Blog Update Dec '08

It's been over a month since I last blogged so a quick update just in case the Internets think I'm dead.

There is only a finite time available every day, and while we're making do with the 7 day week (gave a thought to turning it into 6, could it be done!?) it means that something has to give, and the last month, it has been the blog.
Recently I've made a renewed effort to improve my attendance down at the gym, which I've had some degree of success. Add to that the fact that this last quarter has given us so many high quality games and even with the extra time devoted to this vice, there's still a fair number I need to try. Expect some Insert Coins about them all soon (probably in the next year :s) but I will add now that Left 4 Dead, a co-op first person shooter set in the wake of a zombie apocalypse is probably the greatest gaming experience this year, plus thanks to Gamestation's Christmas offers, I am soon picking up Fallout 3, so looking forward to that as well.

Also, I'm falling more and more behind with the podcast reviews as well, so will make a bigger effort to catch up. Plus (I may have used the word too many times!?) I'm thinking of setting up a new themed set of posts covering Film and TV, inspired a great deal by Billy of geekytalk.wordpress.com. Plus (the last time I promise...), I may finally get my very own Podcast/audioblog off the ground, and throw in some personal musings, rants, whatever I feel like etc

Hope to post soon, but if not, happy holidays! :D

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#13 The Dark Side

So I finally caved and got myself a PS3, woah! The last time I had two consoles was the Gamecube and the Xbox, and well I quickly stopped using my Gamecube oh dear! That outcome is unlikely to happen in this case, Xbox 360 has the better first party (and exclusive) titles, and any multiplatform releases I would get for the 360, considering the superior online experience, and how in a lot of cases (not so much now) the PS3 version has just been a port of the 360 version.

That being said, the PS3 does have some pluses. For one, the dashboard is slick as fuck - not to mention supremely easy and quick to navigate, it makes the 360 dash look old and clunky in comparison. That will of course all change when the New Xbox Experience drops in November, but until then the PS3 comes out on top.
Also a big motivation for getting one is of course Blu-Ray playback - I haven't watched one yet, but I've already converted my LoveFilm queue ready (EDIT: I watched Gotham Knight, the collection of animated Batman shorts akin to the Animatrix, in brief, some stories very cool, some not so much). DVDs look great thanks to the upscaling, plus the PS3 can handle a wider range of media files, so I have to convert video podcasts, TV shows etc a lot less. It has wireless connectivity built in by default, and even some large files (a HD version of a very recent Heroes ep for example) played absolutely fine. Plus if streaming is getting a little choppy, the dash offers the option to copy the file onto the PS3 HDD, problem solved.

That being said, I have had some problems with syncing the controller to the console. I've experienced whole days where upon pressing the "PS" button on the controller (their equivalent of the 360's guide button), and literally nothing happened - no flashing lights, nothing. It's possible that the battery had ran out of charge, but it seemed incredibly problematic charging up the damn thing. As it's a USB cable, it can be charged off the PS3, or indeed any computer (even some cable boxes I read), but I was not getting the slow flash to indicate charging. Late one day, I pressed the PS button just to see what would happen, and it switched on the console - it took me completely by surprise, I had to run and connect up the cable like it was the only chance I was going to get.
Thoughts on the controller itself, it's light, much lighter than the 360 controller (no chunky battery) although I'm not a fan of the triggers - they don't feel at all comfortable. I haven't had a chance to utilise the sixaxis motion controls; The Force Unleashed didn't have any mechanics within which utilised it, and that brings me smoothly onto some thoughts of my first PS3 title eva!!!11one1.

Now, the Force Unleashed's premise is where you play the super badass, secret apprentice of Darth Vader, Starkiller (wasn't that the original name for Skywalker, or did I read a bad trivia fact?!), set between Episodes III and IV, and will hopefully fill in the gaps between the two trilogies, but more about of the story later.

The only time I would die would be due to the annoying knock back onto bottomless pits, where Starkiller would animate getting to his feet, before realising where he was and in trademark Wile E. Coyote fashion, fall to his doom.

I've heard murmurs that this has been the most expensive game ever developed (I don't believe that's the case...), and it's an absolute must have for die-hard Star Wars fans. To be honest they're the main driving reason why the franchise is still knocking about, and whilst I really like the original trilogy (not so much the recent films), my nostalgia gland tingles on familiar locales in the game, not to mention the rousing fanfares that ebb and flow throughout the game. Unfortunately once you look past all of that, an average hack 'n' slash game is all that is found.

All the force powers you'd expect are included, force grip, push and lightning are at your disposal, and can be leveled up via three simplistic categories. The categories also allow you to purchase new lightsaber combos, and also buff your character with increased health, improved force regeneration etc. That being said, this RPG mechanic didn't leave the impression that I was developing a unique spin on Starkiller. The first level of the game sees you play a pimped out Darth Vader, sporting all the force powers at their maximum levels, it was a lot of fun tearing through the Wookie habitat - following that level, you begin the adventure with a nerfed Starkiller and you have to work your way back up to that level; what a tease.

The mechanics are very button mashy - there's not much strategy required here. A lot of the times, I run up to a group, work some force push/lightning and finish up with some lightsaber. Lightning is pretty much the standard point of attack, stunning pretty much every enemy in the game. That invites you to take the time to go to town with the lightsaber, or fling the smaller troops far with the force grip for instant kills. In fact, all this power becomes destabilising after a while. I actually never "properly" died in my playthrough. The only time I would die would be due to the annoying knock back onto bottomless pits, where Starkiller would animate getting to his feet, before realising where he was and in trademark Wile E. Coyote fashion, fall to his doom. Perhaps I was playing on too easy a difficulty and coupled with the health boosts you acquire through leveling, low health was never a problem. It was very consistent that my attack animations could be interrupted and that the enemies' animations couldn't - especially the 10 foot tall elite troopers later on (I've never seen those in a Star Wars film...)

Of course, the force allows you to double-jump, but it feels horrible and difficult to control. I was constantly caught out on the later levels which add a verticality to proceedings. Also walking off platforms meant that Starkiller falls directly down rather than retaining some forward motion as real physics dictates should happen, which for a game that boasts great physics, doesn't actually have any groundbreaking innovations. I never saw evidence of stormtroopers held in a force grip trying to grab their surroundings - as the game progresses, the difficulty ramps up by throwing more enemies your way so there wasn't much chance to observe.



The story of the game is probably the best thing about this game, but the story only exists in the cutscenes that separate the levels. I won't spoilt it here, but I did experience a disconnect with the dialogue early on in the game, but the story cleared that up in a rather predictable fashion. I'm annoyed at the love story that was shoehorned in - again completely needless and very clunky considering the storytelling experience the Lucas camp have. The levels themselves are exact copies of each other, the environment the only thing changes. Get ready to button-mash your way through waves and waves of enemies, the odd sub-boss mixing it up, before you reach the end encounter versus a master Jedi of some kind.

Be warned; when it comes to the boss fights, get used to coming up against good ol' quick time events. With the sub-boss/elite units you encounter throughout the level, an optional quick event sequence will be offered for a quick takedown when their health is low. Unfortunately, with the boss battles, these QTEs are mandatory. I wouldn't mind that much for two reasons: The first being that, the button presses you have to match are the same every time, so even if you're slow with the reactions, you'll soon commit them to memory. Also, once you've initiated the QTE, you're not getting out of it, so if you slip up, it resets back to the beginning, along with the accompanying FMV - "hey didn't you throw the junkrock at me, just a moment ago?!"

Speaking of QTEs and the buildup of this game, saw a trailer where Starkiller pulls a Star Destroyer out of the sky and crashing down to the Sith's feet. That was very cool. Sadly, the set-piece in the game does not approach anywhere near the level of coolness that it should have been. Some tedious analogue stick action separated by waves of tie fighters to interrupt the flow. It was only very frustrating as the tie fighters proved very hard to destroy, that is until I discovered that the only some can be destroyed on the left by using force grip, whilst others could only be zapped by force lightning on the right, very annoying, anyone else get this?

Overall, not a great experience, and nothing in it that made me want to repeat at harder difficulties. The story is the only redeeming feature of the game, although the fanboys will check this out through rose-tinted glasses. So my first PS3 game was not a keeper - in that time I did order Metal Gear Solid 4 which I will play through once I've gone through the current crop of Xbox 360 games that are begging me to play. I traded The Force Unleashed in for £18 and then paid the difference to get Civilization Revolution, a game of which I literally can't put down now, despite Fable 2's main quest screaming out for attention; a review will be on the way. The bundle deal I got The Force Unleashed meant that the game worked out as £10, so if only financially, I believe I've broken even, maybe even come out a little on top.

Also post #100, woah! Here's to another 100.

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#3 ExtraLife Radio

It's been a long time since I put out a Podcast Review but I am obliged to cover Extralife Radio, not only because it is very awesome but I recently made a donation to the show. Making a donation means that your name gets read out at the top of the show, so I've posted a short clip from show #197 where the legendary Scott Johnson says my name- woah!

