We Fish You A Merry Christmas

Conspiracy theorists rejoice! With the Doctor Who Christmas special now unleashed upon the world we now have a pretty clear idea of what the Moffat master plan is all about. It's not about cracks, or silence, or rivers or any of that.

It's about fish.

Behold your new masters

 Now, I admit that Christmas fish wasn't something I ever saw coming. And it's not everyday you get to say that. But the thing is it was all forshadowed from the very first episode of the new series. What was it little Amelia Pond was thanking Santa for?

A FISH.

Then the Docor comes along, and eats FISH custard. And then in the Beast Below the Doctor quips about looking for an escaped FISH before finding the star whale. Which is sort of like a fish. And what were the Vampires Of Venice? FISH from space.

Thus I have no doubt at all in mind that the big bad guy at the end of the next series will in fact be.... THE MYRKA.

Just like I always said it would be

But anyway, I'm supposed to be talking about the Christmas special. Mind you, I'm supposed to be taking my medication and not listening to the voices anymore, but whatever.

Doctor Who of course has a long and respected history of ripping off classic literature, but I don't think it's ever been quite so overt, at least from an in-story perspective. The point where the Doctor basically decides to reinact a Christmas carol as his plan to save the crashing space liner is a joy to behold. It's like you can SEE the cogs turning in his brain. This is, of course, down to the brilliant Matt Smith who is of course a pure joy to behold as the Doctor. Poetry in motion. Albeit a somewhat spastic, random motion. But motion nonetheless.

The script is great, replete with much wit. It was mentioned to me by a certain someone watching the new series for the first time how very Douglas Adams it all felt. And you know something, it really does. There is that certain sparkle to dialogue.

Visually we have a nice neo Victorian type aesthetic. You could call it steampunk if you really wanted, but the lack of anything actually powered by steam rather puts paid to that overworn term. It does, after all, require something in excess of wearing goggles.

But what of the story itself? Well, it's certainly the most christmassy of the Christmas specials done thus far. This is perhaps it's strength and also it's greatest weakness. The whole thing is so strongly tied into christmasness, both in script, tone and execution that I feel it'll seem rather out of place watching it at any other time of year. But only time and the series 6 boxset will tell. Obviously there is room for a certain amount of cheesiness here, but I think that the central conceit of having the characters knowingly and deliberately acting out a Christmas carol avoids much of these issues.

The fact that the companions are sidelined for almost the entire episode in favour of concentrating on the Doctor and Sardick is interesting, and does actually work well. Whilst you do rather feel sorry for poor ld Rory having basically nothing to do, Matt Smith is just so very GOOD as the Doctor that you really don't miss him or Amy that much at all. Just goes to show that maybe you really don't need the traditional companion after all. Tom Baker was right. Not that I would wish to knock any of the companions here. It's just that there's really not much for them to do here than play the centurion and the call girl. Thankfully offscreen.

So the action is basically confined to the Doctor, Sardick in his various age brackets, and his frozen paramour. What can you really say about these performances? I've already mentioned that I'd have Matt Smiths babies. Micheal Gambon puts in a good turn as the fundamentally unlikeable (yet fundamentally flawed) Sardick. And The opera singer whose name eludes me right now does manage very well when you consider she's never done any acting before. It does have to be said that the big draw with her is perhaps not so much her acting skills as her beautiful singing voice. Which is awesome.

Though it is worth mentioning that her 8 day romance with a young boy is kinda creepy when you think about it.

Overall what we have here is a well crafted tale with a very specific focus. This isn't a bad thing at all. We also get the concept of Christmas fish, which really should become a fixture of future decorations. Better than the usual ghastly tat anyway. Everything's better with sharks.

Merry Christmas!

The Misadventures of Tron n'est pas bon

So, we went out to see Tron Legacy last night. Whilst I wouldn't say the movie was exactly top of my list of things to watch I was certainly vaguely intrigued to tag along with a couple of friends for a night out. I mean, everybody loves Tron, right?

Anyway, this was also my first time experiencing the latest fad of 3D. It's that I've been avoiding watching a 3D film up to now, so much as there has so far not been any films that are in 3D that I've had the slightest desire to actually go and watch. Frankly 3D has always struck me as being a bit of an unnecessary gimmick.

Tron Legacy has done nothing to change my mind on this issue.

Frankly the only thing it actually added to the experience was severe ocular discomfort. Now, I'll say that the technique is certainly interesting from a technical perspective. So are particle cannons, doesn't mean I want to be staring down the end of one. The main problem I found was simply that the 3D made everything look really flat, which I admit may seem counter intuitive. Basically what it looked like a lot of the time was a series of flat layers superimposed one over the other, like a cardboard diorama. Rather than adding any sense of depth or perspective this just made it look like a bunch of flatness on flatness on flatness. Only the lst layer is slightly out of focus to make it look further away.

Also, since the glasses just hurt my eyes it made it very difficult to actually focus properly on what actually happening, particularly in the more fast paced action sequences. Now, the film does have some nice design work, but it's kinda wasted when you can't actually look at it properly because the glasses are trying to send you boss eyed. There are, I do admit brief moments where the 3D appears to work, and you'll have a sense of depth or things coming towards you. But these moments are far too rare and infrequent to justify the vast majority of time which is spent doing my goddamn eyes in and looking frankly naff. At the end of the day I saw NOTHING achieved through the use of 3D that a half decent director couldn't do by appropriately framing his shots and taking a bit of time over composition.

Or, you know, DIRECTING.

So, the 3D was a complete bust, but what of the film itself?

It... wasn't a childhood raping atrocity like most crap they pump out these days. But neither was it really actually very good. And when simply being not utter crap is the best you can say you know that something is wrong. It's just sort of there, you know?

Visually (when you're eyeballs aren't trying to escape out of the sides of your head) it looks very nice of course. But it takes more than just looks to make a good movie. What this lacked was a real sense of heart I think. It's slightly hollow. It has lots of nice nods back to the original, which is cool, but the story really doesn't GO anywhere. The program characters are too much like people and the main person character is to much like cardboard. Nothings really properly defined. Now, in order to talk about the films various short comings I will have to give out spoilers. Though how you can really spoil a plot that doesn't really happen I'm not sure.

So, Bit. Do the spoilers begin here?

YES!

Right, so after a cursory bit of real world introduction (thankfully presented in flatland o vision) Chippy McCardboard or whatever his name is gets sent onto the grid. He is promptly captured and stuck in the games. Disc combat and lightcycles, woo. We are also here introduced to our evil overlord, xbox Jeff Bridges. To be fair depending on the lighting the cgi job they've used to make him appear young can look pretty cool. But it seems to get less convincing as the film progresses until it finally looks like a screenshot from mass effect or something. So anyway, xbox here is a program copy of Flynn from the original movie who's gone a bit mad and taken over. This is not actually a bad idea. After all, these are PROGRAMS we're talking about. So if he's working from a faulty assumption as to what it is he's programmed to do that could cause problems. Oh, and there's also an uberminion guy who fights with 2 discs. This is quite cool, but would be a lot better if he didn't otherwise look exactly like every other disposable minion in the film.

Which is quite a lot of minions.

