Muted?

I have to admit I'm getting really pissed of at myself for not posting more often, its not like I'm short of topics either. Plenty of major comic stories going on, and I'm even reading some. Sooo many good games coming out in the run up to Christmas its ridiculous. Halo 3, Call of Duty 4, Guitar Hero 3 and Mass Effect are all subjects I can talk about. I think that's the main problem, I'm trying to complete so much that the bit of time I'm on my computer is spent trying to catch up on the sites I regularly visit. So a quick run down of recent events is in order I think.

Halo 3 rocked and I spent one Hell of a lot of time playing multiplayer. I was kinda disappointed that the campaign was so short but with the way the trilogy finished I feel quite happy with. But I left Halo 3 MP way before I was ready to and there was one reason for that.

Call of Duty 4, my God this game rocks. Right now I'm pretty tempted to label this one as my Game of the Year but we'll wait and see. Multiplayer is immense and the Baboons are one nasty team to come across. Is quite likely to take the thrown from Halo 3 and Rainbow 6: Vegas as my most played online.

Guitar Hero 3. Boss Battles are SHIT! At least in single player anyway, I've yet to play one in multiplayer. Overall I'm happy with it, but it's Guitar Hero so you can't really go wrong. I can't shake the feeling that Neversoft haven't quite got it and 4 will be the one that really shows that, 3 comes across as the "We need an engine that matches Harmonix's". Co-op career was very nice though.

Mass Effect I'm gonna leave a bit longer before I talk about it because I'm about halfway through and liking it so far. Assassins Creed I'm getting for Christmas so that can wait too.

On the comics front Messiah Complex is shaping to be a good X-Men crossover which I nearly didn't bother with due to too much other stuff going on. Sinestro Corps continues to impress but is starting to dwindle with the infrequency of the titles recently. Booster Gold's new title is great and another I nearly missed out on. Top Cow's First Born and Pilot Season are both something I really wished I hadn't bothered with.

Sony Bastards

Five or six years ago I laughingly took part in the Sony vs. Microsoft Wars on the side of M$. Truth be told I didn't really care, the fact was I owned an X-Box and my friends and I knew how much shit Sony were spewing when it came to their own console and the pish they let be released on it. Also there was this little thing called a Dreamcast that just couldn't survive the fight.

However, Christmas two years ago I received a Sony Walkman MP3 player. Then my position changed. From the title of this post I bet you can guess which way I went. It may have looked cool but the software that came with it is a piece of shit. At least on every other player in the world you can tell it not to download Album information, SonicStage does it no questions asked. Sure they give you the option to tell it not to but does it actually stop the gathering, does it Hell. Oh yes, it only plays a format Sony invented that isn't compatible with anything else but don't worry SonicStage will convert your entire music collection to that format so we double the file size of your music folder. Also only Sony headphones will work with the thing, any other make is quiet as hell and practically useless.

Part of my job involves tech support for an online Music Provider that sells the songs as protected WMA's. In a meeting with some of the head guys we were talking about the fact we weren't compatible with Ipods and I brought up that we also had the same problem with Sony. One particular higher up said he had been promised by Sony that we were. I assured him we weren't, I own their player and have tested it myself. So Sony tell business what they want to hear even when it is total and utterly opposite from the truth.

Then of course we come to the PS3. Released in time for Christmas 2006, unless of course you happen to live in Europe then you had to wait until March 2007. The debacle of how they're releasing Gran Turismo. There's the different versions, ok Microsoft have been bad for it with the Core and Premium then adding Elite then rumour of replacing the Core with the Arcade version but Sony have been just as bad if not worse. At least it took Microsoft over a year to come out with a different, better version. In under a year Sony have announced they are no longer producing the original release version and only producing the crappy version with less features, once they've sold out of the original then they'll start selling the better model with a 80gb hard drive.

So what sparked this little rant. Well, since getting my new PC a few months ago I've been without the ability to add MP3s to the aforementioned player due to having lost the disk for the software. Today I finally got around to fixing that, only to find that the Sony website insists that you use Internet Explorer to view it. A minor incident I know but it was enough for me to finally have a rant about the bastards.

Doomsday

There's plenty of topics I should talk about right about now. I've watched quite a few films that I've enjoyed and of course there's Halo 3. However, being English it’s far easy to moan than it is to heap praise. So today I'm talking about the first of DC's Direct to DVD animated movies Superman: Doomsday. Supposedly the last movie to appear in Bruce Timm's style but not connected to the DCAU that he shepherded for over ten years.

Now I've never read the original comics of the Death of Superman but this movie takes the direction of telling the whole death and return. The Return is something I have read and it felt odd that where we had four pretenders running around we now have just one and filling both the roles of the Eradicator and then later Cyborg Superman while having the origin of Superboy. It also had parts from all three storylines that make up the Death and Return and as such certain parts felt under developed. Thankfully that didn't try to shoehorn it all in with things like Mongul attacking Coast City which were just too big to cover if they were determined to fit it all in one movie.

Onto the actual movie and first of all the main characters. Once again Superman and Lex Luthor have both been redesigned. Lex has been made a lot thinner which seemed to suit this version and definitely suited James Marsters voice. Superman on the other hand has had some lines added to his face for some bizarre reason and just ends up making him look weird rather than add any gravity to his presence. Adam Baldwin does a great job as the Big Blue though and that certainly made up for the face lines. Lois looks exactly the same as the old version which makes hearing Ann Heche's voice all the more strange in her first scene, I'm not sure whether it's this shock or not but Ann Heche's voice work isn't up to the standard of her co-stars but as the film gets further along that is noticeable improvement. Doomsday also looked better in his brief JLU appearance than he did in the movie.

Then there's the fight scenes. Seeing these animated was great, they are a lot more brutal than anything we've seen before from DC. They were long, nasty and Superman certainly took the worst beating I've ever seen which is only right for the story telling the Death of Superman. However, compared to the final fight against Darkseid in JLU these just lacked any drama and considering the story that's just not right.

Shocking Bio

Bioshock. What can I say about this game that's not been said before... Not much really, it is a damn fine game and you really should play it. It's easily one of the best shooters I've played in a good long while.

That said I have to own up to something, from the start I thought I was playing an pretty average shooter. As the game progresses you suddenly realise how involved with the whole thing is and you sink deeper (pun intended) into Rapture. By the time the twist comes up I was in love with it. The way the plot is slowly fed to you via voice recordings you have to find yourself is brilliant and while I felt at the start that it was really bad way to convey the story it turned into one of the more involving stories in a computer game in a while.

I've heard one or two people bitch about the ending. The end cinematic is not the end of Bioshock, it is the epilogue. From the twist to the last fight is the end of the story and it is brilliantly told. If you've not played it yet or given up due to a shaky start, you really do need to play this game.

Ghost Rider

I finally got around to watching Ghost Rider tonight and I think I may be the last person to see it. I went in expecting Nic Cage to annoy the crap out of me because when I heard the news he was cast I couldn't believe how miscast the role of Johnny Blaze was. As it turns out his Johnny was the better half of the main character.

While the Ghost Rider may have looked cool, even in a fight, he acted all wrong. Whoever thought it was a good idea to have the Spirit of Vengeance chortling all the way and cracking one liners needs to be shot. I mean here we've got a demon with a flaming skull for a head and we feel the need for him to talk smack to other demons. How about he just smacks the shit out of them and leave it at that?

The whole Police side story was un-needed and unresolved. We could have spent those twenty minutes or more important matters like showing how bad ass the Rider was or even some character development.

The random attempts at humour such as the Gecko being burnt to death felt horribly out of place. The old cheesy western music was atrocious, its like someone put it there as a place holder and they forgot to replace it. Someone needs to take Mark Steven Johnson away from superhero films. That's two he's fucked up.

More Then Meets the Eye

Last night I watched the Transformers, to date this is the biggest franchise of my childhood to be remade by Hollywood and it's unlikely to replaced except for the unlikely event Mask gets remade. The film was quite good, not amazing but certainly not a bad movie either.

It certainly had plenty of fanboy moments to keep me happy. The first meeting between an Autobot and a Decepticon certainly proved to me that Michael Bay got the subject matter and the Rangers were pretty cool, especially when I found out they were based on GI Joe.

However, there were some bad points in the film too, the scene in and around the Witwicky's house seemed very out of place for the movie, one friend described as Transformers meets American Pie which sums things up perfectly in my opinion. The guy from Sector 7 was just plain annoying and as Drew pointed out he seemed like he was from a bad 80s kids film.

I did enjoy the film, and I am looking forward to the sequel, but not too fussed about re-watching this one. Still, for the first time in Transformers, I actually liked Bumblebee.

Bossy Snake

Today, I finally completed Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater. I started it months ago and just never could be bothered with it really. As previously mentioned I got very put off during the sniper fight, but even after that I'd pick it up for a bit, get a bit further and put it back down again for a few weeks while I played something else.

Previously I put it down to the jungle setting rather than the more urban settings used for the first two games. However, now I'm not so sure. It definitely had something to do with it but that wasn't the only problem for me. Believe it or not, and I'm expecting to get lynched for this next sentence, some of my problem lies with the gameplay. The running about and sneaking hasn't really evolved that much since Metal Gear Solid except for the hanging that was introduced in Sons of Liberty. The camouflage was a nice addition and the fact Snake swapped clothes just like that I have no problem with because Metal Gear has always worn the fact its a computer game on it's sleeve.

We also got the introduction of food and that was very cool but the other introduction of healing I'm less happy about. I mean it was good to start with, but having to use it during boss fights sucked hard and really took me out of the moment. While most games are doing what they can to not take you out of the experience such as no loading times etc this menu based healing system seems like a step backwards in some ways. Thank God I was playing the Subsistence version of the game so I had a decent camera too.

However, I have not totally lost my marbles. The one thing that always is amazing in Metal Gear is the story and Snake Eater certainly doesn't disappoint. From start to finish the story intrigued me and is one of the main reasons I didn't abandon the game. Watching Naked Snake go through many of the changes that make him Big Boss was fantastic, and the phone conversation that happens at the end of the credits made my jaw drop.

