Up In The Air

George Clooney is one of the actors who I think can basically do no wrong. He picks great movies to be in, and while his performances are usually all basically a minor variation on a theme, that theme and those variations are usually just so damn good I can't fault him for it.

Such is the case with Up In The Air, a film about a man who lives most days of the year traveling around the country and firing people for a living. It's an extremely relevant film considering the economy, and one of the film's big pluses is the recruitment of actual people who lost their jobs giving their reactions to being told they were fired. It adds a somber tone to a movie that fluctuates between sadness and happiness in a fluid way that feels very real to life despite the kind of surreal life Clooney's character builds for himself.

This movie is all about contradictions: between being surrounded yet being lonely, constantly flying yet always feeling at home, giving hope and despair at the same time, and the dynamic between love and commitment. It takes a clear vision and a great script to effectively manage all these ideas without losing focus or meandering between philosophies, and this movie certainly had both.

The actors are also more than competent in their roles, especially Clooney's main competitors Vera Farmiga and Anna Kendrick who steal the movie right out from under him, which is no easy task. Farmiga wonderfully carries out the role of a woman much like Clooney's character ("but with a vagina") who seems to carry an instant bond with him, and Kendrick's youthful inexperience and indoctrination into Clooney's world is hilarious but also sadly revealing about just how out of touch the older people are with the world at hand.

It's a touching commentary on the world we live in, and what we carry with us. It may not be happy, but at least it tells the truth.

Up In The Air gets a 9/10.

Sherlock Holmes

Fans of the original Sherlock Holmes character may not be pleased with this Hollywoodized, styled up version, most notably because he actually likes a woman. However, I believe this movie should be viewed in the mindset that it's a Hollywood bastardization and as such will suffer in translation, because as a Hollywood action/mystery flick, it's pretty good.

The casting, for one, is spot on. Robert Downey Jr. as a drunken, witty, and tortured yet brilliant mind is wonderful, and Jude Law as his basically better half (though still not without his own issues) couldn't have done better. Rachel McAdams as the main love interest obviously has some fun fighting right along with the boys and tricking Holmes as often as she can. The rest of the supporting cast fill their roles well.

Unfortunately the script just isn't up to their caliber. The art styling, sets, and costumes are great and convey a deathly gloom, the fights are a bit too fast paced but still carry impact and action, and the cast is certainly up to snuff...but the script unfortunately makes little use of all the right components.

The plot involves a member of a secret magical society murdering people to gain the power of the dark arts and then using that magic to gain control of the world. Holmes steps in right at the beginning and in stops him, he gets hanged, and then revives from the grave. Holmes is then left to hunt him down and stop his nefarious plans. Meanwhile an old flame, a thief who has outsmarted him twice, shows up with plans of her own and working for a mysterious professor, thus walking the fine line between helping Holmes and helping herself. And all the while poor Watson just tries to get married. It certainly isn't a dense plot, and the ending (and subsequent explanation of all the "magic") can be easily guessed at since it follows the tradition of a standard mystery plot. Of course, there are some things that only Holmes can figure out (unless you know the chemical properties of rhododendron) but they feel a little cheap and not the result of some masterful deduction.

But of course, it would be able to get away with that if the characters were likable. Like Star Trek, not the best plot but the characters gave it a humor and depth that made it great. Unfortunately the script doesn't exactly give the wonderful actors in Sherlock Holmes much to work with. It tries too hard to find the line between being a serious mystery with a seriously flawed protagonist, and a light-hearted witty comedy and as such falls short of both. The few scenes we are given where Holmes is basically a drunken, drugged mess it's unclear as to whether they're trying to give him depth or make us laugh at him. The comedy itself is great in places, but all too often the wit is just not that witty. There certainly are many laugh out loud moments, but I couldn't shake the feeling that it just could've been so much better in the hands of a more adept screenwriter.

However, the movie carries a nice charm to it that the actors deliver despite the limitations of the script, and if there's a sequel, as there will most assuredly be, I'll be there to see it.

Sherlock Holmes gets a 7.5/10.

Avatar

10 years and 300 million dollars later and we get...an okay movie with some VERY pretty graphics.

James Cameron's triumphant return to the screen after Titanic comes as an ode to the future of motion capture, special effects, and 3-D. Even if the plot and script were as bad as Transformers 2, I'd probably still give this movie a solid 5/10 (instead of 1/10) just for the incredible epic quality to every little graphical detail in this movie. Trust me. See it in 3-D. Don't worry about IMAX since it appeared they just projected a normal screen size onto the IMAX screen (top, bottom and sides all had sizable black margins). For all those who looked at the trailers and were skeptical, don't bother with anything less than was intended, which is a full 3-D experience.

Cause otherwise...let's just say I hope they didn't spend most of those 10 years working on the script. If they did, wow did they waste their money. It's a paint-by-numbers plot of the evil human invaders conquering a less powerful race, with the race then rebelling with the help of truly good humans and conquering the invading force. There's also a routine love story thrown in there for good measure.

Basically the only new bit is that instead of just being normal good humans who help, they're humans who mentally inhabit specially grown bodies (avatars) that look like the alien inhabitants.

The first half hour or so that sets all this up is frankly boring and derivative. It's also easily forgotten once we are finally exposed to the lush world of the Na'vi. Every single scene is breathtaking. The motion capture and graphical detailing is so lifelike and vivid that you often forget that every single thing you're looking at on screen was generated by a computer. The traipsing through the jungle, finding curious and interesting lifeforms that do funny things, the Na'vi themselves, and the flying...oh god, the flying. Once they started soaring around on tons of awesome looking birds, that was enough to seal the deal and make me like this movie despite its faults.

When the final battle rolled around I was mesmerized and on the edge of my seat. It didn't matter that everything was completely predictable, it didn't matter that they blatantly bashed Bush (you should never mimic George Lucas' star wars prequels in any way), it didn't matter that the dialogue was mostly trite and filled with cliches, it didn't matter that the Na'vi were basically all black people in blue bodies and I think all but one of the invaders were white. The pure spectacle of that last battle was jaw dropping, as was all the spectacle before it, and that can't be denied.

