Bloggings

I'm moving

2009-11-16T20:02:00.003Z

This blog will cease to be updated, you can find me on WordPress instead here: http://knoxee.wordpress.com/

Work

2009-11-03T18:42:00.004Z

Work is a horrid thing, really. It's especially horrid when you've been stuck in unpaid full-time work for almost 5 months, are rushing off a student loan form with no clue of when it will arrive and borrowing money from family as well as an emergency loan from the university. It's dire and depressing.

I am on trail with possible paid work, but it isn't going well, because I severely lack free time, and due to the above circumstances, the motivation to put in any serious effort to any other aspect of my life.

After plodding back home in the icy cold (and finally changing my light bulb after about 5 weeks of darkness), it's time to get a serious move on!

Here is a screen of Picnic Panic for you to get excited about.

Oh Blog

2009-09-09T19:01:00.004+01:00

What on earth happened to my blog? I used to write things. It's been so long since writing things that Robin Hood is no longer on BBC iPlayer for me to poke fun at, and yes, dark dark thoughts have entered my head about actually paying real money to acquire the latest series so we* can all gather round** and have a giggle again. Perhaps if I had a job with a disposable income this would actually happen.

*I
**Sit alone at my PC

Future Racer still isn't out. Well, it was, briefly, then due to technical problems we've had to take it down. New Future Racer will be improved both graphically and erm, 'programmy'.

GDG#3 is up on Ready Up. My apologies to the team for another late entry. One day I will lead a life that is organised. That day is not yet upon us.

I went to Turkey for a week with some lovely, lovely people and burnt my skin.

I came back from Turkey, whinged about the weather, encountered a deadly spider in my room and had an interview.

Now to round things off with a word from my neighbours adorable cat, who has practically taken over the house!

"Meow".

Game Development for Gamers #2 and Future Racer developments

2009-08-05T13:31:00.003+01:00

I got a little stuck planning out my posts for Game Development for Gamers, because I honestly have no idea how little or how much you know about game development. My mind has become so warped lately I froth at the mouth thinking about parallax maps....
In other news, Future Racer is getting so very, very close to release. I'm testing the game in the office today, and, to be honest, I'm really enjoying it. A good sign when admittedly I'm sick of the sight of it, but a collection of small, yet significant tweaks have made a massive overall difference.

I feel intimidated by the number of results I'm getting when I google "Future Racer" (many thanks in advance to Dave Cook for all his hard work), and I seriously hope the finished title can live up to something and provide enjoyment. Because that's the goal. If someone, somewhere, buys this game and enjoys playing it I'll be absolutely stoked. All this full-time unpaid work, living in a box, sleeping on a Thermarest and succumbing to the Noodle Diet will gain purpose.

Game Development for Gamers #1

2009-06-09T08:46:00.001+01:00

Although this marks the first post in what will hopefully be an interesting, compelling, mysterious, exciting, breathtaking, daring and life-threatening series, my first day in the office as a game developer is by no means the real beginning.

I have roughly noted that I’ve been working for the studio for 1 year and 3 months without making an income (ouch), and I am by no means the longest serving or highest contributing member. As the weather and my melanin-deprived skin type will attest to though, I am the most sunburnt.

Northern Lights

2009-06-07T15:54:00.004+01:00

I just remembered that (for once) I finished a book. I finished Northern Lights, having already seen The Golden Compass, and although I thought the film was terrific I can now see huge blank gaps where sections from Northern Lights should've gone (fit it into screen time, possibly dumb it down, add amazing effects, but I do not want to criticise the film since compromises always have to be made).

Film impression of Asriel: The leading man, the good guy, who is pounced on by a pack of wolves. Dang, I hope they didn't scratch his pretty face.

What they crucially seemed to miss is that Craig Daniel/Daniel Craig/James Bond, whatever his real name is, is not simply playing the part of a badass scholar with a snow leopard, and he is by no means one of the "good guys". His means to an end are as selfish as Mrs Coulters. While she is willing to forcibly round up and test hundreds of small children in the name of research with a significant number of casualties, Lord Asriel (AKA Craig Bond Daniel James) has no qualms in kidnapping his daughters best friend and killing him so he can open up a bridge to a different world. And then abandon his daughter in doing so. And his lover.

Book impression of Asriel: Actually, you're a complete knob. So is that f*cking snow leopard.

Lesson: If there's a book, read the book. The chances are it isn't as sickeningly, conveniently happy as the film.

V for... Relief

2009-05-15T20:20:00.004+01:00

After handing in my last assignment for this year (which I will say here and now, I'm not happy with the quality of), I headed back to my box room, threw a pile of clothes in a bag, and my toothbrush, and got on the next available train from Middlesbrough to Darlington. Then to Newcastle. Then to Carlisle. Then to Penrith. Then the next bus from Penrith to Keswick. (No, my route home does not win any prizes for being cheap, quick or straight forward)

Perhaps I'm stating the obvious, but the difference between a city voted the worst place to live in the UK, and one of the countries most desirable countryside tourist destinations is noticable as soon as you step off the train (err, the fourth train). It's the air. I appreciate this may have something to do with a large building near my house in Middlesbrough being demolished and creating a giant dust cloud that hung around for days, but the air here is wonderful.

The sounds are blissful too. Instead of listening to the neighbors angry dog having a barking fit at everything, the fire engine that drove past every other day, sirens, and chavs inflicting their "banging tunes" on everyone with ears (innit), when I walked outside I only heard waves lapping, lambs bleating and birds twittering. Yes, twittering. They were out in force, hanging around tree branches on their laptops posting status updates less than 140 characters in length.

Due to circumstances I will be back on the train(s) and in the cesspit shortly, but I have realised how removed my lifestyle became from 'normal' during the crisis that shall be known as: Oh shit, I have so much work to do, and I just spent my weekend doing someone elses work because all they contributed to a group project was a plagerised piece of shit and a tampon joke. My diet of one bowl of Corn Flakes in the morning, 3-4 energy drinks and a bowl of Somerfield's value noodles gave me a daily intake of about 400 calories, while the reccomended intake for a woman is 2000. (Men: 2500. You are special. You deserve two Mars bars at the end of the day, because your lives physically demand two Mars bars-worth of extra effort than women.)

Are you familiar with Natalie Portman in V for Vendetta? Particularly - the moment where she walks outside into the rain, after experiencing a gruelling regime of torture?

This is how I felt today. I walked outside into the rain, and ate a giant cornish pasty. Fuck you, miserable, confined, sedentry and underfed lifestyle, I have moved on.

Light at the end of the tunnel

2009-05-04T12:05:00.002+01:00

Disclaimer: this post is mainly serving as self-motivation and has great potential to be boring and irrelevent.

When I'm out of the cesspit (box room: Middlesbrough), there are some clear goals I've got to meet for my own sanity.
I had a horrid realisation that come June I will be 20, and since I was 17/18 I've made no headway on fell running and simply slipped backwards into a vegetable state. I was doing quite well too, and if I let more years slip by I'll feel like I missed an opportunity for no real reason.

It doesn't even have to be an opportunity to make a team, finish in a certain place or time or beat someone. It's more about having the capacity to walk up a mountain without stumbling around and drowning in my own sweat. Running is a way to clear your mind and achieve something in just a few hours. I'll probably start using this blog to update my progress and keep focused.

I want to live a more scheduled life that no longer centres around my computer. To do this I must avoid the temptation to renew my Age of Conan account, however, I dearly miss Gingerwookie, her long red hair, riding a horse coloured like a bowl of milk and corn flakes, and running errands for Captain Redrik in Tortage. Imagine Mick Hucknall, who is infact a stacked seasoned warrior with a badass Scottish accent, baring a braided red beard and captaining a ship. This is why video games are fabulous and possibly why I don't have a social life at the moment. If I pick up running with a giant club and a cloak made from a bear pelt, you know why.

