Some of the developers from Monolith, those that had worked on the first F.E.A.R. and the No One Lives Forever series, have gotten together to make a new independent studio by the name of Blackpowder Games. The new studio has announced themselves and their first project today in the form of a video trailer.
Titled Betrayer, the new game will be set in 1604 in the New World as the player seeks out the missing inhabitants of a English colony. With a distinctive art style, the FPS will require players to stockpile a variety of period weapons such as muskets, crossbows, and tomahawks.
Players would be smart to keep all those weapons ready and handy as Betrayer features dangers in the form of ghosts and other enemies on the path to finding out what happened to the colony, but not everything in the wilderness of the land will be hostile, as players will find aid from a woman in red in the distance.
Those wanting to see Betrayer in action in the announcement trailer can find it embedded below. Players wanting to find out more about Betrayer themselves will have their chance when its Steam Early Access becomes available on August 14th, 2013 for PC. Until then though maybe check out some PC deals.
The Imposter conveys a true and disturbing story of how identities can change people in terms of their perception and imagined reality. Bart Layton directs this documentary exploring the 1994 case of missing 13yr old Nicholas Barclay in San Antonio, Texas, who was ‘discovered’ 3 years and four months later in Linares, Spain. The film challenges the well-known case by providing evidence to support the imposter, Frédéric Bourdin, and the Barclay family’s recollection of events. Does ‘The Imposter’ excel beyond a dramatic biography or give the audience further insight into the famous French serial imposter?
Story
The film begins with a recording of Nicholas, who is filming his sister Carey’s room before showing the birthday girl and himself on camera. On-screen text introduces the audience to the case; in 1994, 13 year old Nicholas Barclay disappeared from San Antonio, Texas. As with most drama documentaries, each family member speaks separately to the audience to provide a sense of intimacy and realism. In 1997, the Barclay family receive news of Nicholas being discovered in Spain, resulting in a chain of mixed emotions from anticipation to bewilderment for sister, Carey Gibson, brother-in-law, Bryan Gibson and mother, Beverly Dollarhide.
The film progresses cleverly by rewinding back to the opening scene, of a young boy hiding in a telephone booth and the voiceover of the concerned man who called the police station. In order to understand how ‘The Imposter’came to be, we see the real Frédéric Bourdin talking us through his actions as a younger boy, performed by Adam O’Brian. In order to successfully prove to the police he was a missing juvenile, Frédéric covered himself with layers, upon layers of clothing, with a hat and scarf to conceal his face, and created barriers of verbal and physical contact to prevent the authorities from identification.
Attempting to impersonate someone else completely is not exactly an easy task; although for Frédéric it was either steal the identity of a young missing person or be put in jail and beaten for perjury. The imposter explained his demeanour by stating, “For as long as I can remember, I wanted to be someone else, someone who was acceptable”. To give himself a chance of becoming a new person, with a different face, name, and security of a loving family and home, he searched through the US missing person’s list in the police station database and chose Nicholas Barclay.
From this very decision, the film unravels into chaos which impacts significantly on each of the Barclay family members and the memory of their son, Nicholas. The extent to which dark-haired and brown-eyed Frédéric Bourdin recreates the distinguishing characteristics of blue-eyed and blonde-haired Nicholas is unnerving to think about, especially the three matching tattoos he got; T on his left hand between his thumb and forefinger, J on his left shoulder, and an L and N on the outside of his left ankle. With the arrival of Carey (Anna Ruben) in Spain to pick up Nicholas, Frédéric was convinced that she would not see her brother in him. However, as luck would have it, Frédéric was embraced as a part of the Barclay family and for 4.5 months was taken care of in San Antonio, as their lost-and-found son, Nicholas.
The most interesting aspect of the documentary lies within the family’s immediate acceptability of Nicholas, despite only having pieces of information about what really happened during his disappearance. Special Agent, Nancy Fisher (Cathy Dresbach) at the FBI Headquarters in San Antonio, Texas takes on an interview with Nicholas to get an account of his kidnapping and torture and to assist in the capture of his military abductors. When a private investigator, Charlie Parker, comes forward and discovers evidence proving Nicholas is an imposter, he also finds out an even stranger truth about the Barclay family.
Visuals
Throughout the film, the audience moves to the real people and actors portraying the events simultaneously, highlighting the engaging visual experience associated with documentaries and biographies. I thought it was very effective to have specific blurry scenes that created a surreal atmosphere, as Frédéric changes into Nicholas, the audience interweaves between a world of fact and fiction. The photos and video footage of Nicholas, as well as Frédéric, emphasis the truth and power of these events and show the audience how different the imposter and child are.
