21 Jump Street; A Review
Posted by Landerpurex on March 19th, 2012, 3:05 am. Category: Scribery Entry
9/10
I consider myself a comedy connoisseur. Whether it's the fine wine comedy of Monty Python, the outrageous antics of Will Ferrell in Step Brothers or Old School, or the recently over-the-top Wanderlust, and even further back to classics such as Caddyshack, National Lampoon, Animal House, and even further to the Stooges and Charlie Chaplin. I've seen it all. I have not, however, always enjoyed it all.
21 Jump Street was, simply put, a fantastic comedy. I wouldn't consider myself a huge Jonah Hill fan, but he does well in this movie. The star who really excels is Channing Tatum, however. As some other reviewers mention, seeing the actor exit his (boring, in my opinion) romantic role and enter into a comedic one is fantastic. His simple, yet sincere character is one we've seen time and again, but it's incredibly funny and somehow fresh in this film. Jonah Hill's character is similar to those in the past, the outcast bookworm, but again, it fits the movie.
The premise of the movie is that Tatum and Hill are newly graduated policemen, and aren't at all good at their job. After losing some perpetrators doing drugs in the park, they are reassigned to the run-down undercover unit at 21 Jump Street. Here, their captain (A hilarious Ice Cube) assigns them to pose as students to try and take down the supplier of a new hallucinogenic drug called HFS (Holy F'ing
). Simple enough premise. A large part of the comedy of this movie is currently edgy, and will hit home with our generation for years to come. Tatum and Hill return to school to find that studying, caring for the environment, and being tolerant is now 'cool'. This, of course, is openly satirizing the abrupt shift that is taking place with youth today, for good or ill and remains a very potent comedic strand throughout the movie. In a memorable scene, when the two first return to high school, they are bombarded by new cliques, such as asians dressed in cosplay and the now infamous hipsters. Again, it's humor that has a target audience and works incredibly well for us who are mired in these new cultural phenomena.
Interestingly enough, there are a few good action scenes to be had in this movie as well. It's no Jackie Chan movie, but the director manages some good action, explosions (and satirizing the convention of explosions), car chases and shootouts to change the pace when a change is warranted.
This isn't an art film, and will not wow you with presentation, cinematography, sound, or any other technical aspect. It is driven by its humor, strong acting, and script, which is always enough with a successful comedy. We are meant to pay attention to the jokes, not what the camera angles suggest. It is sufficient enough technically that we aren't distracted by *bad* decisions, there is just not anything that will wow you in that respect.
There are many laughs to be had in this movie, for people of all ages and backgrounds. The guys are forced to try the new drug right away to prove they're not police, and the insanity ensues. Tatum bursts into the band room and destroys and disrupts. Hill returns to drama class and somehow nails himself the lead part in the school's production of Peter Pan. In an attempt to get in with one of the dealers, the guys throw a party of wicked proportions, and kids from a rival school show up. This ends in Tatum punching almost anyone who steps in front of him and Hill getting stabbed with some kind of artifact. Then, their parents return and break up the party.
This movie toes the line between ridiculous and incredibly funny exactly the way a great comedy should. It's witty, edgy, and simply funny nearly all the time, with very strong acting and writing throughout all the while remaining grounded in a decent enough story. There are even a few great surprises to be had, including a fantastic cameo. The ONLY reasons this film garners a 9 instead of a 10 from me is because it falters in the final scenes, going too far with a shock device that seems totally unnecessary given the merit of the rest of the film. There are also some cliches to be had, but they serve their purpose in the plot.
In short, go and see this film as soon as possible.
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Guild Wars 2 (Pre-Purchase) April 10th
Posted by killa kiaba on March 15th, 2012, 6:52 pm. Category: Scribery Entry
https://buy.guildwars2.com/
All pre-purchase editions include these exclusive bonuses:
Access to all Guild Wars 2 Beta Weekend Events
Three days of headstart access
Hero’s Band (+2 to all stats)
DIGITAL EDITION $59.99
Guild Wars 2 game
DIGITAL DELUXE $79.99
Guild Wars 2 game
Summon Mistfire Wolf Elite Skill
Rytlock Miniature
Golem Banker
Chalice of Glory
Tome of Influence
COLLECTOR'S EDITION $149.99
Guild Wars 2 game
Summon Mistfire Wolf Elite Skill
Rytlock Miniature
Golem Banker
Chalice of Glory
Tome of Influence
10-inch figurine of Rytlock
112 page Making of Guild Wars 2 book
Custom Art Frame
Art Portfolio and Five Art Prints
Best of Guild Wars 2 Soundtrack CD
Minimum System Requirements*
* Due to potential changes, system requirements may change over time, and you may be required to upgrade your current system (or obtain a new system) to continue to play the game.
Windows® XP Service Pack 2 or better · 2 GB RAM
Intel® Core™ 2 Duo 2.0 GHz, Core i3, AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 or better
NVIDIA® GeForce® 7800, ATI Radeon™ X1800, Intel HD 3000 or better (256MB of video RAM and shader model 3.0 or better)
25 GB available HDD space
Broadband Internet connection
Keyboard and mouse
All pre-purchase editions include these exclusive bonuses:
Access to all Guild Wars 2 Beta Weekend Events
Three days of headstart access
Hero’s Band (+2 to all stats)
DIGITAL EDITION $59.99
Guild Wars 2 game
DIGITAL DELUXE $79.99
Guild Wars 2 game
Summon Mistfire Wolf Elite Skill
Rytlock Miniature
Golem Banker
Chalice of Glory
Tome of Influence
COLLECTOR'S EDITION $149.99
Guild Wars 2 game
Summon Mistfire Wolf Elite Skill
Rytlock Miniature
Golem Banker
Chalice of Glory
Tome of Influence
10-inch figurine of Rytlock
112 page Making of Guild Wars 2 book
Custom Art Frame
Art Portfolio and Five Art Prints
Best of Guild Wars 2 Soundtrack CD
Minimum System Requirements*
* Due to potential changes, system requirements may change over time, and you may be required to upgrade your current system (or obtain a new system) to continue to play the game.
Windows® XP Service Pack 2 or better · 2 GB RAM
Intel® Core™ 2 Duo 2.0 GHz, Core i3, AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 or better
NVIDIA® GeForce® 7800, ATI Radeon™ X1800, Intel HD 3000 or better (256MB of video RAM and shader model 3.0 or better)
25 GB available HDD space
Broadband Internet connection
Keyboard and mouse
The Mars Volta - Noctourniquet (3/27/2012): A Review
Posted by defeat on March 12th, 2012, 8:14 pm. Category: Scribery Entry
Rating: 9/10
There are few bands I expect to blow me away with every release, and The Mars Volta is one of them. In any form of art there is an indefinite number of artists trying to take their chosen medium to the next level of originality. This is especially true in music, but most tend to get hung up on the concept of genres. It’s an easy thing to do, as genres are the best reference points art has to describe it. A genre is sometimes necessary for description, but at other times putting a label on a work of art can hinder the art itself. Trying to describe The Mars Volta’s music is hard enough, but putting one specific genre or label on it is simply impossible. One thing that they have stuck by, however, is the pop format. Granted, their songs aren’t the verse/chorus/verse all-in-under-four-minutes that Top 40 radio stations have come to embrace (it’s more like intro/verse/chorus/verse/bridge/chorus/outro, all-in-sometimes-10-minutes-or more), but they do have choruses that fans of intensely poetic, non-linear lyrics can try and sing along with. I say try, because, come on…Who can sing that hauntingly beautiful falsetto like Cedric Bixler-Zavala?
Throughout their career The Mars Volta have incorporated everything from jazz to Latin into their music, but their latest release, entitled Noctourniquet, comes closer to being a pop/rock album than any of the others. There. I said it. It’s a pop album. This shouldn’t have come as such a surprise to me, as the last release, 2009’s Octahedron, only had a single song over eight minutes (a huge departure from the band’s early days that spawned songs like the 35+ minute epic “Cassandra Gemini”). It was a surprise, though. Maybe it’s surprising because this is the first album they’ve released that I’ve heard parts in songs that could have come from other bands. “Aegis” has a feel reminiscent of Muse in the verses. “Zed and Two Naughts”’ drums instantly brought A Perfect Circle’s song "Weak and Powerless" to mind. Even the lead single has a guitar riff that could have come from any of the songs on Queens of the Stone Age’s album, Era Vulgaris, or any of Jack White’s past and present projects. I’m not saying that they were trying for any similarities, but when you make a pop album, it’s impossible to completely avoid them, even for The Mars Volta…
…And a The Mars Volta album it is! Even with these few similarities, the above mentioned songs are undoubtedly and uniquely straight from TMV’s songwriter and producer, Omar Rodriguez-Lopez. His guitar playing is as riff-tastic and sometimes nothing but effects per-usual. He’s always been an experimental little guy, and even with Noctourniquet’s pop sensibilities, he's still pushing the boundaries of music. Their usual use of keyboards has changed from jazzy piano and organ to synth (possibly due to the departure of keyboardist "Ikey" Owens), although their trademark sound manipulation can be heard throughout the album’s entirety. Fans of The Volta’s past efforts won’t be disappointed, especially with the songs “Dyslexicon”, “Molochwalker”, and “Trinkets Pale of Moon”, which range from in-your-face to soft and sweet, respectively. One thing some fans tend to complain about is the revolving door of drummers since Jon Theodore stopped playing with the band in 2006. I never jumped on that band wagon, and really enjoyed Thomas Pridgen’s drumming on the last two albums. However, the only complaint I have about Noctourniquet is just that, the drumming. New drummer, Deantoni Parks, just doesn’t do it for me. He seems to be trying way too hard to live up to the sonic pummeling that the previous albums have featured, and sometimes fails miserably (evident in “Lapochka”).
If you haven’t heard The Mars Volta before, disliked their previous efforts for being too artsy, or are one of the many who haven’t liked an album of theirs since the full length debut (2003’s De-Loused in the Comatorium), Noctourniquet is a great album to get acquainted with, as it’s their most accessible and listener friendly album to date. Fans of the entire discography beware…
It’s a pop album. There. I said it again...
Recommended if you enjoy: Radiohead, Muse, Queens of the Stone Age's Era Vulgaris and/or Jack White
The official lead single can be listened to here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yh0stkLanx4&ob=av3e
Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning; A Review
Posted by Landerpurex on February 15th, 2012, 12:33 am. Category: Scribery Entry
Overall rating: 8/10.
I've done my homework on this game, both before and after buying it. Everyone seems to be looking at it completely the wrong way. Other reviewers and consumers are comparing this game to Skyrim, Mass Effect, and many other juggernaut RPGs. This is a mistake. Reviews range from a 9/10 from IGN to a 5/10 from Adam Sessler at G4TV.
Kingdoms of Amalur is similar to other RPGs in some respects, and in others it is radically different. If we analyze and enjoy this by itself, it's a great game. If we stand it next to Skyrim, it falters badly in some respects, and excels in others.
The things this game does well are apparent from the moment you start playing. Environments are very vibrant, and are sufficiently unique. They're somewhat linear, but also allow for quite a bit of exploration and free roam. There are enough hidden treasures, places, and quests to keep you busy for many hours. Often I would venture off the path in search of a treasure that showed up on my map thanks to my 'detect hidden' skill, and would instead spend a few hours saving a town from some kind of spider woman. This had nothing to do with the main quest or any of the 'factions'.
The story for this game is very good, and has RA Salvatore's flair. Sometimes, however, this is its undoing. Every little quest has five minutes of backstory or lore, when you might simply be trying to complete a quest for a quick buck or exp gain. I sometimes found myself skipping dialog for meaningless side quests. On the other side of this issue, the main storyline and faction quests are well-done. I especially loved the storyline of the House of Ballads, a group of elf-like people who endlessly reenact battles and adventures long past. In short, the overarching story isn't anything unconventional, but there are many originalities and nuances to be enjoyed. It's easy to see the care that went into the story, and that a good novelist was the one who oversaw it.
I can't write a review about this game without mentioning it's greatest strength: the battle system. It's fast-paced and more than simple button mashing. I like the emphasis on combos and certain attacks, such as those that 'pop up' your enemy, making them vulnerable for further hits. The amount of attacks is satisfying, but the key is exploring which ones work best together.
The game's skill system is pretty basic but fulfilling at the same time. There are plenty of skills and styles to be explored, without there being *too* much. The destiny system is great, you can unlock bonuses for your character as you dump points into any of the three skill trees. You can also unlock destinies for hybrid classes, even ones for supporting all three trees. This allows for a fantastic amount of customization with ample reward for whichever tree/s you choose to support.
That being said, this game's mechanics allow for one of the best roleplaying opportunities I've seen. The destiny system and hybrid classes make for an experience that really hasn't been amply explored in other titles. If you couple this with the strong story and hundreds of quests, then you have a very enjoyable recipe.
The game, of course; is not without faults. Some consumers have complained about the voice acting, but I actually enjoyed it. I found it more inspiring than some, and dialog seemed to fit the character saying it. I will be the first to admit that character models and facial expressions are lacking. Though the voice acting is good, it is not paired with good facial modeling. The characters are expressionless and half the time, their mouths don't even follow what they're saying.
Other cons involve slight dips in framerate, but nothing that was at all gamebreaking. I also often found the shops lacking, I finished the game with over 5 million gold. Granted, I was a money-making machine with max mercantile and detect hidden skills, but there was literally nowhere for me to spend my money after about 2/3 of the way through the game.
I spent about 50 hours on this game, and I was thoroughly satisfied with my experience. There seems to be dozens more hours of content, as I finished with over 50 side quests unfinished, and who knows how many more I left not taken. The replayability of the game is high as well, with trophies/achievements awarded for each playstyle. Though it would be just as easy to totally re-allot your skill points than to start over, but what's the fun in that?
The game is pretty standard fantasy fare on almost every front, while excelling in a few respects; namely the battle system and the major storylines. As other reviewers have pointed out, this game seems to borrow the best features of a lot of other titles and implement them in game to the point where they work together to near perfection. Loot, story, battling, skills, environment, and more. Overall, this game was a great experience and I would recommend it to anyone looking for a new, solid RPG to play from a new studio, but with some very hard-hitting names behind it.
The Woman in Black; A Movie Review
Posted by Landerpurex on February 6th, 2012, 1:05 am. Category: Scribery Entry
Rating: 7/10
This was a good movie, not a great one. It did its job, it scared me (badly) at times, and there were very great technical things happening with this movie. However, it was inconsistent and Radcliffe's acting was just awful.
This movie is pretty typical as far as horror stories go, it's set in early 1900s England. The main character Arthur Kipps (Radcliffe) plays a lawyer or paralegal, hard up for a break. He is sent by his firm to a sinister house near a small town, where the spirit of a woman terrorizes the town and the house. His son and their nanny are supposed to join him at the house after some time. Don't be fooled by the PG-13 rating, I learned with Insidious that underrated movies can be terrifying.
The opening scene of this movie was literally the most technically sound, and perhaps the best scene in the movie. While any opening scene should be great, it shouldn't be the best scene in the film. We're shown three young girls playing in an upstairs room, and nothing seems to be wrong. After a few moments, one of them drops their little teacup. It shatters. They then get up and advance towards the three windows, one of the trampling the teapot on the way. Here we have many good things in the cinematography and editing. Short takes. Shades of montage. Short jump cuts. This serves to confuse us, and it works very well. The three girls step up to the sill simultaneously, and jump out the windows. Then we're taken to Arthur's house, shocked by the previous scene and left with many questions.
