now I hear (HtLFa) Alienate People is crap also.

Why does the universe deny me the pleasure of being able to see a truly great comedy at the cinema?

Holdiay

2008-07-27T07:59:00.002+01:00

Off on my holiday, so no time for a review. Have just seen Dark Knight and Wall.E and they are two films that have redetermined my love of cinema. They really are very, very good.

Hancock - Review

2008-07-04T12:23:00.000+01:00

I attempted to see this film with no idea of the reviews, so that I could form my own opinion. Sadly this was not too be, and I am aware of the kicking this film has received from critics. They hated it. At first I argued with them. But they were right.

This movie is made up of two short films. Not literally, but that is the way it plays out. The first arc, the one shown in the trailers, lasts about 40 minutes, and I should say now that it is amazing. The opening half of this film is exactly what I wanted to see. Will Smith played the character perfectly, his abilities were powerful but not overly so, and his personal problems made him an endearing character. I thoroughly enjoyed myself.

Then that plot ends. Will Smith has superpowers, but he is a drunk. He is not a traditional superhero. Everyone hates him, and he goes to prison to reform himself. He goes through personal changes, and comes out a hero. This takes half an hour. This is great. This, if fleshed out a bit and with a strong ending, is the film I wanted to see.

But this is not Hancock. Everything after this point goes downhill. And amazingly so. There is a twist that creates a bull-shit mythology, and destroys almost all of the character relations. I felt my enjoyment slip, as Hancock, as a movie, fell apart. And then it end, for this is a very short film. A very short film, that booth looses it message and any resemblance of entertainment.

The humour was quite funny, but not enough to make this a comedy. The action was brilliant, but based upon the same premise. Super-Will Smith beats up idiotic criminals.. The plot holes are immense, and just get bigger. There are no real bad guys, and way they act defies all logic.

I cannot stress how much fun I had at the beginning of this film. I had avoided reviews, and I loved it. Then it skipped everything I wanted to see in one montage, and destroyed all enjoyment I had. The dénouement came after a half-hour, and the film that emerged after that was cringingly bad.

But I will watch this again. No matter what comes after, the opening of this film is wroth going to see. When it is cheap on DVD, or shown on T, I will tune in. But I will only watch the first half. This could have been amazing, but the film they chose to make was not the one I wanted to see. What I wanted, they skipped. So much promise. Shame.

SiN Emergence review

2008-06-29T19:38:00.001+01:00

I recently picked up the first episode of the videgame series SiN, at a bragain price on Steam. Sadly, SiN was cancelled for unnconeccted reasons and only the first episdoes exists. Once I had finished playing, the urge to review what I had bought struck me.

Not that long ago, everyone was abuzz about episodic gaming. About how this was the future. The first big attempt at this was SiN: Emergence, the first episode in a new series. Sadly, the developers, Ritual, were bought out and SiN appears to be dead. Only the first glimpse into this series is available for the world.

SiN is a FPS that draws immediate parallels with the Half Life Series; episodic, on Steam, all first person with no cutscenes. It even has a similar loading bar. But the difference is that while Half Life is perfectly crafted, SiN is pure entertainment. The enemies and weapons are few, and can become repetitive. This is not a flawless game. Nonetheless, its weapons feel meaty, and it is well paced. You will be entertained, through well chosen humour, diversity and tougher sections. Difficulty is something targeted by the game, dynamically shifting throughout, to maximise fun. Hardly noticeable, but that is the point. The game does not break your immersion. Music, speech and sound effects all play a role in this, keeping you involved in this sort game. You sit down, and you play, a pleasure until the end.

The problem with SiN is that it has no end. The final boss is finished with a teaser for the next episode, giving more questions. Who will survive? What is really going on? The potential for the rest of the series leaves me eager for more.

And so all that can be done is to enjoy. Enjoy an underrated great. Don’t be put off because there is no sequel, but enjoy it because it is fun. And hope, that one day, the essence of SiN is continued.

Doctor Horrible

2008-06-27T16:18:00.003+01:00

This looks awesome.

I know nothing about this. It is new from Director Joss Whedon, he of Buffy and Firefly fame. It is a musical about a failing supervillain and his attempts to win the girl, and is coming soon.

The first trailer just appeared and looks awesome, so here I am to share it with you.

Teaser from Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog on Vimeo.

TF2 - Pyro update

2008-06-23T18:59:00.002+01:00

This will be one of the most useless posts ever, because I have not yet played the update, and I do not in the slightest feel excited by it.

Two new custom maps and a change to the (hateful) CTF_Well. Those are nice touches. Changes to a class I have little intrest in playing, but will be swarming around the servers for the next week or so. That is the huge "meh".

On the plus, Meet the Sniper was one of the best things I have ever seen.

J-Film #14- 'The Incredible Hulk (Audio)'

2008-06-12T20:19:00.002+01:00

still haven't found out about embedding, please go the the JXM forums and the reviews section for the download link as it wont work here, I will be writing a special film report for the bloghammer soon, so don't worry about that

J-Film #13- 'Gone Baby Gone (Audio)'

2008-06-11T16:41:00.012+01:00

cant embed it yet more research is required (please help me!) so heres a download link.

http://forum.j-server.org/showthread.php?p=5584#post5584

well actually thats the link to the JXM forum post but yeah silly rapidshare link wouldn't work

Reflections on Gran Turismo 3

2008-06-02T20:42:00.002+01:00

The first game I got, with my brand new, Christmas present PS2, was GT3. It was amazingly pretty, but it was so boring. It was slow, and I was too young to understand that slow equals fast in a true simulation. So I went out and bought something else instead, Bond's Nightfire I believe, and messed about on that.

Recently, I put GT3 back in my PS2. I do not have a new console, but I do have a new TV, and so i spend my time playing through all the games I missed first time around; Metal Gear Solid and Devil May Cry for example.

Firstly, I want to point out how wrong the younger me was. Perfecting cornering is extremely rewarding. Secondly I want to point something out. GT3 is one if the most beautiful games ever. You may be incredulous at this. This is a game from 2001. Yet, it offers wide-screen support, and is truly breath-taking. This, to be fair, is because it cheats. Just like all the best games should, it is very particular about what it presents to you. There is no damage, no weather, limited ocular customisation and no interior for the cars. Because of this, GT3 allows the player to marvel at the tracks, the heat-waved air, and the cars. GT3 is stunningly pretty.

And this is my gripe. The PS2 was not finished. Looking at the life-cycle of a games console, you can see the comparison between launch titles and games from later on. I personally feel that the older consoles could have been pushed further. But they are not. Why is it in Sony's, or Microsoft's, interest to prolong the life of their console. They want us to buy the new one, and this kills the specialisation of the old. Pro Evo is a case in point, the transfer to a new generation has ruined the game on all formats, and will take years to correct. We don’t need the quick turnaround. Anyone remember the 4mb of RAM expansion for the N64?

I am having great fun, and it has not cost me a penny. I just looked to what I already have and took joy in that. Nonetheless, I still want MGS4, and I still haven't started MGS3 yet.

J-Film #12- 'Indianna Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull'

2008-05-30T12:56:00.001+01:00

Here it is, the review of the film you have all been waiting for! And yes, this is another case of the review being a lot more entertaining and having a lot more characterization than the actual film. I'm sorry, I know you all like Indy and I do too, but this film was just bland, and worse, it was more of a cheap, pikey copy of Tomb Raider than an Indy flick. The reason I haven't reviewed the film before today is one involving a cougar, a tank and a washing machine...only joking. I wanted to see the new film in juxtaposition with 'The Last Crusade', so I could get a better feel of what was missing; and here are the sad, ominous and foul smelling results.

You all remember that famous moment when our most loved protagonist shot that martial artist in 'Raiders of the Lost Ark', how he would continually outsmart his enemy? Whenever he did something particularly stunning, it was usually by accident, and you got the general impression that he was more of a thinker thrust into these situations than a male Tomb Raider? Well, Steven Spielberg hasn't.

There could be many explanations of this, ranging from the abduction and murder of Spielberg by the separatist forces or the 'Order of the Cruciformed Sword', through to dementia (or possibly mania, if he was playing Oblivion); but upon closer inspection it becomes apparent to me that he was just trying to revamp the film for more modern cinemagoers. Particularly the ones who just went to see the film so they could fondle their girlfriend while their dad campaigns for the BNP.

It is rather ironic to see Harris-old Ford become younger and younger throughout the film and cope with pain and his hard wearing situation better than he did in previous films, including surviving a Manhattan project nuclear bomb in a fridge. Ok, so that didn't make much sense, but shut up, I'm tired. Just read it, ok?

I will not endeavor to tell you much about the technical aspects of the film, as they aren't really the point of focus here, but as the film carries on the cinematography gets much worse. The soundtrack was alright and there is some early film recurring joke about CGI gophers (this is not the fucking Incredibles, get rid of the CGI you twats and shoot the motherfucking gophers!). Theres also a cringe worthy moment involving CGI monkeys (you'll know it when you see it) and millions of man-eating ants for no apparent reason.

I'm not trying to say the film is bad, and by all means as its own film it's above average, but following up a great and iconic trilogy, its effectively as bad as 'Cloverfield' having a threesome with '10,000BC' and the third Matrix.

By all means go and see it, but if you don't expect much I'm sure it'll be a lot better. Frankly, though, you'd probably be better off going to see 'Cassandra's Dream', as that is fucking EPIC. J-snukk out.

Rundown -

Shooting: 7

Characterisation: 5

Soundtrack: 7

Plot: 8

Effects: 4

Variable field dependent on context and genre - CGI fucking gopher and monkey clusterfuck: -107

Overall J-score: 5/10

If there is anything you would like little Johnny to know do not hesitate to email me at Johnny.neicho@sky.com Johnny.neicho@sky.com> (Seriously, if you read this and reply to me via E-mail within 2 days I will give you my Age of Conan drinking cape and war mammoth (free items with special editions))

A huge nothing..

2008-05-28T22:58:00.001+01:00

Exams. Nothing happening. Sins of a Solar Empire will be bought soon. Indiana Jones will be watched. 'Till then, it is those damn exams I need to focus on.

Reflections on the TF2 Update

2008-05-19T20:29:00.003+01:00

Frankly, that was a bit dissapointing. I must admit, my hopes where ludicrously high. After leaving it a few weeks to see how things settle, it is time to reflect. The truth is, that instead of rekindling my love for Team Fortress, the update stopped me playing for a while, what with everyone wanting to play one map the whole time, and far too many medics about the place.

That map was the main new bonus, for it is far better than Badlands. The idea of safe-guarding a cart to the end of a map I love. It leads to some very tense endings, as the cart will almost always almost reach its destination, which happens to be just next the the enemy spawn. This is a stroke of genius, which leads to some great momemts, some great impossable defences. The problem is that many people have not yet adjusted to it, which massivly overpowers some classes, like the demoman; one the other hand this is also the greatest thing about this new map, this new mode. It is new. I like it. It is a good new. It is just annoying that it seems to be the map most servers (that I like) are running most of the time.

The truth is the new achievements annoy me. I am not a fan of achievements, having watched my brother grind hours of Pro Evo on the lowest difficulty in order for points on his 360, I now see people playing on special servers to grind out the new weapons. "Meh," is my only reply, and to follow it with launching a personal tirade as some brilliantly worded inner-monologue, for their focus and dedication should reward them, while my desire to just play the game is unlikely to yield results.

The new Weapons suck. Sadly, I don't speak from experience, but I have it on reputable authority and having seen t9ohers about the place with them. I have only got he first, and it has made almost no difference to me. A bit of health with every needle gun hit, but no crits? I need crits. The others, I dont even really know if they exist, I dont see them in agme much, and have all nbut put them from my mind. It does seem interesting the possibilities for the other classes, but valve seem determined to only make very minor changes, at the expense of something cool.

Meet the Scout was quite a nice video. I liked it, but I didn't love it. Meet the Engy made me want a turret, Meet the Demo caused me to sink hours into that class. Meet the Scout made me chuckle and move on.

This new update has royally annoyed many. I am just dissapointed. Having waited months for this to come out, it was frankly average. Ho-hum.

Iron Man - Review

2008-05-11T21:53:00.002+01:00

So, Iron Man is finally out, and the review is finally here. I don’t know if you can remember my thoughts on the Iron Man trailer, all the way back in February, but I made a few crucial points back then, a few things I felt Iron Man needed to avoid. My first point was to keep the origin story plotline to a minimum. The second suggestion was to make the villain interesting and therefore the resulting conflict dramatic.

Iron Man failed to heed either of these suggestions. It is all origin story, and the conflict between hero and villain is disengaging for the audience to the extent that we really just don’t care at all. The villain is terrible, and the actual heroic of Iron Man are kept to a minimum. All he does is deal with his own self-important morality crisis and then defend his own life. He does not even get a kitten out of a tree once. He is really not mush of a “hero”.

The good news is that Iron Man is still awesome.

And I claim that is because of my third point: make a hero who is both super-strong and still super relatable. This is based upon one key principle, Robert Downey Jr.

The casting as a whole is superb, Gwyneth Paltrow and Jeff Bridges do good jobs at supporting the tone of the film, even if their characters are a bit flat. Special kudos must go to Robert Downey Jr, who turns a potentially disastrous character into a watchable, relatable hero. His delivery is perfect, he carries scenes on his own.

He is perfectly supported by the effects work. Iron Man truly looks like he is flying. He truly looks like he can do what he does, and the division between computer effects and a man in a suit are brilliantly done.

Unless, that is, you decide to pay real close attention. Under scrutiny, you can see some flaws. My advice, don’t watch properly. Just let it float on over you. One good point I should add is that Iron Man does a good job of showing the audience what is going on, something becoming rare in a post-Bourne world. Yes, Transformers, I am looking at you.

Iron Man stays away from the traditional love story that most superheroes films focus on. Iron Man also stays away from the traditional Bad-Guy-needs-to-be-stopped-from-doing-evil story that typifies the genre. There is not even a natural disaster on an accident that needs to be averted. There is a small amount of love, and there is a small amount of evil that only serves to make the last half hour of the film quite disappointing.

What Iron Man does do is split itself neatly into three segments. In the first, the main character, Tony Stark, is captured by terrorists who want him to build them a superweapon, and he embarks on a plan to escape. After these first 40 minutes (exactly), the second period is spent with Stark working out the mechanics of building a working suit. The final fragment involves Stark using his new suit to try and stop another suit inhabited by the oh-so-obviously evil baddy. This division works well, but it does give the impression that you are watching three short films, that are only loosely interconnected. There is no feeling of true continuity to the feel and tone of the film. And then the film ends just when it has found it’s feet.

Making matters worse is the pathetic predictability of the whole film. Every scene plays out almost exactly as you would suspect. This is a traditional superhero film. It is quite well done, but if you are not a fan of the genre this will not be the film to convert you.

This brings me to my main point. The morality of the film is questionable, the view of death and of violence I found disturbing. I know I shouldn't find a popcorn film like this troubling in any way, but the choice to place much of the film in the middle-east, with terrorists, did not sit well with me, personally.

Nonetheless, Iron Man is brilliant for what it is. It is well made, well acted, and the action is well done. But that is all it is. "well" sums up all aspects of this film. I left the cinema feeling content, but the more I thought about what I had seen the less impressed I was.

What pissed me off most was the feeling that I had just waited months to see the beginning of a story. Iron Man is setting up a sequel, and I hate it for this, because as soon as Iron Man is ready to go, we stop.

Ironically, this may read like a bad review, but Iron Man is actually quite enjoyable. I would recommend going to see it. Luckily for you, you already know, for sure, if you want to see Iron Man or not. It is so formulaic and so traditional. My first impression was that it was awesome. It is awesome. It is just not as awesome as I had hoped. But then, I was hoping for it to be the best thing ever.

I am not too happy with this review. J-Snukk put so much pressure on me, and I don’t think I did the film justice. It is, actually really good. I am just bitter, because it falls for every trap I hoped it would be smart enough to avoid. That aside, Robert Downey Jr portrays the best main character in a superhero film, and the film is an enjoyable way to pass a few hours. And from this point on, I will build up in my own heart the hype for the nest film.

In three words? Predictable. Anti-climatic. Formulaic.

Bricked Xbox, unfinished GTA IV and Apathy

2008-05-07T20:53:00.003+01:00

Now I was very surprised this evening for 6 distinct reasons, i shall now go through all of them in chronological order:

1) the evil that is RRoD chose today to bite me on the arse

2) I haven't finished GTA IV, and now i cant

3) I went onto steam, declared the RRoD rather dramatically and nobody noticed, apart from plec

4)I then banned somebody who was saying "no u!" for some reason to various comments before popping a your mum joke, completely out of context or decency, did i mention he was a guest?

5) People seemed effectuated (I hope spell check chose the write word there, and no, this is a not a time to mock my spelling) with this little cretin

6)I was then thoroughly subjected to sever amounts of 'flame' as if I was to expect a random guest saying very random, clealry irritating things wasn't in fact just what he was

I think three simple letters can sum this up W T F.

Curse you God, just cos I'm an atheist it doesn't mean you have to fucking shit on my head! (irony and hypocrisy in one there?)

Much to my dismay...

2008-05-06T15:35:00.002+01:00

As I sign into google and glance upon our fair bloghammer, I see that DDude plans to write and 'Iron Man' review, now i have been inactive for a couple of weeks mainly due to a lack of fulfillment in my life (which i have now started to ignore) but you see now I'm back, and i saw an advance showing of the incredibly good 'Iron Man' on Thursday I thought i might write a review of it. I forgot. I now remember, but my plans are foiled, Dam you DDude, you may have this review as in all fairness you did get their first, and it would be spiteful of me to post now. I suppose it gives me a break until Friday though (as nothing else but Iron Man came out this week)

But Mr. Ian Dawson I got bagsies on 'The Dark Knight' 'The Incredible Hulk' and the newest 'Indiana Jones' BE WARNED, BE VERY WARNED.

the ideas expressed in this rant are the opinions of God himself

Warning!