Audio
The composer, Anne Nikitin, created compelling and dramatic music to suit the pace of the film’s story-telling, which was particularly evident with the introduction of Frédéric Bourdin; where more layers of instrumental pieces from the ticking xylophone, harp, double basses and violin, audibly reveal how the simplicity of one lie can become magnificently complex.
Extras
With The Imposter DVD, there are a variety of additional features, including the audio commentary with Bart Layton, making The Imposter with the producers, podcasts of telling the story, meeting Frédéric, shooting the drama and creating the music, the theatrical trailer and Madman propaganda. Bart Layton discusses with the audience why he introduced the film as a conventional documentary and rewound to where the extraordinary story began, in order to create a movie and not a dramatization. The idea of changing perspectives in the film and manipulating the audience, as Frédéric Bourdin would, is necessary in illustrating the imposter. Accordingly, the Barclay family took part in the film to clear negative allegations from the media and public about the case of their son, Nicholas, who is still regarded as missing.
Overall
The Imposter is an amazing and thrilling film-based documentary, which captures the true story of one of 500 different false identities that Frédéric Bourdin has assumed. The French serial imposter is well-known publically for his record of fabricated lives and professional career in perjury. The film opens up two doors into the case, as both sides of the story challenge the audience to determine whether or not both Frédéric and the Barclay family were pretending. I would highly recommend watching this insightful case to understand more about the imposter, as well as your own family values and what you would do under these circumstances.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
That’s right fellow Browncoats. You’re not reading this wrong. Firefly is getting its very own video game! Many die-hard fans of the much beloved Sci-fi western were very surprised to learn during San Deigo Comic Con 2013 that FOX had officially licensed Firefly to Sparkplug Games and that an MMO was already in the works. The announcement came with a shiny new trailer detailing all of the Captain-y things players will be required to do to make a successful crew and run jobs in the verse’ that so many of us have come to love. After years of waiting for a continuation to the Firefly/Serenity mythos we finally have the chance to keep on flying in the big ol’ verse. One can only speculate as to what familiar faces and places we might see, and what unanswered questions get addressed. The game appears to be slated for a 2014 release. Check out the trailer for yourself below!
My Little Pony follows the story of the mane six, Twilight Sparkle, Pinkie Pie, Apple jack, Rainbow Dash, Rarity and Fluttershy, as they overcome milestones in friendship. Each episode sees the mane six through their lives, day to day, as they each learn new lessons in friendship, and discover how important friends and friendship really is. My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic – The Return of Harmony contains the first five episodes of season two of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. The two feature episodes, The Return of Harmony Part One and The Return of Harmony Part Two, are the first two episodes of season two. These episodes follow the mane six as they overcome problems in friendship and defeat the god of Chaos. The other three episodes on disc see the mane six through hiccups in friendship as they help each other and their friends discover the value of friendship.
Each episode is packed full of bright colors, cute, quirky lovable characters and provides viewers with funny entertainment and keeps them wanting more. Hasbro Studios have yet again delivered another amazing DVD volume suited for young children and families.
Story
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic – The Return of Harmony subtly progresses the main story of My Little Pony. The feature episodes (The Return of harmony Part 1 and 2) follow the mane six as they overcome one of their toughest milestones yet. Discord has returned after Princess Celestia and Princess Luna imprisoned him in stone and is wreaking havoc and chaos throughout Ponyville. He tears apart their homes and, through trickery and deception, convinces the mane six that they don’t need friendship. When it seems all hope is gone, Twilight Sparkle pulls through and helps the others remember why friendship is so important. They regain their memories, rebuild their friendship and defeat Discord, once again imprisoning him in stone, whilst learning that friendship is always worth fighting for, no matter what. The other episodes focus on characters like Princess Luna, Rarity and Sweetie Bell as they learn to not judge ponies without getting to know them, and accept each others differences, no matter how hard it can be.
The first two episodes Return of Harmony Part 1 and 2 create a two part story arc. In this story arc, Twilight takes the spotlight and saves Ponyville, and Eqeustria, from the clutches of the Spirit of Chaos, Discord. Discord tricks the mane six into believing that friendship isn’t important. Eventually, all of the mane six give up on friendship. All seems lost, until Twilight Sparkle is reminded of the importance of friendship. She reunites the mane six and defeats Discord, returning harmony to Ponyville.