More after the jump...

I'll keep the review itself pretty short as it seems that the show is planning to end after episode 200 (technically one episode away, #199 was just released!). It's a big shame as it is a great show, one of the podcasts I really look forward to listening to.

But I've just realised I haven't mentioned what the show is about! OMG! At its essence, the show brings together three webcomics in a discussion over the week's "geek" news, whether that be recent film releases, video game previews, comic-related stuff etc. They include some personal stories as well, plus there's also a fair amount of banter thrown in too for good measure. The host is Scott Johnson of myextralife.com fame and he is the regular participant (as well as host, did I mention that?!), hence why he has lended the name to the radio show/podcast. The two other most regular appearances are from Brian from comicscoasttocoast.com and missiondeep.com and O(bsidian) from commissionedcomic.com. There are of course other guests on the shows, most notable Randy Jordan (aka Randy Deluxe) from the Instance (a WoW themed podcast which Scott also runs) who joins in to throw in his two cents usually about films as he's a massive film buff.

In short, it's a great show, more often than not released on a weekly basis, has a duration of just over a hour most times (although it can vary) which is great for my commutes. In addition to plugging the podcast, go check out their individual websites if you're into webcomics at all, it's very funny stuff. While initially I couldn't stand O at the start who always seems to cut across people and comes across as obnoxious; now I can fully appreciate what he brings to the table, plus more often than not he mixes it up to cause conflict and doesn't really mean a lot of it. That being said, I probably like O's comic the most. Scott's comic is what got me into the podcast and that was through his comic because of all the wow-themed comics he did many years ago when I was a World of Warcraft junkie (free at last!)

In conclusion, it's a fun, light-hearted show where three like-minded individuals come together to chat and joke about all stuff geeky which suits me down to the ground. I wholeheartedly recommend it!

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Where would you sit?...

I went to a house party that was being hosted by an old friend, Marsh, or as I had to teach myself to say Chris as noone in Worcester (where he's currently studying) know him by the old name we used back in school. Anyways, the house party was a lot of fun, although too much drinking led me to forget exactly how it all ended but good none the less. It had all the makings of a good party; drinking, drugs and a large number of strangers to meet.

One rather cool thing that happened which I felt needed to be blogged about was a little conversation I had with this guy Kwan (don't know how it's spelt sorry) about some behavioural psychology which I do find very interesting. Anyways, not sure how we got talking about it but I posed a scenario to him, which I will repeat here:

You get on a bus and there's an attractive girl (or guy, whatever works for you) sitting in one seat. Knowing this, where would you sit?

I posed this to Kwan and I made a decision myself. Make yours and hit "read more" to see if there's some mutual thinking going on. I'd be curious to know what people chose.

It is was rather spooky, Kwan gave his answer: opposite and one row back. It was a proper woah moment, as I thought the exact same thing. I thought that was awesome and we tried to reason why - you wouldn't sit in front of the girl as you wouldn't be able to see her without obviously turning round. But why not directly behind her, or even opposite but on the same row?
It's no secret that I'm a big podcast nut and I would love to find a podcast that discusses this kind of stuff - unfortunately the couple I've tried haven't been that great.

That being said I did ask Chris later that evening, and he replied again opposite, but two rows back. The bubble had been burst but still he half agreed, so I'm clinging on to the victory.

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#12 Soul Calibur IV

The next step towards myself renting Civilization Revolution took a little detour and with me changing my lovefilm plan to save a bit of money, Soul Calibur IV will be my last rented game for the foreseeable future. The reason being there are the likes of Fable 2 and Fallout 3, huge RPGs that I'll lose many a hour to, not to mention other upcoming releases like Gears of War 2. Then, factor in some of the games I've yet to really play through, Grand Theft Auto 4, The Orange Box, Viva Pinata: Trouble in Paradise, and it's obvious that I won't have the time to continue renting games that I'm interested in, just not enough to purchase. It's a shame that the last one of these is Soul Calibur IV...

Now, one point I need to stress, and probably the most important thing to take away from this, is that I don't like fighting games. Now that may be a result of me being generally poor at them which I'll get on to later - consequently this "review-of-sorts" will probably be on the short side.

Before I tear apart the mechanics and all the "different modes" of the game, a quick note on the visuals. With fighting games the immediate foreground is the only area of concern and with this being a relatively small area to render, fighting games have always been very beautiful and Soul Calibur is no exception. All of your (presumably) favourite characters are back along with a couple of new characters, including some Star Wars stars (see later...)

Pick a dude and fight a different dude. Sometimes you may have 2,3 or even 4 dudes in a row to kill, and you may be lucky to have one (or more) backup dude, repeat ad infinitum.

One notable feature of this game is the character creator, something I looked into after giving the story and arcade modes a quick go. Although it's understandable, the character you create is effectively a re-skinned clone of one of the existing characters in-game. There's not the option to build your own move-list unfortunately. Despite that, the look of your character is very customisable, and new weapons, clothes, accessories are unlocked as you make progress through the game. That being said once I had made a half-naked, busty chick with a squeaky voice, my interest in the character creator had subsided so I moved back into the main game.

So Soul Calibur offers a number of modes: Story, Arcade, Tower of Souls and then there's the online play as well, but in reality all this is the same thing over and over again. Pick a dude and fight a different dude. Sometimes you may have 2,3 or even 4 dudes in a row to kill, and you may be lucky to have one (or more) backup dude, repeat ad infinitum.

The main reason I don't like these style of games is the the tedium of going through looking up a character's move list, returning to the game and I'm there staring at the pad trying to perfect the diagonally-down X, X, Y move and getting frustrated that my character is instead performing the forward X, X move every time. Add to that the time spent looking at the pad trying to get the timing down, only to miss the AI character take off 50% of my health - it does not lead to an enjoyable experience.
If I ever pull off a very cool looking move, it really is a fluke and whilst the more extravagant combos do reward you with better looking and more damaging moves, I can never repeat them again - and that is more of a reflection of my own "playstyle", not necessarily a flaw with the game.

Something I can't stand about this genre are the pre-fight exchanges and Soul Calibur is no exception. Expect your character to taunt their opponent "I will have victory" or "get outta of my way!" are prime examples, or seemingly random lines - I find it hard to take seriously, and it's something which could easily be dropped. Are these build-up cutscenes there to build "drama" or are they masking loading times? Speaking of which, the game has surprisingly long loading times - definitely a game that will benefit from the "rip to hard drive" feature coming in the new dashboard, sorry the New Xbox Experience, sorry my bad...

Moving on and the game also boasts the inclusion of characters from Star Wars. The Apprentice from the recent The Force Unleashed game and Yoda (Xbox 360) or Darth Vader (PS3) are the included cast. There's no way to convince me of a cohesive story why these guys are in the Soul Calibur Universe. I played through the story with Yoda for the achievement, there was something about a rift caused by the force that teleported Yoda through, WTF?! The apprentice seems a little overpowered during my play through, he was consistently the roadblock I hit during the Arcade, plus his mutterings of "kill" and "die!" were pretty lame - maybe that's why I lost my concentration and subsequently the bouts...

It sounds like I really ripped into this game and I'll reiterate what I said at the start "I don't like fighting games". I have friends who are fans of the genre and the Soul Calibur series so I could just be a button-mashing idiot that can't handle more than four buttons. The test comes to how often you come back to playing the game and with this being a rented game, I wanted to get my monies worth, but every time I loaded up the game, the same mechanic stared back at me, only with increasingly sophisticated AI which can easily trounce my very "one-dimensional button-mash and hope for the best" mentality. Whilst I usually try a rented game for a week, (sometimes longer) I had to cut it short as there was nothing in this game for me that enticed me back.

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What's your Green Karma?

I got the idea for this post whilst on the commute into work. For those not in the know, part of my commute consists of a bus journey. Getting closer to work, and I more often than not see a queue of cars in the other direction and as I go by pretty much every one has just one person in the car - maybe 1 in 20 there is a single passenger. Anyways, this got me thinking, that whilst I am tied down to public transport, I'm doing my bit to save the environment as opposed to these non-carpoolers.

Before I get shot down, I'm not claiming myself to be some kind of eco-warrior here - whilst I do subscribe to the public transport, I have a host of power-hungry, and no doubt world destroying, electronics at home, so there is some kind of balance. To answer the question I threw out there: What's my green karma? I'd probably argue that considering the above, I'm going to argue it comes out at about neutral. To help swing the pendulum in my favour I also buy fairtrade bananas from Sainsburys, so check me out...

That being said, as soon as I (finally) pass my driving test, I will ditch the joy of sharing a rickety and sometimes smelly bus full of noisy kids, chavs and drunken bums and become one of those lone occupants in the queues of cars I see. Does that make me a hypocrite? Probably. Am I ok with that? Oh yes.