There Can Be Only Four

On Thursday I finally bought a Highlander DVD. This was quite an event because every time I saw one I kept thinking about it, I lost track of the amount of times I nearly bought Endgame which thankfully I didn't. Anyway, the one I bought was Highlander: The Search for Vengeance, the animated movie made in collaboration between the American company Imagi and the Japanese animation company Madhouse.

The story follows Colin MacLeod and his 2000 year quest for revenge. This now takes the number of the Macleod clan that have been immortals to four, following Connor, Duncan and the previous animated Highlander, Quentin. If you want to live forever, forget the Spring of Eternal Youth find a member of the Macleod clan and sign up. Colin's a bit more bloodthirsty than the other Macleod's before him especially Duncan and Connor both of whom enjoy life and have civilised through the centuries. Colin on the other hand has lived for the death of his enemy Marcus and as such found himself on whatever side is the opposite to Marcus on a battlefield.

Apart from the quick recap of the story I'm not sure what else to say apart from the fact that I really enjoyed this film and would class it as the second best Highlander film, after the original. The action is fantastic and just what you expect from the company that brought us Ninja Scroll and Blood: The Last Vampire while the American script kept out any of the more out there concepts that can crop into Japanese productions that I'm not very fond of.

Intergalactic Space Nazis

This week starts yet another reality altering universe defining comic crossover. After Infinite Crisis and Civil War both hitting my wallet in a big way I said I was out for the foreseeable future. That didn't last though. Shortly after Crisis I started picking up Green Lantern just in time to see Batman fail recruitment and Amon Sur get inducted into the Sinestro Corps. In the past few years my interest in GL has been slowly growing and I've read most of the important points of the mythos but I wasn't that bothered about this crossover. However, the backup stories detailing some of the more important members of the Sinestro Corps was slowly getting me hooked and then I read the Ion maxi-series which not only was a great look at Kyle's new place in the universe but offered a hint of things to come so I signed up. From here on in expect major spoilers.

The first issue, a one-shot, landed this week and the story kicked off in a major way. Hal and Kyle have both been following up their own investigations into the Yellow Rings and they meet up on Oa, the Green Lantern base world, just in time for the first frontal attack by the Sinestro Corps. Kyle gets taken and many GL's bite the big one and things look bad. However, things look at lot worse when you find what happens to Kyle now that he's in Sinestro's clutches. Mentally tortured and stripped of his defences we're shown that his new expanded powers are thanks to benevolent entity, basically the new Parallax's opposite. This now gone and Kyle scared out of his mind leaves him open to possession by the fore-mentioned opposite and we have a new Parallax. The reveal of the rest of the higher ups of the Corps is more power than the bad guys in Infinite Crisis ever showed.

What really impresses me is that Johns seems to have been building towards this since his first Green Lantern script, the entity of Parallax was questionable but at least made Hal redeemable, making it not the only entity out there makes perfect sense. He's also tied in his own work from Infinite Crisis while also pulling from Crisis on Infinite Earth's and the entire history of the Green Lanterns. I'm glad I'm reading this crossover because it was easily my favourite of the week, and a week that included Iron Fist and X-Factor that is saying something. To be fair Sinestro Corp has always been billed as a Green Lantern story and so far I don't see this being untrue. After the last few pages I had to check the cover to check the name was "Green Lantern: Sinestro Corps" and due to the amount of power there has me worried for the characters which are fast becoming my favourites.

Less to Meet The Eye

In a few weeks the world will be exposed to Michael Bay's vision of Transformers, which I'm not entirely sure about. Bay has a good eye for over the top action, something really needed for this film. However, things can go a bit wrong in his films just look at the Cuba sequence in Bad Boys 2 and most of Pearl Harbour.

That's not what we're here to talk about today. No, it seems Hasbro are moving away from Takara and giving Cartoon Network a shot at a animated show. On a very basic level I'm happy, I've never really given any time to the imported show made by Takara but the few I caught bugged me with their weird and long plotlines. Usually I'm a fan of such things but they just seemed to crawl along like Dragonball Z. All very Japanese, which of course does make sense. On the other hand, there were many things that I mentioned a long time ago that needed to be fixed with Transformers that Takara actually did.

The news that Cartoon Network have released is very worrying for any long term Transformers fans. No longer will the Autobots be fighting their long term enemies the Decepticons, instead they'll be fighting evil humans and "basically turning it into a superheroes story". This is totally against everything that has gone before where the Autobots are a peaceful race and are really bothered about getting back to Cybertron, but have to fight so humans doesn't get enslaved by Megatron and his cronies.

The art is, erm, different for Transformers as well. It's what I call Americanised anime so really its just following the trend the majority of the industry is going. The character design is where things really change. Prime's got a chin that would make Bruce Campbell jealous and the military bot (I want to say Hound but since no names have been released and its just a departure I'm not going to guess with any of the old names) looks like a metal version of The Thing.

The show also seems to be going for a Emergency services theme, Prime's once again a fire truck and there is also the military vehicle and a Ambulance. There's also a small yellow car and a motorbike which don't look to be anything emergency service related but look like they could have sirens as well and I'm willing to put money on the yellow car being Bumblebee since he somehow always manages to be popular. It's an interesting direction and one of two things that make me wonder if they can pull this off.

The other thing is some of the people involved have some good pedigree with shows like Teen Titans, The Batman, X-Men and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. At the end of the day we'll just have to wait and see if we finally get a good Transformers show. I'm not holding my breath though.

The Torch and Surfer Show

4: Rise of the Silver Surfer. Funny it's called that, because really the Fantastic Four really don't do that much in the film. There's one scene where they actually work as a team, and that falls apart miserably. Really it should have been called The Human Torch meets the Silver Surfer. Apart from those two Sue runs around worrying about her wedding and moaning about their lifestyle not being the right environment to bring up a family and The Thing plays well off of Johnny and is good for a few laughs but really doesn't do much. Admittedly Reed's genius is put to good use in this film and he was much better here than the first film.

As for the actors from the returning cast Ioan Gruffudd, Chris Evans and Michael Chiklis seem a lot more comfortable in their roles. Jessica Alba on the other hand looked out of place the whole movie, and it was unsettling to see her with totally blonde hair and blue eyes. In the first movie it never bothered me but I'm now convinced she's been miscast in this movie, or at the very least they've tried too hard to make her the traditional Sue Storm instead of just letting her look like herself.

The worst part of the film was Galactus. You see a planet destroyed at the start of the film by something that isn't the Surfer, then he tells Sue that something else is coming with barely anytime left of the film. No real menace was put behind the big G, and for him to then turn up and be a massive cloud was pathetic. I'm entirely aware the regular Marvel Universe version wouldn't work on film, but Ultimate would or even some giant spaceship. Not something that looks like an update of the Planet Eater from Kirk-era Star Trek. The fight between Surfer and Galactus was rather boring to say the least as well.

At least it was better than the first film, and I'm sure with the money we're going to get a sequel and if the rumours are to believed it's going to follow a similar formula and launch the Black Panther. Hopefully there's a bit more teamwork and the end of the film doesn't revolve around the guest star saving the day.

No Solid, Liquid or Zombies?

I've finally managed to pry myself away from my 360 to play two games from the last generation it's taken me far too long to get round to. What has managed to pull me away from the grasp of Achievement Points and Live? The last Resident Evil and Metal Gear games of course.

Both of these franchises I was relatively late to. Metal Gear Solid I played as the second game appeared and I didn't get to that until it was ported to the Xbox. Resident Evil I arrived even later for. Despite the story really interesting me I'd somehow never played any of the series, sure I once saw someone start 2, and I once tried a friend's copy of the first Resident Evil but I missed the concept of the series and ran out of bullets pretty quickly and died. It took me to owning a Gamecube and Capcom remaking the series on the Gamecube for me to actually play the series properly.

Finally giving into the fact I'd never complete Code: Veronica without restarting I started what many have said is the best in series, Resident Evil 4. It was a pleasure to be stepping into the shoes of Leon again, as Resi 2 was my favourite so far and I found Leon's half of the story was much better than Claire's. It's quite a shock at the start of the game to realise that it's got a lot more gung-ho with Leon shooting anything that moves that isn't the President's Daughter. So far I have to agree with the accolades this game has got and it is one of the best Resident Evil's made to date.

It's a shame I can't say the same for Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater. Not to say I'm not enjoying the game, because I am, but I definitely preferred the last two games over this one. The references to the previous games (yet to happen when Snake Eater takes place) are great for the fans and playing as the man who will become Big Boss is certainly a thrill but something just seems to be missing. The jungle setting certainly is bold and well implemented but for me Metal Gear works better in an urban type environment. Also something about David Hayter's performance in this game is lacking and his usual performance as Snake just isn't working for me this time. A boss battle that took me nearly two hours is very impressive, however being in the mood to deal with it has seriously slowed my playing time of the game down.

All said though, I am enjoying both games a lot and I'm glad I prised myself away from the addition of Gamerscore for these two additions to some of the biggest franchises of gaming culture.

How Many Films Into One?

Spider-Man 3 has joined us in a record breaking way and I'm kinda happy. Quick summary, it's better than the second film but not the first. I agree with my mates Drew and Mike in that the first two thirds of the film rock but the last bit is super cheese rubbish. Tobey Maguire seems to have gotten over his need to keep removing his mask whenever he gets into any trouble what so ever, though the habit is still there.

My hatred for Dunst's Mary-Jane increased ever more this time round, ever more the bitch and I thought leaving a guy at the altar was pretty bad. Sandman was a good villain, the transformation scene was unbelievable, although I really wasn't keen on the flying sand storm and his last scene was atrocious.