Anyway, our cardboard hero is rescued from the arena by some bint in a lightcar, because merchandising. I think the car must be operated by some sort of pump mechanism, as that's the only way to explain what the hell she's doing with the steering wheel. Seriously, I've seen five year olds pull off better driving acting. She then takes him off the grid out into some poorly defined wasteland and it's at this precise moment that the film stops making ANY sense. I mean, how does a computer have wastelands? The world in which Tron takes place is either the internet (though the lack of porn would dictate otherwise) or the ENCOM server array. This is the space in which the programs move. It's all fairly metaphorical I know, but what the fuck is this wasteland supposed to be exactly? Couldn't they have just moved the files to secure server or something?

I dunno.

Anyway, in the "wasteland" we arrive at Flynns super special secret hideaway. Captain Cardboard briefly tries having daddy issues for about 5 seconds before realising it's completely out of his acting range (which basically encompasses eye candy and little else). Flynn reveals that he's been hiding out here doing absolutely NOTHING to fight the encroaching totalitarian regime (a matter in which he has some experience) because....

BUH?

I don't know. HE doesn't know. No one does. He just couldn't be bothered I guess? That or he was to busy spying on bint through the big creepy interconnecting spy holes in all the rooms. No wonder he's dressed all in white.

Anyway, theres' some guff about how xbox Jeff Bridges needs real Jeff Bridges disc. Because I guess if we aren't gonna have a real plot we might as well have a Macguffin instead. Oh, it's also here that it's revealed that Evil "2 Discs" Minion is actually Tron. We wondering where he'd got to. They even have him grabbing another guys disc in the flashback and fighting with 2, just to make sure you get it.

Oh, I also nearly forgot a major plot point. Mainly because after this moment so do the writers. So apparently, before xbox went crazy these dudes showed up. SPECIAL dudes. A form of machine intelligence arising spontaneously from the grid. Which might be cool of they weren't EXACTLY like everyone else only with a tattoo. But they had special green house to live in. And the xbox blew them the fuck up, because he's a dick. And now they're all dead. So you know, that was really worth putting in, since absolutely nothing ever come of the idea.

So anyway, son of cardboard decides to go fight the power. When even this guy has a better plan than you it's really a sign to just give up already. So, he's trying to get the portal to get off the grid and unplug xbox from the outside, which seems reasonable. However despite coming in right in the middle of the grid the portal is now off in the distant beyond. Because I guess portals are migratory. Anyway, where does he go to look for help getting to the ancestral mating grounds of the portalbirds?

A NIGHTCLUB.

Captain, if you be so kind.

Why do PROGRAMS need a nightclub?

Seriously. The whole sequence is simply a drawn out and pathetically transparent opportunity to have Daft Punk do a cameo. Consider they wear helmets covering their faces this seems redundant at best. Anyway, blah blah, betrayal, ambush, whatever. Flynn turns up and demonstrates his awesome powers, which is actually pretty cool and kind of what you'd expect a user to be really capable of here. I mean surely there must be SOMETHING to differentiate them from the programs?

No? Not even the beard?

Okay, nevermind. So anyway, the Macguffin disc is stolen, oh noes. But it's okay because right outside the nightclub is a space tram headed straight for the portal. Why we couldn't have just taken this to start with is not an issue that is ever addressed. Sadly it's the slow train, stopping at Slough, Putney, and the TOP SECRET EVIL MILITARY BASE.

Cracking bit of luck that.

So anyway, xbox is apparently making an evil army to invade the real world with. And now he's got the disc he can send through his literally hundreds of buys with pointy glowsticks.

Into a small room.

ONE AT A TIME.

Let's be honest. It's not VERY threatening is it?

Anyway I guess there's some fights or something and then there's a chase with lightplanse because merchandising. the Tron decides to turn good because... they... shot at him? Nicely? I really have no idea, it makes absolutely no sense, but it also makes absolutely no difference as all that happens is he falls in the water and is never seen again. I mean, considering the amount of money they spent on xbox Jeff Bridges we never even get to see Trons face. But Bruce Boxleitner is IN THE FILM. He's right there, in the real world bits. He even gets a line when tron randomly decides to be good/useless (take you pick). Did they just hate him or something? What do you suppose he did to piss them off?

Anyway, one chase seen and no sense later we arrive at the portal, but xbox is already there. Oh noes. So Jeff Bridges activates his cosmic hoover powers and explodes whilst the cardboard kid and his generic lady friend exit the grid into the real world.

AND THERE IS NO CLIMAX. That's it. It just sort of happens and then everything stops.

Woo. Oh, and apparently the bint is one of those super special dead people. Though for all the difference it makes she might as well actually be a secret turnip. But now she's real. Thrust from a world of pure data into a fleshy sac of disgusting secretions. I confidently predict a nervous breakdown and possible suicide once her period kicks in. I mean, seriously, how can you prepare a program for that shit? When you think about it biology is basically nauseating. Does anyone think a program will be able to deal with all those FLUIDS?

NONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONO!

So yeah. Tron himself is not addressed in anything but the most cursory and indeed arbitrary way. Plot points are raised and then ignored, and far to little actually makes sense. Whilst the visual look is quite cool it frankly feels a lot less like another world inside of the machine and more like a trip to Cyberdog. The soundtrack is pretty cool though, with a fairly old school feel. But like I say, whilst it's not great it is at least some shade of respectful to the source material. So rather than wanting to pretend the franchise never existed at all it really just makes you want to go dig out the original and watch that instead.

There are worse ways to spend an evening. But then there are also plenty that don't involve corneal hemorrhaging. Your mileage may vary.

Seriously, They Should Have Had The Myrka In It.

So, it's christmas then right? And being that I'm an overly verbose Doctor Who fanboy with far too much time on my hands there's only one logical thing that I'm gonna be writing about today.

Part 4 of the adventure games.

I WOULD be doing a review of the christmas special, but I want to watch it through again before doing so and it wasn't yet on iplayer last time I checked. However the final installment of the adventure games has been available for a few days now, only I hadn't gotten around to playing it yet. Something to do with the ridiculous amount of grinding I've been doing on Devil Summoner. But this morning I finally managed to play through.

These games have certainly been an interesting experiment. Had they decided to charge for them I have no doubt I would have bought them, though perhaps not in as timely a manner as I've aquired them thus far. They're not bad games by any means. However neither are they, in all honesty, the most shining examples of the art ever commited to disk. They're a fun enough diversion for an evening, which seems to be about right for this whole episodic thing. Replay value I'm not sure of yet. I can't say I've felt particularly motivated to replay the others thus far, though I do think it would be interesting to work through them now we've got the whole lot and see how things progress. Or not.

See, the question you might well ask about this fourth installment is "what does this add to the series?" and the answer is, basically, more of the same. It's not really a dramatic departure in any way. There's a few puzzles, a bit of exploration, a bit of stealth. Fairly basic stuff that was established in part 1. Not exactly "hardcore" but then why should it be? It works well enough, suits the tone of the show and is simple enough for the younger ones to play without getting annhiliated. Not that it's THAT easy. I still died plenty of times.

The big thing this time of course is the return of the Vashta Nerada. As a monster they do seem to be one that would suit the game environment. And they're used reasonably well as you might imagine they would be. In addition the odd lumbering suit coming to get you (Barbera) there's a bit of light based running around puzzles.

Kind of.

