by Bret

Our Daily Beard

I can barely manage to summon up enough shit to give about E3.

Just not feeling it this year!

However, I’ve been keeping up a cursory following of what’s going on.

This is the gist as I understand it:

The PS4 will be region free and DRM free for many things, so you can play used games on it and imported games too. This is pretty massive and undermines the Xbox One nicely. It means that ebay will be the new second hand game shop of choice, too. With everything going ‘downloadey’ these days and the internet being notoriously global in nature, this makes good sense to me. There’s hardly any point in differentiating between countries; they will get their hands on games in other ways. You can even play your game on a mate’s PS4, unlike Xbox One which apparently only lets you share a game once.

Xbox One also screws you in that you need to connect to the internet at least once in 24 hours, just to play your games offline. Big brother’d. All for the low-low price of $499 (£429). The PS4 is $399, lulz. Both are still too pricey for my tastes… but there’s always the re-released Xbox 360!

Microsoft isn’t all bad, you know. Xbox LIVE Gold subscribers will now get two 360 games for free each month! This starts in July and the titles mentioned so far are Assassin’s Creed 2 and Halo 3. Leaving aside the fact that these games cost about £7 new and everyone already has them, it’s a nice touch that makes Gold a bit more worth the money. I’m just glad that 360 isn’t being forgotten yet. Microsoft Points are going out, allowing you to just buy stuff with money! Finally! It’s nice to know exactly how overpriced things are without having to do the dreaded maffz.

Oh, games. We have a lot more to go on now, which is great. Largely it’s sequels, which is fair enough, such as Dead Rising 3 where the zombies will be more realistic than ever, yada yada. I gather than the majority of Xbox gaming buzz is around Titanfall, a shooty jetpack thing, and Ryse: Son of Rome, which looks awfully quicktimey but also quite fun. I like historical epics, so I can stomach a bit of hammering Y to gladius the shit out of a barbarian. Oh, Metal Gear Solid V will be on both platforms. This is nice news, as I’m tired of the old exclusivity garbage. Snake rides a horse, I think, which is how stealth works now. Okay, so maybe MGS has had it’s day.

Elder Scrolls Online also goes both ways, just like that goth chick in collage claimed to in order to appear interesting.

The PS4 has scored a lot of points in the last day. It’s looking far more user-friendly and at this juncture, I’d be inclined to go that way, if I were to buy a next-gen at all.

Until then, it’s PC all the way, yo.

 
[sociable]

Our Daily Beard

Oooh.

Well, E3 looms, doesn’t it?!

Looking forward to hearing what we can expect in the rest of the year. The real centerpeices of the show will be the next gen consoles, xbox one and ps4. Unfortunately, both have so far been met with trepidation; at this stage it’s more a case of hoping to hear that things aren’t so bad, rather than waiting with anticipation of a spectacular product.

Still, I’m going to keeping up with it all as much as possible.

For now, take a look at this funky competition to get tickets to the Relentless Kerrang! Awards afterparty. Just retweet to enter. You might get to rub noses with the best musicians ever to wear eyeliner.

Good luck!

 
[sociable]

Our Daily Beard

Ayup

I can’t believe it’s still sunny!

Anyway, we’ve been absorbed in the new Hannibal TV series.

I think there’s something there for those familiar and not familiar with movies and/or books. It’s rare that I get into a psychological thriller, either because the psychology is a bit wet or the thrills are cheap.

Hannibal skirts that lines at times, not least of all when it rolls out the grisly tableaus (you can’t spit around this state without hitting a dead person displayed in a gruesome but artistic and conveniently TV-worthy fashion).

Nevertheless, the show is strong. Mads Mikkelsen steals the show, of course. At first he may seem wooden, but in fact it’s just superbly understated acting; even when he’s perfectly still, there’s a nuance in everything he doesn’t do. This is the perfect way to approach a character that’s so well known- we expect the glint of evil all the time and so we see it in the most mundane of his actions. For example, Hannibal repeatedly feeds people. “Here, have a delicious fillet of pork prepared in a fancy gourmet way.” The guest pops the red juicy meat in their mouth. We know that Hannibal is a cannibal. Nothing else has to be said; we watch, we know. We know that he knows.

Though the violence gets a bit much at times (I’m not squeamish, it’s just… come on… how high is the crime rate around here?!) it’s a well written and stylish show. The main plot is a cat-and-mouse between Hannibal and the protagonist Will. Will is cheese central- a gifted investigator who gets into the minds of killers, but at what cost to his sanity? Yada, yada. It actually doesn’t matter- it’s based on a classic novel, so it’s not really a cliché if they did it first. What matters is that they move onto new grounds with these old tropes. The cat-and-mouse is all done without Will knowing what Hannibal is- in fact, they become friends. The descent into madness is slow and startling, portrayed with some nice visual effects and a patient pace that you won’t get in a movie.

Of course, anyone would go mad if they found decapitated/mutilated/defenestrated naked people every day.

Give it a try.

 
[sociable]