My main problem is how it would have made two amazing films instead of one pretty good one. Ever since the announcement of Venom being in the film I was worried about villain overkill, a problem most superhero franchises suffer. I hoped beyond hope that near the end of the film Peter would get rid of the symbiote and the ending would be the cliffhanger of revealing Venom. Watching Spider-Man 3 reinforced this belief. The film was doing a perfect job of introducing Eddie Brock and if we can have two films of building Dr Connor's character why rush to Venom and have him fight Spidey in the same movie.

Raimi was doing such a good job of Harry as the new Goblin as well, James Franco seems to have caught Maguire's mask removing disease though. Not to sure about replacing the glider with a futuristic snowboard, the glider is such a symbolic part of the Goblin. There seemed to be a lot of plot holes too, the main being the famous bell tower scene, why did Peter go there? He had no reason to as he knew nothing of the symbiote's weakness. What happened to his spider-sense? Peter kept getting ambushed throughout the film and Venom bypassing it was totally lost despite a line explaining that very fact. Now we get to the spoilers.

In my mind Spider-Man 3 should have been the same film up to the point where Brock got the symbiote and Harry was disfigured then we could have concentrated on some of the sub plots and new characters a little more. I was totally loving this part of the film and thought it was a fantastic realisation of the Peter/Harry relationship in the comics. Harry's more underhanded messing with Parker's head was over far too quickly and Peter seemed to decide to put on the costume and go beat the living daylights out of the someone he thought was back to normal a little to quickly for my liking.

Topher Grace did a fantastic job as Brock and his Venom was great, he deserved more than just the one fight scene, and one he needed Sandman's help with. Spider-Man 4 should have been Venom's movie. Parker trying to regain his popularity, Venom coming along and messing Parker up totally then the kidnap scene from 3 to finish. Parker knows he outclassed so has to go groveling to Harry to help him rescue MJ, the only thing the two could actually forget their differences.

All of which takes us to that final fight scene. Some fantastic moments in it but overall, WHAT THE HELL? Peter and Harry are suddenly best friends and quipping jokes to each other because of something Osborn's butler said. This should have been a fight the two of them forced themselves through for MJ's sake. The clapping at Spider-Man's arrival who we've just been told is hated again, any scene involving the gathered crowd was awful in fact. The shot of Spidey and the flag actually made me winch.

The rumours for the next film have already started and Sony have said they're defiantly making up to six. Hopefully there's truth to Dunst not re-signing and will see if a new actress is enough to get me to like the character. The other main rumour is that one of the two deaths will be reversed. I'm hoping it's Brock rather than Harry for reasons I've covered above.

Man I Love Being a Turtle

I just got home from watching TMNT and man that was good. I came out of that film feeling like a 12 year old again.

The voices of the Turtles were spot on, and even though they were all brand new actors they were perfect for the roles. The action was great, especially Raphael’s fight scene to Black Betty and the big scene versus the Foot Clan. While the CGI for the human characters wasn't 100% for the Turtles and Splinter it was fantastic. The movements were important for a film about ninja's but what really struck me was the facial expressions. All four turtle’s faces were totally individualistic and you could really see the characters of the Turtles show through, from Raph's grimness to Mikey's easy going attitude. Also how the bandanas on the faces actually looked like bandanas rather than just part of their faces which is something that can happen in animation.

Only a couple of times did I start to worry, mostly when Raph was making his speeches towards the end. Apart from that, as you've probably guessed, I totally loved this film.

Happy Birthday from Marvel and Raven

In eight days time I hit my quarter century. It's not been bothering me too much but now I'm getting within breathing distance of it I'm starting to get a little worried. 25, now there really isn't an excuse to not start acting all grown up (like that'll happen though). I mean I can't even decide what to do for my birthday celebrations, a few little things are falling into place as we approach but as yet there isn't a big celebration to be had. I may try to relive last year's last minute night out that was absolute quality.

But in the midst of all this indecision, Marvel and Raven have publicly announced my birthday present. Marvel: Ultimate Alliance is getting 8 new Heroes and Villains added to it. We're getting the option of playing as Cyclops, Hawkeye, Hulk and Nightcrawler on the good side and for the bad guys Magneto, Sabretooth, Venom and most importantly Doom. I'm mostly psyched by Cyclops and Hawkeye, Cyke was my character during the original X-Men: Legends game and Hawkeye is one of my all time favourite Avengers.

This of course gives me a reason to play through the game once again with Drew and Daz. When we finished it the first time, we always said we would go through it again with Arcade Mode on Hard difficulty but never got round to it. Drew's got hard decisions to make between Sabretooth, Hulk and the more likely Venom. Daz on the other hand I think may struggle to pick anyone, Doom may be suitable if they've played up his tech and magic angle. I'm quite impressed with Raven as well, recording a lot of extra dialogue to make the characters fit into the game better. This should prove interesting when the team meets Bruce Banner, Dark Cyclops and the main protagonist, Doom himself. Still giving us 10 new achievements worth 250 points seems a bit of overkill just revolving around the new characters.

The Tony Stark that isn't a Total Arse

The Invincible Iron Man. Yet another Marvel animated DVD has joined the recent Comic to DVD range and it's another good one. Although I find it quite strange this one was even made as we're not that far off from a Hollywood Iron Man with the genius casting of Robert Downey Jr, especially since both versions seem to be dealing with a different telling of his origin.

Not that I'm complaining because I did really enjoy this one, far more than the two Avengers films previously released. This being me and as an extreme continuity nut I noticed that this actually seems to be based in the same timeline as the Ultimate Avenger films, the armour bay Stark has is extremely similar to the one shown in the second Avengers film and both the Ultimate Armour and the War Machine Armour were shown in it. Also establishing this link further, the voice of Tony Stark is exactly the same guy as the other films.

Onto the actual film and I've always preferred Iron Man in cartoons than in comics. I'm not sure why but Tony just never works quite as well for me in the books as he does when in motion and after months of evil Stark, proud sponsor of the Super Human Registration Act over in Civil War I thought it'd be nice to get a nice friendly version. We didn't quite get that, instead we get a typical heartless business man who places himself first and everything else second. He lied to his best friend and kept him out of the biggest project ever undertaken, even when Tony and Rhodey are building a makeshift armour Tony totally underplays the fact he wasn't exactly creating this stuff from scratch. As the film progresses Tony becomes more human and all round nice bloke but at the start he is a bit of a bastard.

Of course dealing with Iron Man we have to put up with his greatest enemy, the bottle. I mean the Mandarin, though a drunk Iron Man could make for some interesting viewing. This version of the Mandarin is ten times better than any other and instead of being some mental Chinese bloke, he’s a spirit of an ancient Chinese ruler. His appearance is brief and it is far better for it.

The other characters were quite a surprise, James ‘Rhodey’ Rhodes was different to any version I’ve experienced before but then I’m used to him either being War Machine or having fallen out with Stark for some reason or another. Pepper, Tony’s secretary, was a lot older and there was no sexual tension there as there would be normally. Most bizarrely, we have a version of Tony Stark who stands alongside his father in running Stark Enterprises. Also, considering this is an origin story the armour was handled very surprisingly. It was explained well but it does catch you by surprise.

To date this is easily the best Marvel Animated film, let’s hope they continue this upward curve with Doctor Strange and beyond.

No More Through The Gate

Stargate SG-1 has now finished its 10, and final, season making it longest continuous Sci-Fi series ever. I’ll definitely miss the show and feel bad for Ben Browder for having another show end on him but am I sad about it? Not really. Please be aware any American readers, your scheduling sucks and Sky One has shown the whole thing here in Blighty. This here blogging is going to be very spoilerific.

To be honest, I know I'm a story arc kinda guy but I was hoping for the SG-1 version of Deep Space Nine’s Dominion war. A ‘sod all else and those little happy stories we’re in a war and it’s a nasty one so follow us while we take this galaxy back one system at a time’ sort of thing. Ooo that made me feel all Sheridan like typing that.

Instead the shows leading up to the end of the season certainly didn't leave you with the feeling that it was all going to be over. After Daniel gets taken by the Ori, things quieten down and we get to see Mitchell's school reunion. Daniel returns and despite then unleashing the entire Ori army onto our galaxy we get some wonderful stories involving alternate realities and rebels. I’m not saying these weren’t good episodes, just they weren’t what I was hoping for. Then with two episodes before the curtain falls it all kicks off. In one episode so much ground was covered and it was fantastic. I applaud the writer who came up with Ba’al’s plan, that was an absolute masterstroke.

Then we have the last ever episode of Stargate SG-1. It, erm, wasn't what I expected. Sure I got the explosion I wanted and the start of the episode explains something that has seemed a bit off during the whole Ori storyline in the most shocking manor possible. But most of the episode was a character piece looking intently at our five main characters. It was an interesting way to end the series as nothing concerning the defeating the armies of the Ori was really addressed, but it did make for a good look at what was good about the show.

Then it was all over… well not really. SG-1 have two movies coming, the first ending the Ori storyline and the second a good old fashioned timeline buggered story that Stargate does so well. Plus Atlantis plunges on, a show I really think I need to watch considering how closely I’ve followed SG-1. There’s the 2008 debuting Stargate series that nobody knows anything yet. Plus apparently one of SG-1’s main guys hasn’t given up the fight for his series yet. Though I’m not sure if that’s such a good thing.

I'm with Union Jack

Because everyone's doing one.

[EDIT] It has come to my attention that Marvel's UK does indeed have a Superhero law, but our superhero's didn't have a hissy fit over the whole thing. So I'm still with Union Jack.

Happy Smiley Counter Terrorists

Rainbow Six, bit of an odd name for a counter terrorist agency but that's what Tom Clancy has given us. We're onto the fifth version of the computer game and this is my second. I'd messed around with the original game but only really got stuck in with Rogue Spear. I became disenchanted with the franchise when they abandoned the planning phase and went all action in an attempt to take on SWAT.

However, I had really loved Rogue Spear and its add-ons so I always felt the need to go back. Enter XBox Live's ability to download demos and I was trying Vegas. After telling myself this was a much needed buy since I first tried it, three months later my Dad came to the rescue and I finally own it.