See, whilst the whole keep out of the shadows OR DIE thing works very well I must confess that a lot of the time the shadowy realm of death parts didn't look particularly dark. At all. It's hardly Fury From The Deep bright, but I do think they could have upped the contrast a bit, which would add to the atmosphere as well as making things a bit more obvious. Though it's always possible this is just my crappy display. Who knows? My impression is that the Vashta Nerada could have been utilised slightly better.

Whilst I don't think the game is particularly longer than any of the others it does manage to FEEL bigger. This is due in a large part to the glass corridors of the sea base. At the start there is an awful lot of running down corridors as a giant mutant alien shark harrases you, which certainly adds to the feel of the available square footage. But it's really being able to see the base sprawling around you (as well as said shark swimming around) that gives a feel of openess. Contrast this with the view out of the windows in City Of The Daleks, which was a matt job painted on the inside of a bubble, and you've got a much less claustrophobic feel. Even though you're trapped in a base at the bottom of the ocean.

Story wise things are okay I suppose, though there is a bit of rather jarring jumping around in one or two places that really disturb the flow of things. There's bad stuff happening, everbodies getting eaten. save the day, defeat the bad guys, back home on time for tea.

It's also here that I've finally pinpointed one of the main problems with these games. See, whilst the voice recording seems well and good there's always been something that felt a little off with dialogue. After watching a few episodes of the series in close conjunction I've finally realised that, quite simply, it's just that a large part of matt Smiths performance is very physical. The way he moves is just not something that you really capture in a game like this. Frankly I doubt you could capture it even with a huge budget "proper" AAA game on whatever overpriced console happens to be flavour of the week right now.

Overall there's really not much I can say. If you liked the other chapters then you'll probably like this one too. If you didn't then I don't think there's anything on offer here that'll change your mind. Considering that all 4 games are available free I don't think there's really much to complain about. Whilst not perfect these have, I think, certainly been a shot in the right direction and have proven the viability of Doctor Who based games. What will be particularly interesting is to compare them to the new Wii game and see which comes out best.

But that is a job for the new year I think.

Lincoln Vs Presley

"Death reveals to man what he truly is"
                The intro to that one song by the Berzerker

“Bullshit.” Thought Abe Lincoln sullenly.

The real problem with death is when it reveals to everyone else what you really are.  Especially when that something happens to be an immortal vampire overlord.
Oh sure they covered it all up. Put out a story about how he'd been assassinated, how he was a great president. How he'd never eaten a live baby on the white house roof.

Lies! All of it. Nothing but Illuminati bullshit propagated by those CIA bastards.
So now people remembered him as some benevolent martyr to freedom, rather than a bloodthirsty tyrant. Outcast, forgotten. Skulking in the shadows, scavenging from the dregs of society to survive.

It made no difference. There was one simple fact that no rewriting of history or mass brainwashing exercise could ever change.

Being shot in the head REALLY, REALLY FUCKING HURTS.

Perhaps, Lincoln thinks to himself sometimes, he could have sweet talked his way out of having slaughtered half the theatre audience in a blind fury. What the powers that be really took offense to was all the swearing that accompanied it. Bunch of tightasses.

He scratched idly at the smoking hole that had once been his right eye. Never fucking healed. That bastard had known what he was doing. Must have had something holy in the bullet.

Never did get a chance to find out what. When the whole world thinks you're dead, except the people that want you dead some things get forgotten in the heat of the moment.

Damn thing had been knocked out by a CIA vampire hunter with a baseball bat and a bad attitude. Couldn't say he missed it, the damn thing had burned like crazy.
Still without the constant burning of the bullet he'd at least been able to think straight. Stopped being a raving tornado of death and laid low. 140 years on the run, and for the past 3 he hadn't needed to surf the waves of battle out of town before the reinforcements turned up. Not that skulking in a dilapidated crypt in a dead end backwater town in the middle of butt-fucking nowhere was really where he pictured himself being by now. In fact it was about as far from the opulent luxury and baby raping parties he’d assumed were his right as it was possible to get without actually living in a sewer.

He wondered what he must look like by now. No point looking in a mirror after all.  Words such as drawn, haggard, ragged, hobo and shite crossed his mind. Still, that's the problem with feeding of junkies. They might taste like shit, but somehow nothing else seems to quite... satisfy.

Still, with the hunters off his trail, perhaps he could find some time to clean himself up. Get out of this stinking shithole of a town, sort out his diet, and regain his strength. Maybe get out to one of those Amish places. No drugs there, and it's not like they could phone for help.

Lincoln chuckled to himself, a guttural, mirthless sound. Suddenly he span to face the entrance of the crypt, hissing. Someone else was here!

A black clad figure stepped from the shadows of the doorway. Moonlight spilled in behind him, illuminating the squalid filth in which Lincoln had been living all this time. Discarded needles mingled with discarded bones in stinking filth.

The stranger himself was illuminated. Black leather jacket and trousers, black T shirt emblazoned with the logo "Who Killed Marilyn?” He was wearing fingerless gloves decorated with a bone pattern, and his long black hair was slicked into a point, hanging down over his face.

“Oh great,” thought Lincoln. “It's a fucking goth.” He’d seen one’s dressed like this hanging around recently. One group of sad pretenders worshipping yet further pretenders to throne long since broken. The tributes He’d demanded in his day were of blood and fear. He’d walked his own grim path and none could follow, even had they so desired.

Another age, another life. Honestly, the youth of today. Still, he was hungry, and it seemed fate had ordered the metaphorical pizza.

Lincoln straightened up, confidant now. This was no threat.

“What do you want, little meat thing?” He spat contemptuously at the stranger.

“Well sir, I'm just taking care of business”

“What?”

Had he a working circulatory system or a body temperature above that of his surroundings, Lincoln’s blood would have chilled at that voice. He knew that voice.

“It can't be. You're dead.”
“Actually, you're dead. I'm just lying low for while. Mr. President.”
“Don't mock me Presley.”
“I'm not here to mock you Mr. President.”

Something glinted in the moonlight as Presley drew it from his jacket. Something sharp. Something pointed.

“I'm here to kill you.”

Instantly Lincoln leapt to attack, claws outstretched, fangs dripping. His sole remaining eye burning with hate. Centuries of experience in the art of the kill transforming his body into a lightning fast missile of concentrated death.

Or at least that was the idea. All those centuries of vampiric night stalking didn’t appear to have quite prepared him for the lightning fast roundhouse kick to the head which Presley delivered, with perfect timing.
Lincolns withered body slammed into the decrepit brickwork, sending up a cloud of dust and filth.

“Don't fuck with me Mr. President. I'm a goddamn black belt in ass kicking.”

Lincoln climbed unsteadily to his feet.

“Fool. You can beat my body, but you can't break it. Don't you understand I am immortal! Batter upon me until your fists bleed, eventually you, mortal will tire. And then I will destroy you! No weapon can harm me!!”

“Yu-huh” deadpanned Elvis as he slammed the three foot metal stake through Lincoln’s ribcage, straight into his dead black heart.

Lincoln screamed. The pain was incredible. Like nothing he'd ever felt. Nothing since... Since...

Shit. Since he'd been shot in the head with a bullet carved from the pope’s old hipbones or whatever it was. A holy bullet.

Shit.

