Showing posts with label Reviews. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Reviews. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Best Time You'll Have On A...Er, Hog...
The modern 3D Grand Theft Auto games have always been packed full of things to see and do, but there is inevitably places in the city maps that the games just don't have the time nor inclination to visit for a mission. It's just something that fans of the series have come to understand. Why can't I do a mission in that small town near San Fierro? What about the military base in Vice City? How about the amusement park in Liberty City. Well, thankfully with the advent of current-gen game systems network capabilities Rockstar Games, developers of GTA, can rectify this issue with the release of the first Xbox 360 downloadable content pack: The Lost and Damned. Can you do something in the amusement park? Sadly, no. At least not yet. But you will explore the mostly neglected island of Alderney. Even without the amusement park this pack is still a joy to behold and just as Rockstar sets the standard high for other developers with their games, they redefine what DLC means to Xbox 360 owners.
The Lost and Damned introduces us to Johnny Klebitz, vice president of the titular biker gang "The Lost"(and before you ask, there is no gang called The Damned, it's a metaphor, meathead). Johnny has been running things while gang president Billy was cooling his heels in the can. Billy gets paroled and Johnny has to give up the autonomy he had before. It doesn't help that Billy is a total hop-head and seems to want to start a massive gang war in Liberty City.
The first thing you must realize is that The Lost and Damned is practically a full length game. Hell, it took me less time to beat Mirror's Edge than it did to finished TLAD. It's easy to balk at the $19.99 price and feel like you will be slighted by purchasing it, but trust me, this DLC's main story will easily take you 9-10 hours to complete. I pretty much rushed through it and it took me ten hours. The price is much easier to swallow when you consider all the things that this expansion offers.
More than twenty main story missions, twelve bike races(in the vein of seminal fave Road Rash), twenty-five gang wars, side missions, more birds to find, new weapons, new vehicles and new mini-games are most of the additions that this DLC provides.
One caveat, the additions in TLAD cannot be traded up to Niko's story in GTAIV. So, no grenade launcher or arm wrestling in the main storyline. Sorry, folks. The good news, however, is that like previous GTA games, once completing the campaign in TLAD you can still continue playing as Johnny as long as you like.
The good news here is that most of TLAD is fantastic. The story, while not as moving as GTAIV protagonist Niko Bellic's, is top notch. Johnny's story is handled fairly well in the short time that it has to present itself. You will get to know the members of The Lost fairly well, with only a few main characters being slighted(Brian the wheelchair bound ex-bike being the biggest example). The ending does seem to come too abruptly, and unfortunately like GTAIV it wades into the cliched mafia story towards the end. Unlike GTAIV these missions are few and come mostly towards the end.
Rockstar has implemented a mid-mission re-try feature, which allows you to restart any mission you fail from the last cut scene you are shown. While this is a much needed feature, it tends to make the game slightly easy. Rockstar seemingly tries to balance this easiness by making any ammo you expend(not to mention money spent at the hospital after you die and before you restart) not respawn during the re-try. It feels like cheap way to punish players for re-trying the missions and after I realized the game did this I quit using the replay "feature."
Using motorcycles has been refined, and unlike Niko, Johnny is an ace cyclist. No longer will you fly off the bikes with a slight tap, it takes quite a wallop to knock Johnny over the handlebars. The handling has been tweaked as well, most of the choppers are a joy to drive now, and you probably won't want to pilot Johnny in anything else(unless like me you take to the skies in every mission that lets you do so). Some of the time when you are riding with the gang to or from missions a The Lost insignia will appear, holding position over it will recover armor and activate dialog. While this is a cool feature, it is lost in the shuffle of the story and disappears after about a third of the game making it somewhat pointless overall.
The new mini-games are pretty worthless and not worth touching more than once. Air hockey sounds great in theory but the controls are spotty. High Card, Low Card is interesting but doesn't have much depth. Arm wrestling asks you to slam the right analog stick back and forth violently, I cherish my controllers enough to not destroy them on something so trivial.
Friend Lost gang members are usually available by phone to give assistance in missions, provide weapons or bring bikes to you. Unlike Niko's slacker pals, these guys will provide their assistance right away without being taken on a man-date. Though it's nice to have access to these perks rather early, it makes some of the collecting of money rather pointless as you don't need to waste it on weapons. The Lost member who provides paid weapons in his van charges entirely too much for some of the high end firepower making him fairly useless until later in the game and by then you probably won't need to buy anything from him. It's nice to have the option however.