The game is great and it’s reminding me of the fun I had playing Republic Commando and I'm really starting to like the tactical squad games. The pleasure you get when you successfully take down a room is fantastic. More than once have Michael, Jung and I stormed a room and the dirty terrorist scumbags all dropped seconds later. Also there is a lot of joy from sneaking about slowly killing all involved without alerting anyone else.

Though that brings me onto the problems I have. Sometimes the enemy AI is great, but all too often am I amazed how stupid these terrorists are. Last night I opened a door and shot gunned the guy on the other side for the pure joy of the shotgun. Amazingly, a couple of guys down the hall (out of my view I will point out) failed to really react to my little bit of Rambo. Admittedly they did switch from just standing around to being alert, but it didn't occur to either of them to go investigate what the loud noise was.

As I already stated, I cut my anti terrorist teeth on Rogue Spear and we no longer have the planning aspect. I don't pine for its return but I do miss the level of control it gave me over my team mates. More than once have I wished that they move up from the cover position I gave them. As it stands they only move to cover I tell them too, and therefore I have to be able to see that cover. I also find that when they are on follow in a fire fight they don't make the smartest of moves and I now do my best to make sure they're ordered to do something else other than just shoot people.

The Rainbow series hasn't totally filled the gap it created by removing its planning phase but all in all I am enjoying the game a great deal. I wonder if they've managed to fix the problems with Splinter Cell.

From Zombies to Policemen Officers

I've been a big fan of Simon Pegg's from Big Train through to Shaun of the Dead. Now we've got his latest venture from him and his two mates Edgar Wright and Nick Frost. Spaced started this wonderful trio and they've still got the magic.

Bluntly put, I really enjoyed the film. Not quite as funny as Shaun but as a whole the film is absolutely brilliant. One of my first reactions was amazement at one or two of the cast members. Shaun had quite a few British stalwart comedy actors but seeing Jim Broadbent and Timothy Dalton as major players goes to prove how far these guys have come since that Channel 4 sitcom.

Pegg's acting is some pretty fine stuff, I must admit I was quite surprised to see him play the straight man here but he does it well. However, Danny Butterman has got to be one of Nick Frost's worst performances. He was brilliant at both Mike and Ed yet here he seemed to be struggling, only really comfortable when Danny was being particulary Edish.

Wright's directing has certainly improved but I think he's heard one too many good comments about his fast cutting in Shaun, it's a little over done in this movie and at times it felt like he was just doing it because he could.

Winter-Een-Mas

Happy Winter-Een-Mas everyone. For those who have no idea what I'm going on about check out the official website or go google it. I hadn't actually realised how big it was until I did that.

As is becoming tradition on the weekend of Winter-een-mas we're celebrating with booze at Scott's, even though all he has is a PS2 on offer. Though I'm taking my old X-Box round too for more varied gaming. I'm also going to make a point of playing as much multiplayer as I can over the next week, something I usually barely bother with, favouring more the single player experience. I'm probably going to be found on Test Drive Unlimited, Rockstar Table Tennis and Gears of War. I'm more than likely going to be buying Rainbow Six: Vegas as well.

Also in the spirit of the season I post again:

3x3

I'm currently on tender hooks waiting for Mass Effect from Bioware on the 360 later this year. However, something has come to my attention as a result of this game and a few other upcoming releases. Game developers are becoming obsessed with trilogies. Is it that they've been looking at Star Wars, Back to the Future and The Godfather and decided that is how it has to be done?

Apart from the aforementioned Bioware game, Silicon Nights are finally going to be releasing their Too Human based on Norse Mythology (which does sound quite cool) and it's slated as the first in the trilogy. XBox 360's "biggest game" Gears of War is part of a trilogy. Knights of the Old Republic is rumoured to be a trilogy, and certainly the second game left a few plot points unresolved but I don’t know if it was originally intended that way, the fact it is Star Wars probably means LucasArts did mean for it to be.

Not only that but this year we've got the end of the Halo trilogy starring Master Chief. Two more games have already been confirmed by other studios expanding the universe, and making me actually play a RTS game.

Bioware and Bungie aren’t new to this trilogy business either. Bungie had the Marathon games on the Mac. Baldur’s Gate was intended to be one but in the excitement and moving technology of Neverwinter Nights the third part, Throne of Bhaal, was relegated down to Expansion Pack rather than a fully fledged game.

Not every game can be a Halo though and have its trilogy play out. Shenmue was a fantastic game, but the second came just as the Dreamcast was about to fall in it’s grave. It was later released on the XBox but low sales figures have left the third instalment on permanent hiatus. Then there’s Advent Rising a game that promised to blow everyone away and proceeded to not sell at all. No doubt there are people who enjoyed it and they only got part one of its three part story.

On the other foot we have Valve with Half-Life that was intended as a trilogy but they have now said that they're just going to keep going while they still have ideas and people are still playing. Notice how there is three Half-Life 2 episodes. Coincidence? You decide.

Microsoft Addiction Points

I knew as soon as I started playing on my 360 I knew I was in danger of getting terribly addicted to Achievements. Thankfully to start with it was relatively low level addiction as I slowly clawed my way towards several peoples scores who I wanted to match. Then Drew got his 360.

Nothing that harsh was said but I did like to point out his little score. So he made it a competition He halved my lead in no time at all. Really I wasn't bothered but then he made a comment about how he was about to take me over in Dead Rising. Low and Behold he took over my 480 and jumped up to 680, and the race was on. Yes, I am well aware of how petty this is but damn it, it gives my need to get 100% in games a bit more of a competitive aspect.

On the plus side I get to appreciate even more how good Dead Rising is. Third time through and I'm still finding new stuff. This game is amazing, the shine is only just starting to tarnish now that I've hit the maximum level.

Gangsters and Tropical Islands

Happy New Year Everybody. A New Year and my first post is about two old topics. I've finally managed to finish two games this week, Far Cry: Instincts and Saints Row.

I'd never got round to the original version on the PC and I realised I needed at least one version under my belt. Far Cry: Instincts was touted as one of the best shooters on the X-Box and saying that to a die hard Halo fan like me is certainly something. It was something I totally agreed with when I started the game, the intro is fantastic even if I did get a bit lost swimming straight away. I thoroughly enjoyed the game, even the bad handling of the vehicles wouldn’t put me off ploughing on. It seems odd to me that both Half-Life 2 and Far Cry go for this style when Halo has proven what can be done because everyone knows how much fun throwing a Warthog around can be. The hang glider section felt pointless too, I really didn't see any point of even doing that since it was far easier to do it via Jet Ski. The game only offered you the chance to use the hang glider twice, the first time the only real time it was needed and I ditched it through not knowing how to control it and finding the aforementioned Jet Ski.

However the vehicle controls are a minor niggle. Much more importantly is the end section of the game. From what I understand from Smith and Daz this was a big problem for Far Cry and Instincts has the same though I've got the feeling it's not as bad. At one point in the story one of the main bad guys legs it to another island and you follow. The minute you land on the new island things go downhill. I can't quite put my finger on what was so bad about it but I loved playing the first part of the game, once I got to this bit I only carried on because I figured I must be near the end. Once again a fantastic start to a game, let down by the ending.

Then we have Saints Row. I've already covered my thoughts on the gameplay so I'm just going to give brief thoughts on the story. Now Saints Row obviously falls under the category of GTA clone but to the extant this game goes to is extreme. More than once during a mission I got a serious sense of deja vu, one or two missions are directly ripped from the Rockstar series. That said the ending for this game is fantastic, though while there was plenty of side missions left to do I felt going back after that would ruin it for me so Saints Row has returned to its owner. Yes the driving’s bad, one aspect of the story revealed in the end sequence wasn't covered enough but decent shooting and a fairly good story do make it worth while.

I need HD in my life

This week Mr Drew has spent a ridiculous amount of money on a HD TV. When it came time for our next gaming session it only seemed right that I take my 360 up to his and find out what they could do. Let me tell you, they were beautiful together. First thing I had to do was both Halo 3 trailers, these amazed me when they first came out, but seeing them in HD took my breath away. Then onto the games.

We spent most of our time on Marvel: Ultimate Alliance, unlocking the last few morsels erin that game ready for the hard mode arcade action, of which we got a taste for and Drew and I are once again addicted. I was a bit let down of the jump from X-Box to 360 graphically originally but HD totally removed that. How much better this game looks is incredible. Everything just looked so much more detailed and crisper.

Drew had mentioned it was the racing games that really looked amazing on HD, unfortunately I don't own any but luckily I do have a demo of Carbon on the hard drive. I was drooling at the car selection screen never mind in game. Finally we tried Dead Rising, I noticed less with this game, but that may be due to the fact Capcom made it for HD and really ignored the standard definition. If was nice to be able to read the text in game for a change though.

Gangsters and Capes

Two topics up for discussion today. Firstly Heroes because I'm not going into much detail. This show is fantastic. Finally a show I have gotten into right from the get go rather than sticking with it because I feel like it could go somewhere. I'm not sure I've done that since Buffy started on Sky One. It really does feel like someone had a comic story to tell but managed to get a TV network to make it instead.

Secondly there's Saints Row. It was one of the first demos I downloaded off Xbox Live and while not overly impressed I did think it could be quite fun, and I've been craving some GTA like action recently. When I first put the game in the machine I hated it, I thought it was very badly done. The car handling is atrocious, the cars feel extremely similar, its only you start getting into the game and start driving very different types of cars that you can start to notice the difference in the handling. Though the handbrake never improves, no matter what you're driving the normal breaks barely do anything while the handbrake is the guaranteed to stop you dead with a near perfect 90 degree turn.

