See what I did there? OK, so if you weren’t aware before, there’s going to be a Zombieland TV series funded by and debuting on Amazon to stream online. Personally I’m not sure how chuffed I am about it as I love the movie, and would prefer they leave it at that rather than sully the material and end up making a pig’s ear of it.
However, largely thanks to such shows as The Walking Dead and In The Flesh, it’s likely the show will be a success… and as Zombieland was originally conceived as a TV show and then developed into a movie afterwards, I’m a little more hopeful.
The press release that confirms the green-lighting of the Zombieland pilot quoted creator Paul Wernick as saying: [quote]“Zombieland will strive to break the rules— action, adventure, thrills, chills and laughs, and all packed into a half-hour format. This is not your average show, but Amazon is not your average network.”[/quote]
Thankfully the original writers Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick are both on board in creating the series, and they’ve had Tucker and Dale vs. Evil director Eli Craig direct the pilot, which is awesome- if you’ve not seen Tucker and Dale, it’s absolute genius.
Here’s the new cast of the forthcoming series, with the movie cast below…
From left to right: Little Rock (Izabela Vidovic), Tallahassee (Kirk Ward), Wichita (Maiara Walsh) and Columbus (Tyler Ross)From left to right: Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson), Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg), Wichita (Emma Stone) and Little Rock (Abigail Breslin)
Personally I think the cast of the TV series don’t look like they have much charisma, except maybe Wichita… that is of course in comparison to the movie. The important question is: what do you think?
I like cosplay, it’s not something I partake in myself but I love seeing other people’s takes on well known and not so well known characters; whether they’re from comics, videogames, TV shows, manga or films. I like the imagination on show, I admire the talent, skill and dedication that it requires and it never ceases to amaze and surprise me at what people can achieve. Some of these creations look as good if not better than what an FX studio with a massive budget has achieved for a feature film, if you don’t believe me then check out this Doctor Doom
There’s something else that’s becoming more prominent in cosplay though, with the advent of Facebook pages following the mass deletion of Cosplay profiles. Cosplay has arguably become more of a squabbling popularity contest with a relentless quest for ‘likes’ and validation. Which leads to the question of ‘are people cosplaying for fame?’ This in itself would’ve been a rather bizarre notion just a few years ago but with all things comics being thrust ever more into the mainstream spotlight, with comic cons popping up everywhere, cosplay is bigger than it has ever been before.
In the new ‘Facebook Age of Cosplay’ the amount of ‘likes’ a page has is perceived as relating to the amount of talent and skill that person has, too many ‘likes’ though and people will question their ‘nerd/geek cred’ and accuse them of having no interest in comics/games/etc, not enough ‘likes’ and they are seen as unworthy of attention.
Another consequence of the integration of Facebook is an emphasis on well composed and professionally edited images and the sexually appealing. The latter of which has lead to the apparent bizarre trend of numerous people ‘liking’ pages of cosplayers purely so they can subject them to callous often misogynistic abuse. The more ‘liked’ a page is the more abuse that page’s owner is subjected to; a consequence of this is the owner may be far less likely to respond to comments from actual fans because they are buried in amongst the hate. If every third comment on a photo they post is callous then you can hardly blame them for being less inclined to actually look at them at all.
Everyone’s used to people being malicious on numerous sites. It’s called trolling and long ago entered into the lexicon of internet users, a direct result of the anonymity that the internet bestows on people when they are on most websites, where all you need is an avatar and a username. The difference here is an intent on the abusers part by actively liking the page in order to partake in the abuse and for the most part these aren’t people hiding behind usernames and most have photo’s of themselves too. Just to get the point across here are some examples, although I should warn you it’s not pretty.
These are just a sample of the comments on just one photo, some of it is far more vulgar and it didn’t take more than a few seconds to find them.
In amongst the hate and misogyny people will occasionally try to defend the cosplayer in question.
These are regulary met with abuse too.