2008-05-05T20:16:00.002+01:00

Iron Man review incoming!

All I have to do is see it first!

I am very excited!

A Great Moment in TF2

2008-04-27T11:48:00.002+01:00

I love TF2. I play on Javaserver, mainly because I love the company. I am good, because I play a lot, but I am not brilliant. I do, and this is the important part, get very exited over moments of brilliance. They keep me buzzing for weeks. This is the latest one...

I few nights ago we were playing on Gravelpit. For those not in the know, this is a map based around attack vs defence. One team must capture two points before moving onto a third to win the game, the other team must hold out for a set time to win. This is fun.

We were defending, and we were being pushed back. We had lost the first two points and things looked bleak. I decided to try my hand at engineer, a class whose main job is to build big sentry guns. I went to set one up in on of the corridors the other team would come through.

Sadly I was interrupted. A Heavy and medic combo ran around the corner and blew my just put up level one turret away. I jumped back, around the corner, and they did not see me.

But I did not back away. I had my wrench out, and I ran at them. They were distracted, looking the other way.

First to feel my wrath was a sniper. He never saw me coming, and I smacked him with my wrench. One down.

Then the medic fell. With a crit, my wrench smited him. Two down.

And then the heavy, and old enemy, was startled by my presence. He is a slow class to react. If he could turn his minigun on me I would be torn to shreds. But I had a few short seconds while his gun rotated up to speed, and in that time I hit him twice. Crit. Crit. Dead.

And there I was, a lowly, unprepared Enjy. Standing on the corpses of three of mine enemies.

It was a glorious feeling.

PGR3 review

2008-04-21T14:50:00.002+01:00

It says something about the human condition that the manufacturers of washing machines made the dials on the front click when they were moved, just because people preferred them that way. It says something about me that I've yet to find a more satisfying feeling in any racing game than, when pulling off an immense powerslide in PGR3, you hear the little Kudos meter in the top left of the screen clicking away, quantifying your awesome trick, affirming by the small chime at the end that yes, that was an incredible drift.

The encouragement of stylish driving has always been at the heart of the PGR series, with the Kudos meter awarding you points based on how stylishly you complete its many challenges, creating a very different focus to the game. In PGR3 the most formidable opponent you will face is yourself. You'll curse yourself for each corner you miss. You'll swear when you hit the wall, trying to pull the biggest slide possible. By comparison you probably won't care if you get overtaken by an AI racer, regarding it as a minor inconvenience.

The bulk of PGR3 lies in its solo career mode where, as previously mentioned, you race your way through a series of events, typically with 3 challenges per event, to get a shiny cup. What makes PGR unique is that these challenges are very rarely straight out races. You'll be faced with challenges asking you to overtake 5 people in a minute, you might have to complete a long course in 20 seconds, made possible by every stylish move you make stopping the clock. The variety of challenges is huge and this helps to keep the game fresh, despite the fairly limited track variations.

Apart from the test track every track in the game is set in one of three cities- London, NY and Tokyo and the big gimmick of PGR3 is that the whole city is rendered in the game, so in theory there is a limitless combination of tracks. This does, however fall down in practice with most of the tracks included by default (you can make your own in a track editor) looking, and behaving, exactly the same- 90^ocorners, long straights, the occasional view of a city landmark. Once you've mastered driving on one of PGR3s tracks you've pretty much mastered them all, it'd have been great if the developers had included some real tracks to race on to give the game more longevity.

While the tracks leave a little to be desired the cars in PGR3 certainly do not. You're given a supercar right from the very start of the game, in contrast to games like Gran Turismo where you're pootling about in a hatchback at 30mph for the first few hours. It says something about the selection of cars in the game that there is a "walk around garage" option, allowing you to drink in every small detail on the lovingly modelled cars.

Obviously such a large collection of cars and tracks is useless if the games driving physics aren't sound and, for the most part they are. PGR3 certainly isn't a serious racing simulator in the way that titles like Forza are- drifting is almost insultingly easy and it's very rare that you won't be in total control of your car, no matter how ridiculously fast you're going.

In fact, difficulty seems to be a bit of a problem in PGR3- opponents in every challenge are selected according to what car you have so there is absolutely no incentive to use anything than the cheapest car, which is also the easiest to drive. You can pick a difficulty at the beginning of each challenge but rather than making the races harder it simply sets higher targets, for example on "professional" you have to come first in every race, compared to third on "medium" difficulty. It's an interesting idea but the races are so easy that getting first place really is no hassle at all. Some of the non-race events are more challenging, the timed events in particular coming down to the last 10 seconds nearly every time but nothing beats the thrill of a tough race and it's a pity that PGR3 never quite manages to deliver this thrill.

Difficulty issues can be rectified by taking part in the Xbox Live online mode included, but this requires Xbox Live gold and in my experience the XBL community are awful racers, preferring to ram you off the track than have a proper race, and swearing at you endlessly if you mess up and hit them.

With PGR4 now in the shops you can pick up PGR3 for less than a tenner and for that much it's very definitely worth it. Its great fun to play with friends, one challenge each, but once you've experienced all the challenge types and bought all the cars (which will take less time than you think) PGR quickly loses its appeal, without a decent online community and with too little challenge in its offline modes

79%

J-Film #11- 'Pathology'

2008-04-12T17:32:00.002+01:00

Today I would like to start by letting you know that this film was fucking hard to get into (for good reason, see further down). My film session began with me entering the rather large and glassy lobby of Stevange Cineworld, as you could probably expect. This went swimmingly: I didn't get hit by any irate cinema-goer unfortunate enough to actually buy a ticket to 'Meet the Spartans' or trip over the door frame like a flid (why that isn't in the dictionary I really don't know). The problem arose when I met with the ticket geezer (for want of a nicer term) who, rather rudely I thought, asked my age.

I said I was 18, but had left my ID at home, and all I had to show was my HAND card (Harts Additional Need Database). He then asked me my birthday. "Simple" you all unanimously breathe in smug tones, but unfortunately I am horrible at mental arithmetic. Basically, I cannot subtract 18 from 2008 without looking retarded. "Wait!" I thought to myself. "I have handed him my retard card, I am meant to look like a retard." Thus, in a flash of mental prowess, I told him "I don't remember", whereupon I fidgeted for a bit. That my dear friends and disciples, is how I single-handedly made not just the entire queue for the ticket booth, but also the ticket geezer, very uncomfortable, and gained access to a truly epic film.

On with the film then. Well first of all, its more of an 18 than 'Rambo'; hell, its more of an 18 than 'Homicide 4: The Barbed Dildo Chronicles' (Dildo isn't in the dictionary -.- BOBLIKE). It involves a lot of consequence free murder, a lot of sickening body parts, rib crackers and a sick game played by psychopaths, whereupon one of the circle kills someone in an odd way, and the others have to use their pathological (have a clap for guessing pathology was involved) skill to work out how exactly they did it. Well, no; it doesn't sound too dark, but its complete moral ambiguity is deeply disturbing, as are its oddly deep subtexts and comments on society and the modern world and how it doesn't fulfill itself. However, this is an artfully (read: poncy) unfulfilled film, and even though I saw it yesterday afternoon, I am still deeply disturbed by the whole thing.

With that out of the way it may be time to focus on the more technical aspects of the film. I think I'll start with the sound track. AllI know is that it's either average, poor, or non-existent. That's right, I don't remember it at all; this could be from the soundtrack being the aforementioned things, or it could be a mix of that and my tainted love for the film. Moving in a deliberate, logical fashion it may be time to judge the shooting quality of the film, and guess what? I don't care if it isn't, because I'm going to do it anyway. The film uses largely defined film principles, uses all the rules, except that of the growing trend of no establishing shot, which could probably be considered a rule now anyway. The rule of thirds, etc. etc. is all there, but at the same time that takes up all the room leaving a lot of arty shots unattended, and leaving the hotel without paying.

Finally, I am going to dedicate a whole paragraph to the effects. In short, they are brilliantly gory, artful and dark which makes a complete and brilliant poncy infusion, which compliments the film's storyline. In long, the lighting on all the gore, especially towards the beginning (artfully getting darker towards the end, as do the shots themselves, although, as I have previously mentioned, the shots considered in a technical sense are nothing special) makes it seem unreal, seemingly ineffective, but very strangely it seems to make it very disturbing, creating a world that could perhaps be described as "through the psychopath's eyes" which indeed makes he aforementioned darkening of the scenes and the gore border upon even more planes of understanding and sense, as the characters degrade even further. Need a break? Don't worry: that's the end of the issue.

Next issue...actually, you know what? I'll surprise you. J-film quiz on Monday, if you want an invite to the steam group contact me.

Rundown -

Shooting: 6

Characterisation: 9

Soundtrack: 5

Plot: 9

Effects: 9

Variable field dependent on context and genre - moral ambiguity: 9

Overall J-score: 9/10

If there is anything you would like little Johnny to know do not hesitate to email me at Johnny.neicho@sky.com (For God's sake, just e-mail me some granny porn or something)

Off on Holiday

2008-04-12T09:25:00.002+01:00

I was going to go and watch The Orphange and provide you with a review, but it is sadly not showing anywhere at a useful time.

I'm off to Devon for a week with family. Should be fun.

Happy Birthday Java.

See you all later.

Long or Short posts

2008-04-07T22:15:00.002+01:00

Just a quick question.

Do you like short posts or long posts. I try to keep my anecdotes short, but I let my reviews trail on.

Do we need to better self-edit oursleves? Should we blog what we feel, regardless? Do you give up on long posts automatically?

J-Film #10 - 'Son of Rambow'

2008-04-06T19:55:00.000+01:00

If you haven't heard of this film, you must be suffering from a rather severe case of death. It has been all over the TV, all over the radio and all over the net, and on all of these places it has been rated as a superb film. I am obliged to agree with them: the film is very, very good.

Its filmed lovingly, with a loving story and a lovable cast of characters, and yes, while it's lovable, and syrupy, and chuck-worthy and not my cup of mountain dew, this probably goes a long way to explain its extreme commercial success; after all, the media and East-Ender riddled cretins love a nice, happy tale, full of loveliness. But I'm afraid that'll never be me.

However, if you do happen to like this sort of thing, it's practically a perfect example of the genre. There is not much to say about it, really, it is a lovely moist cake of loveliness, with a filling of lovely and some humour drizzled on top. It really is quite good.

This film wouldn't have scored so highly with me, but for one very important feature: it pisses straight in the face of religion. Now, I'm not trying to say I hate religion...oh wait, I do. To avoid getting into an argument I'll just say that I really loved how the film did this, and consequently it's going to get an extra point in the rundown.

I realise this is a relatively short review, but there isn't much to say: it just works. And just like 'Hair Spray' and many others, while it's nothing spectacular, its very nature means that it becomes a shining beacon of win.

On another note, next time I shall be looking at either 'Never Back Down' or 'Funny Games'. If it ever comes out at fucking Stevenage Cineworld that is.

Rundown -

Shooting: 8

Characterization: 9

Soundtrack: 6

Plot: 8

Effects: 8

Variable field dependent on context and genre - Kicking religion in 'teh nutz': 10

Overall J-score: 9/10

If there is anything you would like little Johnny to know do not hesitate to email him at Johnny.neicho@sky.com (Oh Comon)

Greatest Day Ever!

2008-04-05T14:16:00.003+01:00

I try not to talk about football here too much, but I figured I could share with you all one of the gretest experiences of my life.

Last Sunday I was one of the 39,994 people who paid a visit to Stamford Bridge to watch Chelsea play Middlesbrough, in a Premier League game. It was the first time I have ever visited a Premier League match, and it was amazing.

I am not a Chelsea fan, but I felt like one. When Carvalho nods in the first goal, and everyone around me went wild, I felt a magnificent tingly sensation that I have never felt before. It was so liberating, to be able to look wherever I wanted to, to see what I could see, without replays, living the game in the moment. It was so humanising, to be able to see these players in real life, to watch how they play.

The seats we had were truly incredible. I don’t not really have a yard-stick to judge them by, but I understand that being in the front row of the third tier, almost level with the centre circle, is amazing.

I have never felt like this before. Never before have I been able to watch what the keepers do when no-one else is around!

It was an exhilarating experience, and I now have a new goal in life - to go and see England play a proper competitive international at Wembley.

J-Film #9 - 'Drillbit Taylor'

2008-03-29T18:15:00.002Z

There’s a lot of difference between a mediocre family comedy and a good family comedy, on one hand you have a great deal of inoffensive content, that was not designed to offend or amuse anyone, on the other hand you have slightly less in-offensive comedy, with some genuinely funny moments. This is What Drillbit Taylor is, however its not strictly family comedy, as its co-created by that geeza who made ‘knocked-up’ and ‘super bad’ and the elements he provides are clearly visible and even though its not nearly as offensive (or, funny really) as ‘Super Bad’ the characters are of the same breed and a lot of the subtler comedy is very much akin to the two great comedies mentioned above.

“So, basically, you’re saying it’s Super Bad for people of the younger persuasion, then Professor Neicho?” I hear you scream at me from your assorted places of residence (notice I didn’t insult you this time.) However you would be slightly misguided in this assumption, while it’s clearly go the aforementioned influences to its comedy and very nature, apart from the obvious family orientated feel, there’s some subtle differences.

You can’t quite put your finger on it at first, but it will soon begin to dawn on you. There are two things that the other co-creator brings - both of which I could have done without to be honest – firstly, over-Americanization (lets play count the times they say “HURRAH”) and secondly, and ordered story, un-like ‘super bad’ and ‘knocked up’ the story-line is pretty much easy to guess, you know whereabouts its going to end, how its going to start and what’s going to happened in-between.

Although, there is a debate about this, some may argue, as it is aimed at a younger audience, they need the familiarity of a more ordered comedy, where they know when the laughs are coming and are not surprised, scientist’s have proved (taking for granted the universe exists of course) that children react better to familiarity. Thus, however, us adolescents (the intelligent ones, at least) or adults, require more surprises to bring humour to the fore-front of our emotional pallet.

This aside however , the film is really quite funny, nothing special, nothing un-expected but very fun, with general laugh worthy moments throughout, although its not the best comedy you will ever see, nor is it the worst. You will enjoy watching this film, whether with your kids (pffffffff hahaha) or with your wife (OMGWTFLOL) or your dad (just right) this is a strong piece of modern comedy cinema, and if you have money to burn, are bored or have a Cineworld unlimited card, you wont want to miss ‘Drillbit Taylor’ especially in such a poor fortnight for films.

And now for something completely different. Just a notice, that I have permission from the Mighty Java to host a weekly J-film quiz, and although there wont be one this week as unfortunately I have to go on holiday with my family, you can all look forward to it when I get back, whereupon after the first one a date shall be decided upon which they shall more regularly be held. The quiz will be aimed at very iconic movies and modern films so don’t worry about any ‘J-ponce’ exclusive films from the 1670’s!

Next issue I shall most probably be reviewing, oh I don’t know, the Cineworld site is still royally fucked, so it looks like ‘Funny Games’ which seems set to be a delightful, Horire (Horror Satire) and is another 18, so don’t say I don’t do anything for you guys.

Rundown -

Shooting: 7

Characterization: 7

Soundtrack: 6

Plot: 7

Effects: 4

Variable field dependent on context and genre - Similarity to Super Bad: 4

Overall J-score: 6.5/10

If there is anything you would like little Johnny to know do not hesitate to email me at Johnny.neicho@sky.com (Still No E-mails, dammit!)

Stargate SG-1: The Ark of Truth

2008-03-29T11:00:00.000Z

Sorry this review is a few days late. I have been working on it, wanting to get it just right. As such, I hope you like it, and agree with me. I also hope, like all good reviewers, I have, somewhere, delivered a point that you would not have seen otherwise. Please leave any comments below; they make my day, even if they are just to say hi.

I love Stargate. It is not perfect, I will admit. It is prone to errors in judgement, and often suffers from bad episodes. Nonetheless, ever since the revamp, with the new Ori storyline, and the new characters, things have been very good.

For those who don’t know, Stargate SG-1 was good, not so great, great, crap, and then brilliant, more-or-less in that order, over 10 seasons and 214 episodes. It's time on TV over, even with a successful spin-off Atlantis, the makers of Stargate had still not finished their story, and they decided that their best plan was to create a dvd-movie to finish this off, and so this new incarnation revolves around that crusade in the name of evil gods that we were in the middle of when the TV show ended. This was shown, as a two-hour special on Sky One, this Easter just past. It is know as:

Stargate SG-1: The Ark of Truth.

Of course, in true SG-1 style, this is all about our heroes chasing a McGuffin with which to save the world, here by convincing all the followers of the false gods the Ori, that they are indeed false gods, and their crusade against all unbelievers is immoral. This is the titular “Ark” that will show them “Truth”. As it is, this is a great plotline, which does of course develop with many twists and turns. It is also problematic, because it alienates new viewers by being very much the conclusion to a story that some of us will be very familiar with, more so than others. If you have not watched SG-1 before, while this is a good showcase of what Stargate is, but I would recommend starting elsewhere, for much of it will not make sense. If you have been watching SG-1, this is the story that you have been waiting for.

This is because this is awesome, a true finale to the Ori plotline. It keeps a large amount of the humour that typifies the show, with self referential nods and jokes at science fiction staples, whilst keeping many of the things that have run throughout the show intact. The effects work is top notch, but not overused, and the tension builds in junction with the dual plots, which are well interwoven, timed and acted, especially because the relationships between the characters are brilliant. They fact that I have been waiting for this for so long does not hinder the end product, it fulfils everything that you could want the finale to do. It ties up the loose ends without closing the book entirely, or destroying many of the themes that are part of SG-1 lore, as many series finales tend to do, with Buffy and Serenity springing immediately to mind as key culprits.

