So after the recent announcement of the final date for Star Wars: The Old Republic going to the free-to-play model, it’s just a matter of letting players know just what and how the new Cartel Coins and marketplace will add. Luckily, not wanting to leave people in the dark the developers have been putting out preview trailers of this new information.
As players can see in the trailer embedded below, there are already plenty of additional items planned for the new model that players will be able to purchase with the Cartel Coins system. Be it lizard monkey pets or axes to replace the Jedi lightsabers, though honestly why anyone would want to replace those is beyond me.
Other information that has been passed along though is that there has been an extension to the Rewards Program of those players who once played the game looking to get back into it for free-to-play. Now past players can rejoin up to December 20th, 2012 to receive complimentary Cartel Coins for the months in the past they had to pay for.
Players can find out more and begin getting started for SW:TOR free-to-play by checking out the website HERE.
Gintama The Movie Studio: Sunrise Publisher: Madman Format: DVD Release Date:Out Now Price: $29.95 (Buy here)
Overview
Gintama is a comedy Anime series about a group of Samurai that run a store to investigate things. It’s an action-packed franchise that is incredibly hilarious and full of anime and pop culture references that would make even the most humourless person laugh. I really, really want to empahsise the action-packed and incredibly hilarious parts. I’m pretty sure I’ve given you a good idea of it below.
Gintama The Movie is set after the events of the series and has a crazy storyline of its own. Does it hold up well? Is it a hilarious contribution to the saga? Find out in our review below.
Story
Hilarious. Hilarious would be the best way to describe Gintama The Movies story. I mean, you know that this is definitely the case when it takes the movie three attempts to even begin.
The story is incredibly cliched whilst also being really, really unique in its setting. But really, what makes this movie great is the way the characters interact with each other throughout the story. I mean, sure I can go on about the stories arc, which I might do later in this section; but really, the most enjoyable thing to talk about is the characters.
The characters in this, where to begin!? We could talk about the main cast, comprising of an orphan that is the reincarnation of a white knight, a red-head with a matching personality, glasses and a duck-suit named Elizabeth. And, man, they mix incredibly well.
One of my favourite moments in the film is when the red-head gets captured and is being interrogated by the equally hilarious villains. Somehow this ends up becoming one of the most vulgar scenes in the movie and it is done with two incredibly cute girls. If you’re curious as to what this scene is, let’s just say that it involves large amounts of hocked-up spit. I will also point out that it is technically work-safe, read into that what you will.
Opposing the hilarious main cast are the just as hilarious villains. They don’t get as much screen time and they’re not as obviously funny, but if you look at them right – they are clearly parodies of something. The best example of this is probably the villain that constantly makes perverted remarks and then claims that he’s a feminist. Or the blonde haired girl that totes guns. So many examples.
For those of you that are unaware of Gintama, like I was before going into this, the sitting is incredibly unique. It’s set in a Samurai era Japan, but there’s like aliens and spaceships and stuff. But what’s good about that is that they’re also sitting in the background of the film, this doesn’t become a samurai in space film at all. I liked this a tonne.
I’m watching this again in the background whilst I’m writing this, because it’s that hilarious, and the scene where Elizabeth is wearing a samurai disguise just came on and all the goons are remarking on how sketchy she is. SHE IS A DUCK SUIT, HOW DO YOU NOT REALISE THIS!? Laughing so hard.
All up I just can not talk about the story in too great a detail without sounding like I’m just repeating myself ad-nausea. It’s freaking hilarious and you absolutely have to watch it.
Visuals
I really love the way this anime looks. The characters aren’t all incredibly pretty, nor are they hyper-masculine like in many other series. Each character has their own unique look and feel that, I believe, emphasises their character traits and personalities. Also, Elizabeth.
In the movie there is this really evil sword named after Cherry Blossoms and it glows pink and stuff. When it’s not being used, it looks just like a regular Katana but with a pinkish glow. However, when one of the villains wields it, it becomes this veiny, large, pulsating and thick replacement for an arm.
The background scenery in this movie is also incredibly well done, as it is in most Anime films, but it also fits the style incredibly well. It really looks great when it’s time for some story over the over the top madness that is usually occurring.
Actually, this shows action sequences are amazingly well done. I mean, incredibly amazingly well. What’s really good about Gintama The Movie is that each of the characters have great action scenes, not just Gintoki the main character. I also love how exaggerated these can be at times. One of the best examples I can think of is the scene with the airships and Elizabeth and everything going on there. Man that was amazing.
Once again, I could spend all day talking about how amazing these visuals are, but really, I’d just like to nutshell it. The visuals in Gintama The Movie excel at emphasising both the comedic aspects and the action aspects of the film. Without the visuals being as strong as they are, this movie wouldn’t be half as great.