There seems to be one page in particular that acts as a lightning rod for this kind of behaviour from which the above comments were all taken and that’s Jessica Nigri’s page. If you are reading this then you probably know the name, since Jessica was picked to promote Lollipop Chainsaw by Warner Bros. and Kadokawa Games (her video thanking everyone who voted for her is endearingly adorable) pretty much anyone with an interest in gaming or comics has probably seen her face.
The image that provoked all that abuse featured above?
Photo by Grant Brummett
The first thing that came to mind when this popped up on my feed was ‘how did she make/where did she get the horns?’ I can acknowledge that she is attractive but this doesn’t make me regress into a priapic neanderthal and start pawing at my laptop screen whilst drooling and express this in a comment consisting of poorly constructed sentences, which pay scant regard to grammar or decency. So I’m a bit baffled as to why so many others seem to have this response.
There seems to be this train of thought amongst a section of male con attendees that says if a woman decides to cosplay as a scantily clad character for example Jacqueline Goehner’s amazing oldschool Witchblade or Toni Darling‘s Lady Thor, then somehow it’s okay to act like a creep because well you know, they deserve it right? This view is only reinforced by the numerous cosplay features focusing on women with ‘sexy’ or ‘hot’ in the title like this, this, this , this or this or the other countless sites which seem to focus purely on cosplay as a source of titillation for guys. Thankfully there are rather more balanced features on cosplay like this one which, shockingly, actually features pictures of male cosplayers! I thought they were like unicorns but apparently they are real!
This can have disturbing real world implications as seen with the case of Mandy Caruso, who found herself on the receiving end of some sexual harassment during New York Comic Con but quickly became at internet hero after posting about her experience. It’s not just regular folks getting tangled up in this either, actor Simon Pegg found himself dragged into a Twitter argument after posting a photo of some women cosplayers with an ill thought out caption.
It’s an inherently depressing state of affairs that conventions even need an ‘anti-harassment policy’ but more and more of them are having to put them in place with sites like the ‘con anti-harassment project‘. This being the ‘go to’ guide for prospective attendees to check their desired con’s policies on improper behaviour. As with all things involving policy, things can become complicated as seen when Jessica Nigri was promoting Lollipop Chainsaw and asked to change outfits, despite it not contravening any of the con’s rules.
Cosplayers both guys and girls put a lot of effort into doing what they do because they enjoy the experience and not for other people’s gratification. Regardless of whether they have 200 or 20,000 ‘likes’ they are still people, just because someone can’t slap you for being a creep doesn’t mean you should be. Most of all it should be about fun.
14 years after the events of Vietnam, Nick Fury finds himself in Nicaragua at the behest of Senator ‘Pug’ Mcluskey. Whilst there it becomes apparent that despite not officially being in charge, ‘Barracuda’ is running things at the encampment and doesn’t like the idea of outsiders looking around.
His name might be synonymous with Hellblazer, Preacher, The Punisher and more recently The Boys but what Garth Ennis really excels at is war stories, jettisoning the crass black humour found in a lot of his other work for the bleak reality of the front line and the politics behind them.
With a framing device of an older Fury telling his story, it’s a cunning way to write a story about various wars and conflicts despite being a Marvel comic.
Fury touches down to Barracuda’s obvious delight.
This issue is essentially moving pieces into place, so we are introduced to Barracuda (who previously featured in The Punisher) who is in the middle of interrogating some prisoners and wielding a chainsaw rather gleefully.
Despite appearances Barracuda isn’t just muscle as one of his men looking at Fury from afar says ‘Shit, don’t look all that much to me’ Barracuda’s response ‘then you even dumber’n I thought you was Danby’.
The snappy dialogue between Fury and Barracuda is great stuff as they both try to fake out each other without the other realising, with Fury surmising to Agent Hatherly his right hand man that ‘He’s smart as Hell, I can tell you that much’
Shirley has an unwelcome visitor.
Back in the US, Pug and his wife/secretary Shirley debate the political and moral ramifications of the Agency’s operations over seas. The shift in the pairs relationship dynamic is nicely handled as Defablio isn’t as naive to the ways of the world as before.
