Beyond Good & Evil | PS2 | Review
You know, Ubisoft wasn’t always the god-awful company it is today, shovelling out the same old garbage year upon year. Ubisoft has been responsible for a lot of great games but perhaps most notable of all, is Beyond Good & Evil due to it being both critically acclaimed and a commercial failure. So let’s take a look back at Ubisoft’s cult classic.
Injustice & the Creative Bankruptcy of Modern Fighting Games
Mortal Kombat managed to weave an engaging story between its gameplay which was continued in all of NetherRealms preceding games, it is right that the developer should receive lots and lots of praise. However, as good as this improvement is within the genre, it’s still not good enough. Because if we look back at the most feature rich fighters of all time we find that NetherRealm’s formula is tiny in scope compared to some brilliant features and gameplay systems that seem to be taken for granted nowadays.
How Nobody Absolutely Dominated E3 2017
A very mild E3 wouldn't you agree? Microsoft's new Xbox One X is set to be "the most powerful mind control device ever" but does it have any games worth playing? Bethesda seem content to re-release Skyrim til the end of time. Nintendo wants us to be excited for games that will come some time between now and the end of time...but at least Ubisoft got rid of the terrible, annoying Aisha Tyler!
GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY 2 | Reel Talk
The latest in the Marvel cinematic universe: Guardians of the Galaxy vol. 2 had high expectations due to the success of the first film. let's discuss whether it lived up to those expectations and give our review of the film in this episode of Reel Talk.
Does Post Rock Exist? | Interviews with Yorkshire Bands
This is a series of interviews with Yorkshire bands exploring the local music scene and their ties with the divisive genre of post-rock. The title stems from the unwillingness of certain bands to accept the term, with some simply claiming it as journalist jargon.
Was Moonlight a Worthy Winner? | Full Oscars Analysis
Let's talk about the Oscars, where a bunch of rich, old, white men arbitrarily choose between a handful of popular Western films whilst ignoring the majority of films from other parts of the world because they're not about rich, white people.
The Star Wars: Rogue One Debate | Reel Talk
Join us as we tackle the most important question of 2016 and possibly all time: "Is Rogue One: A Star wars Story the most over/under-rated film of all time?" ...Nah, not really, but we do talk about Rogue One and it's various pros and cons. This time we have a two way split between Arron & Ben who are on opposite sides of the spectrum, with Jake mediating the discussion.
Mono & Alcest @ The Brudenell Social Club | 13/11/2016
Mono played a surprisingly wide array of material from their 4 most recent albums dating back to 2009's Hymn To The Immortal Wind. Starting the set with my personal favourite 'Ashes in the Snow.' This song starts very quietly with a glockenspiel duet and usually when these kinds of sections are played at gigs in Leeds this is the time when the audience can forget they are listening to a band and begin a full-blown conversation about their last drunken night out...Strangely enough, this never happened whilst Mono were playing, the audience were truly captivated throughout which I was very grateful for.
South Park | PS1 | The Retro Perspective
Tom joins me once again to enjoy some tasty member berries. This time we play Acclaim's South Park first person shooter from 1999. That's when games were great! Video game journalism was just as bad though....
What Can Ride Along 2 Tell Us About the Games Industry
I know, I know. Another article about sexism, I'm as tired of it as you are but having just seen Ride Along 2 I was struck by a wave of inspiration. I found it surprisingly relevant to many recent events in the video game industry regarding censorship and representation. It got me thinking just to what extent Video Games are scapegoated and vilified as the cultural representative of "offensive" violence and sexism, while the film and music industries can do whatever the hel they want with not even a squeak of protest from the majority of people.
Sense8 | Season 1 | Review
Do you know who wrote & directed The Matrix? For some reason, I didn't until just now when I looked up the Wachowskis and saw it in their filmography. I had been watching the first season of the Netflix science fiction drama series Sense8 and was wondering who these brilliant people were (writing & directing alongside J. Michael Straczynski) and why I'd never heard of them before. It makes sense now because while The Matrix was an ambitious, unique movie, ahead of its time, the ambitiousness of Sense8 as a series causes me to question how Netflix even considered it.
