Alex - Is a Factory of Blog, Sweat and Tears.

Enter The Dragon

2008-08-24T09:24:00.000-07:00

As you can see from the title I couldn't quite think of a witty and humorous title for this blog post, but oh well cest la vie and all that. And yes this is due to be my second essay thingy in one week. And no I haven't gone mad. What I have done is realise how much longer we have of our 'summer holiday' left. A week essentially, well with a few extra days. So since stumbling across this rather depressing reality I though I still have alot of work to do so here I am, bored as hell on a sunday so Im going to do another post.

This one is on Enter The Dragon. It was directed by Robert Clouse and released in 1973. And straight away this film is special as it is the first co-made Japanese and American martial arts film. Being the first martial arts film to be made by an Hollywood studio is pretty damned big news. Now although this film is deemed American/Asain to most people it is considered to be predominantly Asain due to the location as the majority of it is set in Hong Kong, the actors as it mainly stars Asians, and the films star Bruce Lee even revised of the script and even directed parts of it. It was made with Golden Harvest, a Chinese film production studio and Lee's own film production company Concord.

So although this film does have a bit of America in it, it is Asian at heart, this is mainly due to Bruce Lee wishing to portray this film not as another mindless action film but as a wway of expressing his beautiful Chinese culture.

The plot of this film revolves around Bruce Lee's originally named character, Lee as a martial artist/monk type guy who is asked by some suits (the FBI or the government, who knows) to infiltrate a karate tournament on an island hosted by Han, as Han is thought to be a heroine/opium dealer. Needless to say Lee agrees and becomes enthralled in a masquerade of murder and martial arts until the film flash kicks its way to one of the most iconic climaxes in cinema, the mirror maze fight between Lee and the claw handed, Han.

You don't mess with the Lee

As the picture above shows the star of this film is the late and very great Bruce Lee. He died 6 dyas before the release of the film mysteriously making this his last film and most well known, influential, iconic and money making. Bruce had previously starred in films before this, most notable were his martian arts films with Golden Harvest Studios such as the film that catapulted him to fame Big Boss. Now this article is not on Bruce Lee, but it could quite easly be given that this film helped him to achieve fame in the US and in Europe. But this film did not just make Bruce a legend. The film it self was a box office legend taking in an estimated 90 million dollars world wide with only 850, 000 dollars for a budget, making this one of the most profitable films ever made.

As well as making Bruce a hit all over the world even after his untimely death, Enter the Dragon also as my hypotheses states, changed world cinema forever. Not only did it introduce the world to the brilliance that was Bruce Lee but it also introduced the world to the martial arts sub-genre. Before Enter, martial arts films were a massive niche market of films only really found in Asia at the time. Enter changed all that. The box office taking show don't you think. But it was not just in cinema that martial arts was making an impact, it made an impact on the whole world with martial arts themed shows such as 'Kung Fu' and songs such as Kunf Fu Fighting. Enter had changed media at the time. People every where were taking up martial arts inspired by the film. That along with the fact it sparked a sub-genre in itself is reason enough as to why this film is so influential and had such an impact on world cinema. But it also paved the way for modern films such as the money spinning Rush Hour trilogy.

Which conveniently allows me to move on to my next point. If launching a sub-genre wasn't enough and establishing Bruce Lee as a popular culture icon, but also launching the acting career of none other than Jackie Chan. Chan starred as a stunt man in this film as well as having many other minor roles, this lead to further association with Golden Harvest Studios and arguably the launching of Chans film career. Further acting on world cinema as Chan has starred in 94 films himself. Thsi can only snowball really as arguing that it paved the way for Jet Li as well. I think you see where im going with this. Enter the Dragon = alot for martial arts to be thankful for really.

A financial and critical extrodianre. One of hte most culturally significant and one of the greatest films of all time. Taken into accont all it has done for cinema that is not really a surprise is it.

It is also constantly referenced in popular culture. A list on wikipedia to long for me to type out on this. Bruce and the film are referenced in countless number of video games, inspiring characters and move sets. Inspiring scenes from other popular films such as Pulp Fiction and many many more.

According to wiki a remake is even said to be in the works.

Bruce Lee's wife once said that we shouldn't dwell on how Bruce died but rather remember how he lived. Enter the Dragon is a prime example of the man and one of the best martial arts experiences there is as the jewel in the crown of martial arts films.

- Alex x

Akira Akira.

2008-08-21T06:43:00.000-07:00

In 1988 something happened that was to change the term 'cartoon' for ever as far as im concerned, the Japanese cult hit Akira (directed by Katsuhiro Otomo). A film adaption of a Manga Comic of the same name, Akira made mass waves all over the world.

In continuing with continuity of this series of critical research essays/blog posts on the films I shall do as I did with Godzilla and start with the story.

Right, the story, ermm... the story is well hard to explain. So I shall let imdb do it for me.

"A secret military project endangers Neo-Tokyo when it turns a biker gang member into a rampaging psionic psychopath that only two kids and a group of psionics can stop"

In a rather large nutshell that is basically it. This is by no means a classic Hollywood high concept film. As this film is based on a Manga (one that spans over 6 volumes) it is by no means going to be an easy and smooth translation to a two hour film. People who have already read the Manga will no doubt understand the story vastly more than others but doesn't stop this from being one heck of a film. The story revolves around a rebellious teenagers slow and rapid fall into psychological oblivion. With awesome cartoon bike chases to top it off. The story is hard to encapsulate is what I think im getting at here.

The film, in terms of visuals is a masterpiece. It is a lush and glorious depiction of a cyberpunk punk dystopian Neo-Tokyo. This fusion of psychedelic colours and bleak back drops consisted of over 150, 000 cels of animation, thats 3 times more than usual to me and you, equaling to alot of layers of awesome. The explosive 'Japanimation' is powerful enough to shudder even Disney's feathers as even to this day 20 years after its first release it is still considered to be a landmark in animation and even film, breaking previous anime trends such as cornet cutting (such as moving mouths and static faces). This visual approach to the film could be argued to be one of the reasons it is so damn popular. But there are obvious other reasons such as its stock fan base of loyal Manga readers who flocked to see their favourite Manga distilled into film(and it shows as it grossed over ¥6,346,343,871 in Japan, almost 50 million dollars, a number which is still probably rising in DVD sales). Also the films themes were popular of the time such as as it consisted of the destruction of Japan as well as its post-war revival (such as Godzilla).

Another reason for this films success would be the sound that accompanies it, it fuses together moderns synth sounds with classical Japanese instruments to create a delightfully futuristic sound. Also as the director often extracted the sound at key action orientated points in the film such as explosions to emphasis the emotion of the characters and then revving up the action again in the scenes after with a plethora of sounds and effects. Often attacking the viewers ears.

Artistically this is an amazing film. Critically and commercially with an averages score of 88% on RottenTomatoes its easy to say it was 10 million dollars well spent on a film. With its main criticism being that at times the story is too complex.

"Okay Alex, so its a good film, but how the hell is this changing world cinema??" Is what some people may say. Well let me tell you.

Akira is not just a landmark film cos its looks pretty. Its a land mark film because it is the one of most internationally successful and described as the "definitive anime film" as it is credited as being the first full length animated feature to play widely in cinemas out side of Japan. Injecting Manga into the western audiences as some would say. Before Akira cartoons were seen as childlike and well rather simple, but Akira opened their eyes with its apocalyptic tale of a teenager running amok in Tokyo who accidentally destroys it as well. In destroying neo-tokyo, Otomo lead the way for anime in the west.

Akira was followed by other works by Otomo such as Metropolis in 2001 and Steamboy in 2004. Although not as successful as Akira, they also effected cinema winning awards such as best Animation and builds on the foundations of Akira in catapulting Anime out of obscurity.

Akira had highlighted anime and created an interest in it which could be argued to be a reason for the ever growing popularity of the Studio Ghibli films post- Akira such as Howl's Moving Castle, Princess Mononoke and Spirited Away which even won an Oscar for the best animated feature.

Akira is still popular till this day with a mass cult following surrounding its mainstream success it is often referenced in other media, most notably of late in Kanye West's video for 'Stronger' in 2007 with scenes of the film remade using CGI. Clips of the film were even in a Michael and Janet Jackson video called 'Scream' in 1995 and is even referenced in the British sitcom, Spaced.

So as you can see Akira didnt just do wonders for anime film it also changed world cinema for what I hope is, forever. As I dread that Akira will fade back into the obscurity of its predecessors. But it doesn't seem like thats going to happen thanks to the Hollywood remaking machine 2 live action adaptions are to follow with one in the summer of 2009. Great.

- Alex x

I are Gozilla, you are Japan.

2008-08-12T12:40:00.000-07:00

Right, erm I have commented on the blog my hypotheses as requested and was going to initially wait for it to be published or ok'd in some way. But no activity on the school blog or any one elses blog I figure I will have to wait a fair bit for that.

But I assume its a fine hypotheses as I had talked it over and over with Mr White (=[) and Ms Ward and they were happy with it, plus I do not want to put this off any longer. So I figured I may as well start, going to have to some time.

So I am going to with my research into my first film: Godzilla. Dir - Inoshiro Honda

When I say Godzilla most people immediately picture a gargantuan lizard tearing through Tokyo (Or America depending on how clued up you are, but more on that later) like a chainsaw through butter. People do not typically think of a political film that has impacted the world of cinema almost like no other in certain genres.

'Nooo way' you say at that second statement, well as my hypothesis is on the impact of Asian films on world cinema, in my research I found that Godzilla was one of the most impacting.

Let us start with the story. Godzilla was released in Japan in 1954, 9 years after the first atomic bomb was released and the story tells of nuclear testing that awakens a slumbering Jurassic age reptile by the name of Godzilla. The following of the film consists of Japan deciding what to do with this new menace of massive proportions whilst Godzilla pops up and wreaks havoc on the mainland and islands off of it. All matter of military force is used to stop the monster from bullets to missiles to electrical fences but obviously none of it has any effect and Godzilla's path of destruction lengthens with each failed attempt. How ever a secret scientific prototype weapon developed by a lonesome scientist known as the 'Oxygen Destroyer' seems to be their only hope. How ever not only would it destroy the monster but all other life within Tokyo-Bay.

That is the jist of the story, an even shorter version would be 'a monster fucks shit up'. But I don't think the examiners would appreciate that. Now, the fact that this film was released almost a decade after the first Atom bombs were dropped on Hiroshima in JAPAN is no coincidence and as it was released at a time when science fiction films were used as a covert way to shoe horn political and social commentary into films with out offending people. Godzilla could be said to be the epitome of this as it is a metaphor for the nuclear age, which is one of the reasons why this film has gathered such fame and had such an impact on world cinema as behind the rubbery costume of Godzilla lies a cleverly crafted critique of modern science, war and its effect on post-war Japan. Not only was it a metaphor for the atomic bomb and Hiroshima but also of another tragic Japanese incident 5 years before involving the boat 'Lucky Dragon 5', which was aJapanese tuna fishing boat which was exposed and contaminated to American nuclear fall out, this is notable and obvious during the films opening as a fishing boat is destroyed by Godzilla's radioactive breath and a life preserver in the background of the wreckage has the number '5' on it.