Honestly, this movie should've been made in less than a decade, since I doubt the graphics took that long to perfect, and that means the rest of it was script writing or bureaucracy and that's really sad. However, even the bad stuff isn't terrible, it's just kind of average, and the technological feats of this movie more than make up for it. It's an achievement that will be hard to top for quite some time.

Avatar gets an 8/10.

EDIT: The more and more I think about this movie, and have settled down from the initial awe of the effects, the more I have realized that honestly I shouldn't have given as much credit to it as I did. Even writing this review I knew that much of it simply wasn't that great, but because of the effects I could be forgiving. But now that it's up for Best Picture I simply feel it's my duty to calm down, clear my head, and rethink my review. With that in mind, the average story, average to below average acting, below average script and above average spectacle/graphics add up to just an average movie.

Avatar gets a 7/10.

Bayonetta Demo

Since I'm reviewing demos now I thought I'd add my two cents on the Bayonetta demo as well.

Scanning the amazon forums I found many review saying Dante's Inferno was totally badass and amazing and people couldn't wait to get their hands on it while Bayonetta is a Devil May Cry clone that was too frenetic and not fun at all.

Perhaps my brain works differently. Perhaps my view that complexity in a game makes it better is completely wrong. But until then I will just have to take it that everyone on amazon is insane and blind.

First off, yes, Bayonetta is a Devil May Cry clone. It's made by the same people, and why change a formula that works? For those unfamiliar with the series, the gameplay is managed mostly through very flashy and very frantic gameplay with lots of hard-to-do combos on hard-to-beat enemies. You gain experience beating enemies and then use that experience to gain new combos that do more damage or upgrade health, etc. There's nothing new, at least in the demo, except for a special "Witch Time" feature that slows down enemies when you dodge an attack at the right time. Oh, and the nudity. Basically Bayonetta uses her hair as clothes so when she summons a badass hair monster from the aether to chomp on a boss baddy...she basically gets naked, though mostly covered by strategically swirling hair. There's also a new feature where in certain areas you get to walk on the walls. While this provides some interesting thought processes about how to fight, it mostly is just a pain trying to locate an enemy that's flying around on other walls as well.

Okay, with that covered, I've got a big spoiler alert for those who didn't notice. DANTE'S INFERNO IS GOD OF WAR. BUT LESS INTERESTING. At least in God of War you were required to kind of switch things up and use combinations of grabbing, light attacks, and heavy attacks, and they all flowed well together. Dante's Inferno says bugger that and massively overhauled the light attack and underhauled the heavy attack and introduced a long range attack (the beaming cross that shoots out of your hand) that can be spammed to your delight and gets rid of most stuff before it reaches you. Oh and there's magic too, but at least in the demo it's kind of useless.

Bayonetta, on the other hand, keeps much of the badassery in Devil May Cry and doesn't dumb it down for you. There is an easy mode where you can just press "attack" and it does the combos for you (kind of like Dante's Inferno on any difficulty) but otherwise there are some really fun moves you can pull off, and the more difficult ones are appropriately flashy and full of impact.

The one thing I can hand Dante's Inferno on a platter is the graphics. They're just plain beautiful. However, Bayonetta still carries its own style that, while not as detailed, is still nice to look at.

Finally, the really sad thing about Dante's Inferno is it's based off of such interesting characters who go through hell listening to other really interesting characters. The game decided that was rubbish, robbed them of any personality besides anger and sadness (or Vergil's just being mellow) and then let you go carnage-happy with a scythe. Bayonetta actually has a personality. In the little bit of gameplay we don't get to see much, but it's enough to tell that she's FUN. And a little sassy.

We'll see what these games are like come release day, but from what I've seen I know which game I'd rather sit down to.

The Bayonetta Demo gets a 7/10.

Dante's Inferno demo

Really? Really. Really? REALLY? Okay...

That was just about my reaction to playing through the recent demo release of Dante's Inferno.

Already the premise of Dante's Inferno being a video game is ridiculous. In the story he literally just goes around, looks at stuff, and talks to people about philosophy and politics. So turning that into a hack and slash rush through the 9 gates of hell is a little bit of a stretch.

Especially when you turn Dante into a Crusader in the 11th century.

Who stitches a cross for no apparent reason onto his bare skin.

Who then finds his wife dead (with exposed breast), and gets stabbed in the back.

Who then fights Death with a poleaxe.

And wins.

And then steals Death's scythe for himself and kills Death.

And then travels into hell with Virgil, a ghost of the poet, to find his wife and slay a couple thousand demons in the process.

This is button mashing at its normalest, with no reason to ever take your finger off the square (light attack) button except to do quicktime events (push the right buttons at the right times to kill the boss) or to jump to flying enemies.

The best thing about it are easily the graphics, which are frankly incredible. Otherwise, I expect this to be yet another hack and slash God of War clone with nothing new to bring to the table.

Dante's Inferno Demo gets a 4/10 (and most of that is for the graphics).

Folklore

After the blandness of Resistance I wanted to go back and look at one of the most original titles I've ever played: Folklore.

Set in the somber Doolin village, you play as either the young Ellen, who is looking for her long lost mother, or Keats, a reporter for an obscure occult magazine who is lured there when he gets a mysterious call for help. Both have separate storylines and play styles, and at the end of each chapter you get to decide if you want to continue with the character you've been playing or switch. Eventually, though, the game does force you to play through both before you can continue, so you can't just finish one character's story and then move on to the other. They are intertwined.

That being said, I found it highly rewarding to play through Ellen until I couldn't anymore and then move on to Keats. Keats is a very mysterious and bad-ass character whose motivations, especially if you don't play as him until you have to, are very unclear.

And it's that kind of suspense that drives this game. It's hard to capture Folklore into a specific style of video game, but it's best described as kind of two games in one. For a great deal of the game your character is stuck in Doolin, walking around, talking to people and trying to figure out what the hell is going on. When you first arrive in the village, you find a woman sitting at the edge of a cliff. Or, you think she's sitting there until she falls over obviously dead. Ellen thinks it's her mother, while Keats believes it's the woman who called him, and before they can find out the woman falls off the cliff into the water. You walk into the town and find it populated at night with mysterious creatures who come from the Netherworld, the land of the dead. It turns out that one night a year, the doorway between the real world and the Netherworld opens up, and you've just stumbled there on that day. For their own reasons, both Ellen and Keats enter the Netherworld, and in some awesome cutscenes both go through a tranformation, Ellen donning the cloak of the one who can walk between the worlds, and Keats turning into a demon-looking guardian. After meeting some faeries and dealing with some folk (which I'll get to soon), both return to the real world to find that real people are there during the daytime. As you progress further and further, trying to unravel the secrets surrounding the dead woman and the Netherworld, more and more of the townspeople start dying and revealing more and more of a tragic event that occurred 17 years before. So this part plays like a fantastic and oddly surreal point and click murder mystery adventure game.