Parlov’s art maybe a little quirky in places like pug’s expressions but Fury looks great, he isn’t disproportionately or inappropriately built and the steely look in his eye, in several panels really nail’s Fury’s presence. There’s some great imagery to be found, Fury stepping off the chopper, cigar hanging out of his mouth, bag in hand. Really says all that needs to be said about his character in one dialogue free panel.
Barracuda on the other hand looks almost child like in his expressions and seeing the two contrast works really well.
Despite this being a Max title Ennis isn’t constantly trying to throw in adult content for the sake of it which compared to other adult oriented titles makes a refreshing change.
Plenty of news from PAX East last weekend, including tech demos from Nvidia and some very promising previews of The Last of Us. To go along with this there was once again a flood of news from the Gearbox camp, as they announced a whole host of new bits and bobs for Borderlands 2, and in typical Gearbox fashion, these updates will be arriving very soon.
First up; we have a new playable character; Krieg;
LOOK. AT. HIM! As you can see; Krieg is a bandit. Specifically, a Badass Psycho bandit; easily one of the most intimidating and difficult enemies in the game, and clearly a character built for getting up close and personal. Why he’s decided to become one of the “good guys” remains a mystery, but there’s’ scenes involving secret labs and underground complexes in the teaser trailer; possibly hinting at another piece of DLC, or at least a backstory. Luckily, though no trailers have been released, good old IGN managed to get us some Shakeycam footage;
Interesting choice of class, too. He’s clearly a Tank, like Salvador, but it looks like Krieg is all about going toe to toe with his enemies. Borderlands doesn’t really have any dedicated melee class, and although Zero can be built into a close range assassin, I’m glad we finally have someone more akin to Brick from the first Borderlands on the team. Some of his skills seem absolutely daft as well; of particular note is the “Light The Fuse!” skill, which allows you to run around like a , well, like a psycho in Fight For Your Life, throwing dynamite endlessly before exploding akin to a suicide psycho, trying to take someone with you to allow you to revive. Safe to say I’m very much looking forward to seeing what he’s like to control. Krieg will cost $10, and be released in May.
Second up is Gearbox’s ‘upgrade pack’, containing something that fans have been asking after for a while now; a level cap increase. The pack will increase the level cap form 50-61, it will rebalance the whole game to reflect this, and moreover will also introduce another class of weapons in the game; Pearlescent. Sounds lovely. Although little detail was given on them; players of the original Borderlands will recognisePearlescent weapons as far and out the most powerful, yet equally rare, weapons in the game.
Moreover, gearbox will also be adding yet another playthrough option to the main game. You know, just in case you didn’t have your fill the first two times you completed the game. Ultimate Vault Hunter Mode, as it is known, is basically a New Game plus plus, with higher level gear, higher level enemies and much stronger enemies. Although, playing through True Vault Hunter Mode myself, I’ve got to say gearbox must be aiming for Dark Souls levels of difficulty.
But the best news so far? While the level cap increase and new weapons will cost just $5, the new playthrough mode is completely free, you lucky dogs, you! I mean, good luck getting past the first few hours of the third playthrough without being able to level up, but there you go. This pack will be downloadable from April 2nd.
Next up, we had a teaser trailer for what looks like the next round of DLC; Tiny Tina’s Racism Adventure.
No, seriously, watch the trailer;
Clearly a reference to the public getting riled up a while ago over Tiny Tina using apparently ‘racist’ language; although it’s highly unlikely that the DLC will actually be called this, Randy Pitchford is still showing the world what he thinks of such opinions. As if this twitter conversation didn’t clear it up 100% for you.
Being a teaser trailer, it lacked any facts at all, but it showed all the vault hunters around a table playing “Bunkers and Bandits”, the Borderlands version of D&D. Whether this will actually feature in the game or not isn’t clear (Hint; IT SHOULD), all we know so far is that Pitchford has promised us this final spell of DLC will be the biggest and the best one yet. And let’s face it compared to the slightly bland ones we’ve had so far, it had better be, too (although this last piece of DLC is apparently being developed in-house, unlike the others, so hopefully we shall see some quality stuff). Being bigger than the last; it’s hard to predict how much it will cost; but it will most likely be free to Season Pass holders (unless perhaps Krieg does get his own portion of DLC, too). Either way, it will be available “by the end of June”.