The reason Godzilla acted as an allegory for the nuclear age was due to the state of the global post-war environment where opinions had to be hidden or not said at all, as to not upset the delicate status quo of the times that had been achieved at the end of WW2. Although Japan was seen as the victim to American aggression for Japan to openly criticise it was still unacceptable, so they did the next best thing and made a film about a Jurassic monster to voice their opinions.

Regardless of the some what controversial nature of the film at the times upon its first release it sold 9,610,000 tickets and was the eight most attended film of that year. It grossed approximately 152 million Yen ($2.25 million dollars). Also critics at first were dubious about the film and saw it as a mockery of the nuclear age but as time went on the film slowly gained more and more respected in its home country and is considered to be second only to another holy iconic Japanese film, Seven Samurai (more on that in due course).

The popularity of Godzilla had such an impact in world cinema that it prompted a joint American and Japanese release of Godzilla: King of Monsters in 1956 that was released a year after Godzilla's initial release in America and it consisted of original Godzilla footage with an American character in the mix of it as a reporter, reporting (duh) on the arrival of Godzilla. This change was to make American actors identify more with the film and it was thought that the original was still too anti-American due to the storyline which heavily focused on nuclear activities and its release to a mass American audience could have been damaging to the relations between the countries. How ever this was not the only spin off...

There are numerous amounts of scenes in Godzilla, not only the first one which sees the destruction of the fisherman ships, this also holds implicit meanings as Godzilla, the walking metaphor for the bomb is first spotted in the sea by Japanese fishermen. Other less monster-esque scenes that hold numerous implicit alter meanings are when the citizens of Japan are demanding information about the deaths by Godzilla from the government but are given the littlest information possible, also when Professor Yamane gives his hypothesis that Godzilla was awakened by nuclear testing he is told he cannot let the public know, this sparks a debate on the panels. This reflects how the government were about the Hiroshima incident and the war in general by not reporting losses to the people to maintain the illusion of victory. Information was leaked as the government saw fit, alluding to the idea that the government knew more than than they let on about America's plans to bomb them. A monstrous government?

Godzilla's carnage is also vital as he is often seen destroying roads, electrical towers, roads, bridges, hospitals, malls and cars, which are all signs of modernity and represent the nuclear bomb wiping out all signs of life in Japan. The fact that the film is shot in black and white is also noteworthy as it was intended to increase the audiences tension and represent the starkness, also Godzilla's roar was akin to the sound that accompanies the dropping of a bomb.

The 'oxygen destroyer' is noted by its inventor as a terrible invention that claims its destruction could be worse than that of the atomic bomb. This is a scene put in by Honda to give a face to the faceless by using the film Honda questions whether the inventors of the A-Bomb knew of its destructive capabilities. In doing this Honda confronts and questions complex ethical and moral questions.

Nom nom nom.

So there you have it, the low down on Godzilla and all the reasons as to why it had such a huge impact on cinema of Japan AND the world. But it also had a large influence on the science fiction genre and created a genre in itself, the monster movie genre (still popular today, a la, Cloverfield). Godzilla used state of the art special effects in order to do this and the success of the film allowed other films to take its concept and run with it. It also spawned many, MANY sequels;

Godzilla (1954)

Godzilla Raids Again (1955)

King Kong vs. Godzilla (1962)

Mothra vs. Godzilla (1964)

Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster (1964)

Invasion of Astro-Monster (1965)

Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster (1966)

Son of Godzilla (1967)

Destroy All Monsters (1968)

All Monsters Attack (1969)

Godzilla vs. Hedorah (1971)

Godzilla vs. Gigan (1972)

Godzilla vs. Megalon (1973)

Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla (1974)

Terror of Mechagodzilla (1975)

The Return of Godzilla (1984)

Godzilla vs. Biollante (1989)

Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

Godzilla vs. Mothra (1992)

Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II (1993)

Godzilla vs. SpaceGodzilla (1994)

Godzilla vs. Destoroyah (1995)

Godzilla (1998)

Godzilla 2000 (1999)

Godzilla vs. Megaguirus (2000)

Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack (2001)

Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla (2002)

Godzilla: Tokyo SOS (2003)

Godzilla: Final Wars (2004)

If you beat the dead horse enough it'll still let out whimpers of life, above is the evidence of this.

Godzilla luha- Godzilla goes to Hawaii

The one most people are familiar with is the big budget American remake in 1998. How ever this lacked positive reviews from critics and fans alike.

But this all sparked from the original. A small cult film that is still not really that heard of by wide audiences of today (people often mistake it one of its many, manyyyy sequels) and in popular culture it is often seen as a joke due to those sequels, but Godzilla stands as one of the most iconic figures in film of all time. Also as it pretty much spawned a genre on its own show the impact that this film has had on world cinema, he even has a star on the walk of fame. The use of a Jurassic creature as a metaphor for the dawn of a nuclear age and for the future is rather bizarre and quite ironic and even in a sense comical, if it were not based on a disturbing reality.

- Alex x

Back.

2008-08-05T15:37:00.000-07:00

Hey, It is 20 to 12 on the 5th of August and ive just got back from seeing The Dark Night for the second time and am eating Quaker Oats whilst waiting for Dara O'Briain to come on the television. Welcome to my summer holiday.

After a few initial weeks into my summer of relaxation and generally doing nothing (which I haven't actually done much of ironically) I have noticed everyone has been moved in to the 'slogs' section and no activity, from well, any one from media as of late. So to get back into the proverbial swing of things I thought id do a post. Now this post will not involve any critical research as the book I was using as research had to go back to the library as it was overdue :/

But! This post is going to act as a predecessor, a warning if you like to say that after this I will be back in my blogging ways and post some actual useful... stuff. On Japanese films. Soon.

Sometime by the end of this week soon. The posts will consist of a post by post look at the films I am researching, as you already know. Just thought id clarify.

.... :/

- Alex x

p.s. GO SEE THE DARK KNIGHT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hurrah!

2008-07-17T06:34:00.000-07:00

Finally, huzzah! I have now decided on my final hypothesis after much weeks of paranoia, worrying and deliberation.

But yeah, more to write about in question 1 I guess.

Now that I have changed my hypothesis it has, as madam said it would, meant i can now narrow down my focus films. So i am removing some and just simply changing others. Which is the same I guess.

Any way my new list of films is likely to include:

- Gojira

- Seven Samurai

- Enter the Dragon

- Old-Boy

- Akira

I may not do 'Old-Boy' as im not sure whether or not my theories as to it changing world cinema are just enough. But oh well time will have to tell. But I am pretty sure the other films have had a influential impact on world cinema. Influences of which I an going to elaborate on in further posts. At home. As blogging at school is harder than concrete.

Above: Something really hard

- Alex x

:/

2008-07-12T05:49:00.000-07:00

Since the beginning I have been having numerous problems with my hypothesis, starting with my unoriginal too cliche video-game violence one and followed by my completely wrong comic book film one. So to the realm of cult Asian film I went and good lord im still having problems.

I originally came up with the hypothesis of 'Cult Asian Cinema' when I realised, 'what the hell thats a title not a hypothesis'. So I quickly changed that. My most recent hypothesis is more towards the;

'The influence of Asian cult films on world cinema.'

But im just thinking about how I could refine it or improve it. So after much deliberation and confused talks with my teachers, I think I know how to do it now.

So drum roll please.

'The influence and growth and popularity of Asian cult films in World Cinema'.

It may only hold a difference of around 4 words but I think that it will enab...

Wait a sec... ive just had a, what Ms Ward would say, a brain wave.

'What effect, if any, has cult Asian film had on World Cinema'.

Oh yeah! If that isnt good enough ill be forced to shoot some one [JOKE!!1+shift!]. One of my, and I think Mr White's previous qualms with my early hypothesis was that it was more of a statement opposed to a question so would it of been critical research.

But upon listening to David Bowie and eating chocolate spread rolls I think that one up there allows me to argue 2 sides of the argument whilst enabling me to do all the things I previously planned to do in terms of the films and what to write about, only now, with more direction.

That Way!

The good thing is I kinda already know what I would write about with some of my films as well. I may have to change one or two though to cater for my new hypothesis. Or maybe I don't, maybe I could use them to argue that there is no effect.

Ladies and gentlemen I think i have cracked it!

What would i do with out him?

- Alex x

Narrowing it down.

2008-07-08T08:53:00.000-07:00

Right. Back from the rolling hills and picturesque mountain tops of Wales and im back, in bonny ol' Albion again. To work.

Great.

Any way whilst I was away I was paranoid about having lots of work to catch up on so in between setting up tents and hiking up mountains with increasingly slowing steps, I took a few moments to think about my media work and my hypotheses which led me to think about the films in which I would like to study and what not.

So i narrowed it down to these;
-Godzilla
- The Seven Samurai
- Akira
-Perfect Blue
- Battle Royale
- Old-Boy
And finally, Versus.

Although i may lose Perfect Blue as there is no sense in having that AND Akira when both films are of the same niche genre. (That sounds like something to write about in my evaluation thing, or question 1 in the exam, not bad.)

So yeah ill get rid of that.

So the films I will be studying are;
- Godzilla
- Seven Samurai
- Akira
- Battle Royale
- Old-Boy
- Versus

I have picked these films because for obvious reasons, they are all Asian in origin and when they were released they were all Cult films of sorts or 'B-Movies'. But some of them have gone on to achieve world wide fame stemming from their cult Asian roots. Also some of the films have gone on to influence more renowned 'mainstream' cinema in the West, even to influence genres as a whole. Some, are just damn good cult films.

In my research of these films I will look at how the films are sold to an home Asian audience and how they try to appeal to Western audiences. I will also look at their box-office earnings to see if their popularity matches up to their money. I will also look at their influences on other world cinema (if any) and throw in some theoretical textual analysis to round it all up.

I will do blog post to cater for each films.

Expect to be seeing one on Godzilla soon. and it might be long. Don't say i didn't warn you.

Seriously, i just spent like 15 minutes trawling though Wikipedia looking at Godzilla stuff and all its reincarnations, theres LOADS! Did you know that in the 1998 American version of Godzilla the giant dinosaur lizard thing isn't even called Godzilla! Read away.

I hate purists.

- Alex x

p.s.

Oh! Back to my days of ol' NMT video game nerdiness, i have recently bought GTA4. And after all the hype that came with it my verdict so far is a resounding; its alright. If you do own a PS3 and are really looking for an amazing experience i would suggest MGS4. But hey,

p.s.s.

In-game XMB for PS3 at last \o/

Decisions decisions.

2008-06-28T09:45:00.000-07:00

As Sir for saw, after talking to Ms Ward and trawling the internet and library for books I found that Asian cinema is the most prominent in terms of Cult cinema. So as Sir predicted I have narrowed my hypothesis right down to;

'The influence of Asian cult films on world cinema.'

