The Holiday Season is upon us, and Event Cinemas George St. wants to celebrate it with all of you!
On December 19 at 6:30pm, they will be holding a special ‘Christmas Screening’ of the classic 40’s filmIt’s A Wonderful Life starring James Stewart and Donna Reed.
Tickets cost only $8, and you are also invited to hang out at the Set Bar with Santa himself an hour before the movie starts… so we can now confirm that Santa is indeed a drunk! The best dressed attendees will compete for some nice prizes as well.
Bookings can be made online right here. If you are planning on attending, visit the official Event Cinemas George St. Facebook page and join the Event to communicate with the rest of the community and receive future updates.
Al Emmo and the Lost Dutchman’s Mine Developer:Himalaya Studios Publisher: Himalaya Studios Platforms:PC Release Date:November 26, 2013 Price: $9.99 – Available Here
Overview
Himalaya Studios are best known for their remakes of classic point and click adventures Kings Quest 1 and 2. Then called AGD Interactive, the studio existed primarily to remake old Sierra adventure games. Renamed Himalaya Studios, the team now has a few original projects under its belt, the upcoming Mage’s Initiation and two Al Emmo games. The first, Lost Dutchman’s Mine, has just been re-released in this enhanced edition after first hitting screens in 2006.
It features a new voice actor for main character Al Emmo and replaces the original 3D cutscenes with 2D animations. Numerous other fixes have been made, adding lines of dialogue, achievements and a scoring system.
Story
Al Emmo is a middle aged virgin with a whiny voice, terrible hair and a desire to get married. In an attempt to convince his parents of his worth, he orders himself a bride and heads off to the West to meet her. When he gets dumped at the local saloon he finds himself stuck in the town of Anozira with little to do and even less to do it with. After poking around he quickly becomes besotted with local beauty Rita, and sets out to woo her with no further ado. Unfortunately Al’s efforts are hampered by the swaggering Antonio Bandana, a suave member of the Spanish royal family who happens to be passing through.
Astute readers will note that there is nothing in that paragraph about any lost Dutchmen or any mines. Al Emmo is split into nine acts, and the Lost Dutchman’s Mine only comes into play somewhere around act seven, and even then the location itself doesn’t feature until endgame. The majority of the game is about Al chasing after Rita, so don’t head into Al Emmo expecting an Indiana Jones style romp -a better title would be Al Emmo and the Desperate Quest for Sex.
The story just doesn’t take off until the aforementioned act seven, and until that time the game feels like a largely pointless journey with an unlikeable and off putting main character. Al is incredibly irritating at first, and many of the other characters are little more than cheap stereotypes or poor rips on celebrities that would have been outdated even in 2006 -hello Pammy Sanderson.
There is a ton of humour in Al Emmo with every clickable object having one or two lines of sarcastic banter attached to it. Good old quantity over quality does come into play though, and for every line that hits the mark there will be a dozen that fall flat. Al does grow less annoying as the game goes on, but he really doesn’t have anything going for him as a character. Any redemption comes from his verbal sparring with the narrator, who does provide some smirk worthy material if not outright laughs. The humour is very much snark orientated, with the odd dose of sleaze on the side.
To give Al Emmo some credit it does take a swipe at various real world issues, whether it be the “termites of mass destruction” that must be destroyed with excessive force or the “cocoa acid water” that the Indian Chief is addicted to. Of course humour is about the most subjective thing in existence, so if the writing tickles your funny bone the experience will certainly ratchet up a point or three.
Gameplay
The point and click gameplay is very traditional. Right clicking cycles through look, touch, speak, and move options, whilst left clicking carries out the selected action. There is an inventory which is accessible by holding a right click, and Al can be made to run instead of walk by double clicking. Players who don’t fancy watching Al criss-cross the same landscape a few dozen times can hit Esc to have him skip to his destination, a mechanic eventually upgraded when Al acquires a map that allows him to fast travel between major areas in the game.
It all works pretty well, with the odd hiccup in transitioning between areas. There are no highlights on objects or transition points, which will be an old school blessing for some. The puzzles do tend to the slightly bizarre, so prepare to reactivate that nineties adventure game logic (or Google a walkthrough, one benefit of playing a game originally released in 2006). Al Emmo is also surprisingly long for an adventure game, with the nine act structure and numerous locations giving it a decent length.
