Everything is Overrated

Top 15 most overrated bands…

• The Rolling Stones
• U2
• Coldplay
• The Libertines
• Radiohead
• The Beatles
• Red Hot Chili Peppers
• Fall Out Boy
• The Eagles
• Foo Fighters
• Nirvana
• Green Day
• The Killers
• Lostprophets
• Paramore

That is all…

Race Driver GRID preview

Back in the day I used to play loads of different racing games. Looking back now, most of them were probably fairly shity, but at least they were something to keep me occupied. Today i’m more inclined to play a First Person Shooter than anything else, however the other day I stumbled across the demo for “Race Driver GRID”.

The game follows on from Race Driver 1, Race Driver 2, Race Driver: Modern Warfare and Race Driver: Extraction Point. Once again it is developed by Codemasters, who until they released DiRT last year held pretty high acclaim in my books. I only had to play the DiRT demo for about 10 minutes to realise that it was a steaming pile, so naturally I was a bit wary of GRID.

Fortunately though it looks like Codemasters have really got there act together for this game. Its good to see that British developers are still up there with the very best.

The first thing that struck me about this game was the graphics. When turned up to MAX the textures and lighting look spectacular. Sadly though, I imagine this game with have the sort of system requirements that will make you cry into your pants.  Running on an 8800GT I got an average of 45FPS (MAX settings @ 1280×1024, No AA).

In the demo you get the choice of 3 races. Take to the European circuit in a BMW touring car, race around an American street circuit in a Ford Mustang or try you skills at drifting in Japan.

Personally I didn’t find the drifting to be much fun, possibly because I was crap at it. Certainly though the idea is well realised, and it is possible to pull off some very cool looking drifts.

Taking on a street circuit in an American muscle car sounds really cool… and it is! There was a real sense of speed around the tight track, where even small mistakes would be punished with a trip into the barrier.

Out of the three races the Touring cars was the best. The handling was smooth and the track was just plain excellent to drive around. It was challenging, but importantly not frustrating.

Unlike a lot of other racing games the AI is GRID is actually very good. The driver don’t just race you, they race each other. On several occations I would see two drivers battling to out for position, the result being that one of them would end up in the gravel trap.

Crash damage looks very realistic and actually affects the way your car handles rather than being purely cosmetic. The actual crashes themselves look very good, rather the just bouncing off walls, cars react to collisions in a life like manner.

Based solely on this very short demo, i’d say GRID is lining up to be one of the best racing games this year.

Ricky Gervais to star in GTA IV

If the Telegraph is to be believed, Reading born comedian Ricky Gervais is set to star in the Grand Theft Auto IV. He will perform three minutes of new material as well as jokes from his recent sell out tour.

“It’s a first - which always interests me,” he said. “It’s seriously a big deal, though. Games have outsold Hollywood for the past few years so it’s nice to be a small part of that.”

Grand Theft Auto IV goes on sale on the 29th April. Estimates suggest that the game will take $400 million in its first week alone.

Medal of Honor Airborne (PC)

Developed by EA, Medal of Honor Airborne is the 5^th game in the series to come to the PC. Despite using the very good Unreal Engine 3 this game has “bad” written all over it, with only a handful of redeeming features.

Like most of the other Medal of Honor games you once again take on the role of an American soldier. Fighting alongside your allies from the 82^nd Airborne you take part in various missions including the invasion of Normandy and Operation Market Garden.

The first mission sets a benchmark for the game, and yet you very rarely see any improvement on this. It’s almost like the developers got bored early on, fumbled together some poorly designed maps and gave the player the exact same objectives to complete on each one, such as… blow up a tank, destroy enemy radio, blow up another tank, take out the sniper etc…

It’s a shame because the Unreal Engine has a lot of potential, which has been realised to some extent in games like Gears of War and Rainbow Six Vegas. However it’s difficult to see anything new with Airborne. The games main selling point is that you parachute into every level, but even this seems like a gimmick which doesn’t serve to affect the gameplay in any way, shape or form. The idea seemed to be that by choosing your start point you could complete your objectives in any order. However due to the small size of that maps this doesn’t make the game seem any less linear.

Fortunately for Airborne the actual gun play is very good. The weapons feel powerful and there is always plenty of ammo lying around. Although for the most part this is due to the stupid AI of your team mates, who seem intent on getting themselves killed as quickly as possible. Sadly this really screws over the “realism” factor as you continue to win the battle despite your allies being cut down quicker than the Amazon rainforest.