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You can't change your family...

And myself, I wouldn't want to. My family are awesome, I love them very much. Just this weekend, I moaned/reported to my family the grief I've been having with some DIY issues in my house. Namely, a broken door handle that has been so for what feels like forever, and recently the handle of my toilet shearing and snapping off, leaving with having to operate the toilet within its very bowels (pun intended). I had a go to fix both myself, but as it goes, I lack the misfortune to purchase replacements which don't quite fit exactly, and the tools to put them right. My family jumped to the rescue and said they would come visit the following day - awesome!

An afternoon of DIY-oriented fun with my Grandad, and the rest of the family helping clear up my neglected garden was the outcome and am very happy with the results. It also has become tradition for them to bring some supplies, amongst which are a number of quiches cooked by my Nan (again awesome!). It's not said enough, but I very much appreciate the support and efforts of my family. As anyone who knows me quite well, they would describe me as being close with my family, and that has grown with the events of the last year; me living on my own for the very first time and the accompanying ineptitude to make new friends in a strange new county. I am on the phone much more often, and although I do tend to regress back to a child in their company, it's still really nice to be around them.

Although my family don't fully understand the tech/computing stuff I want to do for a living or looking into the past, my wish to take Computer Science as a degree, they are(were) in support of all that, and no doubt will continue to do so in the future, whatever decisions I decide to take.

Just a short and sweet post really to say how much my family rock. It's a little cliched (and kinda broken logically) but you don't miss it till it's gone. I think the lesson to take away is a reminder not to take things for granted, and remember to show credit where it's due.

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#11 Burnout Paradise

It should be clichéd when entering Paradise City, the new latest open-world iteration in the Burnout franchise, the Guns 'n' Roses hit of the same name plays in the background, but it's really not, it just feels right. The core mechanics are still here; the boosting, quick reaction swerving through traffic, takedowns and the exhilirating sense of speed which no-other racer can seem to match, only this time the idea is full immersion, all the front end menus are gone - you press start and you're dropped straight into the city.

Now Burnout sits firmly at the arcade end of the scale of racers, hell they don't even include a speedo on the HUD. Each intersection in the game marks the start of a particular event. Simply stop at the lights, hit both triggers and you're straight in. A quick voiceover from DJ Atomica (replacement of DJ Crash?) explains the brief of the event. More often than not it will be a race from the intersection you stopped at to one of eight points on the city. At first glance it seems cheap that there so few finish lines to drive toward, but having these handful of persistent landmarks means that soon you'll be fine-tuning your routes and finding those useful shortcuts. This is where the open world setting comes in to its own - there is no defined route you have to take, you are given the start and finish points and anything inbetween is upto you. The direction of the finish is given as a compass bearing, and the game will offer up recommended turns but there's no obligation to take them.

The core mechanics are still here; the boosting, quick reaction swerving through traffic, takedowns and the exhilirating sense of speed which no-other racer can seem to match

At first, hurtling through traffic, battling as well as holding off your opponents (takedowns still count!) and having to cope with trying to plot your route and decipher the extra information can be daunting. In fact, that's the main reason why I was put off by the demo, a popular consensus apparently. Playing the full game, it's a much more enjoyable experience. It's probably a good time as any to mention the graphics of the game. Put simply the game is beautiful in all of its HDR lighted glory. Draw distance is very good which helps to see those cars fast approaching, and the frame rate is probably the most impressive of all - never dropping in my time with it, something that is very important to give that blistering sense of speed.

I do have some reservations. During the first few events there is a longing to open up the menu and hit restart if it's not going too well, but it is understandable that would break the metaphor of this open persistent world. That's something I'll accept but I wish there was an abort option. A couple of times I've missed a crucial corner, lost a lot of time and know that I am resigned to finishing 7th or 8th, but the event has to be completed no matter what to let you back into the open world - it's a small complaint. A popular mode from previous titles was of course the crash junctions and they have all but disappeared unfortunately. There are time attack records held on every road (another extra to keep you busy) and there are crash records (amount of money in damages) on the intersections but they are completely optional which is a shame.

As strange as it sounds, I want to draw comparisons with WoW so bear with me. After finishing an event, successful or not, there is usually another event to complete nearby - that's what I found so addictive about WoW, with travelling between quest hubs, there is always one more quest that's ready to be started, and the same applies to Paradise. And if there are no events available, there are all the extra non-event stuff to do, so the game's momentum never lets up. Finding all the smashboards and the destructable billboards are a welcome distraction if the racing gets too stressful, not to mention the super jumps to be found throughout the city. Unlocking of most new cars takes the form of a challenge where by you have to takedown the car in question, a lot of fun to be had chasing that shiny new model and a real sense of accomplishment - completely different from being handed many cars after finishing a single race which the series has been guilty of in the past.

I spent only the briefest amount of time online during the time I had with this title, but what I saw was very cool (not to mention the generous handing out of achievements for my short duration :D). Along with the front end menus being chucked, there is no lobby screen as such, the city itself becomes the lobby where you are free to explore or more commonly smash up others. Soon enough the host will decide an event and off you go. An effort has been made to make the whole experience streamlined, there is of course the aforementioned triggering of events, jumping onto an online match is literally a quick flick of the D-pad away and there's the repair depots, fuel stations, paint shops and junkyards which keep the menus at bay.

In closing, a mention has to be made of the post-release development of the game. A few weeks before I got my hands on the game, they released the "Cagney" update, a large, completely free update which adds literally hundreds of extra online challenges and irons out some of the creases no doubt. I can't say how the game was before but the commitment to putting in all the extra content really does boost the longevity of Paradise. Soon to be added are bikes into the mix (I'm gonna hold off on a PGR4 tie-in rant...) as well as day/night cycles, where the nighttime comes with a high number of unique challenges.

If you are a fan of racing sims, then this probably isn't the game for you. On the other hand if you like your racing very quick and dirty and have the reactions that will have your eyes out on stalks then look this one up. It's no secret that I love my racing games and if you like them too then I strongly recommend Burnout Paradise.

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#10 Bully

Still hoping to get Civilization: Revolution as my next rented game, but instead I received Bully this time. More accurately I should say Bully: Scholarship Edition, as this is a "beefed up" conversion from the original PS2 game. Now this is one of the original games (along with Dead Rising) that I put on the "games" queue for LoveFilm - it has been one of the games which came along, I said I'd give it a try, but it must have been a busy period or I was short of cash or something as it's been a long time since it's release.

Now it might be quite lazy to say that Bully is GTA set in a school, but in a nutshell that's essentially it.It is made by Rockstar also, but actually the Vancouver studio rather than Rockstar North who are famously responsible for the GTA series.
The presentation is just like GTA, down to the style of the mini-map (curiously the health meter is very reminiscent of GTA4, which came much after this game - one idea that went the other way), the construction and pacing of the cut scenes, even down to how the camera works during tutorial set pieces and how the helpful popup text looks.

Bully was surrounded with a lot of controversy pending its release, not unlike the scrutiny that the GTA games have received. Many believed that it would glorify bullying in schools and promote it as a positive image. Thanks to this controversy, the game sold pretty well and actually the game does not in fact give the above message, the story in fact offers a flipside where you partner up with the less popular cliches in the school and help them overcome the jocks and bullies.

So following in the same mould as GTA , there are the multiple mission-based storylines dotted throughout the school and later the nearby town. That being said, the sandbox in Bully is not quite upto par with the GTA series, there is scope to annoy fellow students with the variety of "mischief" weapons such as laying marbles to trip them, stink bombs, itching powder etc, but it does feel very limited and only serves to be a short-lived distraction.

Adding to the now tried and tested formula are the idea of Classes which you attend a the school. These take the form of short mini-games which more often than not are quicktime events which rely on well timed button presses that scroll on screen. The only mini-game I struggled on was English class (embarrassingly) which takes the form of a word jumble where you have to construct as many words as possible from a set of letters in the time allotted - I was not able to pass that class after the couple goes I had *shakes head*. They are a welcome relief from the free-roaming mission-based storyline, but are rather too simplistic to gain any real joy from them.

The GTA comparison has been done to death but we're almost through. Like in GTA, Bully does use a number of varied gameplay mechanics including sneaking sections a la Splinter Cell/Metal Gear Solid, Some first person action with the slingshot and some driving sections in the go-karts. Now, each of these sections in isolation do not hold up against titles which specialise in that genre, but just like GTA, Bully is more than the sum of its parts - the many options that the game offers a varying experience along the lengthy journey to completion.

The game is a lot of fun but is ultimately let down by a poor conversion. A lot of the graphics are lo-res and look down right ugly in HD, plus there are frame rate issues for a lot of the game. If these can be overlooked, then Bully is a deep enough experience to derive some enjoyment from it. I only had the game for about a week and I made it approx 25-30% through the game, and I didn't bother much with all the optional missions. Not to mention there is a multiplayer option where a friend can jump into your game which I didn't try out, I am not sure how much they can help your story progress - most likely is that it's like the 2 player option in previous GTA titles where you are both limited to the confines of the single screen and you cause havoc as you see fit.

