Gears of War 2 Review

I played the original Gears of War like everyone else with an Xbox 360 in the lean days before Halo 3.  Microsoft knew Halo had saved their original system, and the gap in time between the launch of the 360 and Halo 3 did not sit well with higher-ups at MS.  To fill this gap, Microsoft held a magnifying glass over developer Epic to encourage them to make a killer app for their fledgling system.  As a result, early adopters were treated to a fairly polished 3rd person shooter experience, complete with solid campaign mode and an engaging, competitive online multiplayer.  And you could chainsaw people in half.

Years have passed, and Halo 3 has come and stayed to take its place as the rightful heir to the Microsoft gaming throne.  But what has become of Epic Games and their intrepid band of chainsaw welding badasses?  With their second entry in the series, they have created a game that can stand proudly among the triple-A titles currently available. 

You've probably heard someone use the phrase "went there" as in, "Oh he went there," or , "I can't believe she went there!" or most regrettably, "I went there, put my thing down, flipped it, and reversed it."  Well this game goes there.  You thought the first Gears of War was a bloody, hyper-masculine brodeo?  Gears of War 2 makes the first installment seem like a Nicholas Sparks novel wrapped in a Thomas Kinkade painting.  Strong words, you say?  I drowned a few times in blood during the story campaign.  This is not a metaphor; my character was literally in over his head in blood and died as a result.  ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED?!?! 

Full of excessive gore, disturbing imagery, and deliberate profanity, this game is not for kids.  This game works hard to earn its mature rating, and with the average age of a gamer now being 35 (yes, really) I have no problem wallowing in the depravity.  Disembodied hands and jaws are sent flying and jiggling around the screen while the camera is occasionally obscured by thick blotches of blood, but the exaggerated art makes it all plays like a violent cartoon rather than a naturalistic representation of bodies being eviscerated.  Once again, this game is not for children, but anyone older than 13 should be able to play this game and still remain a well-adjusted member of society.  

Adding to the typical campaign mode and multiplayer online matches, Epic has given us a simplistic little gem called Horde.  This involves you, along with 4 human controlled players, fighting off waves of increasingly challenging Locust baddies.  It starts off slowly but escalates quickly, forcing tight team work that usually results in a glorious Alamo-like last stand before you are overwhelmed by a throng of horrific creatures.  

Gears of War 2 is probably the best looking game I've ever played on the Xbox 360 game console.  I remember thinking how great the original Gears looked years back and the sequel is a significant graphical improvement.  It also boasts a far grander sense of scale, with sweeping vistas and cavernous underground environments to explore.  This game is a great deal of fun, and it encourages you to play it with friends.  What more could you ask for?  Well for starters how about a patch to finally fix all the online issues plaguing the game.  

While it might not do much for the "videogames as art" debate, Gears of War 2 is a polished and engaging work.  If excessive violence and gore are not your thing you may want to skip this one, but players looking for a fun, frenetic, and visceral experience need look no further.

Why I Don't Care About the Election

We're a scant two weeks away from what has been touted as THE MOST IMPORTANT ELECTION EVER...until of course the one right after it. Frankly I could not be more sick of this circus and I can't wait until it's all over. If I never hear the phrase "Joe the Plumber" again, it'll be far too soon. Now, before you call me an apathetic prick or evil Republican, please allow me to eloquently explain why I do not care about the 2008 Presidential Election.

I feel like every aspect of my life has been hijacked by this election, and I'd really like my old status quo back. No form of media is safe. Television is pretty much unwatchable, unless you like attack ads and watching SNL, the Daily Show, and The Colbert Report desperately try to jam the same three jokes down your throat. The Internet is even worse. There was a time when you could go on Digg and easily find a video of a primate trying to consume its own feces. Now you're lucky if you can hack your way through the jungle of Huffington Post links about how stupid Sarah Palin is to find a decent Chimpanzee riding a Segway video. Congrats Digg, everyone knows Sarah Palin is an unqualified moron, but at what cost? You can't go 3 minutes on the web with looking at what some pompous blogger has to say on the election (erm...), an attack ad that was trigged by what you searched on Google, or a disappointingly bad photoshop of Sarah Palin's head on the body of a nude pornstar.

