Mr W Phallus

That would be a good episode, but considering the death count unlikely. Unless the dead bodies were evil aliens, then we're back where we started. Although it would be worth it for that episode, the could meet Pliny the Elder on the beach and stuff.

Humans can't be perilous? And what about natural disasters? And what's wrong with an episode where the Doctor & co visit an important moment of history, meet some interesting characters and accidentally end up being the catalyst for that important moment? I'm sure there are other problems in history for the Doctor to solve than malevolent aliens and monsters.

I watched the first three or so episodes of the show and loved it, but for reasons I can't recall I never continued watching it (nothing to do with the quality of the show, or indeed anything about the show). I'm reluctant to get back into it a week before an exam that I haven't started revising for, so it'll have to go on the waiting list. The long, long waiting list.

Yeah sure an introduction can like all things be done wrong. Once again I submit Portal as an example of doing it fucking right. Portal is pretty unique in the artificiality of the setting, however. The story of the game is that you are playing a game and so it is easy (relatively speaking; let's not belittle Valve's achievements) to gradually introduce the player to the game mechanics when the entire game is a series of enclosed rooms, specifically designed as a portal puzzle. When other games attempt to recreate this narratively logical, step by step introduction to the game mechanics it almost always feels awkward because the game is not structured in that way. So when you play the beginning of ACII you plod through a series of enclosed encounters, each bridged by cut-scenes because unlike in Portal each 'room' does not directly lead onto the next one. Further problems arise in games (particularly shooters) where you are an established bad-ass and should therefore, narratively speaking, be accomplished at everything from the moment you pick up the controls. I'm sure I've gone on about how good the level design in Half-Life 2 is many times on this forum now, but the opening level is a great example of slowly easing you into the game mechanics without it feeling like a tutorial. In fact the chase sequence through City-17 is a contender for my favourite moment in a video-game ever and that happens before you're even given a crowbar to hit things with, let alone a gun. I'd like to point out I'm not actually disagreeing with you here, Johnny, just rambling on for the sake of it. Finally, unrelated to all that, if people are happy to memorise long lists of move combinations from a (usually in-game) manual for fighting games (or alternatively button-mash regardless of the existence of a list of moves) then why are they so reluctant to do this in other genres?

Wait, Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellan couldn't hold up a movie on their own? Had the script been good enough, the whole film could have been those two talking over a chess game for one and a half hours and it would still be entertaining.

Also bad game design: Excessive hand-holding which renders significant sections of the game tedious and unenjoyable for second time or experienced players. Try restarting Assassin's Creed 2. First time round it is quite good, you are eased into the game mechanics slowly and the 'tutorial' is suitably story-focused. Second time round it's boring as hell, and since it's incorporated into the story there's no way to skip it. This article comes to mind: http://www.significant-bits.com/super-mario-bros-3-level-design-lessons

I'd like to clarify this. I am genuinely interested in games as an art form. I am however less interested in the debate because it usually turns into a discussion on the definition of art. There is that danger, but it could be avoided by concentrating on what can games do to be more accepted as art, what games have managed it already (in part or completely). It would be good if everyone in the podcast put forward the game they consider to be most art-like. As for topic suggestions, what about Narrative in Video-Games or Video-Games in Other Media (I'm was thinking specifically of film adaptions of video-games and game adaptions of films but you could also talk about representations of video-games and gamers in other media etc.). I'd be quite interested in talking about narrative myself, but I'm a bit busy atm, so we'll see if you ever get round to it. Also a suggestion for the formula of the podcast itself, each week you could have an Off-Topic section where you talk about one non-video-game related subject for a bit. Anyways, great job with the first podcast guys. I think Six did a great job of hosting as well.

This weeks episode was pretty average, although the ending was really good, if a bit rushed. Like with the pirate episode though, it feels like the story was tacked on because they knew the rest of the episode wasn't great. Few things to point out:

I think the film could go either way, and not just because that fits the title. The trailer was pretty average but for some reason gave me a strong feeling that it was a film that just wouldn't really work as a trailer even though the film itself is good.

Then wouldn't it have been better to say 'I thought Steve Rogers was going to be like what you said too before I actually started reading anything with him in it' in the first place, rather than just leaving an unexplained insult? But just because the man commits treason (I'm betting it was still for the good of America/mankind/universe) doesn't change the fact that the guy is a walking, talking propaganda poster. Besides, your insistent use of the name Steve Rogers suggests that you find something embarrassing about the whole idea of a 'Captain America' yourself. And for all that you push his human side, you just highlight the redundancy of his alter ego. Quite frankly he could be Captain Whatever and it would make very little difference to his character, especially if, as you say, they've dropped the blind patriotism (although patriotism has nothing to do with treason; treason is against the government, not necessarily the country). Whilst most superpowers or superhero identities inform or are informed by the superhero's character, Cap'n America was created simply to big up America. Any characterisation that exists now has been tacked on now that readers expect a bit more than pro-American propaganda and a bit of action from their comics. Now maybe, just maybe, the recent comics depict a character torn between his reliance on the government for funding etc. to do actual good in the world and the fact he is the poster child for a political regime he doesn't believe in. Maybe Steve Rogers reads Marx and Engels in his downtime and he doesn't even like apple pie. But even if there is some interesting characterisation happening in the comics, the likelihood of that actually getting filtered down to the film is even smaller. So really I don't see what was wrong with Thursday expressing distaste for a character that probably wouldn't even exist if it weren't for name recognition.

