SomTervo

I thought Sucker Punch was bruuuuutal. It was like, a pretty good idea, with a decent story, but written by a 6 year old, and edited/directed by a 4 year old. The opening scene, which I thought was really interesting at first, is now my go-to example of "how to completely fuck up a story and make it really, really boring simply by editing it badly". The music was often retarded, and it dreewww out simple scenes and made them boring. Four of us went to see it- one had a look of extreme concern all the way through, two laughed every few minutes at how awfully it was written/done, and I was just facepalming all the time. Goddamn stupid. But the story and everything would have actually worked if they had just told it better! -Speaking of DC comic films, me and my flatmates just watched AllStar Superman the other week. The comic is one of the best things I've ever read- on par with (maybe better than) the Dark Knight Returns et al.- and the film was actually pretty good. For those who haven't heard of AllStar Superman- it's basically a story that progresses Superman's story, for the first time in the 70-odd years since his inception. Basic intro (no spoilers): on a trip to the Sun, Superman is overexposed to solar radiation, which overloads his cells and causes them to begin dying. These are the last days Superman, his powers are tripled at least, but he is dying, progressively faster- and he performs the greatest Herculean feats of his career, while he ties up all the loose ends of his life. The comic tells everything, especially the Herculean tasks part, better, but the film was still good! One of the best stories I've ever read, surprisingly emotional, feels like a great Greek myth written in the present day. -Also- A Town Called Panic. Hilarious Belgian animated movie, described as 'Toy Story on absinthe' by one reviewer. If anyone's seen the funny Cravendale Milk adverts with the toys battling for milk, usually shouting 'miiiiilk'- that's an advert made by the people who did the show, and now the film. Really good stuff. I recommend.

Mine was pretty simple, I think I did almost everything 'right', i.e. people survived dangerous situations, everything was cool- the only stuff I did "wrong" was: I thought the story was fine- just not told in a good way. This made it seem unbelievable or too unlikely. At first I was like "awesome but crazy!" then I was like "wait a minute. This is bullshit" but after thinking about it loads and discussing it online with folks, it makes sense- just isn't edited/ told well and leaves far too much up to the viewer's imagination or blank-filling skills.

Hey Hottie, can I have your sunglasses? I'm good on the handbag though. Is it a manbag?

Yeah. More MP details and videos are dropping. There's a pretty great video and decent article on Kotaku, if y'all haven't seen it already. That Uncharted is so hot right now. http://kotaku.com/#!5792872/hands-on-with-uncharted-3s-three-team-deathmatch-and-free-for-all-killfests All this cinematic shit really reminds me of the Operations game modes in Killzone 3. That was awesome- although in that case it was only in between normal-style rounds that you got cinematic stuff. In Uncharted 3 the cinematic stuff seems to be happening all the fricking time, and it looks awesome. I particularly love the truck-jumping sequence while players are chasing after the plane. That bit in UC2 was amazing, and this looks even better in multi.

Not to DP, but I fancy a game tonight and was wonderin if anyone wants to join?

Badass.

Not adding anything new here, but (unsurprisingly) the OED sums it up perfectly. I love having access to OED online at uni. I love that too =D ... What's our plural for 'cannon', Hot?

The DLC, from a gameplay standpoint, is better than anything in the full game. (Not that the full game is really bad, I loved it.) It's like they finally realised that in order for the game to be great it has to have interesting gameplay: and that's what the DLC does. Makes it interesting. The actual battles get more clever and entertaining. The story is resolved a fair bit too. On the ending:

Y U no KZ3, TAY? I'm all for a game some time. The multiplayer's incredible. The singleplayer... Not so much.

I consider an infant to be like a baby, almost newborn. In my head I've got some made-up schema where a new person is an infant, then a toddler (2-3), then a young child (4-8), then a child/kid (9-12) onto teenager etc. As Phallus said, this isn't really an issue of contention between American English vs British English is it?

I love that. I do not love that, for some reason, they make you play through it again... I dunno, it skips out the more infuriating bits of having to play it again, and also adds his sardonic/ pissed off/ in pain comments as you're climbing the train again. Mmmm I'm going wet at the lips thinking of how they're gonna one up that opening in Uncharted 3. Also I'd like to add Dead Space to the list. Seminal opening, it's like a much more entertaining version of Half-Life's opening scene where you don't have control, but can look around, and it's so frigging cinematic.

