» by Xander on Fri 20th Nov '09 6:14PM	10/10

Some have said this is the British Gran torino but this comparison does neither film justice.

The film starts with hoodies committing crime and filming themselves on mobile phones. So far so 21st Century Britain. But then become almost Ken Loach in its social realism as we see Harry Brown (Michael Cain) coping with being a pensioner on a rough housing estate.

After Harry's best mate is murdered by the local hoodies he starts taking the law into his own hands. Here the film treads a fine line between serious drama and potential ridicule. Luckily the film manages to stay on the side of drama.

Cain is terrific as Harry Brown as he plays a man who is both vulnerable pensioner and very cool very credible vigilante.

The film is undeniably British featuring our top fears, hoodies, drug dealers, rioting, inept police, and knife crime. It makes for some disturbing viewing.

In short brilliant. Trailer is below but doesn't quite reflect the film which is distinctly grittier.

» by General on Sun 4th Oct '09 10:00PM	9/10

I've had my Hero since the week they came out in the UK, but I've been waiting until the new firmware (v2.7) was available to do a review and I'm glad I did. Initially I was somewhat disappointed with the lag on flipping through the home screens and the feeling that the hardware was struggling to cope with all the fairydust HTC have sprinkled on the UI, but the new firmware is like night and day. After the update everything is slick and speedy. Believe me, if you have a Hero or are planning on getting one make the next thing you do to upgrade the firmware. Similarly if you were thinking about picking one up but were put off by the pasting some reviewers gave it for being slow then give it a second look.

Hardware
Internally the Hero has the same memory and processor as the HTC G1 and G2, but externally it's a far tidier more professional package and makes the earlier phones look like the development prototypes that they essentially are. Unlike the version due to be released in the US it still has the chin which a lot of people don't seem to like however it does have the effect of holding the touch screen out of contact with the contents of your pocket which is a plus.
The phone also boasts a 3.5mm jack and an impressive 5MP camera.
The battery life is pretty reasonable although you will probably want
to charge it overnight. I generally leave the Wi-Fi on all the time and
even when spending the day listening to music and synchronising
hundreds of megs of music over Wi-Fi with Spotify it didn't give out on me.
One black mark is the non standard USB jack, What's that all about? The Mini B exists, why reinvent the wheel?

Software
This is a review of the Hero rather than the Android phone OS so I'm going to concentrate on the changes HTC have made. The most significant updates are the addition of multi-touch for photos and web browsing which I couldn't imagine doing without and the excellent social network integration which links your contacts to their Facebook profiles and provides you with a rather nifty Twitter widget. In addition to that you get some useful buttons which let you turn Bluetooth and Wi-Fi on and off with one click and lots of UI sugar sprinkled all over the place.
One thing which I love is the ability to have your contacts pulled in from google meaning no painful exporting from SIM or syncing with some rubbish bit of software (I'm looking at you PC suite)

I guess if you are reading this the question you want to know the answer to is should I buy this phone rather than any of the other mobiles on the market?
In the course of my job I've played with a stack of mobile phones so I'll offer a couple of thoughts on the subject.

Hero vs Other Android Phones
The most obvious competitors for the Hero are the existing Android handsets on the market having played with the two previous HTC devices I would say there is no competition. The Hero is much slicker device and you would be missing out on the 3.5mm, camera and sense UI improvements. If you must have a hardware keyboard then you may want to hold out for the Samsung Galaxy or the Moto Cliq neither of which I have tried.

Hero vs The Old Guard
First up the Hero is a pretty pricey phone and if all you really want to do is make a few calls and write some text messages then my vote would be for an inexpensive Samsung slider especially as an iPod touch is only £150 and makes up for most of what you would be missing out on, but if a smart phone is where it's at there is nothing on the market that can compete with Android outside of the iPhone.
Having tried a variety of Symbian phones they range from the mediocre to appalling but all seem like they belong to a previous generation. The same goes for the dreadful WinMo. e-mail junkies love their Blackberries, but they really are more oriented to business and the consumer focused ones don't do much for me. Maemo phones and the Pre both look good, but they aren't available in this country yet which just leaves the iPhone.