The Rise to Failure

2009-04-30T15:00:00.003+01:00

"Failure" seems to be becoming a prominent theme here. Before I begin, I'd like to quote myself, playing MotorStorm Pacific Rift on Monday: "NONONONO! NO NO NO NO NOOOOO!!!"

You can see this classic moment right here.

Yes, about 4 people pass me while I dither around the finish line. Not only that, this event can be relived in all it's shame with a slightly painful ringtone here.

That's not enough, right? Let's cover a song. How about No Limit.

My moment of failure aside, my judgement day is almost here...

The failure of the Robin Hood Blog of Fail

2009-04-11T21:20:00.002+01:00

Well, episode 3 of Robin Hood is on iPlayer. It's completely void of Richard Armitage. He isn't even in the credits. I actually don't have the willpower to force myself through a whole episode any more, not without Richard (I've got a great idea for a plot! Let's take out one of two people who can act, who also happens to be the most attractive!)

I'm currently locked in battle with my ISA's, game work (do you review games for iPhone? Do you want to review our game? Email me), and experiencing a pathetic slide out of games' journalism because I have so little time. That's not just little time to write in, but little time to play games in to actually be able to write about them. (Hello world, I played a few rounds of Killzone on Thursday. Good bye.)

On that note, I'm up to my eyes in work. Fingers crossed Richard Armitage parachutes off the top of Nottingham Castle with a stand in episode 4.

The Robin Hood Blog of Fail - Part 2

2009-04-05T01:52:00.000+01:00

I'm back. It's time for...

Episode 2: Cause and Effect
In usual cocky git style, we're introduced to the episode by a series of scenes with Robin & Co stealing from the rich and giving to the poor. And acting smug.

Perhaps he's smug, because it appears the budget for this series has bumped up. Costumes are looking more elaborate (no sign of khaki trousers, red t-shirts or flared trousers), and they've acquired a Robin Hood TM digger.

In LOCKSLEY VILLAGE, some soldiers are hassling and gathering up the locals, shouting what I'd roughly translate as "Mmmph hm hm hmph!". That's what talking into a helmet sounds like to people not inside the helmet with you. In the absense of Maid Marian, a new female has been brought to our attention. She's well kitted out for the hip 12th Century look: hair straighteners, hair curlers, eyebrow tweezers... take that, Marian!

Her name is Kate. I like to call her Marian 2.0

The male villagers are being rounded up to form an army. At this point, the priest asks, "Why does the Sheriff need another army?".
I'll tell you why. 1) His current army is fucking useless, he hasn't been able to kill Robin Hood after two series, and 2) Because the budget is there to be milked, baby! The villagers are brought to Nottingham castle, and in a clumsy accident, so is Robin. One of them then gives ROBIN a HOOD so he can be DISGUISED. Now, is it just me, or do those 3 words together make very little sense?

ROBIN + HOOD = DISGUISE

Not only in this image is Robin wearing the hood down, revealing his face to all, but to top it off some berk soldier behind him has the noseguard of his helmet covering his left eye. (Like wearing a cap on the side to be trendy? Yeah? Robin from the Hood, y'all).

The usual unbelievable idiotic sequence of events follows. Merry Men go to Nottingham to rescue Robin. Then they go to the woods for no reason. Then they go back.

Meanwhile, chained up in his stone cell, Robin uses a necklace to free himself from chains around his wrists and ankles, then starts lifting stone straight out of the wall to escape.

As pictured, Robin is able to climb to the top of the castle, dismantle a stand, and use it to fly down to the bottom. The next 10 minutes are too fucking stupid to contemplate, let alone write down.

To cut it short, gorgeous Guy of Gisborne could be potentially written out of following episodes. If there was one thing saving this programme, it was Guy, and some clever soul appears to have written him out. Here's a topless photo of him to compensate for future lack of Guy.

Another episode, another amazing failure of epic proportions. Please join me again for episode three. I'm not sure how I'll deal with another 40 minutes of rubbish if we are Guy of Gisborne-less.

The Robin Hood Blog of Fail - Part 1

2009-03-29T03:43:00.000+01:00

It's nearly 4am. Welcome one and all to...

Episode 1: Total Eclipse
I know what you're picturing. A primary school teacher eating Jaffa Cakes in attempt to educate her pupils about the Eclipse. Unfortunately, it's the BBC's shite adventures of Robin Hood all over again. It's one of those programmes that's so bad and cliché that it's actually enjoyable. In the second scene, being the hip, cool, and 'with it' Robin from the Hood, he's gone all macho and angry, trying to get away from his friends, saying "watcha gonna do?!" If Robin was real, would he really talk to his Merry 12th Century Men like this?

Stop following me, y'all!

In the programmes usual annoying obession with captions at every opportunity, it's swishh-ching to LOCKSLEY VILLAGE, and Robin is on the war path against the gorgeous Guy of Gisborne. As a threat, Robin fires an arrow through Guy's open window.

If he's so fantastic at aiming on the spot like that, why didn't he just alter the trajectory a little and get him between the eyes? Too simple?
In the spastic jerky blurry shuddery camera movement fight, Guy throws Robin down a waterfall. As 'proof' of his 'death', he brings Robins necklace to the Sheriff of Nottingham.

By the same logic I could have someone post my parents a sock and it would be solid proof of my demise. Thankfully unconvinced, Guy is sent to the river to find proper proof. In the same way anyone would search for a dead body, he flails around the riverside shouting "where are ya?!"

With one of Robins Merry Men taken prisoner, the Sheriff uses him to try and locate a stash of everything they've stolen. Foolishly, he digs a perfectly square height depth pit (in about 5 minutes), before saying "oh, maybe it was by that tree over there." Annoyed, the Sheriff hands the shovel to one of his soldiers, asking him to "fill it in".

As you may be able to tell from the picture, this soldier is footing the spade in the ground to dig up fresh soil. It seems the Robin Hood™ Digger drove the previously displaced soil to an off-camera location.

As the episode progresses, people get caught, stupid decisions are made, and Robin pulls daft faces. Oh, and the moon legs it across the sky to form an eclipse and vanish to the other side of the sky within about 7 seconds. Check out the timer on these pictures.

A total Eclipse at 38.24

An entire 5 seconds later, and there's no sign of the moon. It was just Robin Hoods big fat head all along.

Oh, that's where the moon went. At 38.56. Just in time for his god-awful motivational speech. Once again, sterling performances by Kieth Allen and Richard Armitage are destroyed in a cess-pit of plot holes and an appauling mountain of rubbish. See you next time for episode 2.

Self Indulgent Misery

2009-03-23T17:49:00.000Z

I have returned to Middlesbrough after a few days back home with the family. I am feeling miserable right now for a number of reasons.

1. For an escape and some piece of mind, I intended to bring The Gormenghast Trilogy back with me, which I have held onto for too long and still not finished. I forgot it.

2. I'm very almost in my overdraft and still awaiting/pestering for my pay.

3. I didn't see enough of my dad when I was home.

4. My front-right tooth is stained down a crack where it is chipped, and the stain will not go away.

5. A certain news story.

I'll elaborate on 5 first, but I'll make a few things clear before I take the plunge. I've got nothing 'against' anyone because of their weight or size, and I also think I'm lucky to be in a country where if I need medical or financial assistance (provided I meet certain requirements), I've got the infrastructure behind me to help. Granted it can be a massive hassle getting that help (for example, my maintenance grant for university is a godsend, but trying to squeeze a loan out of Student Finance Direct can only be described as a mountain of stress), but at least it's there, to help people who need help.