Overall, Bully is good, not great. If open-world sandbox games are your thing then look it up, Rockstar are kings of the genre and whilst this is the not their best (a different studio probably being the main reason behind that, no Rockstar North magic), it is certainly a good offering and an interesting take on the genre , not featuring any guns, gangsters or serious crimes.

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You're so pretty and I'm so stupid...

This was Reuben's lyric that was playing to me on the bus in to work on Monday morning, this first sober morning which could be spent reflecting on the drunken adventures into Liquid - premier nightclub in Shrewsbury. Described by this guy Simon it's "...a bit like a prison". In despite of that, I was fortunate enough to meet two attractive girls on Saturday eve and Reuben were giving possibly the most concise summation of all (and I mean all) my crushes to date.

The plan of the evening was to go out for drinks in celebration of my mate Fletch's recent birthday. Off into Shrewsbury we went and bumping into Simon and Mark who I met the last time I was back in Shropshire on a fun camping adventure. They mentioned that they were heading to Liquid and whilst we make a quick detour where I once again got my glasses knocked off my face (man, the argument for contacts has never looked stronger), we headed over to Liquid to join the masses.

A digital camera is either a dangerous thing or a source of cliched snaps, and there was probably a healthy amount of both. There are many pictures of the evening now circling facebook - all I know is that I must have been pretty wasted as a. I can't remember the majority of these pics or time spent in liquid and b. I was pretty much giving the same, muppet-nobend-"I want to demonstrate how much of a good time I'm having" poses i.e. either sticking my tongue out, giving the horns, or both.

Moving on to the meat of this post and back to the two crushes I gained that night - my only wish is that I remembered more of the time in Liquid, for the majority of it, all I have to go on are these pics on facebook. One in particular involves Kym, the first of the crushes I would like to discuss, pretty much exposing her breasts with me giving the tongue and horns to the camera (again). Now I wish I could remember if there was anything I did to motivate this pic or whether it was just, hey it's a camera, let's do something kerazee. There are many comments saying that she exposed a nipple and the evidence I would argue is pretty conclusive, bless them the people that commented saying "I think we can see your boob Kym" - what they actually meant to say was nipple plus the fact is you could see the majority of them for the whole evening, which is probably the main (possible read: only) reason I was crushing on her; that and maybe the fact she had red hair, I blame Diggnation for the potential brainwashing, it seems all red haired laydees are now v attractive. That, or as I'm going to attempt to rationally argue that having very brightly coloured hair is very eye-catching, much like if a girl is wearing bright colours in the gym, they more often than not catch my eye. (I may have got away with it...)

Some of the few memories I had did involve telling Kelly that she looked really cute in a photo I took - she dismissed it of course, which is also a shame. As I've already discussed with my good friend Wilson, I put all my eggs in what turned out to be the wrong basket, and concentrated on Kym. At one point I remember asking her if she was single, to which she made the inductive step and replied that she's not interested. Well, it stunned me a little (surprisingly) to which led to a swappage of messages entered into our phones - the terrible thing is I cannot remember her response, although it was cool that she felt the need to explain herself more. It was probably along the lines of you're not my type, you're a nice guy an' all, the same old BS. Basically the only thing we had to go on was the physical attraction, impossible to hold a proper conversation in Liquid. It was a simple conflict of interests - I was very much interested in her, but she did not reciprocate, it's a common situation, and strangely enough I was cool with it.

And as I said, I can't remember a lot else at Liquid, except visiting the bar several times with Fletch to consume more shots with him, only for it to backfire and cause me to not be able to remember anything, really regretting that. That being said, it can't have been *too* bad, a lot of people I met there have since befriended me on facebook, so that's all cool. Actually, Kelly friended me and not the other way round. After being a little nosy checking out her profile, turns out that all the music she has listed I also like, so I actually have more in common with her, plus she's facially more attractive than Kym, and that's probably the largest check box of mine (to be rational and slightly cold for a moment).

Anyways, I need to message up Kelly if I can just put aside five minutes where I'm not getting completely distracted with something else. To bring it full circle, Reuben chanting away "You're so pretty and I'm so stupid", just reminded me like a sobering slap across the face, I've never (and I mean, never) have been properly intimate with a crush of mine, and that sucks, I mean, that really sucks.
I ask myself, perhaps these girls are only crushes as I determine them to be out of my league, and/or I get a serious case of bad nerves/hesitation (speaking of which, how is everyone enjoying the podcast? Oh no wait, I still haven't started recording any eps arg!)

I could go on, but it's late and I don't quite feel up to unravelling my inadequacies here. I'm sure there will be another time, but until then I'll be occasionally visiting places like Liquid doing my mock-dancing thang where noone understands it's done to be ironic, waiting for you to give me a smile.

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#9 Lost by name, Lost by nature

So I altered my LoveFilm queue to introduce games back into the mix. I have about 10 games in the "games" queue (how did I ever come up with that name?!), most are to boost my gamerscore with easy achievements and others are games which I've been meaning to try but don't really want to fork out the cash for. Now, what I was hoping to get was the new Civilization Revolutions, but instead I got Lost: Via Domus.

Now, first off this game is unsuitable for anyone who is not a fan of Lost. I will also say that you're got to be pretty familiar with the main events of the story, because this game visits them but does not explain a lot of the exposition required to fully understand how the people in the fiction got from A to B. I'll try and keep the spoilers down but no promises.

So first off, what genre does the Lost game fall into? I hear you cry. Well it probably fits under the RPG category, although part of me wants to be bold and say it's reminiscent of the point and click adventures of yesteryear but more about that later.

Imagine if a secondary school student wrote some really bad fan fiction set in the Lost universe and that is the level of sophistication we're talking here

Speaking of yesteryear, that links me smoothly onto the visuals, and there is something horribly prev-gen about this game. Granted the environments are adequately rendered, nothing amazing for this generation, and technically quite small and constrictive, get ready to meet your old friend, Mr invisible wall.
Moving on, and the main motivation for playing the game is of course the excitement brought about from being dropped into the Lost universe. Want to play Jack or Kate? Bad luck I'm sorry, you play some side character just to ensure that the plot laid out in the TV show remains untouched.
Looking at the characters in more depth, and this is where you would hope the game would excel, capturing the likeness and personality of the characters you've all enjoying watching. Sadly, that isn't the case. To be fair the characters in-game are recognisable against their real-life counterparts, but a lot more work could have been put in, particularly with the animation of the characters; the horrible head bobs and jerky hand/arm gestures accompany every sentence, and don't get me started on the speech. As if I haven't knocked this poor game enough already, the game creators were not able to get all the original voice talent, the actual dialogue in this game is terribly woeful. Imagine if a secondary school student wrote some really bad fan fiction set in the Lost universe and that is the level of sophistication we're talking here. It might be an unfair comparison but the game is similar in pacing to Mass Effect, where there are extended conversation sections and then action set-pieces. Where Mass Effect has some of the most realistic facial animations, sophisticated dialogue trees and genuinely deep and interesting characters, Lost has none. It's pretty lame (but useful when in a hurry), that there is a tab of dialogue options which will guarantee that your progress in the current episode moves ahead. Don't bother with the other crap...

Hilariously there was this interchange where I was asking Sawyer to trade, and he would first go: "Do you want to trade or what? I haven't got all day?" ...to which I cancelled and Sawyer departs saying, "I'm here all day." WTF. Little screwy.

Your character is a journalist, I won't go into any more detail for those who still want to play after how I slated it just, but it does allow for some photo-taking gameplay - the most interesting of which being the flashbacks where you have to snap the correct photo from a torn up photograph. Shame, it is a little too easy, especially when the flashbacks last about a minute and you seemingly have as many do-overs as you need. Other noteworthy photo opportunities are clearly signposted by the object being labelled with a button press and some popup text "...might be worth photo..." - you're right!

The other core gameplay revolves around some action! yeah! The parts in between the hatch, black rock etc involve moving from marker to marker and have them point out the direction you need to travel, so there's no real exploration of the island. There's also the black smoke you come across, and in the tamer moments, you simply hop into the large reeds to hide - it was used like once or twice in the show so that's enough justification to have many of these spots equidistant from each other, how convenient! The action really hots up in the "chase scenes" which actually is very reminiscent of Crash Bandicoot levels I remember from the PS one days. You have the option to either jump a log or slide under a err... log. The only difference between this and Crash is that you're running away from the camera and not into it, so it's even easier, sigh.