Well something to that effect. Also I am already aware of some films I will be looking at in relation to this topic.

For a start I have the original Godzilla and anime sensations Perfect Blue and Akira and any teachers nightmare(or dream depending on the teacher) Battle Royale.

I already have a overview of how I would like to write it in my head but other the week I will develop it more.

Any way, this isn't a long post like normal because im sorta strapped for time at the moment as tomorrow I take my leave for the sheep haven that is Wales.

So see you in a week with further ideas and posts!

- Alex x

Cult Films.

2008-06-24T11:19:00.000-07:00

This bring me back a few months. I remember like it was a few months ago, doing my media coursework on magazines with the almighty 'Alt*' magazine. I had chosen my article to be on cult films. Months later and here i am again in familiar-ish territory trying to pull off the same feat again. But this time i am looking at international cult films opposed to familiar 'commercialised' (if you can call a cult film, commercialised) cult films such as Fight club and Reservoir Dogs and trying my hand at the foreign language world cinema view on cult films.

From Quintin Tarantino to Luc Besson, the leafy suburbs of Donnie Darko to the dystopian neo-Tokyo of Akira and from Tyler Durden to Konstantin Khabensky.

But before i get into more detail on the films in which i am researching into, which i have compiled a LONG list of to sift through, i thought that as i seemed to have defined World Cinema it is probably for the best that i now try to define 'Cult Cinema'.

In a previous cult film article i described it as;

"The word cult refers to a social group who all follow the same ideologies of something out side of the mainstream and which deviates from the norm. Slap the word film on to the end of it and you get ‘cult film’. Cult films are particularly known to of failed commercially at the cinemas (bar a few exceptions such as Tarantino’s ‘Pulp fiction’) and out side of their relatively small fan bases. These fan bases over time become obsessive and slightly obscure as they transcend into the depths of fandom, hence why they are compared to ‘cults’. Simple. Cult Films can be identified thanks to the conventions with in them; they are usually eccentric, obscure, random and go against the traditional narratives found in the more generic genres such as action and drama. These are the ‘alternatives’ of cinema in a way as they at times can be called controversial as they turn their backs on the ‘Hollywood cinema’ that we all know and love and instead tell magnificent stories and highlight innovative exotic topics that no other film would dare touch upon."

I feel that this is a pretty solid basis of what a cult film is. Although upon reading it, it could be possible to label ALL of international cinema as 'cult' films as they as stated, have loyal solid fan bases, the films have flopped commercially, they do not go against the normal genres of the western world, and they are the 'alternatives' for all those who frown upon 'Hollywood cinema'. Also international films tend not to focus on the commerciality of westernised films such as the ever original Hollywood blockbuster film factory.

Pretty straight forward right. Im not going to write about every international film ever, cos i quite frankly just don't have the time, instead im going to choose a select few from a select few countries and analyse the crap outa them. These films will be chosen for many reasons such as their influence and their impact on other cinema. If thats okay. Which i damn well hope it is.

I will post a list of said films up in a later post.

Also to further my research beyond the interwebs i have joined ilford library \o/ and i have taken out a very useful book called 'The cinema of Japan and Korea' which as the name entails focuses on mainly Asian cinema. I will use this book to gather work on the 3 Japanese films i shall be researching. I will search for more international cinema books upon my next visit.

Until the next time

-Alex x

Sigh.

2008-06-18T09:48:00.000-07:00

As the title entails. Sigh...

Got to my first lesson of critical research with Mr White told him about my chosen topic of study. I told him of my comic book hypothesis and what topic i was going to be doing. When all of a sudden i was back to square one.

We meet again...

Sir had informed me that my topic of choice and what i had already done and wanted to look at such as blockbuster and Marvel etc were in layman's terms. Wrong. This was due to the Hollywood and American influences that would be involved in my project. Something that apparently is NOT World Cinema. This sparked a discussion on what exactly 'World Cinema' actually is? As far as i thought it was any cinema from all around the world, i.e. English, American, French etc etc. Sit said, this was wrong how ever and asked us to look it up.

To wiki i went!

They described it as;

"World cinema is a term used primarily in English language speaking countries to refer to the films and film industries of non-English speaking countries. It is therefore often used interchangeably with the term Foreign film. However, both World cinema and Foreign film could be taken to refer to the films of all countries other than one's own, regardless of native language."

And the way i saw it was, 'Well even American films are to be deemed as foreign to Spanish people so what the hell'.

And:

"In other English speaking countries, it would be extremely unlikely to class films made in the U.S. as foreign films, or belonging to World cinema, as American films are reasonably dominant in all English-language markets."

Damn you wiki, you've failed me :(

Also as wiki lists World Cinema as;

"
World cinema

"
It just confused me more as it says North American it only confused me further. So i found the examiners report for World Cinema last year and to my morosity (i should SO copyright that word) it read that people would lose marks for getting too wound up in Hollywood or more Western films ignoring other films such as Japanese and German etc etc.
The source of my anguish.

So basically i rang OCR to ask if they could help and provide some Deus Ex Machina on this unsatisfactory situation only to be provided with in my words; "The dude that would usually answer this is on holiday". I hope hes having fun... ¬.¬

So i have basically taken it upon my self and deducted that World Cinema is everything that doesn't originate from England and or America. World Cinema seems to have an aura around it more focused on the artistic values and interpretations with more substance to it, opposed to the commercialised superficial block busters that seep from America. So as i was saying back to square numero. It bad enough trying to define my exteremly vague area of work let alone define a topic with in it. Which is why all i am most probably changing my comic book related hypothesis. I came up with another one in relation to this absurd revelation of how 'Japanese anime and manga affects films' or something to that extent, but as the report says; "Other areas of study were Japanese cinema: Manga/Anime and Horror." And i don't want to be just another one of those guys who would fade into obscurity along with all the other i-did-anime-and-manga guys. So i have basically abandoned my comic book origins, yup that does mean my post on Marvel is redundant now. Merely a wall of word vomit on my Mario themed viral.

So i went to ask Madam, [warning: Exaggeration] 'What the hell am i going to do?!!?!?!'
she was as dumb founded as me and we agreed that to avoid the examiner looking at it stamping it with a novelty sized stamp reading 'EPIC FAIL'.

So i have chosen to change it to Cult Status within World Cinema. In other words what are the most famous/inspiring/wonderful/...good cult films with in different areas of World Cinema and why? As well as how have they influenced other films... maybe even western ones. If i dare touch on that.

So yeah, i appreciate Sir's bluntness and nice way of saying 'wrong' as it is best to identify problems such as this one early on. Also it gives me more to write about in question 1 on the exam.

So every metaphorical cloud has a metaphorical silver lining.

- Alex x

Marvelous.

2008-06-14T10:04:00.000-07:00

The term comic book is almost synonymous with a certain company called 'Marvel'. Marvel a company so huge searching for it on wikipedia dishes out several possible results;

"

Marvel Entertainment, a character-based entertainment and licensing company based in the United States of America
- Marvel Comics, a comic book publisher owned by Marvel Entertainment
- Marvel Productions
- Marvel Animation
- Marvel Studios, the film division of Marvel Entertainment

"

Thats not even the half of it seriously.

What with my research and topic on comic books and their effect on world cinema i thought i would research a bit into the organisation known as Marvel and there break into world cinema. Now i know that Marvel are not the only comic book company which has films to its name as well but none of the other companies such as Dark Horse or DC are going to do something very very special in the coming years that will have fanboys creaming their pants for a while...

Its obvious to everyone that the beginning of the 21st century saw a massive boom of comic book films. As Marvel Studios, a sub-division of the Marvel Entertainment company was formed in the late 90s and headed by Avi Arad. This sudden burst on to the silver screen had come at a profound time for Marvel as in the late eighties up to the early nineties some would say that Marvel had lost its way as they had suffered some severe financial pit falls and abundantly increased their amount of titles from around 40 to 140, their sales were plummeting. Marvel's former boss Ronald O. Perelman would only prove to cause more problems as he made more and more financial moves by implementing failing ideas such as trading cards, sticker collections and collectibles causing major problems for the company already teetering on the edge of total financial melt down and even resulting in eventual bankruptcy.

But enter Avi Arad who swung in like some hyped up super hero and rejigged everything by taking control of Marvel Studios with co-company Toy Biz. With the release of Batman films through the 90s from Marvels rival leading comic company DC comics, Avi put the wheels in motion to convert Marvels hottest properties, its characters into film by latching onto Marvels then wasted licensing potential by setting up films such as Spider-Man and Hulk with distributors such as Universal and New Line Cinema. Following the success of Marvel Studios first major motion picture Blade in 1998 which saw takings of over 130 million dollars world wide and studios began to churn out more and more comic book titles with 18 films since Blade burst onto our screens in 1998. But these films were made by companies that hadn't any thing to do with Marvel and thus rendered with some of them being total flops financially, such as Ang Lee's original Hulk or just plain terrible, point in case;

At least being blind meant he didn't have to see such a terrible film

But recently Marvel have decided that they will start to produce and distribute their own films in the years to come with Paramount Pictures as they regain the rights to their characters. A bold move and a very highly lucrative one that paid off very well with their first release of Iron Man in 2008 which had an opening weekend of over 100 million dollars world wide, damn. Not only that but has gathered mainly positive reviews! Some thing quite uncommon of Marvel films of late what with Fantastic Four 2, ghost Rider and Spider-Man 3. But what may be one of the best things about Iron Man could be the short scene after the credits in which Samuel L. Jackson comes into the screen announces himself as Nick Fury and informs Tony Stark of the 'Avengers Initiative'. This is followed closely by Marvel's second self produced film, a reboot similar to that of DC's Batman Begins directed by Edward Norton him self of The Incredible hulk, a film that is laden not only with intense action, Liv Tyler in a wet shirt but also many references to World War 2 and a super soldier serum, which all act as indirect references to another of Marvel's upcoming films, that of Captain America. The third member of The Avengers reference in film so far.

The Avengers, widely known as one of comics greatest show case of super heroes consisting of Iron Man, Hulk, Captain America and Thor and Ant-Man. The latter 2 films are also soon to be in production which will finalise The Avenger's singular character films before getting them all together in the on screen debut of Earths mightiest Heroes, The Avengers which is said to be released in 2011.

"And there came a day, a day unlike any other, when Earth's mightiest heroes and heroines found themselves united against a common threat. On that day, the Avengers were born — to fight the foes no single super hero could withstand! Through the years, their roster has prospered, changing many times, but their glory has never been denied! Heed the call, then — for now, the Avengers Assemble!" — Prologue from The Avengers

If this film isn't awesome,there is no hope for any of us. Ever.

Marvel are looking to monopolise the comic book film market in the future, and if the recent success of their current films shows any thing, maybe even world cinema as a whole. The pending films will most definitely dominate our summer block busters for the years to come. And thats JUST from Marvel.