The third episode, Lesson Zero, focuses on Twilight Sparkle. Her weekly letter to Princess Celestia, explaining what lesson in friendship she has learned, is going to be tardy if she doesn’t find a problem to resolve among her friends. Twilight turns to her friends for help, but they don’t take her problem serious enough. After being unable to find a problem to resolve, Twilight decides to create a problem. Chaos breaks lose throughout Ponyville thanks to Twilight, causing Princess Celestia to step in and sort out the chaos. Everything is resolved, and Twilight’s punishment is forgotten, provided that the rest of her friends write a letter to the Princess as well. Each of the ponies realise that it’s important to take your friends problems seriously, no matter how small and insignificant they seem.
Luna Eclipsed, the fourth episode, focuses onPrinces Luna. It’s Nightmare Night, a holiday dedicated to Luna’s alter ego Nightmare Moon. This is Princess Luna’s first time visiting Ponyville after what happened in Friendship is Magic Part 1 and 2, and the ponies of Ponyville don’t seem too over-joyed to see their Princess of the Night. It takes a while, but with Twilight, Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie’s help, the ponies start warming up to Luna, and begin accepting her. Everypony in this episode learns that no matter who or what they appear to be, each pony deserves a chance.
Sisterhooves Social is the last of volume one. Rarity and Sweetie Bell take the stage, and learn that no matter how hard it may be, siblings must accept each others differences, no matter what. In this episode, Rarity has to babysit Sweetie Bell for a week after their parents decide to go away. Sweetie Bell tries to help Rarity with her day to day activities, but, like most younger siblings, does the complete opposite. Eventually, they dis-own each other, but it doesn’t last long. They soon realise that they need each other, and that life wouldn’t be the same without each other.
There is no overall plot to My Little Pony. Each episode, with the exceptions of feature episodes, has a brand new story. On occasion, there are flash backs to other episodes, but apart from that, the episodes don’t have much relevance to each other. Due to the lack of overall plot, each episode, with the above stated exception, can be viewed in any order.
Visuals
The DVD cover art captivates the essence of the show and characteristics of the ponies. The cover art fits in with previous volume DVDs. The DVD carries on the spine design from season one’s first and second volume, by placing Pinkie Pie, one of the mane six, on the top of the spine.
My Little Pony has come a long way in terms of visual aesthetics. Original generation one, two and three ponies had horrible coloring schemes. Not only did the pony’s colors look off, the character design was completely different. The character design has now been changed dramatically, with the new My Little Pony characters looking cute and adorable. The original My Little Pony character design had the characters looking more horse-like, with very strong horse-like muzzles and long faces, whereas Friendship is Magic generation ponies are designed cutely, with round faces and small muzzles.
The cartoon is great quality, presenting their intended audiences, young children and families, with warm, bright colorful characters and smooth animation. The visuals are fantastic. They don’t assault the audience with overly bright and eye-straining colors, like some shows designed for young children do. The pony’s colors are bright enough to captivate the younger audience, yet not to bright that they over balance and take away from the background. The contrasting works exceptionally well, as does the shadowing. The contrasting is not to stark and over the top, it’s fairly subtle, yet effective. The shadows, though extremely visible, are not over-powering either.
Audio
Nothing says ‘kids TV show’ like a poppy-girl-band theme song. My Little Pony’s theme song is not an easy tune to forget. Designed for younger children, the tune is extremely catchy, and the lyrics are hard to forget.
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic – Return of Harmony’s audio fits in with the visuals really well, and helps complete the show. The music scores are worked into each episode and scenes, having a strong yet subtle effect. The music, balanced quietly, works well with the context of the episodes. The witty dialogue caters not only for younger children, but for their older family members also, with little jokes placed here and there that draw out a small chuckle every now and then. The dialogue is loud enough for you to hear when the TV is at a reasonable volume, but not to loud that you have to turn it down when the characters shout.
Extras
The extras on the DVD cover trailers of other cartoons published by Madman such as Noddy, Pearlie and Growing Up Creepy. Each trailer shows a brief insight into the shows and the title sequence. The trailers introduces the shows to the viewers and plays through the title sequence and theme song.
Overall
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic – Return ofHarmony is extremely different from the older My Little Pony episodes. With new character design, color schemes and a new catchy theme song, My Little Pony is hard to forget. With each episode packed with bright colors, witty one liners and cute, quirky characters, it’s sure to provide many laughs and keep viewers entertained and wanting to watch more. The show sends across meaningful messages to young viewers, and this particular volume sends across powerful messages, particularly to younger viewers. Return of Harmony is a great volume of episodes, but we could expect no less from Hasbro Studios.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
Welcome to the 21st episode of CC Powerslam, Capsule Computers Wrestling Podcast! In our twenty-first episode we discuss the rise and fall of Ryback, Daniel Bryan’s upcoming title shot, predictions for Summerslam and the possibility of the Corporation being revived by Mr McMahon.