I've slated the game, but there are *a few* pluses. If you can get over the bad writing, then this is technically the best Lost game out there (as it's the only one!), so for super die-hard fans that want to absorb anything Lost related, then this is a must have. When starting each new episode, the game offers a flashback FMV sequence, very much like the show, especially with the immortal slow-floating "LOST" moving close and eventually past the camera - the presentation here is very slick so that's pretty cool. The main character Elliot (mini-spoiler) has had a lot of attention, particularly facially, and is therefore arguably the best modelled character, it's a shame that the characters you actually care about haven't had as much care taken.

In closing, The game is pretty thin on the ground, and probably lives up to the low expectations which are given to licenced games like these. Being a fan of Lost, I had to give it a try, again not expecting a great deal. I could go on but in short the writing's a bit sucky, the game mechanics very simple, but look it as a fairly comfortable 900-1000 achievement points as I did and you might actually come away with something from it.

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I want to get away (I want to fly away)

For those clever people, the above is indeed a lyric from the well known Lenny Kravitz song. It should be relevant to a post which has been on the backburner for some time but finally throwing it out there - that is my respect and admiration for those that document these epic journeys, sometimes not even for sightseeing purposes but for raising money for good causes and how I am very jealous of discovering lands anew.

The first thing I saw/read that got me very interested in travelling the globe was reading the travel fiction of Bill Bryson. It's not just the travelling but the whole lifestyle as well. Basically Mr. Bryson would go travelling somewhere with the only limitation being that he would have to produce a book at the end of it. That being said, not everyone can write books like he does, but man what a cool life to live. Just think how great this blog would be if it was something that I did full time, and not throw in 5 minutes here and there.

I also checked out the show A Long Way Down starring Ewan McGregor and his good friend Charley Boorman travelled from Scotland to South Africa on a pair of bikes, followed by a TV crew. They were raising awareness for a number of charities and also had a number of charity events scheduled along the way, but the rest was all unplanned, meeting people, visiting cool places along the way - it was actually very entertaining and interesting television. A lot of times they did grumble about the trip in the "end of day diary" sessions but as they would probably tell you, the good times on the trip clearly outweigh the bad times, or at least that's what it looked like watching.

It's weird that whilst I'm quite scared of the unknown, the main reason why I hesitate such a lot, but I've always really liked the idea of travel, although I could not do it like what my mate Adam did, you can read some of his travels (and check out some pics) over at www.adamswonderfultravels.blogspot.com. He went all over the Far East and I believe he's planning on heading back out to Japan this time. I have a lot of respect for that, to have the motivation to just get on a plane all on your lonesome and go see these faraway parts of the world - it is very cool.

Another charity effort which is a bit closer to myself is the efforts of some of Adam's family. His brother and dad along with some of his dad's friends did something very much like A Long Way Down but on a smaller scale - the aim was to visit 8 capital cities in 8 days on trikes, whilst raising money for the Alzheimer's Society and the NSPCC. The blog and links to help donate can be found over at www.g8globaltour.blogspot.com.

I've always thought that once I am driving, I would be keen on going on epic road trips. My friend Chris Simms from Uni told me stories of the road trip he did down the west coast of America, visiting places like LA and Vegas, damn I was so envious. I would like to go on a road trip round the British Isles to start possibly, before going on an epic trip round America and/or Australia, very much like Bill Bryson above.

Anyways, this is a quick post to highlight some of the efforts which I admire and respect and maybe one day I'll do something similar. Like some of the examples above, I think if I could get some kind of fundraising element into the whole thing, then that would be cool as at least that way someone else benefits from my selfish desire to see the world.

Here's thinking of making all blog posts have song lyrics as their titles.

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I'm a drug user f*ck the police! ...2!

The alternative title being "The Le Mans BBQ" but that doesn't get the curiousity tingling as much does it?

Anyways, a while back I wrote about my very first drug experience here. I was invited to a BBQ for the Le Mans 24 Hour race weekend, and there I took my drug experiences upto the grand number of two OMG! But first, the Le Mans BBQ, and what was a thoroughly enjoyable weekend.

It has become a yearly tradition for Will to host a BBQ for the Le Mans 24 hour race. I was invited last year but other commitments meant I couldn't make it, but when the invitation came round this year, I firmly declared my intent of attendance. Now, Will himself will admit far too easily that the timing of the BBQ for Le Mans is basically a wafer thin premise for a piss-up weekend. Looking back, I think we *just about* managed to catch the start and we watched for some extended periods the day after when we were all too tired and hungover to try and do anything else, but you're probably asking what has this got to do with drugs?!?

To go back to the start, there is a National Express bus stop literally a stone's throw away from Will's new place, so the travel down was pretty much pre-determined. I got a National Express coach down from Birmingham, and wow are the National Express coaches awesome. Very large and comfortable seats, with ample leg room which is good for me as whilst I might not be the tallest I do tend to slouch in the chairs. Along with that, they had those infamous circular air con fans along the immediate ceiling, and unlike all the school trips I went on in my youth, the air con was impressive, I was not reqwuired to hold my head within millimetres of the fan to experience a weak breeze, so I was mucho chuffed with that as well.

Dropped some of my stuff over at Will's before heading over to his parent's place for the actual BBQ itself and I promptly made a start on the drinking. To mix up festivities I took along Rock Band minus the drums, so we had 3/4 the fun. Despite the lack of drums, it has proven to be a game that literally anyone can come in and have fun.
What with it being a glorious day we also went and played some American Football, I was hoping for regular footie but it was still pretty cool - I scored the first touchdown but my team lost in the end :(. As I discovered the day after, I took a knock to my ribs, thought it may have been broken but was assured that I had just bruised the muscle. It took like 2 weeks for it to stop hurting when I put pressure on it or twisted it. That was pretty lame as it really interfered with my sleep at first but thankfully that's all cleared up now.

Moving on to the drugs itself and as the BBQ was starting to kick off, this guy Lee (back in the day he was known as Chem Soc Lee, giving it an oriental twist ), who has become a renowned "druggie" as my Nan would pigeonhole, started passing round a joint. I found it a little humourous (although not enough to throw out a snigger) that this girl Claire (very cute btw) passed on the offer which left it to me where I took a few drags, only for her to proceed to do so as well when I passed it on.
Interspersing the yummy food (did I ever say BBQs are awesome?) I had a few more smokes with Lee; getting in to the evening and I popped out for a smoke, so there's just me and Lee there and he asks me if I've ever done ecstacy.

...I was quoting Scrubs where Carla asked Turk to see I love you just like Astro the Dog, so there's me going "Raggy! Raggy! I Wuv you! ...RAGGY! Where are you!"

I replied no, but I was incredibly curious and empowered thanks to a sense of being a combination of merry and high, that I was not going to back down on this opportunity that had presented itself. I was asking what were the side effects I was likely to experience, in particular how badly I was going to crash. Lee could have told me my foot was going to drop off, and I would still have gone through with it, I was that made up in my mind.

Now, Lee actually told me to make the open can of the 'bow I had my last one in order to enoy the E I had just done, but I kinda went against that advice. Now it's supposed to be experienced best at clubs with loud dance music banging away - it made me wonder if there wasn't a rather large placebo effect, or perhaps I was expecting a much greater effect. We popped inside, grabbing some food, sat down some people with rocking out on Rock Band. For some strange reason, I felt the need to do a Scooby Doo impression, aided greatly by a mouthful of burger. It was either that and/or I was quoting Scrubs where Carla asked Turk to see I love you just like Astro the Dog, so there's me going "Raggy! Raggy! I Wuv you! ...RAGGY! Where are you!" I remember it very distinctively, only cos Lee absolutely lost it, to which I kept on going - he was holding his sides by the end of it, I was laughing cos he cracked up so much over it, everyone else looking slightly confused and intrigued to what could have been so funny.

I did bother Lee to perhaps try some more, but the first taste was on the house and he wanted some money for any more. In fact, it seemed like he called pretty much everyone in his phonebook to see if they wanted to come along to the BBQ and purchase some drugs from him - bear in mind at this time it must have easily have been around midnight, if not later :s

In reflection, there is a big environmental factor to the experience gained from E, that was the general consensus I learnt, so it's difficult for me to say whether it was a good or bad experience. That being said, Bill Hicks perhaps has the greatest argument on drugs. He goes on to say that he's had both good times and bad with drugs, but will he give them up? No, his argument being that he's had both good times and bad times with women, but he's definitely not going to give up pussy. Bad experiences are there to build character or so they say.
I am a well-renowned hesitator (so much so I was going to throw out a whole post on it but I binned it) in pretty much all parts of my life, from telling people how I really feel to crossing the street, but it's strange (but satisfying) that I have taken both opportunities for drug-taking. A part of me thinks that I could get into the semi-habit of smoking weed, if only to de-stress from time to time. Thankfully for my health (and my wallet) I am not that well-connected, which is the main reason why I'm making such a deal out of these experiences, as alluded to in part 1.

