23 Feb
Please forgive me for that horrible, horrible pun.
The Playstation Vita launched around the Western world today and I was fortunate enough to be able to pick one up. Not that it was cheap. Not in the slightest.
Day One haul, clockwise from bottom left: Starter Pack, PSVita Wifi Model, Preorder Bonus Box, Uncharted: Golden Abyss, Little Deviants, PSN Voucher, Memory Card. My wallet hurts.
Just under $600 all up. Ouch. Let’s get straight to some first impression reviews. Continue reading
22 Feb
My album reviews start with a left-field choice, but one that introduced me to an entire genre all by itself.
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Released: March 2010
Label: Yamaha
Genre: J-pop/Dance
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…Nup. Can’t explain the logic here.
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TRACK LISTING
1. Stay With You
2. Player
3. I Wish You
4. The Music
5. Factory
6. I Was Wrong
7. Can I Have a Word
8. What Do You Want to Do
9. Hello
10. Love or Lies
Some time in late June, 2010, I was travelling on a long Singapore Airlines flight to South Africa when I decided to pass the time by checking out some of the Eastern music options available on their (awesome) in-flight entertainment system. The first option I chose was PLAYER, a Japanese electro-pop album that was relatively new at the time and that I knew absolutely nothing about. Continue reading
21 Feb
Last year I watched 35 movies in the cinema as part of my 100 movie project (more on that later). This year, with summer on its last limp legs, I am up to a grand total of eight. With the Oscars less than a week away, it seems as good a time as any to go through them (I won’t be rating them yet though).
The posters pictured below are the properties of their respective studios.
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Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows
Another year of (hopefully) 100 movies kicked off with several loud bangs thanks to Guy Ritchie’s Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows. The film does not shy away from pyrotechnics and seems to take delight in framing its explosions in the most ludicrous way possible. The traditionally tame period setting has no effect on this; Ritchie knows what he likes from his films and he runs with that. The banter between his leads Robert Downey Jr and Jude Law is what holds the otherwise confusing narrative together. The supporting cast, especially Noomi Rapace, is underused, although Jared Harris’ criminal mastermind Moriarty is well depicted. One brilliant slo-mo heavy escape sequence in particular stands out from what is ultimately an “alright” movie. Continue reading
20 Feb
This is probably the closest I’m going to get to posting a videogame review at the time of its launch. I usually take quite a while to finish games (if I finish them at all).
I imported Catherine two months ago with a friend and finished it recently. Catherine was released in the USA last July, but was only released here in Australia two days ago.
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Platform: PS3, Xbox 360
Developer: Atlus
Rating: MA15+
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The key is to look at the OTHER stuff on the cover. That gives you a better idea of the kind of crazy game you’re in for.
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Oh, how these words haunted me while playing through Catherine. As stupidly obvious as they may sound, heeding them is easier said than done when you’re trying to solve devious block puzzles with an oppressive time limit and a grotesque mess of body parts constantly on your case. Make no mistake, Catherine is a very crazy, very difficult game. But it is also a multi-layered experience that rewards persistence and skill by telling a story the likes of which no other mainstream game has ever attempted. Dare I say it is worth a look. Continue reading
19 Feb
We live in a world where entertainment media saturates our lives. Music, movies and videogames make billions of dollars every year and the vast majority of us are contributors to this in some way. As frequent consumers of this media living in financially troubled times, we often turn to the opinions of others to help us make a decision on what to part with our money for. They can make us feel more at ease about our purchasing decisions and, if things go sour, they give us someone to blame.
CDs and DVDs and Blu-Rays oh my!
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Whether the opinions we seek are those of our close friends, professional critics or random people on the street, the end result is some kind of review. From essay-length dissections to that old chestnut of eloquent wisdom, “It’s pretty good”, they can all be useful in their own way.
But because people are all so different from one another, opinions tend to vary quite wildly from person to person. Different experiences and personalities influence the way we react to the things we consume. Yet you might find that Continue reading
Vagrant Rant 