The main selling point of this package is the connections to GTAIV. Rockstar promised that TLAD would fill in mysteries from GTAIV, and while I couldn't think of anything mysterious to be filled in TLAD does mesh with the main story wonderfully.
Without going into any spoiler specifics, something happens late in the game that is upsetting but happens off screen. I got really upset that I wasn't allowed to see an important story scene. Later while cruising the city a news report came on the radio describing the situation I didn't witness. I then realized that I witnessed the scene in question from Niko's point of view in GTAIV. I literally got chills from that. The last time I felt that kind of astonishment from a game was Bioshock's big twist. It's not quite on par with that classic twist, but it's rare that a GTA provokes those kinds of feelings.
Despite the high price tag Grand Theft Auto: The Lost and Damned comes highly recommended for it's intriguing story and new bike controls. Beware, this expansion is strictly for those of you who have already completed GTAIV. For the rest of you, what the hell are you waiting for?!
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Wednesday, February 4, 2009
Just Try To Find The Special Weapon To Beat This 'Final Boss'
It takes a rare breed of man who can write rap lyrics that range from references to Ralph Macchio to Star Wars convention golden showers and while I certainly don't want to be privy to the details that spawned these songs, I can't help but listen when MC Frontalot starts singing about them.Front's latest album, 'Final Boss'(released November 2008) follows the titular singles placement during the closing credits of Penny Arcade Adventures Episode One. Despite being hyped by it's involvement in the Penny Arcade game, this album(aside from a few small quibbles) hits all the right notes.
Let's get the bad stuff out of the way, two of the albums twelve musical tracks are remixes of older Frontalot songs. 'A Very Unlikely Occurance' and 'Listen Close' make their return here. It's hard not to feel like the original cuts of these songs were catchier and just generally better. One can presume that these new remixes were included perhaps to document the songs without the use of licensed sample music, but nonetheless it's hard not to feel cheated by their inclusion here.
With that out of the way, let me say that 'Final Boss' is an absolute blast of nerdy goodness. From the opening song 'Wallflowers'(about a new dance called the Margaret Thatcher) to the actual 'Final Boss' track the album takes very few missteps. The weakest track, 'Black Box', is an attempt to broach a political topic in this case the fallacy of computerized voting machines. The song's message is that voting doesn't work, so don't do it. It seems childish and petulant in it's complaints about voting and government, which is a shame because Front's last major attempt at a political song 'Special Delivery' worked fairly well.
Even 'Black Box' can be forgiven when it is preceded by the sublime 'Scare Goat' a song about the internet viral videos of fainting goats. With lyrics like:
Go back in time, find Scully and Mulder.
Don't ask, just grab their zoology folder,
then bring it back to me now, if I'm still around;
I might be mingling with mole people underground
or up in the sky on a hippogryph,
flying through this abyss (it's in my syllabus).
It's a great song, probably the strongest on the album. It is also accompanied by a spoken skit that sets up the improbability of people denying the existence of the scare goat. Both skit and song are well done and very funny.
Near the end of the album there is a mostly spoken skit starring Star Trek: The Next Generation's Wil Wheaton. At the risk of spoiling the joke, let me just say there is rapping. Just let that sink in for a moment.
In addition to Wheaton, Front is joined by other guests for assistance on these tracks, most notably to me is indie geek-rock sensation Jonathan Coulton famed for his songs Re: Your Brains, Flickr and Still Alive(which lit the video gaming world on fire with it's inclusion in Valve Software's Portal). His work on the song 'Diseases of Yore' moves the song into a hip hop/acoustic rock mash up that works surprisingly well.
All in all 'Final Boss' is an impressive effort that should be in any nerd's musical collection regardless of whether you normally enjoy hip hop or not.
'Final Boss' is currently available from Frontalot.com in both physical and digital formats.
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Monday, February 2, 2009
Six More Weeks Of Winter?