Other little nuggets about the weekend, I learnt how to play the darts game "Killer", very cool game, very much like Uno where you can get so close to winning and then have it snatched away from you just with less cards and more darts I guess. Also, Will still owns me at Call of Duty multiplayer, especially with low numbers where it becomes a game of waiting and biding your time - I simply don't have enough patience for that - enter me going for many suicide runs down the streets only to get picked off by Will who has been patiently looking out a particular window, waiting for me to break, arg!

(Is anyone else tired of the constant bracket text?)

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Lately I'm getting better / Wish I could stay sick with you

This is the first work-related post I've made since the "First day" post. Having checked Google Analytics, it's interesting to see what search terms lead people to my blog. Someone found the blog after having typed "prestwood professional" into Google - I can only wonder what they thought upon reading this :s. It's probably best to take this opportunity and say that any thoughts expressed within are purely my own and are not linked to any organisations etc etc.
Now the legalities are out of the way, we can get down to business, and the bone I want to pick concerning the health of my work colleagues (I love the phrase "work colleagues").

I've avoided posting about work for the above reason and the potential rant floodgate which once opened I would find very hard to close. First off, it's best to give a little background. The company is pretty small, there's actually only about a dozen of us, including part-timers, and the core is made up of 6(ish) support staff which I am one of.  It seems like people are coming down with colds and flu all the time.  These people are very poor immune systems, Simon for one has had this chest-infection type problem for as long as I can remember.  I always shudder when he makes this horrible throaty, regurgitating noise when he clears his throat - he really should get that looked at, seriously.

Now I'm pretty sure I've never had to call in sick and skip days, I had some problems with my teeth so I had to take a couple of afternoons off, that was pretty lame but necessary. The question is what is different about myself and seemingly everyone else on the support team. I wondered if it was my diet, but dismissed that straight away as whilst I've been trying to improve my diet, it's still pretty crappy when you break it down.
You could argue that it might because the job itself is not particularily active, a lot of sitting in front of computers all day, but it's the same for me too so it can't be that either.

I was ranting to my Nan about this one day and I think she nailed it. I am the only one that doesn't drive into work, therefore I walk a fair distance, although I've yet to plot it accurately on Google maps (or indeed any other map) but when I had a quick look at the aforementioned pr0 site, I approximate my walking to be about 3 miles a day. It can't be that simple I said, but on the face of it, that is the main obvious difference. So my inability to drive is both a blessing and a curse.

There's also the possibility that my co-workers (another great term) are quite wimpish when they become a little under the weather. Everyone seems quite lax and comfortable with taking time off. The silver lining is reading the "calling in sick" emails that get sent in - some of them are really hilarious, part of one I remember used the phrase "flu-like way".

Here's hoping it is never anything really serious or else I may have to start believing the sick notes...

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Some gym motivation tips

Been a bit lazy on the blog recently, I blame my recent birthday and the rather cool celebrations that went down last weekend. Yes, for those that are interested I have now reached the ripe old age of 23 - pretty scary stuff, I'll be hitting 30 before I knows it.
Anyways, moving on and I thought I'd throw out some gym motivation tips, especially if like me your wardrobe is in serious need of a cold reset.

The first method of motivation I will detail here is the power of wearing old clothes that don't fit anymore due to all the weight you've lost on the treadmill/rower/bike machine etc. I was wearing some old jeans the other day and I because I was staying in and catching up on some hardcore tidying (soaking ftw!) I didn't feel the need to accessorise with a belt. But thanks to the inches lost on the belly, the jeans kept falling down, leading me first to walk around a bit like a cowboy in an effort to keep them up, finally resulting in conceding and applying a belt.

So that was looking back at the progress made, I remember a pair of shorts I got a few years back I purchased cos they were very cool (Saltrock shorts I believe...) but even back then they were a little tight. I wore them the other week for the first time since last Summer and was shocked at how much looser they appear now. Whilst that's great looking at past achievements, the contrary to the above is to look ahead to the future, what work still needs to be done? This is done by wearing a tee-shirt/sweater etc that is perhaps just a little too small. That way if you catch yourself in a mirror, you're immediately shocked by the less-than-perfect bump you've got going on for a belly (in my case at least). Whilst this can be potentially damaging.

...leading me first to walk around a bit like a cowboy in an effort to keep them up...

"After all this work I still look terrible" are examples of the thoughts, you really do have to think of it as a journey. I for one were thinking the same thoughts when I started, and sometimes, yeah, those same thoughts trickle back in, and I find that good motivation - it doesn't work for everyone. Basically I'll reach a point that I am happy with - I won't turn into some body builder type, I simply don't have enough time (or the desire for that particular look) for all that.

The thing with the gym is that is really is a battle of discipline and then attrition. Discipline is required to make yourself go on a regular basis and then attrition where if you go long enough, you will see the positives of your efforts. That being said I did set a goal of getting into shape that I'm very comfortable and happy with by the time I turned 23. I have missed that goal in my mind, although again the progress made is very encouraging, friends and family alike are commenting on how much better I look now - those shallow bastards! :P

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#8 (Not so) Beautiful Katamari

For a week I had the chance to play Beautiful Katamari for about a week. I only got one or two evenings to give the game a chance - I had only just received the instruments for Rock Band, the sunday before :s.

For those not in the know, the premise of the game is to take a "Katamari", essentially a ball which everything sticks to, and roll it about collecting other objects to increase the diameter of the ball/katamari, with each level giving you a target diameter to work towards. When you start out, you can only roll over very small objects, but as your Katamari increases in size, so too do the objects you can now collect, and this leads to an exponential growth - the first metre seems to take an age, but the following metres come thick and fast.

Right, let's get down to the nitty gritty, the game itself is very original, I've certainly not played a game like it. That being said, there have been previous games on older consoles which have done principally the same. I did actually believe that the game had been ported from an old console version gamecube/ps2 etc but the 360 version is actually a seperate game in it's own right.

Having to navigate my silly wide-headed character to a load/save house in the level hub is frankly lame and felt terribly backwards.

I only thought it was a port as, graphically this is not a next-gen game. All the objects are terribly angular and poorly textured, if they textured at all. And believe it or not, the game does get some terrible slow-down at times, oh dear huh?

Whilst it is the first Katamari game I've personally played, and as I've mentioned I've not played anything like this before, this iteration of the game has not done anything new with the formula if a quick look up on wikipedia is to believed. So in that respect, the game isn't next-gen. Another terribly annoying feature is the complete lack of auto-save, I mean WTF. Having to navigate my silly wide-headed character to a load/save house in the level hub is frankly lame and felt terribly backwards. It's not as if an autosave would be a contraversial feature to add. The game is broken into very distinctive levels which have to be accessed via the level hub so it would be super convenient to auotsave after finishing a level. I only complain as I assumed that this feature existed and quitted out (probably to go play Rock Band) and when returning to Beautiful Katamari, my progress had not been saved. LAME.

The gameplay itself is pretty cool, although I didn't seem to be very good - the King kept asking me why I bothered, well Kingsy, I might just pack it all in together. Now I only played a few evenings, I didn't complete the game, I got a few achievements for my trouble and at the time it was very fresh. My fear is that the game will get very same-y after a while as there's not a lot that can be done with the formula. One level had me collect "hot" things but that was probably one of the most frustrating levels I managed to play.

Overall, I would say that Beautiful Katamari is a good game, nothing special but unique enough to warrant a try, especially if like me you've not played any of the previous games in the series. It's worth a go but not without it's faults, especially when if you're looking for worthy games for your next-gen xbox 360.

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Red Hair Revelation

I've been meaning to put together the very first episode of Your New Favourite Podcast for what seems like ages, and thanks to unexpected events this week, it has still not been possible. So, I'm going to offer up the content of that planned episode in a blog post which I'm gonna put together over my lunch break.
I was going to cover a fair few subjects in the podcast, but here I'll stick to something which has been at the forefront of my mind for the last few days, well when I haven't been in a terrible mood, but that's gonna be left for another time.
I was in an absolutely fantastic mood at the start of the week, I was dropping some suggestive hints through my twitter tweets. The reason being that I've developed a crush - it's a good time at the moment, right before I become far too obsessive and self-destruct my chance.
Yes, an upside of this crush has been the elevated mood, it's strange (well maybe not that strange) that music seems to get me incredibly pumped, like it's never resonated so strongly it what seems like forever. That being said, I think doing some of the vocal stuff in Rock Band has also encouraged me to sing along with the songs.