The early missions aren't anything special, at least for the Vice Kings anyway. There are three gangs to take down in the City of Stillwater and it's entirely up to you which order that you do them. I've just finished the Vice Kings and moved onto Los Carnales. The difference between the early Kings and Carnales is quite shocking as I'm really enjoying the Carnales missions while the Kings I did get bored with half way through and it's only my worrying determination to finish games that kept me with Saints Row at that point. Also the activities, while initially standing out as good, just don't work for me really. I realise that they are pick up when you fancy them but I just find myself getting very frustrated with the level system used for them.

All said and done Saints Row is an alternative to GTA, not a better one and not necessarily worse either. They both do certain things better than the other, car handling is certainly better in GTA while targeting is better in Saints Row for instance. One thing for Saints Row is that although the story isn't great is does feel a better gang experience than San Andreas was, which seemed to forget where it came from once CJ’s brother got arrested.

Quick Shout Out

In order to make my posts a bit snappier, if I've got something to say I'm just gonna say it, rather than waiting till the end of the month (which I'm still gonna use as a general sum up).

First off, I've finally got off my arse and posted up links to some of my friend's blogs and the like.

Secondly, I've finally picked up last week's comics. In my pile the to read list was X-Factor (yes a week late but it's fantastic) and Iron Fist. I feel ashamed it's taken me this long to pick up Brubaker at Marvel, but now that I have his and Matt Fraction's story is fantastic. A quick read but brilliantly told. The advertising in Teen Titans was atrocious, and people have been complaining at Marvel? Also Wisdom was a bit of a let down. While it did feel like a proper British comic in the Marvel universe, it also felt like the story needed two issues to be told.

Movies Games and Videos

During getting my website back up and running and preparing an actual update for it, I realised I’ve not used this for one of the main reasons I originally set it up. When I updated my website I usually covered what movies, games and comics I’ve been watching/playing/reading. Due to my lameness at getting updates done it always bugged me that it got ignored. So here we are, and hopefully I’ll get this done once a month.

On the movie front we of course have Casino Royale. I applaud the makers abandoning the formula that has been ruining Bond films of recent and returning to the books with the very first one that somehow never got made. The film is great, and I could barely believe I was watching a Bond film, and I was delighted to see a third of the film dedicated to a poker game.

On the TV I’m quite pleased at the Legion of Superheroes show, and I’m ashamed to say I’ve not yet got around to watching Heroes. Other than that I’m sticking with the shows I’ve talked about many times on here.

As already stated I’ve recently bought an Xbox 360 and am I glad I did. Apart from the initial gamertag issues (see Mini Rants entry below) things have been going great. First game I got was Marvel: Ultimate Alliance. Nothing majorly different from X-Men Legends 2, and what they have changed is for the better. Less item slots makes gear management a damn site easier, though my RPG heavy team mates bemoan this particular change. Instead the costumes have different abilities and you pick which costume suits your gameplay. Also Extreme Powers work on meter you build up rather than based on pickups making them much easier to use and more rewarding, though I’m not keen on ‘everybody uses it all at once’. At times it’s way too much overkill. Also the new team management is quite cool, and adds a bit more depth to the game.

On games that are actually next gen I bought Dead Rising. This game is great. If you’ve got a 360 you need this game. I’m thoroughly enjoying going back through this game for the 100%, unlike most games where I just feel the need to do it. I also broke my promise to myself and started playing Oblivion. I always said I’d lose my life if I started playing, and to prove my point I’ve lost a lot of hours without even realising it.

Comics wise, nothing much has changed. I’m looking to dropping a few titles but I’m not 100% made up my mind yet. I’m still loving Civil War, though I need to limit the amount of titles I’m getting for it, it’s become a bit all encompassing for my collection. Really need to get hold of more Invincible, reread the first trade, the only one I own and am craving the next book, but need to hold off till the New Year.

Catching Up

Going through my old rants on Monday as I was sorting my website out I realised I talked a lot about shows that have had a good run and some have even ended, and my opinions weren't necessarily the same now as they were on seeing one or two of the episodes. I even feel I need to talk more on the new Fantastic Four now that I've watched more than two episodes.

But first the big one, Justice League Unlimited. This currently rules supreme as the best superhero animated series ever. Ongoing story arcs that built up over the season with a huge payoff at the end, especially the Cadmus arc. Green Arrow clearly making it into one of the big names alongside GL and Supes. Even with the massive cast they stuck with the GL/Hawkgirl romance, making it a love triangle with Vixen with the added complication of John meeting his and Shayera's future son. This brings us to one of my favourite points, tying it all into Batman Beyond. Not only did we have the time travel story featuring the Beyond JLU from 'The Call', but we had the episode that should have been the last ever episode of the entire DCUA universe, Epilogue. OK, so it was extremely Batman centric, but it linked everything from the start of Batman: The Animated series to JLU through Batman Beyond. If you've not seen any JLU stop making excuses and Get It Done!

Three years ago I wrote my first rant and it was about Teen Titans and overly I was quite enthusiastic about the show. That enthusiasm carried right through to the end of the movie. In some parts it increased. For instance I now regard the theme tune as a fantastic piece of J-Pop. I loved the fact the series could be deadly serious one show and deal with Robin being too focused then the next just go off on one and the Titans get trapped in a magic hat. The Mad Mod episodes always surprised me with how experimental they were being, especially as this was far more of a kids show than JLU. The characters grew on me and Starfire stopped annoying me, though I still prefer the comic’s version. My biggest problem was it's last season, the season before had been fantastic, but then they went travelling the world and meeting new Titans in order to warn them, and the show felt really shallow during these episodes.

As I already mentioned, I've watched a few more episodes now and while it hasn't grown on me a huge amount, there are a couple of things that have warmed me to it. HERBIE as the Baxter Building's AI is a great little touch. Its become obvious that it's based on the movie continuity except Doom is the comic version, which makes sense since Movie Doom was terrible. The Human Torch is annoying the hell out of me, which is rather troubling since he's my favourite. He's far too stupid, he's meant to be cocky not an idiot. Most importantly we've had another episode building on the Kree/Skrull war, with a fantastic prequel to the debut of the Super-Skrull and a twist at the end. More than anything else, this has got me watching more of the series.

Finally, we have Smallville back on. Zod was a rather good episode but nothing spectacular as the last episode of the previous season was. So far the new series is quite good. Thankfully we've been given a new reason for people being super powered instead of Kryptonite powered humans, though the first one felt like a rip off of Poison Ivy. This season we have a young Oliver Queen, and just like JLU they've got the character down, though this is millionaire play boy Queen instead of the fighting for the everyman Queen. I've yet to see the episode where he properly goes out and about in a costume, but the cheek of the producers having him go to a fancy dress party as Robin Hood, but actually put Ollie in the pre-Infinite Crisis GA costume was wonderful. I think it'll be good for Clark to meet someone who enjoys the life of a costume hero for his progression to wearing his underpants on the outside, unlike the Angel of Vengeance *cough*Huntress*cough* we had last season. My hatred of Lana Lang grows ever more with each passing episode, hopefully now she's with Lex she can die a horrible death that will finally put Lex on top of the evil chain where he's been travelling towards for the whole of Smallville's run.

Don't worry, Marvel: Ultimate Alliance is coming, I'm just trying to finish it before I talk about it. Also Legion of Superheroes once I've seen a few more episodes (I am learning), but so far so good.

Mini Rants

Nothing outstanding for me, but a few little things. Finally got round to the Teen Titans: Trouble in Tokyo. Good movie that carried on from the series in a great way, hopefully we see more things like this and Ultimate Avengers then we do Superman: Brainiac Attacks. Bring on the Hellboy movie.

Got an X-Box 360 this weekend. I was all happy through out Saturday and Sunday. More to come on Marvel: Ultimate Alliance. However, I had some trouble with setting up my X-Box Live account. You see I have been on Live before with my old X-Box but got bored and the account was cancelled. There I am trying to reactivate it but I just don't have the info, which is well over a year old. In my desperation I actually ring Microsoft's helpline to get them to reactivate it then I can update the details. After pretending to be Chris and waiting for 5 minutes while the guy prats about, I'm told it was cancelled. Which I knew. However, it turns out when Microsoft cancel an account it can never be touched ever again and that Gamertag is lost to the world. No more NightJim. Sucks big hairy elephant balls. So I've resorted to KnightJim. Bloody Microsoft.

New Robin Hood on BBC isn't all that, first episode suffered from trying to play it too lightly, the following episodes have improved on that front, but something about it doesn't sit quite right. It may be how Dave put it, it's far too clean for medieval times.

Got Agent X, was disappointed by how little Gail Simone wrote of it, first and last stories. Hers are easily the best in the series, one of the others actually reading like a through and through Deadpool story, which is against the whole point of the book. Alex desperately was trying to be different to our man Wade.

Everyone's After Aliens

Two subjects to talk about today. First up, Torchwood started on BBC 3 on Sunday and I was there for the first two episodes. The new Doctor Who has done so well it’s managed to spawn a spin off that’s aimed at adults. So far it appears to be a British X-Files based in the Doctor Who universe. I just hope they manage to address UNIT at some point, because the fact the British Military has an organisation that investigates the paranormal seems to have been forgotten.

Captain Jack Harkness, the second companion for half of Ecclestone’s series has been given control of the third Torchwood facility in Cardiff. The fact that Torchwood isn’t hiding the fact that it’s based in Cardiff is one of the things that have impressed me about the show. Having just come back on the Friday from my business trip there it was very cool seeing one or two places that I recognised. Even to the point that one of the pubs I went in could just be seen as Gwen, the character the series seems to from the perspective of, enters the Torchwood facility for the first time.

More to the point, the stories are really good. It is far more adult that Dr Who can be at 7 o’clock on a Saturday night with death and murder quite strong in both episodes. The show does seem to have a fixation on sex though. With Captain Jack a little is to be expected, he was easily the horniest companion in the history of Who. We have been promised every single member of the cast will get a same sex kiss, and we’ve already had two in as many episodes. The whole plot of the second episode revolved around an alien that fed off orgasmic energy, killing the male in the process, similar to that Outer Limits episode that scared me shitless when I was 14. It seems to me that Russell Davies has to get some of this out of his system, since he has to spend his time looking after a ‘family’ show the rest of the time.