The fact that there are bad points does not detract from the overall awesomeness of the entertainment, and they all draw from one point. Stargate is much better at creating plotlines, and setting up events than it is at finishing them off. The best episodes of Stargate always end as a set up something that will come later, or are entirely unrelated to the grander plot. Episodes that are finales, in every sense of the word, are always underplaying their potential; it is imposable for them not to. That is why the series did not tie up the loose ends, because that it not what Stargate is best at. The set up, the drama, is best before the end, and as such this is not a movie I would rewatch again and again. Once I have seen it once I am happy.

Importantly, the inclusion of the IOA and their plan is a masterstroke of a decision, which those who have seen this will understand, for it is amazing, even if it breaks SG-cannon slightly, it still works, and it really does make the film, even if it does slightly marginalise the huge crusade that is destroying our galaxy.

But there are some problems. Firstly, the extra money seems to have been given straight to the cameramen, who have spent all their time panning around characters, wobbly-cam at the ready, zooming in on every face in a very overdone style. Secondly, because this film cannot realise all of its enormous potential, some of the set-pieces are sacrificed.

An example, which is a spoiler, but one that does not matter in the slightest, a massive evil fleet approaches Earth. Instead of a huge-battle-where-Earth-fights-aggressors-and-is-saved-at-the-last-moment, the film leaves this alone, and focuses elsewhere. This set-piece is not realised, and this is repeated as the same for many other scenes. There is no time for the slower moments when everything conversation must either start “remember the time when…” and serve as exposition, or “our only hope is to…” and ramp up the tension. This cannot live up to expectations because it has to do so much. And yet, it still does. It matched my expectations, it is a magnificent finale, exactly what the series, and the fans, deserve.

The fact that this is a movie, that it comes over a year after the series ended and has to tie up all the loose ends, is problematic. It means that, not only do we need closure on a long-standing issue, but we need to be reminded of what that issue was. Who characters are, what they have done, why they need to be stopped or helped, an audience needs to be reminded of this, and only then can the answer be given. This is a very time consuming process, which does at some points drag away the tension.

Most of all, there is one problem with Stargate which always comes to mind, and may be more of a criticism in general than a particular fault of this film. It is especially apparent after watching Battlestar Galactica. SG-1 always approach a big issue, a controversial one, that has no “correct” moral answer, but instead of challenging our perceptions, as in BSG, they back away hurriedly and avoid the issue like the bubonic plague. For example, here it is the nature of religion, which they avoid, and the nature of fanatical interpretation of sacred texts, which they also avoid. I also find it morally questionable that they have, in the previous season, wiped out an entire race of beings, in if they are evil false gods, with another McGuffin, in an act of genocide, and seem quite proud of their actions. Fine, they saved humanity by doing so, but I would like it if a few of the characters approached the issue head on, and tackled it as it should be. Naturally, if you didn’t spot any of this, it if because it is only alluded to. I understand the reasons the writers avoid these debates, of how they could corrupt the tone of the piece, but it annoying the way in which they always pull away from, what I feel, could be the most interesting of punches, and the hollow feeling it leaves some aspects of the show.

To conclude, this is a brilliant movie of Stargate. The tension is high, without compromising the characters and their interactions with each other. This is exactly what I had hoped for, even if it does suffer from the long-standing problems that Stargate has always suffered from, and that concluding a long story is always hard. This cannot be as fulfilling as when the writers are developing a story to be finished later, but this is still a brilliant finish to the Ori plot, it does everything you could want of it, and does it well. However, I do not know how much enjoyment anyone who is not a full Stargate fan will be able to gain from this. I love Stargate, and was paying attention to all that happened in the last two years. If you didn’t watch those, chances are you will be left feeling unconnected to the plotline here, as more time is spent of reminding the audience of what is past than of developing the characters, something unnecessary for a full television series, but that may have been appreciated by new-comers to the move.

Bring on Continuum, the second film due in early summer, a more self-contained movie, a time-travelling adventure featuring Jack O’Neil!

If Ark of Truth is just the first example, it bodes very well for things to come.

Stargate Review Tommorow!

2008-03-28T23:01:00.001Z

Just finished writing the Stargate SG-1: Ark of Truth review.

I want to proof read it in the moring, to ensure that I was not talking crap, and then it will be online.

This is my first, real review. I am exited. Are you?

J-Film #8 - 'Love in the Time of Cholera'

2008-03-25T15:51:00.003Z

Theres allot to be covered in this issue of J-film. This films is rather nice as it happens and thus as you can probably tell by the title is a love film, which to be good of-course requires it also be deep and thought provoking. Well, here I am required to say in-fact this is not a petty chick-flick about love - as i have already shown by calling it deep and thought provoking - It carries some brilliant and subtle under and over-tones about life and happiness , where-as it becomes apparent the title is slightly mis-leading, the letters o and v should be neatly replaced with i and f. But then you have the even more obtrusively misleading title 'Life in the Time of Cholera' To competently title this film you would have to remove the last 5 words.

The film effortlessly implements the above plots and deep intricacies in a wonderful manner, and is complemented by an amazing cast, lead by the constantly extraordinary Javier Bardem, who, as ever develops the plot into something heart-felt and genuine. As he interacts with the rest of the cast upon the backdrop of a heart-warming and (to say it again) deep story, magic is made. So, very positive, but why was no-one else in the screen with us, admiring this piece of art? The answer, they were all watching 'Meet the Spartans', truly a reflection of the overly bureaucratic and capitalist time and place in which we live, highly publicized and highly crap is the way modern, stupid and ignorant society likes it. However instead of attempting in vain to fix this, I shall attempt to bring more of the film to light to you, who hopefully, will appreciate my efforts.

'Love in the Time of Cholera' uses no overdone or special film effects, and instead attempts to bring the story and the brilliant acting to the fore, and shows everything necessary and well done in the best of lights, along with the easily forgettable but effective shooting, come Shakira, yes, thats right, she performs brilliant and original music which super-imposes upon the the multiple layers of shining brilliance, and forms the most perfect and warming sheet of MDF ever, oh dear I'm good.

Of course, no film (accept 'The cottage') is perfect and as I have been criticized for having too positive reviews I will endeavor to bring to light some of its bad points; firstly: it is drawn out to an unknown, but possibly infinitely long run time (I didn't check the time, as in my hurry to get to the cinema, I forgot to take my phone, watch or underwear) The points, which were undoubtedly good, could have been put into a more rounded, shorter film, whereupon they would be easier to digest. Secondly there are some slight continuity errors involving the change of actors with age, which are hardly worth going into to; and on a tertiary note, this is not a film for the sort of people that would be sitting in the cinemas at [miscellaneous time] in the morning watching Spartans laugh at Britney Spears. However if you truly appreciate the modern art from that is Cinema then this film is for you, shame about the absence of Flamethrowers though...

Join me and my surpassing and godlike wit next issue whereupon I shall be reviewing, if not 'Meet the Spartans' (just to wonder at its crapiness)... a film, yeah I'm not sure as the Cineworld website is fucking me about and pretending to be hard like Quentin Tarantino (not that his films are bad, mind you, oh God please don't sue me.)

Rundown -

Shooting: 7

Characterization: 9

Soundtrack: 9

Plot: 8

Effects: 7

Variable field dependent on context and genre - not being a chick-flick: 10

Overall J-score: 7.5/10

If there is anything you would like little Johnny to know do not hesitate to email me at Johnny.neicho@sky.com (I'm, serious, why does nobody ever want to talk to me!?)

Stargate Tonight!

2008-03-24T19:09:00.002Z

Happy Easter all?

Snowing in London, odd for march. Chocolate makes me feel sick. I bought Superbad on DVD and plan to watch it tonight. But that is not what excites me the most...

Stargate SG-1: The Ark of Truth is on Sky One tonight. Finally, the conclusion to the Ori plotline that I have been waiting over a year for. I cannot wait! Review imminent! Woooooooooooooot!

HL2: Ep2 - The End...

2008-03-21T09:49:00.002Z

(Limited Spoilers and Speculation)

Turns out that after that bit with those striders and those hunters, and the magnusson devices, that was the last bit of shooting, leaving one of the best bits of Half Life, and some great storytelling from Valve.

I was in shock by that ending. I love Dog, he has saved my life so many times. I love the way Valve build relationships between charachters, and that made the final scenes all the more distressing. But, is it definite that, he who is dead, is dead? I believe he must be. I wish there was some way of hoping he was not, but that would be living in denial. I just wish we could have had an uninterupted talk, so I could have found out what he knew about the G-Man.

Now I have a very tough choice. What was the best bit of The Orange Box. This choice, I will have to avoid, because my feeble mind cannot comprehend the answer.

My predictions for Episode 3, we will travel, by helecopter, to the Borealis, and to rescue Julia. The whole principle of the Borealis confuses me. What were Apeture attempting to do again? Something with portals, if I recall, which could be very appetising to stranded combine forces. I predict it will be in snow, and underground, and on the Borealis for much of the game, there will be a reason why we cannot fulfil our promise to Eli and destroy it straight away. I dont think Gordon will get the Portal Gun, although I think it may be involved, the same for Glados. And, am I the only one dissapointed by the fact that we havent seen Barney in ages? And will Odessa Cubbage return?

My hopes for Half Life 3 are different. I like the principle of one full game, followed be expanion episodes, which was been sucessful with both HL and HL2. I dont think Valve will abandon Gordon, he and Alyx will probably be put into stasis, or Alyx will have gotten older, I pray that we do not lose her.

I hope Valve build an entire new generation engine, Source II, and add all manner of new things. This, I predict, will not come until 2011, at the earliest, with Half Life 3 following soon after.

The is only one thing I don't want. NEVER SHOW THE SEVEN-HOUR WAR! If George Lucas has taught me anything, it is that climatic, world-shattering battles are often best left unseen. I do not want to be a rebelious citizen during that war. Please dont be stupid valve.
I lve you too much for you to let me down.

Now I have nothing to do but replay Ravenholm for a year-or-so. Oh-well. It could be worse...

HL2: Ep2 - So Far...

2008-03-19T22:14:00.002Z

(Limited Spoliers)

I have just done that bit of Half Life 2: Episode 2, that bit with those striders and those hunters.

Oh My God!

Valve have just created so many perfect moments, from the blind-tentacles and the marines in Half Life, to playing catch with Dog and Ravenholm in Half Life 2, to the Strider in Episode 1. They combine all these elements brilliantly in Ep 2. The fear of running from an unbeatable enemy, the vehicles, the gravity puzzles, the crouched-sneaking section, the Combine, the zombies, the section where you cannot touch the ground. Linking both drama and action, carrying each scene past bursting but keeping it feeling natural. I even cried at that opening bit with Alyx. And, argg! Hunters!

Valve have created the perfect game in Episode 2, and I have not finished yet. I am about 2/3 of the way through.

Oh My God!

(PS. "They Combine all these elements..." - best pun ever! I crack myself up!)

Your Opinion

2008-03-18T21:06:00.004Z

I have just put up a rather nice football post on my personal blog. Do you guys want to hear sport related posts in bloghammer, or mainly films and videogames?

For those who want to see: http://thinkingddude.blogspot.com/

Answers needed in the comments below:

J-Film #7 - '10,000 BC'

2008-03-18T17:11:00.003Z

oh dear , oh dear, oh dear. To be quite frank I am really not sure what to say, so out of blind hatred I will start with, urhhhm.. the plot, if you can call it that, it's more like America's national anthem, non-nonsensical and a lie, well thats not wholly true, you can understand it, but only if your willing to strain your body to the border of defecation, you give up on it in the first five minutes in a vague hope of it picking up at some point, I mean, its got Atlanteans in it, possibility for some really thought provoking ideas, involving aliens and ancient civilizations, but instead just sells out like Tom Cruises' 'War of the Worlds', on top of an overly freedom driven, ridiculous plot, that for some reason is in 10,000 BC this is yet another film which assumes that Neanderthals spoke like retarded half-formed BNP members, with myriad grunt-like sounds and top be perfectly honest, this sort of behavior isn't worth the above joke about the BNP.

Whence you realize that the film is going to be shit, about 2 microseconds in, you sort of expect it to have some cool monsters or a really big spaceship (See 'independence day') as is the way of most of the poor film, as a way of bringing themselves up from the level or the 8th deadly sin, '10,000 BC', however, does not bother, its monsters are comprised off: Fuck loads of mammoths, about 5 giant chickens and a God, yes a God. Not a very good one though, he looks sort of powerful and has a certain air about him, and you never see him until the end. Still, in some obscene breaching of the laws of cinema, they fucked this up as well, the God turns out to be... a geeza, just a normal geeza, wonderful. To complement this horror, they also build up several sub-plots which go nowhere, when the film distractedly and eventually ends.

On top of this already more than substantial butchery of a usually and increasingly solid art form, them music is ripped out of every feel good children's action film EVAR, and just undermines what little reserves of credibility left in this God-awful film, the shooting is so decidedly average, its impossible to comment on and it has some sort of sentient, friendly saber-tooth tiger, which does no end of bad and corrupts this childlike film about destroying the master-race. Ahh here we go, that was what i really wanted to talk about, a group of stupid, americanized, egotistical twats, take on the Atlantis!!! I mean What the Fuck, by the end they have killed a God (Fuck spoilers, you could guess the plot while dead and with several mental severe mental conditions) and set the technological advancement of the planet back 5,000 years, and by the time you realize this, all you want to do is shout at the screen "Are you happy you morons, are you really happy, you saved your push-up bra girlfriend?!"

Next issue I shall be reviewing, oh jesus there nothing decent on, oh god, it might have to be the new DR Seuss film, ahh fuck this I'm going on Jerry Springer... Take care of yourself and others.

Shooting: 3

Characterization:0

Soundtrack: 2

Plot: 0

Effects: 4

Variable field dependent on context and genre - Wasted Potential: 0

Overall J-score: UNGRADED/10

If there is anything you would like little Johnny to know or would like to subscribe to my mass mailing alert service do not hesitate to email me at Johnny.neicho@sky.com

Crysis review, by Sith(y)

2008-03-17T21:58:00.001Z

Crysis.

The mere word makes the mind wander to islands, lush jungles, white beaches, and people to shoot. The mind is correct in thinking these things. Crysis is Crytek's second project, after Far Cry and its pitiful sequels. You play as Jake "Nomad," Dunn, an operative for the US Special Forces, as part of Raptor Team. Of course, you're not alone, silly. Why'd you think that?

Your team consists of yourself, your commander Prophet, your British mate Psycho, a Hispanic guy named Aztec, and Jester. Dunno where he's from, exactly, but assume they're all from America unless otherwise stated.

You probably already know that Crysis is basically the most hyped game this side of Deus Ex, but the hype is unfounded in some aspects of the game. Many features, such as the branching storyline, have been removed from the full game. Some have been changed, like the graphics (Toned down, though this can be corrected. Google Crysis Graphical Tweaks.), and the TAC bullet system, which became sleeper bullets that make your target pass out upon impact.

But, the game is still good. It has easily the best graphics and physics that I've seen in a game, trees snap where they're shot, buildings collapse from grenade blasts, and Koreans fly through the air merrily after being thrown by the neck. By you, naturally.

That's another thing, you're fighting North Koreans in this game. But, that is not all you're fighting. From the start of the game, you're exposed to many paranormal phenomena. Look around a lot while you're 'chuting to the island in the first part of the game, you'll see what tackles you and botches EVERY DAMN THING UP.

Gameplay is fun, yet similar to many other FPSes. Nomad (That's you.) is not your ordinary soldier, oh no, he is a KRYPTONIAN. Just kidding, he's actually part of the nanosuit prototype project, which outfits the best of the best with special exosuits. These give their bearer extraordinary powers.

You have four modes, strength, speed, armour, and cloak. Strength is the most fun, yet least used, of the modes. You can punch through walls and surprise a NK soldier as he pisses in an outhouse, then grab him by the neck and lob him through a tree. Also, you're able to perform super high jumps, and fire weapons with less recoil than normal in strength mode.

Speed is the second least-used, giving you, you guessed it, super speed. For a limited time, of course, but it's good for legging it after jumping in over your head, or as an alternative to the vehicles. NK soldiers recoil in shock if you super speed up to them, too. Which is fun.

Armour does what it says on the tin, being the most (Or second most, depending upon your playstyle) useful power. It basically uses up your suit's energy reserves to let bullets ping off your outer shell, like gnats biting a mule. Then your suit energy fails and you die, but it's fun while it lasts. Use liberally.

Cloak is the final, and second most useful power. It lets you blend in to your surroundings, hiding from the short-sighted enemies. Works well in combination with a bush, and prone mode, but your energy gets eaten up like fat-free pies in a weight loss meeting while you run in this mode. Use with caution.

Now, on to the weapons. The enemies in Crysis seem to be made of Kevlar, and are thus capable of absorbing 6 bullets to the FRICKING TORSO while they're FRICKING ASLEEP. Either that, or the guns are utter bollocks. The rifles are.. Rifles. SCAR ammo is SCARce (See what I did there?), so dump it for the NK rifle early on. The minigun is.. Fun. Shoot it while shouting "SO MUCH BLOOD!!!" and you get the full experience. The shotgun is rather useful in close-quarters combat, but is otherwise useless.

The gauss rifle is very useful in the latter parts of the game, as it eats aliens for breakfast, lunch, and tea. The precision rifle is bollocks. Just use the NK rifle with a sniper scope and laser sight thingy. The pistol is a pistol. What more can I say?