Resident Evil's Fall From Grace Part 3: Resident Evil 6
Previously in the series we took a look at Resident Evil 4 & Resident Evil 5 but nothing could have prepared us for Capcom's descent in to the pure madness that is Resident Evil 6. For the very first time we play the game and give our thoughts on one of the worst games ever created. Everything from the animations & textures to the characters & inventory, we lay it all bare in this in depth review. Resident Evil 6 truly is one of the markers of the decline in quality of Japanese games and things only seem to be getting worse. Whether by creative bankruptcy, laziness or pure greed, this game series has fallen from a true icon of the gaming industry to a broken, zombie corpse, shell of its former self. At the very least Resident Evil 6 is in fact the scariest game of all time...scary how horrifyingly bad it is.
Animal Collective @ Leeds University | 07/09/2016
I have never been sure if Animal Collective's songs would translate well in to a live setting & while the energy & stage presence is all there, there is one element of their music that I feel prevents it from working 100%. That is the dissonance between the sole acoustic instrument (the drum kit) and the other members who are playing synthesisers & sample pads through a giant tangle of pedals & mixers. The drums were often overpowering, even when they weren't meant to be and many sections of songs felt a bit of a mess of crazy electronic sounds and frantic drums.
Enderal | Skyrim Mod | Review
The Skyrim Creation Kit, possibly the greatest video game creation tool ever that isn't designed for that specific purpose. Through it, modders have developed whole systems within Skyrim such as real time strategy, setlement building, tower defense, sex slave simulator...you name it, someone has modded it in to Skyrim. And now, developers SureAI, the same people who brought us Nehrim for The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion have created an entirely new game using Skyrim's 'creation engine.'
Rise of the Tomb Raider | Review
If you enjoyed Crystal Dynamics' 2013 reboot of the Tomb Raider series then I have some good news, some bad news & some worse news concerning Rise of the Tomb Raider. The good news is that this sequel is the exact same game in almost every conceivable way. The bad news, is that it's the exact same game in almost every conceivable way. The worse news is that all the things that are different about Rise of the Tomb Raider are significantly worse than what's come before.
Simone Bernacchia | Amiga Homebrew | Composer Interview
Simone Bernacchia is an Italian composer now living in LA since 2005 when he married his wife. He has been composing music on the Amiga platform since the 90s, with his first commercial title, arcade shooter 'Powder' released in 1998. Currently working as a web developer, he is now part of the Amiga homebrew community, contributing music to a variety of games from independent studios. In this interview we talk about his recent projects, the most well-known being Blocky Skies. The homebrew community as a whole and how Amiga homebrew compares to other homebrew communities. The hardware and software behind composing for Amiga such as the open source Milky Tracker and the limitations of the platform. All this, and more:
Demon's Crest | The Retro Perspective
Demon's Crest, a Ghosts & Goblins spinoff and a a game literally everyone should play. Because in the age when indie platformers are being thrown out left, right and centre and a "retro aesthetic" is seen as an instant positive as these indies attempt to be throwbacks to a better era. It takes us a trip back to play an absolute masterpiece (Demon's Crest) to realise that not many of these modern games have actually lived up to their influences. But enough cynicism, let's chat about Demon's Crest for the SNES!
Edge Of Eternity | Interview With The Composer | Cedric Menendez
Cedric Memendez is a composer working with Midgar Studio, a French indie studio currently working on the JRPG inspired Edge Of Eternity. The game was a massive kickstarter success and also reached its stretch goal to bring on help from Chrono Trigger composer Yasunori Mitsuda. In this interview we talk about recording with Mitsuda and the Bratislava Symphony Orchestra. The history of Midgar Studio and their previous games and Cedric Menendez's early Japanese RPG inspirations. As well as some discussion on sound design and finally we change the subject, as I ask about the game itself and the turn-based mechanics of Edge Of Eternity.
Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness | Review
Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness is an unfinished game. Not in the way you might have heard before; as a complete product that is 20 hours long (far too short for a JRPG of this type, and in the Star Ocean series to boot) and not in the way that Drakengard 3 was unfinished; that game only needed a few bug fixes, a bit of optimisation and a budget to speak of....No.
Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness is a completely unfinished game.
The Gamechangers | BBC Drama | Review
We watch and give our thoughts in this Retro Perspective Review of The Gamechangers. A BBC documentary drama film made for TV. Starring Daniel Radcliffe as Sam Houser, creator of Grand Theft Auto, & Bill Paxton as Jack Thompson. The film takes place while Rockstar was creating Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas & Thompson was trying to sue them for "poisoning children's minds."