Anyone who once thought the media had a slight liberal bias must now see how clearly defined that bias is. Except of course for Fox News, which you can't help but admire for their creative re-imagining of history and current events. At least they don't hide behind the pretense of being a fair and bal.....well at least they've got the shiniest graphics. What else do you want people!? But back to every other media outlet I've come across. The pro-Obama fanaticism that's been created is staggering. Obama's been more overhyped than the 2008 Dallas Cowboys. He's like Jesus, except everyone already knows he's black, as opposed to finding out after you already spent all that money filling your church with paintings of Ken doll Jesus. I heard Obama's got X-ray vision and he can read DVDs with all different regional codes.

Yes, I understand the excitement and enthusiasm. George Bush kind of sucked the big one and now we're all feeling vulnerable and used. Along comes this new, younger, more worldly man. He's everything our old boyfriend wasn't: he's a democrat, he's black, he had to make up stories about partying instead of trying to hid them. I get it, he's the anti-Bush, and we need someone to make us forget about all of the cheating and lying that he did to us. Those late nights, waiting for a phone call that never came. So now we've met this guy who's debonair but a little mysterious, and we're about two flirty text messages away from inviting him up to our place to see our new piercing.

On the other hand, we have a man who spent 3 years of his life in a box being tortured by Viet-Cong, and all anyone can talk about is how he'll surely die within the next 4 years in the most safe, secure, and lavish house in America. The real shame about John McCain is that there was a time, before he sold his soul to the devil that is a presidential campaign, when he actually could have been the reforming maverick he always broadcasts himself to be. Then he got castrated by some frat boy from Yale in the 2000 elections and realized if he couldn't beat 'em he'd have to join them. He was a little shaky as a candidate, but everyone could concede he had the experience Obama lacked. And then of course, the moose hit the fan.

What can be said about Sarah Palin that hasn't already? Well for one, she was born a man. That's not true, but I'm trying to get linked on Digg so I kinda have to fudge this one a little. I haven't read too much about her because I don't have to. People on television tell me what I should think about her. In all seriousness, it's clear to me that being mayor of a town with a population of 9,000 and two years as governor of arguably one of the most unimportant states in the union doesn't really qualify you to be Vice President. This probably wouldn't have matter 8 years ago back when the Vice President literally did nothing, but in the post-Dick Cheney era the role of the VP has change a bit. There was a time when the VP had to be the tie-breaker for a vote in the Senate, but now it seems their tasks include misleading large percentages of the population and wiping out all reminding Jedi.

Somehow through this entire shit storm, Joe Biden, a man who's been referred to a "gaffe machine" because of his uncontrollable verbal diarrhea, has gone through all this pretty much unscathed. That's probably partially due to the fact that most Americans were busy reading on Wikipedia just who this Joe Biden character was, and then became entranced by their own reflection gleaming glorious off of his 8 1/2 by 11 printer paper sized ultra white teeth.


So why am I indifferent towards the direction our country will be headed. Well, first off I live in New Jersey, and therefore my vote is meaningless. New Jersey will forever be a democratic stronghold, and whether I vote for Obama or McCain the electorate votes that come from my state will go to Barrack Obama. For that reason, I cannot care on a person level whom I vote for. Beyond that? Well I could go on to say that our two party system is far too simplified, and the resulting differences between the two candidates are somewhat superficial. Neither candidate will pull out of Iraq soon, and when they eventually do those troops will probably just head over to the re-escalating conflict in Afghanistan. Neither candidate can "fix" the economy, as we have a long hard road out of this crisis no matter how you look at it. Universal healthcare will definitely result in one thing, and that is skyrocketing taxes. I'm not trying to say it's stupid to vote, or we're better off than we were 4 or 8 years ago. I'm just saying our lives won't be that much different on Nov 5th no matter what happens.

On Moving Out of Your Parents' House

If you're reading this then you surely know me in real life, and will therefore know I have recently escaped from the clutches of my parents' house and fled into the wild of young adulthood. My family's homestead, or as I like to call it, Freaky-Deaky-America-Church-Global-Warming-Is-Fake-Make-Sure-You-Lock-This-Sliding-Glass-Door-Before-You-Go-To-Bed-Lennie-Briscoe-Is-A-National-Treasure-Oh-And-By-The-Way-We're-Having-Carrabba's-For-Dinner-Tonight-What-Do-You-Want-Me-To-Get-You-I've-Had-The-Crab-Cakes-Before-They're-OK-Land, was harder to leave then I had originally anticipated. However, after a contentious, but rent free, 13 months living in the house I grew up in, I somehow manage to maneuver my way into a corporate job and make a living.

