If This Is How Water Is in Games These Days, I'm Jumping In

Because it's summer and the heat is practically unbearable and the general tendency of people is to gravitate towards the water where we naturally came from, I chance upon this. The gorgeously rendered Vulcano island in Crysis.  Of course, game graphics is astounding us by leaps and bounds every year.  But this alone, just because it involves a lush tropical getaway, already has me awed big time.




Related: A listing of jaw-dropping game graphics from Wired. Although, as one commenter argues, it should be "game visuals" instead of graphics.

Lots and Lots of Zombies: Into the Dead Finally Arrives in Android

Confession: I’m not a big fan of zombies.  But apparently they’re a hit with everyone else, considering the various zombie-themed apps hitting the Google Play store every two weeks or so.  I tried installing one or two games where you shoot zombies from a stationary position or else guide them on a route towards fresh brains, and then quickly got bored.  

Then Into the Dead comes along.  

Just when I thought the endless runner genre can no longer be improved on—except for Vector, another excellently rendered game—Into the Dead (by game developer Pik Pok) freshens it up with a sinister twist.  It’s a first person point-of-view runner game, where you meet head-on an infinite wave of zombies, appearing from out of the mist, ready to snatch you if you get too close.  And from the looks of it, you have no choice but to wade through them.  

Graphics are rendered gritty and realistic, starkly black and white with perfunctory splotches of red for blood.  Into the Dead forces you to traverse a grassy field, a patch of forest, and a terrifying section of cornfield.  Needless to say, the result is creepy agoraphobia unlike nothing you’ve ever felt in a game before.  (Seriously, I still wince every time I graze too close and get eaten).

Fret not though—you’re armed with an armory of weapons which you earn by accomplishing missions.  There’s a pistol, revolver, a rifle, a (practically useless) grenade, and even a chainsaw, so the killing spree never gets boring.  

In this way, the game has that addictive replay value, even if no clear goal is present Who do you meet at the other end?  Where is the end?  Because, man, that horizon that never gets close, the sun never rises nor sets, there’s the uncertainty of a destination, and the hopelessness of ever finding someone else alive.

Yes, Into the Dead is scary as hell.  And as a bonus looks good on my screen too.

Nice: Graphics, realistic POV, excellent replay value, and Free!

Not So: Sound effects can be improved.  Off-screen zombie grunts and growls don’t increase in loudness when the zombie actually gets near you.  

Also: How about food and water, and a short break after which you have to run right away or else the zombie attacks you?   All that running is tiring business, you know.

The Smiler Will Now Marmalise You Whether You Like It Or Not

After a frenzy of game downloads from the Play Store, I'm particularly fond of one app: The Smiler.  Here, you play the role of a ride operator, controlling a roller coaster car as it twists left and right, and up and down the tracks.  If you're feeling benevolent, you can tilt the ride ever so dangerously, especially at steep turns--(the cars don't get derailed or fly off, don't worry--although they breeze right through the tunnel dock at the end of the ride even if the car is overly tilted.  Passengers are unharmed, no severed heads thank God, but it makes me cringe when I see their happy unaffected faces.

Apparently, the Smiler is a promotinal game developed for the Alton Towers Resort, Britain's beloved theme park, which will be opening the actual roller coaster ride in May 2013.  It's not your usual theme park rider: whereas traditional roller coasters subject your body through intense speeds, the Smiler apparently includes one other aspect into the equation: the mind.

Which explains the sinister feel to the game, as if the Joker had devised it himself.  The Cheshire cat smile is a signature motif in the game, flashing constantly.  Plenty of split-second flashing images in fact occur throughout the game, and there's actually a disclaimer in the beginning that warns people who have photosensitive epilepsy.   

The folks at Alton Towers Resort have a name for this: The Marmaliser, a wicked suite of pyschological effects (subliminal messages, flashing images, etc) meant to disorient the rider, as if being hurtled at incredible speeds and subjected to a lot of G-force isn't disorienting enough.  

I had to look up marmalise in the Urban Dictionary. To marmalise is to reduce someone into "a pool of viscous orange bio-soup", presumably from various external and internal forces.  The last time I rode a roller coaster, I clearly remember not smiling at the end when I finally got off.  Now I know I got marmalised.  Smiler - Marmaliser.  Nice.