Then you step into the Netherworld and things get real interesting. Upon entering you come across these monsters called folk, which suddenly attack you. You are saved by a traveling companion (a creepy scarecrow for Ellen and a sophisticated looking invisible man for Keats) who beats them up and then shows you that they have little red souls popping out of them. With your newfound transformation you are able to capture their souls (or "ids" as the game calls them) and use them. So the two folks who attacked you you are able to use as a basic short range attack and a shield. From then on each folk you get can be mapped to triangle, square, circle or x depending on how you arrange them. Each folk can then also be upgraded either through giving them specific items that drop randomly or by reaching a certain requirement like "Capture 5 of this folk" or "Kill 5 of X folk with this folk". So basically it's kind of like Pokemon except each one has only one move and you use 4 at a time (and can switch any of those out at any point). You use folk to beat up other folk and then capture their ids when they pop out. However, there's a huge variety of folk. You start off in the Faery Realm of the Netherworld, and move on to explore 4 other realms, each of which has something like 15 folk. As such, there are a huge variety of folk that can only be hurt by certain other types of folk. There are some that are only vulnerable to wind, for example. The way you find out difficult weaknesses are by collecting pages for picturebooks from each realm, which show you a vague picture of what you should be doing. Unfortunately many folk look very similar, so sometimes it's very hard to tell exactly what the picturebook is saying.

So you have a kind of slow paced murder mystery along with an action rpg. While the two are completely different and you wouldn't think they'd mesh well together, the styling of each keeps them coherent and working well together. Possibly the best thing about this game are the graphics and the style. There is literally nothing else like it. The atmosphere and buildings of Doolin are appropriately creepy, and then each realm is like walking through a lucid dream. The Faery Realm is forest themed, with vibrant colors and flowers everywhere, while the next realm, Warcadia, is appropriately drab and full of fire from battles. Each setting is amazingly detailed, creative, and artistic. Even just the folk themselves put other games to shame with their incredible diversity and style.

However, putting all the praise aside it has its problems. For one, the storyline is almost too complex/surreal/bizarre to make any sense of. Yes it's interesting, but by the time the final twist rolls around you might be too confused to make anything of it. Also, what could've been essentially double the gameplay by playing both Keats and Ellen turns out to have very much in common with each other. Both of them have unique folk that are specific to their style of fighting, but you end up fighting the same bosses in practically the same ways, and the stories are barely different in terms of where they go. This game also suffers from the unfortunate Pokemon conflict, which is that there are so many of them that it gets troublesome to try upgrading all of them, yet you never know which will be an asset in taking down future folk. There also isn't much replayability, as the odd kind of build your own labyrinth challenge mode unlocked at the end is just kind of...weird, and the story itself is very linear. There are extra quests/costumes that can be bought on PSN, but frankly they're probably not worth it.

Despite these problems it's a beautiful, interesting, and fun game that's got more substance and creativity to it than many games out there.

Folklore gets an 8.5/10

Resistance: Fall of Man

Along with Ratchet and Clank, I decided to grab the equally ridiculously low-priced Resistance. I had heard nothing but great reviews, it's a PS3 "classic", and I needed an FPS in my arsenal of games so I figured why not.

I have to say, I am severely disappointed.

Resistance is an alternate history scenario where instead of the Nazis ruining everything, a rogue alien force called the Chimera attack the world. From what I could understand it's essentially a virus that mutates humans into disfigured killing machines who need a cooling system attached by tubes to their back since it massively upgrades their metabolism and would normally cause them to combust. You play through the game as Nathan Hale, an American soldier sent over to Britain to help them defeat the infestation. After battling your way through several of them, a gigantic spire crashes into the ground, releasing tiny spores which infect and kill everyone...but you. Instead of mutating into a Chimeran, you simply gain the ability to regain portions of health over time and use the equivalent of Chimeran med packs. So you and your newfound abilities go out and wipe the Chimeran scourge from Britain.

While the premise is certainly interesting, almost nothing is done with it. This is one of the most typical first person shooters I've ever played, with no real innovations. There are some interesting alien weapons you can pick up, the most interesting of which is the Auger, which allows you to shoot through walls (and that increases in damage with each barrier it goes through). The first alien weapon you get, the bullseye, has the much required function of letting you "tag" enemies and then fire anywhere and still hit your target. Why required? Well let me tell you.

This game made the horrible mistake of trying to be a cover based game, with no cover controls. The only way you can dodge most things is to hide behind objects by ducking, and even then most enemy weapons will still catch you on the head. Yet the game likes to throw huge crowds of enemies at you and give you plenty of places to hide, but as soon as you pop your head out you get a nice huge volley of plasma in your face. Cause you don't just pop your head out. You can't. You have to move your entire body out from behind cover, get a few shots off, return to cover, heal after a few seconds, then rinse and repeat. It's a reaaaaally boring strategy, especially when many times you can just run into the crowd, toss some grenades, shoot like mad, and then find health packs and ammo refills right around the corner to recover. Only towards the end of the game does that not really work anymore.

There are some missions where you get to drive a tank, which you think would be awesome, until you try driving it. Instead of doing the normal thing and having the left stick be full movement with the right stick just swiveling the camera, they decided that the left stick is only used as acceleration in the up and down directions, and then you have to swivel the camera to where you want it to go. This creates endlessly frustrating situations where you would like to, say, move to the side while still shooting at big bad guys but have to turn the camera away from them, move, and then turn it back to fire. IT'S STUPID.