Shit shit fuck fucking shit.

Lincoln screamed. And screamed, and writhed. But that was all he could do. He couldn’t move, he couldn’t pull the accursed object from his chest and shove it up Presley’s ass like he so badly wanted to.

“Wha.. What? Where?....”

Looking down he saw the spike protruding from his chest, pinning him to the wall.  Around the wound his pale, pallid flesh began to blacken and flake. Consumed by an invisible fire. Radiating outward from the golden stake.

“Where'd I get hold of a holy weapon? One powerful enough to put down an ancient night crawler like you?”

“Well it weren't easy by any means. But they haven't found all the secret passages and I do like to slip back home from time to time. And as much as I hated melting 'em down, those records weren't really doing much just sitting on the wall like that. Hell, the fake ones look just as good. It's not like anyone will ever know. Except you and me.”

“Wh.. why?...”

“Well, me anyway. So long Mr. President.”

As the burning finally overcame his ability to scream, the last thing Abraham Lincoln Vampire Lord of America was Elvis quietly singing to himself as he slowly walked away

"Five twenty five, august fifth, nineteen sixty two....."

Ultramas

It's christmas time. Hooray. And around these parts there's only really one way to do christmas. The same way we do most other things.

No, I don't mean badly or on the cheap.

I mean the ULTRAMAN way.

daa daa da daa!

So with that in mind consider this a specium beam in the war against christmas.

Of course, it was December 08 when I visited Ultramanland, and maybe that had an effect on me.

I DARE you to tell me this isn't awesome

And it was there that I acquired the fantastic Ultraman christmas card. Which in addition to being an ULTRAMAN CHRISTMAS CARD contained a DVD message from Taro and Ultra Father. I have no idea what they're saying exactly, but I don't need to. The message is clear enough: Ultra + Christmas = WIN.

But wait, it gets better. Because then we then find out that there is such a thing as the Ultraman christmas ALBUM.

Yes. This is an album containing christmas style versions of some Ultraman theme songs, christmas songs sung in Japanese (and thus rendered infinitely less annoying then usual), a short audio drama in which Baltan Seijin learns the true meaning of christmas and the single best version of jingle bells EVER RECORDED.

Baltan Seijin fucking LOVES christmas

And so the seeds had been sown. I'd had it in my mind to conduct an Ultraman themed christmas for a while now, and this year I have finally achieved it.

Now, the first part of my plan was to construct a suitably Ultra themed tree. How? Simple.

Yubi Ningyo! The original plan was to get a white or silver tree and decorate it with red tinsel. But then I found that you could get red trees, which somehow seemed much more appropriate.

These actually work really well. At first I was a bit unsure as to how I would affix them to the tree, but the solution was incredibly obvious. It's an artificial tree. Just bend the ends of the branches up and sit them on. They are finger puppets after all.

And then for the top...

At first I was unsure. I mean, Pestar or maybe even Bemstar would look pretty cool if you could get them in a suitably festive paint scheme. Or there's always Yunijiin, if only they actually made one.

I mean, he's only the christmas kaiju

But I found a set of glitter Mebius and Tiga from the Superior 8 Ultra Brothers on ebay pretty reasonably, and if I do say so myself they look pretty spiffy. Would be perhaps cooler if they were to light up, but I really couldn't bring myself to drill holes in their butts and jam fairy lights up there.

So far so good thought I. But somehow it wasn't quite enough. And then I hit on the best idea yet.

Yup. Ultra presents. I was, it has to be said, rather pleased with how these turned out, as I thought it would be lot more difficult. I admit they're not exactly mathmatically precise, but that's hardly the point.

Ultraman

Ultraseven

Ultraman Ace

Ultraman 80

Father Of Ultra

Mother Of Ultra

To make these I simply got some silver and red wrapping paper, as well as a bit of blue for the colour timers. Then I found an image of a leaflet checklist for the Ultraman toys, which provided me a reasonable straight on view of the chest designs. The it's just a question of cutting out the detail in paintshop, scaling it up to the approximate size ofthe present and printing out a template. Though if anyone wants to make some decent quality scalable vector templates I'd be VERY grateful. Anyway, scissors and glue later I have a pretty funky selection of gifts for my friends and family. 

Although I am left with one last problem. How the hell do I explain to my parents whats going on with the wrapping?

Anyway, this is how I'm doing christmas this year, and in all probability every year. I can only hope that this post will add to the somewhat dissapointing google search results for Ultraman christmas, and maybe even inspire some other Ultrafans to do christmas the right way next time.

Hail To The King

This is something I wrote for an RPG, but since in all probability it'll never get used for that I figure I may as well put it up here since it's one of those strange and rare things: Something I'm actually quite chuffed with.

The King of Murder dances slowly
Turning round and round
No smile he wears upon his face
But nor is there a frown

His smile he holds in both his hands
It's teeth are sharp and bright
To share it's laughter all around
That is the Kings delight

The young and old
The rich and poor
Both sorrowful and sane
Shall dance and scream but only once
Then never dance again

Things I Find Hilarious

You ever wonder if there should be like a Meagan's Law for Paintshop? You know, so before you start talking to someone online they have to declare that they have created a variety of atrocious pictures for their own amusement? That NO ONE else has any chance of finding funny at all? But they still post them and expect to be hailed as some sort of genius?

I am one of those people.

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101

My how time flies. Mind you, so do cats, bricks and hedgehogs when you pack them into a piece of drainpipe with a sufficient quantity of high explosive.

Fly Mrs Tiggywinkle! Be Free!

EVERYTHING flies with a sufficient quantity of high explosive. However I'm not here today to debate the depressingly linear nature of temporal mechanics or how almost everything is better with 16 pounds of C4 strapped to it. Oh no, what I'm going to talk about is far, FAR more boring.

Because you see this is my one hundred and first post this year. Not only that, but checking back in the archives this actually the 1st anniversary of this blog!

Yeah, I know, you can hardly contain your excitement. But if I actually gave two shits what you think I wouldn't be writing this. Because I'd have DYSENTERY.

Anyway, This is I suppose in some ways a milestone. 1 year on I'm still managing to crap out something every so often (that'd be the dysentery again) and have even managed to achieve my goal of an average of 1 post a week. I haven't actually MANAGED 1 post a week, far from it. But that's hardly the point. The long silent periods where I weep quietly in the corner have been counterbalanced by long soul destroying series of posts on badly written supernatural romance novels where I scream loudly at the computer. Seriously, I'm crying blood just THINKING about doing book 3.

Also I make this face a lot

It's also thanks I think to these particular forays into SHEER TERROR that I apparently have hits for the term "free comics rapening porn". Just think about that for a second. Someone out there thinks RAPENING is an actual word.

This is why I make the face. I'm not even in the DREGS of the internet here.

But ho hum.

The point remains that despite a complete lack of critical acclaim I've managed to keep going with this bullshit, and am not actually thinking of giving it up like almost everything else I've ever done. So go me I guess?

Anyway, let's round out the year with the last few bits of old crap from the vault I had on standby, and then enter the new year with...... Something else. Probably.

Until next time.....

Sometimes I Get These Ideas... And They Just Won't STOP.