Ill be posting more about different comic book industries from different sections of the world etc, but i felt that this post at the moment was appropriate what with Iron Man and Hulk coming out within a month of each other and causing such a kerfuffel. There are so many comic book films out there, some of which you wouldn't even know originated on the glorious technicolour pages of a 1 dollar 25 magazine. and i hope to inform you more of these soon ;)

-Alex x

Newww Toooopiccccc

2008-06-07T09:50:00.000-07:00

So year 12 is over. Well technically any way in that we've finished all out year 12 courses and exams. Everyone returned to school gayly anticipating a month and a half of coasting their way to the summer holidays to the upbeat sound of The Beach Boys like some typical American high school film. But our teachers have other ideas.

First lesson back off media and the gauntlet has already been thrown down. We are know knee deep in a new topic of study that involves critical research and an abundance of independent learning. We were given a list of options from our teacher with things regarding the media such as 'crime in the media', 'women in film' and 'sport in the media' and other such items. Immediately i noticed the 'crime in the media' section and the nerdy neurones in my brain connected that with my previous knowledge of video games and how video games are portrayed in the media for being a catalyst of violent related violence. Bingo i thought. 15 minutes into year 13 and i already know what im doing in the exam. I mean, hell, i had already done a entry into this matter here.

But all was not to run as smoothly as something really smooth...

I told madam my idea and received a resounding, 'hmmmmm, mehhhh'. I had told her that i would implement many different things into my hypothesis that "Violent games are said to cause violent crimes". Things such as the controversy surrounding the recent release of uber game GTA4, the recent published Byron report on video games and the story of a teen on teen murder that was apparently inspired by 'Manhunt'. But i was informed that this would be hard to do as most of the games are American developed and the Byron report was more to the psychological side of things opposed to the media side of things.

So there i sat, in dismay. My idea shot down in an instant. So i was thinking of more and more ideas Becky had nabbed the one on how youth culture is portrayed in the media, so i spoke to Josh and how he was doing world cinema. Then all of a sudden like a 9 iron to the head i was struck with an idea. I had noted how a plethora of films being released over the next few years are comic book films so i pieced lots of different things in my head and came upon a new hypothesis of "To what extent are comic book films affecting world cinema". I had decided that the area of media in which i was studying would be 'world cinema'. I have chosen this area of study as i felt like i wanted to detach my self from the video game side of the media to try to broaden my horizons, also i felt that it goes hand in hand with my film studies course. I chose comic books because i have a keen interest in them and how they are converted to film especially. I want to investigate the effects that all types of comic books from all over the world have on the world cinema, in particular the block buster.

In terms of primary research i would watch certain comic book films of late and early origin and read comic books and graphic novels. For secondary research i would take into account other peoples views on this such as film reviews and box office taking etc etc.

I felt that this had a wide scope as i could write about comics from all over the world such as Japan, America and the UK and the different types of comic book styles and where they originate from such as Manga, Anime, Graphic Novels and comics. Then how they are being constantly converted to film.

So there you go.

Super hero films, only 'popcorn movies'?

I feel i already have a pretty sound knowledge on a lot of comic book films already out and as this summer is set to be riddled with them it will allow me to be constantly updating with reviews and trivia on them.

Also, i may try to continue to add in NMT video game related stuff as well from time to time.

So far things have been going well in that i have seen an abundance of comic book films and have my own views on them and know many other peoples views on them already. And as more comic books/films come out it will allow me to further my research.

Lets hope it carries on going well hay =]

-Alex x

Oh Hai!

2008-06-01T10:22:00.000-07:00

Its, been a while. But im back bb. But not with a vengeance... with a desire to write about the games industry!
Over the course of my time off between my last gruelling psychology exam and my media exam tomorrow i have had some time to think and ponder the state in which the gaming world lies. It has come to my knowledge that my blog is basically 20 or so posts about how awesome it all is. As undeniable as that is, i think that its time for a change, i think i should write about some of gamings, down sides. Down sides that have only really come about thanks to the introduction of more and more new media.

Remember what Sir said, the M in media, is for moneyyyyy! Everyone in the industry is out for what they can get, which is moneyyyy! And to do this they have utilised many many ways in which to get this out of us. And i just thought id run down a few ways, ill most probably get a tad distracted on the way, but you know.

Above: Money

As games are now pretty much always utilising the online facilities available for it a few games have started the selling additional features for the game for an additional charge. Games such as Call of Duty and Resistance sell new map packs for their consumers for a tad more cash. Sure thats fine, if you buy them you get a new map and a bit more added on to the game, but if you don't, no harm done.

Until now *dramatic music*, Battlefield: Bad Company, the latest in very popular series of war games that specialise in lots of people killing each other online, have a great idea in that people can buy guns in the game with real life money, essentially adding an instant advantage to who ever wants to shell out for say, a new shotgun (pun intended). Skill, schmill. This is at the height of realism, money = power dammit! Capitalism ftw!

But these guns are also already on the disc, yes, the one you paid for, fully. Inevitably this has caused confusion and outrage. You own this game, its yours, just you can't use certain things on it. Think of it as... buying a house, but the estate agent keeps the keys to the spare room until you pay him a bit more...

Numero... two. World Of Warcraft is a massively popular mmorpg that ive written about before. The company behind this game is Blizzard and in a rather cold move (ahaha again, intented!) in a method to stop its 9 million plus subscribers from cheating they have programmed their servers so that the online games download a client worm thing to scan your computer and ensure your not using a cheating programme. That seems like an awful lot of effort to stop what could be one of the worlds most pathetic past times, cheating at online games.

Any way, heres something that this scanner thing does;

"... COMMUNICATE INFORMATION BACK TO BLIZZARD, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION YOUR ACCOUNT NAME, DETAILS ABOUT THE UNAUTHORIZED THIRD PARTY PROGRAM DETECTED, AND THE TIME AND DATE THE UNAUTHORIZED THIRD PARTY PROGRAM WAS DETECTED; AND/OR (b) EXERCISE ANY OR ALL OF ITS RIGHTS UNDER THIS AGREEMENT, WITH OR WITHOUT PRIOR NOTICE TO THE USER ..."

The scanner will scan (duh) your computer in search for unauthorised programmes and will report back to Blizzard what these programmes are, but what does it consider unauthorised? Credit card numbers, addresses, chat logs? Right, although Blizzard hasn't actually done anything to this equivalent (that we know about ¬__¬) this is exactly the type of thing that is giving other NMT facilities such as social networking like facebook a bad rep, ala BBC.
Also whats there to stop the scanner being altered? Hmmmm you'll need a scanner to find a scanner.

With great new technlogy comes great new graphical improvements which comes with great new scams. Advertisements come preloaded with pre-rendered (in normal people terms, awesome graphics) which make the game look as dazzling as the second coming of christ. But there are a few games that try to sneak pre-rendered sequences into their advertising and unveiling of games. The guilty include well known games such as Killzone 2 which at an E3 show displayed a sequences with amazing visuals boasted to be in game, only to find out that they were pre-rendered for that one segment. Deceit indeed. But that games not out yet.

Everyone knows about Call of Duty 4, but before that according to the laws of continuity was Call of duty 2 which was advertised like thisss;

Needless to say people were flabbergasted at the thought of playing a game that looks that orgasmic. Cutscenes are usually shown for advertisements and a disclaimer usually comes up saying 'Not in-game footage' but this pre-rendered sequence was created especially for advertisements and the adverts were even pulled by the Advertising Standards Authority forcing Activision to remove the adverts from British TV before more people succumbed to the prettiness.

Finally, well for now comes the segment of the article i have been meaning to write about for a long time, and that is the state of games reviewing. any clued up gamer should of heard about Kane & Lynch: Dead Men a game that came out to much hype only to fall at the first few hurdles in that it was shit. GameSpot a trusted reviewing site reviews many of the latest game and boasts an impressive database of information on the gaming world. How ever on November the 13th of 2007 (sadly it wasn't a friday, sigh) a review was posted by senior GameSpot writer Jeff Gerstmann in which he gave the game a 'meh' inducing 6.0.

Evidence!

The good news was it was a pretty solid review the bad news is the games publishers had recently bought an abundance of advertising space around the site.... awkwarddddd. Imagine slagigng some one off only to find there standing right behind you. And poor ol' Jeff was fired.

Jeff vs. The Man

To kick him while he was down it was found that Jeff's score of 6.0 was considerably higher than that of the users aggregated review, so he even gave it a generous review and paid the price. so much for journalistic integrity.

The message from Gamespot's management was clear: a good review is part of what the advertiser pays for. Jeff being fired sent this message to every reviewer on the site.

So there you have it, a reviewer paying the price for honesty.

But not only did GameSpot lose Jeff, they also lost the trust from many many visitors [including myself]. People would rethink whether or not to trust the internet.

Which nicely brings me on to my next point. Everyone who is everyone has heard of GTA hell i even hyped it up majorly in my last post. GTA has perfect score across the board and a metacritic score of 98% out of 56 reviews. But many reviewers have boasted how GTA4 is in fact not worth a perfect 10 and the reason why it has obtained many perfect scores is similar to that of the GameSpot controversy. Companies want new game exclusive reviews and developers and games companies want perfect reviews. I think you can see where im going with this. So, in turn for a new exclusive review which would generate lots of visitors to their site or get lots of people to buy their magazine and more money/popularity/traffic the game makers expect a certain type of review, a damn good one. Considering the metacritic score for GTA4 is only 8.1 from a users perspective it leaves all that remains to be rather suspect.

Game sites such as GameDaily gave the score a perfect 10 but recently published a post entitled; "Why We Stopped Playing GTA4". Highlighting the games flaws, surely a 10/10 game means its perfect and in turn should mean, it has no flaws?

For me i find it increasingly harder to trust game reviews from the web, i now only trust one man, and his name, is Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw.

Warning: here be strong language.

Described as "hilariously cutting ... first legitimate breakout hit from the gaming community in recent memory". Gamers love it and developers fear it, how things should be.

This post was incredibly inspired by the amazingly amazing website Cracked! Go here! Your boredom shall be decimated!

Any way, thats pretty much all i wanted to write about for like a while, Cracked beat me to it but also provided alot more detail for this post in general such as the Blizzard bit. Thats not to say there haven't been over developments in the gaming world, such as;

Playstation 3 is looking to get a new firmware upgrade 4.20. This is no ordinary stability increasing firm ware, this firm ware has... IN GAME XMB!!! Oh yeah, the gamers have moaned and Playstation have delivered. Also coming is trophy support, so like Xbox achievements. Some are even hoping for a surprise release of Playstation Home.
Lets bloody well hope so.

I just wanted an excuse to use that face really

Also there has been talk of motion controllers for the PS3 and the 360 similar to that of the wii. At the moment these are just rumours circling the web, but hey! so was the hundreds of 'Bioshock is coming to the ps3!' rumours and look how that turned out. It is!

Exclusivity, pffft.

- Alex x

Gasp.