The worst thing about this film, I felt, were its inconsistencies. It's easy to see that the aforementioned scene was meticulously cared for during production, whereas the rest of the film only shows glimmers of that care. As I said previously, Radcliffe's acting is terrible. He never shows any emotion, both when he realizes his wife has died in childbirth, nor at the end of the film when he is reunited with his son. This movie didn't call for him to strive for any awards, most of the time Arthur runs through the house chasing various noises. I was disappointed that when the script called for a little acting, he didn't deliver. And this took me away from the movie.
The movie delivers through jump-scares that we've come accustomed to with modern horror cinema. The cinematography is sound, with several first person shots that round corners, raising suspense. Of course, the scares don't come when we expect them. Moreover, there are several scenes in this film with these creepy, awkward, grimy toys that often act on their own. This was perhaps the most unsettling thing about the film. Picture a porcelain clown toy from that era, that contorts itself and ends with a close-up shot of his grinning face. Don't see this (or do) if you're afraid of clowns. *shudder*
Along those same lines, there is a scene where Arthur is (you guessed it) checking a noise he heard in the house. He's using a candle, and upon entering the room, there are closeups of the aforementioned toys, and the light of the candle is reflected in their eyes. It's moving with Arthur, and subsequently, moving in the eyes of the toys, making it seem as if they are following his movement. There are similar scenes to this, such as one where Arthur sees the reflection of the ghost in a mirror, but when he turns to check, she is gone. Subtle tricks like these make this movie a positive experience.
The house is a major star in the film, as it should be. It is sinister, old, foreboding, dusty, cobwebby, and simply everything a haunted house should be. There is a cemetery on the grounds that adds to the feeling. In addition to that, there is a lone wooden cross in the front yard where a little boy died when he sank into the swamp.
When we are first introduced to the house, Arthur goes downstairs, exploring. His job in the place is to make sure there are no more official papers in the home and to try and find the owner's last will and testament. When he enters the room, there is a newborn baby crow on the floor. He picks the baby up and puts it in the nest nearby. As soon as he does so, he is attacked by mama bird. I enjoyed this scene, it seemed an homage to the horror of yore, movies like The Omen and Hitchcock's The Birds, where birds figure heavily in the horror.
Additionally, this scene bears a stark parallel with the final moments of the movie. Clever foreshadowing, or heavy-handed symbolism? Go see the movie and find out!
In short, I really enjoyed this movie, both at the surface level of modern horror and as an amateur film student. Its inconsistencies are many, but the great scenes it offers do redeem it. It is scary in the same way that other modern horror films are, and is easily enjoyable by anyone that loves the horror genre. I recommend this film.
The Devil Inside: A Movie Review
Posted by Landerpurex on January 25th, 2012, 3:43 am. Category: Scribery Entry
Before we get started, let me state that there will be plot points discussed in the following text, but I will do my best to keep crucial points a secret. Let me also state that I am not a professional critic, but have more critical film expertise than most people; having taken several film courses in college.
Rating: 3/10
The premise that a woman named Maria Rossi kills three people in 1989. Her daughter, Isabella, goes to the hospital in Italy where her mother has since been committed. Isabelle then attends a class full of priests about exorcism. She befriends two of them, and sets out to find what has actually happened to her mother and document it on camera.
Let me first say that this movie was completely horrible. Awful. Terrible. The plotline was as jagged as a piece of broken glass, and not nearly as sharp. I don't even know where to begin with this one. The movie opens with a short black-screened scene that lets us listen in on the 911 call after Maria has killed three priests. This is, without a doubt, one of the scariest scenes in the movie, which isn't saying much. Then we are treated to some convoluted storyline and some basic 'travel' footage of Isabella and her cameraman in Italy. There's nothing of significance in the first portion of the film.
After a bit, we see Isabella visit her mother in the hospital. I was intrigued by the fact that the staff seemed to trust the woman, even though she had a violent past. I was surprised that her daughter was even allowed to see her. This was one of the numerous gaping plotholes in the movie, but I was willing to forgive if it could deliver in the scary department.
Maria Rossi's character is sufficiently creepy, especially on the first meeting. She's clearly insane, and looks the part. Her hair is frazzled, she looks completely gaunt and malnourished, and she has been cutting crosses into herself, into painful areas like the inside of her lip. She asks her daughter if she knows how to "connect the cuts..." which was creepy. But it wasn't nearly enough. Maria screams a scream that is certainly not human, and Isabella leaves the hospital.
Between 'exorcisms' we're treated to mundane storyline, and the ever present battle between the two priests. One wants to exorcise Maria and others like her to help them, the other is afraid of losing his priesthood as the two are doing these exorcisms without the church's consent. While the idea is nice, and shows another side to the politics of the catholic church, it is the same conflict between characters we've seen in thousands of other movies. It fails to deliver, and the bad acting doesn't help.
The film's only redeeming scene comes when the priests decide that Isabella should accompany them on a separate exorcism to learn more about the practice. In this scene, the victim does numerous disturbing things, such as popping her shoulder out of place and generally contorting her body. It's nothing more than what we've come to expect from this genre, but it is effective still.
After this, the film loses all its merit. The group returns to the hospital to exorcise Maria, only to have her multiple demons jump into one of the priests, the cameraman, and Isabella. There are generic scenes such as one when the lights go out with the possessed priest upstairs.
Lastly, I must comment on the ending of this movie. I warn you, I am about to spoil it. But then, a movie as poorly made as this doesn't deserve the decency of secrecy.
In the final moments of the film, with the possessed priest dead, the cameraman is rushing Isabella to an exorcism expert in Rome. He becomes 'possessed', takes off his seatbelt, and veers into oncoming traffic, causing a wreck and the presumed death of the people in the car. The movie then ends. Abruptly. We are told the case is unresolved, and that we can visit http://www.therossifiles.com/ to find out more. Is this a clever blending of modern technology to enhance your moviegoing experience, or is this cheap, pathetic advertisement? A good film shouldn't need some website to further explain itself, and the site doesn't even do that from what I could gather.
The way endings like this work in a positive way is if we have been on a satisfying journey throughout the movie. In this one, we have not. We don't care about the characters. We can barely process what's going on as we see multiple exorcisms and the demons jump into the characters. There are no technically sound aspects to speak of, this movie is low-budget and it shows. It takes from a really great genre, the 'documentary', 'found-film' horror. Such titles like the Blair Witch Project and Paranormal Activity work because they utilize the cheap camerawork to make it look real. There are clear plot arcs. There are foundations in classic horror, and there are innovations as well that make up for unknown (but not always bad) actors. The Devil Inside has none of these, as I've mentioned.
The Exorcism horror sub genre never stood a chance. In it's premier, the original Exorcist movie got it right the first goddamn time. And no good exorcism movies have been made since, only cheap, floundering copies cashing in on the same idea.
There were some decent things about this film, but not enough to make it any good and certainly not enough to redeem the ridiculous ending. It was as if the movie itself were saying "Ha-ha for watching this garbage, now go yourself" and the ending was the exclamation point on that statement. Don't waste your money on this movie, hopefully it'll soon be out of theaters and we can move on.
Rating: 3/10
The premise that a woman named Maria Rossi kills three people in 1989. Her daughter, Isabella, goes to the hospital in Italy where her mother has since been committed. Isabelle then attends a class full of priests about exorcism. She befriends two of them, and sets out to find what has actually happened to her mother and document it on camera.
Let me first say that this movie was completely horrible. Awful. Terrible. The plotline was as jagged as a piece of broken glass, and not nearly as sharp. I don't even know where to begin with this one. The movie opens with a short black-screened scene that lets us listen in on the 911 call after Maria has killed three priests. This is, without a doubt, one of the scariest scenes in the movie, which isn't saying much. Then we are treated to some convoluted storyline and some basic 'travel' footage of Isabella and her cameraman in Italy. There's nothing of significance in the first portion of the film.
After a bit, we see Isabella visit her mother in the hospital. I was intrigued by the fact that the staff seemed to trust the woman, even though she had a violent past. I was surprised that her daughter was even allowed to see her. This was one of the numerous gaping plotholes in the movie, but I was willing to forgive if it could deliver in the scary department.
Maria Rossi's character is sufficiently creepy, especially on the first meeting. She's clearly insane, and looks the part. Her hair is frazzled, she looks completely gaunt and malnourished, and she has been cutting crosses into herself, into painful areas like the inside of her lip. She asks her daughter if she knows how to "connect the cuts..." which was creepy. But it wasn't nearly enough. Maria screams a scream that is certainly not human, and Isabella leaves the hospital.
Between 'exorcisms' we're treated to mundane storyline, and the ever present battle between the two priests. One wants to exorcise Maria and others like her to help them, the other is afraid of losing his priesthood as the two are doing these exorcisms without the church's consent. While the idea is nice, and shows another side to the politics of the catholic church, it is the same conflict between characters we've seen in thousands of other movies. It fails to deliver, and the bad acting doesn't help.
The film's only redeeming scene comes when the priests decide that Isabella should accompany them on a separate exorcism to learn more about the practice. In this scene, the victim does numerous disturbing things, such as popping her shoulder out of place and generally contorting her body. It's nothing more than what we've come to expect from this genre, but it is effective still.
After this, the film loses all its merit. The group returns to the hospital to exorcise Maria, only to have her multiple demons jump into one of the priests, the cameraman, and Isabella. There are generic scenes such as one when the lights go out with the possessed priest upstairs.
Lastly, I must comment on the ending of this movie. I warn you, I am about to spoil it. But then, a movie as poorly made as this doesn't deserve the decency of secrecy.
In the final moments of the film, with the possessed priest dead, the cameraman is rushing Isabella to an exorcism expert in Rome. He becomes 'possessed', takes off his seatbelt, and veers into oncoming traffic, causing a wreck and the presumed death of the people in the car. The movie then ends. Abruptly. We are told the case is unresolved, and that we can visit http://www.therossifiles.com/ to find out more. Is this a clever blending of modern technology to enhance your moviegoing experience, or is this cheap, pathetic advertisement? A good film shouldn't need some website to further explain itself, and the site doesn't even do that from what I could gather.
The way endings like this work in a positive way is if we have been on a satisfying journey throughout the movie. In this one, we have not. We don't care about the characters. We can barely process what's going on as we see multiple exorcisms and the demons jump into the characters. There are no technically sound aspects to speak of, this movie is low-budget and it shows. It takes from a really great genre, the 'documentary', 'found-film' horror. Such titles like the Blair Witch Project and Paranormal Activity work because they utilize the cheap camerawork to make it look real. There are clear plot arcs. There are foundations in classic horror, and there are innovations as well that make up for unknown (but not always bad) actors. The Devil Inside has none of these, as I've mentioned.
The Exorcism horror sub genre never stood a chance. In it's premier, the original Exorcist movie got it right the first goddamn time. And no good exorcism movies have been made since, only cheap, floundering copies cashing in on the same idea.
There were some decent things about this film, but not enough to make it any good and certainly not enough to redeem the ridiculous ending. It was as if the movie itself were saying "Ha-ha for watching this garbage, now go
yourself" and the ending was the exclamation point on that statement. Don't waste your money on this movie, hopefully it'll soon be out of theaters and we can move on.
Lamb Of God - Resolution (01/24/12): A Review
Posted by defeat on January 23rd, 2012, 5:49 pm. Category: Scribery Entry
Rating: 7/10
I almost didn’t review this album after listening to the first half of it. I was thinking, “Oh….It’s (2009's) Wrath…again, and I’ll have nothing to say…” After giving it another chance, the second half of the album was indeed Lamb Of God’s saving grace.
Every member of Lamb Of God have seemingly evolved over the years, except for the second most talented member, drummer, Chris Adler. Don’t get it wrong. He’s a favorite drummer of many, as he’s a consistent, speed drumming machine with great fills and feet faster than light. Come with the dynamics already, though, Chris! Maybe, it’s the production that’s held you back with your sound. Maybe, it’s the way you tune your drums (Let them resonate a bit next time, eh? Every, single, solitary drum shouldn’t have the short thump of a bass drum…). Maybe, you just don’t care. Some don’t. Oh, well...so it goes. (I've been reading a lot of Vonnegut as of late.)
Resolution, contradictorily to the drumming, is LOG’s most dynamic release yet. Some thought the band had been lost to “The Graveyard of Previously Great Bands” with the bore that was their previous release, Wrath. It just seemed like a filler album without any originality. Resolution is an adventurous turn of events in LOG’s discography. Guitarists’ Mark Morton and Willie Adler have given us a new take on The New Wave of American Heavy Metal with some softer, more progressive, off-time riffs in the songs “Barbarosa”, “King Me”, and lead single “Ghost Walking”. In most metal, the bass guitar is just a copy of the lead riff, just lower. In this release, though, bassist John Campbell is pleasantly noticeable in parts throughout Resolution’s entirety.
It would be fantastic to have Machine back at the production helm instead of Josh Wilbur, as some minor kinks in the production are what took away some audio enjoyment points. The drums have been mentioned as a major issue. Other kinks were really just post-production snafus. “Barbarosa” and “Invictus” is clearly one song. With fourteen tracks, it’s not like LOG were scraping the barrel for material. Some of the songs on the second half of the album should have been mingled with the first half to break up the turn off of early monotony. This takes away from the listening experience the most. God, is that second half great, though…
In other news, vocalist, Randy Blythe is still alive.
Lead single: "Ghost Walking" Official Video
Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows; a review
Posted by Landerpurex on January 7th, 2012, 7:28 am. Category: Scribery Entry
Before we get started, let me state that there will be plot points discussed in the following text, but I will do my best to keep crucial points a secret. Let me also state that I am not a professional critic, but have more critical film expertise than most people; having taken several film courses in college.
Rating: 8/10
Everyone knows the story of Sherlock Holmes, renowned detective. This movie is no different, with Holmes needing to solve a difficult case involving a sinister man named Professor Moriarty. The movie is deliciously mysterious, with Moriarty's motives in question until the final moments. Holmes of course enlists in the help of Dr. Watson, who is newly married; and the two go on an adventure that spans the European Continent to uncover Moriarty's plans and to try to save his intended victims that include Dr. Watson, his wife, a gypsy, and eventually all of Europe.
This movie was fantastic. Robert Downey Jr, Jude Law, and Jared Harris can do no wrong. The acting is superb, though sometimes over the top. I have, however, come to expect this of Downey Jr in general as well as within this franchise, so it works. He and Law make a fantastic pair, and the charisma and camaraderie come across well. Jared Harris makes a great villain as well, it's that simple.
The film lives up to its predecessor. It leaves a trail of clues that you are expected to notice, but not expected to piece together as Holmes does in the end. Certain important items are centered in the shot from Holmes' point of view, labeling them as imperative. The cinematography is sound, using multiple angles and distances when necessary. Sound is coupled with this approach as well. For example, there is one scene where one of Moriarty's lackeys is shown smoking a hand rolled cigarette. The cherry burns extra bright, and the sound of it burning can be heard over the other things going on in the frame. I wondered to myself, 'how is this important?' And I had a great time racking my brain trying to figure it out. I felt accomplished when it was revealed that the cigarette was important to the plot. This movie's greatest quality is that it makes you think and guess along with Holmes.
The film's comedy is fantastic, though sometimes ridiculous, as with the killing and revival of the poor bulldog (again). Though, once again, Downey Jr has made Holmes his own and put a modern spin on the man. That is not to say that the movie doesn't take certain liberties with the classics, because it does. Which is one of the reasons it remains an 8 out of 10 instead of a 9 or perfect score.
The great fighting scenes narrated strategically by Holmes return, though they go awry by variants not considered by Holmes. In the final scenes, Moriarty himself interjects in Holmes monologue and engages in a match of wits with the detective that is both exciting and original.