Audio
The dialogue in Gintama is freaking hilarious. I absolutely love how hilariously funny the dub tracks came out in both English and Japanese. However, I will admit that as a native English speaker, I much prefer the English track over the Japanese.
I love how everyone in the movie is generally being loud. Loud and shouting. However, there are often times where they are speaking normally and I feel that those times are just to calm the audience down after a bunch of laughs and to continue pushing the story. And then suddenly its loud and hilarious again. Loving it.
The sound effects used in the movie are also really well done as well. As a comedy anime you might have expected this to have been filled with low quality gag sounds that plague many works. This is not the case with Gintama. Everything sounds as realistic as you’d expect it to and this really pushes the contrast between action and comedy as the film would display.
Extras
Other than trailers, I have yet to find any Special Features of any kind on the disc for this film. Yeah, I’m pretty sure I’m right here. Audio just has English 5.1 and JP 5.1; no commentaries and the menu only has the usual options. However, the interior of the case has a drawing of one of the greatest scenes in the film, so that’s cool.
Overall
Gintama The Movie is an incredibly hilarious and action-packed film that will have you coming back again and again. As someone that has never seen an episode of Gintama before, I found it strange that I was being tasked to review this amazing package; but after I was done, I could see why. This is a series that everyone has to see, and for someone with my sense of humour, this was a no-brainer. Aside from the lack of special features, I would heartily recommend this to anyone anywhere.
The images reflected in this article fail to articulate the humour of this Anime.
With the Wii U’s release date slowly approaching it is time for companies to release launch titles for the many games that will be joining the Wii U on store shelves everywhere. Today EA chose to release a launch trailer for the Special Edition version of the game which will be released exclusively on the Wii U.
In the trailer you can see some of the things that will make this version of Mass Effect 3 superior to the other versions of the game which have been released earlier this year. The game will be hitting stores with the Wii U on November 18th in North America while various PAL regions will be able to pick it up on November 30th.
Today Square Enix released a new six-minute CG trailer for Final Fantasy XIV and believe me, you should definitely check it out. Don’t worry about reading the rest of this and even if you haven’t been playing the MMO, you should still check it out below.
Have you watched it yet? Well the trailer itself is called the “End of an Era” and it shows the Eorzean Alliance and Garlean Empire clash in battle in an attempt to “deliver the realm from certain destruction.” As for Final Fantasy XIV A Realm Reborn, a beta test will begin at the end of January or early February.
To those who may have forgotten, Family Guy: Back to the Multiverse is due out in just under a month. Today, fans of the hit series have been treated to some new screenshots with some colorful, pirate fare involved.
Though it isn’t a huge shocker, these screenshots show off the “Legend of Long John Peter” level within the game, which will have Brian and Stewie battling pirates. Check out the pics down below, and Back to the Multiverse will be out for the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 on November 21.
Smart as… Developer: XDev Studios Europe Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment Platform : PlayStation Vita Release Date: November 1, 2012 Price:$29.99 (available here)
Overview
Ah brain training games. Nintendo arguably started the great educational handheld party with Dr Kawashima’s brain training on the Nintendo DS, following it up with various mind enhancing titles. Sony have decided to step into the brainbox ring with Smart as… a Vita exclusive that aims to fill the same niche filled by Nintendo’s various titles.
It’s not a typical game and no one with any knowledge of the industry should be expecting such. So judging Smart as… as something other than a game, how does it fare?
Happily the Vita and XDev Studios make a good pairing for this kind of game. Where the DS has a single touch screen, the Vita has two and a gyroscope to boot, and manages to throw in camera usage for some VR games and decent internet integration to let you broadcast your smarts (or lack of) to the rest of the world via Facebook and Twitter.
Gameplay
Right, brain training. This niche genre is something that so called hard core gamers can easily dismiss as worthless, but let’s face it – these things can shift units. Now I doubt that many people are going to invest in a Vita over Smart as…, as sadly the initial enthusiasm for this kind of game has waned, but does it top Nintendo’s handheld efforts such as Dr Kawashima’s Brain Training? Easily.
Smart as… is sleek, taking advantage of the Unreal Engine to provide a crisp and well thought out experience that never once misses a step in it’s delivery. It’s simple, something to be played every day in half hour bursts, perfect for short commutes and thus ideal for the Vita. The games provide intriguing little twists on generic puzzles, and John Cleese pops along for a bit of narration. Why British comedians of a certain vintage are Sony’s preferred narrators is beyond me, but for amusements sake can we have Rowan Atkinson narrating a Bastion style RPG next?
That aside the Smart as… set up is very similar to other brain training games. Players fill out a few rudimentary details such as sex, age and location, and then begin a daily regimen of neuron enhancing mind games. There are four categories on offer here – logic, arithmetic, language and observation – neatly represented by four lobes of the brain.