2008-04-27T08:47:00.000-07:00

Forgot to mention in my last post, 'Grand Theft auto: 4' is out in two days!
Two days until a flurry of individuals become too 'sick' to go into work or school or visit their other boy/girlfriends (girls game too, apparently).

Analysts are already assuming it is to be the game of the year already, and if early reviews are any thing to go by (perfect 10/10 - ign) it seems to be that way.

- Alex x

^day8

2008-04-27T06:22:00.000-07:00

As i have mentioned before my topic for the exam will be video games with a hint of social networking and how the two converge and other the past week or so i have been delaying making an update as too gather information on the subject and in particular Playstation's take on this, 'Playstation Home'. Now i know that i have already made a post on 'Home' agessss ago (how the hell do i stop this hyperlink?!

There we go... any way, yeah i had intended for this update to be based on 'Home' as it is like social networking in a virtual literal sense as explained in that previous article, touted as 'gaming 3.0', but thanks to the punctual guys at 'Sony' there are still very little details about 'Home' to update on and just to add salt into hte proverbial wound, it was due for release in April 2009, you know, this month, the one thats almost finished. So 'Sony' have announced that they are delaying 'Home' again! If this is 'Sony' trying to do a 'Blair Witch' and delaying to create more hype, it is not succeeding. 'Sony' have been having 'closed Beta' testing on 'Home' for some time now (a beta is basically like a glorified demo on a game currently in development and/or nearing its release) we still don't seem to be any closer to having it on our XMB's.

Gamers are growing impatient as news on Home is dwindling into non-existence, and any news is likely to be further delays, so is 'Home' going to be too little too late? Will i never be able to play virtual bowling with avatars of people ive never meet before? As the magic 8-ball would say, 'Not likely'.
To be honest i don't particularly care too much for 'Home', i only use it as a counter to 360 vs PS3 arguements as long as my console still has games im happy, throw in an in game XMB and ill be even happier. But until then i guess ill just have to stick with reality... sigh.

As games consoles are adopting social networking, social networking are also adopting gaming. Social networking sites such as 'FaceBook' and 'MySpace' boast new 'application' features that allow their users to add applications to their pages that can range from games such as poker to snooker and paly with their friends on them over web 2.0. For example 'MySpace' has just announced the public launch of its "applications gallery" at Web 2.0. Central to those applications will be games. It's hardly 'Call of Duty' but its a start. I guess.

Read more here.

Speaking of 'facebook', i know that theres no such thing as bad publicity, but i was reading 'The News of the World' today and came across a section headlines 'Disgracebook', "haha, i see what they did there" i thought to my self, only to be disgusted to the articles premise. A section on a social networking website known as 'onemodelplace' or some other largely unoriginal name, where models, agents and photographers have profiles on this global website. Now your all probably think, "what the crap is wrong with that?" Well theres photos of girls as young as 11 who have uploaded pretty tasteless photos of themselves on it and posted details on how they long to work as glamour models. And ANYONE could just set up a fake login name etc and look through these profiles. Warning lights any one? Cos that is just WRONG!

It only further highlights the dangers and downsides of social networking.

If only there were some kind of police for this kind of thing...

In time.

- Alex x

Online gaming = increased violence? Wrong!

2008-04-03T12:21:00.000-07:00

In correspondence with my last entry on how people are blaming video games for some of the nastier things in life such as violence, a recent study have been carried out to prove or disprove this at Middlesex University by a Jane Barnett.

"The psychologists recruited 292 male and female online gamers, playing the game World of Warcraft. The players, aged between 12 and 83 years, were asked to complete a questionnaire on anger, aggression and personality and then played the game for two hours. After this time they were they were asked to complete the test again.

The psychologists found overall the gamers were more likely to feel calm or tired after playing – but there were differences depending on sex, age and personality.

Miss Barnett said: “There were actually higher levels of relaxation before and after playing the game as opposed to experiencing anger but this did very much depend on personality type.

“This will help us to develop a emotion and gaming questionnaire to help distinguish the type of gamer who is likely to transfer their online aggression into everyday life"

'World of Warcraft' is well known around the globe as the worlds biggest MMORPG (massively multiplayer online role playing game) in which gamers adopt an avatar usually a complete mash up of what they long to look like whether its vikings or elves, and then they basically run around a massive online world interacting with other people(social networking!) killing things and doing quests. The game is also referenced in popular culture from cartoons such as 'South park'.

One of the main stories that comes to me in terms of violence and games causing this is the story from the UK from a few years ago about a boy who murdered another boy his ages (17 i believe) and the media narrowed down the suspects motives to that of following the basic premise of a video game 'Manhunt'. A game which is an 18 certificate and always has been in which the 'protagonist' completes a series of missions in order to get to the person making him go through the missions... well the game isn't praised for its story telling mainly for its sense less violence. as violent as the game is (cos it is, can't deny that, to be honest it wasn't THAT good a game) it was found out that the murderer did not actually have a copy of the game and in a bizarre and morbid twist of fates, it was actually the victim who owned the game. Never the less the game was banned for a while. This severely damaged 'Rockstar Games' chances of making a sequel but often the boundary pushers they did. But the game had to go through a series of hoops before finally being passed by the BBFC.

Lets take a lot at some of the benefits of gaming;

"Video games damage your eyesight" Well I'm sorry but they actually improve your eyesight! Playing video games and watching the screen; trying to find the guy who's trying to snipe you improves your eyesight. This is because your eyes react to the fact they are being worked hard and become more efficient so that next time they won't have to work as hard to perform the same task!
Video games can improve your logic and ability to solve problems. This is because most games involve some sort of strategy that you need to find out and improve as the game progresses; this is effectively training your brain's logic and strategic abilities thus making it more efficient and effective.
Your hand eye coordination is greatly improved playing video games. Nearly all video games require continual fast, accurate and precise hand, finger and thumb movements. This strengthens the muscles in your hands and greatly improves your hand eye co-ordination.
Reaction speeds increase hugely from playing video games! In nearly all video games you often need to react fast. Obviously if you do something a lot then you are going to get better at it and it is for this reason that video games improve your reflexes and reaction speeds.
Last but not least video games improve your concentration span. Because in most games you need to concentrate for extended periods of time; the slightest lapse in concentration will be punished in nearly all games. If you concentrate lots then your concentration span will increase!

Damn straight. All in moderation of course.

In other news, with the soon release of 'Dualshock 3' PS3 controllers with SixAxis motion sensing technology and rumble, it will see the discontinuation of the original 'SixAxis' controllers which lack rumble. This is all down to fan response really.
Also! The worlds fastest home internet connection has been unveiled and it belongs to a 75 year old woman in Sweden whose internet is currently running at 40 gigabytes per second... FORTY!
She can download full HD films in 2 seconds, and what does she use it for, to dry her laundry because the modem gets awfully warm. Selfish... It is all part of a new internet experiment thing to demonstrate how a low price, high capacity fibre line could be built over long distances and channel the internet from one place to another directly with out any interference or traffic.

Read in envy as she may be getting 60 more gigabytes of speed...

Sup.

2008-04-02T09:36:00.000-07:00

Yo, after a long absence of posts mainly due to all the other work i have had dropped on me from other subjects who believe that they are in fact the only ones i have taken coupled with the magazine coursework that i had to do for media, i didnt get to up date this quite as much as id of liked. But any way, all that rubbish aside and its time for more updates.

Not much realllly happened since i last made an update;
The xbox 360 had cut its price down to 200 pound for a standard model where as the P$£ is remaining at a rather heft price tag of 300 pound for an ordinary model. This people have got in a huff about as some internet dwellers seem to forget that the 360 has been around for a year longer than the ps3 and is by all means entitled to a price drop by now. This caused an increase in sales by up to 40% in the first week. But to a few people surprise, the ps3's predecessor, the ps2 was also one of the most highest selling consoles of the easter... However this is a clever marketing marketing campaign as it is used to promote momentum for the 360 as the PS3 slowly catches it up.

Other news on the net includes a new aka for the 360. As to many gamers it is know to be prone to malfunctions, thus developing the nick name '3FixMe!'. Not a great reputation really.

Also as the format war is now well and truly over and Toshiba has officially discontinued their productions of HD-DVD players and HD-DVDs rumours are sparking up everywhere like the back of a bike shed that the 360 will be graced with an external Blu Ray drive. Only time will tell on that one as Microsoft have always seemed adamant that this would never be the case.

Games giants 'Electronic Arts', known for franhises such as 'EA Sports' have been very busy lately by trying to monopolise the gaming market all to their self by buying out smaller more indie games developers that pose any threat to their success and money making. 'EA' made most of their money with their annual franchises such as 'Madden 2008' and over recent years the averages score ratings for their games has seen a slump as there games continued to lack innovation and originality. Not one to break their carnivorous eating habits 'EA' have set its sights on 'Take Two Interactive' as games publisher and distributor known for their highly anticipated and loved 'GTA' series and the not so loved 'Manhunt' series. After 'TT' denied an offer of 2 billion dollars EA set out other means to acquiring the company by buying out big share holders of the company. This convergence of companies is not the first in this sense as 'Activision' and 'Vivendi' formed earlier on in the year. In my opinion, 'TT' would be fools to sell out at such a crucial time what with the release of GTA 4 coming out, which is almost guaranteed to make millions.

Oh yeah i forgot to mention, today in class we were told to narrow down our NMT scope and i have narrowed mine down to Games. If you couldn't already tell. But i will also be using other aspects of NMT such as social networking in games (xbox Live, PSN), convergence in games with other peripherals and incorporating the format war (blu ray vs HD-DVD) and wireless aspects such as wifi in psp's etc.

I have chosen this because i feel that games are at a time in the media where they are attracting alot of attention. The majority of which is negative as games are being used as scape goats for violence and other maladaptive behavior. Reasons for this being because kids are playing games that are far too mature for them, or that kids are spending to much time on games. These are the types of retarded games politics that are gunna ruin gaming as presidential hopefuls such as Barack Obama whose opinion on gaming is that it is a 'Metaphor for under achievement'

Yeah...

As well as it being proposed that games receive film like certificate ratings, i always thought they already had them to be honest. But thankfully female psychologist Tanya Byron is acting as the voice of reason in a world full of retards claiming they should "get a grip".

Waheys!

In my opinion any one who goes out and buys a game which simulates violence and cannot differentiate between reality and that video game is bound to do something wacky regardless of whether or not a game is involved. I have been playing video games from a very early age and not once have i had the urge to hijack a car, go for a joy ride, then kill some prostitutes. If were banning violent material then why not ban some violent literature while were at it, King Lears pretty messed up, some guy had his eyes plucked out, sure Shakespeare wouldn't mind i know i wouldn't.

Rant over.

On a lighter note on april fools day a story was leaked about those crazy Japanese and how they came up with a bizzare new way of playing the wii. Taking the name a bit too literally i think in the form of 'Super Pii Pii Broters'.

Look how much fun shes having.