And you know the worst part? This could really work. And don't just mean in terms of being so retarded that it's obviously awesome. I mean you could totally write this. Just replace "puritanism" with "being a fucking WEREWOLF" and the story practically writes itself. Except that someone would probably make the royalists vampires and the whole thing would quickly become gayer than a submarine full of jello. Maybe I should get some books on Cromwell and try it myself? Except for the fact that I'd be torn between wanting to write it properly or in the semi literate ravings that somehow pass for literature in this day and age. Either way it surely could never be as bad as certain other things I could mention but would prefer not to because it gves me an embolism.

.Anyway, I did another pic for this as well, so here it is.

Cromwolf Book One: A Parliment..... Of WOLVES!!!

The tagline is: Biting history....IN THE FACE!!.

This Is Why We Love Scrabble

I've been playing WordSquared lately for reasons which have nothing to do with avoiding doing any work. And I feel compelled to record todays triumph for posterity.

Interestingly though it doesn't recognize "shite".

Oh yes. And it's on a triple word score.

You know what that sound is? It's the sound of me WINNING THE INTERNET.

I am so not mature right now and I don't even care.

By Any Other Name (Part 2)

So, if you'll recall last time I was engaged in what can only be described as a painfully protracted attempt at a character assassination of one Rose Tyler. A person who is NOT EVEN REAL. Why, exactly would I wish to spend hours of my life complaining on the internet about a character from a tv show that I somehow profess to enjoy despite the amount of complaining I do?

Well, for a laugh. Believe or not I do really love Doctor Who, but that doesn't mean I have to blind to it's faults. And since I love it I of course enjoy thinking and talking about it. And whats the easiest thing to do about anything? COMPLAIN.

So, here I go again. Rose Tyler, a companion who on the scale of 1 to Adric turns it up to 11.

Series 2. Oh dear, series 2. There are, sadly, many problems with the second series of the revived show. Most notably that it was crap. Quite how it manages this when you consider how many great stories it actually has is rather puzzling. I think it's something to do with front loading most of the good stuff and the existence of Fear Her, which is the only story in the entire history of Doctor Who that causes me physical pain.

Throw me in the Timelash and exile me to the Web Planet but please stop it with this disney shite.

Still, before we get onto the series proper we have The Christmas Invasion first. Now, I'll admit it's not a bad idea having the companion a bit freaked out by a regeneration. In the past some have taken it fairly well after all, which might not be considered an entirely normal reaction. Anyone would think they'd been off witnessing the infinite wonders of time and space or something. It does have to be said though that Rose does take it a little far. What with the weeping and wailing and mooning and pining and generally hanging around doing very little. Oh wait no, she did manage one thing. She managed to make a complete tit out herself trying to talk to the Sycorax. I know it was a high pressure situation and everything, but that speech descended into total farce with what I can only describe as a deliberate rapidity. It just stands as further proof that she really can't seem to achieve ANYTHING on her own. Always relying on others for help, even when those others are flat out unconscious coma patients.

Still, let's move ahead (albeit with trepidation) into series 2 proper. First up is New Earth. Not the worst episode ever, although it is rather spoiled by the retarded resolution and forced happy ending. But what of the hapless miss Tyler? Well, to be fair we can't be too harsh as she does spend most of the episode possessed by Cassandra. So let's just gloss over the fact that her only major contribution to the plot is getting captured AGAIN and move on to the next episode, shall we?

Ah, Tooth And Claw. So what does she manage to do here? What's that? Get captured you say?

Get used to the view

I'm shocked. No really, I am. Anyway we shouldn't be too harsh here. After all, this one of the few time she actually manages to escape. Also worth noting it's here that she really starts exhibiting what I'll be restrained and call a rather offensive cockiness. After all it might be impolite to label it a callous disregard for the fatalities around her. Never mind going out of her way to piss of the bloody QUEEN. Over the course of the series this attitude will go from tempting fate all the way up to flicking fate in the nutsack and insulting it's mother.

Moving forward in time and space we arrive at School Reunion. An episode with many highlights, none of which it has to be said are Rose. There's that terrible attitude on display again. That selfish sense of absolute entitlement. Once again we are asked to believe how SPECIALY SPECIAL Rose is. And once again I'm really not seeing it. Never mind the whole slagging match and dismisiveness towards Sarah Jane Smith (a woman who I actually can buy as being special having actually witnessed her accomplish something useful at least once) the real telling part is that look she gives when Mickey tags along at the end. You know the one, like someone just shat in her mouth? Yeah. Seriously. Still leading the poor guy on and only using him when it suits her. There are many words to describe someone like that, none of them suitable for a family audience. On the bright side though she doesn't get captured for once.

Still, at least she's managed to suck it up and polite in time for The Girl In The Fireplace. Only it's here that the problems REALLY start. See, over the course of this series we are quite clearly supposed to believe that Rose and The Doctor are totally hot for each other. Like totally, completely, obviously going at it. However at no point do we see anything that makes this believable. Now, I can buy Rose fancying the Doctor in the times she's not bust picking up strangers, emotionally abusing Mickey or having rather improper urges towards deceased family members, but I simply don't buy the Doctor fancying Rose at all. And it's not that I'm going that whole "Time Lords don't do that, never have done, never will do and obviously reproduce asexually since the Doctors had kids" bit, because here I can TOTALLY buy him copping off with Madame De Pompadour. Which does seem a bit of an odd story to have here. The whole series is, on one level, a lengthy clumsy attempt at foreshadowing Roses departure which is terrible and yadda yadda yadda. Only we go straight from a story about one of The Doctors past companions straight into one about him falling in love. This couldn't do less to set Rose up as a super special apotheoses of companionhood if it tried. Not that it has to. Hangs around doing nothing, gets captured, whines, doesn't help much, roll credits. Pretty much standard.

And then we fall through a hole in good writing and arrive at the Rise O The Cybermen / The Age Of Steel. Since the purpose of this article is to unceasingly rip on Rose I won't digress into a long rant about how parallel universe stories are inevitably crappy ways of destroying any sense of consequence and rendering character deaths MEANINGLESS. I won't even mention how the conceit of using a parallel universe to explore varying consequences and divergent timelines is completely redundant in a show about time travel. Instead I'll come back to the chilling phrase which forever haunts anyone who thinks about these episodes:

Perverted Dadlust.

There, I said it. I mean, seriously. Forget everything else. Just that in itself is enough. I've often said about hitting Rose in the face with a shovel. It's here that we see that concept crystallize. As soon as she starts lustily staring at that poster and whinging and wibbling about going of to see her NOTdad the Doctor should have just pulled out a shovel and belted her in the face with it. It would have saved a lot of problems. I mean, REALLY. Last time you went off to see your dad you NEARLY DESTROYED THE UNIVERSE. So really, what's the wost that can happen?

You will be like us. Except that one. We don't want that one.

Oh yeah, everybody's dead. AGAIN. So anyway, aside from nearly getting killed by the Cybermen and being REALLY REALLY UNNECESSARILY CREEPY with her paralleladad, what does she actually do here? Oh yeah. She has a phone. Call me old fashioned, but somehow that just doesn't strike me as being particularly impressive. Still, on the bright side at least Mickey finally gets away from the manipulative bitch.

Oh, did I say that out loud? Sorry.