That's about it for guns, on to enemies. The enemies in Crysis are smart. They throw frag grenades, split up to hunt you down, and use turrets for suppressing fire. They're also lifelike if not alerted. They smoke, sleep, wash cars, lie down, piss, talk to each other, go on patrols, everything you could expect from a small military outpost.

I won't even mention the multiplayer. Much. It's utter shite, just don't play it.

The maps are generally huge in both SP and MP (Perhaps its only redeeming feature), covering enough space for a helicopter to take a while to traverse it. Helicopters are also bastards. Kill them whenever you think you can. Use missile launchers or jeep-mounted machine guns.

The vehicles are pitiful, exploding way too easily, taking tons of damage from small knocks, and other rather bad things. I quite liked piloting the VTOL, conversely, but the tank level was horrific. The only good thing about vehicles in Crysis is ramming them into small huts and watching them explode in a glorious display of physics, and shooting down helicopters without dying horribly.

The storyline is acceptable, of the average action film style. The ending left me wanting more, because it was a cliffhanger mainly, but it's going to be a trilogy of games anyway so let's hope Crysis 2 isn't gonna do another Halo on us.

The last boss was rather clichéd, involving an Independence Day-esque "Nuke in hole at the bottom of big ship," death. The level in the alien ship is confusing, though that's what it's meant to be since it's in zero-gravity, but the relief I felt when I finally got out of there was immense. The gooey aliens are tricky bastards by the way. Shoot them before they cotton on to you, or just evade them.

Last of all, perhaps the biggest turn-off out of Crysis. It eats computers for a mid-afternoon snack then heartily belches until a little bit of vomit comes up and it needs a drink of water. Sorry, that got a bit deep, but anyway, you need a very, very, very good system to run Crysis on high settings at a good FPS. Doesn't even look that great without a graphical tweak, anyway.

Once more, my review has ended. I'd give Crysis a score of 8/10. It looks magnificent with a graphical tweak, though we shouldn't need that, it plays well, though disappointed me due to its lack of some features Crytek showed in earlier videos. The MP is crap, so don't buy it for that. If you see Crysis and think your computer can run it, pick it up.

Sith

GeneRally, a free top down racing game

2008-03-14T22:24:00.001Z

To compare GeneRally to real motorsport would be to compare TF2 to CSS. While the latter is focused on skill, tactics and accuracy the former is a distillation of the very elements of its subject matter- in TF2s case shooting things, in GeneRally's case racing things round tracks.

There is no shortage of things to race in GeneRally, with 12+ classes of car to race on an almost infinite number of tracks, thanks to GeneRally's devoted community and a very easy to use track builder, which uses 16 colour images to create tracks, meaning you can create them in any image editor you like.

Such a simple track editor is made possible by an equally simple graphics engine. Every car has 40 polygons and the game is played in a defiantly top down view, albeit one with some fairly nice touches, such as tyre marks remaining on the track for the duration of the race, marking out a line to take and cute little puffs of smoke from your car when it's damaged.

Yes, I said damage. Generally can become a surprisingly hardcore little racing simulator if you so desire, with tire wear, fuel and damage all modeled. You repair all of these with pit stops, opening up a whole new level of F1 style strategy. If you pit earlier than your opponent can you overtake him when he has to? Is it worth risking a lap running on vapour for the extra speed? (Fuel has a weight too) Such thoughts are constantly running through your head during a race and this strategic element makes generally incredibly compelling.

Of course such strategies are dependent on the level of your opponents who, like everything else in GeneRally, are customizable. You create your own AI drivers, setting their skill, name and car colours individually. I recreated the highlights of the 2007 F1 grid lineup to race against, which was a lot of fun. Of course you can also race against friends, which is even better due to the AI being quite aggressive, to put it mildly.

GeneRally is great fun, one of my favourite racing games in existence. You can pick up the latest version (alas, it is not being updated) at:

http://generally.rscsites.org/download.shtml

A fairly easy to use car editor can be found here:

http://www.generally.com.ar/

Forums full of likeminded fans, all beavering away making mods are here:

http://forum.rscnet.org/forumdisplay.php?f=199

J-Film #6 - 'The Cottage'

2008-03-14T20:02:00.003Z

well, I am a bit lost for words to be perfectly honest, cinemas has hit a high point, this is quite possibly the best thing to happen to the universe since the wheel, this film my friends is perfect.

First of all, wait, hang on, there is no 'first' this is the greatest horo-com ever, its aspects blend into a melody so thick and juicy, Jesus would have trouble changing its composition, The shooting techniques are the best the civilized universe has ever or will have ever seen, the soundtrack fits like a glove to the brilliant, artistic gore blended with entirely side splitting comedy moments.

Thats it... What can I say, it the best film I have ever seen, ever, if you can find anything better I'll give you my legs;and if you don't like it I'll take your whole families... but thats beside the point. The point is, this film is made of pure win, there is nothing it doesn't do flawlessly, It has the most delectable mixed of horror and comedy, that mixes your emotion in such a manner, you are easily tripped between open laughter and jumping out your seat in laughter, if you don't see this, you will not have lived, is here a point of a rundown? There certainly no point in writing anymore, short and sweet, keeps it neat. I write all my reviews to match the films and this one is no different, pure artistic fun; nothing more and nothing less than pure perfection.

Next time ill probably be J-filming the most probably shit 10,000 BC or something or other, look forward to it whatever it is and SEE THIS FUCKING FILM! Oh and did i mention it's British?

Rundown -

Shooting: 10

Characterization: 10

Soundtrack: 10

Plot: 10

Effects: 10

Variable field dependent on context and genre - Horo-com mix: 10

Overall J-score: 10/10 J-FILM MUST SEE (fuck must see, this is more J-fucking must see)

If there is anything you would like little Johnny to know or would like to subscribe to my mass mailing alert service do not hesitate to email me at Johnny.neicho@sky.com

An ode to Grey

2008-03-12T18:57:00.004Z

Congratulations Grey_Painter you won my the 'Fill J-snukk with Love' competition and as i promised I am now writing a review of you personality, be prepared to cry in admiration of yourself mate.

Now, Grey, you have been with us through allot, you have lurked within the chat-room for eons, and form the solid core of the PCG Steam Community, you are a myrmidon among gamers, leading an elite phalanx of our best and brightest. Just picture it, You carry the banner of our New World Order, you scream, enraged by the heretic legions of the stupid "CHARGE!" and we oblige I knock soldiers with the likes of Ains and Javaguy, and our solid legion of pure holiness and retribution, advances with holy fire burning in our eyes, and we the uber-men enslave all those who despise us...

Oh Sorry, almost turned into a hate rant there, anyways, back to reviewing you. You are great, from your amusingly dull story about painting Grey all the time, to you astounding taste in games, where you collection could only be considered an art gallery, I would imagine even the stacking of the DVD cases forms a kind of subtle art, you are better than God, better than nature. In truth you are not a 'grey' painter you are an octarine_painter, the very knowledge of you brings joy to our hearts, march on Grey, march on and crush the infidels!

Rundown -

Shooting: 10

Characterization: 10

Soundtrack: 10 (i'm hearing queen and foo fighters...)

Plot: 10

Effects: 10 (even tho they are all grey)

Variable field dependent on context and genre - Pure Lovlieness: 10

Overall J-score: 10/10 J-FILM MUST SEE

If there is anything you would like little Johnny to know or would like to subscribe to my mass mailing alert service do not hesitate to email me at Johnny.neicho@sky.com

Brian's Guide to...

2008-03-11T22:28:00.001Z

Any of you who have read John Walkers wonderful blog will probably have read some of his "Brian's Guide to..." comics. They rule; so I made an attempt to make my own. I am not that good at Art. Infact, you could say I am terrible, but I like this. Please take a look. Please laugh. Please!

http://i274.photobucket.com/albums/jj280/ddude700/brianslightbulb-cropped.jpg

Two Worlds review.

2008-03-11T16:25:00.004Z

It would be very easy for me to write a scathing review of Two Worlds, dismissing it as a lacklusture oblivion clone. To do so, however, would be to ignore its many charms and innovations that help make it an enjoyable 40 hour RPG, albeit a 40 hour RPG with a fair few issues. I may as well start by explaining these issues as your tolerance of them will pretty much determine whether you should buy the game.

The first of these flaws is apparent pretty much as soon as you begin: The combat is rubbish. Killing enemies is a matter of hammering the left mouse button as fast as you can and hoping you don't get hit. A block function is conspicuous by its absence, replaced by "dodge", which causes your character to hop backwards, avoiding an enemy attack. This function is, however, too cumbersome to use frequently and this gives rise to the tactic of heal killing. When you die in Two Worlds you respawn at a resurrection point, which also heals you if you go near it. These points are so plentiful that combat becomes a matter of luring the enemies to the point, where you will be constantly healed, and then mashing the left mouse button.

These healing points, however, also encapsulate what is good about Two Worlds. On all difficulty settings but "hard" your dying has no adverse affect on your character. He loses no experience, no items, nothing. It makes Two Worlds much more accessible than other RPGs, you won't be punished for getting yourself into tough situations, of which there are many thanks to the crazy agro system and fairly punishing difficulty that means you'll always be fighting/getting killed by 5 or more monsters at once. One of the more amusing tactics to deal with this is to run round and round so the six wolves, four bandits and two bears following you all hit each other and start fighting amongst themselves, allowing you to retreat and watch from a safe distance.

The surprising honesty with which combat is approached means that if you get in the way of a weapon you're going to get hit, no matter who it was intended for, the same applying to arrows. It all implies that there is a strong physics engine behind the game, as does the compulsory installation of the PhysX drivers. This, however seems sadly not to be true. While enemies do become ragdolls on death the rest of the world seems devoid of any physics at all, with objects glued to tables and characters/horses struggling to navigate the terrain.

The wide variety of issues certainly have the potential to be game running for some people and if you're expecting Two Worlds to be the next Oblivion you'll probably be disappointed. 'tis no matter though, for if you've got this far I'm going to assume you can live with the above and are ready to move on to what is so good about Two Worlds. The delicious apple pie (of +2 apples) after the bland casserole of problems above. Also: Yum, apple pie.

And yet, it's hard to pin down any one feature that makes Two Worlds so enjoyable, despite its flaws. The whole game just seems to have had a lot of love put into it, apparent by the manual that has 32 pages of general information about the world before it gets to how to play it. It's a lot more… personal than the like of Oblivion, which are often polished to the point of being soulless. It also has a lot more humour than other RPGS, whether intentional or not.

Another strong point of Two Worlds is the graphics. While the game suffers from an incredibly close draw distance for buildings it has some amazing vistas and dense foliage, with some of the nicest trees I’ve seen in any RPG. There are also some really nice weapon models, textured surprisingly intricately for a game that doesn’t demand that much from your PC.

Not only are Two Worlds’ weapons pretty- they are also very copious. Even at early levels you’re bombarded by a constant stream of new items, each shinier and with more skill modifiers and attributes than the last. It’s the most capitalistic RPG I know of and by level 10 your character will be decked out like a spoilt 22 year old after a London shopping trip, with rings on every finger, an inventory full of hats and shoes and a mind full of armour sets and where to find matching trousers for your chainmail top.

Of course such items are of little use unless you can show off to friends and Two Worlds has this covered with the option to play online multiplayer in standard deathmatches or the far more interesting “RPG” mode, where you create a persistent character and level him up by fighting foes and doing quests co-operatively by friends in slices of the world map. This mode is slightly let down by the WoWness of the quests, with objectives ranging from “kill these wild animals” to “find this mirror, which is guarded by wild animals” but it’s still a blast and capable of eating up hours of time, even with the lag inevitably introduced by only allowing listen servers.

So, yeah, Two Worlds really is a game of juxtapositions, like a Trabant: Eastern European, rubbish, yet still charming enough to draw loyal fans. You’ll either find yourself hating the game due to it’s flaws or loving it for the feeling love that has gone into everything, from the gently swaying trees to the way the grass becomes charred when fire spells hit it. So, this is for you, hardened RPG players, used to seeing a myriad of bugs infesting your latest purchase. However for those whose first introduction to the RPG world was Oblivion Two Worlds might not be the best choice. Try the demo first.

I give the game 75%. Flawed yet charming+2

Two Worlds

2008-03-08T15:38:00.003Z

Two Worlds, a deeply flawed yet fairly engrossing RPG, is avaliable for not much more than a fiver on Steam this weekend. Its very much in the mould of oblivion boasting an open world and many quests to do. The average score on metacritic (69%) is fairly low due to its myriad of technical issues and LOLworthy voice acting but those willing to overlook such problems will find a decent 40 hours of fun.

It's a good deal for a fiver.

The game also includes an interesitng looking multiplayer mode, so if enough of us buy it we could have a go at that sometime.

J-Film #5 - 'Diary of the Dead'

2008-03-08T11:12:00.002Z

'Oh deary me' was the idle thought that drifted through my mind upon departing the cinema last night and not because the film is bad, or indeed, anything less than superb, but because it was going to be hard to review. The reasons it is hard, is because the film is so great and does allot of things so well and subtly, it can be hard to find our, just what makes it good; but i shall try.

Anyway, 'Diary of the Dead' is the next, possibly last, film in George A. Romero's classic satirical zombie series, not following on from 'Land of the Dead' but parallel to the times of the original 'Night of the Living Dead' (possibly one of the most iconic films ever, if you have the original ending and not the fucking queer one, that is) however, as Mr. Romero likes to do he has set it in the modern day, for his satires strongly reflect the troubles and occurrences of the day, and i assure you none of his satire is lost.

throughout the film lots of satirical points are underlaid on the main zombie survival thriller, including humanity's need to document things (It is steady cam, but ill talk about that later) and his classic player, how the zombies are better than us. Those points are, if anything very obvious and practically said by the woman commentating the 'diary' and many more accompany it, but some of the most important satire i hid deep within the bowels of the film, its reflects New Orleans, yes, big disaster, people being raped and exploited by everyone, all the rich fuckers bugger off leaving the poor black minority populace to fend for themselves, creating a crisis zone, the government not helping at all, people blaming it on Immigration etc. Its all there including that fact that presidential coward George W. Bush was hiding in his mansion, just like the remaining cast are at a point during the film.

What is also great is how akin this is to 'Night of the Living Dead' and 'Dawn of the Dead especially' where as well as great satire, there are many comedic, laugh out loud moments, say I as remembering a deaf, mute Amish man who, as he throws a stick of dynamite at a huddle of encroaching 'Flesh Eaters', holds up a sign proclaiming him as 'Samuel' as bits of zombie fly casually and humorously over his head. So, its got the strong aura of satire, the typical apocalyptic humor and the brilliant slow shuffling, useless zombies, they are not dangerous at all if you know where they are, and thats just brilliantly reminiscent of that 'ooosome' scene in 'Night of the Living Dead' where the main female character just walks past all those zombies, with no danger to her whatsoever, they are not individually difficult to manage or dangerous,but they just wear you down with numbers, and with the stress they cause, they 'Zerglings', but apart from that the best description for them would be soviet Russian troops, theres just so many, so so many.

So, its an amazing and classic piece of George A. Romero cinema art, and just about the only American film that actually has an admirable British character in it. "But whats bad about it?" I hear you guffaw over the retaining wall i have built to separate myself from you zombies, well the 'Steady Cam', it isn't 'Steady Cam'. Now this may be for myriad reasons, such as, they are film students, who know how to use a camera and they have proper camera's not like Clover-Shit's hand-held, but this did get quite annoying, because it seemed not to be bale to decide whether it was 'SC' or not, now my dad liked it because he was never a fan of 'SC' in the first place, but i just don't think it was used in the correct manner, there weren't enough zombie jump moments as there could have been with a first person view from the camera man, angle, allot of missed potential there, I think. but if you don't like steady Cam, because it makes you dizzy or for any other reason, this fact will probably go down allot better with you.

Join me next issue, when hopefully It will be British 'Horocom' 'The Cottage' on the J-films elegant Marble table, hand carved by 67 million, naked, heaving virgins, oh and by the way 'Cloverfield' is shit.

Rundown -

Shooting: 6

Characterization: 7

Soundtrack: 8

Plot: 9

Effects: 7

Variable field dependent on context and genre - Satire and Humor: 9

Overall J-score: 8.5/10 J-FILM MUST SEE

If there is anything you would like little Johnny to know or would like to subscribe to my mass mailing alert service do not hesitate to email me at Johnny.neicho@sky.com

The Problem of Phones

2008-03-06T17:42:00.003Z

I was in an awkward situation today. There I am standing on a crowded bus, and this large, middle-aged bloke suddeny yelled into my face if I wanted to "ave a beer this even'n".

I responded that I had a prior engagment, politely turning him down, only for him to give me a threatening look. He followed this up with an, even louder, "Are you bein' funny?!"

It was at this stage that I realised he was yelling into those headsets that people use, connected to their modile phones, and then sureptitiously tucked into their collars. I was, of course relived, and slightly embarassed. This embarassment was made worse by the fact that I was stuck less than a foot away from him the next half hour.

So, in an attempt to make this game related... hmmmm... I don't even see if that is possable...

Oh! yes!

In GTA IV we are all going to be given mobile phones to runa round with. We had one in San Andreas I believe, but these will be more important, being used for much more that just recieving calls. Is this a good thing? Who can tell...

Jsnuk’s weird philosophy- English edition

2008-03-04T18:35:00.001Z

Javaguy is great.

Man is an animal but has raised itself above those instincts.

We tend to fall back to war if we can't achieve things peacefully [reverting back to animal instincts]

Bible quotes maek me loock clevars

The day when we stop developing new techs is the day when we all nuke each other. Er, sure.

Why were we made? Dunno.

Lets fix global warming kids!