Thankfully they’ve addressed the fact that Captain Jack is alive despite the fact he died facing the Daleks in the final episode of Eccelstone’s run. He even mentioned wanting to meet the Dr to find out what’s going on. Technically the audience knows this as it was shown at the end of the Who episode (though I had to read it on Wikipedia) and from the special effect when he kissed the orgasm alien its obvious that its to do with the chronal energy that Rose Tyler absorbed. All said, the show is great and I fully intend to keep watching it every Sunday.

The second topic of conversation is the new Fantastic Four cartoon. I’ve watched two episodes so far, and I’m yet to be impressed. The animation is pretty slick although it falls under the category of the US imitating anime once again. I was mildly surprised to see the first episode start with a Ronan the Accuser story, a minor character from the Marvel Universe rather than an origin story or something with a better known character such as Doom. Which brings me onto my next point, it feels like I’ve missed some episodes. The series just starts getting on with things, no real character introduction and the second episode is Doom and it doesn’t really explain the feud between Doom and Reed its just accepted fact that Doom hates him. Now I can cope with this as I’m a major comic geek and this stuff to me is like the Bible is to the Pope, but have we got to the point where we don’t have to tell the origin of the Fantastic Four or their biggest villain? If so that’s great, but I only thought we were there with Superman, Batman and Spider-Man. I’ve got a total of five episodes to watch, I’m going to watch them and see if I fancy watching anymore. Though the hints at a Kree-Skrull war hinted at in the first episode has got me very intrigued.

There Can Be Only One

I bet you're wondering where I've been? Well probably not but I like to pretend anyway. Well after my 3 week trip to Canada, which was great thank you. I just got home when work asked me to go to Cardiff to help look after the new people in that new office. They also gave me a semi-promotion, so I'm now looking after IS Support while someone gets round to actually advertising for the positions there properly.

So I'd been home a week when work sent me to Wales for another week, which has to be said was a great time as well. Anyway, I'd not had a huge amount of time to dedicate to the promise I made myself and to the good people at Heroic Images. That of getting my website back up and running once I got back from Canada. I got one night on it before going to Cardiff and we're nearly there and since I've got three days off from work I hope to get more down this weekend. Then I've just got the DNS to sort out and we should be ready to go.

Last night, having only slept for 2 hours on Thursday and traveling, I was shattered and in need of a film. So I watched Highlander: Endgame, against Chris' recommendation. Well his recommendation wasn't far off but it wasn't that bad. But as Chris put it I've watched quite a lot of the show and he hasn't. Which I feel is one of the main problems of the film. Its big thing was that we finally had Connor and Duncan together properly for the first time, and it was good for some of that, we got to see there history together, and why Connor wasn't about for the series. In other ways the film really didn't manage that.

The main villain, apart from being extremely cheesy and over the top, was someone that had been plaguing Connor for centuries but had nothing to do with Duncan, yet it was Duncan who had to take him out at the end. This seemed to be the problem for the film as a whole, they never managed to find someone who had real resonance for both of the MacLeods. That said, it's not like Christopher Lambert is in the modern day setting a huge amount, which is probably a good thing since how old he looks these days. Not really the nest thing for an immortal. Also some of the blue screen was absolutely shocking as well and all three people watching laughed out loud.

It's not a great film by any stretch of the imagination and unless you've watched the series you're probably going to disappointed.

GUNning it

Friday was an absolute quality night out, though Alex ruined the theme by getting back with his ex earlier in the week. Saturday, hung over to hell, I decided I needed some good shooting action, something not offered by any of the games I’m currently playing. What with actually having something to write about I decided I better fit another post in before the Canada trip.

Gun was one of those games that when it was released had intrigued me, the adverts looked great and when was the last time a decent western game was made? Anyway, Smith had warned me at the time that while it was supposed to be good it was also very short. However, seeing at £10 and on Buy One Get One Free you can’t really go wrong, unless you decide the latest Leisure Suit Larry or Lula game would be a good purchase.

Anyway, Gun is a brilliant game but, as Smith warned, it is rather short. I completed it in a weekend, though admittedly it did take two hardcore sessions. The game starts off rather hard to control but as your stats improve and you buy upgrades for your weapons it gets a lot easier, and a lot cooler. In no time at all I was picking bandits off their horses with my rifle and taking arrows and dynamite out of the air with my pistol.

The storyline is great and has a fantastic Western feel, with kind hearted whores, dirty business men, history with Indians and Civil War veterans looking to right wrongs. Also it managed to throw quite a few curve balls into the story, something which is quite unique in action games.

That’s not to say the game isn’t with its faults. I had one total crash and a fall through floor moment. The physical gestures during in game speech were quite often comical, and once or twice a model’s hands got mangled up during those gestures and I once saw a mission specific target walk through a wall. Also the game does a GTA and lets you keep playing after the storyline, and the more complete the game is the more fun stuff you get. Thing is, it’s not that hard to complete the side missions, once they’re done there’s not much to do, making the two best items in the game practically pointless.

All said, a great game, that was well worth the £10 charged, even better when you think I only paid a fiver.

Long Time No Update

So nearly a month and no update, and God knows how long it's been since my site's been updated. Hell the thing isn't even working right now. Well I've had nothing to rant or rave about, nothing I've seen has really given me any strong feelings. It's going to be even longer. On Wednesday I'm off to Vancouver on holiday with Drew for three weeks. Right now I'm telling myself when I get back I'm going to get back on track.

Civil War is still going great and I'm not bothered at all about the delays, I'd rather have it all told well by Millar and McNiven than put up with some fill-ins, a personal hatred of mine. I'm thinking of having a major upheaval in what I buy. Two comics have already been cast aside. Marvel Team-Up is finishing and I'm thinking of giving up on Birds of Prey. Speaking of Gail Simone, I finally got to read her 5 issues of Deadpool. Absolute Genius! Some of the best Deadpool I've ever read. Really need to get hold of her Agent-X now.

Stargate season 10 is pretty good, and Blade has improved but still isn't that amazing. Need to watch the new Fantastic Four animated.

Games wise I've got plenty on my plate. Currently been paying attention to Prince of Persia: Warrior Within, which seems to improve the further you get in the game. Also Chris bought Guitar Hero and it is brilliant. Wish I had an X-Box 360 for Dead Rising, the demo of which blew me away (Damn you Smith!).

Well I'm off to go get drunk again. A celebration of my four of Flat 28 are all single at the same time, the first time it's happened since we met six years ago.

Avenging to the Ultimate

Since the first film came out during the time I’d stopped updating my website and before I started this blog it never got covered by me and as I’ve just finished watching the second film I figured lets talk about both. Although with emphasis on the second obviously.

Released early 2006 Ultimate Avengers took Millar and Hitch’s first Ultimates storyline and made it an animated film. Unfortunately, they did that by dumbing the story down for time and audience reasons. In my opinion, while nowhere near as good as the original comic series it was an ok film, with Ultimate Cap and Iron Man getting good showings. The wife beating storyline was lifted and the aliens were nowhere near the threat they were in the comic. I can understand why most of this was done, Millar and Hitch had 12 comics to get their story across. Ultimate Avengers had less than an hour and a half and some of the scenes would have ramped up the rating of the film, but you can’t help miss them when you know they should be there.

The second film creates a totally original story and it’s better for it. Starting that the Aliens are defeated just set back was a great idea. Kleiser, a great character from Ultimates who was wasted in the first film finally got a good showing, though his defeat was one of the more disappointing parts of the finale. We also get the wife beating storyline rear its head in the only way I think the movie producers could have gotten away with and I’m glad to see it. The second seems to symbolise more of a departure to sticking to Ultimate timeline and mixing from normal Marvel Universe to create a match that suits the film, with an introduction of Iron Man’s Armoury and Tony switching to the War Machine Armour.

Both films have fantastic animation, but some of the design leaves a lot to be desired. Maybe it’s the fanboy in me but a lot of the character design just comes off bad. Mostly going for the Ultimate designs is all well and good, and it’s understandable going with the more well known green Hulk. What annoys me is, although it’s Ultimate Thor the designers have taken away his beard making him look more like he belongs on a Californian beach than the battlegrounds of Asgard. Also super spy Black Widow has her top unzipped and showing a whole load of cleavage, to be expected in this kind of production, but I was expecting her to zip it up when it came to going into action. Plus the new design of Black Panther was awful in my opinion and instead of looking regal, T’Challa looked like he belonged in a wrestling ring. Lets not even get into this new morphing into a panther power he’s found.

All in all, the Ultimate Avengers films are good fun for the superhero fans looking for some light entertainment, though anyone who has read Ultimates volume 1 will find the first a bit annoying.

The Big Boy Scout

Of course I have to talk about SUPERMAN RETURNS. A thoroughly good Superhero flick, which has equal focus on the relationship between Lois and Clark as it does Luthor’s evil scheme. My heart started racing from the very start with the opening credits with the John Williams film, which I admit is kinda odd since I’ve never had too much of a soft spot for the Reeve films, while the first two were good, I wasn’t even born when they were released and only ever caught them on ITV. I have to admit, it’s been some years since I’ve seen. Also several FUCK YEAH moments when Supes was doing his thing.

On a down note I had a problem with a few of the characters, I always had a problem with Gene Hackman’s Luthor so Kevin Spacey’s didn’t rub me the right way, though he did do a better job than Hackman. Parker Posey’s character annoyed the crap out of me, I will never understand why they’ve had Luthor have someone like that hang around with him, an introduction of someone like Mercy would have been so much better. On the plus side I expected to hate James Marsters’ character from the moment he was introduced, and was pleasantly surprised that Singer and co made him a very likeable character who I’m going to feel very sorry for when he finds out the revelation that Clark and the viewer are shown at the end of the movie.