Visuals
Obviously Al Emmo is not aiming to be modern, instead aping classic adventure game style. The 2D backgrounds and interiors are highly detailed and bring the Western locale to life with ease. Whilst there is no visual highlight on significant objects the challenge level isn’t absurd – everything is clearly visible and the way that NPC’s change between scenes adds a nice sense of immersion.
For some reason Al and the other characters are all in 3D, which takes a bit of getting used to. It is nice to see the main character actually using inventory items, but when the trade off is a walking animation that is as awkward as hell you can’t help but wish the developers had stuck with 2D sprites. Similarly background characters are incredibly simplistic, leaving Al Emmo somewhere in between actual 90’s fare and a modern love letter to a classic genre.
Audio
The soundtrack is a nice compilation of Western themed ditties that complement the visuals very well. Whilst there isn’t anything particularly fresh on offer this is a Western we’re dealing with, and producing something new in that setting would be nigh on impossible. The soundtrack also comes packed with the game if you happen to download it from Indie Game Stand.
The audio that will hit the hardest with Al Emmo is the voice acting. Every character in game is voiced, and the over the top Narrator takes his omnipresent duties very seriously. Al has been replaced from the 2006 version of the game, which a quick gander at YouTube will tell you is an extremely good thing.
The chipmunk quality has been toned down significantly, and whilst his voice still takes a bit of getting used to, it is by no means as horrific as before. The rest of the cast are evenly split between annoying and amusing, but again your take on the lisping Antonio Bandana could be very different from mine.
Overall
Al Emmo and the Lost Dutchman’s Mine spends too long ignoring its title to be great. When the story gets over Al’s obsession with Rita things improve hugely, but that still leaves hours of gameplay where the plot is unfocused, and neither the humour or the characters are strong enough to make up for it.
The 2D artwork is lovely, the music works well, and the point and click puzzles are decent, but those strengths are tempered by some strange design choices and voice work that toes the line of irritation. As mentioned above, how well your sense of humour matches with that of the game will change the experience massively, but Al Emmo just fell flat for me.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
After months of hype, the Godzilla teaser trailer has emerged! I think it’s a safe bet that this ‘Legendary‘ Kaiju will also chew up fellow Warner Bros. film Pacific Rim‘s box-office numbers and spit them out.
You can view the much anticipated teaser trailer embedded at the bottom of this article. Also provided is a brand new poster visible to the right, which depicts a visually stunning sequence involving military troops HALO jumping into the disaster zone.
Lucky attendees at Comic-Con this year saw some early footage from the film that reportedly included a second, scorpion-like Kaiju. It’s no surprise as director Gareth Edwards (Monsters) has expressed his fantasy of a world existing where we lived amongst multiple creatures of gargantuan proportions.
The viral marketing website for the film, www.mutoresearch.net, has been updated with the teaser trailer, but there are surely many more secrets to be discovered there. Click through to visit it and try your hand at unlocking them with the rest of the community.
Video game publisher 505 Games has announced that the highly successful indie sandbox game Terraria will be coming to the PlayStation Vita handheld console. The game will be available to download from the PlayStation Store for $14.99 from December 17 for North American players. With this download comes several new features:
Includes PS Vita Cross-Platform Play, enrolling PS Vita players in Terraria‘s wider community and allowing them to interact and game with PS3™ system players.
A redesigned PS Vita control system (including touch support), an intuitive crafting/item interface and a revamped tutorial world.
PlayStation Network online multiplayer allows up to 8 players! Fight bosses together, build awesome castles or duel each other in PvP combat!
A glimpse of the upcoming Terraria 1.2 update, including over a dozen new items & recipes, 2 completely new armor sets, more that 20 new NPC types including 8 new Zombie enemies and 6 fearsome new Demon Eye variants.
PlayStation®Network leaderboards & trophies.
This is in addition to the vast number of existing features already available in Terraria including 200 crafting recipes, 25 block types, 100 monster types, over 30 recruitable inhabitants and over a dozen explorable environments. So this holidays, why not choose to spend some quality time crafting, exploring and slaying your way through a world which is conveniently placed in the palm of your hands.
Indie developer Digital Tribe has announced today that their newest title, FortressCraft Evolved, is now available on Steam Early Access. You can jump in and give it a try for only $5.99, which is a 60% discount off the final price when it’s expected to launch in March 2014.
FortressCraft Evolved is, as you might have expected, a game in the same vein as voxel-based builder titles like Minecraft and, more recently, Guncraft. The twist is that you’re given the tools to build entire buildings, cities, and worldscapes much more easily than its predecessors.