I wonder if this family, instead of trying to recieve more money due to their size, have tried looking for a job? Unfortunately the story is missing detail like this, because you don't need to be fit and healthy to work, all my work involves sitting infront of my computer, and at the moment I do it all from the comfort of my room.
I'd also genuinely like to know if being overweight really is genetic or hereditary. I've always imagined the only thing that's hereditary is the lifestyle, while you're living under the same roof it's difficult to have a lifestyle radically different from your family, and undoubtedly if you leave home you'll take some of that lifestyle with you.

Vegetables are not expensive.

Back to number 3.

Years ago my dad started having problems with his heart rate. They recurred too often, sometimes at night my mum would have to drive him to hospital, and I would go to school having no idea what condition he was in, and having a rather small understanding of his problem in the first place.
He was placed on a waiting list for surgery that we believed would stop his heart murmours.

I've got a poor concept of how much time passed, but eventually he got to the top of the list and had the surgery. It was successful, we thought. It was here I found out that surgery on his heart was infact much more difficult than the next man, because he's such a strong runner. Why? Because the heart is a muscle. If you train specific muscles, they become bigger, thicker and stronger. His big strong heart was now suddenly a problem.

Perhaps 3-4 years had passed, with no heart problems at all. Then, just last week he was in hospital for the same problem. Evidently the surgery didn't work. Apparantly, just diagnosing what is wrong with his heart is also made harder because he's fit and healthy. It's been suggested that he has a small hole in his heart. After nearly a week in hospital, we still don't know.
He was back out and on medication when I got home, but it's unnerving not knowing what's wrong.

It's also extremely depressing to see the most active member of your family now in fear of a hobby that has nearly encompassed a lifetime.

Comedy Genius

2009-03-13T22:39:00.000Z

"Full of lame gags, boring sketches and barely hidden narcissism, this show has only one thing in its favour: it might finally put an end to the idea that Horne and Corden are any sort of comedy geniuses."

...So says The Guardians Hannah Pool. I couldn't agree more.

As everyone knows, you shouldn't declare something awful till you've tried it, so I painfully forced myself through episode one on BBC iPlayer.

It reminded me of when my dog, Suzy, decided to try and squeeze between the wires of a fence, and got wedged in half way through, becoming stuck, and had to ungracefully wiggle for five minutes suspended in the fence before she could land on the other side.

Cringe worthy. Humiliating. Lack of thought or foresight. My beagle, however, at least made me laugh, Horne & I'm fat! I'm going to take my clothes off and tell you 50 fat "jokes" Corden failed to even raise a smile.

If you find the show funny, that's fair enough. But I reject the idea that the pair are some kind of comedy 'genius'. You made a joke about being fat, clap clap, how innovative. Oh, you're doing a sketch about Ricky Gervais? Wait, not Ricky Gervais. About a comedy character he plays. The words 'copy and paste' spring to mind. That sketch itself is an even bigger failure if you don't find The Office amusing in the first place.

Shite/10. NAY. Watch Not Going Out instead. It's actually funny, and you won't be forced to look at a fat naked man for half an hour.

Killzone 2... Part 2

2009-03-04T15:56:00.000Z

This game has really turned out to be a mixed bag for me. On the one hand, the graphics are absolutely stunning, I'll stop in the heat of battle to admire the sky, the lighting, the smoke, perchance, see the corpse of a Helghast sail through the air after a well-placed grenade. The atmosphere is pretty powerful. At least, it is until you have three meat heads swearing their faces off at you and coming out with the most awful inappropriate dialogue at every opportunity.

If you played Killzone on the PS2, you'll appreciate that Rico Velasquez (pictured) was the arrogant, brash, mouthy one, who came out with gems such as "These Helghast Elites look like yo' moma!", and "What the fuck is a Shakespeare?". It was funny. But in Killzone 2, everyone is Rico. And I can only take so much Rico.
Not only are all your ISA allies Rico by tongue, they're also Rico by nature. They're more like inflatable bullet sponges, that you have to keep re-flating. I wasn't bothered at first, but after earning my badge for team revivals on the second level I was sick of it. One minute they're legging it around infront of a turret spouting "Motha fuckin' Higs shit bastard wankers!", then you must revive them, rinse and repeat. The game provides a much more enjoyable experience with voice volume on zero and subtitles on. Then you can ignore this "Wassup, you so slow gettin' here, did yo moma make you a ham sandwhich?"/tripe. How am I supposed to take anything seriously in this game?

As for the story, well, I'm not sure what's going on really. It's my own fault though. I got so sick of the Gears' style woo kickass fuck shit yeeeaaah rubbish that I had no voices in cutscenes for a while, then later realised I could turn subtitles back on. Apart from going to Helghan to woo kickass muthafuckers I don't know if there's anything "more" really happening. It's not a big complaint, I bought this game to shoot things, not laugh and weep, but I was quite immersed by the original, now, nothing.

I'm really dissapointed the group dynamic from the first game has gone, that was a massive strong point. Not only did it allow different experiences, styles and level routes with a different character, but it gave the story a pinch of love interest, some uncertainty with character allegancies and plenty of bickering. It was pretty straight forward, but enjoyable. Plus, if your allies did anything dumb, they didn't die, they had no health bar, they're in the game purely for aid, not annoyance.

To be honest, it's a good job Sony never went for the boomerang controller style, otherwise my controller would've flown back and hit me in the face several times now. Maybe I'm not as patient as I used to be. Don't get me wrong, this game is still terrific in so many ways I havn't touched on; the way the Helghast flail and stagger as you shoot them down, the impact of the pistol, the epic soundtrack, the destructible environments, the enemy AI (a complete utter contrast to ally AI), and of course, the multiplayer. It's an absolute fucking blast. You should play it with yo' moma.

The overwhelming majority of gamers proclaim Halo as having the best multiplayer action. I strongly disagree. I'm sorry, but as good as that game can be online, the majority of my experiences centre from other players identifying me as female (clap clap), singling me out, taunting me, and sometimes deliberately killing me, even if I'm on their team. I'm afraid the adolescent American teens make that game what it is. For every good online experience I've had, there's been a shitty one. Killzone so far has been pure manic fun, not a single bad experience, and I feel far more at grips with the controls instead of bouncing around on moon-esque gravity (but that's purely down to taste).

I'm not going to give it a score. From now on, let's go with 'yay or nay'. This is a definate 'yay', I just wish they'd brought some of the strengths from the original forward, and kept the characters familiar.

Killzone 2

2009-02-06T16:08:00.001Z

Finally the demo is upon us. After a couple of goes I've sent off my pre-order from Play.com, I'm very excited but also worried about the detrimental effect this will have on my work flow.

I can't help but dispair at the mentality behind the people Adam Sessler is talking about here.
In a way I feel sorry for anyone who can't broaden their horizons beyond one console. I perfectly understand being a fan of a particular platform for specific games (I'm easily a PlayStation girl because I'm so fond of Metal Gear, Tekken, Gran Turismo, Ico/SotC, and so on), but why would you go out of your way to slander something you havn't even tried? Granted, we don't all have to give Nazi-ism a go to get the gist of it, but that's a bit of a no-brainer.

The rivalry between platforms is a good thing. Developers making AAA titles for any specific platform will scrutinise the competition and (hopefully) see what they can do differently or better. Without competition, how do you better yourself?
Generally speaking, this is why larger countries like America and China can do so amazingly in the Olympics, because there's a bigger volume of competition in sport across all levels. Being the fastest sprinter in America is a totally different feat to being the fastest sprinter in the UK. I used to be the 5th fastest (junior) fell runner in England on a routine of video games, caffiene, and four training runs a week, which isn't a lot. I probably should've smoked cigarettes just to emphasise my point.