Finally; Gearbox will also be releasing 5000 limited edition Diamond Plate Loot Chests; available for purchase at Forbidden Planet in the UK, or Thinkgeek or Shopgearbox in the USA. This will contain goodies such as a replica Goliath mask and a code for an in game version, cards with codes for 20 legendary weapons which scale to your level, a wanted poster and window decals, a certificate of authenticity, but not a copy of the game, strangely. Maybe it’s all those diamonds. The chests will go on sale in May, for a whopping $99.99.
Although there’s no news on UK release dates; past form dictates they should be exactly the same, although we will have to wait and see as far as the prices go. All in all, not a bad run of announcements. Plenty to keep Borderlands fans busy and giving away free content is always going to be well received. Who knows; this may well be Gearbox trying to make up to gamers after the frankly abysmal Aliens; Colonial Marines, but even so I’m still glad to see developers investing so much time into making a game last longer, and responding to player’s requests.
In the latest installment of the Resident Evil franchise, the T-virus is back! You have three intertwining stories to play, with six playable characters. Seven, if you unlock Ada Wong, a fan favourite for most. Now the main criticism of the latest game is the length of the story-line. I will admit it is rather long but I don’t see that as a problem. If people are willing to fork out £50 on games with a six hour campaign mode, then why is a game which I clocked up 10 hours on in Leon’s campaign alone a bad thing? I view it as amazing value for money in this day and age.
Another huge improvement on the older titles, you can FINALLY move and shoot! Now this isn’t a big deal for 99% of most modern day games, but this is the first time you can do it in this series. This has made things a lot more fluid and given a new dimension to RE6, being able to slide and shoot at the same time. I cannot tell you how moving whilst shooting in a tough boss battle helps too.
Where the game does have difficulties is in the multi-player where ‘random;’ people pretty much ruined it for me. They seem to neglect team-work or your dying body, in need of help! Though this cannot be seen as a fault created by Capcom, I have found that there is an issue with connectivity and lag which makes things a lot more complicated and frustrating.
Finally the game looks wonderful, it’s not pixel perfect, I don’t know many games that are. But at times my room-mates mistook it for a movie as they walked through the living room and glanced at the television. That is how good the graphics appear in this beautiful piece of art.
Along with my multiplayer gripe, there is at least one other problem with this game; there are far too many loading screens that last far too long. Whilst your inside the game you are drawn into the dramatic moments and ambiance, unfortunately due to these loading screens you are taken out of gameplay far too many times….arrrggh!
Overall I enjoyed RE6 and despite a few gripes it was a good game. The re-introduction of the T-Virus and the real zombies, which the series seemed to steer away from in the prior two incarnations,harkened back to the old days and added another level of enjoyment for me. Yeah there are too many loading screens and connectivity issues but the single-player campaign is worth the money. The game-play is classic and the graphics top-notch.
For anybody who enjoys the franchise, this is well worth a play.
You may not be aware of this but the Geek Pride writers don’t operate on honour or respect when it comes to divvying up articles but on the ancient rule of ‘Baggsie Mine!’ This allowed me to claim the role of Game of Thrones correspondent for Series 3, something I’m very much looking forward to.
In the thread where I claimed this most precious of Preciouses, people started to talk about the adaptation and differences between the books and the show. I was once very much of the opinion that an adaptation should be as materially close to the source as possible, that what made the original great was the whole and it should be reproduced as faithfully as possible. I think it’s quite a Geek thing to believe and thus a somewhat prevalent opinion.
But I also think it’s wrong.
This is going to sound dense but one of the key things about an adaptation is a change in medium; you are going from book to film, from comic to TV series, and as such you are aiming for a different audience, tone and aesthetic. The kind of person who massively enjoys the Walking Dead comic books has never been the main target audience for AMC’s The Walking Dead; it’s the larger geek, even non-geek, world. The same goes for any adaptation, such as comic book to rather injurious Broadway musical. It is assumed that the core, original audience will be coming with it, at least to give it a try.