Speaking of which, editing must be mentioned. The film uses jump-cuts when necessary, and very effectively as well. Just before the scene mentioned prior, parallelism is used to near perfection as Holmes and Moriarty are having a game of chess. The movie cuts between chess moves and the exploits of Watson and the gypsy as they attempt to reveal an assassin and ultimately, Moriarty's plot.
My biggest problem with this movie was the extreme slow-motion. It was only in one scene, but that makes it stand out and it went on for far too long. Ever since 300, movies have been abusing slow motion. It was over the top in that title as well, but at least it was consistent. In an otherwise great, sound, smart movie I felt this was the only thing that seemed uninspired and frankly, too stereotypical Hollywood.
In closing, this move was very enjoyable. It was a bit on the long side, but I was sad it was over. In some ways, it is very typical action, in others, it is original, fun, and smart in a lot of ways modern movies are not. It is technically sound, but not ambitious. The cast delivers and I hope they continue to do so. The plot keeps you guessing right until the final moments, and there are many twists and turns to be had.
Go and see this movie while it's still in theaters.
Rating: 8/10
Everyone knows the story of Sherlock Holmes, renowned detective. This movie is no different, with Holmes needing to solve a difficult case involving a sinister man named Professor Moriarty. The movie is deliciously mysterious, with Moriarty's motives in question until the final moments. Holmes of course enlists in the help of Dr. Watson, who is newly married; and the two go on an adventure that spans the European Continent to uncover Moriarty's plans and to try to save his intended victims that include Dr. Watson, his wife, a gypsy, and eventually all of Europe.
This movie was fantastic. Robert Downey Jr, Jude Law, and Jared Harris can do no wrong. The acting is superb, though sometimes over the top. I have, however, come to expect this of Downey Jr in general as well as within this franchise, so it works. He and Law make a fantastic pair, and the charisma and camaraderie come across well. Jared Harris makes a great villain as well, it's that simple.
The film lives up to its predecessor. It leaves a trail of clues that you are expected to notice, but not expected to piece together as Holmes does in the end. Certain important items are centered in the shot from Holmes' point of view, labeling them as imperative. The cinematography is sound, using multiple angles and distances when necessary. Sound is coupled with this approach as well. For example, there is one scene where one of Moriarty's lackeys is shown smoking a hand rolled cigarette. The cherry burns extra bright, and the sound of it burning can be heard over the other things going on in the frame. I wondered to myself, 'how is this important?' And I had a great time racking my brain trying to figure it out. I felt accomplished when it was revealed that the cigarette was important to the plot. This movie's greatest quality is that it makes you think and guess along with Holmes.
The film's comedy is fantastic, though sometimes ridiculous, as with the killing and revival of the poor bulldog (again). Though, once again, Downey Jr has made Holmes his own and put a modern spin on the man. That is not to say that the movie doesn't take certain liberties with the classics, because it does. Which is one of the reasons it remains an 8 out of 10 instead of a 9 or perfect score.
The great fighting scenes narrated strategically by Holmes return, though they go awry by variants not considered by Holmes. In the final scenes, Moriarty himself interjects in Holmes monologue and engages in a match of wits with the detective that is both exciting and original.
Speaking of which, editing must be mentioned. The film uses jump-cuts when necessary, and very effectively as well. Just before the scene mentioned prior, parallelism is used to near perfection as Holmes and Moriarty are having a game of chess. The movie cuts between chess moves and the exploits of Watson and the gypsy as they attempt to reveal an assassin and ultimately, Moriarty's plot.
My biggest problem with this movie was the extreme slow-motion. It was only in one scene, but that makes it stand out and it went on for far too long. Ever since 300, movies have been abusing slow motion. It was over the top in that title as well, but at least it was consistent. In an otherwise great, sound, smart movie I felt this was the only thing that seemed uninspired and frankly, too stereotypical Hollywood.
In closing, this move was very enjoyable. It was a bit on the long side, but I was sad it was over. In some ways, it is very typical action, in others, it is original, fun, and smart in a lot of ways modern movies are not. It is technically sound, but not ambitious. The cast delivers and I hope they continue to do so. The plot keeps you guessing right until the final moments, and there are many twists and turns to be had.
Go and see this movie while it's still in theaters.
The Darkest Hour: A Movie Review
Posted by Landerpurex on January 7th, 2012, 6:49 am. Category: Scribery Entry
Before we get started, let me state that there will be plot points discussed in the following text, but I will do my best to keep crucial points a secret. Let me also state that I am not a professional critic, but have more critical film expertise than most people; having taken several film courses in college.
Overall rating: 5/10
This movie was nothing that the previews didn't show. In short, it's about a pair of software designers either fresh out of college or in the twilight of their college careers. They are in Moscow to pitch an idea for a user-based online comprehensive travel guide to some executives. They meet with a Swedish exec who has basically stolen their idea and screwed them out of a major (multi-million dollar?) deal. After this, the guys go to a club and meet a couple girls vacationing as well, and know of one of them due to her use of their program. Then come the invisible aliens. The creatures are made of electromagnetic energy and are somehow able to vaporize people. But their weakness is that they give themselves away and set off any and all lights and electronics when they approach. The rest of the movie is spent showing the characters trying to escape these creatures and get 'home', though they soon find similar landings and destruction have happened all across the world. Near the end, the group find out that there is a nuclear submarine waiting to help transport survivors back to their homes and/or to a safer facility.
First, it takes some time for the creatures to land. This is notwithstanding the fact the the premise of the guys' reason to be in Moscow is convoluted, not paramount to the plot, and completely forgettable. Though there were a few comic moments, there was nothing to be had in the first quarter of the film. Once the creatures land, I was intrigued. This movie's lone strength is the originality of the aliens and the plausibility of their form and powers. But the scripting failed to deliver more on the subject, with only a few lines from a Russian militant describing the nature of the aliens in no terms understandable by most people; myself included.
Speaking of the Russian militants, their characters are amusing, but completely stereotypical and over the top. They spout catch phrases like 'welcome to Russia' when fighting the creatures, they speak stereotypical nationalist dialog such as stuff about protecting their home, as well as typical, completely uninspired dialog about war and tactics. Couple this with forgettable characters all around and it makes for an equally forgettable experience.
The technical side of the movie was unimpressive as well. Nothing incredible in terms of cinematography, sound, or anything else.
The star of this film is the city of Moscow. It's exotic, beautiful, and foreboding. The architecture is fantastic, and there are some shots that are worth looking at.
In short, this was a movie that offered very little in terms of excitement, technical inventiveness, writing, and basically everything else that makes a film good. It had a tiny bit of originality with the creatures but this was not appropriately handled by anyone. The city was fantastic, but left one wanting. I did not see this movie in 3D, but I'm positive it would have been a debacle.
This movie was far from the worst I've seen, but falls very short. If you've seen the preview, you've seen everything cool there is about the movie.
Overall rating: 5/10
This movie was nothing that the previews didn't show. In short, it's about a pair of software designers either fresh out of college or in the twilight of their college careers. They are in Moscow to pitch an idea for a user-based online comprehensive travel guide to some executives. They meet with a Swedish exec who has basically stolen their idea and screwed them out of a major (multi-million dollar?) deal. After this, the guys go to a club and meet a couple girls vacationing as well, and know of one of them due to her use of their program. Then come the invisible aliens. The creatures are made of electromagnetic energy and are somehow able to vaporize people. But their weakness is that they give themselves away and set off any and all lights and electronics when they approach. The rest of the movie is spent showing the characters trying to escape these creatures and get 'home', though they soon find similar landings and destruction have happened all across the world. Near the end, the group find out that there is a nuclear submarine waiting to help transport survivors back to their homes and/or to a safer facility.
First, it takes some time for the creatures to land. This is notwithstanding the fact the the premise of the guys' reason to be in Moscow is convoluted, not paramount to the plot, and completely forgettable. Though there were a few comic moments, there was nothing to be had in the first quarter of the film. Once the creatures land, I was intrigued. This movie's lone strength is the originality of the aliens and the plausibility of their form and powers. But the scripting failed to deliver more on the subject, with only a few lines from a Russian militant describing the nature of the aliens in no terms understandable by most people; myself included.
Speaking of the Russian militants, their characters are amusing, but completely stereotypical and over the top. They spout catch phrases like 'welcome to Russia' when fighting the creatures, they speak stereotypical nationalist dialog such as stuff about protecting their home, as well as typical, completely uninspired dialog about war and tactics. Couple this with forgettable characters all around and it makes for an equally forgettable experience.
The technical side of the movie was unimpressive as well. Nothing incredible in terms of cinematography, sound, or anything else.
The star of this film is the city of Moscow. It's exotic, beautiful, and foreboding. The architecture is fantastic, and there are some shots that are worth looking at.
In short, this was a movie that offered very little in terms of excitement, technical inventiveness, writing, and basically everything else that makes a film good. It had a tiny bit of originality with the creatures but this was not appropriately handled by anyone. The city was fantastic, but left one wanting. I did not see this movie in 3D, but I'm positive it would have been a debacle.
This movie was far from the worst I've seen, but falls very short. If you've seen the preview, you've seen everything cool there is about the movie.
1-6-2012 Modern Warfare 3
Posted by Tanksandguns on January 6th, 2012, 4:43 pm. Category: Scribery Entry
As a man who has played every Call of Duty game since Call of Duty 3, and sporadically before that since Big Red 1 I like to consider myself one of Call of Duty's biggest fans. Call of Duty has taken it's place as THE First Person Shooter. It's the franchise that comes to mind first when one talks about FPS games, and until recently, has had little to no competition in the field.
Rating: 9/10
Campaign
Modern Warfare 3 builds itself off of the same story line that we saw in CoD4 and MW2. It follows multiple story lines as you play several different characters across each and also brings back the memorable duo of Captain Price and Soap MacTavish. Modern Warfare 3 starts right where Modern Warfare 2 left off. The world is in chaos, and Makarov is still at large. The game has the player visit several cities completely ransacked with war and destruction, including New York City and Paris, France.
The overall flow of the campaign is excellent. The transitions between missions and the pacing is wonderful. And the whole games had sitting on the edge of my seat, with a subtle anxious feeling the whole time. I was constantly wondering what would happen next, and where I was traveling to.
The game is also very challenging. Having completed the first two games on Veteran difficulty, this was my first choice on my first play through of the game. I quickly learned, that this game doesn't beat around the bush, and I couldn't even make it past the first checkpoint. I quickly dropped the difficulty to Hardened, and again to Normal. Even while playing Normal, I found myself dieing fairly frequently, and I loved it. I enjoy a real challenge while playing video games, and to get one in a FPS is no easy task. I also didn't find myself in the slow buildup of anger mode that usually comes with the frustrating deaths of FPS Campaigns. At one point, mid-combat, the game cycles between one the ground fighting, and in the sky fighting in an AC-130 gunship. This is one of the best moments that I can remember throughout all the games, second only to 'Ghillie in the Mist' from Call of Duty 4. The developers did a stunning job of transitioning immediately after an explosion from the AC-130 missile, to the ground troops in the smoke and debris of where the shell had just impacted.
The game itself is really beautiful (or as beautiful as a war-torn city can be). I played the entire campaign on a non-HD TV, and still found myself staring in amazement at the graphics. When I moved over to an HD TV for multiplayer, I found that they were spectacular.
The storyline does an excellent job of wrapping up the first two games. I had few questions left after I had finished, and even teared up at one point during the story. If you played the first two, I can assure you that you will not be disappointed in the final game.
Multiplayer
The multiplayer has been reworked again from Modern Warfare 2. They have new Kill Streaks, and introduced things called 'Strike Packages.' Strike Packages affect what kill streaks you are awarded, and how they are awarded. They offer three types you can choose from: Assault, Support, and Specialist. Assault focuses on killing enemies to gain enemy killing kill streak rewards. It includes, AC-130, Predator Missiles, and Attack Helicopters. Support focuses on objectives such as capturing a flag, planting a bomb, capturing a Domination point, etc. It doesn't require kills to advance through the rewards, but kills also help. Also, Support doesn't reset on death, so you can keep on dying and unlocking rewards. This was my personal favorite. This can give you UAV, Care Packages, Stealth Bomber, etc. The final Strike Package you can use is Specialist. Instead of giving you kill streak rewards, it unlocks perks every 2 kills the player makes. By 8 kills, the player then has all the perks in the game. These have really reworked how the multiplayer feels, and it feels a lot more balanced than the second game ever did.
My main problems with Modern Warfare 2, were that there were kill streaks in the air almost constantly, and there was little anyone could do about it. That feeling has really subsided with Modern Warfare 3. There doesn't seem to be helicopters, AC-130's, and Predator Missiles clogging up the sky nearly as much as it did in the second game, and there's more that can be done about it. More launchers, Sam Sites, and fewer overpowered kill streaks make for the multiplayer experience to be a lot more enjoyable.
Another complaint that I had with MW2, was the the Sniper Rifles seemed extremely underpowered. It took 2, sometimes 3 shots to kill someone in a Core match. In MW3, this has been fixed. One shot to the torso is more often than not, a kill shot. I find this to be my favorite change that was made. I'm finally not getting angry that my high velocity round isn't killing someone when it should.
With CoD: Black Ops came the addition that CoD had been missing for all of its games that Halo and the likes had picked up on. Split Screen multiplayer available online, either through multiple Xbox Live accounts or the use of Guest Accounts. Modern Warfare 3, thankfully, did not change this. You can now play with a buddy on the same TV, online.
Usually with First Person Shooters, I find myself hating a majority of the maps. For whatever reason, Modern Warfare 3 seems different. I only really dislike one or two maps. All the others I seem to have a blast on! They're all beautiful, fun and fairly small. The only complaint I have, is there's really no open area map that is good for Snipers.
All in all, I was extremely happy with the subtle tweaks they made to the multiplayer experience. Prestige Mode now goes to level 80 (ten times), and they added Prestige tokens which can unlock little bonuses such as Double XP, Double Weapon XP, and Emblems and Titles, among other things. Each player starts out with 3, and since I haven't prestiged yet, I'm unsure whether you get 1 ever prestige level or more than that.
Spec Ops
Modern Warfare 3 sees the return of the Spec Ops mode. This can be done either solo or with a friend. I tried doing several of these solo, and found that once I had a friend help me out, they became significantly easier.
Spec Ops mode is a series of missions and objectives, some from the campaign, some completely fresh that test your speed and accuracy. Also, they can be a major challenge. From capturing the Russian President aboard his airplane, to killing waves upon waves in a Firefight type game mode, Spec Ops is nothing short of fun. Infinity Ward added a new style that resembles Horde from Gears of War and Firefight from Halo, where you face wave after wave of enemies including foot soldiers, dogs, helicopters and the infamous Juggernaut soldiers. For those looking for something after the campaign and after you get bored with multiplayer, I would recommend Spec Ops with a friend. It's an absolute blast!
Conclusion
All in all, I would say that Modern Warfare 3 was definitely worth the money I spent on it. It provided me with hours of entertainment, and will continue to do so for months to come. It fixed a lot of the issues I had with the previous game, and added some awesome touches as well. It did not disappoint me, and so far has lead to a lot less frustration with the game than Modern Warfare 2 did. I would recommend this game to any First Person Shooter fan, any fan of the Call of Duty franchise, and anyone looking for one of the best multiplayer experiences in gaming. I won't beat around the bush though, some of the fan-boys and the some of the casual players of MW3 can ruin your multiplayer experience, but that's why there's a mute feature.