Also the flight scenes were a mixed bag, some were “Oh dear God that’s some terrible CGI”, others, well, lets just say, I believed a man could fly.

On a minor note, at San Diego Comic Con, Edgar Wright, director and co-writer of Spaced and Shaun of the Dead has been announced as the director of Marvel’s Ant Man. An interesting choice of character for a movie translation, but Wright picked and wrote it himself and the few ideas he mentioned at the Con sounded quite cool.

Another Vampire Slayer

It's been awhile since I've actually wrote about something sci-fi or comic book related and since that's the main point of this place I think it's about time.

So, the new Blade TV series. Thankfully continuing on from where Blade: Trinity finished, Blade's got a new partner and seems to be sticking to Detroit, now revealed to be his hometown. I'm not overly sure about the revealing of his real name and home town, I've no knowledge of the comic to know where they got this from, I only know what I've learnt from the films and the episodes of Spider-Man he appeared in. The name did seem a bit forced in, like they had decided that he had to have a proper name and just dumped a bit of dialogue in there to reveal it.

The new actor seems to be doing a good job of filling Wesley Snipes shoes, though he's nowhere near as cool at the minute and he does seem to hunch when he walks. Not sure if this is on purpose or just because he's not sure how to walk about with a sword strapped to his back. Whatever it is someone needs to teach him to stop it.

Also the whole premise for the ongoing story seems a bit... crap. I liked it when the girl was bitten, but thought we were going to get a replay of the (girl) from Blade 1 when Blade and Whistler stopped the transformation. Instead Blade gives her some of his serum and she gets her human mind back. To me this just seems wrong. It makes Blade having these abilities but being a good guy less unique, plus I thought the whole reason it worked for Blade was his half-breed nature. They give the explanation that it only works for her because she hasn't been turned for 24 hours, but I'm still not convinced.

Nightwing: All My Life

So I've decided to have a go at one of these music videos edited together with animation. Because its me it had to be Nightwing and Foo Fighters. Enjoy!

Cheered up and Inadequacies

Like Smith, I promised myself I'd not using this as a diary but felt I really needed to today.

Well I feel a whole lot better. I’ve been pretty down recently for various reasons and been trying various things to cheer me up, none of which have been working. It’s amazing what a quiet night in the pub will do for you. After the initial quick bitching session and catch up, we had a very long and very geeky conversation with both of us cracking the other up. We even managed to fit in a quick rant about women in. Thanks a lot mate ;)

Also figured I'd talk about why my comic has not been updating for over a month now. See in interviews with professionals they go on about how good a storyteller their artist is and how they pass on so much through the imagery. Due to a total lack of artistic talent I use sprites, so fixed camera angles and no real expression. Plus I don't make my own sprites, Alex makes them for me (which I am eternally grateful for), therefore I've got a set of sprites to pick from and if I do need a new one I have to give Alex a weeks warning. All in all these leads to a very frustrated writer. I'm not saying I've stopped. I needed a break, I reckon it should be back soon. I determined to get to the next few storylines where I've got people interested in doing guest arcs. In the very least I'll give me time to seethe over the inadequacies of my chosen format. Anyone fancy drawing it?

Finally an update

I feel I’ve been letting my geek responsibilities (not to mention my general blogging ones) down recently. Thing is, I’ve not had anything major to write about. Watched the odd Smallville and kept reading my comics, but nothings really got me angry. So I’ve figured I better start covering subjects that impressed me.

First up is Whedon’s X-Men. Late to the game but earlier this month I bought the first trade and it was amazing. I know many people have said it but I’m just adding my voice to the choir. Colossus and Kitty were fantastic and Wolverine acted like Wolverine, which actually made me realise how bad X3’s portrayal of him was. It felt like the X-men should do. If you’re an X-Men fan or a Whedon one and you haven’t already I urge you to go get it!

Second, we have Star Wars: Republic Commando books. I know I said I was barely touching the Star Wars books anymore but Republic Commando the game blew me away with how good it was and the first book got quite a good review so I picked it up (BTW, I never did pick up that other series based after New Jedi Order, hive minded insectoid Aliens = Rubbish!). The first book is a straight forward, behind enemy lines infiltration op the second a lot more in depth deep cover investigation. I’m amazed at how different to the other novels they feel. They read exactly like most Special Ops books I’ve read, only difference is it’s based in a sci-fi universe. This is something I’ve been crying out for ever since we got the Rogue Squadron books, and thank god we’ve got them. They’ve managed to restore some of my love for Star Wars.

Last, we have Civil War. Two issues in and it’s fantastic. Captain America is kicking so much arse and being cool about it, Spider-Man’s reveal shocked me, took me a few days to process that one. Personally I’m enjoying this far more than I did Infinite Crisis.

Footballer's Wives

Had to share this. Thanks to Johnny Vaughan on Capital Radio and my Mum for this.

Disccussion on what a collection of Footballer's Wives should be called. Here are the options:

1. A Boutique
2. An Implant
3. A Giggle
4. A Handbag
5. A Meow
6. A Pout
7. A Vacuum
8. A Rack
9. A Shallow
10. An Extension
11. An Excess
12. A Surgery

Personally my favourite is "a shallow".

The Wolverine and Storm Show

Thanks Drew for the title of this.

You guessed it, I went to see X-Men 3 last night. Figured I'd better say something since everyone's expecting me too but this is going to be quite short, cos I actually quite liked it. Sure there were a few minor problems with it, Plastic guns, Vinnie Jones and Magneto's helmet not fitting properly and conducting whenever he used his powers.

Also the inclusion of Spike, the politically correct rip off of Marrow from the X-Men Evolution cartoon and far too many story threads for the time given, the Bobby, Kitty Rogue and her trip was tragically unexplored as was the Angel storyline with his father. Other than that I quite enjoyed it. Special mention must go to the inclusion of the Blackbird as the X-Jet, my favourite X-plane as it was this plane in the 90s cartoon and in the comics when I started with X-Men, a silly thing but I loved seeing it.

Update on Smallville and Stargate

So I managed to get through the whole of season 4 of Smallville and it was quite a slog. My problem with the ‘losing memory’ story line got worse with 3 episodes in a row doing it at one point. The main story arc kept me hooked though and I’m glad it did. Season 5 has significantly improved things with only one “Oops, I’ve forgotten what I’ve actually done” episode to date. We’re also getting more concentration on the arc rather than the odd 5 minutes thrown in. I’m also getting perverse enjoyment about Clark worrying about the very problem that Brodie brought up in Mallrats, that he might take out Lana with one well aimed shot.

I’ve also got over my problems with the continuity with one simple realisation. There is no way this Clark can ever become any version of Superman that we know of. Lois and Lex would take one look at Superman and recognise the guy they spent a good few years hanging out with. And so what? If you’re that bothered lets call it an Elseworlds and stop worrying.

It also seems to have taken a leaf out of Stargate’s book for getting audience by having other cult actors appear. With James Marsters of Buffy and Angel fame appearing as Brainiac (though never called that) and having it rubbed in your face with a Vampire episode and the lead vampire being called Buffy. Then the other Duke of Haazard turned up, in a Dodge Charger no less. Plus they not just using real people but pulling in other DC heroes now. After season 4’s Kid Flash episode, we’ve had Aquaman and Cyborg from the Teen Titans in season 5.

Speaking of Stargate it looks like we are getting the mini Farscape reunion with Claudia Black becoming a regular in season 10. It’s also covering Firefly/Serenity angle with Morena Baccarin confirmed to appear and Richard Dean Anderson’s Jack O’Neill coming back for an episode or two. Plus Michael Ironside appeared at the end of Season 9 and he’s practically been in everything going.

DC saved by Superman and Schuie's up to his old tricks

Well, sort of. It was the Monaco Grand Prix this weekend, the first F1 race I've watched for ages.

David Coulthard, DC for short, just secured Red Bull Racing's first Formula 1 Grand Prix podium plus DC has been having a bit of a rough time for the last few seasons. On a weekend where they were sponsored by Superman Returns. The car had the well known S on the nose and the back was made to look like a cape billowing from the driver's cockpit.

On the podium itself Coulthard had to wear a red cape, which would have been even funnier if he had been wearing the Superman firesuit like he was meant to and his team mate had done.

As for Michael Schumacher, I'd more or less forgotten all his dodgy little moves over the years, until Qualifying yesterday. Michael was top of the board with minutes to go before the end of the session and he goes and parks his car on Ras Cas corner and ruins everyone's lap so they can't better him.

Thankfully the stewards agreed with My Dad and Me (plus 90% of the F1 community) and sent Schumacher to start at the race from the pit lane. It shows how good a driver he is to end the race 5th (though at least 4 or 5 of those places were attrition).

I agree with Jackie Stewart that Schumacher didn't set out to do it, he had a minor incident which he decided to make a major one and ruin everyone else's laps.It seems a stupid move in what may be his last year in racing to remind everyone what type of person he can be, bringing back memories such as Adelaide with Damon Hill and Jerez with Jaques Villeneuve.

MI + MI:II

Watched MI:III this afternoon. Not bad, better than the 2nd anyway. Problem is when I came out of 1 I was "Wow", I was the same for 2 though on repeat viewings it doesn't hold up. I came out of 3 and it was just "Yeah, it was good".

It did have a lot of quality sections in it. I thoroughly loved the SWAT like rescue and the kidnapping was fantastic, and you could so tell J.J. Abrams of Alias fame was behind the film at that point. The bridge sequence was pretty good, and I liked the fact that when Hunt broke into a building it stayed with the team outside being concerned and waiting, but maybe this was because it was so similar to a sequence in MI:II.