There are also different tropes, budgetary constraints and requirements for different mediums. The Lord of the Rings films display this well; Tolkien only donated a few pages to some of the battle scenes but a film must spend more time to not be seen as glib and downright weird. And American audiences would have been weirded out by a Liverpudlian Constantine through a lack of exposure to that particular lilt.
Constantine is actually a good example of distillation. When I first watched it, I’d never even heard of Hellblazer; I just thought it was an amazing concept, a solitary and broken person fighting demons through trickery and rough magic, and really wanted to see it. I actually love the film and, as a result, have read a number of Hellblazer comics. And that was because the essence, the core, of Hellblazer was present in Constantine, albeit somewhat diminished. I would have loved to see Keanu Reeve’s Constantine being a bit more of a git but it wasn’t to be. Another excellent example is American Psycho, a much-heralded classic of the film genre. The violent and gory scenes in the book were curtailed to allow the film to be made at all and director Mary Harron worked with fellow screenwriter Guinevere Turner to bring across the core of the book, the satire and the dark comedy, to brilliant effect.
The adaptation of a work from one medium to another is the act of transporting its core across. This will mean changes. Sometimes these changes are awful, as with almost every video game movie in history or with the Golden Compass horror show. Sometimes they are brilliant. But you cannot expect that bringing a new voice, or voices, to a piece of art will result in the same work being reproduced. And if it does end up like that, you should watch out; a die-hard fan is one of the worst people to make a sequel or adaptation as they won’t be honest about the flaws in a work, could even end up multiplying them, such as with the more recent Monkey Island games.
My final point to you, my fellow Geeks, is this; if you see that a favourite book or comic or video game is becoming another thing, a film, for example, then you shouldn’t decry the differences. I only read Hellblazer because of a massively-altered Constantine. I only read Lord of the Rings because of the films. I’ve only bought The Walking Dead because of the TV series. An adaptation brings in a new audience and new people you can geek-out with. And that can only ever be a good thing.
Two hours ago The Wolverine director, James Mangold, tweeted a 6 second ‘tweaser’ for the next installment of Wolverine. Whilst this snippet is really just a sequence of images with a soundtrack there was one significant character that that got my little geek heart beating with excitement.Our good ol’ Jean ‘never really dead, dead’ Grey with Famke Janssen reprising her role.
I’m afraid that is all the information I have to offer, I really don’t want to speculate wildly, just yet, but luckily a 20 second teaser is coming tomorrow with a full trailer on Wednesday, so I’m sure I will get back to you with some obscure theory or other. Here is the very small but exciting peep at what The Wolverine has to offer:
http://youtu.be/TXu0tgLlebk
Did you see her? If not here is the screen cap:
Released on the 26th here is the official July official synopsis for The Wolverine:
[box_light]Based on the celebrated comic book arc, this epic action-adventure takes Wolverine, the most iconic character of the X-Men universe, to modern day Japan. Out of his depth in an unknown world, he will face a host of unexpected and deadly opponents in a life-or-death battle that will leave him forever changed. Vulnerable for the first time and pushed to his physical and emotional limits, he confronts not only lethal samurai steel but also his inner struggle against his own immortality.[/box_light]
Answering this question isn’t an easy one, as Defiance isn’t just a game, but also a TV series made for the SyFy Channel. I’ve had the pleasure of playing the game, but unfortunately I can’t comment on the series yet, besides what brief clips I’ve seen floating around the interweb. However, my initial tentative answer to this question would be yes, and what follows is the reasoning behind my answer.
Defiance centres around the TV series, due to debut on April 15th. It tells the story of a race of aliens called Votans who have come to Earth seeking refuge following the destruction of their own solar system. The negotiations between the humans and Votans broke down, resulting in hostilities, and during the ensuing war the Votans deployed terraformers which radically transformed the surface of the Earth, as well as the animals and plant life. After nearly a decade of conflict, each race realises they’ve basically screwed themselves over, so decide to work together to focus on survival. The series uses small-town lawkeeper Jeb Nolan (Grant Bowler – True Blood, Lost) as its protagonist, and follows his struggle to maintain the peace in his former childhood stomping ground of St Louis, which is now a refugee camp known as Defiance.