I don't care how much you hate the PlayStation brand, how much better you think FPS's are on a PC, how much you think it's trying to copy something else, because I'm the one having fun. Miserable forumites.

Red Magazine

2009-02-04T23:16:00.000Z

Today, I bought a women's magazine. Infact, I bought a couple. This is most out of character for me, I'm a tomboy, the only magazines I buy are about video games.
Most of us know ladies' magazines are full of pictures of women, so I bought these to help me draw some female character concepts for one of my modules at uni. I bought Red because it's pretty thick, and Heat because it's almost entirely made up of pictures.

"Red" Magazine is 179 pages long, packed with pictures, which is perfect for what I wanted, but what's in the actual magazine? I know this is a long list, but seriously, try and read it.

1-2: Advert for anti-wrinkle cream
3-4: Advert for ridiculous looking clothes
5: Hi, I'm the editor. "Cosy" is fashionable. Buy cushions.
6: Contents
7: Advert for skin care product
8-9: Advert for womens fragrance
10: List of people who write for Red

11: Advert for anti-winkle cream
12: "Your Say"
13: Advert for womens fragrance
14-15:Advert for foundation
16-17: Advert for anti-wrinkle cream
18: Advert for womens fragrance
19: A picture of a stupid looking ring to mark the 'shopping' section
20: A page of over priced clothes for 'office' wear

21: Advert for foundation
22: 7 pairs of dumb looking shoes
23: Advert for womens skin care
24: Advert for womens skin care
25: Some lingerie
26-30: Models modelling strange outfits

31: Advert for womens skin care
31: Some make up shizzle for Valentines Day
32: Advert for foundation
33: Advert for hair care
34: Buy these things:
-Some stars to stick on the wall
-An old chair
-A grey lamp shade
-Grey cushions
-An old fashioned telephone
35: What Vanessa Knox-Brien thinks about fashion
36: Advert for foundation
37-42: Interview with Jodie Kidd. The picture of her has a lowdown of the costs of her clothes.
Silk shirt £140
Cotton vest £12
Necklace £2000
Ring £3990
Another necklace £850
Another necklace with some rings on it £4620

43: Advert for deodorant
44: Advert for mobile phone
45: Possibly the worst article I have ever read, about 'minibreaks'
46-47: "Closet smokers"
48-49: "Luxury living for less" (how contradictory, when they told me to spend £125 on a grey lampshade on page 34)
50: Advert for Uncle Ben's Express

51-52: "Smart Spending" (Including 'I ditched my trainer to pay for Botox')
53: Advert for hand cream
54-55: Interview with Javier Bardem
56: Advert for lip care
57-58: "Smart, successful & secretly bulimic"
59: Advert for money-saving event
60-61: "Domestic Disharmony", a generic man and woman argue about 5 trivial things, second worst thing I've ever read
62-64: I'm Brix Smith-smart, but my real name is Laura Elise Salenger, and here are some pictures of my home
65: Advert for mayonnaise
66-68: Some women preach about how to be 'green'
69: Advert for Shredded Wheat
70: Matt Christie talking about marriage

71: Advert for anti-perspirant
72-75: A reader survey about work
76: Vote for women to win an award
77: Advert for clothes
78-79: Advert for more clothes
80-82: Advert for even more clothes

83: Something about Sean Penn
84: More random shit they want you to buy (a candle, a book, and for some reason a TV show they want you to watch)
85: Advert for washing up liquid
86: Advert for health club
87-88: More random shit they want you to watch/buy
89: Celebrities in dresses

90-91: Subscribe to Red, the shittest magazine ever created
92: Advert for tissues
93: A handbag for £136
94: A handbag for £216
95: 16 handbags
96: Some ugly jewellery
97: 5 easy steps about how to order this ugly jewellery
98: Advert for washing up liquid
99: "Modern Retro" (in other words more random shit they want you to buy)
100-109: Models modelling really expensive stuff. Most of the outfits are are between £1000-£2000 in total, and look completely stupid.

110: Advert for anti winkle cream
111: Advert for skin care
112-116: Something about makeup products I don't understand
117: Advert for nail varnish
118: Advert for hair products
119-120: Stop bad habits - drinking, smoking, stress (it's a bad habit?) and sunbathing

121: Advert for hair care
122: Some bollocks about fragrances and make up
123-124: Advert for anti-winkle cream
125: Next months issue (inlcuding, 'what to wear for work - solved!', even though they covered that on page 20.)
126: Advert for butter
127: A picture of some manky looking food
128-131: Pictures of cushions, a dog, curtains, mugs, trees and biscuits

132-136: Make some food
137: Buy Lenor washing up liquid for Valentines Day, seriously
138: Advert for holidays
139-144: People talking about holidays
145: Advert for Feta cheese
146: Advert for weighing scales
147-152: "£80,000 worth of life advice -free!" (There's a bloke here who'll charge £27,000 per hour for a consultant management group. His free advice is to make a "not to-do list". Wow.)

153: Advert for some positive/uplifting/life changing event
154: Advert for Tesco Diet web site
155: Diet tips
156: Advert for sore throat relief
157-159: Some boring stories
160-162: "Upgrade your life"

163: Advert for sanitary towels. It says "Have a happy period." I say "Fuck off."
164-166: Some women talk about holidays, yet again
167: Advert for cough syrup
168: Buy these clothes
169: Advert for Vicks product
170-176: Tons of adverts

177: Horoscopes. Apparantly I (Gemini) have opportunities in work and romance abroad, and I am going to be the centre of attention on the 19th. Of course.
178: Talking to Michael Sheen
179: Advert for hair care

So the motto here is:

Spend a fortune on clothes. No wait, buy them in a supermarket because some women ranting about "green" told you to.

Don't spend your money on trivial things and turn your life around instead. No wait, spend hundreds of £'s on a grey lampshade.

You need at least twelve different types of foundation.

Buy cushions.

If your boyfriend goes in the shower and decides to use shower gel to mess around with his hair, you need to dump him.

I think I need to play GTA IV violently and squash women.

Metal Gear is Real

2009-01-28T16:49:00.001Z

Everyone who knows me knows I've been affectionate about the series since Metal Gear Solid in 1998. Anyone who knows the Metal Gear universe will be aware that some pretty crazy stuff happens (dead soldier becomes cyborg ninja, dead soldier lives on through severed limb, crazy soldier is stabbed and shot in the head regularly but remains A-OK, you get the idea), so I was pretty shocked when I came across this story.

To sum this story up, a couple in Florida froze some of their dogs' DNA while he was still alive. With an expense of £108,000 given to BioArts International (seriously, how Doom 3-esque does that sound?) they have been able to create a clone of their deceased dog. As amazing as it is, Lancelot (the dog) died of cancer, yet if Lancelot Encore (the clone) is a perfect clone, isn't he going to die of cancer, too?

FOX..... Die?

Age of Conan (again)

2009-01-22T02:35:00.000Z

Oh yes, I can never be short on words for this title. An incredible game, some absolutely amazing artwork, fantastic voice acting, addictive game play, wonderful music...but riddled with technical problems. A few days ago I was shocked to see my inventory disappear, but at the same time pleasantly suprised to see all the men in Hyboria lost their clothes (such a pity they fixed that, since AoC has no ugly man creation options).

I really enjoyed venting about this in more detail over on Ready Up. My words are broken up by pictures of the lovely Gingerwookie, my level 66 Bear Shaman. Check it out!

This is what happens when you...