A couple "boss" fights happen along the way, though they're more sub-bosses that show up repeatedly as the game goes on. When they first showed up, I thought "ALL RIGHT, AWESOME, LET'S DO THIS!!!!" and then killed them rather quickly and kept killing them over and over as they kept showing up. The first boss you fight is a giant mechanical walker that is vulnerable at a point on its back, and you keep trying to get around it and let your little soldier buddies distract it long enough but EVERY FUCKING ENEMY has the amazing tendency to pick you out of a crowd and focus all their fire on you. Then you remember you have a gun that can shoot through anything and sure enough it gets the job done. Well at one point you face three of them in a row, along with a giant baddie that spews bio-mines at you or just claws you if you get too close. This was about the closest thing to an epic, hard, and awesome battle there was in the game. But what about the ending you ask? Isn't there some gigantic boss waiting for you at the end?

Nope. You get an improvement to the bullseye right before the final battle, which made me happy that I could start kicking more ass, but then you quickly realize that all the other enemies now have it and their health upgraded too. So basically...there is no point to it. It takes the same amount of time to kill them and the increased damage they do is negligible. So you're there in this ultimate Chimeran tower that is supposed to be the most heavily defended and impossible to destroy places in Britain, and all you have to do is kill some normal enemies and a miniboss to reach a button that opens these panels and expose these rods that you shoot and destroy while avoiding enemy fire. That's it. That's the end. You blow up some rods while you avoid getting killed. No huge epic monster, no nothing. It was one of the least satisfactory endings to a game ever.

I can understand that maybe around the launch of the PS3 it was considered excellent since the other launch titles were crap, but by now I'm surprised so many people don't recognize it as nothing more than a standard FPS with a great premise and lackluster execution.

Resistance: Fall of Man gets a 6/10.

Ratchet and Clank Future: Tools of Destruction

I'm a newcomer to the Ratchet and Clank series, but having heard such wonderful things about each and every game I figured there'd be no better time to get into it than when the game was on sale for a measly $15.

Knowing little to nothing about the characters, I started a new game and watched the hilarious opening cutscene. Turns out you play as the last member of a species known as the Lombax (Ratchet) and his small robotic companion (Clank). Both of them are immediately likeable, with Ratchet being a bull-headed techno whiz and Clank being the voice of moderation and sensibility. They get a message from the self-proclaimed hero of the galaxy, Captain Quark, that a heavily armed robotic force is attacking and he needs their help! They blast off, and through much hilarity and action, crash before they get there, leaving you to fight your way to the building. And with that, you're off to save the galaxy.

My first main frustration came at this point, and sprouted later, when I was basically thrust directly into the action without even being told what button was "shoot" until the enemies were on top of me. A recurring theme with this game was an assumption that you had played other Ratchet and Clank games before. Nonetheless, it's an easy hurdle to get over with a little trial and error. One of the nice things about this game was that you weren't punished too severely for dying. Which happened. A lot.

This game is of the dying breed known as platformers, and as such has plenty and puzzles, hidden items, and jumping about on...well...platforms. Despite the repetitive nature of the tasks you're doing, it never gets boring. Part of this is most likely due to the fact that there are an astounding 17 places to visit, including sections where you're flying your ship and shooting stuff in a traditional arcade-like fashion. With so many varied environments and so many ways to get around them (thanks to more gadgets like robotic wings) it never gets old. Even revisiting planets to try and find hidden treasure you missed is fun as the enemies are constantly engaging. And to deal with those enemies...

Of course the main attractor for this game, as implied in the title, are the weapons. And boy oh boy are there weapons. There are 15 "weapons", each of which can level up 5 levels by using them and are upgradeable using raritanium, which drops from some monsters and chests. They range from a standard rocket launcher to a post with insects that shoot out at enemies to a tornado launcher that you direct towards enemies with the sixaxis controls. Then there are 9 gadgets that don't upgrade, but do all sorts of fun stuff. My personal favorite was the groovitron, which forces every enemy around you to stop what they're doing...and dance. It's a giant disco ball that puts on a light show and spouts an old disco tune. I laughed so hard the first time I did it the enemies killed me once it wore off. Usually the gadgets are much more deadly/resourceful, and as such cost more to buy, drop less often in battle, and have very low ammo counts. With such variety comes varied enemy types that are vulnerable/more easily destroyed by some weapons more than others. Thankfully you can quickly pause the game with the push of a button and select the weapon you want, leading to some interesting strategic battles.

Boss battles play out much the same as normal battles, just with a bigger target. There are, of course, the standard attack patterns that you look out for, avoid, and then keep shooting, but overall they're nothing special.

What really keeps this game, and something tells me this franchise, afloat are the personalities and humor that the game constantly brings in. The evil overlord trying to kill you will pipe in comments over loudspeakers on some planets, and they're always funny. Captain Quark's meddling antics and complete cowardice make for a humorous mix between The Tick and Zapp Brannigan.

So was it worth the $15? Beating the game unlocks a challenge mode with harder enemies but you keep all your upgraded equipment, but there seems to be little replayability otherwise. Nonetheless there's a lot to this little game, and if you choose to go hunting all the hidden golden bolts, raritanium chests and unlocking every skill point there's certainly a lot more. Overall it's a fun way to play with a bunch of different ways to blow stuff up with some humor on the side, and you can't go wrong with that.

Ratchet and Clank Future: Tools of Destruction gets an 8/10.

Batman: Arkham Asylum

Sorry for the delay, readers, but what with Thanksgiving, finishing teaching and starting a new job the time to review has taken a hit. However, I return to the foray with a charming new review about Batman: Arkham Asylum.

You start the game as Gotham's famed caped crusader, having just captured the Joker. You are transferring him into the hands of the police at the most dangerous prison/looney bin in the world, and something doesn't seem right. Joker gave up far too easily this time it seems, and on a hunch you escort the Joker, tied up like Hannibal Lecter, to his cell. Along the way you're introduced to several famous enemies from the comics, all who have a deep seated hatred for the dark knight. Sure enough right when everything seems golden and secure Joker escapes his bonds and with the help of Harley Quinn hides behind a force field, leaving you to fight several inmates and eventually practically the entirety of Arkham.