The series itself looks to be potentially quite epic, with a Firefly vibe fused with Falling Skies and Gearbox’s Borderlands game. From the trailer, the tone and atmosphere look to be quite fun, and I must admit I’ve always been a sucker for most series set in dystopian futures.
My impressions of the series are quite good- it’s the sort of thing I’d probably watch without the extra component of the videogame… but then I’m a fan of series like the aforementioned Falling Skies, along with shows like Fringe, Continuum, Battlestar Galactica and way too many more to mention.
OK, so what makes Defiance as a TV series stand out is that there is an accompanying MMORPG that runs alongside it, developed by Trion. What’s even more interesting is that it’s not just a tie-in… both the game and series are linked… so what happens in-game affects the TV series, and vice-versa. I don’t think this will be major plot points like character assassinations and the like; the effect the game will more than likely have will be environmental, for example if a particular race controls a certain area in the game, that information will transfer to the series… However that is just speculative at this juncture- we haven’t had this confirmed properly yet.
Looking at the game of Defiance is a bit more clear-cut thankfully, as I’ve been able to have a tinker with it, and get a feel for how it will play and what to expect. What I’m happy to report is that it’s pretty fun, bar a few small glitches which I’m sure will be ironed out before release (it is in a beta phase at the moment).
If I were to describe the game in a brief sentence, I’d say it was “a fusion of Gears of War and Planetside with a bit of World of Warcraft thrown in for good measure”. When you initially play the game, you’ll instantly relate it to Gears of War. You have the same over-the-shoulder point of view and a very similar (if not identical) control system- bar the taking cover mechanic and aim lock-on.
When you first start the game, you’re treated to a cinematic which sets the scene before you get the opportunity to create your character. You’re on a transport ship with civilians and military personnel, and are introduced to the commanding officer and a man called Karl Von Bach who are having a bit of a barney about equipment and such. It turns out that Von Bach is the CEO of Von Bach Industries (fancy that!) who employ “Ark Hunters”- these are basically mercenaries that are tasked with searching for and retrieving sophisticated alien tech… and guess what? You’re an Ark Hunter.
You actually get briefly introduced to the TV series’ main protagonists Jeb Nolan and Irisa (albeit briefly) before the ship gets fired upon, and you’re forced to get in an escape pod and be blasted down to the planet’s surface.
Character creation is pretty basic- you can choose an Origin -basically a Human or Irathient- in the sex of your choice. You then choose your character class- these boil down to an assault rifle soldier class, a sniper survivalist class, a shotgun-wielding nomad class and a heavy machine-gunner class. Adjusting the way your character looks is also limited to about nine different skin colours and noses; you don’t get a say on your hair or build, so don’t be expecting levels of customisation like City of Heroes. The reason there aren’t many options in terms of customisation is because there are massive battles in the game, and rather than getting the servers to worry about what the players look like so much, they’re opting for stability.
During my investigation of game menus (which was pretty intuitive to be fair… and I was playing on the PS3) it seems that you can swap your “loadouts” from one to the other. So it seems you can have a Sniper class build, as well as a Light Machine Gunner build and so on. This only looks like a build for your gear though- if you want a totally different build for your acquired abilities, you will need to “respec” and re-assign your EGO points.
Speaking of EGO, once you’re blasted to the Earth’s surface and you’re released from your escape pod, you start to writhe around in pain a bit until a Cortana-esque female hologram appears – this is the manifestation of the EGO or “Environmental Guardian Online”. This is a symbiotic, neuro-muscular bionetic implant developed by Von Bach Industries which allows the player to develop certain abilities. When I played as a Survivalist sniper class I could choose a cloaking ability, an increased bullet damage ability, a speed abilitiy and a decoy ability. What is really cool is that when you get your first EGO point, you’re stopped and put into a simulation by EGO and it demonstrates all four abilities in a little tutorial before you make your choice. That way instead of making a blind skill tree decision like you do in most MMOs, you can actually make an informed choice.