~Tanksandguns
Rating: 9/10
Campaign
Modern Warfare 3 builds itself off of the same story line that we saw in CoD4 and MW2. It follows multiple story lines as you play several different characters across each and also brings back the memorable duo of Captain Price and Soap MacTavish. Modern Warfare 3 starts right where Modern Warfare 2 left off. The world is in chaos, and Makarov is still at large. The game has the player visit several cities completely ransacked with war and destruction, including New York City and Paris, France.
The overall flow of the campaign is excellent. The transitions between missions and the pacing is wonderful. And the whole games had sitting on the edge of my seat, with a subtle anxious feeling the whole time. I was constantly wondering what would happen next, and where I was traveling to.
The game is also very challenging. Having completed the first two games on Veteran difficulty, this was my first choice on my first play through of the game. I quickly learned, that this game doesn't beat around the bush, and I couldn't even make it past the first checkpoint. I quickly dropped the difficulty to Hardened, and again to Normal. Even while playing Normal, I found myself dieing fairly frequently, and I loved it. I enjoy a real challenge while playing video games, and to get one in a FPS is no easy task. I also didn't find myself in the slow buildup of anger mode that usually comes with the frustrating deaths of FPS Campaigns. At one point, mid-combat, the game cycles between one the ground fighting, and in the sky fighting in an AC-130 gunship. This is one of the best moments that I can remember throughout all the games, second only to 'Ghillie in the Mist' from Call of Duty 4. The developers did a stunning job of transitioning immediately after an explosion from the AC-130 missile, to the ground troops in the smoke and debris of where the shell had just impacted.
The game itself is really beautiful (or as beautiful as a war-torn city can be). I played the entire campaign on a non-HD TV, and still found myself staring in amazement at the graphics. When I moved over to an HD TV for multiplayer, I found that they were spectacular.
The storyline does an excellent job of wrapping up the first two games. I had few questions left after I had finished, and even teared up at one point during the story. If you played the first two, I can assure you that you will not be disappointed in the final game.
Multiplayer
The multiplayer has been reworked again from Modern Warfare 2. They have new Kill Streaks, and introduced things called 'Strike Packages.' Strike Packages affect what kill streaks you are awarded, and how they are awarded. They offer three types you can choose from: Assault, Support, and Specialist. Assault focuses on killing enemies to gain enemy killing kill streak rewards. It includes, AC-130, Predator Missiles, and Attack Helicopters. Support focuses on objectives such as capturing a flag, planting a bomb, capturing a Domination point, etc. It doesn't require kills to advance through the rewards, but kills also help. Also, Support doesn't reset on death, so you can keep on dying and unlocking rewards. This was my personal favorite. This can give you UAV, Care Packages, Stealth Bomber, etc. The final Strike Package you can use is Specialist. Instead of giving you kill streak rewards, it unlocks perks every 2 kills the player makes. By 8 kills, the player then has all the perks in the game. These have really reworked how the multiplayer feels, and it feels a lot more balanced than the second game ever did.
My main problems with Modern Warfare 2, were that there were kill streaks in the air almost constantly, and there was little anyone could do about it. That feeling has really subsided with Modern Warfare 3. There doesn't seem to be helicopters, AC-130's, and Predator Missiles clogging up the sky nearly as much as it did in the second game, and there's more that can be done about it. More launchers, Sam Sites, and fewer overpowered kill streaks make for the multiplayer experience to be a lot more enjoyable.
Another complaint that I had with MW2, was the the Sniper Rifles seemed extremely underpowered. It took 2, sometimes 3 shots to kill someone in a Core match. In MW3, this has been fixed. One shot to the torso is more often than not, a kill shot. I find this to be my favorite change that was made. I'm finally not getting angry that my high velocity round isn't killing someone when it should.
With CoD: Black Ops came the addition that CoD had been missing for all of its games that Halo and the likes had picked up on. Split Screen multiplayer available online, either through multiple Xbox Live accounts or the use of Guest Accounts. Modern Warfare 3, thankfully, did not change this. You can now play with a buddy on the same TV, online.
Usually with First Person Shooters, I find myself hating a majority of the maps. For whatever reason, Modern Warfare 3 seems different. I only really dislike one or two maps. All the others I seem to have a blast on! They're all beautiful, fun and fairly small. The only complaint I have, is there's really no open area map that is good for Snipers.
All in all, I was extremely happy with the subtle tweaks they made to the multiplayer experience. Prestige Mode now goes to level 80 (ten times), and they added Prestige tokens which can unlock little bonuses such as Double XP, Double Weapon XP, and Emblems and Titles, among other things. Each player starts out with 3, and since I haven't prestiged yet, I'm unsure whether you get 1 ever prestige level or more than that.
Spec Ops
Modern Warfare 3 sees the return of the Spec Ops mode. This can be done either solo or with a friend. I tried doing several of these solo, and found that once I had a friend help me out, they became significantly easier.
Spec Ops mode is a series of missions and objectives, some from the campaign, some completely fresh that test your speed and accuracy. Also, they can be a major challenge. From capturing the Russian President aboard his airplane, to killing waves upon waves in a Firefight type game mode, Spec Ops is nothing short of fun. Infinity Ward added a new style that resembles Horde from Gears of War and Firefight from Halo, where you face wave after wave of enemies including foot soldiers, dogs, helicopters and the infamous Juggernaut soldiers. For those looking for something after the campaign and after you get bored with multiplayer, I would recommend Spec Ops with a friend. It's an absolute blast!
Conclusion
All in all, I would say that Modern Warfare 3 was definitely worth the money I spent on it. It provided me with hours of entertainment, and will continue to do so for months to come. It fixed a lot of the issues I had with the previous game, and added some awesome touches as well. It did not disappoint me, and so far has lead to a lot less frustration with the game than Modern Warfare 2 did. I would recommend this game to any First Person Shooter fan, any fan of the Call of Duty franchise, and anyone looking for one of the best multiplayer experiences in gaming. I won't beat around the bush though, some of the fan-boys and the some of the casual players of MW3 can ruin your multiplayer experience, but that's why there's a mute feature.
~Tanksandguns
Skrillex-Bangarang (12/23/11): A Review
Posted by defeat on December 23rd, 2011, 7:11 pm. Category: Scribery Entry
Rating 5/10
Listen. I’ll start off by saying I’m as on the fence with the newest Skrillex release, entitled Bangarang, as I have been with all the others. The guy is an exciting producer, and the voice samples/hooks he’s used are unforgettable. However, as with his other releases, the mid-register robotesque bass lines, four to the floor beats, and general feel are the same as they ever were and absolutely forgettable. You’ve got the electronic industry by the balls, Skrillex, and the time to fix your broken record is nigh.
When Skrillex became an instant success, and his songs could be heard everywhere, I was impressed with the mash up of genre’s with him and Korn in the Korn single “Get Up“, and really enjoyed "Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites" and “Kill Everybody” off of Skrillex’s EP with the same name Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites. It seemed like a fresh, American take on the dubstep scene. That fresh take quickly turned into endless copycats and the post dubstep sub-genre dubbed “brostep”. As the forerunner of this new trend, Skrillex didn’t impress me with his first release, mildly did with his second release, and fails to with his newest.
There are definitely moments of production clarity on Bangarang in the title track (a song referencing the movie Hook?! Awesome!) and the non-bass line heavy house song “Right On Time“, but he even uses a broke up, syncopated, unintelligible, Asian sounding voice on the track “Summit” juuuust like he did on the track “Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites”. In a nutshell, Bangarang should be entitled Sonic the Househog On Crack. It’s got a Sonic the Hedgehog music + house + brostep sound on most of the songs on the seven song EP. If you are already a die-hard Skrillex fan (and I know you are out there as I just read the comment “Skrillex is life.“ from a fan on Skrillex’s Facebook page), you are going to absolutely love this album. If you haven’t ever heard Skrillex, and are into dubstep, you are probably going to like this album. The rest of us will either like it, dislike it, or think it’s OK (Mitch Hedberg anyone?). It does have bass drops and a couple buildups/breakdowns that make you smile with delight, so even after I write this review.....I’m still on the fence.
The title track:
Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross-T.G.w.t.D.T.Soundtrack: A Review
Posted by defeat on December 12th, 2011, 11:14 pm. Category: Scribery Entry
Rating: 10/10
When Atticus Ross and Trent Reznor work together, they don't just make music. They mold sounds into layers of emotional synesthesia, and their newest masterpiece, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, is no different. Your brain and body don't quite know what to do with themselves. You smile. You get the chills. You get creeped out. You contemplate, yet sometimes you stop thinking all together.
After the near three hour playtime ended, I took my headphones off and the first thing to come to mind was Homer's epic poems the Iliad and the Odyssey. If Homer were alive today, he'd be furiously writing a screenplay, day in and day out, so Reznor and Ross could give it the sonic pulse it (I'm sure) would deserve. They are just that good.
Reznor has always been one of my favorites as far as extremely layered music goes. I consider Nine Inch Nails' The Fragile to be the greatest double-album of my generation, and it's a perfect example of Mr. Reznor's musical depth. Atticus Ross, on the other hand is more of a minimalist, and I was first introduced to his music when he did some programming and/or produced Nine Inch Nails' last four albums. He also caught my attention whilst watching the movie The Book of Eli. The entire time I was thinking to myself, "This HAS to be either Trent, Atticus, or Saul Williams doing the soundtrack for this...." It was indeed Atticus, and I became a fan.
The soundtrack for The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is a drone type of electronica with some darker ambient soundscapes layered in, and when I write "layered in", I mean it as emphatically as is possible. It's the most complex minimalistic album ever created, if that's even possible. You'll always hear synth, and you'll sometimes hear keys, bells, guitars, strings, vibrations, xylophones etc., etc. One of the songs even has vocals, and oddly enough it's a cover of Zeppelin's "Immigrant Song" (featuring Karen O on vocals) In a nutshell, it's epic in every way possible. Find three hours and treat yourself to what's bound to be a Grammy winner.
Recommended if you enjoy: Sigur Ros, Ghosts I-IV by Nine Inch Nails, The Book of Eli (soundtrack), The Social Network (soundtrack)
When Atticus Ross and Trent Reznor work together, they don't just make music. They mold sounds into layers of emotional synesthesia, and their newest masterpiece, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, is no different. Your brain and body don't quite know what to do with themselves. You smile. You get the chills. You get creeped out. You contemplate, yet sometimes you stop thinking all together.
After the near three hour playtime ended, I took my headphones off and the first thing to come to mind was Homer's epic poems the Iliad and the Odyssey. If Homer were alive today, he'd be furiously writing a screenplay, day in and day out, so Reznor and Ross could give it the sonic pulse it (I'm sure) would deserve. They are just that good.
Reznor has always been one of my favorites as far as extremely layered music goes. I consider Nine Inch Nails' The Fragile to be the greatest double-album of my generation, and it's a perfect example of Mr. Reznor's musical depth. Atticus Ross, on the other hand is more of a minimalist, and I was first introduced to his music when he did some programming and/or produced Nine Inch Nails' last four albums. He also caught my attention whilst watching the movie The Book of Eli. The entire time I was thinking to myself, "This HAS to be either Trent, Atticus, or Saul Williams doing the soundtrack for this...." It was indeed Atticus, and I became a fan.
The soundtrack for The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is a drone type of electronica with some darker ambient soundscapes layered in, and when I write "layered in", I mean it as emphatically as is possible. It's the most complex minimalistic album ever created, if that's even possible. You'll always hear synth, and you'll sometimes hear keys, bells, guitars, strings, vibrations, xylophones etc., etc. One of the songs even has vocals, and oddly enough it's a cover of Zeppelin's "Immigrant Song" (featuring Karen O on vocals) In a nutshell, it's epic in every way possible. Find three hours and treat yourself to what's bound to be a Grammy winner.
Recommended if you enjoy: Sigur Ros, Ghosts I-IV by Nine Inch Nails, The Book of Eli (soundtrack), The Social Network (soundtrack)
allbroke- Broke/Free EP (12/02/2011): A Review
Posted by defeat on December 6th, 2011, 11:23 pm. Category: Scribery Entry
Rating: 10/10
The dubstep scene is in two factions at the moment. You’ve got the UK kids who are all, “Yeah, Yeah dubstep…it’s played out and now the Americans are catching on late….yet again.” And we also have the US kids who are getting into dubstep because the US producers/programmers decided to 1-UP the UK’s scene. I personally don’t get into all that myself. If the track is good…..the track is good, wherever and whenever it came out.
Now on to the album you all need to know about. Allbroke has had a few songs independently released recently, and his Facebook was droppin’ hints about a present to us all (his fans). It’s here. His present is the absolutely free EP Broke/Free.
This you are going to enjoy. It’s a mix between UK and US dubstep in all the right ways. The music itself tells a subtle sci-fi story in it’s four song way. Makes me wish dubstep was around when The Matrix was being produced. I think It would have been very cool for Allbroke to have had a couple songs on there.
“The Device” is the opener, and from start to beginning it walks us through a device being used to make some nasty drops. It’s a very unique song. I have yet to hear of anyone doing what Allbroke is doing here. With this opener you know you’ve stumbled upon something unique.
“Nostromo” is second in line and well. It’s pretty chill at first until 55 seconds in when it drops and don’t stop….in a good way. Enter some sci fi dialogue. Great song.
“Orion” The third track I really, really, really , really enjoyed. Sweet, sweet tension and release I am a fan of. This one however has more of a UK sound to it. Not that I’m complaining .
“Field Medic” This closure is the epitome of what I was trying to get across up in hurr. It’s a UKUSA dubstep orgy.
Over all this albums broke down the boundaries between UK and US dubstep with one fell swoop. I was impressed with the dynamics of it all. Solid, Solid, EP.
Recommened if you enjoy: Ed Solo, Datsik, skrillex, Nero
Now how about a music video combining the songs for maximum epic? EH?
The link to the FREE EP is
http://www.facebook.com/spirographed?ref=tn_tnmn#!/Allbroke
Like the page, download the nasty.
The dubstep scene is in two factions at the moment. You’ve got the UK kids who are all, “Yeah, Yeah dubstep…it’s played out and now the Americans are catching on late….yet again.” And we also have the US kids who are getting into dubstep because the US producers/programmers decided to 1-UP the UK’s scene. I personally don’t get into all that myself. If the track is good…..the track is good, wherever and whenever it came out.
Now on to the album you all need to know about. Allbroke has had a few songs independently released recently, and his Facebook was droppin’ hints about a present to us all (his fans). It’s here. His present is the absolutely free EP Broke/Free.
This you are going to enjoy. It’s a mix between UK and US dubstep in all the right ways. The music itself tells a subtle sci-fi story in it’s four song way. Makes me wish dubstep was around when The Matrix was being produced. I think It would have been very cool for Allbroke to have had a couple songs on there.
“The Device” is the opener, and from start to beginning it walks us through a device being used to make some nasty drops. It’s a very unique song. I have yet to hear of anyone doing what Allbroke is doing here. With this opener you know you’ve stumbled upon something unique.
“Nostromo” is second in line and well. It’s pretty chill at first until 55 seconds in when it drops and don’t stop….in a good way. Enter some sci fi dialogue. Great song.
“Orion” The third track I really, really, really , really enjoyed. Sweet, sweet tension and release I am a fan of. This one however has more of a UK sound to it. Not that I’m complaining .
“Field Medic” This closure is the epitome of what I was trying to get across up in hurr. It’s a UKUSA dubstep orgy.
Over all this albums broke down the boundaries between UK and US dubstep with one fell swoop. I was impressed with the dynamics of it all. Solid, Solid, EP.
Recommened if you enjoy: Ed Solo, Datsik, skrillex, Nero
Now how about a music video combining the songs for maximum epic? EH?
The link to the FREE EP is
http://www.facebook.com/spirographed?ref=tn_tnmn#!/Allbroke
Like the page, download the nasty.
