Game #188 - Anomaly: Warzone Earth.
Posted on May 11, 2012 at 6:09 pm.
I was recently reminded of this game's existence when I saw that it was a daily deal on Steam, and then I remembered that I once played the demo and liked it. So I downloaded the full game and finished it in just about over 8 hours or so. Not a bad little game! If you like reverse tower defense, check it out.
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Book - The New Watch.
Posted on May 11, 2012 at 1:52 am.
I read the New Watch by Sergei Lukyanenko.
It's too bad when a person who is good at writing is also a thoroughly unpleasant human being. Then again, this is often true for anyone who creates good art. I hear that some people can learn to separate the art and the artist, and enjoy the former while knowing full well some unsettling things about the later. Hopefully I will learn to do that as well some day.
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Game #187 - Bonsai Blast.
Posted on April 16, 2012 at 1:15 am.
I had this game on my phone for over a year or something. It's for the times when I am bored out of my wits. Having been on two 6-hour airplane rides recently, I finally managed to beat it. The game is free, challenging enough, and helped me pass the time, which is as much as one could ostensibly ask of it.
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Game #186 - Osmos.
Posted on April 16, 2012 at 1:12 am.
I was on vacation and bored. So I bought a casual game to play on my ASUS Transformer Android tablet. Osmos is pretty neat, I feel like I got my $2-something worth of entertainment out of it.
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Movie - The Muppets.
Posted on April 16, 2012 at 1:02 am.
I was on vacation and there was an open air movie night, ok?
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Movie - Prince of Persia.
Posted on April 16, 2012 at 1:01 am.
It is an unshakable law of the universe, that movies based on videogames must suck. This one sort of sucks, but it knows that it sucks so it just tries to make the best of it. And that, it does well. It's also pretty clear what you are getting into, so anyone having real expectations is a fool. For that reason I was able to reasonably enjoy it. That means I wasn't rolling my eyes and spitting every second, which, when it comes to movies in general is not a bad result.
Now the bad part. I rented it from Google, which means I had to watch it on YouTube. That in itself is fine, since YouTube obviously supports high-rez streaming, so I was getting ready to watch it in 1080p. Well, I was shocked to discover that the highest resolution available was 480p. That's bullshit, Google. That's just utter, unreasonable bullshit. Fuck you too.
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Movie - Catch-22.
Posted on March 27, 2012 at 11:51 pm.
Catch-22 is likely the best (certainly one of the best) work of fiction of the 20th century. This film doesn't do it justice, but I don't think it is even possible to introduce (much less elaborate on) all of its spectacular personages. Also, since the majority of humor is in the description, as opposed to the dialogue, that gets lost too.
The movie makes a valiant effort, but falls short for reasons beyond its control. Might be worth watching if you know the book by heart, if only to witness the effort, otherwise probably not worthwhile.
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Movie - Bodyguards and Assassins.
Posted on March 27, 2012 at 11:45 pm.
It turns out there really isn't anything worthwhile on this stupid Netflix thing. Good thing I didn't pay them any money.
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Movie - Red Cliff
Posted on March 21, 2012 at 1:14 am.
More Netflix. Today I watched Red Cliff - a John Woo film about people fighting in ancient China. This movie is quite something special, because it appeals to my fascination with Chinese state-sponsored propaganda films, while also being the kind of over the top visual effects explosion that would make Michael Bay proud. (That's very bad, in case anyone is wondering.) The whole thing is absolutely gorgeous, reasonably well acted... and terrible otherwise.
The underlying message is the same as in all other such films. China is awesome, its people are awesome, its nature is awesome, and its government is awesome too and should not be challenged. Sure, a jerk appears every so often, but all the bad stuff he does is really his own thing, since he tricks or bullies the good ruler into abiding him. And even though he causes a huge blood-bath, in his heart he's still more or less honorable, so he should be let go to contemplate the error of his ways. Even though a million people just got brutally slaughtered due to his antics. Not even that big of a number really, at least so far as China is concerned, and certainly no excuse to do anything bad to an official who just happened to err.
Also, the size of the guy's army and navy made me laugh. Unless they had Jesus with them, who could produce fish and bread in unlimited numbers, they would all starve in three days. The horde was so absolutely enormous, that the orcs from Lord of the Rings had nothing on them. And of course their fighting technique boiled down to the following formula: about 10 generals were doing most of the fighting, while about 1,000,000 soldiers were doing most of the dying. Them generals sure were tough!
Red Cliff was not a waste of time by any means. If you know what to look for, it can provide two solid hours of mirth. Old Bugs Bunny cartoons do it better, of course, but this one makes quite a valiant effort as well.
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Movie - 13 Assassins.
Posted on March 21, 2012 at 12:50 am.
The second movie in my Netflix trial was 13 Assassins, a story of 12 samurai and some dude, who decided to assassinate an evil and cruel official. Graphically the film is very pretty, but at its core, it's one of those non-realistic action flicks. The official had something like 200 men with him, and of course the good guys killed them all and 2 of the 13 even managed to walk out alive. It was neat to watch though, as Japanese movies tend to be.
One thing that disappointed me, was that the official, who was a sadistic psychopath, became quite distraught after taking a wound, started crying, rolling around in the mud, and repeating how scared he was. Not that this couldn't happen, but it kind of diminished the assassins' achievement. Plus, all the other people who died or were wounded in the film (some hundreds) behaved rather stoically. Well, at least the bad guy found his balls at the last moment, and managed to thank his killer for the most interesting day of his life, just before his head was lopped off.
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