Basically what the game entailed is strapping the wii remote on to a pair of peripheral pants and then well, peeing. According to the Japanese text on the box "Super Pii Pii Brothers promotes good bathroom skills and allows women to experience for the first time the pleasure of urinating while standing." How thoughtful. Unfortunately though this is just one of the many april fool gaming pranks up there with the likes of a new Final fantasy 7 remake for the ps3.
Sigh, in time.

- Alex x

Blackholes and Revelations

2008-03-05T10:45:00.000-08:00

First update for a while, this is mainly down to all the work that has come with the other aspect of the media studies course the magazine part. Work in fact that i am going to do after ive finished this quick update.

Any way, a while back i posted a update how the playstation 3 was being used in a experiment know as 'folding at home'. Well what do you get with scientists and 16 PS3s?

You get scientists trying to simulate the collisions of two black holes. To be honest it is all very complicated how they are going about it, if you feel the need to hurt your brain see for your self here.

Good luck getting to grips with the 'Gravity Grid'. I just think its nice to see the PS3 being used for something that isn't gaming, or an immense media experience... or curing cancer.

RIP HD-DVD (Acronyms are taking over)

2008-02-16T11:26:00.000-08:00

As the title suggests, the guys at Toshiba have decided to pull the plug on their HD-DVD campaign following a shock decision by Wal-Mart store to only cater for Blu-Ray discs and not distribute said HD-DVDs. This will allow Blu-Ray discs to be the next in line for home film technology as it will no doubt gently edge DVD out of the picture in the coming years.

Michael Bay, director of such films such as 'Transformers' backed Blue-Ray from the start and he had this to say - "Hahaha i told you all so!"

I don't Toshiba will be laughing about this as it is said to of cost them hundreds of millions of dollars to scrap production and step out of the format war.

Extension

2008-01-28T06:07:00.001-08:00

This is mainly just a little extension from the last post about the whole format war fandango.

Found out today that Woolworths have become the first high street retailer to fully halt selling HD-DVDs in store.

Reasons for this are because Blue Ray discs outsold HD-DVDs 10 to 1 over the christmas period. This has been linked to the PlayStation 3;

“The main reason is the success of Sony’s PlayStation 3 machine. Because it plays Blu-Ray discs, there are over three quarters of a million homes in the UK that can view the new high definition format. There is nowhere near that number of HD-DVD players around."

For more information go here

Also the rumours that the 80 gb PS3's are being dropped are continuing, they are said to be dropped and replaced with 120-140 gb machines bundled with dual-shock 3 controllers.

Blue moooooon

2008-01-26T08:04:00.000-08:00

Who remembers when DVDs first came out?
I do, i remember being like 'what the crap?! Whats wrong with video tapes?!' but in the end everyone turned to the DVD as the main means of home entertainment in terms of the film experience. The DVD was a lot more cutting edge than the chunky video tape and that can be identified easily just by visuals alone. The DVD had the capacity for more storage there fore more interactivity and content on, DVDs came with things such as 'interactive menus', 'special features' and 'bonus content'. Plus they were alot more reliable than the sage old tape, and one thing i personally loved, never having to rewind a film ^.^

The DVD has nestled in nicely in pretty much every home in the western world with DVD players converging with peripherals such as games consoles and computers.

But now on the eve of many other technological advance such as next-gen games consoles and LCD HDTV home entertainment systems, some clever sorts thought that the DVD has in fact become outdated and has for what ever reason seen the need to create a 1 up version of the DVD.
These come in the form of Blu-Ray Discs, and HD-DVDs.

Wikipedia (aka: God of all knowledge) defines blu-ray discs as;

"a high-density optical disc format for the storage of digital information, including high-definition video."

and HD-DVD as;

"is a high-density optical disc format designed for the storage of data and high-definition video."

Hmmm all seems rather similar, however both are locked in a 'format war' to determine which of the two formats will become the leading carrier for high-definition content to consumers.

After a quick google search i managed to find a few prices for the Blu-Ray players and HD-DVD players, because they are made by separate companies there would be no chance one would play the other...it would be like incest.

Any way a Blu-ray player would set you back from £899.99 to £300, infact the cheapest Blue Ray player at the moment is in fact the PlayStation 3, which still costs an arm and a leg.

And a HD-DVD player will set you back ermmm only around £500

A DVD player, £100 at the most. Bearing in mind, HD-DVDs and Blu-Ray discs are both also pricey compared to a normal DVD.

At this moment in time Blu-Ray is in fact on top with Blu-Ray players outselling HD-DVD players;

"New sales figures from the NPD group show Blu-ray taking nearly 93 percent of the market in the week ending January 12. Compare these figures to the week before Warner’s announcement, when there was a near 50-50 split between the two competing formats."

The reason for this is that distribution companies and studios such as Warner Bros. were in the process of deciding whether or not they would cater for both the formats and unfortunately for HD-DVDs they went with Blu-Ray. This gave other studios incentive to go exclusive for Blu-Ray as well as certain retailers. In other words, HD-DVD seems to have lost (for now, just in case they have a sudden explosion in sales and i would feel retarded for writing that, covering my you know), but being the ever nerdy gamer that i am it is possible to see how the format war with HD-DVD and Blu-Ray can have ricocheting effects on the console war between XBOX 360 and the PlayStation 3.
As Sony were the pioneers for the Blu-Ray discs the PS£ (haha see what i did there, unintentional as well) comes with a Blue Ray player built in already, how ever with the 360 Microsoft chose to go for HD-DVDs and instead of having it built in you have to shell out an extra 100 quid on an add on to play HD-DVDs, maybe thats why they system is so much cheaper than the PS3 but adding to the theory that the PS3 is 'future proof'. With a boost in sales as consumers are buying the PS3 as it is as said before the cheapest blue ray player on the market as far as im aware. Thus begging the question, will the 360 go blue? Apparently not, as Bill Gates says that discs are a thing of the past and that digital films will prevail. Sore loser.

To be honest ill still be buying DVDs regardless until i absolutely have to start getting blue rays, because as far as i can see theres no difference between a blue ray disc and an upscaled DVD to the untrained eye. Remember to get the full High-def experience you also need to buy a HD-TV as well...thus rendering you moneyless. Best bet is to just wait just like when the DVD first came out.

Hmmm...

In other news;

Apparently a third of all xbox's are prone to failures and sales of the systems have dropped by 2.3% which could be due to the dwindling 'halo effect'.

Sony are rumoured to be dropping their 80 gb version of the PS3 due to poor sales. This could be because people are just buying the cheaper 40 gb PS3s and then just upgrading their hard drives. This is because Sony have encouraged PS3 owners to 'mod' their systems, enabling them to buy hard drives and replacing it with the one already in the console. So you could go from 40 gb to 100 gb in ten minutes.

With the release of Grand theft auto 4 drawing ever closer (i believe it is being released in the UK during late april some time? Correct me if im wrong), news has arisen that there is to be 2 extra story lines exclusive for the 360 entitling 360 owners to hours upon hours of new game play. Lucky scamps.

Wahey!

Not much news in terms of Nintendo, their wii's are still selling well and questions about its longevity are still arising. And as for the Nintendo DS, thats the best selling gaming machine out.

So i give you a wiitarded (yes, i did just make that pun) comic.

Until next time.

Next Year.

2007-12-17T09:02:00.000-08:00

2007 has been a monumental year for video games and the industry thanks to the release of the next-gen consoles that have gained so much attention in the years that they have began to come into their own.
First we have the xbox 360 released in 2005 it already had a year lead on its competitors, a improvement on the xbox which was dominated by the previous Playstation 2, Microsoft kicked back with this ass kicking piece of hardware that was set to give the Playstation 3 a run for its money, and as every gamer knows, has. Microsoft have had their fair share of pickles, such as 'the red ring of death', known and revered by every 360 owner. 360's were breaking down all over the world and were gaining a reputation for poor reliability and to solve this Microsoft splashed out a billion pound on a three year warranty on all 360's. Microsoft have released many versions of their machines to cater for all gamers;
- The xbox 360 Core, later replaced by the xbox 360 Arcade
- The xbox 360 Premium
- The xbox Elite
The 360 has had its fair share of decent exclusive games in the form of Gears of War, BioShock and ermm that other one, Halo which have been crucial in the 360's walk to the top.

Then we had the wii, Nintendo's stab at next gen gaming, released in 2006 it revolutionised the industry and audience by enabling wireless 'virtual' controls as well as the coming of age of the 'casual gamer'. The wii sold, and continues to sell massively with its large appeal to family and more 'kiddy' related aspects that have proved highly profitable. Is it just a gimmick, and if so, when will people grow tired of it? Games such as wii sports seem to be keeping people entertained for eternity.

Then comes the Playstation 3 launched in 2005, to a lukewarm reaction many complained that it only really appealed to hard core gamers. People were more interested in the shenanigans that happened in the lines queuing up to purchase the ps3's such as shooting and people demolishing the machines in front of impatient customers. Bundled with its relatively weak selection of launch titles things haven't exactly gone to plan for Sony this year. Any one who says other wise is a filthy liar. Losing out on significant exclusives such as Grand Theft Auto 4 to the 360 have pushed many people off the fence and onto the 360's garden.

But what does 2008 have to offer us. Surely enough the wii will come into stock and keep on selling. February the 10th will be a crucial day for Nintendo with the release of 'Super Smash Bro Brawl'. 'Brawls' predecessor 'Super Smash Bros Melee' was the highest selling game on the gamecube and is sure to top charts in the new year with its ability to appeal to the hardcore and causal gaming crowd. IF people do ever get bored of 'wii sports' there appetites are certainly going to be enticed next year with 'wii fit' which is set to be the next big thing. The release of the ever loved 'Mario Kart' will do wonders, because well who doesn't love Mario Kart? And its going to be online, it makes me want to get a wii. Sure they don't have many huge titles to be looking forward to but, 'too many cooks can spoil the brooth', apparently.

2006 and 2007 have been great years for Microsoft with over 100 games to pick and choose from, many of which are critically acclaimed. But ever since the halo-hype has died down Microsoft have not let on too much as to what expect next year, big 360 exclusives are hard to name at this time. 'Halo Wars' is set to keep halo fans happy with its strategy based take on the Haloverse, but will it appeal to the more casual gamers? Ninja Gainden 2 will be released, and as good a game as it is, it is not a console seller. Other large scale titles will also be appearing on the PS3: Burnout Paradise, Devil May Cry 4, Grand Theft Auto 4, Soul Calibur 4, and (by the grace of God) Resident Evil 5. But Microsoft just might have an ace up their sleeve; they could unleash 'Gears of War 2' just in time to boost Autumn sales as well as 'Fable 2'.