2009-01-19T13:43:00.000Z

1. Develop games for iPhone in your "Spare Time"
2. Work hard at University
3. Attempt to write regularly for three different sites
4. Play Age of Conan till 4am

Now I just have to sit back and wait till the effects of living in a box and sleeping on a Thermarest take their toll, and I will have aged nearly as rapidly as Solid Snake.

:(

Assyria

2009-01-13T17:12:00.000Z

I've just noticed that word of our studio is over on Pocket Gamer! (Thanks, chaps). You can read an article about the iPhone game we're developing here.

I'm finding this is a great boost to my development workflow. It's simply wonderful for someone to take notice of us, despite our humble size and low experience, and just generally being a 'nobody' in the industry.

The Lord of the Rings Online: Mines of Moria

2009-01-09T14:02:00.000Z

This is the longest I've ever taken to review a game, but for good reason; with MoM being an expansion, and myself being new to LOTRO, I spent a good deal of time simply in Shadows of Angmar before entering Moria much later. Review at DPAD

On a personal note, my boyfriend and I recently split up. As I was the one who made this decision, I've moved myself into the appropriately named 'Box Room'. It's fucking tiny, but I'm happy, apart from the radiator not working... it's good to have my own space again. Not that there is much space...

Ready Up

2009-01-07T11:34:00.000Z

I'm really amazed at the number of people voicing interest in writing for Ready Up. I don't know viewing figures, but I've always found the site quite small and humble.
Suddenly after getting an advert for Ready Up staff writers on the Xbox 360 dashboard, the forum is twice as busy, and the initial post detailing the staff writer role has more responses than anything we've written before.

If anyone reading this wants to know more about the voluntary position(s) or make an application, click here.

They... want me now?

2008-11-08T17:29:00.000Z

This morning I recieved a letter from England Athletics.

Somehow, I have magically been registered as a member of England Athletics for 2008/09, and I've been given a little England Athletics card with my name on it. What confuses me is that my card is subtitled 'Competition Licence' , and in the letter that accompanied it, I will only have a Competitor Licence if I have paid a £5 registration fee.

I have not paid a £5 registration fee, not willingly anyway, as at the moment my balance reads -£1200, I do not have five pounds to spend on anything that isn't noodles, toilet roll, toothpaste, soap, or rent.

I don't understand what this licence enables me to do that I don't do already, the only advantage I can see is that I get a 10% discount at 'Sweatshop'. As an athlete who already has paid for all the equipment they could possibly need, this isn't very useful. I don't think Sweatshop even exists in Middlesbrough, anyway.

Great stuff. After running my legs off, tearing ligaments and pulling muscles up and down the mountains of Cumbria for years, I finally have a little plastic card to show for my efforts that gives me no forseeable benefits. I want my £5 back.

Long time, no blog

2008-11-04T07:33:00.000Z

So here's a brief summary of whats happened, and whats going on.

With regards to the game we're working on, two more people have quit the team. We've lost our programmer, and one of our artists. It's always a blow to hear people have given up, but trying to make the game alongside university really is hard work.
Everyone has other commitments; a paying job, a social life, university work, clubs, family, and I can attest that the hardest thing at the moment is finding a balance and deciding which tasks are more important.

We still have a talented musician, who is a little out of touch being at a different university, but so far has provided music for our levels that sound brilliant and professional.

We have to push on though, and look on the bright side. With two people gone, that's two less people that need to be paid as part of the games studio 'Assyria Game', so finding enough funding should be easier, and as long as we can all contribute work, we stand a better chance of breaking even and hopefully making a little money for our efforts.

Does that sound greedy?

I think perhaps being months into my second year and still being without a loan or maintenance grant is taking its toll (and no, I'm not one of the lucky teens whose parents can afford to fund them). I am doing so much work, but the only money coming in is a little on the side from games journalism, which helps, but only slightly. I loved doing journalism for free during school, but now there are important costs in my life like food and rent, and I cannot ignore these.

There should shortly be a post from me on Ready Up about the recent event GameCity 3. It was awesome fun and I met some great people... and zombies!

Me on the left there, looking like a goon.

Utterly brilliant writing

2008-09-06T16:01:00.000+01:00

From a free 'Game Career Guide' supplement magazine at Develop in Brighton, which was insightful at times, I decided to have a look at the web site. It's mainly orientated towards a games' career in America, but interesting none the less.

This piece, especially:
Women in Games: Who Cares?

Funny, well thought out and entirely true.

Stoked Again

2008-09-03T21:01:00.000+01:00

I don't find my opinions particularly interesting. I like to write stuff down, to get things off my chest, but, rather fantastically for me, I got the chance to write an opinion piece for a big site.

If anyone is interested in games journalism, development, or both, I would urge them to read it. Or just click on it anyway :P

Here it is

In other interesting news I'm now (at last) getting paid a little for my reviewing efforts. I'm still waiting for further details, but I've got the job, and I can't wait to start!

"Grrrl" Games

2008-08-14T21:36:00.000+01:00

I'm semi impressed that there are an increasing number of games being targetted towards girls, but as a "girl gamer" myself, I absolutely revel in looking at these games, and I will confess now; judging them before I've even played them. I know I get far more enjoyment out of reading a mindless angry rant than something purely informative and reserved. Here we go!

I recently recieved an update from Games Press in my email, and while I'm scrolling down the game titles I notice the following:

Miss Chic: Romantic Girl PC
Miss Chic: Sporty Girl PC
Miss Chic: Party Girl PC
Miss Chic: Business Lady PC

First thought? What the fuck is this shit!

Second thought? Oh, sporty lady. I like sport, maybe this isn't so bad.

Now, just a minute- sport is about trainers, sports bras, shorts, blood, tears, sweat, exertion, skill... for some reason I'm not picking up those "vibes" from screens of Miss Chic: Sporty Girl.
Only an imbicile would partake in sport wearing a minidress and calf-high boots.

Perhaps Miss Chic: Business Lady will fare better?

Perhaps not.

Maybe I'm being too judgemental. Maybe Business Lady has more to offer than nail-painting, but I doubt it.

Come the fuck on. I don't know if the problem here is the game developers (for always making this "aimed at girls" tat), society (for presuming women adore this rubbish), or women in general (for lapping up any kind of game with the words "girl" and "fashion" in it).

Why bother dressing up your game as "Business" or "Sport"? Why not just call it "Generic fashion-orientated game #28, with slightly better graphics"? It's a bit like the PES/FIFA deal, each time you're getting almost exactly the same experience, but with tweaked graphics. Lardy fucking Dar; GTA IV's Brucie is springing painfully into my mind with the line;

"Be original. Just like everyone else who can afford to be!"

I hate most women, so therin lies my problem. In my humble opinion, girls need to broaden their horizons. I firmly believe young girls' only buy into games such as these, because that's what all their other girl friends are doing. They want a pink DS because girl's are, as soon as they are born, expected to adore anything pink.

They are brought up into a world where they are adorned with Barbie dolls, cuddley toys, make-up sets and baby dolls that wet themselves. I truly think I am the way I am, because when I was a child I played with Lego, dinosaurs, a GameBoy, or on my bike outside.

Then, as a girl gets older (or indeed if you are a talented young Chinese girl, with an amazing singing voice...), you are going to be judged two-dimensionally. People are going to look at you, and judge you purely from that perspective. You are too fat. You have an odd-looking nose. Your breasts aren't large enough. You look too pale. You'll have to starve yourself, plaster your face in makeup and wear a push-up bra to be "up to standard" with other female peers.
So, naturally, that's what video games are about when they're aimed at girls.

The End.

I'm On Top of the World

2008-08-07T13:18:00.000+01:00

This is a rarity. I'm feeling totally, completely pleased with myself. This is similar to my last post, but in the time that I've been to Develop in Brighton, a games conference, and mingled with some brilliant games press and devs. They're all great people to talk to, they'll answer your questions down to detail, even if you're a lowly volunteer/student like me.

