Remember the 70 minute Phantom Menace review on Youtube that took the world by storm? Well it’s back! Now in glorious 3D! Just like it was always meant to be seen! As a genius movie maker once said “Moving from 2D to 3D is like the difference between watching a film in black and white and watching a film in color. It works in black and white but it works better in color.” Oh wait, that was George Lucas who said that. I take it back.
Go over to the Red Letter Media website and check out the review in 3D and some extra interview footage.
Also released today is the commentary track for the movie. So sync it up with your Blu-ray edition or put it in your media player when you go watch it at the cinema. Who wouldn’t want to listen to Plinkett droning on for an hour? It sure beats listening to the movie. I started listening to it on it’s own and it’s pretty damn funny if you’re a fan of the reviews.
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First, let me say it. Duke Nukem Forever is here! The shock of the reality is long gone, but it still feels good to say it.
I spent a great deal of time with the game last night. I do not understand how it is garnering such negative reviews. It might be a matter of opinion but I prefer having fun when I’m playing games. Maybe the graphics are outdated. It is still more fun to walk around Duke’s world than the uninspired, blurry gray-scape of destroyed New York that Crysis 2 offers. And while the writing isn’t as clever as Portal 2, Duke did keep me up until 3am on a work day unlike GlaDOS’s shenanigans. It won’t win game-of-the-year simply because the year isn’t 2005. It’s dated, we get it. That doesn’t make it bad.
Now I realize I sound like a fan boy. I can assure you I am not as fanatical as I sound.
Duke Nukem 3D was my first introduction into the series. At a ripe young age of 11 it was my favourite FPS. It was the game I came back to day after day to play “online” when playing online was “MOM DON’T PICK UP THE PHONE BECAUSE MY FRIENDS MODEM IS CALLING AND MY MODEM NEEDS TO PICK UP THE CALL” and epic shootouts dropped because someone decided to make a outgoing call. Maybe I am bred from a different generation of gaming. When we didn’t rank games based on graphics and there wasn’t a push for ultra realistic gaming experiences. So I am not a fan boy. Having played the original and games similar to it in the mid 90′s, I just understand where Duke is coming from. It was the go to game for me and my friends for over a year.
Duke Nukem Forever has been a lot of fun so far. That is all I can ask for from a game. It’s challenging at times and stupid at other times. There are platforming parts that can be tricky and the shooting set pieces are run and gun gory goodness. Best of all, it plays to all the childish and ridiculous sensibilities that I would expect from Duke. It’s a self depreciating and indulgent throw back to the old school shooter. What’s not to like about ending a 10 minute boss battle by ripping the alien apart with your bare hands and then giving it the middle finger.
Duke Nukem Forever is a sequel that is about 10 years too late. In a sea of uninspired cover based war shooters, Duke is a refreshing breath of ridiculous air. Let’s try to stop judging the game by today’s standards, teleport to the late 90′s and enjoy it for what it is. A fun sequel to a great original.
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Should I preface this post that Dogfish Head’s 90 Minute Imperial IPA is my favourite beer ever? Does it bias the rest of the “review”?
Dogfish Head’s 90 Minute IPA is easily one of my favourite beers ever. And unfortunately I have to wait for trips to the good ol’ US of A to drink it.
It pours with a beautiful hazy orange with a nice little consistent head, about an inch thick. It has a fruity citrus, almost orange, aroma. When it hits the tongue, the first thing you will notice is how rich this beer is. The texture is smooth and thick. With a sweet malty citrus and herb middle. The end is not too bitter either. It goes down smoothly with a beautifully subdued hoppy aftertaste. It might have to do with the way this craft beer is brewed. The 90 Minute IPA is continually-hopped to provide a “pungent, but not crushing hop flavour”. Which means the wort is boiled for 90 minutes while the hops are continuously added over that time.
Surprisingly, for a 9% alcohol by volume beer, the alcohol is masked quite well. I’ve had a few beers in that range that just tasted like rubbing alcohol. This is not one of them. The 90 Minute is a sneaky beer that goes down easily but packs a punch. Although I would never waste a bottle by downing it. This beer needs to be poured in a snifter and enjoyed slowly alone or with a nice slab of meat.
If I were to rate the beer on a scale of dogfish heads, I would give it a 5 out of 5. It tastes great from start to finish. Compared to the 60 Minute IPA (which I find much more bitter) this is the Dogfish Head beer to drink.
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Earlier last week I wrote about getting a Motorola XOOM, the shortcomings of the Apple iPad and the slight hesitation I felt when they announced the lighter, slimmer Samsung Galaxy 10.1. On Friday, considering the rapture was upon us, I figured I would enjoy my last pleasurable weekend on earth with a new toy. So I sauntered over to Futureshop after work on Friday and after spending a few more minutes fawning over the leashed device in the store, I purchased it. (I also spent a little time with the Playbook, the iPad and Acer Iconia.)
I haven’t put the device down yet. It really is a pleasure to use. In fact I’m typing this post up on it as we speak. I also took the above photo and edited it with the multi tasking beast. Surprisginly typing on a tablet this size feels really nice. There is no feedback but that hardly matters in landscape. I am able to type rather quickly with very few mistakes and the odd typo gets picked up by the spell checker. That’s not to say that this will completely replace my computer. It isn’t that powerful. It’s just nice to not be shackled to my desk anymore when all I want to do is read a few articles in my reader, view a youtube video or browse the net. (Or update my blog from the couch.)
There are a few things that I really like so far. Reading my RSS feeds with Google reader looks great, as well as all of my saved articles in Instapaper with Instafetch. All of the apps that I have come to love on my phone all work seamlessy. It is especially nice to use some of the apps that have become every day staples on a bigger screen instead of hunching over my phone. I’ve been planning to write about some of the useful apps I use in the future. Unlike what iFanboys would lead you to believe, the Android market really does have what you need and then some.
The one thing that I am disappointed with is video playback. Everywhere I looked, in reviews and Motorola itself have touted that this dual core Tegra can handle 720p HD. It is somewhat of a fallacious claim. Most containers cannot be played and if you find a player in the market that can open different formats it will stutter and be completely unwatchable. You can get these videos to work after you run it through handbreak (or your favorite converter). Even some youtube videos struggle in high quality mode. I really hope that this is an issue with Honeycomb 3.0 and will be fixed when 3.1 drops or that it is simply because no real codecs have been optimized for Tegra. I just hope it gets fixed because this was a selling point for me and I hate having to jump through hoops. That being said, I do not think there is any tablet out there that handles video formats gracefully. However, I have found a sweet spot in handbreak and converted a few videos over. Watching TV on the Xoom is nice and I look forward to taking it on the train this summer.
This isn’t really a review or anything, but I would recommend anyone looking for a tablet to pick this up. It has considerably changed the way I spend my leisure time on a computer.
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