2008 seems to be a lush year for Sony with many exclusives to rely on, such as Metal Gear Solid 4 which has practically been piggy backing the ps3 for a while now. This is the game lots of off the fence gamers have been patient and have a lot riding on this excellent looking game so, no pressure Konami. The second installment of the first person shooter Killzone is set for release as well, titled 'Killzone 2' (woah didn't see that coming) and by the looks of it, is going well. It has wowed many people but is this finally Sony's answer to Halo? Gran Turismo, the most prestigious of racers, will hopefully grace the system with its fifth installment by the end of the year; a huge advantage. Finally Final Fantasy (see what i did there?) will burst onto the scene and bust open Asia. All these and a new Tekken, chances of a new Jak and Daxter as well as a Fian Fantasy spin-off entitled 'Final Fantasy VS'. The futures bright for the ps3.

All that coupled with Sony's very own 'Home', a free social networking like Sims. Sure hardcore gamers may hate it, but social parasites that thrive off MySpace and other web 2.0 application will love it. If the wii has taught us any thing, that is that stupid names sell...and that casual gamers are a large aspect of the gaming market. Sony are looking to encapsulate this with other titles such as 'LittleBigPlanet''.

Slowly but surely developers are starting to use the ps3 s the lead platform when releasing multi-platform games such as 'Devil May Cry 4' and 'Burnout Paradise' as developers claim it’s much easier to restructure a ps3 game opposed to a 360 game. This means that a few games might just be technologically superior when played on a Sony console. Will developers somehow harness the mythical full potential of the Playstation 3's Cell and significantly edge out the 360’s visual capabilities? Let’s say that does happen and you happen to own both consoles. What would you rather buy the games on, the one that is visually superior or the one that has 'achievements', baring in mind that Sony 'Home' will be releasing player 'trophies' to cater for the OCD ridden lot of us in that you have to get every possible achievement.

From that Sonys future seems to be getting brighter by the day. Nintendo's may not look extravagant but one should never underestimate the selling power of a brand name. Think 'ipod'. Sony seems set to do better in the 360 feud as it is more of a multi purpose machine. Microsoft xbox live still runs rings around Sony's Playstation network which is set keep the 360 going steady along with exclusive content to games such as GTA4.

On paper the ps3 seems set to make up for what it failed to achieve in 2007-success. I'd put my money on the ps3 narrowly getting the advantage over the 360 in 2008.

Only time will tell....or fortune tellers.

In other news!

- A ps3 firmware update is set for tomorrow. This will enable DivX playback to counter the 360's.
- GTA4 is apparently related to violence against prostitutes...who knows why.
- Problems UK 360 owners have experienced when renting movies through Xbox LIVE have been "all but cleared up" according to Microsoft.
- wii 2 will apparently not use hand held controllers, instead they will just use sensory cameras located around the room.
- Sony dominating standalone blue-ray dvd sales
- PS3 soon to be able to link to phones to do God knows what.

The Interet founder and his thoughts.

2007-12-11T10:16:00.000-08:00

Chairman Markey, Ranking Member Upton, and Members of the Committee. It is my honor to appear before you today to discuss the future of the World Wide Web. I would like to offer some of my experience of having designed the original foundations of the Web, what I've learned from watching it grow, and some of the exciting and challenging developments I see in the future of the Web. Though I was privileged to lead the effort that gave rise to the Web in the mid-1990s, it has long passed the point of being something designed by a single person or even a single organization. It has become a public resource upon which many individuals, communities, companies and governments depend. And, from its beginning, it is a medium that has been created and sustained by the cooperative efforts of people all over the world.
The special care we extend to the World Wide Web comes from a long tradition that democracies have of protecting their vital communications channels. We nurture and protect our information networks because they stand at the core of our economies, our democracies, and our cultural and personal lives. Of course, the imperative to assure the free flow of information has only grown given the global nature of the Internet and Web. As a Federal judge said in defense of freedom of expression on the Internet:
The Internet is a far more speech-enhancing medium than print, the village green, or the mails.... The Internet may fairly be regarded as a never-ending worldwide conversation.[1]
The three crucial factors of the World Wide Web that got it where it is today are:
A. Universal linking: Anyone can connect to anyone, any page can link to any page B. Open Foundation for Information-driven Innovation C. Separation of Layers to allow simultaneous but autonomous innovation to occur at many levels all at once
One of the main reasons the internet has got where it is today is how easy it is to make a web page. Basically a web page is just standard HTML and the web is just a collection of all these web pages linked together
How ever
The Web is Not Complete
The Web is by no means finished.
The Web, and everything which happens on it, rest on two things: technological protocols, and social conventions. The technological protocols, like HTTP and HTML, determine how computers interact. Social conventions, such as the incentive to make links to valuable resources, or the rules of engagement in a social networking web site, are about how people like to, and are allowed to, interact.
So how do we plan for a better future, better for society?
We ensure that that both technological protocols and social conventions respect basic values. That Web remains a universal platform: independent of any specific hardware device, software platform, language, culture, or disability. That the Web does not become controlled by a single company -- or a single country.

My Response

This is a very insightful article from the man himself who has given us the internet. The entity that we all know and love. The basis of what he is saying is that the internet has got to where it is today because we, the users have been pushing it there. Simple knowledge, the introduction of web 2.0 and social networking has sparked a boom in the internet where every one who’s any one has their own web page enabling people to contact people any where on the planet as long as they have an internet connection.

But I ask you, do you not think that the internet will falter humanities progress? How often have you found yourself sitting down to do home work then slowly but surely dragging the curser over to the internet to type in www.myspace.com. I for one can say, many a time. Hell im surprised im not on Myspace now to be honest. With the internet come many advantages, such as a boost in communication, knowledge and technological design. But it also comes with its bad points. Such as the lack of proper conversation, Myspace comments, don’t exactly count, people losing their grips on reality as they act as hermits playing the latest expansion pack to the MMORPG World of Warcraft and downloading copyrighted content are some of the cons of the net.

So with the good comes the bad. No doubtedly the internet will constantly expand maybe with out us in the future.

Alex out!

This is getting silly

2007-12-05T09:28:00.000-08:00

Ever since both Microsoft's xbox 360 and Sony's Playstation 3 came out fanboys everywhere have been fighting (over the internet of course) over what one is better and at doing what etc etc.

As everyone in this field knows, at the moment 360 in my opinion has the upper hand on ps3 as it has such a wide selection of games and exclusives to choose from. The ps3 at the moment, hasn't. People who have one are just having to be patient. And if that wasn't bad enough the ps3 has lost some of its appeal by losing out on crucial exclusives such as the ever epic Grand Theft Auto franchise to the 360, effectively swaying people more to the 360. It gets worse for Sony. Rockstar have announced that the first 2 additional downloadable content packages for GTA4 will be exclusive for the 360.
:|

But the one thing that most critics agree on is that the ps3 is infact the superior media hub, this has been due to many reasons, from large, such as the ps3's blue ray disc player, to petty, such as the 360's cooling fan being louder that a swarm of very....very angry bumble bees.
Never the less the ps3 always had the upper hand. But yesterday, (or was it the day before, i forget) the 360 launched a firmware update enabling the 360 to support DivX codec as well as a Video On Demand service. This is one of Sony's problems as the ps3 at the moment only supports mp4 formated videos, those of which, no one seems to use.
Hmmmm.

But, PlayStation 3, is going digital.
PlayTV, is to be the new digital TV service released by Sony in early 2008.
It consists of a combined Freeview (DVB-T) TV tuner and Personal Video Recorder (PVR) for the PlayStation 3. Next gen or what.
This new fancy piece of kit will enable ps3 owners to watch, pause, and record live TV by recording the programmes to the console's hard drive. Conveniently, you'll also be able to transfer those recordings to your PSP handheld for watching while on the move. If yur into that kinda stuff.
Designed to reinforce the ps3 as the media hub king and reinstate its place in the family room.
Think of a sky+ box, that just happens to play games and music as well.

Is the Ps3 future proof?

Click the title for more.

The Future of Video Games?

2007-11-27T09:26:00.000-08:00

With next-gen gaming ignorance would have us believe that the gaming would obviously get better, and it has. Except for one thing.

Patches.

Patches are basically 'add ons' to games or a gaming system, it is a small piece of software that is designed to either update a game or fix problems. This includes fixings bugs, frame rate and graphic problems etc etc

Those without a next-gen console may be thinking, 'what the hell? I've never had to get one of those before!'. Thats because you haven't ever needed them, games were released FINISHED, glitch free! What you expect really. Thus comes the down side to patches. I fear that game developers will get lazy, release games 90% finished and then just 'patch' them up a few weeks later. Who the hell wants to shell out 40-50 quid on an unfinished game, and wait for it to be polished off. I for one, do not. It seems that the gaming industry are just taking us for fools. I just hope this does not become a regular occurrence.

This is certainly the case for many games on sale at the moment, Ubisofts much anticipated 'Assassin's Creed' (hailed as one of the iconic next-gen games to come) was released a few weeks back to much joy. How ever when gamers got their copy of it home and fired it up many told of how the game froze, the screen whited out, the frame rate was slow. This has considerably effected the games reputation in the media and amongst gamers and is quickly becoming one of the biggest disappointments in games of the year regardless of achieving global success in game charts. Ubisoft have reacted to these problems and are expectedly, 'releasing a patch'.
Why not just finish the game off properly...?

“We can confirm that we are actively working on a game update,” a Ubisoft spokesperson stated. “This update will help improve the stability of the game and will be released as soon as possible. In the meantime thank you for your ongoing feedback and patience.”

Hmmmm...

The same goes for many other games, such as Pro Evolution Soccer: 2008. Hailed for its remarkable game play. Unfortunately the "geniuses" at Konami seemed to forget the online mode. Sadly it is plagued with lag issues. You could be playing some one from America, running down the wing with ermm [insert football players name] determined to score cos your sick to death of them calling it soccer then BOOM! The game freezes for a second and the ball is in the back of your net. Fail. Again this is a severe thorn in the side as it makes online play almost unplayable with out wanting to smash your controller. Unless of course, your winning :)

"Konami Digital Entertainment has uncovered issues which can affect the online gameplay? quality of PES 2008 on PLAYSTATION 3. We are working at full strength to find a solution as quickly as possible. We sincerely apologise for this inconvenience. Further announcements will be made as soon as we have additional details."

That doesn't excuse the poor front cover.

What were they thinking :|

In other news

The 'wii' is selling on eBay for up to 400-600 £/$ , :O

The PS3 sales have apparently increased by 300%.

Blue Ray is outselling HD DVDs.

Dualshock 3 controllers have been released abroad. Rumble and sixAxis \o/

Until next time.

Nintendo- 'Wii are in trouble'

2007-11-17T07:09:00.000-08:00

It appears that Nintendo has become a victim of their own success.

Ive heard so many figures and stats from wii owners of how it has outsold PS3 by like 3 times in the first year. Yeah, well, HA. Nintendo have run out of wii hardware. Needless to say 'Sony' saw the wounded wii (alliteration ftw) and pounced on it like a cat and cut the price of the ps3.

Two weeks later PS3 have announced they have now sold 100, 000 PS3's in seven days! I mean i thought God creating the Earth in seven days was a big deal. But 100, 000! Damn.