Which brings me to my first major gripe. As we left the cinema Danny mentioned it was like they hadn't watched either of the previous films and I have to totally agree with him. This is where I get really spoiler heavy so I'm warning you all now. After MI:II I remember saying to Smith that they're going to have to think of something new for the bad guy because in both films it was rogue agents, and while the main bad guy isn't a rogue agent the whole reason it goes so very wrong for Hunt is a rogue agent, who just like Voight in the first film, was his boss. Admittedly it had a bit of a twist on it but come on people, some originality please. And that wasn't the only thing, Hunt's squeeze is in trouble: MI:II. Has to steal a biological weapon: MI:II. Hunt goes rogue because everything's gone wrong and someone on the inside is a traitor: MI. Those are just off the top of my head, I’ve got a nagging feeling I’m missing one or two.

Also it's a good job I don't suffer from motion sickness because the floor in front of me wouldn't have been pretty if I did. Half the film the camera's acting like it's having an epileptic fit. I get the idea that it's all gone a bit hectic, but I actually want to be able to see something when things get slightly exciting.

All in all not a bad film, but I think I've had enough of Ethan Hunt and the IMF.

George Lucas is a total and complete tw*t

The guy's been pissing me off for years. Various comments such as "The books aren't mine so who cares?" How about the fans you left alone for 20 years and that was all they had to keep them going?!? Then we had Greedo shot first and other such travesties of the Special Editions, shortly followed by The Phantom Menace, where if Jar Jar Binks wasn't enough we had the stupid little shit Anakin to deal with ("Rolling! That's a good trick" Yeah, if you're 10... oh wait, you are). Not to mention the numerous terrible dialogue moments and the total lack of chemistry between Natalie Portman and Hayden Christensen.

But getting back to my point, ever since Lucas released the Special Editions we've been told that we would never see the original prints again, so I held on for dear life to my decaying video copies. As films the originals flowed so much more easier and felt much better films I wasn't very happy to know I'd never get to replace them for everlasting DVD's. I didn't go out and buy the DVD's of the trilogy when they were first released, and I ranted enough about them at the time so I'm not going to go into that again. Eventually I caved when the money grubbing gits I work for offered it at a super cheap price. I was pleased with some changes to closer the orginals, hated Christensen and wasn't bothered about "Did".

Then the bearded git's announced that after 9 years of saying they'll never release the original cuts again, they will.

Arsehole!

How to make a sci-fi show last

I’ve been watching a lot of Stargate SG-1 recently, the little sci-fi show that could. Stargate is one of those shows that I used to watch because if was a fun show. When I went to uni I was never bothered about catching it so missed a few seasons worth. However, I did catch the odd bit of news through SFX magazine, Daniel leaving, Daniel coming back. The series getting renewed and renewed and now taking over X-Files for the longest running sci-fi show. But mostly I came back because I wanted to see how the brilliant Ben Browder from Farscape managed in this show now that he took over from Richard Dean Anderson as the head of the team.

The first 4 or 5 episodes of his debut series Claudia Black was a major character and we had our own little Farscape reunion. This led me to joke that this was how Stargate had managed to last so long, by being the home of actors from Sci-fi shows that no longer exist, thus attracting the fanboys. My statement was further helped by Lexa Doig from Andromeda starring as the new doctor on the base. Then things started to get out of hand. The Smoking Man from the X-Files turned up as one of the bad guys, leading me to joke all we need is someone from Star Trek. Low and behold, Richard Picardo, the Doctor from Star Trek: Voyager returns in his semi-recurring role, a role I had admittedly forgotten about when I made my joke.

So it seems the way to survive cancellation is pack your show with cast members for cancelled shows. Someone needs to tell Joss Whedon! (still bitter about Firefly)

Smallville's gotten a bit poo really

Smallville was something I really enjoyed when it started. A look at Superman as his powers kicked in was pretty cool. Even if every villain of the week somehow got their powers from Kryptonite. Then Clark started to find out about his extraterrestrial origins. It started off well, and the use of Terence Stamp (Zod from Superman 2) as the voice of Jor-El and Christopher Reeve as the scientist who knows everything, later to be replaced by Margot Kidder after his death were master strokes.

However, the direction they took his plans for Kal-El didn’t really sit well with me. Now I’m not one of those geeks that cries when ever something changes in translation and admittedly I only know the broad strokes of Supes’ origin but as far as I’m aware Kal’s father never sent him to Earth to rule it and for me it ruins some of Superman’s nobility.

Also every other episode is someone loosing control of their body, pissing people off then coming to not remembering a thing and everyone not liking them. First one I can remember is Clark and the Red Kryptonite, and really it was the only good one. Then I pretty sure Chloe and Lana went under control several times during that season just for Clark to go into a cave mouth and come out as “Kal-El”. Then the cheerleaders start making everyone fall in love with them, Lionel Luthor takes over Clark’s body and is nasty to everyone and then Lana is taken over by a 16^th century witch, closely followed by Lois and Chloe, and I’m only half way through the season.

There is the occasional good episode though such as Kid Flash turning up, and that’s a continuity fuck up and a half, but it’s getting to the point that they’re not enough. I’m going to slowly work my way through to the end of Season 4 and see if I can be bothered with Season 5.

Something New

Bored of having to arse about with HMTL and FTP every time I want to have a rant I thought I'd try Blogger and see how that works. Basically I want to rant far more than I need to update my website so taking a leaf from Smith's bookI decided to set up this thing. Hopefully have a proper rant soon.

When Dick met Chris

I was given the 'Batman and Robin' toy as a present from Drew a few years ago, when I bought the Nightwing toy and I saw them next to each other, this was the first thing that popped into my head.

Lord of the Rings: The Third Age

Anyone thinking about giving this game a go, REALLY don’t bother. When I started it, it was going quite well, but very quickly is broke down into fight every minute then watch a cutscene.

The over reliance of Gandalf voiceovers for movie clips seriously hampers the story mode. Nearly after every fight do you unlock an ‘Epic Scene’ that tells you either a bit of the film that doesn’t really concern yourself, or an explanation of events that just happened to you with scenes from the film which are quite irrelevant, for instance when I met my dwarven companion the Epic Scene was full of shots of Gimli with Gandalf’s voiceover saying something like, “This is Gimli, the Dwarf I travel with, he’s quite a nice chap unlike the one you have met. Shame you won’t get to meet him.” Occasionally though, the story will be told from in-game cutscenes that actually feature your own characters, when those happened I felt a lot more connected to the characters. Shame they were few and far between.

The battles are almost random encounters, just not quite. There’s a nice little icon at the top of the screen that gets brighter the closer you get to a fight making it feel slightly less random and much less annoying. They’ve put a few variations on the Final Fantasy style fighting. Most obvious of which is to change your party mid-fight. This is a major change and one I welcome quite enthusiastically, the amount of times I’ve got into a fight in Final Fantasy and think “Damn it, so-and-so would be really handy right now” I can’t count. Also the variation of the line ups; reinforcements, being surrounded and only long range is really quite cool. Shame they didn’t bother with different rows like Final Fantasy.

This game could have been great. But they turned it into constant fighting and ‘unlocking’ scenes from the film. And don’t even get me started on the Balrog fight.

Knights of the Old Republic II

The sequel to one of my all time favourite games is out. Is it any good? Hell Yeah. Rich story and great characters, but it has its faults. Improving things for my personal experience is Chris playing Dark Side this time, instead of vaguely watching someone retrace my footsteps I get to see the other side of the game, some small differences, some major.

One problem I do have is the loading screens/times. I must stress here that in some areas they’re fine in, but others, of note so far the second planet you visit where I got extremely pissed off with them, every two seconds there seemed to be another one. What made it worse was some of the areas appeared tiny, making me wonder the reason for the need to load the area.

I’ve heard the complaint that the game doesn’t have any of the planets from the films. THANK GOD. Is it just me or is the fact that so much happened on backwater planets like Tatooine or Hoth getting a bit ridiculous? I have no problem with places like Coruscant constantly being visited, it is the Capital of the Galaxy after all, but the place furthest from the bright spot of the galaxy I do. Instead we visit a bunch of places that have resonance for this time period, originals or mainstays from games. Onderon, Dxun and Korriban are from the Tales of the Jedi comics that this is following on from. Plus Korriban is a return from the previous game, as is Dantooine. While Peragus II and Telos are originals. Its Telos and Nar Shaddaa that I have problems with. Why make it a new planet with Telos when the previous games Taris fulfils the role perfectly? Nar Shaddaa, surely this hasn’t been this built and that bad for all this time, I can buy that Coruscant is but not a Smuggler’s Moon.

One of the main parts of any RPG is the story. In this KotOR 2 excels… sort of. Personally I think the story of your character is much better that the one in the first time game. Instead of a mind wipe and you discovering what happened to you, the digital you knows exactly what he’s done but he’s keeping quiet, you have to put it together from what other characters know/say. To me this was much more satisfying, the character much more mysterious and for my Light Side game someone who didn’t want to advertise where he was during the Mandalorian Wars.

Which brings us nicely to the other members of your party. Once again all the members have rich stories behind them. Unfortunately this only comes out if you spend time with them, a good touch as they’ll only tell you things if they trust, an excellent example is in Chris’ Dark Side game where the Handmaiden won’t even speak to him anymore because he’s too evil. However it also has the downside that you can miss some major plot points if you don’t favour the right people. In my games one or two of the Handmaiden’s decisions were a bit surprising, and I imagine Chris is going to be quite baffled by her.

The plot characters outside your party are quiet a mixed bag which I feel is LucasArts fault rather than Obsidian’s but more on that later. Colonel Tobin, a secondary character on Onderon who reappears (in the Light Side game at least) felt extremely well flashed out. Meanwhile Darth Nihilus, one of the main bad guys, was as two dimensional as a Garfield cartoon. This becomes blatantly clear during the ending.

Ah, the ending, the main complaint of nearly every gamer whose played KotOR 2. The game was originally planned for a February/March release, then LucasArts took the bright decision to ship for Christmas in the US. Clearly the game wasn’t finished or even ready. Obsidian tried their best but in the end nothing will ever make up for that lost time.

This game could have outclassed the original easily and was well on the way to doing that. Unfortunately, LucasArts got greedy and as a result the game’s ending lets it down. Hopefully Knights of the Old Republic III can address this.