Lets make a SUPER NATION OF +2 SUPERNESS

Lets go to space and be in star trek. I like star trek.

We're all doomed so we should give up. (on what?)

Lets kill god coz he's nature and is MEEN TO US. (!!!!)

So lets kill nature too. (As if nature was anything other than abstract, snukky)

I'm going to put a score here for the lols.

The Javaguy Philosophy:

Javaguy is great.

We're all animals with those basic instincts. Always will be. War will always exist, but never mind.

Technology and war are independent of each other. The pursuit of tech doesn't distract us from war, our higher instincts do.

World is fine as it is.

Nature is always here, always will be too. It is infinitely more powerful than us, it's up to us, as animals, to adapt to it.

I give this article 34%

CoD4 review, Sith

2008-03-04T18:09:00.001Z

Call of Duty 4.

This is the fourth episode of the pretty highly-acclaimed Call of Duty series. Well, it's not the fourth REALLY, but it's called 4 so let's just run with it. You play as either an operative in the S.A.S, or the USMC (US Marine Corps, I believe.), called Soap McTavish (Wut?) or Paul Jackson respectively.

The single player consists of the tried, and tested formula of “Go somewhere, shoot baddies, finish mission.” Don't get me wrong, it's a good formula. As you may have noticed from the subtitle “Modern Warfare,” this isn't set in the usual World War 2 theme of previous Call of Duties. Instead, it's set in the modern world. Of course, nukes are involved in the plot, but I won't give away more than that.

The missions take place mainly in Russia, and an unnamed country in “THE MIDDLE EAST,” the S.A.S, and USMC taking missions in each respectively, though both team up for the last few missions. I really, truly, loved the graphics in Call of Duty 4. The game looked beautiful, though little better than CoD 2 (That was pretty too, so no real loss.). Some of the missions generated tension, the sniper one in particular. I won't spoil it, but it's certainly something you've probably not done anywhere else.

The game play in general is fun, with the new additions of more secondary grenades (CSS fans rejoice, flash and stun grenades have arrived.), and the new bullet penetration mechanics. Popping someone when he thinks he's safe behind cover is satisfying.

A little note, perhaps of little use and interest, is that the old “Hit in face with gun,” melee system has gone away. Now you get a shiny, new, combat knife. That was just filler, really, but who the hell cares?

Onward, then. The game was pretty damn short, I finished it within the first few days of possession, took probably less than 8 hours in total, so it's a good time sink. You've got your mandatory pick up hidden items unlockables, including an arcade mode and slow-motion.

The game ends very abruptly, in the middle of a heated gunfight, which may catch some by surprise. The real gem here, though, is the multi player. I'll come to that in a second, but I've got to finish my three-lines-minimum paragraphs. Right, done.

OK, multi player. You probably already know this, but Call of Duty is renown for its MP. This is no different. There are your bog-standard death match, and team death match game modes, involving shooting people in the face, mainly, and your CSS-stolen (Sorry, borrowed), bomb planting missions. And some bollocks called headquarters, but I haven't tried that yet.

All of the game modes can further be modified by adding “Hardcore mode.” Hardcore mode basically makes stuff... Hardcore, really. You lose your cross hairs, HUD, and map (Other than when there's a UAV on-line for your team. I'll get back to UAVs in a moment.

MP is very populated, thousands of servers on-line at a time, though not all with people on. Most of the mechanics from single player are still in MP (Actually, all of them might be.), so there's no missing out here. Also, you can throw back grenades both in MP and SP. Just thought you'd like to know.

CoD4 has taken a leaf from Battlefield 2, and introduced a ranks, and unlocks system. There are 55 ranks to rise through, and at least a dozen guns to unlock, each with some add-ons as well. Including a Desert Eagle. Yay. Anyway, there are also perks to unlock. These perks are basically bonuses for your character.

Say, for example, I want a high-health assault character, with lots of grenades and the ability to shoot more accurately. I just pick the “More frag grenades,” perk, the “Juggernaut” (More health) perk, and the accuracy perk. Then, nab an assault rifle (May I recommend the M4, once you unlock it?), and a side arm in the create a class screen on the main menu. Job done.

The ranks are pretty easy to rise through, and you have the help of challenges. Challenges are like achievements in Team Fortress 2. You do certain things like, for example, kill 25 people with your AK 47, and you get experience towards your next rank-up, and maybe a new weapon attachment. These range from grips for shotguns, to silencers and scopes for assault rifles. Funnily, you can't have a silencer and a scope at once, but that's a little thing really.

Finally, the support powers. There are three support powers, gained by getting kill streaks. The UAV, which reveals all of the enemy troops on the map without the UAV jammer perk, as red dots on your map is earned for killing 3 people in one life. Air strikes, which are self-explanatory, are earned from downing 5 in one life.

Finally, the big daddy, helicopter support. You get helicopter support from 7 kills in one life, and it is really rather good. Helicopters can shred any infantry unlucky enough to be caught in its fire into small ribbons of meat, though it's vulnerable to heavy machine guns (Like the SAW), and RPG s. The bastard RPG s are hard to aim though, so you'd be better with a gun.

So, that's that then I suppose. I'd give CoD4 a 9/10 in total. It plays well, looks good, lots of shooting, lots of explosions, good multi player, good single player. If you like first person shooters, you will really love this.

Sith

NIGHTHOOD WRITES A REVIEW!

2008-03-04T16:33:00.002Z

This is posted by me, but is all Nighthood's work:

Once, I decided I would make a film. It was a re-enactment of Ben-Hur, but all I had were 3 friends and a cheese sandwich. I gave up, but later discovered that if I had persevered, I could become a cult hero with an unhealthy obsession for Fats Waller. Ok, so this story is fictional, but so is “Be kind, Rewind”, a sweet movie about a couple of guys put into a bad position. Mos Def plays Mike, who is tasked with tending to Mr Fletcher’s (Danny Glover) video store, “Be kind, Rewind”. Mike is given special orders not to allow Jerry (Jack Black), Mike’s friend, and an absolute conspiracy nut, into the shop. Of course, this law is breached, and after getting his whole body magnetised, Jerry proceeds to wipe every single film in the shop. Struck with the dilemma of how they are going to get “Ghostbusters” to a customer, they decide to re-enact the whole film in a scrap yard and library, leaving out special effects in favour of good, old fashioned camera cutting. This continues when a customer wants “Rush Hour 2” by the end of the day. This results in an absolutely hilarious remake of the iconic(ish) bamboo scaffolding scene, as Jerry sends small children flying from a climbing frame. At this point, the 2 guys are a little worried of quite what the people will think of the film, and, without going too much into the plot of the movie, the consensus is good, and eventually ends with a small film studio. However, due to some interesting copyright laws, all the tapes have to be destroyed. Well, that’s about as much as I can be bothered to write, so now all I need to do is get myself allowed onto the blog. Tsk.

Rundown -

Shooting: Not with this budget!

Characterization: 7

Soundtrack: 5

Plot: 9

Effects: Do tinfoil, tinsel and caps count as effects?

Variable field dependent on context and genre - Bear wrestling: 9

Overall J-score: 8.5/10. As likeable as a film about 2 men with absolutely no sex life and a video camera can be...

Very good eh? I would also like to say that if nay of you haventread my J-filosophy below (as this was posted like straight after) please read it, it was made of effort, my back is sweating...

J-filosophy - 'an exclusive look at the nature of humanity, life and everything'

2008-03-04T15:36:00.005Z

I had an epiphany today, and it was a realization that I don't like anything, I hate everyone apart from Java and the whole nature of the universe infuriates me, to the degree of near suicide and as i write this, I would like you to realize this post may not be joke filled as my usual.

humans are designed by nature and evolution to exploit everything, to exploit food sources, to exploit land and to exploit energy, we are also made to hate everything that is not us, we are designed to be wary of other cultures and their influences and be wary of change, but this sort of extreme fear mixed with out intelligence gives us our dominance, we strive to destroy everything but ourselves, we desire for wealth greater than ourselves and we wish not for peace, but for whatever situation will benefit us as the individual the most.

You see we are made to break the rules of nature - which is rather ironic - and thus our primitive instincts have developed throughout history, as our technology and understanding has greatened so has our capacity to override instinct and ascend out of our animalistic ways, so, great you are thinking, yes, wonderful, but what happened if this trend ends? What happens when we stagnate? Wars, lots of wars, wars over nothing wars which destroy everything we know and love. Truly that is our nature.

“Destruction cometh; and they shall seek peace, and there shall be none.” Says the bible, and that is right, on small fronts and on a global scale; you see if humans do not have a greater agenda, if they do not have wealth to obtain through peaceful means and if they do not have technological hopes, then we fall to war, an end to peace in all forms and the apocalypse, now, this may not happen, it is not certainty, but as we continue to face obstacles in our economic and intellectual expansion, and the population becomes ignorant and they produce babies of evil, the probability of this end to our species rises, as global warming threatens our security, wars in the middle east over oil and the Americans seek to enforce the rapture, we become conceited imperialistic and racist.

Now, this is nothing new, for eternity empires have struggled for dominance, but never before with such power and with such at stake, nuclear arms capable of eradicating the planet, sit passively in myriad silos waiting for the button to be pressed which shall single the end of everything we know and allot we don't. As technology develops, so does destruction, thus, if we stop developing new technologies we signal the end to everything and if we do we signal the end to everything, but, there is a way out...

“Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning. (Psalms 30:5)” The end is never really the end, despite what I have said, humanity matters not on a universal scale, but its brief existence raises some questions. Why did nature develop its destruction? why did our planet Seal it's doom? Why did evolution see fit to make us, when simpler creatures could create a worthy ecosystem independently? and Why, does anything exist anyway?! I know none of the answers to any of these questions, and only speculation exists, but that drive keeps us motivated and moving along as an intelligent civilization, there is a small gap in the mesh of Life, we can beat nature, we can beat the universe, we are God's.

First of all, we need to defeat global warming, then we need to form one massive global country with shared wealth and capitalistic ideals, then we need to perfect renewable energy, and finally we need to develop deep space travel. Just watch the original series of Star Trek, such a perfect society, such a hippy show, but thats what we need to achieve, and more. You see the planet we live on and nature will keep trying to destroy us, with ice ages, global warming, resources shortages and our own crude nature; to survive we must seize our nature and bend it into an unrecognizable but wonderful state, we need to destroy instinct, we need to spread our culture and people so far that the death of a whole galaxy would not even phase us. however the basic form of humanity will alter greatly, with different forms of human adapting in different ways across the the universe, we will cease to be one species and will ascend to become something greater, something unimaginable, something great. In short we need to force ourselves to evolve in a way that defies nature, we need to cease to be human.

“I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. (Jeremiah 29:11)” The Lord is nature and nature is the Lord, they wish to destroy us for they have created their doom, of course they are fictional, they do not exist other than in the very forces of the universe, maybe our creation was an inevitable accident spun in the insecurities of the very laws of the universe, we could except our fate as martyrs, or we could struggle on in spite of everything and spit in the face of the universe, our nature is to exploit, so let us bring an end to the exploitation of each other and exploit the universe, to live, to ascend , to realize our potential we need to kill God.

“Everything is possible for him who believes.” Mark 9:23 - Take heart from the words of God my friends for ironically we shall need them to destroy him, for the only way to live is to change and the only way to change is to destroy nature and become our own force, and until that day, which shall probably never happen, I will continue to hate everything and everyone, but Java for “He only is my rock and my salvation: he is my defense; I shall not be moved.”

Rundown (of the Universe, God, Nature and Evolution) -

Shooting: 0

Characterization: 10

Soundtrack: 0

Plot: 0

Effects: 10

Variable field dependent on context and genre - Common sense: 0

Overall J-score: 1/10

“Without wood a fire goes out; without gossip a quarrel dies down”

J-Film #4 - 'Semi-pro'

2008-03-03T19:50:00.002Z

I am in an angry mood lately and i shall not say G'evenang to you, i shall just say "why the holy fucktarded chicken licking savage do Americans pronounce semi, Sem-I, seriously are they that broken in the head that as well as itching to nuke every oil wielding country this hemisphere, they have to spell wrong and mutilate the language in which my glorious reviews are written in!?!?!"

With that out of the way however, I can now actually review something, and that something is, namely, 'Semeeeeee-pro'. Now as my Fingers caress the keyboard with inhuman grace only developed through eons of shooting head-crabs, and i spell almost every word wrong, a question is in my head and that question my loyal simpletons is "What is the nature of a comedy? What is its purpose? and What does it need to make it effective?" and now i shall answer those three questions respectively.

The nature of a comedy is to make fun of occurrences everyday or otherwise, its purpose is to use this 'piss-taking' to make people laugh; and after all laughing is a form of entertainment. Thus a genre is born, so, i know what you are thinking, oh well any laymen who only had 15 GCSE's an A level in philosophy and a masters in ponciness from Oxford with a sandwich working in Harvard's Gay wing could work that out and you would be right. You see, the problem arises with the third question, here you have to take into account myriad genres, how they function and what aspects they use to brand them as entertainment, and ultimately art. Thus Effectively you are asking the first two questions for every possible genre and sub-genre just to work out the answer to the third question. I also know what you are thinking at this point "Oh dear, thats far too poncey for me, ill just pretend I understand"

So after several hard minutes of my Fagmosexual brain whirring and a complete second without taking the piss out of Clover field, I now have the answer, but be warned its not a short one. You see Every film needs a story, and every joke within a comedy needs a context that can be easily and quickly applied to it, in other words the bear eating the commissioner of the NBA needs to make sense. Okay, so a comedy needs a story to make it funny, what does it also need? Relativity, thats an easy one, if you cant relate to the joke and if it means nothing to you it's not funny, do i need to explain that further? Good. One more thing is essential however and is the most important thing EVER; even when A joke has a basis in story, is relative to your experiences and knowledge, it still needs to be Funny. I will not go any further on this, as I am now 519 words in and haven't discussed the film at all, but I will point out, at this point you need to work out what funny actually means, anyways on with the J-film.

Where the above ponceyness fits in with the actual film, is thats its a comedy and yes I do realize I could have told you that in one sentence but i thought i would confuse you first.

First of all this Will Ferrel comedy is not as good as 'Talledaga (fuck the spelling) nights' but is the typical light hearted comedy, with a straight forward plot consisting of Team needs to win big game, team wins big game elements, which are averagely orchestrated with an average cast of actors, excluding Will Ferrel, who I rather like.

The film is fun, full of basket balls and has a brilliant LOL moment involving a bear, but it just simply cannot compete with the 'running over the race car finish line in slow motion moment' in 'TD' there isn't much more to say really, its enjoyably funny, th acting is slightly sub par the effects are rather lovely, the story is average, 'meh' its all right. But it is fair to say, when I'm the editor to 'Art Gay Monthly' in a big pink building with 'PONCE' scribbled over the door in a supposedly artistic manner, this film will not be in my top 10. On another final note, i would also like to express the fact that if you wanted to know how good the film actually was you could skip down to the rundown, but i wasn't about to tell you that at the beginning was I?

Next time I shall be reviewing 'Diary of the Dead' (I mean if they let me into Rambo ill have no trouble with this) and that should be, how do you say? "FUCKING AWESOME YOU CUNT"

Rundown -

Shooting: 7

Characterization: 4

Soundtrack: 5

Plot: 5

Effects: 8

Variable field dependent on context and genre - Bear wrestling: 9

Overall J-score: 5.5/10 J-FILM MEH SEE

If there is anything you would like little Johnny to know or would like to subscribe to my mass mailing alert service do not hesitate to email me at Johnny.neicho@sky.com

*as you could probably tell I'm feeling in a particularly Poncarrogant (yay i invented an adjective!) mood

Crackdown Review (X360)

2008-03-02T20:13:00.001Z

For years the love that gamers have for Rocket Launchers has rested uneasily with the love that I have for being the good guy. For some reason, whatever it is, the good guys never have the really cool guns. It's always the terrorists with the RPGs and really big machine guns, never the police.

Fortunately Crackdown sees things differently. You play a genetically enhanced super cop wearing something very much like a Nanosuit tasked with cleaning up the streets. The key feature of the game is that you are essentially a superhero, by the end of the game capable of causing biblical amounts of damage.

This certainly seems like a fun premise for a game, and usually in a review I would now go on to say how this links in with the story. The main problem with crackdown is there isn't one. You're simply chucked out into the city with 10 gang bosses per area to take down and once you've done that the game is pretty much over. The city has no crime, your skills will all be full and you will quickly become very, very bored. It's a pity that the game is so insubstantial in this way but it is, in part, offset by the skill advancement mechanics, which replace the story as the main hook of the game.

You start the game with your core abilities (strength, agility, explosives, firearms and driving) at 0. This means that your lock on aim is slow, your explosives do little damage, your jumping is unimpressive and cars handle quite badly. To improve each of your skills (apart from agility which I'll get to later) you kill gang members using the skill, for example running gang members over increases driving, shooting gang members increases firearms etc. As your skills increase you become more powerful, able to lock on faster, drive better and cause more damage with explosives. It's surprisingly compelling and I've wasted many a happy hour grinding to improve my skills. Well, I say grinding; it's a lot more amusing than killing endless goblins on WoW due to the alarming speed with which fights build up, especially in the later stages of the game. You'll soon find yourself surrounded by armies of hit squads trying to take you down and the thrill of seeing 20 of them flying up into the air thanks to a well placed grenade is amazing.

As I mentioned before the exception to the skill mechanic is agility. Rather than increasing that through combat you pick up agility orbs scattered in hard to reach places around the city. They're graded according to difficulty and, as with the rest of the skill system, very fun to try and seek out/get to. There are also hidden orbs which increase all of your skills around the city and finding them takes some doing. If all of this "finding things" in tedious then fear not, as the city is so chock full of pickups it's impossible not to find them, at least at first.