Hero vs iPhone
Before going any further I want to make the point that there isn't nor is there going to be an "iPhone killer". Apple are far too good at being Apple for anyone to beat them at their own game. That said the Hero offers some advantages and disadvantages compared to the iPhone which will push you in one direction or the other depending on your requirements:

Hero Wins
Better Integration with Google services: If you are a heavy user of Google services then you won't find a better device for using Gmail, Greader, Contacts, etc
Synch with multiple machines: Unlike the iPhone Android devices will let you copy music back and forth with as many machines as you want without Apples artificial restrictions
Apps Run In The Background: This is a huge advantage when it comes to apps like Spotify which allow you to web browse and write texts while listening to tunes something that you can't do on the iPhone version. 
App store apps tend to be free and less apps get rejected: I have always found apps I'm looking for on the store without having to resort to paying and you can get your hands on naughty apps Apple don't want you to have like Google voice.
You Don't Have To Use iTunes: Not an issue for Mac users but it's not available to Linux users such as my self and I find all Apples software for Windows utterly hateful.
Notification Bar and Widgets: I love the dockable widgets and the nifty notification bar on Android its far more tweakable than the regimented look of the iPhone
Develop Software Without an intel Mac: Only of interest to software developers, but important to me
Flash support in the browser: Not 100% compatible with all sites but a rarity in the mobile world


iPhone Wins
Much Better Mac Integration: If you are a Mac user there is really only one choice

It's an iPhone: And is therefore much cooler and more desirable if you are that way inclined.
More responsive and slicker UI: The Hero is great but the iPhone still pips it for slickness and feedback
Far more apps available on the app store: The app store has far more games including lots of big name commercial games.
Better iPlayer integration: No listen again radio on the Hero
Slicker music player: The iPhone is also an iPod and so has all the whizzy cover flow and genius stuff.

» by Xander on Mon 21st Sep '09 6:08PM	9/10

As a shooter it's a great concept. You get two types of weaponry, your conventional guns and your 'plasmids' which are special powers such as sending swarms of bees at your enemies. Other cool toys include electricity from your finger tips and flames.

The game starts off very scarily as you arive at Rapture via a plane crash. The game gives you some very scarry shock moments.

If there is a downer it's that things get very repetative about half way through the game. The enemies are not very imaginative after a while and killing yet another 'Big Daddy' feels like a chore.

The concept is good as you mine 'Adam' the energy that powers and allows 'Plasmid' upgrades. It makes for a unique experience in shooters.

» by Xander on Sat 19th Sep '09 10:37AM	8/10

The book is a bit of a confusing read. Politically it is as bleak as it can possibly get. The real mystery is around the V character and what are his motivations. These are tentatively hinted as the story progresses.

One has not sympathy with the state in this graphic novel. They are as they say completely totalitarian, racist and utterly unsympathetic. Or are they? In many ways the bad guys in V for Vendetta are more corporeal than V. They have massive hang ups and are by and large prisoners of their own fascist system. As you would expect from an Alan Moore book his writing is fantastic at describing in short details the state of mind of every character. All of them are trapped with a crushed human spirit.

V is the very bizarre answer to all this. V is at his most sympathetic and heroic pointing out the stagnant human condition to the other characters and indeed the whole of England. V is a breath of fresh air to all this and the character is if anything an idea.

The book is not always concise as Moore admits some bits established earlier on don't ring true latter. David Lloyd's artwork is initially not inspiring but one being read really becomes part of the book.

England prevails!

» by Xander on Sun 31st May '09 9:05PM	10/10

It's just great. The final in the saga ties up the Nemesis story. This volume is something of a mixed bag. Almost certainly this is because of the long gaps writer Pat Mills had between books (Nemesis started in the '70's and only finished in the 00's).

Book 8 concentrates on Purity Brown and explains her relationship with Nemesis and reveals a thing or two about the Warlock. The art by David Roach is good but feels like he is being pulled out of his depth. His very realistic artwork is not served well by an outlandish fantasy character like Nemesis. However he can draw very attractive women and Purity Brown has never looked so good.

Book 9 is set in an alternative 1980's Britain and nicely parodies the early Goth and alternative scene. John Hickleton's artwork is much improved but is probably because he is far more comfortable in the 80's setting.