I'm not going to go into the details about the crush here, it seems a little wrong to tell the Internet before I tell the poor girl. Anyways, I'm not sure it's just the crush, I've been feeling a little more susceptible, being more aware of the laydees, although it's probably down to last weekend's festivities, going out with the Kidderminster crowd. Friday evening consisted of a gathering in the infamous Red Man, and Saturday we went off to Wolverhampton for some alternative (read: metal) goodness at the Planet. The weekend was overall very good, although as I've felt before, I don't have much in common with a metal crowd. That being said, as mentioned above I was defintiely feeling attraction to a fair few girls over the two nights.
On top of the crush, there was Jill, one of Neo's exes on the Friday evening. Now, she came over late on in the evening and insisted on touching my fringe. I'd rather not have strangers coming up and entering my personal space like that, but there was nothing negative about it, if anything I only consider a good thing, my hair was obviously of such interest that she couldn't help but be curious.
On the Saturday, I remarked to Wilson via a typed message (it was far too loud inside the club) that this girl Deb (or Debs) was quite hot. Apparently that makes it 2 for 2, although it is possible to find some people attractive, but not actually fancy them. Plus on reflection she was a tocuh naked, and OMG she has red hair! For those not in the know, on DiggNation they covered a story where they found that people with red hair have the healthiest sex lives, and possibly more eyebrow-raising is that people who dye their hair red are subconsciously sending out a message that they are looking for a partner. So maybe that helps explain my initial thoughts towards Deb.

Strangely enough, during Sunday I was ironing a shirt ready for work and I popped on the TV to have some background noise/sights whilst I ironed. As it turned out Scrapheap Challenge was on. It used to be a staple of earlier years but I've outgrown it a little, although the odd episode every now and again is pretty enjoyable. Anyways, for the unintiated the show is hosted by Robert LLywelyn (Kryten from Red Dwarf) and Lisa Rogers. Now, the show has been running for quite some time - 10 years if Robert is to believed, and Lisa Rogers is still very attractive. She would be even more so, if she didn't put on the exaggerated voice to be more in fitting with the show. Anyways I was watching the show, this week's challenge was to build some boats. Now in tradition with the show, any boats built have had the tendency to either not work, or plod along really slowly. It turned out this week, that one of the teams had built a machine which could travel at a fair nick. Anyways, they had Lisa Rogers in a boat for the "trackside" view and once this speedy racer got going, they literally couldn't keep up and then the strange thing happened.

in fact she was looking out of my TV at me, who by now was transfixed onto her smile

The boat Lisa Rogers was in had to really push to keep up with the action, and there was Lisa staring into the camera, and she looked so incredibly cute. It was as if she wasn't staring at the camera, but in fact she was looking out of my TV at me, who by now was transfixed onto her smile. Her expression was of pure delight and excitement - like holding each other, swinging around in a meadow. It sounds ridicolous reading it back but it stunned me, but in a good way.

EDIT: I'm not sure if now knowing that red hair, whether that be natural or artifically created, is the indicator as described above is now affecting how I look at ladies now, but my head seems to turn in their direction much more. Actually on a recent trip back to Shropshire, there was one red-haired girl on the way down on Friday, and then another on the way home on the Sunday. Hell, even the lead female singer of my "solo" band (Bobion the 3rd! yeah!) in the World Tour on Rock Band had, until recently, red hair, mmmm.

On closing, I need to pluck up the courage to do something about this crush and maybe sometime soon I'll be able to put together episode 1 of the podcast. I'm sure once I get started it'll be easier to keep going.

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#4 Escapism

In my head, the idea for this post was more about all the different methods I use to "escape" my life, Master of Escapism was the original post title, although I might resurrect that post in some form, thanks to some recent revelations.
Anyways, I'm knocking out another Random Playlist, as I find that music is indeed my greatest tool of escapism, and also to help boost the number of RP posts, erm.
It's quite strange to think about it really, and I'm sure I can't be the only one, but I do feel a little naked if I'm walking out and about on my own without my music. Fortunately, the shame passes quickly, but it's true to state that my mp3 player ranks with wallet, keys and phone on the list of essentials that I cannot leave the house without (Actually that's the complete list! :S). I actually joke to myself that my mp3 player is actually a "life support" machine, as if you ever see me out and about, there's a very good chance I'm wired up to it, relying on it to continue living.

It might come as a shock to you all, but the sounds of the real world, on the whole, suck. And that goes double for the sounds you encounter on the daily commute. Cars, bikes, buses that drive past, shop alarms, hell other people, they are all noises which I want very badly to block out with my lurvely moosic.

but I do feel a little naked if I'm walking out and about on my own without my music

It's crazy that when the music disappears, whether it be through forgetfulness or a failed battery, I become hyper-aware of all the sounds of the real world, where before I've been happily oblivious. People chattering on the train, or even worse young children/babies, man they go right through me, as my Grandad would say.

The revelation came whilst I was doing some treadmill at the gym, and I looked down at my small player which I take to the gym (my iRiver is simply too bulky for it) and I was thinking how much my mood can be elevated through the right songs - how that a mood is elevated perhaps more than some (read: a lot of) people that I come into regular contact with.

The classic question: If you were stranded on a desert island, what 10 CDs would you limit yourself to taking. Well, screw that, I'll just take a mp3 player with a couple hundred gigs of music on and I'll be sorted. As an added bonus, the mp3 player would take up less space!

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We're all Frak ups!

So I've been slowly rewatching Battlestar Galactica over the last few weeks or so. Way back when (actually about a year ago :s) I was watching the updated Battlestar Galactica for the first time and hit a roadblock at the end of season 2 - there was nothing I felt in the story that inspired me to keep on watching. Following on from watching the simply awesome Totally Rad Show (which I still need to write a Podcast Review for, arg!), they are (obviously) big fans of the show and revealed to me, at least, that the fourth season of BSG will be the last.
I thought to myself, "hey, I'll push through onto season 3 and before I know it I would have seen it all. Now, back in the day I had some criticisms of the show, which can be found here. [As it turns out, it is the most popular post on the mirrored wordpress blog I started up a while back, but no longer maintain, so that's quite cool]. For those worried about spoilers, there are no big ones following that link, more the gist of the plot. There maybe some following the read more link, but hopefully not too big.


As of Monday evening, I rounded off the end of season 2, I had reached the point at which I didn't feel the need to carry on watching. The main reason is the terrible rushed ending. Not to throw out too big a spoiler, but in the last episode (I believe it's a double ep), they do the classic "One year later" halfway through. I didn't like it at all. It would seem more natural to have the one year later occur between the end of season two and start of season three, but then there wouldn't be the cliffhanger (be careful!)

On a more flippant note, what the hell is going on with their stationary. It seems all documents have had their corners removed and it pisses the crap out of me (which apparently has been defined as one of my sayings now). Firstly there's the simple loss of space on a document lost to these corners, it doesn't make sense to just lose the corners, it would still require something rectangular to store it all in, or are they going to cut the corners off them as well?!? What happens when they staple documents together? They obviously can't use the corner cos there isn't one.
More importantly, it seems like it was an aesthetic decision to give the show a distinct "other worldly" feel. It's a change for change's sake, if only to remind us, hey these are people, but they're not from Earth, so how can we make them different? You can just imagine the board meeting:

"hey, let's cut off all the corners from the books!"
"Yes! Great! and while we're at it, let's paint all their skin green!..."

The same can be said for the naming of the twelve colonies, yes we all got it almost immediately, they're named after the contellations of the zodiac. There was a lame scene where they revealed the "old world" names for them - Caprica,

What happens when they staple documents together?

or Capricorn, dun dun duurn! ZOMFG! All they did was swap out the end of the names with A's or On's. Lame.

I think I even saw an octagonal data disc one episode, now that just doesn't make any sense with respect to how a disc is read, i.e. it's rotated about its central axis, so logically a circle would give the most area for a defined radius compared with other shapes. Come on, humanity here is a space-faring race, even we have worked that out long ago.

That being said, Battlestar Galactica is one of the best sci-fi shows I've watched/watching. It is sci-fi but has grounded feel to it, and thankfully avoids very convenient future tech solutions which Stargate became incredibly guilty - too much mention of out of phase bollocks. "Why don't they fall through the floor?!"

Latest: I've watched the first few episodes of season three, and it's actually been pretty good for the most part, although I was left feeling a little sceptical now they managed to return the status quo it seems *rubs chin* oh well. I may throw out some more thoughts after finishing watching season four, but following the twitters of the TRS guys do not hold a lot of hope for season four *looks worried*

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All The Small Things

All The Small Things first go (Rock Band)
Originally uploaded by jimiminar

Another short 'n' sweet Rock Band post. After a brief chat with my good buddy Will, purchasing some extra songs for Rock Band seems like a really good idea, so amongst the two songs I bought was "All the Small Things" by Blink 182 of course. (the other song was Buddy Holly - Weezer =hawt!).

Anyways, I took on both songs in a custom setlist in the Band World Tour as the now hall-of-fame famous Bobion the 3rd, i.e. me on guitar and vocals, and they were the results. Pretty chuffed at that, and the guitar is pretty simple so no reason I can't 100% that in the near future.

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A Photo a day...

Keeps the Camera Fairy away... erm, yeah that'll work. But if I can talk seriously for a moment, I came across a cool article through Digg (EDIT: it turns out, I didn't digg it back in the day, I've just dugg it now :S). The article in question highlighted the efforts of this guy, what he had done was to take a photo every day, right up until he died. The photos picked out in the article are very striking, my respect goes out to the guy for keeping up the photo a day especially in the hardship later on.