Character progression in Defiance seems quite swift, and it doesn’t drag between levels… usually if you’re not leveling you’re acquiring new gear to play with anyway, so you’re not bored as you traverse the new surroundings of what used to be Earth. As you wander around, you’ll bump into enemies aplenty… there are hundreds of the little bugs with teeth. I say little- if these things were real they’d probably be able to rip your leg off without too much trouble. You also bump into a lot of Mutant Riflemen too- one of the first missions is to search a crash site looking for the CEO of Von Bach Industries, and there’s a load of Mutant riflemen and snipers around… and they rarely miss.
The gameplay and combat is very much a “twitch” mechanic like a first-person shooter. I had a pistol and sniper rifle and flicked between the two at will- but there is no aim lock-on, which is fairer when it comes to PvP, but I found a little annoying with the usual PvE play. I didn’t have any issues with the combat at all, but then it’s all very standard as far as third-person shooters go.
You acquire missions through your EGO hologram, and through NPC’s in-game, and the waypoints and objectives are marked on your minimap with ease too… everything is very much as I’d expect from a Twitch MMO, and it’s done very well. The only slightly irritating glitch I came into contact with (besides some slight graphical clipping) was one whereby if I walked to the right, then let go of my PS3 joypad, my character continued to walk to the right… I only really got irritated with this during combat, but it happened rarely when I was ADSing (aiming down sights).
Altogether I’ve enjoyed my time in Defiance, and I’m looking forward to the TV series debut on April 15th… which I think I’ll be watching regardless of whther I get my hands on a retail copy of Defiance. The game itself will be available for the Playstation 3, Xbox 360 and on the PC via Steam from April 2nd.
Have you played the Defiance beta? What did you think of it? Will you play it when the game goes live? Let us know and comment below!
Series Trailer:
Game Trailer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_d4CP2dlBE&sns=em
Thirty seconds. Thirty short seconds is all it takes to raise my excitement levels to a realm never seen before. Call the feds, call NASA, call the men in white coats for I have risen to a new dimension with the sheer thrill that those thirty seconds caused!
Saturday 30th March 2013 brings the new series of Doctor Who to our screens and as you can tell, I am stoked. The BBC have released a thirty second teaser trailer for the first episode of Series 7, Part Two. Named “The Bells of Saint John”, we see the Doctor try and rescue the world once more; a deadly device has been implanted into the WiFi across the globe and now the Doctor must race against time to save us lowly humans for the millionth time.
Oh, and he gets a motorcycle.
Watch the teaser trailer here, and join me in the newly-discovered empire of exhilaration!
I feel, given the title, that I should defend myself. I’m a practising geek. I go to the comic shop every Wednesday, watch every superhero movie the very day it hits cinemas, and own more graphic novels than knickers. I once slept rough in Manchester Airport so I could get Neil Gaiman to sign my copy of American Gods. So please, go easy on me…
I don’t hate Internet Explorer.
At the minute I’m using Chrome, due to a combination of second-hand computer and laziness, but I still get annoyed when people look down on IE users. I’ve used IE, Firefox and Chrome, and in my experience, they’re all the same. Oh sure, Firefox has some cool plugins, but it also has an annoying habit of opening a new window to tell you what you’ve downloaded every single time. Chrome has the inbuilt spellcheck, yet it’s all but impossible to set your browser history to auto-erase when you end a session- and don’t get me started on that twee little tone it takes (“The following page(s) are unresponsive. Kill them?”) like a teacher who tries so hard to make you think he’s cool, but won’t buy you a two-litre cider to drink by the swings. IE comes as standard with all PCs, but is ridiculously uncool.
I get that for the hackers and programmers, there’s a world of difference between the three, but for most people, the only thing you can do with Chrome is go on Facebook to tell people how much better you are for using Chrome.
My cosplay choices are mostly influenced by how well they show off my T&A.