As well as the daily testing – monitored by a home screen hogging percentage and a wealth of other statistics – there is a free play mode for some more frivolous mind boggling when you want to pick and choose your own games. The touch controls are integral to the game, and work accurately about 95% of the time. Letter and number recognition is strong, with only a few wobbles that will on occasion spoil a game. The gyroscope comes into play for rolling cubes into place, and the front and rear touch screens provide an extra level of trickiness too. Surprisingly there isn’t a single game that stands out as a dud, a rare thing for mini game collections.
Only a handful of the games are available when you first boot up the game, but as you complete your daily training there’s a steady drip feed of new ones to keep up interest levels. As well as the different games, each of those comes in four difficulties, ranging from easy to genius level. Each level has a three star ranking system, with the next step up only unlocked when you three star the previous one. Mathematics based games will get tougher by throwing in decimals, percentages and bigger numbers to man handle, a pattern that is repeated throughout the other three categories – longer words, more complex logic puzzles and trickier things to remember.
Not being able to get straight to the harder puzzles may cause some frustration with overly simple games, but happily the difficulty levels are very distinct from each other and foster a feeling of genuine progression.
The more social side of the Vita is utilised to good effect too. Although it lacks any sort of direct multiplayer, Smart as… integrates a wealth of statistics and high scores via the PlayStation Network and Near. Your performance is ranked from friend to hometown to country level, with assorted league tables to spot the smartest country and even continent in the world. Set a particularly good score on a game in free play and you can create a Near challenge so that others can try to best your efforts. Daily training results can also be posted with ease to Facebook and Twitter, so at least if there is no direct battle of the brains you can create a bit of competition amongst your online friends. The only issue with this wealth of statistics is that the rankings feel a little bit skewed because they only look at one days result, so if you’re a genius on Tuesday it doesn’t matter on Wednesday. A small point, but a niggling one.
Whilst there are still new games to unlock you’ll easily keep Smart as… in daily rotation, but whether or not it will stay there when everything has been revealed is more down to personal preference. What it provides is very well done and the games are all solid efforts, so if this genre is your thing then certainly give it a chance.
Audio & Visual
Smart as… keeps it simple yet slick in the style stakes. Backed up by a decent engine and the Vita’s hardware, the animations are smooth, bright and dynamic, crucially never getting in the way of gameplay. It goes in for a bit of a board game feel, and John Cleese’s narrative quips aid the light hearted atmosphere. Including acted sound clips always runs the risk of them becoming irritating by repetition, but Smart as… toes the line quite neatly, keeping the one liners skippable and the music inoffensive. Indeed Cleese’s clips add a lovely bit of atmosphere to the game, giving it an edge over the rather straight laced and dry brain training games in the Dr Kawashima style. The ever present game piece reminds me of playing ludo as a kid, and the Vita’s power gives everything a very refined sheen.
Overall
Smart as is a reason to pick up your Vita every day. Sure it may only be for half an hour, but that time will be well spent picking your way through some great little mini games. It’s pleasant, low on load times and high on portability, and whilst it’s not exactly what your average gamer would admit to enjoying, it does provide a nice bunch of trophies to soothe that hurt hard core pride. The price tag is a little bit on the steep side for what could be considered a highly polished app, but wallets aside Smart as… is a sensible pick. The intrigue may fade after the initial discovery period, but if you enjoy your brain training the difficulty levels should keep you coming back for more.
Own 007 Legends? Want to play Skyfall in it? Well now you can because the completely free Skyfall DLC mission is out now on Playstation Network and Xbox Live Arcade Marketplace and will be released on Steam on the 20th of November.
In order to promote the release of this epic Skyfall DLC mission, a brand new trailer for the Skyfall mission has launched which shows off the features of the downloadable mission. You can check out the trailer for Skyfall DLC below.
The good folks at the Japan Foundation have so kindly provided us with two double-passes for the 16th annual Japanese Film Festival to giveaway to all of you lovely readers of ours. The Japanese Film Festival will begin this Wednesday the 14th of November at Sydney’s Event Cinemas George St.
We have a double-pass for the Saturday November 17th 3.30pm showing of Bunny Drop and a double-pass for the Tuesday November 20th 6.30pm showing of Space Brothers. So how do you go in the running to win a double-pass to one of these amazing films? Well it’s quite simple really, head over to our official facebook page and comment on the competition post telling us which film you’d like to see and why!
Unfortunately travel is not provided, so it’s best that you only enter if you have a way to get to the film screening. If you can get there, then get in quick as this competition won’t last long. Head over to the facebook page now and get in with a chance for a double-pass to one of these excellent film.