"Making a living" doesn't really mean anything, and while I make money and I am alive, I would hesitate to say that I am really "making a living". I'd say "eking out an existence" is a more accurate representation of what my life has become. Once you get your low-paying entry level corporate position, you make literally just enough money to pay rent and buy enough drinks to distract you from the realization that you make the roughly the same amount of money as someone who works full-time at a retail store in the mall. Until of course you run out of money a week and a half before your next paycheck and you sober up, and sit down at your computer and all of these realizations come instantly to the forefront of your mind.

I guess by this point in the post you've figured out the ugly truth. I am broke. Sure, I'm broke, you're broke- we're all broke! Well, when you say, "I'm broke," you don't really mean that. You mean that you have spent a lot of money in the past few days and your checking account is sagging. You've still got your savings, plus whatever money your parents slip into your coat pocket when you tell them you've got to go put gas in your car or whatever little scheme you've worked out to milk your parents for cash. However, when I say I'm broke, I mean I'm fucking broke. I mean that I'm about two more days of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches away from selling my 360. Well in all honesty I think I'm probably closer to clandestinely selling one of my roommates kidneys on the black market than selling my Xbox, but I digress.

The occasionally grim reality of life on your own, especially at the entry-level AA Trenton Thunder back-up catcher starting point where I'm at, is that you will run out of money. My life consists of the nauseating lows of poverty, broken up twice a month by the dizzying highs of a fresh paycheck. One paycheck; however, immediately disappears into the gaping maw of a small Asian man who had the foresight to buy a crappy brownstone back in the days when the streets of this town were, most likely, littered with the bloated corpses of dead children while crack addicts fought for control of city blocks against packs of wild dogs, or whatever else was going on here before that was so shockingly bad that the very fact normal civilization now exists here is reason enough to charge astoundingly high rent. I don't know if that makes any sense, but it's retardedly expensive to live here in Hoboken and I'm not exactly sure why.

Moving out of your parents house is hard for other reasons as well. You don't realize all of the little things that you will miss, like table tops and garbage cans; shower curtains and silverware. All these things you never even knew existed (what is a mattress cover, really?) suddenly become exceedingly important. And the worst part is, you have to go out and buy it. I already knew about all the things I wanted to buy, and I didn't even have enough money for all that. Now we're making up new completely new products, like the Swiffer WetJet, and I have to buy them too.

But, I do suppose its not all bad. When I get home from work, no one is giving me the third degree with intrusive comments like, "how was your day?" or "are you going to eat dinner with us" or "I picked up and paid for your dry cleaning for you after work, even though it was 25 minute drive in the opposite direction for me." Instead, you get the compassionate silence of an empty apartment, the quiet introspection that comes with killing an invading army of ants with Windex, and that bewildering peanut brittle scent that comes wafting out of my roommate's bedroom.

I suppose I can sum up the real horror of life on your own in this way: Let's say one night you somehow accidentally urinate in your bed. You're so tired and you've got work in the morning, so you just throw a towel on it and keep on sleeping. Then you wake up, take a shower, go to work, share this story with not a single soul, and go about your daily life. Later you go home, maybe half-forget you pissed the bed, maybe you're half too lazy to take your sheets off and take them to the laundromat. If you do take it to the laundromat that Central American lady will know your horrible secret. Your only choice is to fall asleep again on the urine soaked bunk and wake up the next morning to do it all over again. Living on your own, this cruel farce could go on indefinitely. However, at your parents' house, there's only so many times your mom could walk past your room before curiosity and motherly instinct would compel her to change the sheets. Maybe she's not doing for you, maybe she's doing it for herself, or the resale value of the house, but Goddammit it gets done!

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull Review

[This review is pretty much entirely spoiler free, so it is safe to read even if you haven't seen the film.]












Going into a movie like this with the right expectations is no simple feat. I went into the Star Wars prequels with extremely high expectations, and as a result I was supremely disappointed. The first Star Wars prequel not only left me feeling angered and bewildered, but it also made me wonder if the original Star Wars films were even as good as I had remembered. That was my ultimate fear going into Indy 4: that I would not only hate the movie, but it would compromise my love of the previous films as well. It was with these fears and lowered expectations that I regarded the film as it began last night at 12:01 am.