Between book 9 and 10 are a one off story and a long story essentially recapping the whole of previous books (nearly 10 years had elapsed since the last Nemesis story in 200AD). Various artists take the reins and do interesting interpretations of Nemesis.

Lastly we come to book 10 which is a fun romp through the utter insanity of the saga. The billing is final battle and it builds into something suitably weird. Artist Henry Flint is a genius artist and brings the old look of the series with a fantastic update. This was how the world was meant to be drawn. Original artist Kevin O'Neil dives in for the final chapter and does his usual gorgeous artwork to finish off.

Aside from books 8-10 also included is the strip Nemesis and Deadlock. Deadlock being one of the ABC Warriors and character most like Nemesis (originally it was going to be Deadlock who piloted the Blitzspear). There adventure together is a little stilted taking place at a meeting and set solely in one room. The story outstays its welcome and feels a little pointless. Essentially it bridges the gap between Nemesis's last story and the parallel ABC Warriors story (not in this volume). I advise reading these stories after book 8 and not in the printing order.

It's been a great saga! It’s doubtful there will ever be a character quite like Nemesis or a villain so utterly evil as Torquemada. The saga is not perfect indeed the plot holes are absolutely gaping and Mills probably only got away with it because of the big gap between adventures. But the plot is rather surplus to the whole atmosphere and weirdness of the story. As usual it's a fable of human cruelty and intolerance, the fascist versus the ultimate anarchist.

However, it's not quite over. Nemesis cryptically talks about the one who is to come after him and any reader of 2000AD knows its Deadlock. Indeed a few Deadlock adventures have appeared. But alas no more Nemesis and Torquemada, they are to be missed.

Credo

» by Xander on Sat 30th May '09 5:48PM	10/10

More genius from the genius that is Pat Mills. In books 5-7 Mills takes another pop at racism and fascists. The analogy is obvious aliens persecuted by humans. What is so that the story focuses on the bigots or Terminators as they are such horrifyingly comic fun personified in the hate figure of Torquemada. Indeed Mills riffs off the then contemporary (1980's) Apartied system in South Africa and the National Front.

However, Nemesis is still a great fantasy, mind bending adventure that really pushes the boundaries of weird and wonderful. The plot follows Nemesis looking for his son Thoth and the mess Thoth makes of time and existence. The stand out is book 6 which essentially is made up of a bunch of weirdos stood on a beach at the end of time having a heated conversation. The ABC Warriors feature as does the dinosaur character Satanus if who featured in a few Judge Dredd stories in 2000AD and recently made reappeared in the Megazine.

Original creative artist Kevin O'Neil only does a few one off stories in this volume with Bryan Talbot taking main art duties. Both are great and on excellent form. John Hicklenton's artwork on book seven is an acquired taste. His pictures feel more like a series of portraits that are at once brilliant rendering of fantasy but arguably not in keeping with the established pallet of Nemesis.

Somewhat oddly there are a series of photograph stories. These have not dated well and look (because they are) very 1980's. Nemesis and Torquemada are not the easiest of characters to recreate as costumes. Torquemada looks decidedly papier-mâché. The overall effect is decidedly amateur. The pictures are in this volume reduced to black and white, having seen the colour versions this is a good thing.

Another curiously are the two dice man games included in the volume. 200AD briefly spawned a dice man comic allowing a bit of role play. It's the old 'if you wish to turn left go to picture 28' and monitor your hit points and score type thing. In the age before decent computer games these must have been ok. Not that artwork or story has been scrimp on but I personally couldn't be bothered to try and play them.

Still another great volume, it's funny, it's controversial, scarily contemporary (BNP), its science fiction, its great fantasy, and it’s weird and outrageously imaginative. Buy it and read it.

» by Xander on Sun 10th May '09 8:59AM	9/10

A fantastic bit of re-imaging and works really well. JJ. Abrams has done the impossible and managed to produce a Star Trek film both fans (Trekkies) and lay persons can enjoy.

What we have is a roller coaster of a movie. The film plunges right in with heavy action and then rolls on from there. Cast are great and show some wonderful chemistry. Zac Quinto and Chris Pine are great as Spock and Kirk respectively. Stand outs performances from the rest of the cast go to Karl Urban as Bones and Simon Pegg as Scotty. Eric Banna as chief baddy is excellent and is the best Star Trek bad guy since Kahn.