Ahead of its November 20 launch in North America, Sony Computer Entertainment have released the opening cinematic for Playstation All-Stars Battle Royale and have announced that the game has gone gold in a post on the Playstation Blog. The opening features each character fighting their rival in the game. The first rivalry that is shown is Jak and Ratchet. Other notable rivalries include Sweet Tooth and Kratos, Nathan Drake and Sly Cooper and even Sackboy and Big Daddy, which has to go down as one of the biggest mismatches in video game history. Also in the video is the final boss of the game. Check out the video to see who it is.
In addition to the opening cinematic, Seth Killen has revealed in the comments section of the post that the digital copy of Playstation All-Stars Battle Royale (both Playstation 3 and Playstation Vita) will be a day one release and a digital copy of the Playstation 3 version will still nab the purchaser a free digital copy of the Playstation Vita version via the cross-buy initiative. He also reveals that the game will have hundreds of hours of content, replying to a comment:
Beyond arcade mode with intros, endings, and rival cut-scenes for every character and all the multiplayer stuff, All-Stars has tons of interesting challenges and trials (both overall trials and character-specific stuff). Certainly it’s hundreds of hours of content there, and a very extensive set of unlocks, from titles, to taunts, to character-specific intro and outro moves, musical themes, badges, etc. Hope this helps.
Playstation All-Stars Battle Royale will see a release on November 20 in North America, with releases in other territories during that week. Japan’s release has now been pushed to January 2013, two months after the Western releases of the game.
After the major addition that was the Adventure Update for Minecraft XBLA news from the developers 4J Studios has been very quiet. Well the reason for this is because they are hard at work squashing all of the bugs that were introduced into the game with this update. The next patch that will be released contains over a dozen fixes to various glitches such as chest lids not working properly, various hitbox and creative mode issues and much much more which can be found in the list below.
It is worth noting that the company has revealed over Twitter that Golden Apples and Golden Pumpkin Seeds will be added into the game and will be crafted with a golden ingot, though gold nuggets will be used for the recipe once they are added into the game at a later date. Currently there is no release information for this patch so keep an eye out for more info soon.
Changes and Additions:-
– Added an option to clear the quick select bar in the creative interface.
– Added an option to enable or disable bedrock fog, and set to off by default.
– Added an option to toggle the HUD off/on.
– Added an option to turn the player hand off/on.
– Added a crafting recipe for Golden Apples.
– Added a crafting recipe for Pumpkin Seeds.
– Made cakes stackable.
– Added a How To Play page for Host and Player options.
Fixes:-
– Fix for a problem with signs in online games causing crashes.
– Fix for save renaming deleting the wrong save due to input received during the confirmation flow.
– Fix to the mob generation code to increase the number of animals in the world.
– Fix for chests being incorrectly lit, and rotated for maps from previous versions.
– Fix for problem with the eating animation being shown for players who weren’t eating.
– Fix for problem with chest lids not behaving properly.
– Fix for animals looking like they were taking damage when they shouldn’t.
– Fix for some sounds not playing when the player has an empty hand.
– Fix for lever sounds.
– Fix for fence gate sounds.
– Fix for splitscreen players sometimes having their settings zeroed.
– Fix for being damaged while flying over lava.
– Fix to stop lava, milk and water buckets being empty after use in creative mode.
– Fix for Leader of the Pack achievement being awarded incorrectly.
– Fix for leaderboard stats issue where value stored was incorrect.
– Fix for hitbox problems with glass panes and iron fence.
– Fix for small character display changing color to green.
– Fix for map rendering incorrectly in some situations with clouds disabled.
– Fix for block rendering problem at the edge of the map.
– Fix for splitscreen players not being able to mine in the tutorial.
– Fix for players not being able to sprint/sprint-fly in creative mode if the player was previously in survival mode with a low food bar.
– Fix for arrow damage not being ignored when PvP is turned off.
– Fix for activated pressure plates not working correctly.
– Fix for the low food bar hint appearing when loading a game in creative mode (usually the tutorial world saves).
– Fix to remove the player shadow when the Invisible option in the Host Privileges is used.
– Fix for Red Roses not being generated on the terrain.
– Fix for paintings being pushed by pistons.
– Fix so that players who can’t eat, due to the Trust Players option being off, do not get exhausted.
– Fix for the interface disappearing after a Share to Facebook action.
– Fix to limit the number of Slimes, Ghasts and Silverfish that can be spawned in a world.
– Fix for the cursor position in creative mode being able to go offscreen.
– Fix for players showing on maps when they should not be, after the player dies and respawns.
– Fix for capes displaying wrongly when sprint-flying.
– Fix for capes not displaying in the Nether.
– Fix for capes not displaying when the player respawns.
– Fix for tools taking damage in Creative Mode.
– Fix so Bows don’t need or use up Arrows in Creative Mode.
– Reduced the volume of the chest open/close sound effect.