Believe me, I know how this sounds. I know that by admitting to this, I may as well put a bullet in feminism’s kneecap. I know that the misogynists that allegedly lurk around every corner will pounce on any admission of exhibitionist tendencies as “proof” that I am not a geek, but a shallow bitch just out to toy with the fragile libidos of the basement-dwelling nerd stereotypes. However, I also know that underneath my case of chronic derpface is a body carved by a benevolent god out of unicorn ivory, and I’m damn well going to show it off while it’s still young and lithe.
Now, obviously I do love the characters I cosplay as, and there are a bunch of other factors that come into play as well, like difficulty level and cost of materials; but right now, the deciding factor between Zatanna and the Question is that one has a rack you can see from space and legs that go on for centuries, and one wears a trouser suit.
I get sad over comic book deaths.
Few things annoy me more than the internet after a comic book character has died. Well not the whole internet, the bits with cute cats doing entertaining things are still OK. I mean the people on the internet who roll their eyes (or type “*eyeroll*”) and declare that comic book deaths aren’t permanent and anyone who felt any shred of emotion is an idiot. It annoys me because pointing it out is like saying, “Uh, you guys know it’s all pretend, right? Nobody actually died?” I know. Everyone knows. But if it’s written well, it doesn’t matter that Peter Parker’s consciousness is still floating around, and he’ll probably be back within the year. It’s still sad.
I mean, it’s not just me who cried like a little girl at the first Question’s death in 52, or the latest issue of Batman & Robin right? Right?
I didn’t watch the original Star Wars trilogy until a year ago.
I figured that was a colossal gap in my geek education and I had some free evenings, so I watched the three films over three nights. That’s not the worst part. Once I’d seen the films, my first thought was “Well, that was alright” (although the first scene with Yoda on Dagobah is one of the funniest and most wonderful things ever) closely followed by a newfound appreciation for the Family Guy and Robot Chicken parodies. That’s still not the worst bit. The worst bit is very bad. You should get a stiff drink before reading on.
I liked the Phantom Menace more than the original trilogy. There, I said it. And when the rest of the Geek Pride staff stand over my shallow grave and vow never to speak of me again, I will rest easy in the afterlife knowing that I stood by my beliefs. If this redeems me at all, I saw it when I was nine years old and easily impressed, and I haven’t seen it since; when you take a film with superior special effects, more dynamic fight scenes, wider variety of lightsaber colours and epic costumes (Darth Maul and Queen Amidala especially) as seen through the eyes of an awestruck child, and compare it to something filmed in the 1970s as seen through the eyes of a 21-year-old used to cutting-edge CGI, it makes more sense. I’m a victim of circumstance, really. I need your sympathy, not your rage. Please put down the soldering iron.
I do not treat my comics with respect.
Oh sure, I started collecting with such good intentions- storing each individual issue in a sealed plastic box, which was then stashed atop a kitchen cupboard where it would be free from vomit, pee, hairballs, dead things, and similar stuff that gets on your belongings when you have a cat. My graphic novels are neatly ordered in a bookcase, and I can’t find the words to describe how beautiful they look. But the single issues? The ones that you’re meant to keep absolutely mint in order to pay for your grandkids’ uni fees? I have done some unspeakable things with them. In my profile picture underneath this post you can see me chewing the corner of Batgirl #1. I have left countless ones on the floor, where they have been crumpled underfoot. I have rolled them up and used them for whacking at invading insects. I left one in its bag, forgot about it, used the bag for rubbish, remembered about it, pulled it out and picked the remnants of Pot Noodle off the back cover. I have cut up a stack of comics a foot tall for a project that I haven’t even gotten around to starting yet. And as much as I try to tell myself that modern comics won’t accumulate wealth quite like their Golden Age counterparts, I can’t help but feel like a terrible, terrible human being.
Phew! Well my soul certainly feels a lot lighter. Hurrah for sharing! Of course I’m now a social pariah… again. Dammit.
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See what I did there? OK, so if you weren’t aware before, there’s going to be a Zombieland TV series funded by and debuting on Amazon to stream online. Personally I’m not sure how chuffed I am about it as I love the movie, and would prefer they leave it at that rather than sully the material and end up making a pig’s ear of it.