Anyway, since I won't be anywhere near the UK anytime soon, I guess the Smiler at Google Play is the best I've got.  As someone who is scared of loathes roller coasters, it's certainly safe, vicarious fun.   And the game's graphics are lovely on the screen, mainly based around a black, white, yellow, green palette, which has been wisely trimmed down to bring focus to the ride.  For a promotional game,The Smiler is pretty neat and well-put-together, except maybe for that tilt to the side at the very end of the ride glitch.  

Fell in Love with a Girl | by The White Stripes

Love the song, love the painstaking effort of Lego animation, and love it even more in Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper's dance sequence in Silver Linings Playbook.

Iron Man 3 | Trailer Peek

It's inevitable that the third installment of Iron Man will revolve around the idea of Tony Stark going out on a limb to save Pepper Potts--that's always been the tragedy of superheroes,  the risk they put inadvertently their loved ones in (because villains think that's their Achille's heel.)

While we're waiting for Robert Downey Jr to armor up again for the third time, here's a trailer for Iron Man 3.  Other versions are already out--it seems every week a new official Iron Man 3 trailer comes out (fine, bring them on), all of them danger-laden and explosive, enough to whet our appetites.  

If you want, you can piece the various trailers together--the overlapping scenes can serve as clues--and come out with a pretty good idea of the story, but what good would that be?  

Verdict: We can't wait for May 3.

Knuckleheads by Joan Holub | Four Fairly Tales Butchered for Fun

Because fairy tales are meant to be told over and over again, somewhere along the way something inevitably gets lost in the translation, something morphs into another, and before you know it, those fairy tales know you better than you know them. 

At least that's the premise of Knuckleheads by Joan Holub.  Four classic fairy tales—Hansel and Gretel, Cinderella, Snow White, and Thumbelina—are gleefully deconstructed.  Just how "deconstructed"?  For starters, they're turned into Handsel and Gretel, Handerella, Nose White, and Thumbelina, respectively.  One other thing: all the characters are made up of entire, single body parts—hands, feet, even noses.  (This is why Thumbelina's title is unchanged since it's  already conveniently hand-related, although her tale later on becomes very much severed abridged in the book.)

What makes Knuckleheads so much fun (if not a little exhausting) to read is the copious amount of puns and wordplay used in the story.  Every known pun in the English language that relates to hands (or feet or noses) is peppered throughout the book.  

So you have "things were getting out of hand",and "they bumped into a house made of tasty finger food" (Handsel & Gretel), "she met a one-hand band" (Nose White), and "an invitation arrived from the handsome Finger Prints" (Handerella).  Those are just some.  Actually, there's plenty more that will have you thinking, wow, you can do lots of stuff with language.

Michael Slack's quirky illustrations are beautiful on each page, imbuing each scene with fun and wit, and sometimes adding irony too.  In Handerella's tale, when she and the handsome Finger Prints "danced hand in hand", and they "spoke the same language" and all the signs were there—true enough, on either side of them are unknown extras spelling L-O-V-E with their giant hand of a head in sign language alphabet.


This well-thought of piece is wacky, weird, and yet intensely gratifying.  Deep down, we always knew something wasn't all right with those fairy tales we grew up on.  Consider Knuckleheads the payback time of sorts.


Oh, and here's Thumbelina's ultra-short tale.  Enjoy!

Sponsored Superheroes

While we're waiting for the next installments of our favorite superhero movies (Maybe, just maybe there'll be another Batman movie, and maybe Downey will still don his Iron Man armor for a third time)--this is what some people have been up to: imagining superhero sponsorship.

It's a lovely collaboration of artists working under a basic premise: The extent of consumerism in these times.  And the power of the logo, the focus on brand recognition and loyalty.  

But more than just poking fun at the state of things, it's also nice to admit that hey maybe even super wealthy Bruce Wayne and all the other superheroes could use the extra dough.  Who doesn't?

Suddenly Batman endorses Nike.

The Iron Man, looking a bit off with McDonald's Golden Arches logo.

The Flash chugs nothing less than Red Bull.  Figures.

Galactus gets all multicolored for you.  While ever the sleek and stylish Silver Surfer is a proud Apple fanboy.  Yeah. 

Images courtesy of:
http://www.behance.net/gallery/Sponsored-Heroes/7322335

Watch Paperman | A Short Animation from Disney about Paper Airplanes as a Vehicle of Love

There, I just summarized the film. 
But of course, summaries won't do.  Go watch it already!

http://www.filmofilia.com/paperman-full-animated-short-film-135358/

Paperman, directed by John Kahrs, won the Animated Short category at the recent Oscars.