This marks the PS3's first birthday and have sold 5.6 million units worldwide.

Click the title as usual for the full article.

In other news, the man behind the xbox and the 'Zune', has hinted at a new type of convergence for the two devices. So i guess thats good for all those 'Zune' fans out there, all 3 of you.

Comprehension for Vodafones 'MusicStation'

2007-11-17T07:06:00.001-08:00

Record labels are predicting that this month's launch of three new mobile phone music services will usher a return of rising sales after years of decline.

Apple's music-playing iPhone grabbed the headlines with its arrival in Britain last week. But music executives are just as excited about the new unlimited downloads service launched on Vodafone. Nokia, the world's largest maker of mobile phones, has also opened a digital music store here.

The world's biggest music company, Universal, is backing the MusicStation, the Vodafone service. Rob Wells, head of digital at Universal's international division, predicts the £1.99-a-week subscription service will have mass market appeal. "We are at a turning point in the UK," he says, predicting digital music sales here could offset falling CD sales within a year.

Global sales have been falling since 2000, down another 5% to $19.6bn (£9.4bn) last year, according to industry group IFPI. Although digital sales are rising fast, at a tenth of the total market, they have yet to make up for tumbling CD sales.

There are already indications that mobile music sales are picking up in the UK. The Orange UK network says its music sales jumped 70% over the past six months and it expects them to double by the end of 2007.

They expect the UK mobile music market to almost double from a predicted $83m this year to $156m in 2011. Four out of 10 UK mobiles can now play music.

There are hopes handsets will improve further from a music-playing perspective thanks to the iPhone. At £269 with an 18-month O2 contract, Apple's handset is not seen by the record labels as a big driver of revenues but it has been credited with raising the bar for phone manufacturers.

Jonathan Arber, analyst at telecoms experts Ovum, agrees, users want more simplicity in terms of being able to play what they buy across various devices. That is already happening with developments such as Sony Ericsson's Walkman phones, which synchronise with computers, he says.

1. What is it known as when companies mix 2 different applications such as phones and music players?

2. Will this service be good for CD sales or not? Why?

3. Who is this new service and new type of walkman phone primarily aimed at?

4. Why do you think CD sales have plummeted and sales of ‘digital’ mp3’s have boomed?

Playstation Threeeee

2007-11-13T12:40:00.000-08:00

As i have already said, recently i got my self a 60 gb ps3 over a xbox 360.
And damn i am glad.
As soon as i got it out of the box you could just see it was made of win. Yes, it was bloody heavy, but o so shiny.
Plugged it in and off i went! Well kind of, that was after i went to 'Currys' and bought an extra 4 scart ports i didn't need dressed as a..person who dresses really stupidly.

When i plugged it in and it all got to work properly, i noticed some thing, it would not stop updating itself! I sat there for a good ermm 15 minutes waiting for it to update with the latest firmware. Days later i found out that the update was released on that day i got the ps3 and i was lucky as other stupider ps3 owners had been waiting a year for it
:D
I plugged in my ipod into one of the four usb ports and within 10 minutes i had all my music on it ready to go. Tested a blue ray dvd i got with it. Came out in black and white :| as i do not have a HD TV. What a con i thought. But still...this machine can deflect bullets....
With the new firmware came a series of new themes and abilities to change the back ground to the XMB screen (XMB- Cross Media Bar, the colours of which change with the time of day :O if wanted that is). Plugged in pro evo 2008 and off i went! Game wise it is quality. What i expected and more. Online, it is quality, what i expected and more. I was online within the day, easily, sooo sooo easily! Downloading demos from future games, its the mutts nutts! So after a few hours of hardc0re gaming i thought, 'this is living, how can it get any better?'

Alas! The ps3 read my mind and i give you, 'Playstation Home'

Basically, what it is is, 'The Sims' online really. If any one has ever heard of the PC game 'second life' it is like that, but free :D
What you do is sign up and what not, create a character avatar, get given your own online 'apartment' (how sad, yet o so great is that) and you can customise your apartment, adding in furniture that you can buy from the 'Playstation Store' or gain by completing certain games. Same with the look of your character, you can change its wardrobe with different clothes from default options, the store and/or completing games. People who enter each other's "homes" can stream the host's music and videos from their HDD. Videos are viewed via virtual Sony TV's, such as the BRAVIA. As well, pictures can be viewed via a virtual picture frame.
At the time being on release you will be able to play things such as pool and bowling with your totally real and not fake online buddies. But in the future Sony looks to integrate cinemas and live events such as sports and even concerts.

Communication will also be a doodle. You can use blue tooth head sets, USB keyboards, on screen keyboards and use emoticons like on msn.

It is scheduled to be released in Spring 2008. And after that, you'll never need to leave your house again.

Click the title for Wikipedia's all knowing view on it.

HAIL!

What else will it be able to do!

2007-11-06T11:27:00.000-08:00

In my first 'non cat related post', i spoke of some of the marvels that the 'next gen' gaming consoles can in fact achieve and compute.

Jokingly in rival gaming arguements, i would regularly say how 'PS3 can deflect bullets' or 'PS3 cures cancer'. Little did i know that it does in fact do the latter.

Well it doesn't exactly cure cancer so to speak. But it does do its part to help.

Basically the PS3 uses a programme known as 'Folding at Home' which is a type of 'distributed computing'(a method for solving large complex problems by dividing them between many computers.), its is a project that harnesses the power of idle PS3's and uses them to generate computing power that is needed to 'crunch' small packets of data and then send them back over the internet to a central computer (holy moley!)

What does this have to do with cancer? Well its not only just cancer its malaria and Alzheimer's too, but F@H uses all this distributed power to examine protein folding and how it maybe linked to diseases.

"It is clear that none of this would be even remotely possible without the power of PSased our research capabilities by leaps and bounds," said Prof Pan
Hes a Prof, he must know what hes talking about.

Questions

The PlayStation 3 is considered as a part of new media technology, but what specific category does it fall into?

What is more powerful, the average home computer, or Sony’s PlayStation 3?

What does ‘Folding At Home’ Consist of?

For more detail, and probably a article that makes more sense on this, just click the title.

In other news (what the hell, you cant underline o.O )

Any way, again in my 'first non cat related post' i said how i didn't know whether to get a ps3 or a xbox 360.
I got a comment from close friend Michael Bond saying how i should get a xbox, so being a good friend, i did the opposite and got a ps3.

Will keep you posted as to what its like in the future.

Holy Mother of God :o

2007-11-04T08:34:00.002-08:00

Last lesson Mr White spoke of how he can see the 'school desk' becoming redundant, replaced with a more technological one.

Will this do?

Really Cool Microsoft Technology - Watch more free videos

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'Microsoft Surface' For The Win!

Breaking News!

2007-10-30T11:49:00.000-07:00

Who remembers the SNES (Super Nintendo Entertainment System)?! No one? Well any way, heres me thinking about 'next gen' gaming and how 'connecting with the internet' was such a vital part of it, that i never knew a SNES could do it. Click the title for more information.

The Nintendo SNES.

What a machine.

First non cat related post!

2007-10-30T11:09:00.000-07:00

I have decided that tonight shall be the night of my first post on actual media studies...things.
This has nothing to do with Mr White saying in media today 'he wasn't happy with the blogs' or because Joe's just happens to be looking full of text.
It is because, im in a pickle.

'New Media Technology', mostly everyone on the planet (bar a few) most probably know what it is with out knowing what it is. Confused?
Don't be, New Media Technology really is a bit of a doodle. In short, in relation to the name NEW media technology is basically all the media related products that are being released in this and upcoming day and ages.
It is the newest of the new, the creme de la creme of products.
And its burning holes in our pockets.
Unfortunately, nothing can remain NMT forever. A new phone will come out, you'll be like 'wowze wow' and hop on out to shell out 300 pound for it and within weeks an even better phone will be released, an 'upgrade', one that makes bubbly noises as you flick it open. Thus making you feel a bit cheated out, and some gullible fools (or rich people) may even buy the upgrade to keep up to date. Carrying on with the medias vicious money making circle.
As new as something seems, give it time it will soon be yesterdays news.
Take for instance the old video game 'pong', that was at a time considered NMT, now look at it. R3tr0.

For example, gaming systems. For 6 years now me and my playstation 2 have lived in harmony, i have got ALOT of play out of it and frankly, its getting old. In 2001 there was no choice whether i should buy a xbox or ps2.
But now Microsoft and Sony are at logger heads as both the 'next gen' systems are now out. Many many years in the making Sony have finally released their (quite frankly overpriced) long awaited playstation 3 shortly after Microsoft's release of the xbox 360.
And as this is new media technology i am inclined to mention. These 'gaming systems' are no longer JUST gaming systems. These babies do everything!
You can;
Play music from mp3 files, by plugging in your mp3 player of choice *cough* ipod.
Download TV shows, movies and music videos from 'internet market places' such as xbox lives market place, straight to watch on your gaming system.
Chat with people all over the world via a head set or if you want to push the boat out, with a web cam!
For all you bored teenagers out there, go on msn!
You can play online with any one else with the same game and system as you who also has a account on line, which basically means theres is always a new challenge everytime you connect to the net. Which is such a good idea as it means an increased longevity with games. Another longevity factor is being able to download additional levels, maps, songs and characters for games which means that some games Microsoft's 'Gears Of Wars' for instance, will never seem to end.

To be frank, you never need to leave the house.

Hang on, isn't that basically everything a computer does? I hear you cry. The answer is yes and that is the beauty of it. These 'next gen' gaming systems have taken such a huge leap from the days of the nes and Nintendo 64 and all i want to know is how can they possibly get any better?!
Virtual gaming?! O wait no, the Nintendo wii has that covered. A gimmick yes, but a good one at that. Sony have even dabbled in it creating a 'six-axis' playstation 3 controller where you move the controller and it moves the view in the game etc.
Ermmm virtual reality is the next logical step. Imagine being able to put a head set on and get sucked into a virtual world of gaming where you can do anything! Is this so hard to believe now days, especially with the interactivity of some games coming out at the moment. Take for instance Red Octanes 'Guitar Hero', why learn to play a real guitar when you can just do that, i did ;). Ubisoft's 'Assassins Creed', 4 years in the making. What have they done in that four years? They have made an incredibly cinematographic(is that a word?) good looking game, and have thrown in one of the extremes in interactivity. You can with your character interact with anything in the environment that sticks out by 2 inches. phw0ar.
I could go on for ages, and i might, sometime in the near future.

But yes, the pickle. As great as these new systems sound i can only get one. And i have NO idea what one to get playstation or 360 :|
for what you get in the systems it is expected that they are to be quite highly priced, but damn. Any pointers in the right direction will be appreciated :)

Until one of them can make a cup of tea, im torn.

Now im finished this little diary style rant and off to talk to my chums on web 2.0 ;)

Click the title for a comic i was bored enough to get my friend to find

Buckets of lol!

2007-10-12T04:20:00.000-07:00