Features of the game include:
Create the largest worlds ever seen in any computer game.
Create epic structures quickly with automated tools.
Huge draw distance.
Full day and night cycle; Controllable seasonal weather system.
Cascaded shadows and unlimited light sources.
Easy to use UI.
“Build to Me” Feature for rapid macro building.
Personalize with intricate detail blocks and share them on the Steam Workshop.
Additional features to be announced as the game develops!
To check out the game and buy it via Steam Early Access, you can check it out here. You can also check out the official launch trailer below this article.
Are you ready for the Multi-Men? Well you better be because the Multi-Men have crash landed into the MMO worlds of Dofus and Wakfu with the brand new mega update for both games.
The Multi-Men add a new level of depth to gameplay by allowing players to call upon the legendary brothers in arms known as the Multi-Men. Each Multi-Man has a different attribute and ability to bring to the games giving countless new strategies to gamers.
Not only does the update bring in the Multi-Men but it also brings in the traditional holiday additions like new quests, characters, dungeons and gear all to celebrate the season of giving.
Be sure to update your Dofus and Wakfu games now to get the full list of new additions available to you now.
Since the release of Saint Seiya: Brave Soldiers in the Americas developer Dimps and publisher Namco Bandai have been releasing a pretty good stream of DLC in the form of costumes for players looking to change things up with their favorite characters. This week is no different as a few more sets of costumes are now incoming to the fighting game.
This week Saint Seiya fans can look forward to the addition of “God Cloth Seiya – Original Cloth”, which allows players to dress Seiya in his God Cloth. But its not just Seiya fans that have something to look forward to as “Bronze Saint Plain Cloth Set” let’s players choose the Plain Cloth for Seiya, Shun, Hyoga, Ikki and Shiryu. Last but not least, “Bronze Saints Final Bronze Cloth Original Color Set” gives Seiya and the Bronze Saints their Original Cloth.
Those wanting to add any or all of that cloth to their Saints’ wardrobe can find them for download on the PSN. Saint Seiya: Brave Soldiers is available now exclusively for the PS3, anyone that wants to know more on the game can read our own Saint Seiya: Brave Soldiers Review.
Atelier Escha & Logy ~Alchemists of the Duck Sky~ seems to be moving right along, which is why Tecmo Koei and Gust have released quite a bit of news today in regards to the newest installment of the Atelier series of games. The first piece of news being that the game is now available for pre-order, plus depending on which retailer players pre-order from they can look forward to different exclusive costumes for the characters.
Those in North America pre-ordering Atelier Escha & Logy from Amazon can get the Enchanted Witch costume for Escha to use in-game, while those going with GameStop to pre-order can get the Apple Pirate costume for Escha and the Tails Butler costume for Logy. Those in other regions can check with their local retailers to see if/which costumes they are offering.
But that’s not all the news either as the official website has just gone live, so those wanting to check out everything that has been released so far about the game, while listening to some of its music can check it out Here. Last, but not least is the next set of screenshots that have been released in honor of both the pre-order and website. Those wanting to check out the new screenshots can find them in the gallery embedded below.
Atelier Escha & Logy ~Alchemists of the Duck Sky~ is set to release exclusively for the PS3 in March of 2014, where player can experience more gameplay than ever before as they follow two alchemists, each with their own story.
Fans of JRPG’s in North America have a treat in store for them on the PS Vita today as the newest from Aksys Games has just been released to retail locations. Sorcery Saga: Curse of the Great Curry God is a rouge-like style game that tasks players with making legendary curry from ingredients found in dungeons.
Players shouldn’t fret that their curry making skills will go to waste while on the path to make the legendary curry, as with the right ingredients players can make variety of different curry to boost their stats as they go exploring through Sorcery Saga. They just have to be careful though, else they risk losing their levels and ingredients should they fail in a dungeon and have to start over again.
Those wanting to check out to see what Aksys Games has to offer in both the Standard Edition or the very special “Hot and Spicy, Everything Nicey Limited Edition” full of bonuses. Those wanting to check out Sorcery Saga: Curse of the Great Curry God can find it at GameStop and Amazon today exclusively for PS Vita.