Send all your wrestling questions, suggestions, predictions and feedback to [email protected]
Topics discussed:
– Summerslam
– The Corporation revival in the cards?
– Ryback’s future
– Daniel Bryan’s title shot
– Does Damien Sandow have star quality?
– Is Cody Rhodes the next big face?
– Ryback and Randy going Corporate?
– Vince vs Triple H power struggle
– The curious case of Brock Lesnar
Feedback:
Send an email to [email protected] and let us know what you think of the podcast or what you’d like to hear or any suggestions you might have.
Tekken Card Tournament was released in April, and since then has amounted to over 4 million downloads across all platforms. Since we first heard about the game, there were rumblings and musings that there would be physical trading cards to accommodate the mobile game. Today those rumors become a reality, as Namco Bandai have announced the official release of the physical trading card booster packs. They are available in sealed booster packs of 5, with a grand total of 191 cards.
Namco Bandai Europe Senior Vice President, Oliver Comte said of the game
The support of the Tekken fans for Tekken Card Tournament has been incredible, and with the launch of the physical cards we’re giving them even more exciting possibilities to enjoy the game … These cards bring so many extra features, not least of all is the ability to take the mighty Heihachi and its rare powers into battle.
As Comte mentioned, each card will bestow special unlocks and abilities to the mobile game. You access these through scanning a QR Code that is present on each of the 191 cards. Once scanned, you will unlock awesome features like; valuable power ups, collectible art, new cards via the card fusion system, augmented reality characters, plus extra chances to get super rare powers for Heihachi.There are also 9 special Art Cards that feature exclusive designs for the game.
No Trading Card Game would be complete without the ability to play like cavemen, away from mobile devices. These Tekken Cards offer players the chance to play a streamlined and simplified version of the game without needing to reach for their iPhone or Android devices, however their true functionality is still reserved for the Tekken Card Tournament game.
Tekken Card Tournament is available for download on iPhone or iPad through the App Store, on Android and Kindle through Google Play and the Amazon App Store, Or through your web browser. Namco have also been so kind as to put up a trailer for the physical cards, which you can check out below. The trailer shows some of the ways that the cards will interact with the game and vice versa.
You can grab the booster packs at any EB Games store, or on their website starting today. Let us know in the comments below if you plan on picking up any of these, and be sure to stay tuned to Capsule Computers for all the Tekken news as it becomes available.
Paramount‘s action/comedy Pain & Gain, directed by Michael Bay and starring Dwayne ‘The Rock Johnson, Mark Wahlberg and Anthony Mackie, will be hitting Australian cinemas in a mere 3 days on August 8 (our review will be up tomorrow), and today we’ve got some of the final promotional clips from the film to get your blood pumping (iron).
Directly below is a clip aptly titled ‘Wood Bat’, as it shows Dwayne’s character threatening a man who is withholding information from the Sun Gym Gang with said weapon. An intimidating man of that size holding a baseball bat…yeah, I’d do what he asks. Check it out.
And embedded below is the other clip entitled ‘Big Bitches’. It shows Mark’s character speaking some hilarious dialogue as he tries to motivate Anthony Mackie’s to go along with his cash-making plans so he can wine and dine (emphasis on dine) those “plump” ladies he loves. We know of his affinity for the larger women after a previous clip of him with Rebel Wilson’s character, who promised she could do some “penis magic“ and help him with his…testicular issues (don’t do steroids folks!).
EarthBound fever is here and it has been running red-hot! This cult-classic, JRPG from all the way back in 1994 has returned, big time, with it’s Virtual Console release on Nintendo’s newest money-maker, the Wii U. Any educated nerd knows what EarthBound, or Mother, is and if you didn’t know what it was before then I guarantee you know what it is now, especially with it’s re-release. Like a lot of people out there I’m new to EarthBound but I feel like an old fan, considering the amount of research I’ve done on the game, and I absolutely love it! I missed it the first time around because it was released the year I was born so I’m real happy that it was brought back. There are a lot of reasons why EarthBound is an incredible game and why it has been and will continue to be an incredible game and I’ve decided to list just a few of the reasons why I think EarthBound is a game that can’t be stopped!
The Transition Into Our Generation:
I mentioned just above, and I’m sure you already know, that EarthBound(Mother 2) has just been re-released on the Wii U Virtual Console, that’s fantastic! It makes me want to scream; “Fuzzy Pickles” because what makes this release even greater is that the game wasn’t changed in any drastic way. The music is still the same, the look is still the same, the gameplay is still the same and for all intents and purposes it’s still the same game! The fact that someone could take an old game, plop it onto a next generation console and have it already be incredible is such a great feat. I’m the type of gamer that prefers to have the latest and greatest of games, I won’t continue playing Pokemon Black and White 2 because I would rather just wait to play Pokemon X and Y, that’s the kind of guy I am yet when I picked up EarthBound to play I never thought to myself “Jeez, I’d rather be playing [insert game here] than this crap”, not once!