A battle of time on communities
Posted by Demon on December 5th, 2011, 6:42 pm. Category: Scribery Entry
Time moves on inevitably, as I’m sure anyone can tell. Childhood memories become just what they are – memories. Not much can stay the same in a world rapidly evolving with people snaking along just as quickly towards some mysterious, unknown goal of worth we, as a society and race, have decided is vitally necessary. This is also true for the internet, but at a much broader and faster rate because of instant gratification and the scope of available tools for developers to build. While driving down ‘memory lane’ after twenty-odd years may bring the shock of finding your childhood home destroyed and a new shopping plaza in its place, you can still find your breath taken away at the vast and expanding internet. Simply visit Google and type in a keyword relative to your life (anything) and you’ll find more information instantly available than you can possibly read in your lifetime… with more being released as you’re reading!
Thus, what happens to a memory of a place once you can no longer visit it or feel that connection you once felt? How often do you drive or walk down a new, but familiar street where memories seem to come alive and flood into your conscious? Where do you go when you begin to relive those days of happiness, the shared, raw energy of a community? The whole experience can be quite a downer once you start thinking about those childhood playmates or perhaps the teenage adventures while testing the world, knowing you had your parents as a safety net. Where, then do you go when that memory is an online community?
Too often I’ve found myself needing information and simply visiting search engines like Google and Bing to find a quick resolution to any situation which may arise. This includes anything from technological break-downs, news, or entertainment; basically anything which would be best served instantly. It seems, at least to me, that technical forums and online ‘gurus’ have become a thing of the past. Why? Most times, ‘Googling’ an issue will bring up a laundry list of posts in forums with the exact problem, usually followed with an answer. However, the post was made and answered anywhere from ten years to a more recent four years. In either case, unless it’s a new product, there is no real need for posting on a forum only to wait days (if you’re lucky) for an intelligent response and possibly longer to get a true answer.
So where do communities fit into this? It seems only natural that communities, though once warm and welcoming to the casual internet browser, has become a thing of the past. They’ve been replaced with blogs and social networking where, again, everything revolves on instant gratification for the end-user. What kind of communities have survived? Other than those directly linked with a brand (Dell Technical Support – Love them) or with a particular product (Tip.It – A fansite based on a MMO game), it would seem there is little opportunity for growth among other communities. Yet there are still communities with mixed interests (Runevillage – A fansite-turned-general interest) where a wisp of memory and the attachment of veterans keep the community together, even through difficult times.
Despite the fondness of memories in our compulsive visits to places we’ve known and grown to love, there is a sort of sweet sorrow in their parting. Just as we must one day say goodbye to our parents, it feels there is an inevitable end to all communities – online or not. In a more directed note, while the Village may be the dear home of a few dedicated users who have stayed around for nearly the entirety of its life, the difficulty lies not in reviving the dead, but re-angling the community to be both ageless and timeless where simple trends don’t direct the life of the site as a whole. I’d say this has been the bane of countless sites with a targeted audience, because there was never any room allowed or even acknowledged to open the door for a broader scope of inclusion for outsiders and thus lays the self-imprisonment of sites with too little a mind to approach a large audience.
Simply putting it, the only means by which to survive in the rapid change and growth of the internet is to build and evolve with it, rather than staying focused on a single niche. A stubborn, slow mind will only be left behind as the community gathered moves on to bigger and better things, though they may still visit every so often (like an old man in a retirement home, perhaps). There can only be success where success is actively perceived and rendered into a useable model; building a strong community is great while there is community to build, but there has to be some means of bringing new users in and getting them attached the same way everyone else has become attached.
Thus, what happens to a memory of a place once you can no longer visit it or feel that connection you once felt? How often do you drive or walk down a new, but familiar street where memories seem to come alive and flood into your conscious? Where do you go when you begin to relive those days of happiness, the shared, raw energy of a community? The whole experience can be quite a downer once you start thinking about those childhood playmates or perhaps the teenage adventures while testing the world, knowing you had your parents as a safety net. Where, then do you go when that memory is an online community?
Too often I’ve found myself needing information and simply visiting search engines like Google and Bing to find a quick resolution to any situation which may arise. This includes anything from technological break-downs, news, or entertainment; basically anything which would be best served instantly. It seems, at least to me, that technical forums and online ‘gurus’ have become a thing of the past. Why? Most times, ‘Googling’ an issue will bring up a laundry list of posts in forums with the exact problem, usually followed with an answer. However, the post was made and answered anywhere from ten years to a more recent four years. In either case, unless it’s a new product, there is no real need for posting on a forum only to wait days (if you’re lucky) for an intelligent response and possibly longer to get a true answer.
So where do communities fit into this? It seems only natural that communities, though once warm and welcoming to the casual internet browser, has become a thing of the past. They’ve been replaced with blogs and social networking where, again, everything revolves on instant gratification for the end-user. What kind of communities have survived? Other than those directly linked with a brand (Dell Technical Support – Love them) or with a particular product (Tip.It – A fansite based on a MMO game), it would seem there is little opportunity for growth among other communities. Yet there are still communities with mixed interests (Runevillage – A fansite-turned-general interest) where a wisp of memory and the attachment of veterans keep the community together, even through difficult times.
Despite the fondness of memories in our compulsive visits to places we’ve known and grown to love, there is a sort of sweet sorrow in their parting. Just as we must one day say goodbye to our parents, it feels there is an inevitable end to all communities – online or not. In a more directed note, while the Village may be the dear home of a few dedicated users who have stayed around for nearly the entirety of its life, the difficulty lies not in reviving the dead, but re-angling the community to be both ageless and timeless where simple trends don’t direct the life of the site as a whole. I’d say this has been the bane of countless sites with a targeted audience, because there was never any room allowed or even acknowledged to open the door for a broader scope of inclusion for outsiders and thus lays the self-imprisonment of sites with too little a mind to approach a large audience.
Simply putting it, the only means by which to survive in the rapid change and growth of the internet is to build and evolve with it, rather than staying focused on a single niche. A stubborn, slow mind will only be left behind as the community gathered moves on to bigger and better things, though they may still visit every so often (like an old man in a retirement home, perhaps). There can only be success where success is actively perceived and rendered into a useable model; building a strong community is great while there is community to build, but there has to be some means of bringing new users in and getting them attached the same way everyone else has become attached.
LLL: Updated 1/07; info on my future in the scribery
Posted by Landerpurex on December 1st, 2011, 2:55 am. Category: Scribery Entry
**EDIT**
Alright, so I daresay you editors and high ranking officials at RV are not interested in pure literature or creative works being put on the front page. Though I think that is ludicrous, I also see why that is. The bottom line is that I go to the movies, like, A LOT. Think on a weekly basis, pretty much. I hope to make some topics there on the front page through reviewing new movies. I have already written two and dedicated several hours to doing so in an effort to help this place. I know they are somewhat outdated, Darkest Hour being most so but I intend to review newer releases soon. I plan on seeing The Devil Inside tomorrow, so perhaps you can expect that review soon.
I also know that there are tons of other movie review sites, far more comprehensive and those that have professional critics (HA), but I tried to take a frank, fresh approach to the movies that will help anyone who is looking for such information. I also have to say that I am inspired by Defeat, but no longer will I allow him to take the brunt of the responsibility here, and the glory along with it.
Bottom line is, I am not going to write nor post creative works if they have no chance of being used, similarly how I am not going to write to no end for the Villager.
If someone wishes to refute or update me on Scribery and subsequently, front page quality policy, I would be much obliged.
Also it should be noted that I would like to buy the new RPG coming out in February called Kingdoms of Amalur, so dibs on that review assuming I actually get the game.
***
This is the thread I'm gonna reserve for the (hopefully) many contributions I make to RV in its new direction. For now, I'm only posting one poem but expect more in the future. This is perhaps my favorite piece that I've written, and I believe it shows. Later, expect more poetry, short stories, and snippets from my novel/s.
That said, I need to post a small disclaimer: I hope to make a living as a writer someday, and much of what I post will be some of my best work. I retain all rights to my work as the author. In the unlikely event that I sell the rights to some of my work, I may ask for it to be taken off the site but that does not seem to be something that is possible for me to accept.
This was something I wrote for a two week intensive poetry seminar. I wrote this in response to my classmates who often said that my work was too triumphant, that it wasn't sad, depressing, or void of conflict. I hope you appreciate the satire. It's a form called "letter poetry" which I had never tried before, but I seem to be at least somewhat good at.
Alright, so I daresay you editors and high ranking officials at RV are not interested in pure literature or creative works being put on the front page. Though I think that is ludicrous, I also see why that is. The bottom line is that I go to the movies, like, A LOT. Think on a weekly basis, pretty much. I hope to make some topics there on the front page through reviewing new movies. I have already written two and dedicated several hours to doing so in an effort to help this place. I know they are somewhat outdated, Darkest Hour being most so but I intend to review newer releases soon. I plan on seeing The Devil Inside tomorrow, so perhaps you can expect that review soon.
I also know that there are tons of other movie review sites, far more comprehensive and those that have professional critics (HA), but I tried to take a frank, fresh approach to the movies that will help anyone who is looking for such information. I also have to say that I am inspired by Defeat, but no longer will I allow him to take the brunt of the responsibility here, and the glory along with it.
Bottom line is, I am not going to write nor post creative works if they have no chance of being used, similarly how I am not going to write to no end for the Villager.
If someone wishes to refute or update me on Scribery and subsequently, front page quality policy, I would be much obliged. Also it should be noted that I would like to buy the new RPG coming out in February called Kingdoms of Amalur, so dibs on that review assuming I actually get the game.
***
This is the thread I'm gonna reserve for the (hopefully) many contributions I make to RV in its new direction. For now, I'm only posting one poem but expect more in the future. This is perhaps my favorite piece that I've written, and I believe it shows. Later, expect more poetry, short stories, and snippets from my novel/s.
That said, I need to post a small disclaimer: I hope to make a living as a writer someday, and much of what I post will be some of my best work. I retain all rights to my work as the author. In the unlikely event that I sell the rights to some of my work, I may ask for it to be taken off the site but that does not seem to be something that is possible for me to accept.
This was something I wrote for a two week intensive poetry seminar. I wrote this in response to my classmates who often said that my work was too triumphant, that it wasn't sad, depressing, or void of conflict. I hope you appreciate the satire. It's a form called "letter poetry" which I had never tried before, but I seem to be at least somewhat good at.
Lander wrote:
Dear self,
You will never triumph against anything.
To presume otherwise is nothing
short of maniacal nonsense.
Wallow in your self pity,
Fill a pool with it,
Drown in it,
Glub.
Write your farewell poem in blood,
Then hang yourself.
Um, don’t do any of that.
I’m being facetious.
It surely wouldn’t kill you,
To let your weakness through
Every now and again.
Death dances around you.
He dances a jig in Swedish clogs.
He trips over his own robe,
Wreaking hellish havoc.
Pontificate.
Your father, dead by simultaneous stroke and heart attack
Your Uncle, dead by spidery spider cancer
Your cousin, dead by asthma attack
Your cousin, dead by drowning
Your mother, dead by house fire
Let a tear chart a new course
Down your cheek.
Taste bitterness.
Become angry.
Shout for no reason,
Curse the people who get under your skin.
Do it to their faces.
Your car’s a piece of,
Drive it til the wheels fall off,
Then light it on fire.
Loosen up and stop hiding
Your past and your trials.
They happened.
Pretending they aren’t real will only
Cause a quarter-life crisis.
Affectionately,
Me
You will never triumph against anything.
To presume otherwise is nothing
short of maniacal nonsense.
Wallow in your self pity,
Fill a pool with it,
Drown in it,
Glub.
Write your farewell poem in blood,
Then hang yourself.
Um, don’t do any of that.
I’m being facetious.
It surely wouldn’t kill you,
To let your weakness through
Every now and again.
Death dances around you.
He dances a jig in Swedish clogs.
He trips over his own robe,
Wreaking hellish havoc.
Pontificate.
Your father, dead by simultaneous stroke and heart attack
Your Uncle, dead by spidery spider cancer
Your cousin, dead by asthma attack
Your cousin, dead by drowning
Your mother, dead by house fire
Let a tear chart a new course
Down your cheek.
Taste bitterness.
Become angry.
Shout for no reason,
Curse the people who get under your skin.
Do it to their faces.
Your car’s a piece of
,Drive it til the wheels fall off,
Then light it on fire.
Loosen up and stop hiding
Your past and your trials.
They happened.
Pretending they aren’t real will only
Cause a quarter-life crisis.
Affectionately,
Me
By far, the most exciting news in the last year was the announcement of the latest entry in the Elder Scrolls series, Skyrim. Along with this announcement was a vast amount of detail on what would be included in the final product, as it would be released in less than 12 months, on November 11. The game is now out, and the biggest question series fans have had is this: Is it going to live up to previous games in the series?
I have to say what excited me was the announcement that this game would attempt to walk the line between Morrowind and Oblivion; Morrowind being one of my favorite games from childhood, and Oblivion being a technically good follow up set in a fairly generic setting. This is a pretty tall order. The magic of Morrowind, anyone can tell you, was in the discovery. You never knew what powerful ring you would find in that tomb across the river, or what daedric relic you'd pull out of the abandoned dwemer tower just outside of town.
Oblivion did away with this system, simply rewarding you these one of a kind items through quests; sure, a dungeon might provide a bunch of loot, but none of it had "pizzazz". None of it belonged to some great, unnamed warlock, and it certainly didn't belong to a demigod. You had to go talk to those guys in person, and you had to make sacrifices, but only when you hit the right level. Not the right level? Go back to Rockmilk and wait for those bandits and marauders to kill each other! Maybe after about ten delves you'll have fired your bow enough to get a level or two. It kind of got... boring. Not that other games don't have ridiculous amounts of grinding, but in a game claiming to be bigger and better than Morrowind, I expect even more relics to be dug up, not to just be handed to me for running between vendors and grabbing a shovel.
Skyrim, I'm happy to say, walks the line and leans toward the Morrowind side of the series. There's no telling what you'll find in any given cave, be it a powerful enemy wielding a magic weapon or a dragon wall providing you with immense power. The quests to find powerful artefacts often trigger just from discovering the tomb or strange item, so you still get the thrill of finding the artefact without feeling like you're a means to an end.
The world is wonderfully alien, just as it was in the good old days of the series. Expansive plains have herds of mammoths and giants wandering through, with beautiful mountains always in view. Rivers and streams flow through the landscape and look wonderful, although they are as much a nuisance as they are a beauty to look at. Often, there is no good way to cross a river without walking for what seems like miles out of your way. Attempting to wade across often goes awry, as there typically isn't a good way to climb out of said river. At this point, the best you can hope to do is survive the waterfall inevitably waiting 200 feet downstream and hope that you'll come out somewhere close to an actual road on the other side.
That's not to say that Oblivion's additions to the series were completely cut from the game; if anything, its shortcomings were tweaked until they became strengths for the game. While it didn't provide much in the way of setting, the fourth game in the series did a few things right: It simplified everything, and it added randomness in items. Skyrim expands on this.
Previous entries in the series required you to build your character around your Attributes, which governed skills, of which several selected as Major and [sometimes] Minor. You could only level up by increasing one of these selected skills, and then you had to weigh the pros and cons of increasing an attribute. These dilemmas are no more. Attributes: Gone. Major Skills: Nope nope. Minor Skills: That's been out of fashion for like ten years! All skills start the same, save for racial bonuses. You don't pick a class. You don't make a class. Whatever you use increases, and when a certain number of skill increases has been achieved, you level. You choose to increase your Health, Magicka, or Stamina bars, and then you get a perk to use to specialize in something. That's it. While I DO miss the challenge of increasing my luck, it's even better that I don't have to worry about respecializing in things after I've made my character. That isn't even a concern until after level 15 or so.