After watching some truly underwhelming trailers, the theater went dark and the glistening green Lucasfilm logo emerged before us. Some nerds began to clap and cheer. I fidgeted in my chair; an almost Pavlovian response to seeing that Lucasfilm logo that had betrayed me so many times before in recent years. The final thought that lingered in my head as the Paramount logo ran: please God, let there be no CGI. The logo faded and the film began, opening with a CGI heavy first shot.

I wish I were kidding, but it's true. You may be wondering, rightfully so, what on earth could even be created with CGI in an Indiana Jones film? This is not Star Wars or Jurassic Park, this is Indiana Jones. Trucks flip over and stuff, and that's pretty much it! It looked fucking awesome in 1981 with Raiders of the Lost Ark, so why did they feel the need to forcefully inject computer generated imagery into every nook and cranny of this film? Well, needless to say, Spielberg and Lucas have found a plethora of things in Indiana Jones to make with CGI, and you are either going to say, "Aw, that's cute," or "Goddammit, they killed everything that I hold dear in this world." But I digress...

The film begins a bit awkwardly as you finally get a glimpse of just how old Harrison Ford is very early on. And he looks old. He's so old that he has old man posture when he stands. With his pants riding high around his navel and his shoulders slouched forward, he looks like an old man you'd see at the grocery store holding a can of evaporated milk in one hand and condensed milk in the other, with a look of profound confusion upon his face. It's so apparent that when you see his younger, more virile stunt double flipping and jumping around, you are instantly taken out of the action. If you can get past all that, I must admit I somewhat enjoyed the first hour of the film.

The first half of the film does have some slick action sequences, and despite his age, Harrison Ford does still throw in a performance worthy of an Indiana Jones film. He is still Indy, albeit an older, grumpier version of the character. Scenes that stand out in my mind are the refrigerator scene and the jungle car chase, which are both pretty neat. Shia Labeof is consistently likable throughout the film, and a surprisingly still good-looking Karen Allen competently reprises her role as Marion Ravenwood. Kate Blanchett is only a mildly believable Soviet villain, but her character disappears for long stretches at a time so it's not really an issue.

After about the halfway point the film takes a turn for the worse, as its increasingly silly storyline takes the movie into a place that I don't think any fan saw coming. I see what they were going for, and anyone who's watched too much of the History channel could have thought up this plot, but I really don't think that this script should have compelled Spielberg and others to actually make this movie. On that note, I don't think any script really would have made this movie a great idea.

Spielberg and Lucas have continued their tradition of making some of the greatest modern heroes and epics, and then going back and negatively altering them. Did they kill Indiana Jones? No, it's an ok film that any real fan should probably see, as long as they aren't expecting to see a Raiders of the Lost Ark-caliber film. Seeing this film is a bit like going back to your elementary school to see your beloved fiery 6th grade history teacher who knew so much and encouraged you to see all you could in the world. Then you go back to visit him and he's completely gray and wrinkled, and starting to go a little crazy. And you think, "Gee, I kinda wish I never saw him like this."

Summer Movies: Tropic Thunder

It's been a while since I've really been impressed by a Ben Stiller film. After the gloriously hilarious Zoolander (2001), his record has been somewhat inconsistent. Dodgeball was, for me, just ok, and Starsky & Hutch blew pretty hard. Well the time has come to redeem A Night in the Museum, and it has come in the form of Tropic Thunder.

Tropic Thunder, which Stiller directed and helped write, features an all-star cast including Stiller, Jack Black, Robert Downey Jr, and others playing actors attempting to film an ambitious Vietnam War film. I was personally on board for this movie once I heard Downey Jr's character undergoes a controversial medical procedure to make him black, in order to get more deeply into character. The reverse Michael Jackson, if you will.

Of course, something goes wrong during filming, and the actors find themselves fighting real guerrillas in the jungle. To get a good idea of what we're in for, click here to watch the red band trailer through itunes. Hopefully it'll live up to its moderate Internet hype, and make us all forget about the fact that sequels to both Madagascar and A Night at the Museum are forthcoming.