The Dark Story:
It doesn’t really seem like it would have a very deep and dark storyline, the game is often so colourful and bright but play it enough and you release that this game is not exactly what it seems. The game goes in and out of the shadows when it comes to the story, it really does, one moment you could be in a happy, little village chasing butterflies and fighting neighbourhood dogs and the next minute you could be fighting off zombies as they attempt to engulf a town. As the game goes on you can feel it getting darker and darker, the Giygas fight (The final boss) as up on the top of peoples lists as one of the scariest, and hardest, boss fights around. The theories and stories behind Giygas and his battle are enough to send chills down spines.
The game creator himself, Shigesato Itoi, has said that the “inspiration” behind Giygas’ lines during the final fight with him came from when he was a young boy and he accidentally walked in on an adult movie where it showed a rape scene, this is disgusting and terrifying on it’s own but for a little boy to have seen would have been extremely traumatizing. He’s also stated that while writing those lines him and his co-writer wouldn’t finish up and leave until they were both on the verge of crying, this right here shows how deep the game goes and the effect on both it’s creator and it’s audience. You can definitely feel the heart and soul put into this game. There are so many theories behind a lot of the characters and battles in EarthBound, I honestly suggest you give them a read even if you have no interest in the game.
The Audio and Visuals:
Beautiful. Just beautiful. This game has been praised for it’s audio and visuals since it was first released and you can see why. The game looks fantastic, the enemies and characters are all quirky and it’s style is done in such a way that it will go from cute to creepy in the span of a single fight and that’s just with the visuals. The 8-bit soundtrack is real funky and I found myself having more fun with it when I was listening to the music alongside the gameplay. The music behind the game is so good that there is an actual soundtrack that you can buy for it. Even rapper YTcracker released an album dedicated to the music in this game, it’s called; EarthBound: Adventures of The Soundstone. The animation holds up in this day and age, it doesn’t feel like you’re playing an old Pokemon game where you can tell how dated it is.
The EarthBound Legacy:
This may be the biggest reason to play this game. Without EarthBound there wouldn’t be as many great JRPGs around nowadays. In a time where RPGs were all fantasy-based, where you’re aknight that fights dragons and saves the princess, EarthBound dared to be different, dared to be “weird” and became a cult classic because of it. Ness, the main character of EarthBound, has been a staple character in every Super Smash Brothers game since the very beginning, they even added in Lucas (Protagonist of Mother 3/Fan name: EarthBound 2) to the last iteration of the game without his game ever being sold outside of Japan. EarthBound has created some of the worlds most dedicated fans with people translating games and even offering the translations to Nintendo for free with the hopes that everyone outside of Japan might get a little more of a taste. It’s left such an impact that 19 years later Nintendo has brought it back and it’s still a crowd favourite that has not only continued to make money but continued to be a great game.
Well there you go! Those are just a few of the big reasons why I think EarthBound is an unstoppable juggernaut of a game. I’m going to continue hoping that Nintendo give us more EarthBound in the future the same as all of you out there. Let us know why you love EarthBound and why you think more gamers out there should start playing it! Hit us up in our comments section below. Keep your eyes on the site and your eyes on the stars because you just don’t know what’s out there!
Need a nice bag to carry around those things that you carry outside of a tote bag? Well, Nintendo have got an answer for you – as for the first time in months, a snazzy new item has been added to the Club Nintendo Rewards section.
Of course the bag is a pleasant sight- and at only 400 coins, this makes for a decent way to cash in some of those stockpiled coins. If you haven’t already, you can also pick up Pikmin 3, which is in stores today for the Wii U, and stay tuned as tomorrow marks a brand new set of digital rewards for the service.
This is one of those articles where we remind you that a game came out. Usually, I would talk about the game, mention the features, and so on – but this is Pikmin 3, the long-awaited sequel that has had a ton of coverage thus far, and if you own a Wii U, it should be high on your priority list already.
Rock Pikmin, flying Pikmin, and new heroes are what this title is all about, polished up in one complete package that is sure to be a familiar yet satisfying entry in the franchise that Nintendo have been steadily promoting for over a year. You can pick up your copy today via any retailer or the eShop, and if you have yet to pick up a Wii U, the steady stream of titles behind this one are more than enough reason to splurge a bit.