After being home a few days, the emails started to trickle in. I'm in contact with some really helpful people, and for once I've been given a job offering (journalism) with pay prospects. I've been doing volunteer work for 2 years, so this is a great step forward and a good excuse for me to keep menial shopwork at bay.

I've come to a realisitation that I'm almost exactly where I want to be. I'm reviewing and previewing games, that are usually posted to my front door for free. It's not just a WOO FREE GAMES feeling, but since I'm working on a game at the moment, being able to play more games is fantastic for generating ideas, seeing what works and what doesn't. Games journalism gives you a chance to play the games that aren't great; something I wouldn't normally do, and having the knowledge that I've gained from the first year of my course at uni, I see the poorer games in a new light, a new dimention, I've got an angle of empathy. I must be much softer now on poor games than I used to be.

I suppose the one downer is that running, for the moment, has gone down the drain. But I'm doing lots of things at the moment, and it's all going to help give me a footing if I want to work in the Games Industry. Roll on the hard work.

What's on my plate...

2008-07-04T23:05:00.001+01:00

It's all dawning on me that, with what I'm currently commited to, I'm going to have a ton of things on my plate.
Firstly, D-PAD; I don't have a big input as it is, but the magazine is evolving a little, and in the future I'll have to put aside more time so I can write more. I do hope I can squeeze the time in.

I was also recently brought on-board to a site called Ready Up. Now, not to shamelessly pimp something I'm writing for, but I'm really pleasently suprised by the site and the current writers because it's very, very varied. As an example, the youngest writer is a 13-year old girl, infact pleasantly so there are a number of girls writing, it doesn't feel like the male-dominated "area" that anything to do with games tends to be, and at the same time it doesn't segregate gender because the male writers are still aplenty. It's a refreshing change from the norm and I hope I can stick around.

It's been brought to my attention that my hometown of Keswick is hosting a commonwealth fell running event in the near future. I'm not going to be naive about it, but just knowing that it's going to be right here has given me the boost I need to start training again. I'll try and keep it up through the busy times of my life, too, so I can at least maintain a constant level of fitness without slipping too far down the shithole of shitty running-ness.

Also, the work I'm meant to be doing for the game my friends and I are working on still looms overhead. There's alot to be done, and I need to kick into gear for it.

I also have the problem of not having any source of income. I'm putting all my time into these "things" without getting anything back. I'm a student. I should be piling the hours in at some shop to desperately fund my education, but I havn't found the time for this. The other thing holding me back is in a couple of weeks I'll be going to my boyfriends, and to Brighton for the Develop Conference. I don't think I can apply somewhere and then say I can't work, I'm going to be away for 3 weeks. So I'll try my luck when I get back home and it's out the way. I'm also waiting on a response for a job with Sony. My hopes are high, and I would love this job, I really hope next time I blog here that I've got a good response from it.

Metal Gear Solid 4

2008-06-17T16:30:00.000+01:00

This game is utterly brilliant. I can't say what I'd think of it if I wasn't already hooked on the story, but it's magnificent so far. Snake has been pulled out of the usual layout of coridoors and guards on regular patrol and is in a warzone; although it's still a stealth game I'm finding it very hard to just sneak around without gunning everyone down, and the lack of a proper radar that's actually useful has left me constantly being spotted with a real lack of places to hide.

I couldn't ask for anything more from this game, except a younger-looking Snake. But I suppose you can't have everything.

Arrrrrg!

2008-06-12T09:38:00.000+01:00

Fucking play.com. God knows how many days later, I call, and they can only "assume" that my item has been lost in the post. All I can get is a refund for Age of Conan. No Rhino mount, no early access (obviously). How useless is that? I'm furious. I've been waiting since the 9th of May, only to get a frikking refund which I'll have to wait about 5 more days to recieve!

Expensive New Stuff

2008-06-10T18:41:00.000+01:00

GTA IV

Army of Two

Gran Turismo 5 Prologue

Metal Gear Solid 4 (Coming soon!)

Lego Indiana Jones

White PS3

32" HD TV

I'm quite happy to say that my PS3 gaming has gone off to a terrific start. I have an awesome TV, and some brilliant games- none of them are lacklustre or mediocre in my opinion, but I'm very glad I waited around for some of these titles to appear. I've got my boyfriend to thank for half the cost of the TV (which we'll share) and 4 of my PS3 games :P

GTA IV has been brilliant so far. It's caused plenty of intentional (and unintentional) laughs. I went to pick up Little Jacob for a mission. Without a car I decided to walk to the checkpoint. While crossing a road Jacob wondered slowly behind me smoking, and was hit by a car. He calmly got up and followed me to the next road where he was run over again, fag in hand. For some reason that has been my most entertaining moment yet, I was in hysterics and had a stitch from laughing, and I can't wait to play some more!

Oh, and I'm still waiting for Age of Conan to arrive. It can't take much longer for a preorder, surely?

21 Days Later

2008-05-30T12:27:00.000+01:00

21 Days ago, Emily went to Play.com to pre-order Age of Conan, with promises of an early access code, a rhino mount, and delivery within 3-5 days.

Within this time, other people within her halls at university recieved their copies of Age of Conan, while Emily waited.

Emily has finished university and left halls. If this game magically appears in the near future, she may have to make a 10-change train journey there and back just to pick it up. (That's around £30 with her rail card)

If in the case that Age of Conan isn't posted to halls before people have to be kicked out of halls of residence, Emily's order will be "returned to sender".

Emily is never ordering anything from Play.com ever again, as she would've recieved the game faster and cheaper just buying it off the shelf at home. She also believes that, having called Play's customer service on this day, and been offered "Early Access", that they don't really know what's going on. Early Access finished on May 23rd. Also known as last week.

Another female-based rant

2008-05-29T00:30:00.000+01:00

In fairness, the things I am about to point out are genuine impracticalities with most/all female clothing. In the words of Solid Snake himself: "I'll take care of the bombs on Strut B. Let's get going."

(Well, um, I suppose Snake wouldn't be interested in what I'm about to talk about anyway)

Girls pockets, in jeans or any other trousers, are totally ridiculously small. When I go out I'll typically need to bring some cash, ID, phone, keys, student card, and I usually want my camera too. Can they fit in girl pockets? No. I'm hard pressed just to fit my keys in, any kind of card I put in just gets bent due to the shallow depth of the pocket. Once you manage to squeeze anything in you'll rip your pockets open trying to get it back out!

I own a nice coat that actually has 4 decent-sized pockets on the front. However, being a girls coat, obviously they can't let us get away with fitting anything useful in the pockets, so the zips are actually half the size of the pocket, that means if you put anything in you break your fingers getting it out. Not that you can fit anything in anyway apart from a couple of your fingers. I've even got a pair of black trousers with two zips on the front. The zips don't even fucking lead anywhere! There's no pockets! Just a zip! How pointless is that!?

I'm not feminine, I think handbags are ridiculous and if I carry one I know I'll leave it somewhere, plus, why should I have to buy myself a special bag just to carry a few things in simply because girl pockets do not facilitate anything useful? In comparison, if I ask my boyfriend he can fit my wallet, keys and passport easily in just one of his pockets. Why can't I be trusted with carrying items in my own pockets?

Next, my nice watch broke recently. I bought a cheap new one from Claire's Accessories and it broke after about a week. So, now I'm home I'm online and scouting for girls watches.