Punxsutawney Phil is one of the hallmarks of Pennsylvania. Once a year the most famous groundhog in Pennsylvania is forcibly exhumed from his stump at Gobbler's Knob and predicts whether or not we will have six more weeks of winter. Though I wouldn't say that Phil is the "hardest" working hog in the business(That'd be his brother, Gus, Pennsylvania lottery spokes-hog), but he is the only one to have a movie framed around his annual hullabaloo: Harold Ramis's 1993 classic, Groundhog Day!
Bill Murray stars as the acerbic Pittsburgh(yeah, way to go Stillers!) weatherman Phil Connors who has big dreams of predicting the weather on a major network. Phil just cannot stand doing local puff pieces because he thinks he's above them. Unfortunately for Phil it's Groundhog Day and the station has tasked him with covering the venerable holiday.
Phil, of course, is nonplussed by this. I mean, can you blame him? His name is Phil and he has to cover a story about a groundhog named Phil. Can you say awkward? Of course, Phil doesn't have the greatest time covering the festivities and to make matters worse a snow storm(which he DIDN'T predict) is descending on the town making it impossible to leave Punxsutawney.
Phil goes to bed that evening hoping to escape the Pennsylvania hamlet but when he wakes up he's reliving the same day over again! At first Phil is upset and shocked at this predicament, he tries to convince his producer Rita(Andie MacDowell) that he's reliving the same day. But suitably no one believes him.
After he realizes that nothing he does matters, Phil decides to take advantage of his situation. He becomes familiar with the town and it's citizens, but then he sets his sights on the one thing he can't seem to get: Rita.
Though he tries valiantly to learn everything about Rita and pretend that he loves the very same things he is unable to seal the deal. Ramis does a fantastic job of hinting at just how many times Phil has looped through the day without actually showing all of them, giving the audience just a taste of the day replaying without driving us insane along with Phil.
After not being able to bed Rita, Phil snaps and begins an exercise in suicide. Killing himself numerous times, everyday Phil wakes up from the dead as if nothing has actually happened. Eventually Phil decides to be himself and try to woo Rita without trying to bed her. It's when this happens that Phil starts to change. He becomes less self absorbed and generally nicer to everyone. He begins to better himself and learn new things.
Ramis handles the third act of the film with a deft hand, keeping it humorous but also giving it an emotional heft when Phil becomes a hero and saves numerous people throughout the town. Murray is wonderful, going from serious to funny in a moments notice without it ruining the flow of the film. It's no wonder that Murray would find work years later in such serious works as Lost In Translation and while he's still primarily a comedic actor, it's nice to see his flexibility in this film and others.
Groundhog Day is a funny and sometimes moving classic '90s comedy. Although this type of story has been done many times since(The X-Files and Stargate SG-1 immediately come to mind), Groundhog Day remains as engaging and hilarious as it was the day it was released. Besides, what other movie can claim to have BOTH Andie MacDowell and Chris Elliot in starring roles and make them tolerable? That's right. No other movie.
Gus the groundhog says: "Though Groundhog Day focuses on my obnoxious brother's holiday, it's STILL the bee's knees!"
You heard it here, folks. Gus likes it. It's a winner.
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Thursday, January 29, 2009
Everything Right Is Wrong Again, But Damn Does It Feel Right
LOST: JugheadSeason 5 Episode 3
Everything right is wrong again
Every movement false, every four is waltz again
Every five and dime's been gained and spent
Tell me that you like my float upstream
Draw the line dividing laugh and scream
You know everything that I know so I know
You've heard the voice that makes the silent noise
That says that
Everything that's right is wrong again
~They Might Be Giants
Spoilers for last night's Lost after the jump.
I've had a love-hate relationship with Lost ever since the season one reveal of 'The Hatch.' I loved the first eight episodes of the series but when show co-creator JJ Abrams left to direct Mission Impossible 3, I felt the brakes were applied to the story and the characters became obnoxious twits.
Flash forward (no pun intended) to the end of season 3 where the producers revealed that at least some of the castaways had, at some point in the future, gotten off the island. This reveal reinvigorated the series for me, but Lost, for me, is always at it's best when it's pushing a science fiction story and from season 3 onward the series has had some interesting tales to tell with time travel.