It's a great setup to a great game. During the intro sequence you quickly get immersed into the dark and slightly unhinged atmosphere, and the first battle brings in the awesome with hard hitting punches, kicks, and slow-mo finishing moves that flow easily as you simply direct Batman towards his target and hit the "kick ass" button. The fun increases when you realize you can use your cape as a fighting maneuver, and a quick throw of the batarang, to stun enemies. Unfortunately, hitting the "give-em-a-whoopin" button over and over again can get tiresome, especially in the later sections when you need to push another button to counter enemies who swarm you while in the middle of a combo that basically can't be stopped (there are also "takedown" final moves that make sure enemies stay down that are almost impossible to pull off due to the sheer mass of enemies who come at you and hit you right in the middle of the animation). So combat, while initially fun, gets a little boring and repetitive after a while.

Once you give a thorough licking to the inmates, Joker opens up the force field from the way he exited and invites you into the madhouse of death that is Arkham. This is where the real fun begins.

Along the way you learn that the Riddler has hidden several little statues and riddles and some odd diagrams that tell the story of the original owner of Arkham ALL OVER EVERYWHERE. He gleefully hacks into your suit's radio and taunts you whenever you can't solve his riddle or when you find a really easy statue. That's another thing about this game...the humor. Every villain has such a wonderfully dynamic voice and personality, especially Mr. Luke Skywalker Mark Hamill as the Joker, and they say such very silly things that it makes the game a lot more enjoyable. One thing this game does amazingly well is bring the atmosphere and character of the comics to life. Anyways, you learn some fun things by collecting all the riddles and decoding all of the Arkham founder's messages, but other than satisfying that RPG urge to find everything and level faster, there really is no value to the side quest. Still, it kept my RPG instincts happy.

The true grit of the game comes in the massively explorable and constantly changing environments. There's nothing like taking off from the top of a big tower and glide-kicking a baddy in the face. Enemies constantly shift places, making you take different strategic routes and really make use of anyplace you can hook to. Of course, you can also just beat them down and not have to worry about that. As you progress and level up you can unlock various gadgets and upgrades that make combat easier and allow for things like spraying explosive glue on the ground and then throwing a sonic batarang to lure an enemy over to it and BOOM. But frankly, as cool as that was there really were no major drawbacks to just running in and kicking everything. Stealth is an important aspect of some missions (where if you get caught you lose), but in most cases it just makes the initial takeouts a little easier.

They added a handy "detective mode" wherein your screen goes blue and you can see enemies' skeletons through walls, as well as breakable walls and other riddler clues. The only problem with this awesome feature is its a little too awesome. There is almost no reason not to have it on the entire game. The only drawback is that sometimes it's hard to tell whether an enemy is directly beneath you or if they're one floor down, but a quick switch off the mode and then back again solves most problems like that.

Boss battles are the standard find a pattern, exploit it so they take damage, rinse and repeat fare. The truly unfortunate thing is that with so many great bosses to choose from they decided that Poison Ivy was basically the only one worth differentiating. Every other one is either some form of Bane (he charges, you throw a batarang and dodge, he hits the wall and takes damage) or is defeated in a lame way. Scarecrow's battles, which should be terrifying, are basically 2-d sidescrolling levels where you hide behind obstacles, and Killer Croc, who they keep building up the tension for, is defeated by a some quick batarang throws and a well timed explosion. Even the Joker is reduced to a Bane-like battle. Fairly disappointing.

Still, there's a charm to Arkham Asylum that kept me coming back for more, and even if it was more of the same it was still very enjoyable. After you beat the game there are various challenges you can try, and pit yourself against the top scorers online, where things like stealth are much more highly emphasized but I just didn't like them as much. While it has its flaws, they certainly aren't terrible, and it's been like....ever since we've had a good Batman game. At the very least it's worth a rent, especially due to low replayability, but it's still a heck of a fun game.

Batman: Arkham Asylum gets an 8.5/10.

Apophis

A 25 million ton, 820 foot wide asteroid named after the Egyptian god of darkness and destruction is hurtling straight for Earth. Current projections put the asteroid at actually passing within 20,000 miles of the surface, more skimming than hitting us. Nonetheless, that's within the orbit of most satellites. The real kicker though? There's a possibility, albeit small, that if the asteroid passes us at a distance of 18,893 miles, give or take a few, it will then come back and hit us 7 years later.

So set your calendars, people. The first pass is expected on Friday the 13th of April in 2029, and if it hits that narrow window, it'll most likely come back April 13th 2036 and hit the Pacific Ocean, creating a 5 mile wide and 9,000 foot deep crater that will cause roughly 50-80ft tsunamis. The best part is, there will be tsunamis from the initial impact, but then the water will rush back to try and fill the massive crater, but all that water crashing together at the impact point will send more tsunamis out and this will happen again and again for a good long time until the western US is basically obliterated along with Japan, parts of Russia and basically anywhere else touching the Pacific Ocean. It's also very likely that the impact will shift the tectonic plate enough to set off the Ring of Fire and cause massive volcanic eruptions and earthquakes.

So we have volcanoes, tsunamis, and whatever chunks of the asteroid break of and slam elsewhere around the world all happening at once.

Oh, and we currently don't have the technology to stop it.

And no one is putting money into NASA to fuel development of such technology.

But don't worry, there's only a 45,000 to 1 chance of this happening. So far.

Lady Gaga: The Fame

So, in a spurt of curiosity and having been unable to get her latest song out of my head for the past two hours or so, I decided to download Lady Gaga's album and give it a listen. I fully expected to be disgusted and maybe a little amused at just how poppy and amateur the album was.

Then I started listening. And....against all my better senses, against all prevailing laws in the universe, against my own personal hatred of all things pop...and I don't think I'll ever be able to wash my mouth clean after saying this, but, I liked it. I actually liked it.

The entire album is literally pure pop drivel. Talking about boys, fast cars, sex, money, and being famous, Gaga actually imitates the themes from rappers more than pop stars. And she wraps it all in techno beats that make you see that just about every song belongs in a club.

So WHY? Why do I like it? Despite everything, Lady Gaga actually has a great voice and uses her range to its potential throughout the album. And as much as I want to hate the pure pop and techno, there's a problem. It's catchy. It's damn catchy, and she carries the arrogance to know it and make you like it.

After watching 17 Again I didn't really think I could feel more ashamed at liking something I really shouldn't. I was wrong. So before I befoul myself any more...