Ah, that city. Crackdown is set in Pacific City, the usual anonymous American fare we're used to seeing in games such as GTA except for one key difference: it's vertical. Most buildings can be scaled even at a low agility level and the rooftops of all the buildings are very intricately put together. You'll spend quite a lot of time at roof level and it really does feel like a whole different game once you're up there, watching the traffic snaking by below. The attention to detail throughout the city is just amazing and gets better with every new district you go to. Apparently the city is divided into individually modeled "blocks" and it shows. I've yet to find a building that isn't interesting in some way, be it the rubber duck hidden on the rooftop or the challenging climb to an agility orb.

For all the fun it is, there are a fair few problems that do spoil Crackdown slightly, aside from the lack of a story. For a start you get punished for killing civilians by losing skill points. I don't mind this system particularly but later in the game when your grenades have a hit radius akin to a nuke it's impossible not to end up killing innocents along with gang members and being punished for this can sometimes be very irritating. If they'd altered the system so it ignored the death of innocents when gang members were also killed it would be much better, as constantly losing skill points makes upgrading that extra bit harder. Another minor irritation is the commentator for the game, a disembodied voice who gives you guidance as you go along. At first he seems awesome, giving you tips as you progress like a tutorial. After a while, however, you realise that he goes on giving you the same tips constantly thoughout the game, whether you're a raw recruit or a seasoned player. It's quite annoying being told in the middle of a firefight that the bar in the top left shows your health, when you've known that for the past 5 hours. He's also quite often wrong, telling me I'm about to die when I've actually got full health.

Still, these few problems are nothing more than minor irritations which you soon forget as you 'splode gang members with grenades, kick them far into the air with super strength and then leap away over a tall building, cackling with glee. It's also of note that the game features online co-op, allowing it to be played all the way through with a friend- a nice side effect of having no story. In conclusion then this is simply one of the most joyous experiences on the X360 right now and it's great whether you want a casual 10 minute laugh or a proper 2 hour playing session.

I give the game 83%

New Iron Man Trailer

2008-02-29T18:45:00.002Z

So we get an extra day this month, this being a leap year and all. To celebrate we get a new Iron Man Trailer to watch. Woooo!

First, let us get the pessimism out of the way. Superhero movies have consistently let me down. Take X3, amazing trailer with a disappointing final product. Last summer let me down. Look at Spiderman 3, amazing potential with a disappointing final product. There are so many ways in which this could go wrong. The first Act could suck, for almost all origin stories do. The Final act could suck, because almost all final fights are anticlimactic. The middle could suck, due to a vagueness of baddies and motive. The direction could suck, the acting could suck, the special effects could suck. This could fail in so many ways.

Now for the hope. The idea of Iron man is awesome. The most important feature of a superhero is their heroics. Think what you will of Superman, is I was about to die, I believe that he could, and would, save me. A certain level of ability needs to be reached. The second most important feature is fragility. A hero needs to have problems, some moral choice or reason behind their actions. This is why Spiderman 2 was so brilliant, it was about Peter Parker. Robert Downey Junior can pull this off. If he can be unstoppable and troubled, then this film should be brilliant.

Secondly - have you seen how awesome that suit looks! It flies! I believe it flies! It has rockets that come out of his forearms! If they can pull this off, then it will be amazing!

Here is the link I used to see the trailer - http://www.empireonline.com/news/story.asp?NID=22092

This is a great trailer. I want to see this film, and it is coming very soon - May 2nd. I. Cannot. Wait.

me dancing, one for the scrap book

2008-02-29T16:07:00.000Z

J-Film #3 - 'Rambo'

2008-02-28T19:49:00.003Z

Well, hello guys, before I start digging into the lovely meat of the film I would like to commend Javaguy on such a witty piece of satirical literature, Everything he says about me is true, he indeed knows me very well, so congratulations Java, very, very well done. With that out the way time for 'Rambo'.

'Rambo' is a gory film, in-fact it borders on genocide and the kill rate could be compared to the holocaust and this makes it highly unsuitable for children, wimps and people who don't like people being shot, also it has allot of murder, torture and rape with the added bonus of footage of real Burmese atrocities. so, lovely you are thinking sarcastically and you would probably be thinking right, DO NOT SEE THIS IF THE IDEA OF RAMBO DEALING VERY STRICT REVENGE ON SAVAGES, WITH THEIR SAVAGERY BEING DEPICTED IN DETAIL. On the other hand, if like me, you are a sick demented bastard who likes to watch chavs be stabbed in the kidneys repeatedly while screaming in in-human agony, this my friend, is the film for you.

The story is basic Rambo, set in Burma and thats about it, the most important thing about this film has been its superior action. The first thing worth pointing out on this front, would be that of the ballistics and the way they blow stuff apart. Now, i was fortunate enough to have an ex-soldier sitting next to me in the cinema, who upon the first scene was amazed at just how realistic bullet sounds, effects and wounds were, and this is an actual quote "Wow, I'm gonna start ducking in a minute!" 'Nuff said.

Now, don't get me wrong the very idea of Rambo is corny, but this film has NO cheesy lines that make you grimace and the few breaks in the action take nothing away from this short but tense piece of art, the pace is fast visually eloquent and elegant, and the visceral adrenaline rush you feel as yet another cardboard cut out rapist is blown to pieces with a 50. cal machine gun, is nothing but truly awe inspiring and when i say blown to pieces i mean blown to pieces. assorted anatomical components fly thick and furiously in this utterly amazing chunk of brilliant cinema, the music blares out as AK47's churn out slug after slug and a barrette 50. cal blows Burmese soldiers 50 feet down the road and there really is nothing to fault, seriously, this is like Yahtzee's review of portal, this is a mute review, 'Rambo' is good, very, very good.

The structure is wonderful as well, The Burmese are built up so evilly it's in-human AND THIS JUST EXACERBATES YOU INSATIABLE BLOOD-LUST, YOU WANT THESE PEOPLE KILLED SO BADLY YOU ARE WILLING TO DISMEMBER GHANDI TO GET JUSTICE!!!! Sorry i shouldn't have go t so pumped there, my legs are still shaking from the adrenaline thats how good this film really is, shame there was only two flamethrowers though...

If you can be bothered to look however there are small American allegories popping up everywhere, but i didn't eve notice till my hate fulled Dad pointed them out, so, the best way to think of the film upon entering is a 90 minute chunk of American action and the American's are great and just appreciate this superb rage filled adventure for what it is; and thats why this small negative paragraph is stuck right on the bottom, it is insignificant, to a very great degree. see this film NOW.

Rundown -

Shooting: 8

Characterization: 9

Soundtrack: 7

Plot: 7

Effects: 10

Variable field dependent on context and genre - YES, YES KILL THE MOTHERFUCKER NOW!!!!!! NOW!!!!!!!! YEEEEEEEEES! - 10

Overall J-score: 9/10 J-FILM MUST SEE

If there is anything you would like little Johnny to know or would like to subscribe to my mass mailing alert service do not hesitate to email me at Johnny.neicho@sky.com

A J-Film review. No, that’s JAVA FILM :D

2008-02-28T16:52:00.004Z

The other day I watched a film. I quite liked it and so am going to review it now, just like jsnuk. Actually, that's a lie because this film is a PROPER FILM. It doesn't have any clever subtexts. It contains no metaphors. It is, in other words, what films should be like. It's also in black and white. Not because the director wanted to explore a complex issue that could only be realized in black and white but because its old and in the olden days colour hadn't been invented. I therefore won't be reviewing it like Jsnuk because I won't devote several paragraphs to exploring any complex figurative elements.

I now realise that I'm a paragraph in and still haven't actually mentioned the film's name. Grudgingly I shall now do so: The film is called 'The Wrong Arm of The Law', made in 1961 starring Peter Sellers. It's a comedy caper film very much in the style of The Italian Job. Being made in the 60s its innocent stuff, with the crooks apologizing profusely to the police when they accidentally hit them. It's certainly a far cry from the chavs of today and it did make me a little sad, seeing how innocent times were in the 1960s. Of course it's hardly a representation of the crime around then, some of which was awful, but still.

The star of the film, as I said, is Peter Sellers, a renowned comic and rightly so. Famous for playing Inspector Clouseau in The Pink Panther he steals the show here, showing off his mastery of accents. The film has many other actors but I can't be bothered to write about them. They were alright.

I don't really know what to write about next, not wanting to go all Jsnuk on you all and start telling the story so I shall put this thing out of its misery. It isn't really an amazing film, clearly aimed at a family audience and perhaps a little limited because of this, relying mainly on slapstick humour. Still, it's fun, and that's all that matters, isn't it. ISN'T IT, JSNUK?

I shall give the film a rating of 8, as it had an Aston Martin DB5 in it, which I liked.

If you have anything you'd like little java to know then you can sod right off, he doesn't like being referred to as little.

Why I hate delays...

2008-02-24T13:50:00.004Z

Valve are taking their time. Left 4 dead is not coming until Spetember-ish. I had so been hoping for a spring release, but that seems not to be. I understand there is no hurry, and I understand they want to make it perfect, for L4D is coming with an entire new steam feature, but I hate knowing that I am going to have to wait, when I have already been waiting for a very long time...

Team Fortress 2 is also progressing slowly. Badlands arrived, and this makes me happy. However, the map I am really waiting for is Goldrush. This is an entirely new game style, not just another Control Point map. Every day I start up steam expectantly... and every day my soul dies a little. I am a patient guy; I waited for Heroes to come to BBC so I could watch it in widescreen without adverts, but when they are this close, it is painful.

I also can't wait for a new "Meet the..." video. Hopefully one is immintent....

And it is not only Valve who give me pain. Blizzard are just as bad. I am not a WoW guy, but since my PC is kinda old now, I am excited to the max by Starcraft 2. This is predicted to come out late summer, but Blizzard alway take their time, so I am already expecting major delays.

And the final kick in the teeth.. the Star Trek movie has been pushed from it's Christmas 2008 release to May 2009.

The upside, I have no doubt in my mind that all of these will be the better for their delayed releases. They will all be awesome. Just not yet....

Javaserver festivities!

2008-02-23T09:18:00.003Z

How did you spend your birthday last year? With some relatives? The odd friend? Well, this year Hotdog Man spent his birthday with 20 other Javaserver players, and we had a bit of a party, courtesy of tf_birthday 1

an MP3 of us all "singing" Happy Birthday is coming soon, but for now we can remember the day with pictures :)

Picture

Are games art?

2008-02-19T19:41:00.001Z

The debate about games and art has gone on for a few years now, with gamers arguing that they are and directors arguing they are not. Over the past few days I've considered this subject myself and have come to a fairly simple conclusion.

If I was to give the names of a few comedy films- Bruce Almighty, Rat Race, Airplane, to name but a few, I'd be scorned by movie directors everywhere. Their mocking laughter would echo round the walls of their Georgian mansions. If, however, I was to mention The Godfather, Amilie and Atonement these same directors would nod their heads, grunt their acknowledgement and let me taste their 1852 claret.

So why is this? Why is one group of films considered to be more artistic than the other? The simple answer is their purpose. When you go into the cinema to watch Bruce Almighty you go there for entertainment. When you go to watch The Brief Encounter you don't enjoy yourself per se, you go for the experience, to be taken on an intellectual journey, to explore emotions that you wouldn't feel if it were not for empathy with the characters that the film develops.

Put simply: For me the key factor that differentiates between an arty film and a trashy film is whether you watch the film for the experience or for the entertainment. For example you don't "enjoy" a sad film. You watch it to be affected by it.

Using this criterion for games, for me, solves the "are games art?" question. If I played a game for the experience, to be told a story, because I had an emotional attachment for the characters then it truly is art. If I played a game solely for its mechanics then it is not:

Art

Max Payne 1/2

GTA San Andreas (I got really involved in the story, yet many people didn't)

Oblivion (side quests, not the main story)

Mafia (I felt really quite choked up on occasions)

Not art

Everything else

Obviously this list is only valid for me. Whether you played a game for the experience is personal to you. Maybe you only played oblivion because you liked killing trolls. Maybe you found the Half Life 2 storyline engaged you.

Another interesting thing is that, for me at least, the number of non artistic games far outweighs the number of artistic ones. I think this is due to the history of gaming. Until very recently computers haven't had the power to tell a story convincingly. Gaming first developed purely for entertainment with titles Frogger, Space Invaders and Doom having no narrative whatsoever. To some extent game designers are still stuck in this era, as are the film directors so quick to criticize gaming. Is this a bad thing? I think not. I love nothing more than losing myself in a match of UT3 or TF2. These games certainly aren't art in the traditional sense, but what they lose in that they make up for in being fun to play, UT3 is pure escapism in a way that Max Payne is not.

Anyway, these are just my thoughts. You may have a different opinion. I've made a very simple distinction between what is and isn't art in this article but at the end of the day it's up to you what is and isn't art. It's a very personal thing, and something that will no doubt cause debate far into the future.

J-Film #2 - 'There will be blood'

2008-02-19T19:20:00.004Z

I shall start this edition of J-film with a formal plea, and that is, please sign up to my alert service for new and up and coming reviews so i can help get the word about the new review across allot easier, thank you. All you have to do is E-mail me expressing interest and i shall add oyu to my mass mailing list and send a confirmation E-mail to you!

Now, to the matter at hand, 'There will be blood' is good, very good, better than 'Mandy Lane' in fact and thats saying something. But, although it may be good, its is reaching around the 3 hour mark, which, to some, is far to long for a film; but then I'm a Cine-art Fag so feel free not to see this film on the premise that its long and boring to the common or garden chav. But with the insults out of the way its time to focus on what makes this film so spectacular.

The film does suffer a little from some areas of disjointedness, but this is to be expected as it is developed from an equally arty book entitled 'oil!' and these sorts of art-to-art cross-medium transfers are always hard on the subject matter, but in truth its extremely artistic and seems to lose none of its actual direction during the cross over.

The story begins with an out of luck miner named William Plainview discovering some sort of diamond or something (I was picking up my drink at the time, while simultaneously trying to open my minstrel packet) which makes him wealthy, or at least wealthy enough to start digging for oil with his some H.W. and after finding some 'black gold' he becomes truly rich and begins to spread his arms around the whole state. While working on a new and recently successful derrick, Plainview is approached by a young man by the name of Paul Sunday, who is handed some money for an exciting oil prospect; so, with his son in tow, Daniel Plainview heads up to 'Little Boston' and quickly buys the whole place, which is where our tale of ever increasing corruption, greed, revenge at the world and of 'having a fulfilled life' begins.

Most of the story seems to lead nowhere at the time it is viewed, but upon the close of the film the artistic destination and 'point' come vividly apparent, if you can ignore the soundtrack, yes thats right, although it shows how good I think this film is, that i can only find two flaws to this film, the soundtrack is awesomely crap, in fact allot of the subtler plot movements and messages that the film likes to bring up can be missed by pondering "Where the hell did they dig up this horrifying soundtrack!?" It really is horrifying and thats because it is a Horror soundtrack, it barely ever fits the pace or the plot of the film and when it does its still a lump of steaming turd among the pristine cinnamon rolls that are the other aspects of this great work of art. You all remember that air raid siren remix thing from uncounted horror movies? even that makes an appearance in the opening moments of the movie as does that strange soundtrack where you can just about hear whispers in the background! It's appalling, but luckily you can eventually numb yourself out to it at around the 1 hour mark.

Well the acting is fairly awesome (I have never been one to spot acting and an actors performance has never really done much for me) and the shooting is quite nice with some lovely oil fire scenes and the characterization is absolutely superb, with all the characters reacting perfectly to their situation and developing on levels more complex than anything mainstream like 'Jumper' or even the masterfully characterized 'Spider-man' films.

Theres not really much more to say, this film delves into unexplored crevasses of art and philosophical speculation, It has one of the most memorable end scenes and lines and cannot be faulted on anything but the stupid soundtrack and occasional leaps in the story, which is obviously more better suited to a book, but still retains an ultimate aura of tantalization and wonder, that your sure not to forget any time soon, if at all.

Next time, i shall be reviewing 'Rambo' (if i dont finally sucumb and go an watch 'Jumper') and you should look forward to 'Diary of the dead', George A. Romero's Zombies gone the way of 'Blair Witch' and, note the groan of disappointment, 'Clover field' with a 'Steady Cam' twist

Rundown -

Shooting: 7

Characterization: 9

Soundtrack: 3

Plot: 9

Effects: 8

Variable field dependent on context and genre - Artistic Direction and Questions raised: 9

Overall J-score: 8/10

If there is anything you would like little Johnny to know or would like to subscribe to my mass mailing alert service do not hesitate to email me at Johnny.neicho@sky.com

A translation of DDude’s review of my review of reviews. Review coming soon.

2008-02-19T18:54:00.001Z

DDude's review, translated:

Javaguy wanted to be funny rather than impartial, so people find the funny to be LOL but then they don't actually learn anything. He doesn't actually talk about reviewing at all but does show how to make funny openings with words. He also used custard creams, which makes him smart and possibly Chinese. Also ancient.

I think I'm going to steal Java's review score because it pwns. He gives an insight into how BLOODY ANNOYING writing a review is but otherwise it's a useless, crap piece of writing that isn't worthy of the HTML its formatted in.

I'm Back!

2008-02-18T18:16:00.002Z

I'm Back from Berlin. Had a great time, even if it is freezingly cold this time of year!

In order to create some kind of existential crisis in which the universe will collapse in on itself, I am going to review Java's review on reviewing.

Confused? Since I got 100% in my Hamlet exam for A-Level English Lit, it seems to have gone to my head slightly....