Why is it that girls watches need to have thinner straps compared to mens? There's no reasonable excuse for it, since they cost about the same too. Oh, you guessed it, and they're all pink. If the whole damn thing isn't pink, we obviously need some pink numbers, a pink hand, or a pink strap, otherwise, what hope would we poor ladies have of reading the time? We can't possibly read it from any kind of thick comfy strap, or watch face that bears colours such as black, blue or green.

I've got the same "pink" problem with many things because I don't like the colour pink, and I abhor wearing it. When I'm looking at girls glasses, they're pink. Shoes? Got to have pink on them somewhere. Wallets? Yep, they need pink too. T shirts? Hell yes, they have to be pink. Oh, and the video-game related t-shirts need to be pink too, and they've got to have Princess Peach on them. Obviously all girls want to grow up to be like Princess Peach and stand around in a far away place waiting to be rescued by a plumber. If miss Peach isn't on there, we obviously need some pink text to "represent ourselves" and label us as grrrrrrl gamers, not associating to any kind of Doom/Killzone/Splinter Cell murkyness, because, we are ladies, and that obviously impedes on what kind of games we like to play.

Who in their right mind would wear that? "I'm just like a simple videogame character who can't do anything for herself. Come get me!"

Sick of it!

I'm just going to wear small mens clothing from now on. I can't be bothered any more.

Gaming Clichés

2008-05-27T00:33:00.001+01:00

For what its worth, making a decent video game today must be damn hard work, for a huge group of people. I almost feel bad moaning about all the things I hate about games, but for some reason it’s far more fun than talking about the good stuff. I appreciate most of these clichés are partly what makes a game a game- sometimes they’re great, funny, and predictable, and they might define why you like playing them, sometimes you even hate them so much you love them…

Girls

This is just an age-old annoyance that I don’t suspect is ever really going to change in videogames as a whole, no matter how many people whinge about it. Almost everything about 80% of female characters in games annoys me in some way.

Ridiculously sized breasts
Waists with the circumference of a pencil
Flawless, beautiful faces
Lack of sensible clothing or armour of any kind
General lack of clothing
Helplessness
Lack of truly decent games with a lead female (Tomb Raider, Primal, Beyond Good and Evil… now I’m stumped)
No sign what so ever of muscle tone or definition, not even from females in beat ‘em up games. Lack of strength, attack, or defence compared to male counterparts in RPG’s (can you name a female “tank”?).

For every believable, or different female character you come across, say, Yorda in Ico, there are fifty E-cup thong-wearing generic looking ladies, with long hair and flawless bodies sporting gravity-defying breast “physics”, or, say, your beautiful Princess Peach/GTA girlfriend whose only purpose is for you, the male, you rescue them and/or have sex them.

Kudos to Metal Gears’ hairy-arm-pitted, sticky-outy-eared Russian albino Olga, the tomboyish ginger “I don’t like make-up” Meryl, and the totally cool, regular ass-kicking, decently clothed The Boss. Thank you Hideo Kojima, these women totally, utterly rock. Even Eva, Metal Gears resident gorgeous blonde, only looks the way she does because she's got breast implants.

The retarded, friendly, helpless NPC

You know the ones. The “special” people that willingly walk into a wall of gunfire or the point of a sword blade, shouting “Aaaa! Help me!”
The folk who readily stand still while being assaulted, crying for your aid
The “lost” people, who instead of looking for a way out of dark generic dungeon, simply stand there and wait for you to talk to them before they can think for themselves
The imbecile travelling with you who got left behind, because s/he couldn’t navigate around a small wall
The moron who is taking shots to the head, and decides to crouch and turn around in open ground, in the hope that this will somehow confuse the enemy, or make him/her immune to incoming bullets (Killzone)

NPC’s of this nature populate a wealth of games, and they’re in almost every genre. There’s no escaping the wrath of their backwards and illogical behaviour.

Again, hats off to Metal Gear. When Snake assists Raiden, he’s awesome, he could take care of all the soldiers by himself - just the way Snake is meant to be. Similarly, Alyx from Half Life, she’s just great. She looks normal, and she’s a fantastic assistant NPC. She points out useful key things, she’s essential for level progression, and she’s great at helping kill the bad stuff. Then there’s that Bass player in Guitar Hero. Has he ever even missed a note? No. If you fail it’s your own stupid fault, because everyone else in that NPC band is perfect.

It’s a horror game, so we’ll make your life difficult from the start

Silent Hill is great as a horror game, and anyone could argue that having annoying, slow controls makes it extra-scary. You could also argue that as a result the gameplay is annoying, and slow.

Silent Hill 4: The Room: after slowly crawling through a pointlessly long tube/tunnel thing, and various cut scene shenanigans, I’m in the underground station, and a corpse is slowly floating towards me. Ha, it’s just a corpse, and it’s floating headfirst, so what’s the worst it’s going to do? It’s early on in the game, it doesn’t have teeth bigger than its face, this should be easy, or at least, simple. Well, I suppose it is simple. I get out a golf club and repeatedly beat the corpse for a good few minutes, then it falls on the ground. A few seconds later, it gets back up and starts making weird noises at me and damaging poor Harry again, and, after a while, I've discovered that the second enemy in the game deals significant damage, and is invincible. Which was learned after all the bullets of my pistol have been wasted on it. Yes, the correct way to “deal” with this enemy is to run away, its just not very satisfying legging it through an area, bumping into bins, walls and other obstacles because your character is a useless runner with only a vague ability to turn.

Resident Evil gives me a system I personally hate. I know a bottomless bag of gear is unbelievable, but it’s nice. In Resi, not only do I have to look out for zombies and shoot them in the face, but I’ve got to selectively arrange all the items I find in a grid of squares. When a zombie is chewing on my arm/neck etc, I’d like to get something to heal me sharpish. I don’t want to spend my time organising a bag just so I can locate something to restore some health.

Don’t get me wrong, Doom 3 is an excellent game, visually marvellous, imaginative, a great FPS… everything. But, you see, this game is really difficult for wimps like myself. We spend a significant number of our precious sought-after shells and bullets on dead bodies we think may not be dead, on lights that suddenly flash, on thin air because we heard a noise.
And, in Doom 3, sometimes a gun is a more “ready” and easy way to light up a room, rather than switching to a torch, since a huge mutant dog-thing could smash through a wall at any minute and maul you to death in very little time.
By the time we are faced with an enemy, unless we’ve been good and thorough with weapon storage codes, it’s really easy to run out of ammo, in which case you can either beat it over the head with a torch (very ineffective), beat it up with your fists (very ineffective), or if you’ve made it that far, chainsaw.

I don’t think horror really applies to the world of Metal Gear (yet), but all the remotely scary/tantalising stuff is imaginative, and done well. In the latter stages of MGS2, the Colonel calls Raiden, and starts unexpectedly talking gibberish about plants, affairs, random Japanese words, and even addresses you, as a player, to turn the console off. Even Psycho Mantis did things, like “making your controller move”, and “reading your mind”. (That’s making your controller vibrate and telling you which Konami game saves you’ve got on your memory card on the GC version)

Generic Fantasy

Fantasy. Shouldn’t it mean something that isn’t ordinary, that isn’t generic? Something strange and out of this world? Yeah, the world of Middle-Earth is great, (or arguably in this case Warhammer, or any concepts that may have preceded it- as I’m not sure on their dates) but that doesn’t mean that pale, skinny, pointy-eared elves have to make an appearance in every single fucking “fantasy” game ever published. It doesn’t mean the bad, ugly, dumb folk in a fantasy game always have to be called “Orcs”, and that at least one characters’ name is an odd misspelling of one we’re already familiar with. “Bartholomo” doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue, “Vaan” sounds like either a motor vehicle or a shoe. (Maybe I’m getting too fussy here, as on the flipside it would be rather under whelming to be playing as “Ben”.)