Moving on once again we come to the Idiot's Lantern. An episode where Rose can't actually be bother to wait for the bad guys to come capture her so she goes to volunteer. Doesn't wait, doesn't tell anyone where she's going, doesn't take one single sensible precaution. Just turns up and says "Hi! Can I be captured now please?" I mean, seriously. What the fuck? Isn't a good job that a bad person dies every bad thing they've ever done is magically undone?

HATE THATSHITHATE THATSHITHATE THATSHITHATE THATSHITHATE THATSHITHATE THATSHITHATE THATSHITHATE THATSHITHATE THATSHITHATE THATSHIT......

Sorry. But that sort of thing bugs me.

Next up it's The Impossible Planet and The Satan Pit. An interesting 2 parter in that Rose once again achieves nothing useful. I mean, shooting out the window on a ship that's already falling into a black hole? That's not really a great move unless you happen to be psychic or badly written. There is, put simply, no way that she'd even know that doing that wouldn't just asphyxiate the lot of them, let alone that a dramatic and implausible rescue was mere minutes away. Oh, and the Doctors whole "I believe in her" speech? What the FUCK is that supposed to mean? I believe she's immune to gravity? Or I believe we're all going to die as soon as I break the magic vase?

Then it's Love And Monsters. Oh dear. Honestly this episode isn't as bad as many would say. Well, up to the last 10 minutes when the "Monster" is finally revealed. Then it really is. So yes she's not really in this one (though sadly her whore of a mother is). She just turns up at the end to be a bitch to a poor innocent guy being menaced by moldy caricature of a comedy yorkshireman. Nice.

And now the moment we've all been dreading. I'm going to have to talk about Fear Her. To recreate the experience of watching this episode simply spend 445 minutes smashing your head into a wall whilst screaming "WILL YOU STOP IT WITH THIS DISNEY SHITE!!!" over and over and over again.

Calm blue ocean calm blue ocean calm blue ocean....

Frankly I can't even process Roses involvement in this episode because everything else in it is such utter, utter BOLLOCKS. I mean, downed alien love ships? Who the hell is supposed to buy this shit?

WHO?!?!?

And then, at long last, we have Army Of Ghosts and Doomsday. And to a great extent your reaction to these episodes will depend on whether or not you'd actually bought into Roses supposed specialness or not.

Needless to say I hadn't.

So in Army Of Ghosts she hangs about a bit, fails to infiltrate anything (which frankly has more to do with her chronic inability to bluff rather than any psychic defense) and, lo and behold, GETS CAPTURED. Though that doesn't last long I admit. Because then the Daleks turn up and double capture her. Yay? Then, Doomsday. It's not really a very accurate title for her. I mean yeah, Daleks and Cybermen and dodgy plotting oh my. But for all the vaunted DOOM and portentous monologuing from beyond the grave it's not really, in the final analysis, very doomy. Is it? It's more like "well I'm alive and well and everyone's safe but I didn't get my own way so WAAAHHH..."day.

Let's break it down. So, she keeps the Daleks from exterminating any MAJOR characters for a bit, which is a bit of a plus mark I admit. And then.... She hangs around until the final off button is set up. Because let's be honest, it's really not so much a resolution as a convenience to keep the run time down. Then, after being sent off to safety with her family she tantrums her way back to get in the way. Do I need to point out that at the end of the last episode those levers were operated remotely? Quite why they have to be operated manually now is never quite explained. But whatever. Fine, everyone's hanging on dramatically and the physics gives up and goes home. Now, again this isn't the place to piont out questions like how is the void a void if it's got stuff in it? But we have a rent in the fabric of reality which is pulling with enough force to yank cybermen into the air at tremendous speed from several thousand miles away. And I'm willing to grant that it's pulling with less force on the heroes as they're allegedly less clagged with whatever. However, the lever disengages and the flow of Daleks slows somewhat. It doesn't stop, it just slows. It's still easily enough to pull a couple of tons of protesting death machine which is quite capable of flying on it's own thank you very much uncontrollably towards it. It's still pulling Rose and the Doctor towards it. So Rose grabs the lever and pushes... away from this? I'm no expert, but how exactly is it you're supposed to exert force in one direction when being pulled in the opposite? I mean, I wouldn't mind so much, but if they'd just positioned the levers facing the other way then everything would make a lot more sense.

Anyway, so she TRAGICALLY loses her grip and goes hurtling towards certain death. Which I admit did put a smile on my face. And the her not dad teleports in and grabs her. Mere feet from the fully open breach. Mere feet from the fully open breach which we have been explicitly told will suck him in to his death as having crossed over he too has clag. Never mind the considerable force with which she hits him. Never mind the simple undeniable fact that HE HAD NO WAY OF KNOWING TO DO THAT.

Seriously. Pissing in the face of common sense and physic simply because you don't have the balls to kill off a character. All that build up and then a nonsensical anticlimax which makes retrograde ejaculation look like fucking bukkake.

So yeah, she sulks, the Doctor broods a bit and then we have that whole beach bit. It's interesting to note that it's this that really made me appreciate just how great the music is in the new series. As despite actually HATING the character by this point the music does manage to carry some sense of sadness. Which is just as well. As despite all the acting going on the simple fact remains that I can't credit the whole romance angle between the Doctor and Rose as anything more than the deluded obsessions of a borderline sociopath. She doesn't want the Doctor any more than she wants Mickey or Adam or Captain Jack. She just wants to made to feel special.

And at the end of the day that's the problem with the character. We're supposed to believe she's something that she simply isn't. She's not some sort of uber companion. She's not any sort of romantic interest. She's not actually competant or even self assured. She's a needy, whiney bitch at the end of the day. I mean, we could maybe let her off if she at least manages to save the universe more my times than she tries to destroy it, but she can't even break even on that score.

By Any Other Name (Part 1)

I've recently been re watching the various series of the "new" Doctor Who (shocking I know), and I was struck by one particular fact that had never really occurred to me before:

Rose Tyler is actually completely useless as a companion.

Now, I'll admit I've ever been a massive fan of the character. I always felt that she went from being fairly alright in series 1 to teeth gratingly irritating in series 2, but it was nothing that a swift blow to the face with a shovel couldn't fix. But it wasn't until I actually started thinking about what the character actually achieves in the various episodes that I came to realize just how OBJECTIVELY crap she was as well. Maybe not quite Dodo, but certainly nothing special.

So I'd been toying with writing up some sort of overview setting out the case. And the I find out that a recent poll has voted the character the best companion of all time. This simply will not stand. So, consider this my rebuttal. Take that, internets!

Now, you need to bear in mind that the major problem Rose presents to us as a character is that she is supposed to be SPECIAL. Ultra hyper mega SPECIAL. Were she not built up as this supreme apex of the art of being a companion and the Doctors one true everlasting ultimate mega super ultra hyper combo fanfic wank fantasy then we wouldn't really have a problem. But sadly she is. And whilst we are frequently TOLD this, we're not really SHOWN it much. If at all.

Truly, a picture really does paint a thousand words. Even if all of them are just "Doctor"

So, let's take a look at the evidence, series by series, episode by episode. Series 1 is, at first glance where she's at her best (or least annoying depending on your point of view). And, it should go without saying that the following rambling semi coherent vitrolic screed may contain SPOILERS. But honestly if you haven't seen any of this by now there is something wrong with you.