Here we can see a clear point from the reviewer, in which his basic instinct to direct himself towards wit from his own personality takes priority over a desire for neutrality. This is a mixed thing, for while it creates an attachment between the writer and reader, it also shatters the positive correlation between the more informative side of reviewing. For example, he provides and insight into how one may use cultural or syntactic elements to provide an insight into the nature of a game, as is clear with his wording of "Theme Hospital is like marmite. You either love it or you hate it." Skilfully, he the "custard-cream gambit" to explain the process of reviewing, a highly developed piece of wordplay which is devolved from an ancient Chinese proverb.

To conclude, I give Java's review 68%. While he provides an insight into how the process of reviewing works, his focus is directed away form any linkage for the difficulties of opening and closing reviews with the body of text that is required in order to make reviewing possible for the masses.

Reviewing. A Review. This title gets 43%.

2008-02-16T22:58:00.001Z

Today I am reviewing reviewing. As I typed that sentence word decided that I'd gone mad and mistakenly typed reviewing twice, so deleted it. Word is wrong. I hate word. Just look at it, sitting there with its blue UI.

Anyway, on with the review. The main problem with "reviewing" is that unless you get a decent start to the review you may as well give up, and when you do get a decent start it's nigh on impossible to go smoothly from there to the rest of the review. Once the first few paragraphs are done you're fine, but it's damned hard to get past the first sentence, let alone any further. I have 5 or so review starts in My Documents. Most of them I didn't save but here are a few:

I consider it my own small protest against the foolishly big, irritatingly short range weapons available that I always snipe on UT3. I would say it's a peaceful protest but the UT3 announcer shouting HEADSHOT at me is hardly peaceful.

Nope, don't like that one. Too difficult to move on from there to the game mechanics.

My engine has started to rattle. Anxiously I stare down at the dials, leavers and buttons before me. I don't know what any of them do so I throttle back my engine to preserve it. The rattling becomes louder. Guessing that the end is nigh I calmly lower my undercarriage and throttle back some more. The rattle reaches a climax, becomes a screech, then silence. The wind whistling past my now diving plane is the only sound I hear. Looking down I see a clearing in the forest- the perfect landing spot. I put my flaps to the landing position and begin to glide smoothly down. A textbook forced landing. Or not. My plane wheels disintegrate on the rough grass- plowing my plane into the ground. The wings sheer off but eventually I skid to a halt. Welcome to IL2.

Boring.

Theme hospital is like Marmite. You either love it or you hate it. Many people would be turned away the instant they saw the cute pixelart graphics. Many people would mock its cheery soundtrack. Many people would eschew it in favour of something gritty and free roaming. Many people would laugh at me if I admitted that I got owned by it again and again and again. Like marmite this game hides a dark and sadistic core beneath its soft, gooey exterior.

Nice, but irritating to move on from, as you're stuck talking about the cuteness for ages.

So you see, starting reviews is rubbish. This is in part made up for with the glorious middle sections of the review. They're like the delicious filling of a custard cream, sliding effortlessly onto the page. However, like the filling of a custard cream the paragraphs are shorter than the hard bits, and eventually you come to the end. Summing up a game is annoying, because you've just written 600 words on the bloody thing and now have to condense those into 20 words that are going to be remembered, thus are the most important. This frankly sucks, but then at least you get to making up a score. This is easy. Think if you liked the game and pluck a suitable sounding number out of the air.

I give reviewing 68%. Its good, but a lot of hassle to begin with and a frustrating ending.

Audiosurf, A Brief Review.

2008-02-16T12:26:00.007Z

I like music. I come from a family of music teachers after all. I have, however, never invested in any music games for a variety of reasons, though mainly because I hate most of the songs on the track list. Audiosurf is a music game that sidesteps that issue by letting you use any music you want. The game works by scanning the music track you select and turning it into a road, well, more of a rollercoaster really, with the track going up during calm sections and down during intense sections. The game also scatters blocks on this road for you to hit in time to the music, Guitar Hero style, which really draws you into the music like never before. The road is divided into three lanes so you'll constantly be dodging around trying to hit/avoid the right blocks in time to the music. Every time you hit a block you see a shower of coloured particles on the screen, making for an amazingly intense, yet flexible, experience. Take Don't Stop Me Now for example. You start going gently upwards with a few blocks to hit before suddenly hurtling down when the main song starts. It's nothing short of incredible.

And yet now I am at a loss for what else to say. It's simply a wonderful game, perfect for anyone with even the slightest interest in music. You can play it in a variety of ways thanks to a variety of ships to control- either trying to hit one colour of block while avoiding another one, or building up connect 4 style stacks of blocks, which is more tactical. The final mode has you controlling 2 ships at once, which can be done in co-op. Conclusion: Buy it! You'll never look at music in the same way again.

Labeled Screenshot Here

J-Film #1 - 'All the boys love Mandy Lane'

2008-02-15T22:54:00.007Z

Well, good evening chaps, as you should know my name is John Neicho and I'm almost as godlike as the almighty Java (God why does the stupid spell checker keep trying to make me write my sir name as Nacho goddammit!) and I am here for the sole purpose of enlightening you to the wonderful world of cinema; and let us face it, what a wonderful world it is from cheap entertainment like alien versus predator, to crap game spin offs such as tomb raider and to great intellectual war tales such as flags of our fathers, cinemas has given us such joy my friends and I, you friendly neighborhood film buff am here to share and amplify the wonder!

Now, I move swiftly on to my first ever review, and you'll be pleased to know i start off on a good film unlike *cough* Clover field, which tried to be two genres at the same time *cough* This film is wondrously entitled 'All the boys love Mandy Lane' but only at the conclusion of this film does it become apparent that this is an excellent title and it is worth noting at this point that its very hard to review a film such as this, as much of its greatness is revealed as the story progresses and not form the get go, but you don't want spoilers now do you?

The story is that of an incredibly beautiful, late high school girl who goes for a party with a group of weird druggy nutters who keep trying to plow her pink, excuse my language my intellectual demeanor slipped for a moment there. But apart from these meager details , at the risk of letting slip those dreaded spoilerz of war, there is not much more i can tell you apart from the fact that about 7 people die during the film.

The film is brought back as a kind of reincarnation of the 80's hack and slash films, which i doubt many of you will have seen, and i myself had to do research on; and I have been told that the story and the twist at the end are both terribly hackneyed fro anyone around 40 something, but lets face it the average age of Steam goers and the like is about 15, so for us its incredibly fresh and a nice relief from such Hollywood tripe as the guiltily enjoyable 'clover field' or the brilliantly crap 'Aliens versus Predator: Requiem' its fun, with a nice inappropriate soundtrack and a madman launching fireworks at people.

So, what have i covered? It's good, check, It's got a great story for someone of my age (I'm 15 don't tell the coppers i got into it) check, it's a relief from the norm, check, the violence, ahhh the violence. Well this brings me to the bad point of the movie and to be honest it lets itself down quite badly on this front, for a film trying to re-imagine the hack and slash of yore it is horribly mild, especially for an 18! The violence starts off not to abruptly and shockingly, but none-the-less violently, after giving a blow job to Jake, cocaine-taking-bitch no. 1 has a shotgun push into her mouth and through some rough encouragement it breaks her jaw apart, cue blood and groans while looking at the person next to you. So, now your started off you can hear the fat bloke-sitting-two-seats-along's heartbeat like a Moria drum, but it rather disappointingly trails off form their, its not gory in the slightest. But leaving taht point behind as we climb another Mayan pyramid of move greatness we come to my last two points, the characterization and the shooting.

'All the boys love Mandy Lane' has excellent characterization in a film where so many character are thrust upon you so quickly, and when each one is killed, you feel both relieved for the bad things the person has done and you are upset at the good inside of them, and not giving away any spoilerz everyone means everyone. ending upon a high greater than the assorted cocaine-taking-bitches of this film i talk now of the camera work, which is just indescribably excellent, it would make make Bambi's mum come alive again it's so wonderful, and I really cant describe it it just blew me away on every single front imaginable!

That concludes my very first film review, next i shall possibly review 'There will be blood' or 'Rambo' (which is supposed to have the highest kill count know to man, so should be good, providing i can get in that is) and I strongly recommend this film to you, if you are not old enough to watch it and cannot sneak in, pirate it, who cares i disagree with this kind of shitty censorship anyway; and on that not i bid you a due.

Rundown -

Shooting: 9

Characterization: 7

Plot: 8

Effects: 8

Variable field dependent on context and genre - Violence: 4

Overall J-score: 7.5/10

If there is anything you would like little Johnny to know do not hesitate to email me at Johnny.neicho@sky.com.

Alltalk

2008-02-13T10:35:00.002Z

The Alltalk debate is one that I have been mulling over for the past few weeks. It all comes about as a result of the Javaserver, the place where I play the majority of my Team Fortress 2 games. In the old days there was the PCGamer server, which would always be slow to update, and often crash for days at a time, disappearing after every update. I loved it. It was the first time I had found a server to play on where I started to recognise the people, in that specific online-gaming way, who lpayed it with me. It was great. It had teamspeak. Then time progressed things along, and the Javaserver was born. Most of the people moved from PCG to Javasever, and I was content. But something was very different, and it was unnerving. It was Alltalk.
The idea behind Alltalk is written in the name. If you use a microphone, and talk, then all on the server will hear you. With Teamspeak, only your team will hear you. This massively affects the words you say. With Teamspeak, glorious tactics emerge. With Alltalk, banter with the enemy enlivens the game. I still can’t decide which is better.
There is a downside to Alltalk, it can get quite loud. Some people insist on screaming at every kill and at every death. I don’t like loud; it’s just the way I am. There is also a downside to Teamspeak, it can be very isolated. You are divided from half of the players, which is not so good at creating such a friendly atmosphere.
Is there a compromise? I don’t see how. Having both Teamspeak and Alltalk would lead to much hilarious confusion, as people shout their tactics to the enemy. Is it even possible, to have both enabled at once? Can I assign two buttons in TF2? Should I have researched this before I started writing?
These are the things that I think about on public transport. One fact emerges form all this however: TF2 rules, and I hope all TF2-ers never leave.

--- News ---
Sorry about having not updating things recently. I have had a crazy time at college, mock exams and coursework! I am gonna be gone for a bit, for I have a trip to Berlin planned. Be back soon. Any comments you may have, feel free to post them below.

Cloverfield

2008-02-03T21:52:00.000Z

I have just blogged about Cloverfield over on my blog. I dont want to take up too much room here, so I'm just gonna like to it. Take a look if you want.

http://thinkingddude.blogspot.com/2008/02/cloverfield.html

Summary
For those who don’t want to link - It is great. The characters are rubbish, but that’s the point. The camera-work is amazing and most of the effects are seamless. It has flaws, but is unlike any film I have ever seen before.

Freelancer - Review

2008-02-01T19:23:00.000Z

Freelancer

Where to start. This is a HUGE game. First I'm going to tackle which game genre it fits into. Hmm. Arcade/Sim I guess. In more straight forward terms it's a game filled with space ships, guns and explosions. Lots of the latter. In the review I based it all on what I had seen in the Trial Edition. The Trial allows you to play through the first main mission and allows you a few ships.

I booted up the game and the first thing I noticed was an awe-inspiring title. The words “FREELANCER” in big white letters set against the background of the universe. What a way to start a game.

Freelancer has lots and lots of beautiful cinematics which are thankfully unstoppable as missing them is a crime. They are well scripted and look amazing in the urban planets. Apart from the weird “I am totally smashed” NPC eyes, the NPC's animations and emotions are admirable.

The controls are 100% keyboard friendly, being controlled with the Mouse and WASD keys.

After absorbing some incredible well scripted intros I was tasked with finding a job. The interaction interface is understandable and really easy to use. At the top there are a layer of buttons with which you can use to interact with the environment and vendors. After finding myself a job with the Liberty Defence Force I was shown my ship which I would be enforcing justice with. Sure, it was tiny and a bit decrepit compared to some other ships I had seen but I instantly fell in love with it.

I clicked launch and gasped as my ship slowly hovered, then flew straight over the beautiful city in which I was previously based. I took off following the objectives that were clearly portrayed at the side of my screen. As soon as my ship entered space I was greeted with an authoritative voice which my HUD told me was emanating from an allied ship whom I would be questing, no that sounds wrong, adventuring with. I could instantly tell how different his character was compared to the bar owned back down on the planet I had dispatched from. After some chit-chat, my new partner “King” ,as he is called, and I flew over to admire a huge beast of a ship which, from what I can only assume belonged to someone vewy vewy important. My camera suddenly zoomed in one approaching rogue ships as a haggard female voice announced to the rogue ships they should turn back or be shot down. The rogue ships didn't seem to care much as they swooped in gracefully and nuked the dukes ship. Instead of feeling angry at the rogues, which I did, I was staring in awe at the explosions which were glowing all over my screen. Angelic. After the cinematic ended, I was ordered to open fire and I obeyed mindlessly, wanting to test out the lasers which were bolted to my bucket of rust.

The combat is absorbing but slightly arcade style. Baring in mind that this is the first combat section of the game, I can't stop imagining what the final battles are like with all of the fully upgraded weapons. Now seems an appropriate time to rant in blatant admiration towards the wonderful graphics effects. It is an old game, so it's not very demanding, but the graphics are simply beautiful. I'm trying not to use that word too much but frankly, this game deserves all the praise it deserves. After you have destroyed a ship you simply hit “B” to use a tractor beam to, err, suck in all the loot, no, goods. After destroying sed rogue ships I felt attached to King. Not in that kind of way, sick readers, sort of like loyalty.

Once I had terminated the rogues I was clearly designated to a “Waypoint”. These are portals to another location in the solar system. It's really easy to do. Just cruise up to the waypoint, dock with it and wait. You enter the portal doctor who style with all the flashing colours and emerge into a totally different yet still awe-inspiring world. It's moments like these which make freelancer such a worthwhile buy. The levels of exploration and free-roaming are immense and the opportunity for role playing is also high.

The game also features multiplayer which is just like the single player campaign, you start with a basic ship but you have to find jobs and adventures, on some servers PVP is enabled which can be enjoyable.

If you have a fiver in your pocket and you are wondering what to do.. Buy this game. Well worth every minute of “Bloody Awesome”-ing you will do.

92%

-Screenshot Album coming soon-

-Hidden

Freelancer

2008-01-31T21:31:00.000Z

Yeah.. It IS an old game but from the trial which I have played it looks totally awesome. I'm installing it as I speak. Expect some hardcore amateur review soon .

-Hidden

My Football Manager Idea

2008-01-31T20:44:00.000Z

Football Manager is great because it is a day-dream simulator. That is all it is, and it is great. I have sunk days into FM07, because it is a day-dream. The dots have names. They have personalities.

Anderson of Manchester United missed a game because of family problems at home in Brazil. This needs to be in football manager. Picture it, if you will: My star striker's mother is ill. The FA cup semi-final is 9 days away. Now, do I tell him to get on with training, or give him a week off, or tell him to stay with his mother until she is better. This decision would affect his relationship with me, his morale, and his performance. It would make him more alive. He would have a little extra story, just for him.

Or would this go wrong? Would FM lose the football aspect that makes it so great?

Maybe a balance? Sports Interactive, your game is great because I love my team. I love them like I love Alyx, or Arthas, or Leon Kennedy. They are my team. Smaller choices could affect their personality, and their performance.

Football Manager is a dream; it is limitless.

Driver Parallel Lines.

2008-01-31T12:04:00.001Z

We all carry guilty secrets. Hidden, for example, lives on the Isle of Man. My number one guilty secret is probably that I quite enjoyed Driver 3. Yes, it is utterly broken in every way. But that made it all the more hilarious and it did have some wonderful car physics.

It was thus with hope that I preordered the PC version of Driver Parallel Lines some months ago. It was rated quite a bit higher than Driver 3 by critics which I took to be a good sign and I really like New York as a setting, if not as much as I do Nice or Istanbul, both of which were in Driver 3.

The basic premise of Driver Parallel Lines is that you're a small time crook in 70s NY. You get betrayed and are locked up until 2006, where the game resumes and you have to kill all your friends. The idea of two different time periods is a nice one but since the game is so short you'll never really stay in any one period long enough to get in any way attached to the city, making the changes (shops become derelict, buildings replaced etc)a lot less interesting than Reflections clearly wanted them to be.

Part of the problem with Parallel lines is that it manages to be really very bland, despite the potential of the setting. The lead character (named The Kid, which shows how much effort went into him) is just a walking stereotype, as are those around him. The maturity of the Driver series has certainly long gone here, with attempts at GTA style vulgar humour shoehorned into every cutscene to the point where you can almost the devs giggling childishly in the background at the 50^th mention of an expletive. It's not quite as overtly gratuitous as GTA: SA was but it's certainly coming close.

It is actually almost impossible not to compare Parallel Lines to GTA as it apes it in everything it does. It's got glowing markers. It's got side missions (some of which are quite entertaining) and through this endless copying the point of the driver series has somehow been lost. Cars are much arcadeier this time around, with none of the attention to detail they put into the physics and damage of Driver 3. Driver used to be all about racing through city streets with time running out and the police on your tail, but that's long gone. Now it's about lock on shooting and swearing.

To be fair to Reflections there are a couple of really nice features in the game. You now have two wanted bars, one for your car and one for your character. The upshot of this is that if you commit a crime in a car and are able to dump it then you can walk away scot free. If you're seen however then the police will recognize your character and things get a lot trickier until you realise can teleport to your garage at any time when you're not being actively chased which wipes your wanted level completely. A nice feature then, but like much of the game a missed opportunity. Another nice feature is the proliferation of litter on the streets. It's nice to sweep dramatically though it and it adds believability, something that GTA could do with a little more of.