Before season 5 the time travel was only slightly used but now with the island (or rather the castaways) being "unstuck" in time Lost is no longer merely skirting the science fiction genre. No, now Lost is diving head first into the deep end of the science fiction swimming pool
Time travel is always a tough literary technique to get a grasp on but thankfully Executive Producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse have saved the show from becoming a mess of time paradoxes like other television shows that use the conceit(cough cough Heroes) by essentially saying that time is a closed circuit and that anything that is, was, or will happen cannot be changed...mostly. The one caveat to the closed circuit time-line is the relationship between previously unstuck Desmond Hume and Physicist Daniel Faraday, who can apparently slightly alter their path's because of previously meeting while Desmond was traveling into the past.
This season thus far has been all about the 815 survivors still on the island moving willy-nilly from time period to time period, and the Oceanic 6 having their own off island adventures. The show seems to have completely shucked they flashback/flashforward template that it used for it's first four seasons. This change is a great move for the series, I was at once elated and intimidated by this new order. For the first time in years I actually feel nervous about the fates of particular characters. The island has been particularly fun with Locke running into a veritable who's who and what's what of the island's past(seeing both the drug smuggler plane crash and being shot by long dead Ethan) before meeting up with Richard Alpert. Alpert, of course, realizes what's going on an gives Locke a compass(the same compass he used in the test on young Locke in the episode "Cabin Fever") to use as proof that they have met before or will meet later, rather.
Everything is terribly complicated this season, way more complicated than the show has been in the past. The thing is, it's also way more compelling that Lost has ever been before. I couldn't help but think of the They Might Be Giants song 'Everything Right Is Wrong Again' while watching this episode. Things are happening out of order, people are telling other people about meetings that haven't happened for us to witness. It's a great way to subvert our expectations for the rest of the season.
For the first time in many years, I am extremely positive about the direction a Lost season is taking and that makes me feel a confidence for the series' end game that I've never had before.
Some random thoughts:
- Desmond and Penny have kid and he's named after Charlie! Nice reference since Charlie sacked himself to speak to Penny in season 3.
- Is the busted H-Bomb, Jughead, still somewhere on the island?
- Charles Widmore was an Other? Guess this conflict between Ben and Chuckles really has been going on for longer than Desmond can imagine.
- Is Ellie the Other a younger version of Eloise Hawking from The Lie and Flashes Before Your Eyes?
- And more importantly is SHE Faraday's mother?
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Billy's Favorite Retro Games (Part 2 of 200)
Billy's Favorite Retro Games (Part 2 of 200)Originally written 9/1/06
This is presented here for completion.
1985 has GOT to be one of my favorite years. Just think about it: Mr Belvedere, Nintendo, Back to the friggin' Future, Macgyver, Rambo: First Blood Part 2 (the greatest fucking movie title of the 80s), Rocky 4 and most importantly... The Goonies (ok, maybe not MOST importantly, but most importantly to THIS post).
So, once we all got our hands on the majesty of the NES, us Goonies fanatics were of course interested in playin
g the game adaptation of our beloved movie. Konami was there of course to show us all why liscensed video games are usually crap with Goonies 2. Now, it didn't take a genius to realize that we had not gotten to play original Goonies game, hell even the explanation that the game was a sequel to the movie doesn't really hold any water because I don't recall Mikey befriending a mermaid in the fucking movie. No...we just...got the shaft. "The Shaft" is defined as the feeling we Western Gamers get whenever we hear of something really cool in Japan, it's true look it up.So flash forward to 2004, I was checking out a CD I had acquired from a disreputable fellow employee which included nearly every NES game produced. Lo and behold...the elusive NES Goonies was on this disc!
I could not wait to play it, and play it I did. The first thing, and let's be honest here, the only reason this game is on this list is because of one simple reason: Cyndi Lauper's The Goonies R Good Enough in MIDI ! Don't believe me? Hit that link and listen for yourself. Don't worry, I'll wait.
...
Now tell me that wasn't badass. Shut up, it totally was!
The gameplay is basic platforming from the 80s, you play as Mikey who decides to take "his time, his time down here" to save his friends from the Fratelli's. Apparently the Fratelli clan is much larger than the movie makes them appear because everytime you kill one of these bastards they keep coming back. In addition to evil mobsters you also have to confront mice and ghosts. I don't recall mice or ghosts in the movie, but those tunnels were littered with dead pirates, so who knows.
So...Yes. I love the Goonies game. I love digital synthesized versions of Cyndi Lauper, and I LOVE good (or is that bad) Engrish...
Congratulation indeed.
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