Now we start of well enough in Rose, with our titular heroine swinging on the end of a rope to save the day. Even if she does wait until the dramatically requisite percentage of the population have been gunned down in the streets. But that's just nitpicking really. She does the whole investigation thing and all that, which is fair enough. But it's also here that we begin to see one of the major unlikable facets of her personality emerge: Her tendency to treat Mickey (Who it is worth pointing out is supposed to be her BOYFRIEND) like complete shit whenever it suits her. Now I'll admit that at this stage Mickey is still very much the comic relief muppet, but still... The guys been violently kidnapped by aliens, cut him a little slack. No? Okay. Being freaked out by hostile alien forces is the reaction of weaklings. Remember this, because it will become important in the next paragraph.

Episode 2, The End Of The World. In which Rose is completely freaked out by FRIENDLY Alien forces. The she gets locked in cupboard. That is her sole contribution to proceedings. It's kind of weird when you realize it, but literally she just turns up, freaks out, gets captured and contributes nothing to the rest of the plot whilst the Doctor heads off to get wood (sorry, couldn't resist).

Still, moving forward (or backward depending on your relative time zone) we move on to the Unquiet Dead. A fine tale where Rose..... Ummmm.... Gets captured. Again. Now, there's nothing wrong per se with getting captured. There is a long and fine tradition of getting captured in Doctor Who. Why, back in my day we'd spend whole episodes getting captured, escaping and then getting captured again. But then again we'd also contribute SOMETHING else to the script. You know, overhear an important conversation, steal a key, scream at a monster. ASSIST the Doctor in some capacity. And here Rose manages to, what, patronise the locals? It's not like she even really lead the Doctor to the house, since all he needed to do was follow the hearse. Still, never mind eh?

Next we move onto the 2 parter of Aliens Of London / World War 3. In which Rose gets chased and locked up. It's not exactly getting captured, but it's close. Other than that she's.... just sort of there. Not really contributing anything unique to the proceedings. Aside from her ghastly mother, but that's a different character entirely (more or less) contribution by association isn't really much to go on. It's also worth taking a moment to consider the return of Mickey here. Who proves himself to be far more of a useful character and indeed a better person. He's the one actually taking action and saving the day. He's also starting to demonstrate that for whatever reason he really loves Rose, whilst she's still quite content to brush him aside.

It's Dalek up next, and even I have to admit that this is a pretty good story for the character as it's one of the few times she actually DOES something. You get that nice bit where she's talking the Doctor down from his Dalekcidal attitude. Of course, the whole thing was all her fault as she was the only one dumb enough to touch the Dalek in the first place and is thus directly responsible for all those deaths, but someones got to get the party started so we'll give her the benefit of the doubt.

The we have the Long Game. Seriously, can ANYBODY tell me what the hell Rose does is this episode? How does she move the plot along? What does she add to the story, other than Adam? And really all that does is prove that she's an appalling judge of character as well as (possibly) a bit of a slag. Other than muppet boy she's just there, in the background, getting captured. I mean, seriously. Adric has contributed more to stories than this. FUCKING ADRIC. Even when he was being a complete fucking moron he was at least DOING something. Adding to the plot, contributing to the resolution or the problem or SOMETHING.

If anyone can tell me why a google image search for adric gives me a picture of a dildo i'd be most grateful.
......Wait, never mind.

Now, I don't mean to be rude, but when you're losing in a fight to fucking ADRIC you really should just kill yourself.

And now we come to Fathers Day. It's a good episode, no doubt. But for all the worthy praise heaped upon it there are a few issues that need to be addressed. For example, when someone gets on board your fantastical time and space machine and asks if they GO WATCH SOMEONE DIE that may be considered a bit of a warning sign. Not that they're going to attempt to interfere with causality in a catastrophic way (more of that later), but they are OBVIOUSLY MENTAL. When you add to this the fact that the person they want to GO AND WATCH DIE IN THE STREET is a beloved family member and you should be setting the coordinates for the padded cell nebula post haste.

IN SPACE!!

But if I'm honest it's not even the fact that Rose actually tries to destroy the entire universe TWICE. No, it's the motivation behind it. The ultimate goal for which the eradication of all life on earth is but an inconvenient aside. And to be fair, you may not even get it until you've sat through the second season. But hindsight is still sight, and there are things that cannot be unseen. The phrase "creepy perveted dadlust" has no place in Doctor Who in my humble opinion. BUT HERE IT IS ANYWAY.

Thanks for that.

Moving rapidly in the direction of away we come to the next 2 parter, The Empty Child / The Doctor Dances. Great stuff again. But what of Miss Tyler? Well, she starts by wandering off and climbing up a barrage balloon.

WHAT?!?!

I mean really. It's not exactly hard to miss, surely. It's a giant fucking balloon. Who the hell could ever see a giant free floating balloon just drifting overhead and think that climbing up it's trailing cables? I mean, I'm pretty sure that whole thing about cows not being able to look up is just a myth, but does it apply to stupid cows?

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Ask someone who gives a shit, I'm a cow.

And after that, what? She dribbles on Captain Jack, bitches and then is generally extraneous to the plot for the rest of duration. Oh wait, she's also starting to dribble on the Doctor a little here to. This I think is the first real hint anyway. Up to this point the Doctor has been more of a father figure. But we've seen how she reacts to THOSE now haven't we? eeeewwww.

And then it's Boom Town. The episode which REALLY goes to show her attitude toward Mickey. Who, you may remember, is supposed to be her BOYFRIEND. She's been off, slagging her way across time and space, whilst poor old Mickey has actually been trying to move on with his life. Only he can't, can he? Because Rose is, basically, an emotional vampire. And Mickey is some sort of disposable affection dispenser.Called up on a whim to make her feel better about herself and discarded once again. The problem here is simply that she will never just TELL Mickey. The gut clearly needs some sort of formal declaration that the relationship has been unceremoniously terminated since he no longer serves any useful function to her, but no. She just wants another lackey to fawn over her, with no regard to anyone elses feelings or well being.

And so, at long last we come to season finale. Bad Wolf / The Parting Of The Ways. And I have to confess that it's here that the whole thing becomes rather more difficult to assess. I mean, I could mention that all she does is fail her way onto the Dalek ship and then hang around not helping until the Deus Ex Machina comes to save the day / crash and burn the series in a nonsensical last minute cop out (delete as appropriate). And that's the problem. That whole Deus Ex situation which, on sober reflection really just doesn't make any fucking sense. After all the build up of bad wolf the final resolution is.... bollocks. Some may argue epic bollocks, but bollocks nevertheless. I do think however it is somewhat telling that the only way Rose was able to save the day (a first in the whole series you'll note) was by staring vacantly into a light and gaining godlike powers through sloppy writing. She didn't actually DO anything herself. I mean, it was Mickey (with the aid of Jackie of all people) who actually managed prise the fucking console open and release the power of the fanfic. Sorry, time vortex.

I mean, seriously.

And for this the Doctor must give up his life and go on to star in G.I. Joe the movie.

Serious Drama

So, just to count up, she's managed to kill the Doctor one time, tried to unravel the very fabric of time itself a few times, unleashed an alien killing machine that tried to destroy all life on earth but only stopped because it would rather kill itself than hang around her and hung around being useless and/or captured more times than I care to remember.

