mediacentric

The second episode of Tales of Monkey came out yesterday, called The Siege of Spinner Cay. This episode I felt was every bit as good as the first episode. I'm really enjoying how this series is shaping up so far. This time I didn't find the controls nearly as cumbersome as before. I think I'm starting to get used to them. It was a really funny episode too, maybe perhaps more than the first. I like the new character introduced in this episode as well, whom I'm not going to mention. There are still some minor issues and bugs, but to a lesser extent this time around. I have two final words: Cliff Hanger! And it's a darn good one too. Now here's my gameplay video for this episode



Now I knew about this movie called Avatar coming out directed by James Cameron for a little while now. The trailer was just released, and man am I blown away by it. I'm happy enough to hear that James Cameron is coming back after all this time to direct a feature length film (he's easily one of my favorite directors), but watching this trailer automatically moves this film to the top of my hype-o-meter. I'm really excited and can't wait to see it. Here's the trailer

I finally went to the bookstore yesterday and here was my haul



I can't wait to read Best Served Cold by Joe Abercrombie. I'm probably going to read it next. As much as I would rather tackle my "to read" pile these new books just keep coming up and I have to put them at the top. :P Damn you Abercrombie for writing such awesome books.

The Lord of the Sands of Time by Issui Ogawa is the beginning of what I hope will be more published Japanese science fiction. I've never read Japanese science fiction before.

Crossover by Joel Shepherd is a book I've had my eye on for a little while now. Also it seems like he pumps them out pretty quickly. The other two books in this series are out.

As for The Sword-Edged Blonde by Alex Bledsoe, based on the title and cover alone I don't think I would have ever picked it up, but I've heard nothing but good reviews on it, so I'm looking forward to it.

I went and saw District 9 yesterday. I really couldn't wait to see this movie after hearing Peter Jackson was involved. Here are my brief thoughts on it from Flixster

"This movie wasn't quite what I was expecting, and by that I mean it was more "Hollywood" than I expected. Regardless, it was a very good film. It was intense and action packed."



I don't want to say anymore about it, except go see it!

It has been a bad year for celebrities. A couple of days ago, director John Hughes died. He directed some of my favorite 80s movies. At 59, he was also quite young. Here's a little tribute, some clips from two of his movies that I just love. Ferris Bueller's Day Off and The Breakfast Club These are my favorite scenes from those movies






RIP John Hughes.

I finished playing Wallace and Gromit's Grand Adventures: The Bogey Man yesterday. It marks the end of this series. I have to say I was kind of disappointed with this episode. I didn't really care for the story much. Also it seemed like this episode was rushed in production because technically it didn't look as good as the other episodes. You could see cracks in the characters' faces. Overall I liked this series, but I'm kind of up in the air about whether I want the DVD. I thought it was the weakest of TellTale's episodic games, but still enjoyable enough. It's not really focused on humor like their other games. Well this was the order I liked the episodes in

Fright of the Bumblebees
Muzzled
The Last Resort
The Bogey Man

Now here's a gameplay video for The Bogey Man. There isn't much to this video because I was in a rush



Now, in the meantime I'm eagerly awaiting the second episode of Tales of Monkey Island, which comes out August 20th.

So, I finished The Secret of Monkey Island: SE the other day. It wasn't quite what I was hoping for. For one thing, I was having trouble getting it to run properly. I couldn't hear half of the voices for some reason. So, I can't say I'll ever want to use Steam to play games again because of all the trouble it caused me. I did finally get it to run and overall it was a very ho-hum experience.

Things I liked

Backgrounds looked hand painted
The voice acting (especially from Dominic Armato)
Nothing changed from the original aside from graphics

Things I didn't like

The interface the interface the interface. Seriously it really sucked. What is with using two different keys to call up the inventory and action windows? So, this is how it worked. You push "I" to call up the inventory, but in order to use objects in the inventory you have to push "Ctrl" to call up the actions, click on one, such as "Use" and click it on one of the inventory items. It's way more complicated than it should be and I have no idea how LucasArts thought it was a good idea. Haven't they heard the term "Keep It Simple Stupid?"

So, as you can tell I was pretty unhappy with the interface. Also getting Guybrush to move was kind of pain too. Sometimes he just doesn't go where I click. I think if those issues were fixed I would have loved the game more. I still liked it, but that kind of ruined things for me.

Also occasionally there were pauses between conversations, but I think that can be excused because the dialog in the game is kept the same. The original game was not meant to be voiced so that probably explains why sometimes the conversation sounds stilted.

I know it really sounds like there were a lot of things I didn't like about the game. I still thought it was worth playing. It just didn't really meet my expectations.

I've been playing the Special Edition of The Secret of Monkey Island. I'll say more what I think about it once I'm done, but I just want to say I'm never ever going to use Steam for games ever again. Here's a gameplay video of what may be my favorite part of the game, aside from insult swordfighting that is



I also just finished reading The Last Unicorn last night. Here's my brief Goodreads review

"A lone unicorn decides to leave her enchanted forest to find out what happened to the rest of her kind. It's a simple story, but a really well told one. I fell in love with the poetic prose, which just lets you drift off to another place. I can see why it's been compared to Lewis Caroll's and J.R.R. Tolkien's work because it's easily in the same league. A classic of fantasy literature."

Yeah, so I really loved it. Now I'm looking forward to watching the movie, since I've never seen it before.

I went and saw Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince yesterday. Here are my thoughts on it from Flixster.

"This movie was really slow compared to all the others, but I'm not sure I can fault it for that because not a whole lot happens in the book either. It's basically all just a setup for the last installment. Also I felt the romance could have been toned down quite a bit even though I know it's necessary because of what it leads up to. Overall I thought it was still quite good, but certainly the weakest of the films. I don't agree with the critics saying it's the best Harry Potter movie yet."



I wish they had given more screen time to my favorite side characters as well, such as Neville. The actor who played the new Professor Slughorn did a good job though.

I saw Public Enemies yesterday. Here was my brief thoughts from Flixster on it

"A bit slow and hard to follow sometimes, but very good. Dillinger sure got cocky toying with the law like he did. An excellent performance from Depp."



Yeah, if I were a gangster I would definitely not make some of the decisions John Dillinger made in this movie. :P

I also knew that this film was shot in HD so I was looking out for it. I have to say that I didn't really like it. Instead of immersing me in the movie it just took me right out of it. Movies are supposed to look like well...movies! I don't like the home video look. I certainly hope that movies don't all start reverting to HD because that would suck. The way they are filmed now is just fine and I love it because I don't know, it just looks more professional. One exception was the shootout scene at the hotel. That looked pretty awesome.

So, I finished the first episode of Tales of Monkey Island last night and I have to say I was very pleased with it. It could easily be the best Telltale game I've played so far.

( Launch of the Screaming Narwhal Review )

Now here is my gameplay video of Launch of the Screaming Narwhal