Yeah, all this stuff's really just icing on the cake for me. On top of a good open world Western (which I got, kinda, with RDR), I've always wanted a Noir game, or something with a great cinematic sense and detective story. Getting all three lumped in one, it seems. The day it comes out over here is the day I have to move out of my first flat though, which will suck quite a lot. Not gonna stop me enjoying, though!

Pop up video is pretty good- for some odd reason I thought it meant it would be in 3D. There's an article I read recently that got me insanely stoked for the game for one reason: It's mature. Not as in the rating. Not in the way that every other AAA game that comes out these days is mature (through violence, gore, bad language, etc.). In the article it went into detail on how the game is 'mature' in the sense that it deals with really adult stuff, and doesn't skimp on or stereotype any ground it covers. They noted a crime scene where the victim was lying dead in a room- completely naked. You could literally see everything from teeth to toenails to pubic hair. On top of that? The player, to do well enough, has to examine her body closely; turning over parts of her for examination, looking up and down, and taking note of stuff, from an almost magnifying-glass perspective of a dead and mutiliated young woman's body. Apparently it was pretty hard to swallow for the journalists watching- and that Team Bondi are basically going for a real, gritty, true as possible story experience in the world of a 40s metropolitan cop. Realistic and mature, that is, until you whap out a shotgun and start blasting everyone. I'm really worried about the combat in the game- it doesn't seem to have NaturalMotion's Euphoria, which imho is a must if you want your game to be realistic at all. It looks fun but scrappy- the worst part of the overall simulation.

But there's no such thing as using a word wrong as long as it is understood in communication by a listener! Philolololology (kinda).

Both my parents are artists (not by profession, save my Dad being a photographer): my Dad is a sculptor, a painter, a photographer, a sketcher; my Mum is a painter, photographer, sculptor, knitter, embroiderer. And me? I struggle to draw a believable square.

Haha, the third one is brilliant. Well played, a blog satirising/ reviewing lots of stupid shows would be great. We should start one.

Games that spring to my mind for decent gore are the Call of Duty series, and the Max Payne games. I remember in the first couple of CoD games games all you'd get is a puff of red coloured dust. It's all you need. In Max Payne the only blood would be a spurt from a nasty wound, which would go onto any surface it hit. Wasn't OTT or anything. And really effective. The GTA games are surprisingly okay for blood, save the loads that spurt out of severed limbs in Vice City and San Andreas. GTAIV is relatively tame; though I suppose Euphoria makes up for the lack of cartoony violence. Euphoria is really an amazing thing, I can't wait to see what it evolves into to help realism in games. If you're replying to my comment, you don't really get what I was saying. (Apologies if you weren't.) I was saying it's when you have an emotional investment in a fictional object, be it a character or a thing or an idea, and there are aggressive acts upon it. That's violence, more than physical acts. The companion cube being cast into the furnace in Portal was a violent act. It was the emotional meaning behind it, not the act itself. In Homefront those soldiers may be justified, or they may not, but that's got nothing to do with your emotions, unless an emotional attachment is worked into the story.

Fiction, no matter what format or medium it's in, reflects reality. And in reality there is violence. However, in fiction we see just this- a reflection. Sure, sometimes it'll be so realistic it's shocking, but there won't be the emotional impact of violence that is what makes it so awful in real life. The only time fiction really captures violence, which I've only really seen done well in film, is when it adds this emotional element, a character we know or understand, and the consequences of reverting to animalistic actions. (The end of Shane Meadows' This Is England is a pretty great example of that). Imho when we talk about violence in games or films or books, I don't think it's the same as violence in real life. It's not honest, true aggression that is being experienced in a game. I think aggression is violence; the emotional and destructive element that someone imposes on another. Not necessarily a physical action that is destructive. A word alone, in the right manner and context, can be violent. More violent than someone beating someone else with a baseball bat in GTA. In games all the player is doing is manipulating an obviously contrived simulation in order to achieve a goal and be entertained. There's no basic, animal aggression there. It looks nasty, but violence is all about the intention, not necessarily the act. As Atomski said, you Brutal Melee someone in KZ3- you're just racking up points. You haven't got anything against that person on a human level. The human level, destroying a bond between two beings, is violence.

Starts properly from 00:39. I love how it starts by putting players in such an intense, cinematic, and thrilling position. Great. I'd also nominate Demon's Souls. The first story-based thing the game does is kill you =D

I'm all for Wednetag.