Overview
With so many shows based around supernatural monsters and fantasy it can be difficult for a show to stand out from the crowd, and Lost Girl has managed to not only stand out but excel at the genre. With strong, interesting characters and a wide variety of mythology to delve into the first two seasons of Lost Girl were able to give more than a taste of what the Fae have to offer. Does the third season live up to the standards of the past and have enough to continue to explore the characters with a starring role? Or will its success begin to peter out?
Story
Picking up a few weeks after the events of Season 2 (Review) and the fight with the Garuda, the new season sees the fall out from what happened. Something is happening with Bo and her succubus powers, Kenzi is reeling from her own encounter with the Norn, Dyson is deciding what to do with his returned feelings for Bo, and Hale is for the most part absentee with his new found position as The Ash head of the Light Fae. Of all these things, Hale’s is the most pronounced throughout the season. While the others deal with theirs in time, Hale’s almost total absence is felt all the more and when he is back it is always about his change in rank.
Hot off the heels of joining the forces of Light and Dark to combat the Garuda, Hale uses his powers as the new Ash to broker a peace deal with the Dark to see if they can continue to work together and since Hale is now too busy to continue his police work with Dyson, it is a Dark Fae that fills that void. Enter Tamsin, a Valkyrie that is unsurprisingly out to get Bo, but forced to play by Dyson’s rules. This new element to the team dynamic has its ups and downs, while it is a tad predicable that Tamsin will be against Bo and then slowly realign herself, the execution of it is well done. Even more so in what Tamsin’s role actually turns out to be.
As everyone is dealing with their own fallout the show does still manage to deal a monster of the week, but the means by which these help to explore the changes everyone is dealing with is top notch. It doesn’t try to handle all of them simultaneously and the pace feels very natural throughout the episodes. Even more impressively is the fact that while the season kicks off with having to deal with all these problems it is able to gradually transition into the new grave danger the Fae will be facing. No step heel turn, but a logical progression that even the characters don’t realize right away. Any worry that this season will be spent entirely on just character development is unfounded and deals with a threat long overlooked.
With all the different pieces moving around throughout the season, Lost Girl is still able to hold interest and explore types of monsters not normally seen or faced, from Valkyries, to an interestingly imagined Pied Piper. The characters even show plenty more depth than what was delved into in the past seasons, the biggest example being the human doctor Lauren. The series is still able to stay up to par, even with a season mainly devoted to the ramifications of the last big battle and facing off against a minor threat on the horizon of a much bigger one.
Visuals
In terms of the main characters, there is only minute changes to their visual designs outside of their outfits from episode to episode. The special effects however are still fairly good for the limited budget that faces a series like this. They really seem to know when and how to utilize CGI to the maximum effect, primarily knowing when not to show whatever monster they are going up against. The practical effects and props also have a nice design quality to them, sometimes having a slight steampunk-esque flair that fits well within the bounds of the Fae. While there is nothing in the way of huge and/or elaborate what is there and how it’s used works perfectly for Lost Girl.
Audio
The acting is another aspect where everyone seems to have gotten into the groove of things, all the characters fit fine within their roles and the themes played fit well the the situations. The most standout aspect though is the use of the song “The Wanderer” by Dion and the Belmonts,which is one of two linked reoccurring elements. The song is used in multiple episodes, several times using different versions of the song, giving it a haunted feeling and adding another piece of mystery to the show. This not only gives the song a new interesting meaning and does so in a way that makes it hard to forget or not think of whenever the song is heard again.
Extras
The DVD set comes with a few special features that fans of the series might find somewhat interesting. Three interviews talk to two of the executive producers and Kris Holden-Ried, the actor that plays Dyson, about different aspects of the show and how it got started and where they fit into it. These interviews are fairly short, between 5 and 12 minutes each, but do give an interesting insight. Also included is the Lost Girl panel that was held at the 2012 San Diego Comic Con that featured the main cast and top people for the show, as they talk about the show, play a clip to talk about the experience, and take questions from the crowd. Finally, the last feature is a set of set pictures from the set showing off a little bit of the behind the scenes for the season, not the most in depth extra but something more to look at.
Overall
In its third season Lost Girl is showing that it is still able to keep it fresh and interesting with even more to explore with its cast of characters and the different kinds of Fae that exist in their world. What could have been a lackluster season devoted just to what has happened from the battle against the Garuda, is instead a season looking at new unexpected developments and a bit of teasing at what is coming for Team Bo, while coming into its own with how to effectively handle its special effects. Those who enjoyed the past seasons should find another great season to enjoy with Bo, Kenzi, and the rest of the gang.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