The Fame gets an 7.5/10.

The Matrix Dezionized

Just as a warning, this review contains SPOILERS about both The Matrix Reloaded and Revolutions.

This gem is a little something I stumbled across thanks to the godly powers of the stumble button. It's a re-edit of Matrix Reloaded and Matrix Revolutions put together. The funny thing about it is they cut out every scene in Zion, so everything focuses on what happens in the Matrix (basically Neo's story). There are some other cuts throughout, such as the terrible resurrection of Trinity at the end of Reloaded, instead just showing Neo catching her and leaving out the whole part where she gets shot.

So is it effective? Does it actually save what were pretty darn crappy movies? Yes and no.

The first bad part about the edit is that it does mix both Reloaded and Revolutions together, with no clear delineation between the two, making it run about 2 hours and 45 minutes long (though shortening it to that is very impressive). And trying to stomach both movies for that long is a trial, even with a lot of the crap cut out.

However, I did finish it with a more positive feeling towards the movie than I did with the originals. It truly was surprising how just by taking out the scenes in Zion and doing little else, the movie(s) improved tremendously. It made things focus more on the bread and butter of the first Matrix: Neo, and the prophecy. No rave orgy, no war planning nonsense, no mechs. I honestly found the battle in Zion more interesting only hearing about it through the snippets that Neo hears.

Of course, it still carries the AWFUL CGI fights between Neo and Smith (especially the OOH THIS EFFECT WHERE THEY HIT EACH OTHER SO HARD THE RAIN IS FORCED OUT IN THIS SPHERE AND THEN DISAPPATES IS SO AWESOME LET'S USE IT 5 TIMES!!!), the terribly convoluted situations with the Merovingian, and the sappy and crappy ending, but there's only so much a re-edit can do. So while it's not perfect, it takes a pile of crap and at least scoops some of it away to make it not as bad.

The Matrix Dezionized gets a 6.5/10.

Scratch that....

While we have made many leaps towards immortality, it all won't really matter because JURASSIC PARK IS COMING TRUE.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AeYhUUFDiF8

That's right people. Dinosaur blood, complete with DNA, has been preserved in their bones for millions of years, and now scientists want to bring them back. Really? Did they not see that movie? I can understand wanting to bring back a peaceful herbivore but T-FUCKING-REX? The only reason our mammal ancestors survived alongside the dinosaurs was because they were small, rodent-like creatures that could run away or dig a hole whenever things went sour. We've gotten a lot bigger since then, and sure, we've got a big ol' military (and the southern US) that could easily take them out with a massive arsenal of weaponry, but many would be lost to the Dinosaur Rebellion of 2015.

So, scientists. I know we've been on good terms for a long time. Hell, I even joined your clan. You've done some things I don't agree with over the years, especially before ethics came around, but for the most part you've been one of the essential forces moving civilization in the right direction. But this? Seriously guys. Don't do it. Just.....don't.

Your terrified friend,
Zach Sanders

Immortality is here

For a couple months now I have been heavily researching emerging technology for a class that I am teaching called "Current and Future Tech, or Why We Are All Doomed". We have discussed everything from robots and A.I., to fully immersive realities like The Matrix, to interstellar travel and much much more. Basically each topic centers around some kind of new announcement about a technology or an innovation that we thought wouldn't be here for another 50 years, and is here today.

Ladies and gentlemen...immortality is here. Or at least closer than we thought.

To our class, this is not necessarily big news. It's been fairly clear for a couple months now that with current research, people will be able to extend their lives by, say, 3 years fairly soon. The thing is, within those 3 years another life extension treatment will most likely come out that extends your life by 5 years, and so on and so on. Basically, given enough time to develop that initial treatment (they've already done it in mice), those people living today are going to be able to live forever.

However, the latest results blew even me away. Instead of extending life in small increments, scientists have literally become able to stop cell death. The whole process is a little complicated if you don't know cell biology, but basically when a cell divides it chops off this end portion of a chromosome called a telomere. When too much has been chopped off, after many many many divisions, the cell stops dividing and dies. This is basically the biology behind aging. And now scientists have found a way to introduce an enzyme called telomerase, which replaces the chopped off bits of telomeres, into cells that normally don't have it. The only problem is that while this stops cell death, it also means unlimited cell growth, a.k.a. cancer. But trust me, the cure for that isn't far away either (check for a later post!). Especially if they can find a way to turn telomerase on and off, the job becomes easy. It could also mean quick regeneration if paired with stem cell research.

In other related news, scientists have discovered a key protein that helps repair damaged tissue that appears to stop working with age. But reinsert that protein into aged/damaged tissue...and it repairs as if it were young again. So basically, those who are old can become young again. The research is in its preliminary stages, but don't be surprised if in the next 10 years we get a fountain of youth in pill form. Couple that with immortality, and we have a race of people living forever in the prime of their youth.

Sound like science fiction? It was. But it's quickly becoming fact.

Orange Box review

For those still unfamiliar with the legendary Orange Box, it is a compilation of essentially 5 different games for the price of one. It contains Half Life 2+Episode 1+Episode 2, Portal, and Team Fortress 2. So let's start from the top.

When Half Life 1 first came out, I was an avid fan. It was a fun take on science experiments gone wrong, with creative level designs, big bosses, and great gameplay. So naturally when Half Life 2 came out I was all over it. Valve took something that was great and made it greater. Relying mostly on their handy dandy physics system, they let the player not only experience great graphics (which still look good by today's standards) and inventive levels, but gave us the almighty Gravity Gun and let us go wild. With it you can manipulate just about everything in the world they have given you, allowing you to come up with creative solutions to problems. Running low on ammo? Pick up a saw blade with the gravity gun and decapitate a zombie. A game with this kind of feature could easily turn gimmicky, but in Half Life 2 it plays a central role in solving challenges (like leap-frogging on platforms you move with the gun to avoid touching the sand lest you be attacked...it's like an grown up game of lava monster), and it's FUN. Overall the game is challenging, intelligent, and continually keeps up its sense of epicness.

I'll lump Episodes 1 and 2 together here since I feel they share a great many similarities. Basically these are expansion packs for Half Life 2 that continue to reinvent the story and throw a ton of great twists and turns in. They continue the tradition of amazing level design and innovation, especially one sequence where your gravity gun becomes superpowered and you can actually use it to shoot people and watch them fry. They are, of course, shorter than the original, but they are no less fun.