Building on the simplification of "Blade, Blunt, and Marksman", the weapon distinction has now become "One handed, Two handed, and Archery", with different sub-specializations within each skill tree that are up to you. One handed weapons include daggers, maces, swords, and one handed axes, and are great for damage dealers who don't want to take any damage. It goes hand in hand with the stealth tree, which only serves to make assassin characters even more overpowered (a common complaint I've heard of the game). From here you have the option to dual wield, a new feature to the series. It dramatically decreases your ability to block an attack, but the idea here is that you aren't going to be hit before this happens. Two handed is for people who don't mind getting punched in the face a couple times while swinging there weapon. These include greatswords, axes, and warhammers. Where does archery fit into all this? Very neatly, since it's so much more powerful than it ever was before. Put enough points into it, and it’s just as effective as any other weapon you could use.
Delving dungeons simply for magic items is always beneficial, especially at lower levels. Don't wear heavy armor, but still REALLY want that archery bonus? With the return of the Enchantment skill, items can be destroyed to learn their properties for use in making new ones. This means that equipment gathering is no longer the endless cycle of finding and selling and paying your first born to the Mage's Guild to make stuff temporarily better.
Oh, and dragons. With how late this review/rant is coming out, you've probably heard a lot about them already. Not a whole lot I can say on that matter except that they are far more fun than any of the other boss fights I have been involved with in this game up to this point. Fight them. Relish them, but remember that they are common throughout this game. If I had a nickel for every time I came out of fast travel and had to save a town, I wouldn’t have much money, because I don't think I've killed more than 20 dragons, and only like half those attacked towns. But I still feel like a boss.
Last, the main quest. I'm not going to get too much into this, because I honestly haven't done much with it. This shouldn't be a problem for many fans of the series, as no one really plays through it. From what I've seen of other people playing it, it is greatly improved story wise from Oblivion. What I can tell you is that guilds are back, with the Fighter's Guild and Mage's Guild being replaced by awesome. Dark Brotherhood is more disturbing than ever, and the Thieves Guild is... changed...
While a great game in and of itself, it stacks up with the best of the Elder Scrolls series. If you enjoyed any of those, give it a shot. It's definitely the best entry in the series. If you didn't, check it out anyway. Enough has changed that you may find yourself a new fan.
I have to say what excited me was the announcement that this game would attempt to walk the line between Morrowind and Oblivion; Morrowind being one of my favorite games from childhood, and Oblivion being a technically good follow up set in a fairly generic setting. This is a pretty tall order. The magic of Morrowind, anyone can tell you, was in the discovery. You never knew what powerful ring you would find in that tomb across the river, or what daedric relic you'd pull out of the abandoned dwemer tower just outside of town.
Oblivion did away with this system, simply rewarding you these one of a kind items through quests; sure, a dungeon might provide a bunch of loot, but none of it had "pizzazz". None of it belonged to some great, unnamed warlock, and it certainly didn't belong to a demigod. You had to go talk to those guys in person, and you had to make sacrifices, but only when you hit the right level. Not the right level? Go back to Rockmilk and wait for those bandits and marauders to kill each other! Maybe after about ten delves you'll have fired your bow enough to get a level or two. It kind of got... boring. Not that other games don't have ridiculous amounts of grinding, but in a game claiming to be bigger and better than Morrowind, I expect even more relics to be dug up, not to just be handed to me for running between vendors and grabbing a shovel.
Skyrim, I'm happy to say, walks the line and leans toward the Morrowind side of the series. There's no telling what you'll find in any given cave, be it a powerful enemy wielding a magic weapon or a dragon wall providing you with immense power. The quests to find powerful artefacts often trigger just from discovering the tomb or strange item, so you still get the thrill of finding the artefact without feeling like you're a means to an end.
The world is wonderfully alien, just as it was in the good old days of the series. Expansive plains have herds of mammoths and giants wandering through, with beautiful mountains always in view. Rivers and streams flow through the landscape and look wonderful, although they are as much a nuisance as they are a beauty to look at. Often, there is no good way to cross a river without walking for what seems like miles out of your way. Attempting to wade across often goes awry, as there typically isn't a good way to climb out of said river. At this point, the best you can hope to do is survive the waterfall inevitably waiting 200 feet downstream and hope that you'll come out somewhere close to an actual road on the other side.
That's not to say that Oblivion's additions to the series were completely cut from the game; if anything, its shortcomings were tweaked until they became strengths for the game. While it didn't provide much in the way of setting, the fourth game in the series did a few things right: It simplified everything, and it added randomness in items. Skyrim expands on this.
Previous entries in the series required you to build your character around your Attributes, which governed skills, of which several selected as Major and [sometimes] Minor. You could only level up by increasing one of these selected skills, and then you had to weigh the pros and cons of increasing an attribute. These dilemmas are no more. Attributes: Gone. Major Skills: Nope nope. Minor Skills: That's been out of fashion for like ten years! All skills start the same, save for racial bonuses. You don't pick a class. You don't make a class. Whatever you use increases, and when a certain number of skill increases has been achieved, you level. You choose to increase your Health, Magicka, or Stamina bars, and then you get a perk to use to specialize in something. That's it. While I DO miss the challenge of increasing my luck, it's even better that I don't have to worry about respecializing in things after I've made my character. That isn't even a concern until after level 15 or so.
Building on the simplification of "Blade, Blunt, and Marksman", the weapon distinction has now become "One handed, Two handed, and Archery", with different sub-specializations within each skill tree that are up to you. One handed weapons include daggers, maces, swords, and one handed axes, and are great for damage dealers who don't want to take any damage. It goes hand in hand with the stealth tree, which only serves to make assassin characters even more overpowered (a common complaint I've heard of the game). From here you have the option to dual wield, a new feature to the series. It dramatically decreases your ability to block an attack, but the idea here is that you aren't going to be hit before this happens. Two handed is for people who don't mind getting punched in the face a couple times while swinging there weapon. These include greatswords, axes, and warhammers. Where does archery fit into all this? Very neatly, since it's so much more powerful than it ever was before. Put enough points into it, and it’s just as effective as any other weapon you could use.
Delving dungeons simply for magic items is always beneficial, especially at lower levels. Don't wear heavy armor, but still REALLY want that archery bonus? With the return of the Enchantment skill, items can be destroyed to learn their properties for use in making new ones. This means that equipment gathering is no longer the endless cycle of finding and selling and paying your first born to the Mage's Guild to make stuff temporarily better.
Oh, and dragons. With how late this review/rant is coming out, you've probably heard a lot about them already. Not a whole lot I can say on that matter except that they are far more fun than any of the other boss fights I have been involved with in this game up to this point. Fight them. Relish them, but remember that they are common throughout this game. If I had a nickel for every time I came out of fast travel and had to save a town, I wouldn’t have much money, because I don't think I've killed more than 20 dragons, and only like half those attacked towns. But I still feel like a boss.
Last, the main quest. I'm not going to get too much into this, because I honestly haven't done much with it. This shouldn't be a problem for many fans of the series, as no one really plays through it. From what I've seen of other people playing it, it is greatly improved story wise from Oblivion. What I can tell you is that guilds are back, with the Fighter's Guild and Mage's Guild being replaced by awesome. Dark Brotherhood is more disturbing than ever, and the Thieves Guild is... changed...
While a great game in and of itself, it stacks up with the best of the Elder Scrolls series. If you enjoyed any of those, give it a shot. It's definitely the best entry in the series. If you didn't, check it out anyway. Enough has changed that you may find yourself a new fan.
29-Mar-2010 - Egg-streme Management (Easter 2010)
Posted by Glodenox on March 29th, 2010, 10:38 am. Category: RuneScape News
Runescape.com wrote:
In this year’s Easter holiday event, you’ll once again visit Easter Bunny Jr’s (EBJ) Egg Plant factory, fix his broken machines, de-funk the Easter Bird and retrain a jobsworth squirrel workforce, but all that’s just the start of it! EBJ has discovered the joys of having ‘face time’ with his customers and, so embroiled in customer satisfaction red tape as he is, requires a middle manager to run the entire work-floor production line.
Once the factory floor is up and running, it’s up to you to delegate ‘production resource’ and get everyone ‘moving forward’ with the task of fulfilling this year’s chocolate egg quota. From the look of EBJ’s clients, the word ‘deadline’ couldn’t be more appropriate, so hurry up and deliver the goods before the bunny gets eaten, set upon by goblins, loses his ‘ealth or worse.
Prove your blue collar credentials and you’ll win over some new squirrel-friend workmates, avoiding a ‘Miscellanian Kiss’ from one particular blue-faced rodent in the process. At this rate, you’ll be the one wearing the big bunny suit next Easter.
Mod Fnord
RuneScape Content Developer
Summary:
In other news...
As promised in the Guaranteed Content Poll, the Darkbow can now be recoloured. Stop by Barbarian Assault and talk to Commander Connad to get yours changed.
Easter will be in-game for at least two weeks from this update.
Once the factory floor is up and running, it’s up to you to delegate ‘production resource’ and get everyone ‘moving forward’ with the task of fulfilling this year’s chocolate egg quota. From the look of EBJ’s clients, the word ‘deadline’ couldn’t be more appropriate, so hurry up and deliver the goods before the bunny gets eaten, set upon by goblins, loses his ‘ealth or worse.
Prove your blue collar credentials and you’ll win over some new squirrel-friend workmates, avoiding a ‘Miscellanian Kiss’ from one particular blue-faced rodent in the process. At this rate, you’ll be the one wearing the big bunny suit next Easter.
Mod Fnord
RuneScape Content Developer
Summary:
Quote:
Where to start Egg-streme Management:
Talk to Charlie the squirrel, south of Falador.
Requirements to play Egg-streme Management:
None.
Talk to Charlie the squirrel, south of Falador.
Requirements to play Egg-streme Management:
None.
In other news...
As promised in the Guaranteed Content Poll, the Darkbow can now be recoloured. Stop by Barbarian Assault and talk to Commander Connad to get yours changed.
Easter will be in-game for at least two weeks from this update.
23-March-2010 - Fish Flingers
Posted by Ezcal on March 23rd, 2010, 1:48 pm. Category: RuneScape News
RuneScape.com wrote:
Fish: what do they mean to you? Perhaps they’re your primary source of income, having fashioned yourself a career in angling. Perhaps they’re your main expense, as you munch your way through death-defying combat encounters. Whatever they mean to you, there is a band of expert fishermen who are simply keen to spread the joy that fishing brings them. As such, they have opened their little-known island, Isla Anglerine, for regular ‘Fish Flingers’ fishing competitions that are open to the masses. Doing well in these competitions will reward you with Fishing XP, raw fish and tackle boxes - useful for keeping your fishing gear tidy.
If you spend time around Catherby or the Fishing Guild, then you’ll occasionally find expert fishermen wandering around, who will be happy to give you more information about Fish Flingers and teleport you to Isla Anglerine. The competitions run every 90 minutes, with the island’s waiting area opening five minutes before each competition starts. You don’t need to bring any equipment, and there is no need to store any items in the bank before playing.
What makes the island ideal is the schools of unusual fish subspecies it attracts. With the tackle box provided, can you find the ideal tackle for each type of fish? Should you use worms or crickets as bait? Which hook is best? How far from the shore are the largest fish? Are they at the docks or perhaps the beach?
Select your tackle and cast your line, then refine your technique to land more and bigger fish than your competitors. There’s everything to play for as you accumulate medals and awards for various feats. Make sure you use your time in the competition wisely, though, as to give everyone a fair chance the expert fishermen have limited each avid angler to ten competitions a week.
As well as a healthy dose of raw fish and raw Fishing experience, with time, you’ll also gain the opportunity to purchase tackle boxes, items that should make fishing trips a more organised affair.
Mod Roderick
RuneScape Content Developer
Summary:
Where to start Fish Flingers:
Talk to the fishermen who regularly appear on Catherby's beach, and both inside and outside of the Fishing Guild.
Requirements to play Fish Flingers:
There are no requirements to play Fish Flingers.
In other news...
Rune guardian pets from the Rune Mechanics quest will now change colour when you use them on any Runecrafting altar but Ourania. To get a new, ‘blank’ rune guardian, talk to Clerval after storing your current guardian in your POH menagerie.
Rune guardian pets are also able to channel the energies of the four element altars (air, water, earth and fire) into infinity robes (hat, top and bottom) to change their colour too. These can be changed back to normal by using them on your rune guardian pet.
The number of pets you can store in your player-owned house menagerie has been increased from 10 to 15, but only if you've built a mahogany pet feeder and you have a consecrated, desecrated or natural pet house.
You can now store the Helmet of Trials and Mask of Dragith Nurn, both from The Blood Pact, in your POH costume room.
After completing the Making History quest you can now re-obtain mjolnirs. You can buy a replacement key after completing the quest to allow you to find another mjolnir.
You can use extreme Herblore potions in Clan Wars, providing the ‘Potions’ option is enabled by the organiser and the ‘Dangerous’ option is off.
Any players who had built multiple Shattered Heart statues in their player-owned house will find that they've been removed. As soon as you rebuild the statue in your study, the statue will be rebuilt to its previous state. If you had already removed a duplicate statue, any progress will have been lost.
If you spend time around Catherby or the Fishing Guild, then you’ll occasionally find expert fishermen wandering around, who will be happy to give you more information about Fish Flingers and teleport you to Isla Anglerine. The competitions run every 90 minutes, with the island’s waiting area opening five minutes before each competition starts. You don’t need to bring any equipment, and there is no need to store any items in the bank before playing.
What makes the island ideal is the schools of unusual fish subspecies it attracts. With the tackle box provided, can you find the ideal tackle for each type of fish? Should you use worms or crickets as bait? Which hook is best? How far from the shore are the largest fish? Are they at the docks or perhaps the beach?
Select your tackle and cast your line, then refine your technique to land more and bigger fish than your competitors. There’s everything to play for as you accumulate medals and awards for various feats. Make sure you use your time in the competition wisely, though, as to give everyone a fair chance the expert fishermen have limited each avid angler to ten competitions a week.
As well as a healthy dose of raw fish and raw Fishing experience, with time, you’ll also gain the opportunity to purchase tackle boxes, items that should make fishing trips a more organised affair.
Mod Roderick
RuneScape Content Developer
Summary:
Where to start Fish Flingers:
Talk to the fishermen who regularly appear on Catherby's beach, and both inside and outside of the Fishing Guild.
Requirements to play Fish Flingers:
There are no requirements to play Fish Flingers.
In other news...
Rune guardian pets from the Rune Mechanics quest will now change colour when you use them on any Runecrafting altar but Ourania. To get a new, ‘blank’ rune guardian, talk to Clerval after storing your current guardian in your POH menagerie.
Rune guardian pets are also able to channel the energies of the four element altars (air, water, earth and fire) into infinity robes (hat, top and bottom) to change their colour too. These can be changed back to normal by using them on your rune guardian pet.
The number of pets you can store in your player-owned house menagerie has been increased from 10 to 15, but only if you've built a mahogany pet feeder and you have a consecrated, desecrated or natural pet house.
You can now store the Helmet of Trials and Mask of Dragith Nurn, both from The Blood Pact, in your POH costume room.
After completing the Making History quest you can now re-obtain mjolnirs. You can buy a replacement key after completing the quest to allow you to find another mjolnir.
You can use extreme Herblore potions in Clan Wars, providing the ‘Potions’ option is enabled by the organiser and the ‘Dangerous’ option is off.