I'd like to see a top-down adventure game set in a medieval-fantasy style open world city for HD consoles. You start off at your house in a fairly poor district and your mother sends you on a (seemingly) mundane task, such as getting some milk (in actual fact you will only be able to achieve this task once you have completed the game 100%). The catch to the game is that as soon as you leave the house you learn that a dragon has been spotted bearing down on the city, leaving you with only a certain amount of time before everyone is killed. The city is completely open world, so no buildings just for show that you can't actually go inside, and has a population proportional to the amount of houses in the city. Every single person you talk to (there will be about 100-200 or whatever is realistic, I'm not really too sure, something quite large) has some sort of quest or task for you to accomplish. They won't necessarily appeal directly to you so for many of them you will have to work out from your conversation with them what they want (a simple example: 'I really like the girl next door' and you work out you have to set the pair up). The real aim of the game is to defeat the dragon and save the day, and to do so within the time limit will be more than possible for a first time player. To achieve the 'perfect' ending however (no damage, to the city, no collateral damage etc.), you have to complete every single quest in the city. Depending on what type of player you are you can replay the game to find different ways of defeating the dragon, discovering new NPCs, items and abilities and finding different endings or if you're a hardcore completionist you can replay it until you have everything down to the exact sequence required to get 100%. The gameplay itself will be very light on combat, instead it will be about finding the right item or outfit or thing to say for the right situation, and a good amount of puzzles thrown in for good measure. Completing the game once (no matter what ending you get) would unlock a mode with no time limit, for more relaxed exploration or practising for the perfect ending. Another idea I had for a game is a first-person game with Oblivion-esque RPG mechanics set in a castle and you have a mystery to solve (perhaps a murderer picking people off in the castle one by one). The catch? You keep reliving the same say, Groundhog Day style. Character progression carries over when the day restarts, so as well as solving the mystery bit by bit, you have to build up your skills until, having discovered the identity of the murderer, you can intercept and defeat him before he commits the first murder. There could be an element of choice in what skills you choose to level up - you could be sneaky and ransack peoples rooms, learn torture from the dungeon keeper, learn alchemy to make a truth serum. Obviously there's no real way to lose - death will just make the day restart - and failure simply leaves you slightly more prepared when you wake up in the morning again. The game only ends when you kill of incapacitate the murderer so you can max out all your skills, find every secret in the castle, mess around with the NPCs, even romance any character in the game if you feel like it.

Maybe the Ratman dolled her up while she was sleeping? He does seem to worship her. It only really looks like she's got eyeliner on though. We're so used to seeing women wearing make-up that it would probably look less natural to try and make her completely bare-faced.

It isn't the last one; it's on again next Saturday. I was referring to the Rapture. Just trying to lighten up the end of the world. Unfortunately the end of the world wasn't real and the joke wasn't very funny.

Yeh I hope they don't have Obligatory Dalek Episode and Obligatory Cybermen Episode this series. Not that I'd be annoyed if they turned up because they actually had a good story-related reason to be there, but it's rubbish when they're just shoe-horned in. This episode was OK, but considering its the last episode we'll see it was a bit underwhelming. And it ended on a bloody cliffhanger. I wonder when we're going to find out about the woman in the prison/asylum hatch thingy. Its interesting how much less subtle the series arc is this series. Compared to say the Bad Wolf graffiti which was like, 'Oh wow, I hadn't even noticed that.

The Akira soundtrack is too good. Too good I say. Tetsuo is the best but Dean already posted that so... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNk2RmCgtEQ

Hmm it's frustratingly unrevealing. I think I'd have preferred his mask a little less high tech looking, but from what we can see it doesn't look bad. Bumpy back is bumpy.

Kenshi you stole my hopes and dreams. And made a start on them already, dammit. I wish I could say I'd made a start but apart from dicking around with my mate on Ableton a little bit I haven't done anything. I just keep telling myself I'm gonna start writing once I work out what I want to write about. Meanwhile one of my mates has a book of poetry published and has finished a novel.

Arcade Fire, The Strokes, Radiohead...so many of my favourite bands I wasn't impressed with at all when I first heard them. What is it? Also it's nice to see people actually discussing music in this thread for once.

Well I did read one review that said: Which was pretty much what I was expecting, moments of brilliance along with a lot of average ones, but that's as positive as it gets. I agree that people seem to be reviewing the film too harshly, and I don't mean that in the usual Hollywood apologist 'It's just mind mindless entertainment' sense. For all that the previous films were bloated and flawed, they managed to deliver some great humour and great action set pieces and if this one follows that trend then it doesn't matter how much of a cash in or more of the same it is.

Well you've restored some hope for me, up until now pretty much everything I've heard about Pirates 4 has been negative.

I thought the same about it not being as catchy on my first play through but by the third it had had really grown on me. Grown Ocean is particularly amazing, but the whole album is great. I'd even go as far to say it's a much more polished effort than the first album. Maybe. IMO etc.

Completely powered though Y, I was up to 4am last night finishing it. Man, that was a bitter-sweet ending. Sure for it's pretty positive for the fate of mankind womankind (barring the Iranian nuclear threat) but pretty damn tragic for Yorrick himself. I really enjoyed The Ultimates Vol. 1 but never picked up any of the others. I used to read Ultimate Spidey and Ultimate X-Men as well but I don't remember whether they were particularly good to be honest. I was young, naive and fairly new to super hero comics so I'm sure I'd have enjoyed pretty much any old crap.

I don't know what to think. Personally I think the CGI characters are a bit too realistic, uncanny valley and all that. Hopefully the story will be good and the won't mess around with the original plot of the books too much.

Finally got round to starting Y: The Last Man after all your rave reviews. I'm only 6 pages in but there's already been a reference to Bad Lieutenant and Serpico. I think I'm going to like this.