Since I want to end with Portal I'll tackle Team Fortress 2 here. For those unfamiliar, Team Fortress was a multiplayer addition to the original Half Life with several interesting classes you could play like the engineer, scout, and medic. With the release of Half Life 2 came the reincarnation of the classic, and it's better than ever. The cell-shaded graphics are the perfect style for this hyper bloody fast paced free for all. Each of the classes you can choose from are relatively well balanced on a team, making each match a joy to play.

So finally we reach Portal. Oh, Portal. I have literally played through this game about 4 times, and I never get sick of it. Yes, the design is quite linear, and yes, I solve the puzzles practically the same way every time. So why do I never bore of this game? GLaDOS is why. I'll explain. Essentially the whole plot of the game is that you are a test subject being subjected to various puzzles involving portal technology, wherein there are 2 portals and when you step through one you come out the other. Simple right? WRONG. I don't even understand how the people who designed this game were able to come up with so damn many cool ways to use this concept, though they provide a developer walkthrough where you literally walk through a puzzle and push little buttons to hear what they have to say. So, during all of these trials you are being given instructions by the pathologically lying mechanical voice of GLaDOS, and this is why the game is fun. GLaDOS has a humor all her own, promising to give you cake when you finish, shouting "WHEEEEE" when you go flying, and constantly phrasing value in terms of organs (i.e. the device you carry is now more valuable than the organs and combined incomes...). It's unfortunately hard to hear everything that she says in the final battle, along with everything each of the nodes you knock off says, but it's well worth it to just save beforehand and listen. When the game ends you are treated to one of the best songs ever made, "Still Alive", during which if you don't laugh, even after playing it for the fourth time, you are a terrible human being. Overall, the game is short. On my last playthrough I finished in about 40min, and there are experts out there on youtube who can do it faster (though good luck telling what the hell they're doing). However, it's just enough to make a worthwhile experience that lets you play around with it and not get bored. Basically, it doesn't overstay its welcome. And for those who want the experience to continue, by beating the game you unlock different versions of levels where you can challenge yourself with fastest time, least steps taken, or just a really hard version of the level.

It could easily be argued that the Orange Box is one of the best video game compilations ever made, if not the best. We get the incredible Half Life 2 series, the immensely enjoyable Portal, and an entertaining multiplayer experience in Team Fortress 2. Especially since these days you can find it for like $20 or less, there is absolutely no reason not to get this.

The Orange Box gets a 10/10.

Melody Gardot: My One And Only Thrill

How could I forget one of the most important parts of my life? Music. I listen every night as I go to sleep, whenever I'm driving, and even RIGHT NOW. I have an eclectic taste in music, from pop to rock to rap to jazz. And jazz is where we land with this review.

Melody Gardot is a 24 year old jazz singer who has a rather fascinating history of dealing with disabilities (from an accident at 19) through music. My One And Only Thrill is her third release, the first (Some Lessons) being recordings from the hospital she was in and the second (Worrisome Heart) being her first official studio release. I haven't heard her previous records, but after listening to the latest one I will have to go back and find them.

Gardot brings back the luscious and deep sound of jazz back from the ages and adds her own smooth as silk voice to the mix. Listening to it, it's not hard to imagine sitting in a club back in the 30s being entranced by the singer on stage.

Unfortunately I don't really know enough jazz to compare her to anyone besides Norah Jones, and even then while their voices carry the same quality, their styles are quite different. Jones carries a jazzy style to her music, while Gardot seems to resurrect jazz itself. It's an amazing record to listen to. So take some time out of your day, sit back, and lose yourself in jazz.

My One And Only Thrill gets a 10/10.

Les Miserables

Unfortunately my reading speed hasn't been up to pace, so I won't post many book reviews here, but as a little taste I thought I would offer a short review to the longest book I've ever read. And yes, I read ALL of it.

Les Miserables most notably tells the tale of Jean Valjean, a thief and criminal who breaks out of prison, is saved by a priest, and turns his life around to become a humanitarian who is constantly on the run from the overzealous policeman Javert. The story is rich and powerful, with wonderful descriptions and moral quandaries that suck you in and pull you along Jean Valjean's tumultuous life.

However, there's another side to Les Mis, which are the endless political and philosophical ramblings that I'm sure you can tell I have no love for. Victor Hugo had many thoughts in his head when writing this book, and he decided to write them ALL down. For the French history buff, I'm sure the works would be engrossing. All the places his characters go, and even those they don't, are described in painstaking detail. The architecture and culture of 17th century France are paramount to Hugo. Unfortunately, to those who don't really care these passages are dry, dull, and looong.

So, if you start to notice that you haven't seen Jean Valjean or anyone you really care about for 3 chapters, just skip ahead because it's not important to the story and it will continue for several more chapters to come.

Overall, it's quite an undertaking at over 1400 pages of dense script, but as long as you skip the unimportant parts it's well worth it.

The complete Les Miserables gets a 6/10.
The story of Jean Valjean gets a 9/10.

Paranormal Activity

While I do have a great love for games, I have just as much love for movies, which are interestingly quickly becoming the non-interactive counterpart to video games...but that's another post. So here are some thoughts on the most recent movie I saw: Paranormal Activity.

When hype begins to surround a movie, especially such a low-budget horror flick that managed to captivate audiences enough to get it a full nationwide release, that movie almost never lives up to it. Such is unfortunately the case with Paranormal Activity.

Admittedly I have never sat through all of the Blair Witch Project, mostly piecing it together from random times I tuned in when it shows up on cable. Even so, it's quite obvious Paranormal Activity is in much the same vein, being an extremely low-budget suspense/horror flick with what sounds like a mostly improvised script that claims all of what we saw actually happened. Oh, and we can't forget the shaky cam, though thank goodness it's not much of a problem in this movie as many of the scares happen while the camera is on a tripod.