Any players who had built multiple Shattered Heart statues in their player-owned house will find that they've been removed. As soon as you rebuild the statue in your study, the statue will be rebuilt to its previous state. If you had already removed a duplicate statue, any progress will have been lost.
RVET #31: King Black Dragon Hunt! (Over, thanks for coming!)
Posted by Dark Paladin on March 21st, 2010, 10:36 pm. Category: Global announcement
RVET Event #31: March 2010
King Black Dragon Hunt
What a boring existence this has turned out to be. Me--the King of Black Dragons--diminished to waiting around for some random adventurer to stumble into my Lair. There was a time, quite a long time even, when the sheer mention of my name brought fear into the hearts of everyone in Gielinor. But then that oversized bug in the desert came along...followed by others like the Waterbirth Trio, Lava-loving Jad, and Mr. Gibberish off to the north. It's almost as if everyone has gotten tired of me beating them up and taking their Rune armor away.
Well, I'll show them. Three heads are better than one--much more so if they spit fire, ice, AND poison. I'll make the next person to step foot in here sorry they'd EVER crossed my path.
And speak of the devil, what do we have here? It looks like another small group of overconfident, unsuspecting "Dragon Slayers"...
General InformationWhat: KBD Hunt!
When: Saturday, March 27
World: 104 (P2P)
Time: 9 PM GMT, 5 PM EST, 2 PM PST
Meeting Place: Edgeville
KBD Hunt Information
Ready for the RVET's second Boss Hunt? We sure are! The King Black Dragon, once the mightiest creature in all of RuneScape, has been since dwarfed by monsters such as the Kalphite Queen, God Wars Bosses, and Chaos Elemental, just to name a few. However, come ill-equipped to his lair, proclaiming yourself a "Dragon Slayer", and he'll still show you exactly how much of one you're not.
We will gather in a Clan Chat in-game (to be announced at the event) to communicate better with each other during the fight. In addition, this is a Dangerous event! You can and will be killed if you're not prepared, and dying in the KBD's Lair means you will lose the items you are carrying.
Three dragon heads are surely better than one, but a dozen RuneVillagers fighting together are better still. Don your special shields, dodge the Revenants on the way out there, remember the anti-poisons, and help us slay that tremendous beast! We hope to see you all this Saturday!
Recent RVET Event Winners
This section proclaims the winners of past RVET events. Want to have your name up here on a Global for all to see? Come on down to our events and give it your all!
November '09 Skilling Contest Winners (MI & SM): Glodenox and Simons Pure
August '09 Games Room Champions: ZinyX (Runelink) and Jackstick (Draughts)
July '09 Skilling Contest Winners (FI & WC): Avian Maid & Glodenox
April '09 Skilling Contest Winners (FM & RC): Vincent Ashe & mentos
February '09 Barbarian Assault Team: Glodenox, Weirdocal, Jaron, Vincent Ashe, Jimmybe
January '09 Staff vs. Villagers War: Villagers win
December '08 Fight Pits Champion: Jaron
August '08 Who's that Villager Winner: Jackstick
May '08 Castle Wars Winners: Team Saradomin
April '08 Trouble Brewing Team: Caedo, Goten, Jaron, Justin, Shadow7, Simons Pure
March '08 Egg Hunt Winners: Simons Pure (2 eggs), Shadowsmage, Zinyx, Devil Fly
February '08 Snowball Fight Victors: Justin's Wind Faction
January '08 Fight Pits Champions: Simons Pure, Paidea, Ges2
December '07 Games Room Champions: Dark Paladin, Jaron, The123king, The Slayer
About The RuneVillage Events Team
The RuneVillage Events Team is a team lead by Dark Paladin and Jaron, with strong support from Jackstick, Jimmybe, Tanksandguns, and Zapp. Together, we plan one event every month for all of RuneVillage to participate in. Hopefully, you will enjoy this event as well as every other event we host, as a lot of thought and time goes into each and every one we do. Also note that if you have an idea for an event and want our help, please do not hesitate to contact us and we shall see if we can help out.
- The RuneVillage Events Team -
Database Upgrade coming up
Posted by Glodenox on March 19th, 2010, 1:43 pm. Category: RuneVillage News
Hey everybody,
Around 10:30AM (GMT) this Saturday (so in about 16 hours from this message) I'll have a stab at updating to a more recent version of our database software. There are a couple of features in there that should be handy for us, but I'm not 100% certain this upgrade will go without problems. I will obviously take a backup just before I initiate the upgrade, but anything that happens between the making of that backup and the actual upgrade could be lost in case something goes wrong.
The board and the chat will still be accessible, but you won't be able to do anything because the database won't be available during the upgrade...
I'm not exactly certain how long this would take, but considering our database's history, I'd estimate it to be about an hour.
So if you are going to post something you don't want to risk losing: don't post it after that time. Normally speaking nothing should get lost in the upgrade, but better be safe than sorry.
Greetings,
Glodenox
Around 10:30AM (GMT) this Saturday (so in about 16 hours from this message) I'll have a stab at updating to a more recent version of our database software. There are a couple of features in there that should be handy for us, but I'm not 100% certain this upgrade will go without problems. I will obviously take a backup just before I initiate the upgrade, but anything that happens between the making of that backup and the actual upgrade could be lost in case something goes wrong.
The board and the chat will still be accessible, but you won't be able to do anything because the database won't be available during the upgrade...
I'm not exactly certain how long this would take, but considering our database's history, I'd estimate it to be about an hour.
So if you are going to post something you don't want to risk losing: don't post it after that time. Normally speaking nothing should get lost in the upgrade, but better be safe than sorry.
Greetings,
Glodenox
Signature of the Month #6 - BEACH PARTY!
Posted by Rocky on March 16th, 2010, 7:34 pm. Category: RuneVillage News
Greetings, and welcome to the OH GOD IT'S SPRING BREAK WOOOOOOOOO Edition of the Signature of the Month competition!
In a startling turn of events, MiKeBoY2003 fought off all competitors in a heroic display of vitality and madness to claim the one, and only, place on the podium this last month. Congratulations on your unopposed victory Mike!
Now, on to the good stuff.
*Ahem*
WOO YEAH SPRING BREAK AWESOME SIGNATURES AND STUFF GO TEAM
*wanders off to the beach*
The deadline for SotM #6 is April 10th, 2010. The results for this competition will be announced in the next competition's topic and in the Winner's List.
Need some help? Check out our Graphics Tutorial Supersticky and our Graphic Design Resource Guide.
» Rule 1: The signature size limits for the SotM are 500x150 pixels and 150kb file size. Users who submit signatures above these limits will be pmed. If they don't resize the image, they will be disqualified from the competition.
» Rule 2: All signatures must be made by you and no one else! You may work with stock images but you have to actually add a significant amount of your own work to it for it to be submitted in the competition. You may NOT find an existing signature, add onto it, and submit it as your own.
» Rule 3: All RuneVillage Rules apply to this competition. If the signature you submit violates any of the rules, it will not be submitted and you -may- be disqualified from the competition.
» Rule 4: Some SotM competitions will have themes, and you must follow the theme to be entered in the competition.
» Rule 5: You may only submit ONE signature in each competition. If you submit more than one, you will be asked to pick one to submit.
» Rule 6: You may not enter in any SotM competitions if you are a SotM Judge.
» Rule 7: Any signature you enter must not have been submitted in any previous SotW or SotM competitions and must not be submitted in future SotM competitions.
If you have any questions about the SotM please post them in this topic or pm Jackstick or Rocky Martin.
Thanks!
- The Signature of the Month Team
15-Mar-2010 - The Blood Pact and Lumbridge Catacombs
Posted by Jocund on March 15th, 2010, 10:32 am. Category: RuneScape News
Quote:
Some adventurers never retire, but, as they get older, they learn the value of teamwork. Veteran adventurer Xenia has seen some Zamorakian cultists take a prisoner into the catacombs beneath Lumbridge Church, but she wants another adventurer to join her before she heads in after them. Xenia was there when the catacombs were built, so she knows something about the dark secrets that they contain. If the cultists have discovered those same secrets, then their prisoner will be only the first of many victims. It's up to you to stop them.
The Blood Pact is the first free-to-play quest we’ve released in many years, not counting the tutorial and seasonal events. It's meant as a suitable first adventure for a brand new character. Completing the quest will reward you with a set of weapons and access to the Lumbridge Catacombs – a dungeon that’s also designed for low-level characters, full of new monsters to fight, which drop the collectable parts of a new costume item.
In other news...
With the release of The Blood Pact, there are now 300 Quest Points available in the game. If you have the full 300 points, make sure you speak to Xenia again after completing The Blood Pact, as she has a special reward to help you show off your dedication to quests. Unlike the Quest Cape, the new item's requirements will stay fixed at 300 Quest Points even after new quests are released – once you can wear it, you can wear it forever.
Weapons with a high-enough slash attack can now cut through webs. These are items such as the whip, Dharok's axe, the dragon 2h and battleaxe, godswords, Guthan's spear and the staff of light.
The Blood Pact is the first free-to-play quest we’ve released in many years, not counting the tutorial and seasonal events. It's meant as a suitable first adventure for a brand new character. Completing the quest will reward you with a set of weapons and access to the Lumbridge Catacombs – a dungeon that’s also designed for low-level characters, full of new monsters to fight, which drop the collectable parts of a new costume item.
In other news...
With the release of The Blood Pact, there are now 300 Quest Points available in the game. If you have the full 300 points, make sure you speak to Xenia again after completing The Blood Pact, as she has a special reward to help you show off your dedication to quests. Unlike the Quest Cape, the new item's requirements will stay fixed at 300 Quest Points even after new quests are released – once you can wear it, you can wear it forever.
Weapons with a high-enough slash attack can now cut through webs. These are items such as the whip, Dharok's axe, the dragon 2h and battleaxe, godswords, Guthan's spear and the staff of light.
RV Lounge Under New Management
Posted by Sayaka on March 12th, 2010, 7:22 pm. Category: RuneVillage News
Hey everyone!
Most of you are aware that I am the RV Lounge Manager, or more specifically, the person in charge of the policies of RV Lounge and how our official RuneScape Clan Chat Channel is handled. Over time, the channel has become a place where certain groups of people have a great time, but sometimes at the expense of the feelings of others. Even a handful of RV Lounge's own moderators have expressed disdain that the channel isn't the shining place it was at its outset, which causes a few to not want to moderate it at all. This simply should not be! Unfortunately, as my ability and/or drive to actively play RuneScape has dwindled in the past couple of years, being the manager of RV Lounge is very much more part of the problem than it is part of the solution. While I've tried to brainstorm ways and procedures to help the channel out and restore its former glory, it all comes right back to the fact that I simply don't play the game enough anymore to actively know exactly what is happening on a day-to-day basis, and thus, what needs to be changed, and what doesn't.
This is why, with the consent of the rest of the administration, I've selected Goten to take over for me as the new RV Lounge Manager. Goten has consistently and repeatedly proven himself to be a trustworthy villager with a firm grasp of how things currently are and how they should be handled, and I'm certain that he will do a fantastic job as the new RV Lounge Manager. This means that he'll be in charge of RV Lounge in general, including it's policies, moderator team, and methods of disciplining rulebreaking players. However, do note that while Goten will have near-full control of RV Lounge, he will not be in ownership of the account itself. We always have and still do take Account Sharing very seriously (if we didn't, we'd still be in RV CC instead of RV Lounge!) and as such I will still be maintaining the Moderator List and Banlist of the channel. But rest assured, if there's anything I've been able to do well in my nearly two years with the responsibility, it's keeping those lists updated with accuracy and no procrastination.
Many villagers hold the belief (and rightly so) that we should be trying our best to attract new people to RuneVillage. Think about it--when new people come to the Village, that means they're currently playing RuneScape. And that means that they'll undoubtably pop into RV Lounge and see what RuneVillage is all about! Thus, this new management of RV Lounge and the higher emphasis on the Clan Chat Channel itself is crucial to RuneVillage's future success.
Well, you've heard enough from my end of things, so it's time for me to turn over the mic to Goten, who I know is excited to announce what changes RV Lounge will be undergoing, effective immediately. Thanks!
Most of you are aware that I am the RV Lounge Manager, or more specifically, the person in charge of the policies of RV Lounge and how our official RuneScape Clan Chat Channel is handled. Over time, the channel has become a place where certain groups of people have a great time, but sometimes at the expense of the feelings of others. Even a handful of RV Lounge's own moderators have expressed disdain that the channel isn't the shining place it was at its outset, which causes a few to not want to moderate it at all. This simply should not be! Unfortunately, as my ability and/or drive to actively play RuneScape has dwindled in the past couple of years, being the manager of RV Lounge is very much more part of the problem than it is part of the solution. While I've tried to brainstorm ways and procedures to help the channel out and restore its former glory, it all comes right back to the fact that I simply don't play the game enough anymore to actively know exactly what is happening on a day-to-day basis, and thus, what needs to be changed, and what doesn't.
This is why, with the consent of the rest of the administration, I've selected Goten to take over for me as the new RV Lounge Manager. Goten has consistently and repeatedly proven himself to be a trustworthy villager with a firm grasp of how things currently are and how they should be handled, and I'm certain that he will do a fantastic job as the new RV Lounge Manager. This means that he'll be in charge of RV Lounge in general, including it's policies, moderator team, and methods of disciplining rulebreaking players. However, do note that while Goten will have near-full control of RV Lounge, he will not be in ownership of the account itself. We always have and still do take Account Sharing very seriously (if we didn't, we'd still be in RV CC instead of RV Lounge!) and as such I will still be maintaining the Moderator List and Banlist of the channel. But rest assured, if there's anything I've been able to do well in my nearly two years with the responsibility, it's keeping those lists updated with accuracy and no procrastination.
Many villagers hold the belief (and rightly so) that we should be trying our best to attract new people to RuneVillage. Think about it--when new people come to the Village, that means they're currently playing RuneScape. And that means that they'll undoubtably pop into RV Lounge and see what RuneVillage is all about! Thus, this new management of RV Lounge and the higher emphasis on the Clan Chat Channel itself is crucial to RuneVillage's future success.
Well, you've heard enough from my end of things, so it's time for me to turn over the mic to Goten, who I know is excited to announce what changes RV Lounge will be undergoing, effective immediately. Thanks!
The site will be offline for maintenance (part II)
Posted by Glodenox on March 7th, 2010, 10:00 am. Category: RuneVillage News
EDIT: I'll be performing maintenance on the server at around 2AM CET, depending on when I get home again this evening. Mainly the dynamic parts of the site are going to be unavailable for a short while. I apparently forgot to enable a couple of options (not related to the attack we had on us yesterday) which are really needed.
The estimated downtime would be about 20 minutes.
EDIT2: and that one went perfectly fine without any bump.
Greetings,
Glodenox
I'll be applying the update in 2 hours from this post. This upgrade will take approximately 25 minutes. During that time, the chat should still be functional and I'll also be available for information over there during the upgrade.
It has been a while since we've upgraded to a new version of phpBB. Some new features will be added, such as the ability to report PM's and extra checks so that if someone edited a post you are trying to edit, you get a warning about that. Also, the registration image will be replaced with reCAPTCHA, which should be easier to read for humans and more difficult for automated bots. The biggest change should be that the board will be a bit faster in loading its pages due to a better caching system.
Greetings,
Glodenox
The estimated downtime would be about 20 minutes.
EDIT2: and that one went perfectly fine without any bump.
Greetings,
Glodenox
I'll be applying the update in 2 hours from this post. This upgrade will take approximately 25 minutes. During that time, the chat should still be functional and I'll also be available for information over there during the upgrade.