And this, ladies and gentleman is Rose Tyler AT HER BEST.

Tune in next time for Series 2: Foreshadowing, you guys. SERIOUSLY, FORESHADOWING!!!!

Dead, Hot And Not Ready Until Next Year

I realize that it's been a long time since I've posted anything. The reasons for this are many and various, but can basically be boiled down to the standard litany of work, depression and video games. This is, it's worth noting, basically the mantra for my life.

Anyway, in a no doubt vain attempt to actually get something done I'm gonna try writing about some of the games I've been wasting my life on. And first up, for reasons that are frankly beyond me, is Dead Frontier.

Now the first thing that needs noting here is that the game is still in beta. This of course makes it tricky to review as it's entirely possible that any of the deficiencies I would normally take issue with will be fixed. But I've never let sanity or reason get in the way of moaning about stuff before, so why start now?

Not that you'll see anything about the game still being in beta on the main site. In fact you'll see very little information AT ALL. It's not often that site design bugs me enough to bring it up like this, but as you can see all we have is a sign up button and a youtube video of gameplay. A youtube video of gameplay with the controls removed, so not only do you HAVE to watch it, you can't even mute it. Good luck if someone sent you the link at work. But if you want something like, say SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS? You're shit out of luck.

However, the main thing it has on the page which interests us is the phrase "The Ultimate Free To Play Survival Horror MMORG". This immediately inspires 2 thoughts in quick succession. Firstly that this should be some shade of awesome even if it is a free game (hoorah for hopelessly unbalanced dual tier economies) and secondly why the hell has nobody thought of this before? Seriously, just consider it for a moment and it quickly becomes clear that the whole zombie apocalypse scenario immediately lends itself to mmorgification. You've got your towns (fortified enclaves of survivors), you've got a wilderness crawling with mentally challenged cannon fodder (everywhere else), you've got dungeons (anywhere inside or underground) and it makes a hell of a lot more sense for the invariable homicidal kleptomania which defines your average PC. And anyway, everybody loves zombies.

Well, maybe not EVERYBODY...

So, anyway, we signs up and get onto character generation. Now this seems pretty good. We get a large array of professions to choose from, each bring with it different advantages. Or not. Looking through the list it's pretty clear that some are obviously better than others, but honestly I don't really have much of a problem with this. Not everything in life is balanced after all, so obviously some will be better equipped for the oncoming zombie apocalypse than others. Notably those with shotguns. In addition to the careers there's also a paper doll of you're character that you can customize a bit. And once you're done we're into the game!

Yeah. Straight into the game. It's at this point that we realize that A: the game is actually browser based (which I must admit came as something of a surprise as the gameplay footage really didn't say browser to me) and that there is no character select option. Now, whilst I would assume that the lack of character slots is something that will be fixed when the full version is released, you better be damn sure you've chosen a profession to suit you and are happy with your avatar because you're not changing it.

I decided to go for a scientist. Why?

No reason...

Well, whilst I lack the obvious combat advantages of some of the other classes I at least get to produce medicine. Which should come in handy. Also: SCIENCE, bitches.

Now, it's at this point where that whole lack of anything resembling system requirements comes back to haunt us. See, I was on my laptop when I signed up and suddenly found myself thrust into the game. Or at least would have done if not the fact that evidently my laptop can only barely handle it. After shutting EVERYTHING else down and waiting and indeterminate amount of time for anything to load I did eventually manage to get to play. For a few minutes at a time. Then the screen went black and I was left attempting to navigate my way back to town using only the mini map. This was rather off putting to say the least.

However, I eventually decided to give it another go on my main PC. The loading times were still a little aggravating, but nothing like the apocalyptic machine killing hellfuck I'd suffered before. And so I actually got to play the game properly. And you know what? It's actually not that bad. As a run around killing zombies and looting simulator it's pretty fun. It looks good and has some really nice atmosphere thanks to a grainy filter and some nice lighting effects combining for a rather Silent Hill feel.

It's all darkness and moving shadows, which is very nice. Then there's the zombies. At first there'll only be a few hanging around, and you can probably avoid them if you want. However the game has this whole concept of aggro. Which may be defined as the tendency for things to quickly go to hell if you draw to much attention to yourself. The number, speed and aggression of the zombies can start to increase exponentially, and you will soon find yourself in the brown trousers of death. I'd love to show you a screencap of when you're getting attacked by hundreds of zombies, but really when that happens you're far to busy trying not to die.

Do or do not as the saying goes

And you know what? That's AWESOME. It's shocking the amount of stuff you can get away with simply by making the game survival horror. In anything else you'd see this spikes in monster aggro as annoying, off putting or even game breaking. But in a survival horror game you don't mind that suddenly hundreds of bad guys have suddenly come to kill you as that's kind of the point. Likewise the death penalty of losing ALL the money you have on you. In anything else it would seem completely unreasonable. Here it's adding to the tension. It is worth noting that I'm only saying that from the point of view of someone who's never yet died after finding a large quantity of money.

So, you head out from camp, kill zombies, loot whatever is lootable and level up. Then you go back to camp to spend you're points, sell your crap and do whatever. So far so standard. Only with zombies.

And it's here where we're hitting the wall of beta. Because right now that's all you can do. Now, it's pretty fun, don't get me wrong. And I would imagine that with a couple of mates this would be a great laugh. But right now missions aren't available, which is a little aggravating. There is only so much aimless wandering that you can do in any game before you get bored and need a little something extra. Even when the missions are restored I can't help but wonder if that'll be enough. The game play is reasonably fun, and the whole zombie thing does give them a unique selling point, but I can't help but feel that the game will need more than just killing zombies to really make it stand out. Time will tell. It is however early days yet.

The last thing I wish to touch on is the economy. Now it's pretty much standard for any so called free game to have a 2 tier economic structure. There's the in game cash you use for standard items, and then there's the paid for with actual money currency you can trade for the high class stuff. I can't say that I have a problem with the principle, but I've never yet found a game that has convinced me to actually part with any money. Often due to the fact that they never seem to really grasp the concept of micro in the phrase micro-payments. For todays' example I would like to introduce you to the hockey mask.

Here we have a nice little prestige item for your avatar. Doesn't boost your stats or anything but it would look pretty fucking boss I think we all agree. So how much does that cost? 2000 credits. Okay. But how much is that in actual money?

Yeah. SIXTY dollars. Going by todays' exchange rate that comes out as £37.50 THIRTY SEVEN POUNDS AND FIFTY PENCE. For which you will get a mask on your character that will be visible to approximately NO-ONE since the game uses an over head view point. Just think of all the other thing you could buy for that. I could get a brand new (and overpriced) Wii game. I could get anywhere between 2 and 6 second hand games depending on how shit they are. I could get another Remembrance of the Daleks collectors set.

Hell, I could buy an actual hockey mask. I realize that I'm picking on one of the most expensive items (but certainly not THE most expensive) but my point remains valid. If you're paying £40 for a small amendment to a paper doll you're doing it wrong.

Anyway, enough of my griping. Overall I'd say that Dead Frontier looks like a promising development, and one worth keeping an eye on. Would I recommend it? With the obvious proviso that it's currently in a rather limited state, I'd say so, yes. There certainly doesn't seem to anything else trying to fill this particular niche, so I wish them all the best.