In conclusion then Parallel lines isn't strictly speaking a Bad Game like Driver 3 was, it's just utterly charmless. The odd flashes of innovation are eclipsed by the dullness of the city (despite the awesomeness of New York), the shallowness of the characters and the clichéd plot. As much as it pains me, Drivers biggest fan, to say this the series really has lost the plot entirely.

59%

TF2 - Ubercharged.net

2008-01-30T20:03:00.000Z

I was exploring the deep depths of the interweb and I found a totally awesome satirical blog.
Link

*Insert the "LOL" here* LOL!

Hidden.

Max Payne in 200 words

2008-01-30T19:03:00.001Z

This was my first review. I hated it. It took me hours to write and I wasn't at all happy with the end result. Still, I kept going and now I can produce stuff I at least like :)

. . .

“Hey” mumbles a goon, not sounding the least bit surprised that I’m lunging at him with Uzis. “What the hell?” burbles another, accidentally blasting his friend in the back with his shotgun. As a shooter, Max Payne isn’t really very good. The AI is pretty unconvincing, the levels fairly bland and the guns lacklusture.

Lacklusture that is, when used normally. The big feature of Max Payne is the ability to dive (literally) into slow mo at the push of a button. This is when the game gets good. The Ingrams, usually sounding like a box of paperclips being dropped suddenly sound like some kind of automatic artillery gun. (Note to self- find game with automatic artillery gun) The terribly unconvincing groans of enemies suddenly sound like the roaring of… roar-y things and your mouth will fall open in reverential awe.

Your mouth may be open in reverential awe, but your brow will be furrowed with hate for the (disappointingly short) duration of Max Payne thanks to its frankly brilliant story. The core content of it may be nothing new (wife dead, revenge) but it is told with glorious hand painted sections of graphic novel narrated with a razor sharp film noir script.

All in all then, Max Payne is one of the best games ever made. The bread and butter components are not all that amazing in themselves but the incredible story and dramatic slow-mo takedowns more than make up for this

90%

IL2 Sturmovik 1946: Review and LOLs.

2008-01-30T17:00:00.001Z

"oh NO!"

We all burst out laughing, having been witness to one of the funniest sights in gaming. What game are we playing? TF2? Nope. GTA? Nope. We were playing IL2, a super realistic flight simulation first released in 2001 and now available in a bundle with all of its expansions for just £15.

The source of the comedy was my slightly useless flying. After stalling horribly I bailed out, only for the plane to fall on my pilot as he fell, causing it to split in two and explode. (The plane that is, not the pilot, who fell quickly to the ground, dead.) Another time Sithy and I attempted to take off on an aircraft carrier. Both our planes went straight into the sea and got promptly run over by the carrier. Again we were both doubled up laughing for many minutes afterwards.

In a vague attempt to make this a serious review I will refrain from providing any more examples of multiplayer hilarity, but suffice to say there are many, such as whe.. no, no. I mustn't. Back to serious reviewing. For your £15 you get IL2, the original Russian front flight sim released in 2001 and all its expansions/sequels: Forgotten Battles, Forgotten Battles Aces and Pacific Fighters, which add up to make what is quite possibly the largest flight sim in the known world. The reason for the name IL2: 1946 is that the pack also hypothetically extends WWII into 1946, allowing the inclusion of some incredible jets, and one crazy VTOL rocket/fan thing, making a total of well over 200 planes. Obviously most of them aren't flyable but those that are are all beautifully modelled, complete with fully 3D cockpits.

Ah, those cockpits. There is something to be said for a full 360^o field of view. As well as being spectacular it increases the immersion tenfold, allowing you to nervously peer around the slightly sparse but acceptable environments when the message "enemies spotted: 11 o'clock high" inevitably flashes onto your screen. It also allows your mean friends to flick your view down with a crafty mouse movement when you're in the middle of a dogfight. I'm looking at you, Dulls. If there is one quibble I have about the graphics it's the lack of an anti-aliasing option (fixed with hardware profiles) and the slightly short draw distance. It would have been nice to have an option to extend it beyond the still fairly close maximum currently available.

So far I've mainly talked about the multiplayer modes but do not take that to mean that the SP of the game is anything less than a credit to it. If you want to jump straight into some dog fighting action then you can, thanks to an instant action mode comparable to the "Quick Combat" on Microsoft's slightly crap Combat Flight Simulator. If you have a little more patience and are able to actually take off then you can try a single mission, typically taking half an hour and tasking you with flying somewhere, killing something and getting back again. There is also a campaign mode where you select your air force and are given missions as you go along. I must admit that I was slightly disappointed by the campaign mode. It lacked the feeling of immersion that is present in dynamic campaigns of other Sims. For example in Red Baron you were also given random missions to undertake but if your pilot died during one then you were out. Similarly if he was injured or crashed you'd spend a bit of time in hospital. If IL2's campaign had these features it would truly excel, as it is you can just retry missions if you die which means that the campaign is little more than a stream of single missions.

Still, the small issues I have with the game are totally eclipsed by the wonderful flight model, the hilarious multiplayer and the dogged dedication to realism that really makes this game shine like the brylcreamed hair of a WWII ace. Highly recommended.

92%

Technology

2008-01-27T14:25:00.000Z

We, as a species, have made some great inventions and discoveries over our brief time on this planet. The written word, antibiotics and standing on our hind legs all come to mind. But we have also made some real big mistakes. One of the biggest comes from our arrogance and self-importance. It is the invention that I hate. It actually makes me physically sick. It is the Automatic Door.

Automatic doors seemed like such a good idea, as anyone who has ever watched Star Trek will testify. They open - for you! They sense your presence, and they should be just so cool!

But this is wrong. This is wrong because the automatic door never works properly. They are always broken, opening when they shouldn't because of a strong breeze, or remaining closed while you stand infront of them. They just don’t work.

This is even more annoying to me, because the door is the perfect invention. I don’t want to simplify this; doors have evolved over time, with the introduction of hinges, pivots and door-frames. During the renaissance, doors began to be used for effect, creating ambience in a room. Doors have, over the centuries, evolved. But the electronic door is a monstrosity.

Opening a door requires minimal effort. Attempting to force my way through a broken automatic door requires more effort. They don’t work. They are always broken.

Inventions do need to evolve. Take, for example, the simplest invention: The Wheel. The wheel has grown up. One wheel can give you a wheelbarrow, or a unicycle. Combining a wheel with another gives you stability, combining it with a combustion engine allows you to travel faster, combining it with brakes allows you to stop, combining it with suspension gives you a better ride. The wheel has evolved, so far as to the point of introducing tyres and tyre pressure, one of the most complicated sciences imaginable. It led the way to a whole new batch of inventors and inventions.

The door didn't. It could be adapted, used in new ways and perfected. But it didn't need this radical overhaul; it didn't need to become something new. It is what it is, and I prefer what it is.

Inventions change. Things evolve over time. But sometimes this is not a good thing. Sometimes it is. The automatic door is not yet perfect, and until it is, I will hate it. Does this make me a bad person?

TF2 Update - Preview

2008-01-24T22:52:00.000Z

Zomg TF2 is getting some new maps and unlocks. Hoping to write a feature length preview later on. Have no free time at the moment... Anyway, in the meantime I advise you to watch "A day in the life of a turret" on youtube. Stay Tuned.

Hidden

Podasts and Me

2008-01-20T19:13:00.000Z

I am a fan of podcasts. They make public transport bearable, and they are the reason why I have sunk so much time into Football Manager.

I have listened to the PCGamer podcast for a long time indeed. The British one is my favorite, but since they are not so involved in this story I will leave them out here..

PCG USA have been going for nearly 120 podcasts, and every week they have listener questions. These listeners all send in mp3s of their voices, and then the PCGers reply, on air, to them. About a week ago, I decided to send in a question of my own...

A thought had struck me concerning levels in videogames. Building on from Portal, I figured that the coolest setting for a shootout in an FPS would be a mirror-maze. A great idea? I thought so, so asked those PCGers if it was possable, and they answered my question. They discussed it. That is why I love this story, because it is a great example of how people connect. I was able to share an idea with people on the other side of the Atlantic, who then built on, and shared my idea to the rest of the world of podcasts. Use this inspiration.

Do great deeds, share great thoughts. This is what we made all this technology and civilisation for. This is my epiphany.

This can be heard in PCG USA podcast #115, after aprox 40min.

My arrival

2008-01-20T18:44:00.000Z

Hello all!

I have arrived, with funny witticisms and tales of wisdom.
This is the start of something great...

Contributor

2008-01-20T18:37:00.000Z

DDude has joined the warm folds of the brotherhood. His wonderous teachings should pop-up here and there preaching great tidings of joy and stuffs.

Hidden

Garrys Mod - Updated

2008-01-20T17:55:00.000Z

The latest additions to one of the best mods for Half Life 2 includes NPC's and items from the following source games : Portal, HL2:Ep2 HL2:Ep1 and TF2

Garrys Mod now utilizes the somewhat more graphically and visually enchancing Episode 2 engine. There are now blur effects which look cool whilst trying to kill a hunter with a crowbar but in theory just increase the already prominent faults in the multiplayer.

Omg wtf lag? Multiplayer is now even more laggy than it was before and spawning an NPC reduces the framerate to about 5. It's not just because I have an older PC, everyone on the server gets it. Voice communication becomes near to impossible with such high pings and moving around is jerky and there is somewhat more room for griefing. As it was only released recently there are still many small updates needed to fix the recurring crashes.

Apart from all the lag and crash issues, the new props are great. I entertained myself for about 20 minutes just by spawning a companion cube and making a little safe enclosure for it to play and frolick in the shiny new textures. TF2 props are entertaining although they haven't integrated the weapons yet. *Drools over the thought of a pyro flamethrower*

It's a big update, allowing you to play more of the HL2 maps and the new Portal and TF2 maps . Sadly they haven't produced an official portal gun yet but there are innumerate 3rd party portal guns.

Altogether it's a huge update with loads of new content but there are still a few issues which need to be fixed.

Hidden

Fable: The Lost Chapters, A Belated Review.

2008-01-20T17:43:00.001Z

It's easy to hate Fable. Before it was released on Xbox The lead game designer, Peter Molenyeux, hyped it like mad, describing a whole load of awesome features that didn't make it into the game. Rather than the genre redefining masterpiece people were expecting Fable was simply a decent RPG. Not an amazing RPG, but not a terrible one either. Sadly that got overlooked in the outpouring of hate from our console playing cousins which inevitably carried over to the PC version. Still, that was in 2005 and by now much of that dust has settled, allowing Fable to stand on its own as the decent game that the reviewers said it was.

You start life in Fable as a small boy tasked with buying your incredibly annoying sister a present. To do this you must perform good deeds while ignoring the incredibly annoying children that try and tempt you to be naughty. I punched one of them in the face, which was nice, but then lost the deed I was supposed to be performing which prompted all the locals to condemn me in their West Country accents whenever I passed.

The game improves tenfold when (spoiler alert!) your village is ransacked by evil bandits. They kill most of the annoying residents which pleased me greatly and spurred me on through the typically tedious training missions which saw me competing against a fellow trainee at the impossibly generic Heroes Guild. For a game that sells itself on being able to be good or evil it certainly makes every effort to get you to be good. It is fortunate that I am, at heart, a good Javaguy because that was all that kept me from slaying the damn villagers as soon as I got free of the guild.

I'm glad that I didn't, however, because Fable really improves once you're out adventuring. The quests available are consistently entertaining, if not up to Oblivion standards of depth, and the locations are very nicely done. The story has plenty of twists and turns as well, to hold your interest. Presumably due to its console heritage the game isn't strictly open world- the play world consists of lots of small areas divided by doors- but this fits in well with the action oriented stance that fable takes. Every time you enter a new area you're faced with lots of bandits to kill, which kind of forces you down the action route but does at least mean that journeys are never boring. It's worth pointing out also that you can fast travel with teleporters, which speeds things up nicely.

The combat in Fable is definitely its strongest point. Sword blows feel weighty and satisfying while the combo feature discourages you from simply button mashing your way out of situations, as do the unsightly scars your hero picks up if you forget to defend. Like I did. Another feature that endears Fable's combat towards me is infinite arrows. It astonishes me that Fable is the only RPG I've seen to include this feature- having to spend all your money on arrows is one of my pet hates.

In conclusion then, Fable is a good RPG. It suffers from a few of the issues prevalent in most every RPG- the tedious training, the slightly superfluous attempt at moral ambiguity- but it contains a whole range of neat features that allow it to be great fun in short bursts, with plenty of pick-up-and-play appeal. Sure, it's no Baldur's Gate but it doesn't set out to be. It's simply a good RPG with a sweet sense of humour and surprisingly visceral combat. Recommended.

80%

Flashlights in games?

2008-01-20T17:17:00.000Z

Flashlights play a key role in games. They help create atmosphere and, depending on the situation, tension or all out terror. There is also a sense of security when you press F and see the friendly glowing circle around your crosshair.

I know I've mentioned Half Life 2 quite a bit but it, out of the many games I have played, captured the role of the flashlight pefectly. In Hl2 the flashlight is used in many a dark passage, bringing horror along with it.

The flashlight has a strong relationship with horror. They dine often together. Wherever one goes, the other must follow. With a flashlight its impossible to walk round a dark corner without fear of what that innocent beam of light might reveal. A health supply? Some ammo? Or a mutilated corpse, ripped to pieces by the zombie who is now creeping up behind you.

The flashlight feels like a part of my body. The sights we have seen. From beautiful, welcoming health vendors to the disgusting zombies, the mutilated corpses and ominous blood splats.

In short then the flashlight is something to care for and be proud to possess. It's the FPS's answer to The Companion Cube, providing solace in times of difficulty, comfort in times of sadness and light in times of darkness.

Hidden

TF2 review in 200 words.

2008-01-20T13:42:00.001Z

I wrote this for the uncensored of PCG, but they didnt post it. :(

Review of Team Fortress 2

Woot! I killed Jaffacake_Killer! The words flitted joyously through my head as I watched my beautifully rendered pyro strumming his fire axe in triumph. No doubt at that moment the great Jaffa himself was gazing mournfully at a dramatic freeze-frame of my pyro, mid strum, standing over his remains- so cheekily pointed out to him with little boxes exclaiming “your head!” “your appendix!” and “another bit!”

The uplifting scene above illustrates, for me, precisely what makes TF2 so great. The whole game is infused with a wonderfully dark sense of humour, relishing in every death. You can almost hear Gabe cackling from afar as a spy gets healed by a medic and then stabs him ungratefully In the back.

It’s a far cry from cheerless CS:S (or for that matter, TFC) which is so… austere… yet is still anomalously populated with screaming 10 year olds. It is ironic that TF2 has a visual style so like the Pixar films they enjoy watching while having such a friendly and mature community. Perhaps it is the emphasis on teamwork throughout the game. CS:S is every ma… boy for themselves, whereas In TF2 you will find yourself devising manically cunning plans with all and sundry for the greater good.

And finally (this deserves repetition) I can kill senior forumites! Their respect, maturity and skill is no match for my impish impetuosity!

95%

Posting names!

2008-01-20T13:38:00.001Z

Yes, thanks to my incredible skill we now have separate posting names!

yay!

Oh dear.

2008-01-20T13:27:00.000Z

I really believe that hidden was using "teh" with complete seriousness.

Oh, my.

Half Life 2 - Striders

2008-01-20T13:23:00.000Z

I was moving swiftly over obstacles without any idea where i was going. I heard some survivors and ran over to pause upon hearing a strange noise. I turned round slowly like something out of the films as a strider stopped over building smashing them to pieces. My reaction was to run but all I could do was stare amazed in wonder at the monstrous machine-alien-thing stomping towards me. I heard rockets being fired from behind me at the strider but was transfixed. It was at that point i realised that Half Life 2 contained more than the usual amount of zombies, hot girls following you around and shotguns. It was art. The sheer beauty of which the strider 0wn3d the survivors was just awe-inspiring. The striders screech made me run for cover. I was trapped under some fallen debris knowing there was a strider up there probably moving into position to mutilate my body when I emerged. I'm going to stop describing what happens now incase i pull a spoiler.

Why Half Life 2? I mean tons of other games have zombies, hot girls and tripods.

It's the way they present themselves. You walk into a building looking for ammo and hear a zombie's cry. You turn round suddenly very paranoid and wondering if you are the only one in the room. You see the door to your left start to move and hit the F key. God i love the F key. The role of flashlights is another post though. I move over towards the door with my shotgun equiped and a heacrab attacks me from the rear and all hell breaks lose. "Can't...see...stupid...headcrab..." Then you hear the zombie's cry again but it sounds closer... You turn round and see the zombie about to throw a barrel at you. It hits you square in the face and you are dazed as the headhumper humps your head.

Small sequences like these are perfectly portrayed and evoke precisely the right emotions required in such a situation.

I rest my case.

Hidden

Manx Cats

2008-01-20T13:19:00.000Z

In reply to the Honourable Member manx cats are teh awesome.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Manx_breed_cat_named_Inkku.jpg

Look at them! Made of pure awesome! Their sleek fur ruffles in the wind as they approach their prey. gliding along the many beautiful harbours on the rock, the cat passed a bush. Did its tail make a noise brushing the bush? No. It remained undetected, and secured its prey. Manx cats > cats.

Hidden

2008-01-20T13:13:00.000Z

The First Post.

2008-01-20T13:11:00.000Z

I, Javaguy, claim this post in the name of beating Hidden.

Anyway.

This blog is basically set up for us to post our writings, with the vague idea of improving. Expect to see the odd article, review and many, many rants about PC Games and anything else that we have the patience to write about at length. Cookies, for example.

Don't expect punctual weekly updates or pages of dazzlingly good prose every day but do expect us to do our best.

Hidden comes from the Isle of Man though, so make allowances. I mean honestly! Cats with no tails! Crazy!