The retro-1960's look of the set is great and not at all distractnig. The effects are brilliant and manage not to distract from the film.

The only flaw with the film is it's pacing which has two speeds fast and faster, blink and you miss the climax. But great fun all the way a sequel is definately on the way.

Not everyone is going to be happy some Trekkie is going to take exception to it and the film does mess with the cannon a bit but that's all explained away. Sod the fans though this is a Trek film for everyone.

» by Xander on Thu 7th May '09 10:52PM	0/10

I can't emphasis what an absolute dog turd of movie X-Men Origins: Wolverine turned out to be. This film should be great and who knows what went wrong in pre-production.

The script is aweful and full of horribly predictable turns and twists. It actually feels like each scene was writen by a different writer then stuck together and not very good writers at that. If you don't see the twist coming a mile away

For an origin story not a lot happens to our main character or changes him in any way. Gets adimantium claws, check. Vengeful vendeta against half brother, check. Actuall development as a character, none existent.

Poor Hugh Jackman, he's actually a very likeable actor and must have put himself through a lot of grueling gym work to play Wolverine.

The other X-Men characters are either boring or underused. The blog has a pointless scene with some really crap jokes in it. Deadpool played by Ryan Reyonlds starts of as a great quirky character then disapears about 10 minutes in. When Gambit appears you just don't care which is a shame for such a popular character, doesn't help that the actor is frankly a bit crap as Gambit.

Even the action is pretty dull and low key considering how much money they must have spent. Annoyingly this has topped the box office and sequel is even as I write in the pipeline and a Deadpool spin off. Something the movie does not deserve.

» by General on Wed 6th May '09 1:17PM	10/10

Can't believe this isn't on the list!

The best, no actually THE BEST!

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» Second Opinion by Xander on 19th Sep '09	10/10

No denying it that is a fantastic achievement in. Indeed after Watchmen we actually got to enjoy comics as adults and after this and we got to call them graphic novels to avoid any embarrassment.

The story is compelling and the way of telling it is just brilliantly imaginative. At the end of every book there is a large text from a magazine or a history book. The use of the comic in a comic 'Black Freighter' is genius and very few comic writers would be brave enough to try such techniques.

Moore gave use here a beautifully thought out world. What an imagination to create all this and wind it up so tightly with everything else to make it just fantastic.

» by Xander on Sun 19th Apr '09 2:50PM	8/10

One of the more fun alternative universe stories out there. The whole Soviet Union angle is a little lost in the stories overall ark. Never the less it's a great little story playing with the whole of the Superman mythology.

The main rivalry is of course Lex luther vs Superman. Other characters appear from the Superman universe such as Louis Lane and Wonder Woman. But it's the central rivalry between Superman and Lex that takes centre stage. It's an interesting take on a world where things could have been a bit different.

Curiously has a guest appearence of Tony Benn, surely this was lost on any American readers?

» by Amanshu on Tue 14th Apr '09 12:44PM	9/10

There's no easy way to say this and make it sound good, but David Ford is a one man band. He does however make it work quite impressively. He makes use of a large number of loop pedals so that rather than playing each instrument at once he simply records a bit and then plays it back on a loop before moving on to the next instrument.

Initially this is just kind of fun, he's either always singing or moving onto the next instrument to add some more depth to the music. As things progress however he starts to do play with it a lot more to create a fuller sound. Whether this is blowing on the guitar strings, singing a seven part backing harmony with himself, or just stamping on his piano, whatever adds depth.

It makes for a compelling show. You're never quite sure which instrument he's going to pick up next or how he's going to use it, and he's a master of all of them.

He doesn't do this for every song. In between he limits himself to just the piano or guitar (with a remote control drumkit!) and these in themselves are compelling, although I'd have to admit I did find my attention wandering a couple of times in the quieter numbers. Still overall the set was a hugely enjoyable evening with David Ford happily bantering with the crowd and rather neatly turning a drunken heckler into a laughing stock!