What an absolutely cool idea, it has been done before, famously there's those guys that have taken a self-portrait every day and formed a video of it, seeing how their hair changes and how they slowly get older - although strangely enough their expression never seems to change.

Anyways, I've been toying with the idea of getting a new digital camera since, well, my current one stopped working.

although strangely enough their expression never seems to change

I've posted a few photos to the blog and of course my flickr but they have come from my phone and as we can see from the evidence, the quality is quite poor. I've taken what I've described as "graffiti" snaps - just random pictures of things that amuse or amaze me whilst I'm out of my travels. I was thinking of carrying on and doing the same but with a digital camera. Now the camera I would be aim to get would ideally be quite small, more importantly very slim so I can easily put it into my pocket. It would have to have a fair optical zoom and some kind of auto-steady feature to negate my shaking hands (see my latest rock band pic).
Unfortunately at the moment my budget does not extend to a luxury purchase such as a digital camera, maybe it'll be a birthday treat from me, but as soon as I have it it would be something very cool to start up. Expect more "graffiti" pics, maybe some random takes on my travels and I'll probs throw in some self-portraits for good measure.

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So... Rock Band is awesome if you didn't know

100% Vox on Paranoid (Medium)
Originally uploaded by jimiminar

I want to do a whole post on the awesomeness of Rock Band but whilst working through the vocal solo tour on medium, I managed to snap this, pretty proud of that.

EDIT: I've since attempted Paranoid in Bobion the 3rd's (a band made up solely of me, lol) World Tour, so did this song Guitar @ medium + Vocals @ Medium and I got 100% on the vocals there. If memory serves me, I got about 98% on the guitar. Anyways, couldn't get a snap of that as it was half way through a 4 song set.
So if people don't believe me I'll have to give the song another go and produce proof like this baby.
Here's trying to be proudtive this weekend but finding it very hard with the distraction of the multitude of instruments that now lie scattered across my living room :s

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Testing the feed (Wilson's Corner!)

Further to our recent conversation, please find included a recording of one of the Wilson's Corner shows we did way back when on Raw, the student radio station at Warwick.


Anyways, enough of that semi-professional talk, I've uploaded this and added it here, to help test out the feed, make sure it's all working. Once the feed is sorted, I'll submit it to iTunes and then that will pave the way to future episodes of Your New Favourite Podcast.

The blog is being put on hold until I can get this all sorted, at the moment I'm checking out some podsafe music to use in the podcast, and at the time of posting I had recorded some stuff for episode zero (a whole 10mins worth!), but listening back to some of it, it does need some polish, I obviously need to get a little better at directing a monologue at my monitor.

Watch this space for further YNFP announcements...

[MP3] Download the show (Right click, Save as)

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Just checking in...

My blogging has been put on hold as of late. I've been spending a bit of time with the new layout design and of course sorting out the logistics of getting a podcast working. What I will say is that I'm almost there. I've set myself a semi-target of getting the first episode out this weekend, so we'll see how that goes.

A lot of recent twitter tweets have involved progress on the blog and podcast, but there hasn't actually been a lot of change here. Checking out a few blogger hack sites earlier in the week and a very sensible recommendation is to set up a test blog to trial new features, layouts etc. So I have set up a beta blog as well it's not like there is any extra cost of having an extra blog.

I'm not going to link it here, as well it's quite messy. I rather annoyingly spent about 2 hours fixing the layout as IE is still a pain when handling CSS, it still has a different interpretation of paddings and margins arg. It looks fine in Firefox, and exactly how I expect it to but not in IE. Anyways, I got it to a point where it looks the same in both browsers, so I stopped for then.

I was planning on watching Clerks 2, my other lovefilm pick this week, but I completely crashed - one good thing is that I got a lot extra sleep so should be refreshed for the weekend.

IE is still a pain when handling CSS

Hopefully that means I might be able to make good on my promises of delivering the podcast + new layout this weekend, we'll see.

So basically, the blog will resume normal operation soon, I'll get one episode under my belt, move the changes over. One thing that has been set up here and not on the beta blog is the ratings widget which should be seen at the bottom of each post. Sometimes it takes too much effort to throw in a comment, saying how awesome the post was, but clicking on some stars should be something everyone can do.

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Testing the feed (Wilson's Corner!)

A recording of the mighty Wilson's Corner 15/02/06, starring Wilson, JC, the Rob and Damon!

Further to our recent conversation, please find included a recording of one of the Wilson's Corner shows we did way back when on Raw, the student radio station at Warwick.

Anyways, enough of that semi-professional talk, I've uploaded this and added it here, to help test out the feed, make sure it's all working. Once the feed is sorted, I'll submit it to iTunes and then that will pave the way to future episodes of Your New Favourite Podcast.

The blog is being put on hold until I can get this all sorted, at the moment I'm checking out some podsafe music to use in the podcast, and at the time of posting I had recorded some stuff for episode zero (a whole 10mins worth!), but listening back to some of it, it does need some polish, I obviously need to get a little better at directing a monologue at my monitor.

Watch this space for further YNFP announcements...

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GTA4 Initial Impressions

So it's been about a week since GTA4 has been released so it seemed appropriate to give some initial impressions whilst still keeping away from any spoilers for those who have still haven't played it. As I read via Digg, there was an article "are you a hardcore gamer?", the last point being that you can get by without getting GTA4 on release date. I got mine on release but had to wait till after work to fire it up - what an inconvenience.
Anyways, I've played for a little bit most evenings, the gym has called to see if I'm still alive (I will be going this week), and the last time I checked the stats I was approx 20% the way through, which is pretty crazy thinking about it.

So what are my thoughts on the game. These are just my first impressions effectively, there is so much to explore and do in the game, not to mention all the clever nuances which I can spend whole weeks without no doubt.
The game exhibits a swagger which we've come to expect from a GTA game. The cut scenes are all delivered in a slick manner and Niko's accent has already got me imitating a little, or should I say lee-tle har har.
They've built in the idea of a mobile phone to handle contacts and being notified about newly unlocked missions - it's quite smart without being as HUD reducing as was claimed a fair while before the game was released. Speaking of HUD, the option of adding a GPS route onto your map is something pretty cool and if you drive an upmarket 4x4 (it's the only one I've noticed in it so far), you'll get the directions spoken to you. Again, a nice little touch. To be honest there are no big surprises in terms of gameplay. What Rockstar have done this time has simply refined the GTA experience, it's more of the same, only that little bit better. The missions still hold true to the templates of old - drive somewhere, kill a guy, escape the police and make it back to safety etc etc

Side activities have been added in the game, the idea of building relationships is something the developers want to stress.

I don't think I've laughed so hard at a video game in so long, I can watch some guy's player model got knocked down by a scooter and it will never get old, I promise you.

So that will involve going out to dinner or a comedy club with friends, going to play darts and pool offer up mini games. It's something quite smart and will appeal to the casual gamer. Personally I've given the mini games a go and it'll probably be some time before I revisit them. What can I say? I have unsurprisingly harvested them of achievements so there's no need to rush back in my mind.

The combat system has had an overhaul, so targeting is much easier, your own health has been incorporated as the border of the map and your target's health appears as a ring on the reticule so it's all pretty slick. That being said, hand-to-hand can feel a little clumsy still and timing of dodges are still something of a black art to me, I failed that tutorial mission so many times cos I lost too much health trying to dodge swings.

Graphically I am perhaps a little disappointed, especially when looking back at the series of trailers which were released which really wet my appetite. The game also features the distant soft focus and grainy shadows much like Mass Effect, I can't decide if it's a work of art and genius or to excuse mediocre draw distance. I will say that driving over one of the bridges and seeing a distant 747-type plane is pretty awesome.

You can't throw in two cents without saying something about the radio stations available in the game. I have to say they are not unmissable, I think they got it just right for Vice City and have been trying to emulate that ever since. That being said there are radio stations for everyone, personally I usually throw on Liberty Rock, or WTTT, which is a little like KChat. The theme music used in the GTA trailers is on the Journey station and that's pretty cool so have to check out the actual music for that.

At the weekend, I decided to forego the single player campaign and brave the multiplayer. What can I say, again it's premature to say this as I have only checked out a few game modes, but it could be one of the best multiplayer experiences when it peaks. I've given the Crooks and Robbers gamemode a go and that was a lot of fun, but I have to say I'm addicted to GTA Race. Essentially it take the basic form of a race but then throw in driveby-stylee shooting at each other, plus the fact you can simply get out of the car and try and take other people out and ignore trying to win the race and you have a winning formula right there.
I don't think I've laughed so hard at a video game in so long, I can watch some guy's player model got knocked down by a scooter and it will never get old, I promise you.

These are just my initial impressions, a lot more time will have to be invested into both the single player and multiplayer to give a true review of GTA4.

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