Defiance Competitive Multiplayer: Rush Hour At The More Than OK Corral…

Posted on March 4, 2013 by geelw

Since Defiance isn’t a garden variety online FPS (or a FPS at all) and not your standard semi-real time MMO where you queue up actions and wait while moves play out, the game flows a lot more like a purer action game because it IS one. Granted, I still can’t play it online at all here (boo!), but nothing should stop YOU from if you’re interested in the show and able to do so. Here’s hoping Trion Worlds has a bigger hit than even they’ve imagined and they can do something similarly fun for those of us who don’t live online (whether by choice or not) when we want some simple, fun but thrilling gaming… my fingers are crossed…

Lego City Undercover: It’s Not Quite What You Think (Which Is Very Good Indeed)…

Posted on March 4, 2013 by geelw

A few months back I was actually planning to ignore this entirely… until I saw a few actual gameplay trailers and read a nice preview on another site. Well, well, well… mind changed. I always knew it wasn’t a Grand Theft Auto clone at all, as the focus is on playing a good cop out to bag baddies instead of a Lego-ized criminal out to do bad. Hell, that wouldn’t pass muster with the parental units at ALL. I mean, think about it, folks (I’ll wait)… la, la, la… yeah, THAT version some were thinking this game would be would have been blasted all over the place by the media using it to say Lego was selling v-i-o-l-e-n-c-e to the kiddies disguised as a family-friendly Lego game (and for once, they’d be right). That said, I like the campy elements here and yes, the fact that the game does parody the open world elements found in the GTA games while adding in and switching up that familiar Lego gameplay. So, yup – I’ll be adding this one to the “must play” queue for my Wii U… and you should too (OK, that all rhymed, but wasn’t supposed to. I am a genius – at least for this post)…

Random Film of the Week: Dead of Night (1945)

Posted on March 4, 2013 by geelw

(thanks, scaringeachother!)

Even though it’s almost 60 years old, for my money, Dead of Night is still an effectively scary horror anthology as well as one of those classic movies worth tracking down. It’s also a decent comedy when it needs to be and even a bit of drama and mystery gets tossed into the mix. Four different directors (Alberto Cavalcanti, Charles Crichton, Basil Dearden and Robert Hamer) worked on the five stories that make up the film (Dearden directed the framing sections that make up the beginning and ending as well as one of the stories), but it’s a seamless production where no style overtakes another. Of course, being an Ealing Studios release means there’s a huge amount of that British film quality that studio managed to make standard issue and a sort of Good Housekeeping Seal for film buffs who want no junk tossed at them from the balcony. Of course, most film buffs sit IN that balcony, but Ealing’s films were always fit for both stuffy critics above the common folk and those cheap-seaters below tossing popcorn and balled up paper napkins upward…

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Another Wonderbook? OK, Let’s See, Er… Read What’s Coming…

Posted on March 4, 2013 by geelw

Well, it certainly looks as if Sony made some money with that J.K. Rowling Wonderbook after all, as now there’s another coming (at least in the UK). Wonderbook: Diggs Nightcrawler is on the way in May there, but I still think Sony needs to whip up one or more of these things for more mature readers. Sure, it’ll be a novelty game/book at best, but they’d make a mint from those 50 Shades fanatics (and hell, a book is always better than a movie, right? OK, usually), and I can even see some sort of sci-fi or fantasy books geared towards cranky older gamers (like me) doing well if the integration between reading and play is done right…

Applied Design @MoMA: Portal Is Actually Harder If You Start in the Middle.

Posted on March 4, 2013 by geelw

Granted, I haven’t played this in some time, but it’s NOT exactly the toughest game out there. However, if you pick up a controller and try to start playing, expect to get lost fast. This level is actually really simple (I ran through it on the PS3’s The Orange Box collection just to make sure I wasn’t losing my touch), but I just dinked around for a bit so the video could be shot. Anyway, the guy who played after the next guy tried DID remember how to play and it was a good thing, as a video crew caught that fun bit of puzzle/platformer action for whatever site they were filming for… Ah, well. Hey, if they had Cosmic Ark or Thunderground there, I’d STILL be playing today…

Once Again, It’s Not The Games You Need To Worry About, Really.

Aside

So, a couple of months back, I’m waiting for the subway and there’s a rather cranky young woman yelling into, or more precisely AT her cell phone. Given today’s general lack of public decorum, I’m figuring it’s one of those angry conversations with a not so friendly relative or soon to be ex-formerly significant whatever that’s not supposed to be heard (and yet gets to be heard by all within earshot). Snip, snip and chop, chop- there goes someone’s entire wardrobe in the street and on fire later tonight, blah, blah, blah… whatever. And IN the freakin’ CAR, too? Yeesh. In any event (and as usual), I sidestep away so I can get some peace and quiet and not have to listen to someone sounding as if they’re auditioning for a new Quentin Tarantino film, when I hear the sound of a phone hitting the platform along with a string of expletives. Well, that’s one relationship busted… and a phone to go with it, I think… Wrong again.