I suppose I should start with the good and then completely crush your dreams of it being great. First off, congrats to the people who filmed it for being able to do so much with so little money. $11,000 is nothing when you look at most films put out these days, and this movie proved that a big budget doesn't mean squat. They were able to create some very tense and scary moments using little more than bumps in the night. I have long been a fan of the concept that what you don't see is scarier than what you do, and this film uses that well...at the beginning. But we're still on the good here. So...umm....actually that's about it. Also, if you're quick to scare then this is your movie. If not...

Let's start with the plot. A couple has moved into this new house. The girlfriend has been haunted for many years, despite moving several times, and so the boyfriend buys a camera to see if anything is really happening or if it's her imagination. Sure enough, weird things start happening and they spend the rest of the movie being scared and trying to figure out how to get rid of whatever is plaguing them. So, it's not the most original of plots, especially when they hire a psychic and things start turning into a mixture of Poltergeist and The Exorcist. But, it's a suspense flick, who really cares about the plot as long as the suspense is good, right?

This is why I say those quick to scare will love this, because anyone who doesn't will see what's coming just about right away. When the camera is set up at night we get a little title card telling us which night it is ("Night 5" for example) and a clock telling us the time. What's frankly stupid is that all the scares take place during these static camera shots between 12am and 3am. Every. Night. Thus, the only suspense left us is trying to figure out what will happen. Admittedly there were one or two times that I was surprised at what happened, but those only came near the end (and not the end itself).

In fact, possibly the most disappointing part of this movie was the end. Yes, there are multiple endings. Yes, I saw them both. Yes, they're both disappointing. The problem is that the theatrical release, while scary and effective, is frankly overdone. The original ending, however, took all the suspense that the movie had built for itself and then just kind of let it slowly deflate. Sure it was slightly more original, but not as effective in my opinion.

Since the suspense scenes themselves aren't that suspenseful, it unfortunately falls then to the actors to carry all the fright and suspense on themselves. They too fall flat. Both the characters are completely one dimensional and are always in one of two modes: with the guy always trying to provoke the spirit and the girl getting mad, or the girl screaming and being frightened while the guy tries to protect her. Oh, or sleeping. But honestly I don't fault them. Both show promise, but are limited by a poor script that sounds either mostly improvised or reeeeally simple.

So in the end, despite its many faults there's still much suspense and scares to be had, especially for those of you who fright easily. And it's certainly to be commended for doing what it did with $11,000, but that budget limit also contributed to many of its failings. Worth a rent, but not much more.

Paranormal Activity gets a 6/10.

Dead Space: a review

As a first foray I thought I would re-post what I wrote on facebook about my new favorite game, Dead Space.

As I enter into the new and exciting world of console gaming with the first console I have ever owned, a PS3, I thought it might be prudent to extend my love of reviewing movies into reviewing games. Also, I just finished the much lauded horror shooter Dead Space and want to share my love of it with the world.

You play through the game as Isaac Clarke, a man with a mysterious past whose face you don't even get to see until the end as it is covered with a metal helmet for most of the game. We start off listening to a sorrowful message from his girlfriend wishing they could be together, and as it turns out, Isaac is on his way. He's part of a crew that's been assembled to check on a "planet cracker" ship called the Ishimura which has been mysteriously out of contact, and his girlfriend is aboard. After trying to dock with the Ishimura, there's a malfunction and the ship you're on goes crashing into the shuttle bay. And things only go downhill from here. After a few tutorial instructions you and the crew are thrust right into the action, fleeing from some kind of monster with claws for arms and an appetite for blood. You soon realize the ship is flooded with these creatures, and it's up to you to slice and dice your way through them while repairing the ship and trying your damndest to get rescued.

Sounds pretty typical and a little cliche, right? Wrong. As you weave your way through various sections of the ship, plot twist after plot twist is thrown your way to keep you on your toes up until the very end. Audio logs spread throughout the ship only contribute to the sense of dread and despair that is pervasive in this game. Sometimes you will happen across former crew members, but they are far from sane, and do some pretty disturbing things.

That's another thing about this game. It is bloody. Pretty much the key way to kill the monsters is to cut off their limbs with a variety of unique weapons, but sometimes a slap with your weapon or a bone crushing stomp to the face (with matching sound effects) is necessary. There's also a handy stasis feature which allows you to slow down enemies, and a kinesis feature which is used to hurl objects at enemies and solve some puzzles. Basically by the end of a battle, if you survive it, there are always copious amounts of blood and limbs everywhere, but that doesn't stop you from continuing to desecrate the fallen bodies by stomping what's left of them to pieces from the pure satisfaction of having survived. There's even achievements for it.

Perhaps the most distinguishing thing about this game, however, is the innovative interface. Your health bar is represented by a blue line on Isaac's back. The map, inventory, and any other "screen" you come across opens up as a small display from the suit, meaning the action doesn't stop if you need to quickly check how many health packs you have or figure out where the door is. However, most of the quick things you need to do are well assigned to specific buttons. Need a quick heal? Press square to use a med pack. Want to use a different weapon? Just press one of the 4 directions on the arrows. Don't know where you need to go for an objective? Hit R3 and a handy blue line will go from your hand to the floor and trace the direction you need to go. It's an extremely immersive and well thought out system that makes you spend more time involved in what's going on in front of you instead of dealing with layers of menus. Buying new stuff and upgrading your weapons are also easily managed through store terminals and benches respectively.

And here we get to what I consider possibly the best selling point: replayability. It is literally impossible to fully upgrade every weapon and your suit in a single playthrough. So by beating the game you are provided with extra money, more power nodes, a more powerful suit, and a chance to replay through the game with all of the upgrades you already have. An "impossible mode" is also unlocked, which I have yet to try as I can only assume it would kick my humble gaming ass.

With plenty of scares (as the monsters can attack you from any vent you happen to be standing next to), intense action, a unique immersive interface, and great replayability, I can't recommend this game highly enough.

Dead Space gets a 10/10.

A warm welcome

Welcome to all who choose to stop by and peruse my meandering mutterings! I have recently found an itch to start reviewing just about everything I read, watch or play and figured that instead of doing the random tagging business on facebook and wading through the tedium of the movies application I could just direct anyone interested to this little harbor of criticism and commentary. I honestly don't know how often I'll update it, but feel free to check back whenever for new updates. Who knows, I may even throw in some poetry or fiction for good measure, and to placate the writing gods for not doing Nanowrimo. Enjoy!