Elves, Orcs, Trolls, Dwarves, Dragons and whatever else seem to define what a fantasy videogame is today. I think fantasy worlds are becoming very stereotypical and normal.
“Magic” is feared, but its best practitioners are weak. They carry a staff, nearly always wear a dress regardless of gender, and instead of adopting armour, wear intricate jewellery and a dodgy hat that couldn’t so much defend them from a goose peck, let along the spiked club of generic big ugly brawly yeti troll monster #27.

Again, Metal Gear isn’t really a fantasy game, but it’s such a different battle to the usual light versus evil, good against bad, with parallels on either side. There’s always “good” magic and “bad” magic, for example. In Metal Gear, all the characters seem to think for themselves and offer their own agenda; despite any grand schemes in the game they all do their own thing. Most of the characters are very much “grey”, rather than being black or white/good or evil, and they often change sides. We can’t even be sure which sides are in the right or wrong.

Instead of the distinction between “magical” and “physical”, you’ve got scientists and soldiers. And the don't battle directly against each other. The soldiers end up killing other soldiers because they all want the scientists for themselves. The scientists all become caught up in this one way or another, and although they don’t directly kill anyone themselves, they face massive realisations about the work they do and how it affects life. They want to quit, but they can’t, because that’s the only thing they’re good at (or in Hals case, providing servings of tomato ketchup). That’s something the scientists have in common with the soldiers, they're only doing it because that's all they can do.

Cut scenes

I feel like lots of games encounter problems here. I found CG in older games, because it often looked much better than the real-time game play like in Final Fantasy IV, didn’t really grip me much. In the FF example, I could barely recognise the pixels of character compared to their shiny CG counterparts, but as its becoming easier for games to have their characters animate, and to depict massive environments or changes to them in real-time, more games seem to be doing it. Final Fantasy is still very much divided with big event CG’s, and real-time game play, but because the characters are easily distinguishable, and the CG is simply marvellous, I don’t think it’s a problem.
What is a problem however is;
No matter how many buttons you press, you can’t skip that bit of speech/cinematic when you’ve heard it all before (An unskippable Splinter Cell intro made me never want to put it in the disc tray ever again)
You can’t read the subtitles, or there are no subtitles.
Bad lip synch. Yeah- it must be really hard to do, but when its bad, it looks awful, and I feel incredibly un-immersed in what’s going on while a pair of lips open and close in no relation to what I can hear.

Oh, and Metal Gear has amazing cut scenes. Yeah, the codec used to be quite primitive, but it fullfilled its purpose.

I want Metal Gear toys. :(

VGA Boxes: Just No.

2008-05-23T17:27:00.000+01:00

So, for my room at uni, I decided that 2 monitors for my PC, and a TV for my games was overkill, when I could just get a VGA box and play my console's games through one of my monitors.
At first this worked alright. A big chunk of deskspace was cleared because my telly was huge, and the VGA box is just a little device that sits there connecting to one of the monitors and to power.
First problem? Annoyingly, the wires on the thing are all really short so it's a good job I've got a number of power adapters to bring things close enough. Everything reaches it, but my desk is now a frustrating labyrinth of wires with hardly any room to do work on that isn't done purely through the PC.
Although my VGA box boasts its own speaker, it's utter crap. I don't know why they bothered. The beautiful tones and melodies of Shadow of the Collosus sound like a child eating crisps. Luckily, again, I've got a really nice set of speakers and a subwoofer that I can (strain to) plug in.
Next up is the quality of the image you get. I understand you'll get what you pay for, but if I'd actually seen the results my VGA box would give me beforehand I'd have upped my price range. I think I paid between £20-£30, and I lost a lot of detail. This was most noticable on FPS games because you get a lot of blur and what seems to be delay which just ruined Killzone for me (Yes, I love Killzone, pass judgement on my FPS "standards" now). I used to have a good grenade-launching technique where I could just flit one off at the enemy's feet and run along, instead I find myself firing one and running straight into it because of the lack of clear vision, I think.

My boyfriend lugged his PS3 over recently to play Uncharted, obviously using my dreaded VGA box. After maybe half an hour or more of faffing around with wires, plugs, power, everything, both my monitor's refused to give us any glimpse of PS3 beauty.
Today, after checking some screens of Tomb Raider: Underworld (while on the subject, Lara's hair looked better in previous games as a long plait that gravity actually affected), I had a massive urge to play Tomb Raider: Anniversary. It's a great game. It's just wonderful to look at and for the most part, fun to play, because Lara has amazing, fast, acrobatic mobility.

So, as a precaution I bought some more batteries for the VGA box remote incase this had something to do with the previous failure. After a few minutes of faffing round with wires to plug my PS2 in, and insterting fresh batteries, I was still faced with a blank screen. The god-awful crackling of "sound" was coming out, just no picture whatsoever, on either monitor, with any kind of combination of wires. I can hardly describe how frustrating it was- somewhere near game rage- but not quite.

I'm sure other people who paid for a decent VGA box are really happy with it. If it worked well it would be great, but as it stands, it isn't working at all, I want to unplug it and drop my old TV on it.

Ouch, first blog..

2008-05-22T19:51:00.000+01:00

I've written blogs in a number of places, and finally I think I may have found a site where I can blog regularly and settle down into it, without having important musings in other places like Myspace, Bebo (god that site is bad..) and 1up spread around anywhere I want to blog. I've stopped using 1up because I can't be bothered reaching 250 posts on their forum before I'm allowed to post any html, I find that rule pretty stupid when I already fairly regularly use a number of videogame forums like GamesRadar and Frag Dolls, and I don't want to reiterate what I think 250 times to a group of different people.

Anyhoo, for the few/zero people reading this I think I'd better introduce myself. I'm Emily, I'm studying Creative Digital Media at Teesside University (largely videogame related modules), and I'll start my second year there in September. The first year has been excellent and increadibly insightful for me. When I started I was completely new to all the software we used; 3DS Max has been the most confusing, but over summer I'd love to get more proficient with it to make my life easier. I've also used Flash and the latest Photoshop for the first time for some of my work, and I've thankfully got these on my PC so I can mess around with them and hopefully get better.

For the first time in my life, I'm highly anticipating the grades I'll get from this year. School and sixth form were a massive failure for me- it was the worst time of my life bar none and my grades reflected this, basically it's a miracle I got on my course. I'm not worrying at night about how bad my grades are going to be, I'm genuinely excited and I hope I live up to my expectations!

So, since the title of my blog involves games, I'd better elaborate on that!
I'm a Guitar Hero nut. I'm obsessed with the world of Metal Gear and Solid Snake; ergo I can't wait for MGS4. I've recently dabbled into MMO's with Age of Conan, and the game looks and is brilliant. I love Final Fantasy 6, 7, 9, and X. I hate Final Fantasy X-2. I thought the original Killzone was great. I also love Timesplitters, The Orange Box (as a whole), Unreal Tournament 3, Age of Empires, Tomb Raider (excluding Angel of Darkness), Tekken, Soul Calibur, Metal Slug, Gran Turismo, GTA... I think that covers my serious love for games. My collection has wavered around the 200 mark, this is partly due to my inability to get rid of games, and the fact that I've recieved free code to review games for a couple of sites.

Currently I write for D+PAD , which I'd be mad not to pimp on here because it is, honestly, a wonderful free mag. It looks great and there are some really brilliant writers on the team.

Apart from playing games and writing about them, I'm currently involved in making a casual game, and I also have/had some mountain running talent that I hope to rekindle. I've finished 5th in England and various other positions, I've sadly closley missed on the chance to run for England, and now all my uni work for this year is out the way, I'm turning a new leaf (again...) and getting back into running (again...)