The Inevitable GTA IV Post

Unless you've been living in a cave on Mars for the past few weeks, or in The United Arab Emirates, you've probably heard about Grand Theft Auto IV. After selling an absurd 3.6 million copies and raking in $310 million in a single day, GTA IV has crossed over from a subculture obsession into a mainstream phenomenon. So what is it that makes this game so insanely popular and, in my opinion, so additively entertaining?

First off, it has a painstakingly rendered version of the major New York metropolitan area, with instantly recognizable landmarks such as the Brooklyn Bridge, Empire State Building, and Statue of Liberty. In terms of graphics, everything looks good, from the sunlight shimmering off water to the bloodstains that adorn your car after mowing down a herd of pedestrians. Throw in some movie-caliber writing and voice acting, along with hours of perfectly crafted radio content, and you've already made a superior product.

However, all that is just the foundation on which the house of GTA IV is built. When you pick up the controller and start walking around the city, you realize something more is going on here. After walking out of your apartment, you see a crazy homeless man preaching to an empty street corner about "reptilian death rays" and the like. A woman walks by, picks up her ringing cell phone, and incredulously reacts to news that she bombed her audition. I see a heavily tinted Escalade drive by and attempt to jack it, when three gang bangers jump out and start beating me mercilessly. I would have been killed had the cops not arrived and arrested them. Everything that just occurred was random and could have happened ten different ways.

Another time, I emerged from my apartment and ran across the street blindly to jack a muscle car parked near the sidewalk opposite me. Before I could get close an ambulance came streaking into view, smashing my head into its grill and then the pavement, killing me instantly. It's hard to explain all the awesome ways in which I've been inadvertently killed, but I can almost promise you it's never happened exactly the same way twice.

Yet another time I instantly stole a motorcycle after exiting my apartment. After reaching top speed as quickly as possibly, I invariably smashed into the side of a vehicle, sending me flipping over the handle bars and cartwheeling some thirty feet into the air. My body hit the top of street lamp which I dangled from for a moment before smashing into the pavement with a sickly thud. I was miraculously alive, and as I stood up to collect myself I saw a minivan hurdling towards me just before I was annihilated.

For all the intense story mission and attempts to create scripted, movie-like events, the true glory of GTA exists in the random occurrences that are unpredictable and can sometimes never be recreated. Thanks to the advanced rag-doll physics engine, called Euphoria, every body in the game reacts to the external forces, i.e. speeding stolen vehicles, in both a naturalistic and cartoony fashion. Add that to all the cars, bikes, helicopters, weather cycles, and everything else in this game, and you've created something truly unique and groundbreaking.

I asked my mom to watch me play yesterday so she could see first hand the game that was making all the headlines. After I flipped my SUV by smashing into a sidewalk of pedestrians, she made a Marge Simpson-esque grumble, and asked, "Now, why did you do that?" Though she later admitted that the game was "not her cup of tea," she did seem impressed by the level of detail and sophistication that was clearly evident after only watching me play for 10 minutes. After playing for quite a few hours myself, (the actual number of hours will not be shared here, as to spare me from your judgmental comments) believe me when I say that this game will own your life. But you should probably try to avoid playing it when your parents are watching.

"Dr" Kent Hovind on Dinosaurs

This stuff makes my brain hurt. I'm not here to look down my nose at anyone who believes in whatever religion they choose. However, when an evangelical young-earth creationist looks down their nose at me, I must strike back. Apparently, even other creationists think guy is nuts.

In the above video, we get to see how "Dr" Kent Hovind works dinosaurs into creationist theory. It turns out Noah just took baby dinosaurs onto the boat. DUH!! It doesn't matter that dinosaurs became extinct nearly 65 million years ago, because that's a lie. The Earth itself is only some 6 thousand years old. Forget all that "carbon-dating, fossil record, vestigial organs, genome mapping" nonsense your fascist professors taught you.

Dinosaurs aren't the only targets for debunking in this video, as we learn that wolves, coyotes, and foxes all descended from a common dog, not the other way around. Right...

It all really goes downhill when he points to cultural legends as the basis of proof for all sorts of creationist events. Come to think of it, this video doesn't start off at a particularly high point so I guess it can't ever really go downhill. The video is good for a laugh, then a cry, then maybe a decision to apply for citizenship elsewhere.

Check out the complete series here:
Part2
Part3
Part4
Part5
Part6