It has been a while since we've upgraded to a new version of phpBB. Some new features will be added, such as the ability to report PM's and extra checks so that if someone edited a post you are trying to edit, you get a warning about that. Also, the registration image will be replaced with reCAPTCHA, which should be easier to read for humans and more difficult for automated bots. The biggest change should be that the board will be a bit faster in loading its pages due to a better caching system.
Greetings,
Glodenox
03-Mar-2010 - What Constitutes the Change?
Posted by mammal365 on March 3rd, 2010, 7:25 pm. Category: RuneScape News
Quote:
Why have we made this change?
We have often felt that the early levels of RuneScape are quite tough to understand and learn, and have been consistently working on improvements to the initial part of the game for the last two years or so.
One of the things we realised from play-testing our game was that new players hit quite a lot of zeros while training combat, and zeros are boring. We wanted to give more excitement to the early parts of the game without making it easier.
Equally, when a new player was hit by a monster, they only had 10 hitpoints to absorb that hit. The minimum damage we can do to that player is 1, which was 10% of their total hitpoints - a hit too big for someone learning the game.
With this change, we can allow low-level player to take hits more appropriate for their level, and deal small amounts of damage instead of seeing so many zeros.
Why change the name of the skill?
The term 'hit points' is a term associated with typical pen-and-paper roleplaying games. Traditionally, it’s a mechanic that allows a player to track how many hits they can take before they die. When we realised that our hitpoints mechanic needed to be changed, we didn’t want to confuse our players by using the same term to describe something else, so decided to remove the old term completely.
Are there any other benefits to the change?
We can start to use the skill itself in quests and skill updates. The problem we had with the skill being the same at the total hits a player could take was that we could never really affect the skill itself. This change allows us to add things like Constitution potions, which could increase your maximum life points but not actually heal you, or add a weapon that drains your opponent’s Constitution stat as well as doing damage to them. It really opens up lots of new design opportunities that were previously unavailable. If you have any ideas on how we can use the Constitution stat, please let us know on the Suggestions - Skill forums.
Is this the new skill you were talking about?
No! We are still working on the new skill; this is not it.
We have often felt that the early levels of RuneScape are quite tough to understand and learn, and have been consistently working on improvements to the initial part of the game for the last two years or so.
One of the things we realised from play-testing our game was that new players hit quite a lot of zeros while training combat, and zeros are boring. We wanted to give more excitement to the early parts of the game without making it easier.
Equally, when a new player was hit by a monster, they only had 10 hitpoints to absorb that hit. The minimum damage we can do to that player is 1, which was 10% of their total hitpoints - a hit too big for someone learning the game.
With this change, we can allow low-level player to take hits more appropriate for their level, and deal small amounts of damage instead of seeing so many zeros.
Why change the name of the skill?
The term 'hit points' is a term associated with typical pen-and-paper roleplaying games. Traditionally, it’s a mechanic that allows a player to track how many hits they can take before they die. When we realised that our hitpoints mechanic needed to be changed, we didn’t want to confuse our players by using the same term to describe something else, so decided to remove the old term completely.
Are there any other benefits to the change?
We can start to use the skill itself in quests and skill updates. The problem we had with the skill being the same at the total hits a player could take was that we could never really affect the skill itself. This change allows us to add things like Constitution potions, which could increase your maximum life points but not actually heal you, or add a weapon that drains your opponent’s Constitution stat as well as doing damage to them. It really opens up lots of new design opportunities that were previously unavailable. If you have any ideas on how we can use the Constitution stat, please let us know on the Suggestions - Skill forums.
Is this the new skill you were talking about?
No! We are still working on the new skill; this is not it.
03-Mar-2010 - Improving Success when Smelting Iron (Free
Posted by Dark Paladin on March 3rd, 2010, 4:48 pm. Category: RuneScape News
RuneScape.com wrote:
Previously, when smelting iron ore, there was only a 50/50 chance that it would result in an iron bar (the rest of the time it would just be lost). Now, that success rate has changed so that, at level 15 Smithing, you will succeed 50% of the time, and from level 45 Smithing onwards, you will succeed 80% of the time (gaining an extra 1% chance of success per Smithing level earned in between).
Free players are more likely to have interest in this update, as members have access to rings of forging, a limited-use item that grants 100% success when smelting iron, but this change benefits everybody.
Mod Hew
RuneScape Content Developer
Free players are more likely to have interest in this update, as members have access to rings of forging, a limited-use item that grants 100% success when smelting iron, but this change benefits everybody.
Mod Hew
RuneScape Content Developer
03-Mar-2010 - Shattered Heart
Posted by Dark Paladin on March 3rd, 2010, 4:47 pm. Category: RuneScape News
RuneScape.com wrote:
While you're out and about practising your non-combat skills or wandering around your house, keep an eye out for ‘strange rocks’. These will usually appear in your inventory and will be of interest to the archaeologists at Varrock Museum.
As you deliver each strange rock to the museum, your discovery will start to take shape; you’ll have the opportunity to gain a little more Kudos from your peers; and you’ll also get some extra knowledge in Agility, Construction, Cooking, Crafting, Farming, Firemaking, Fishing, Fletching, Herblore, Hunter, Mining, Runecrafting, Smithing, Thieving or Woodcutting (depending upon which skill you were training when you discovered the strange rock).
The museum archaeologists encourage you to train each of the skills listed above, as only then will you be able to find every piece of...whatever it is you’re finding. Indeed, it may well be a good time to train a wide variety of skills, so as to gather resources in preparation for future skill training or the upcoming Bonus XP Weekend (starting Friday 12th March).
You can also learn something of Dahmaroc, a Second Age mage who was cursed in a battle over the limited supply of runes in those dark times. With diligent study, this could lead to another reward, this one of more solid and permanent construction...
If, for any reason, you'd prefer NOT to receive these strange rocks while training, you can talk to the archaeologists to toggle their appearance off (or back on) after taking them your first strange rock.
Mod Maz
RuneScape Content Developer
Queen of the Squirrels
As you deliver each strange rock to the museum, your discovery will start to take shape; you’ll have the opportunity to gain a little more Kudos from your peers; and you’ll also get some extra knowledge in Agility, Construction, Cooking, Crafting, Farming, Firemaking, Fishing, Fletching, Herblore, Hunter, Mining, Runecrafting, Smithing, Thieving or Woodcutting (depending upon which skill you were training when you discovered the strange rock).
The museum archaeologists encourage you to train each of the skills listed above, as only then will you be able to find every piece of...whatever it is you’re finding. Indeed, it may well be a good time to train a wide variety of skills, so as to gather resources in preparation for future skill training or the upcoming Bonus XP Weekend (starting Friday 12th March).
You can also learn something of Dahmaroc, a Second Age mage who was cursed in a battle over the limited supply of runes in those dark times. With diligent study, this could lead to another reward, this one of more solid and permanent construction...
If, for any reason, you'd prefer NOT to receive these strange rocks while training, you can talk to the archaeologists to toggle their appearance off (or back on) after taking them your first strange rock.
Mod Maz
RuneScape Content Developer
Queen of the Squirrels
03-Mar-2010 - RuneScape Lobby/Login Changes
Posted by Dark Paladin on March 3rd, 2010, 4:45 pm. Category: RuneScape News
RuneScape.com wrote:
From today, when logging into the game, you will notice that the Welcome Screen has been replaced with what we’re calling the RuneScape Lobby.
There are several things you can do in the lobby before you enter the game. You can see which worlds your friends are playing on; you can chat to friends or enter a Clan Chat; you can switch worlds and set your favourites; and you can change your display options. The lobby adds no additional clicks to getting into the game.
When logging out of the game, you will re-enter the lobby and stay logged in for up to an hour (though you can fully log out by clicking on the ‘X’ at the top-right of the lobby). As you don't need to enter your password to go from the lobby into the game, this should make things much more convenient when you want to change worlds or take a short break.
Mod Hope
RuneScape Content Developer
There are several things you can do in the lobby before you enter the game. You can see which worlds your friends are playing on; you can chat to friends or enter a Clan Chat; you can switch worlds and set your favourites; and you can change your display options. The lobby adds no additional clicks to getting into the game.
When logging out of the game, you will re-enter the lobby and stay logged in for up to an hour (though you can fully log out by clicking on the ‘X’ at the top-right of the lobby). As you don't need to enter your password to go from the lobby into the game, this should make things much more convenient when you want to change worlds or take a short break.
Mod Hope
RuneScape Content Developer
03-Mar-2010 - Changes to the Hitpoints Skill
Posted by Discrimin8 on March 3rd, 2010, 2:41 pm. Category: RuneScape News
Quote:
Today, we have made significant modifications to the Hitpoints skill, the most important of these being that all ‘hitpoints’ are now multiplied by 10 and renamed ‘life points’, and the name of the actual skill being changed to Constitution. The numbers you see will be bigger, but they will still affect things in the same way.
It’s important to note that this will not change standard combat or the way you play the game.
The best way to describe these changes is with a few examples:
Example 1
Before today’s update:
A player has level 75 in the Hitpoints skill (this gives them 75 hitpoints).
The player has a max hit of 34.
The player is fighting a lesser demon, which has 79 hitpoints and a max hit of 8.
The player is carrying some lobsters, which heal 12 hitpoints each.
After today’s update:
A player has level 75 in the Constitution skill (which gives them 750 life points).
The player has a max hit of 340.
The player is fighting a lesser demon, which has 790 life points and a max hit of 80.
The player is carrying some lobsters, which heal 120 life points each.
Example 2
Before today’s update:
Two players are in PvP combat.
Player A has 21 hitpoints and a max hit of 7. He is carrying chickens, which heal 3 hitpoints each when eaten.
Player B has 92 hitpoints and a max hit of 45. She is carrying manta rays, which heal 22 hitpoints each.
After today’s update:
Two players are in PvP combat.
Player A has 21 Constitution (giving him 210 life points) and has a max hit of 70. He is carrying chickens, which heal 30 life points each.
Player B has 92 Constitution (giving her 920 life points) and has a max hit of 450! W00t! She is carrying manta rays, which heal 220 life points each.
Example 3
Before today’s update:
A player falls from an Agility shortcut and takes 4 damage. When the player takes damage, the amount of damage they take is subtracted from their current hitpoint total. Their current Hitpoint skill level also decreases by the same.
After today’s update:
A player falls from an Agility shortcut and takes 40 damage. When the player takes damage, the amount of damage they take is subtracted from their current life point total. Their Constitution level is unaffected.
As you can see from the above examples, your basic stat remains the same, but the amount of hits you can take (that’s ALL damage, not just from combat) have been multiplied by 10. Equally, the damage you deal has also been multiplied by 10, and all food will heal you 10 times as much.
Your current life points are displayed in the status globe at the top-right hand corner of the screen, next to the minimap. When you take damage, this number will go down, NOT your Constitution stat.
The Constitution skill on the stats interface is in the same place that the Hitpoints skill stat used to be (at the top of the second column of skills; however, your current Constitution level does NOT reflect how much damage you can take – you’ll have to look at the life point display next to the minimap to see that. The skill icon for Constitution is the same as was used for Hitpoints.
This news outlines what has changed with this update; if you’d like to know more about why we have implemented this update, please read this blog.
It’s important to note that this will not change standard combat or the way you play the game.
The best way to describe these changes is with a few examples:
Example 1
Before today’s update:
A player has level 75 in the Hitpoints skill (this gives them 75 hitpoints).
The player has a max hit of 34.
The player is fighting a lesser demon, which has 79 hitpoints and a max hit of 8.
The player is carrying some lobsters, which heal 12 hitpoints each.
After today’s update:
A player has level 75 in the Constitution skill (which gives them 750 life points).
The player has a max hit of 340.
The player is fighting a lesser demon, which has 790 life points and a max hit of 80.
The player is carrying some lobsters, which heal 120 life points each.
Example 2
Before today’s update:
Two players are in PvP combat.
Player A has 21 hitpoints and a max hit of 7. He is carrying chickens, which heal 3 hitpoints each when eaten.
Player B has 92 hitpoints and a max hit of 45. She is carrying manta rays, which heal 22 hitpoints each.
After today’s update:
Two players are in PvP combat.
Player A has 21 Constitution (giving him 210 life points) and has a max hit of 70. He is carrying chickens, which heal 30 life points each.
Player B has 92 Constitution (giving her 920 life points) and has a max hit of 450! W00t! She is carrying manta rays, which heal 220 life points each.
Example 3
Before today’s update:
A player falls from an Agility shortcut and takes 4 damage. When the player takes damage, the amount of damage they take is subtracted from their current hitpoint total. Their current Hitpoint skill level also decreases by the same.
After today’s update:
A player falls from an Agility shortcut and takes 40 damage. When the player takes damage, the amount of damage they take is subtracted from their current life point total. Their Constitution level is unaffected.
As you can see from the above examples, your basic stat remains the same, but the amount of hits you can take (that’s ALL damage, not just from combat) have been multiplied by 10. Equally, the damage you deal has also been multiplied by 10, and all food will heal you 10 times as much.
Your current life points are displayed in the status globe at the top-right hand corner of the screen, next to the minimap. When you take damage, this number will go down, NOT your Constitution stat.
The Constitution skill on the stats interface is in the same place that the Hitpoints skill stat used to be (at the top of the second column of skills; however, your current Constitution level does NOT reflect how much damage you can take – you’ll have to look at the life point display next to the minimap to see that. The skill icon for Constitution is the same as was used for Hitpoints.
This news outlines what has changed with this update; if you’d like to know more about why we have implemented this update, please read this blog.
02-Mar-2010 - Cheating and Exploits
Posted by Ericteg on March 2nd, 2010, 7:15 pm. Category: RuneScape News
Quote:
The recent cheating that occurred and the abuse of an exploit has been dealt with very seriously. We have excellent systems in place to catch and detect players who abuse bugs and have taken appropriate measures.
We have now banned 68 accounts PERMANENTLY, with another 48 receiving temporary bans. There are a further 117 accounts which have been temporarily banned while undergoing further investigation. These will be dealt with very shortly.
To give you some idea of the players involved, here are the ten highest-level players banned so far (based on total skill level):
•2,376 total level (520 days of in-game time)
•2,308 total level (477 days of in-game time)
•2,210 total level (365 days of in-game time)
•2,179 total level (1,004 days of in-game time)
•2,131 total level (394 days of in-game time)
•2,105 total level (202 days of in-game time)
•2,102 total level (274 days of in-game time)
•2,096 total level (448 days of in-game time)
•2,022 total level (337 days of in-game time)
•2,021 total level (275 days of in-game time)
We’d like to remind everyone that using macros and abusing bugs is NOT tolerated under any circumstances, and we will ban ANY accounts that have been cheating.
Mod DC
Investigations into the Community Team
We have now banned 68 accounts PERMANENTLY, with another 48 receiving temporary bans. There are a further 117 accounts which have been temporarily banned while undergoing further investigation. These will be dealt with very shortly.
To give you some idea of the players involved, here are the ten highest-level players banned so far (based on total skill level):
•2,376 total level (520 days of in-game time)
•2,308 total level (477 days of in-game time)
•2,210 total level (365 days of in-game time)
•2,179 total level (1,004 days of in-game time)
•2,131 total level (394 days of in-game time)
•2,105 total level (202 days of in-game time)
•2,102 total level (274 days of in-game time)
•2,096 total level (448 days of in-game time)
•2,022 total level (337 days of in-game time)
•2,021 total level (275 days of in-game time)
We’d like to remind everyone that using macros and abusing bugs is NOT tolerated under any circumstances, and we will ban ANY accounts that have been cheating.
Mod DC
Investigations into the Community Team
Say bye to almost three years of your life