» by General on Tue 14th Apr '09 1:00AM	6.5/10

The Darkness is a FPS based on the comic book of the same name.
You play Mafia hitman Jackie Estacado who has wronged loopy Don Paulie Franchetti. Paulie has clearly picked the wrong hitman to whack as Jackie suffers from a family curse called the darkness which gives him demonic powers of the rending people limb from limb with scary black tentacles variety giving him a unique advantage in the extracting bloody revenge stakes.
The upshot of this is that at the touch of a button you can manifest two glowing eyed demon snakes out of your shoulders which provide you with a regenerating shield and a number of additional abilities which you gain throughout the course of the game.
The twist is that Jackie's powers only work in darkness providing the main game play mechanic that differentiates it from other games in the genre.
In the light your snakes burn up and disappear draining your darkness power which can be regained by drawing in darkness in a shady spot or more entertainingly geting your snakey buds to chow down on a fallen foes heart. As a result you will spend quite a lot of your time shooting out street lights as you progress. This is an interesting concept but it does grow somewhat tiresome as there are an awful lot of them and you need to do it wherever you are or be left defenceless when baddies show up (without the darkness engaged Jackie will die from a couple of gun shots and heals very slowly) combine that with the need to trek around all your vanquished foes and collect their hearts and there is a definite grinding element to the game.
Aside from the shield the darkness powers are a bit of a mixed bag. The first level gives you the ability to send out a snake to collect items in tight spots and do some stealth killing but suffers from a control scheme so horrible you will avoid it at all costs. The second level gives you the demon arm which is a spiffy tentacle which gives you one shot kills on anyone nearby and lets you chuck objects and smash lights with gay abandon. The third level gives you darkness guns which are very cool but useless as they drain your darkness power to use them so letting rip with them in a big shootout leaves you shieldless in 20 seconds. The final level is black hole which essentially is a smart bomb which sucks in everything in its way. If you think that might make the game a bit unbalanced you would be right. From half way through the game when you get black hole power you can win any battle by opening a black hole on a group of enemies running to a dark corner to recharge the darkness then simply rinse and repeat. This highlights one of the main problems of the game namely that it gets progressively easier as it goes along. I found the first set piece battle before getting darkness powers very hard but as the enemies are the same all the way through the game I breezed through the final chapter without really breaking a sweat.
This game cries out for a mid game adjustable difficulty level as I would have happily played the first level on easy and the last on hard.
My final gripe is that there are a few tack on Grand Theft Auto open city side missions which don't add anything to the game and involve a lot of dull walking from one end of the city to the other which is exacerbated by the fact that Jackie moves very slowly and the game suffers from long load times.
I've been pretty hard on the game so far so lets dwell on some of its good points. The graphics look fantastic with atmospheric Gothic design and a very grimy real looking New York even when the action heats up there is little skipping or slowdown. The script is generally good and the voice acting is superb as is the sound design. The plot is engaging enough that I played to the end when the game play had started to grate though I can only imagine that at the planning meeting for the game the creators established that the most popular game themes are world war (a scene is set in WWI), horror, and gangsters and upon reaching a deadlock decided to make a game which was all three at the same time.
It's also fun to be the monster in the dark knowing that you're a total bad ass who can eviscerate your opponents in any number of gory ways.
All in all it's an ok game to while a way a few hours on if you can get it at a discount or rent it as I did, but there are enough flaws that you kind of wish that they would do a really awesome sequel.

» by Spanners on Sat 11th Apr '09 4:28PM	8/10

Gets about a bit but she's a good sort

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» Second Opinion by General on 11th Apr '09	8/10

I've heard she doesn't care for parrots but she's seen a cockatoo

» by Spanners on Sat 11th Apr '09 4:21PM	8/10

Basically it's a posh rum and coke but damn does it hit the spot on a warm evening :)

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» Second Opinion by General on 11th Apr '09	9/10

Diet coke and a shot of Mount Gay magic

» by Agentgonzo on Thu 9th Apr '09 3:34PM	8/10

White liquid, served cold from the fridge. Excellent. Tastes great and what's more it's good for you in almost every way. Plus you can mix it with a variety of things (fruit, chocolate, kahlua) to make it taste exactly how you like. At some point I intend on making fizzy milk in a soda stream.

loses two points for having to be squeezed out of a cow.