In stark contrast to your allies, the enemy AI is actually reasonably good, although the occasional Nazi will decide that his weapon is better used as a baseball bat rather than a gun. Unfortunately some clown at EA thought it would be a good idea to give the Nazis telescopic X-ray vision, allowing them to both see and shoot you from about four miles away. When combined with an unfair checkpoint save system this really adds to the frustration which comes bundled with the game. At times you feel you’re trying to beat the actual game engine rather than the Nazis.

Graphics wise the game is very good especially with textures and lighting. The sound is also half decent, but it’s nothing that hasn’t be heard before.

It’s almost a blessing that this game is so short, six missions to be exact, meaning you should be able to complete it in around six hours. Although by the time you get to the end you’ll certainly be wanting that time back.

Anti human nature.

The Advertising Standards Agency (ASA) has once again been doing its very best to prove what a massive joke it really is. Following just two complaints they were able to ban a TV advert for the video game “Stranglehold”.

As if in an attempt to compete with the anti-liberal BBFC, the ASA stated their reason for the ban was that the advert, “suggested that it was honourable to seek revenge and that violence was an acceptable solution to a situation.” What the ASA failed to realise is that far more graphics adverts for films are regularly shown on TV.  This seems to further emphasise the fact that these associations are not only anti-free speech, but totally bias against video games in any form. Next they’ll be trying to ban Mario because it encourages you to take magic mushrooms!

These claims by the ASA also create a contradiction so huge that it could cause a rift in the time-space continuum. If humanity creates violent entertainment and people go out and buy it, then surely this is what people want. Evidently we see some kind of strange inconsistency here, where humans ban the very things they create. The very fact the ASA exists also seems to suggest that humans are incapable of making decisions for themselves and therefore need someone else to do it.

Censorship just doesn’t work…

Richard Brunstrom is a Genius

For those of you who don’t know (or care), Richard Braunstrom is the Chief Constable of the North Wales Police. He recently made comments saying how “ecstacy is less dangerous than aspirine” and that drugs could be legalised within 10 years.

Needless to say he recieved a good roasting from the popular press - in particular the Daily “we hate everyone” Mail. For some reason people seem to think its immoral and irresponsible to legalise drug use. But if its not hurting anyone, other than the user, what is the big problem? Tabacco and alcohol are no less a drug than ecstacy or heroin, and yet they are readily and cheaply available.

Allowing only certain drugs to be legal seems entirely inconsistent. Indeed who has the right to say what chemicals I can and cannot put into my own body? Personally I wouldn’t take drugs, but I wouldn’t want to stop another person from doing so, unless they were physically hurting another individual through their actions.

There are many advantages to legalising drugs, and at the moment I can think of no disadvantages.

• If drugs are legal they can be heavily taxed, just like alcohol or tabacco.
• The drugs would be manufactured by major corporations (like Sony or Shell Oil). These companies are trusted to produce a good quality product.
• Making drugs legal puts the drug dealers out of work.
• Reduced risk of HIV/AIDS (or other disease) through dirty needles etc…

Ultimately it should be the decission of the individual and not some guy in a suit telling me what to do…

Fascists…!

(insert title here)

Just realised that I haven’t written anything since October. Its not that i’ve got bored, I just simply haven’t had the time since being at Uni. However now that the Xmas holidays are upon us I should have time for a few “good” posts.

However, as I write this I can feel my eyes beginning to shut. On top of that I really need a drink (non-alcoholic - unless there is a water shortage, I which case i’ll be having a beer) and the regular 2am dump.

**More rambling**

The McCanns are gay.

According to the BBC, and probably some other sources, the McCann family have used some of the “Find Madeleine” fund to pay for their mortgage….. the Bastards.

USSR vs England

17th October 2007.

USSR 2-1 England.

England:

Robinson, Richards, Ferdinand, Campbell, Lescott (Lampard 79), Wright-Phillips (Downing 80), Gerrard, Barry, Cole (Crouch 80), Rooney, Owen.
Subs Not Used: James, Shorey, Luke Young, Neville.

USSR:

Gabulov, Alexei Berezutsky, Ignashevich, Vasili Berezutsky (Torbinsky 46), Aniukov, Zurianov, Semshov, Bilyaletdinov, Zhirkov, Arshavin (Kolodin 90), Kerzhakov (Pavluchenko 58).
Subs Not Used: Malafeev, Pogrebniak, Shirokov, Sychev.

How can a world supposedly “world class” England side lose to the Soviet Union. I don’t know about anyone else but i haven’t heard of any of the players in the Russian squad. Fair enough Rooney did score an excellent goal, but that is not excuse to sit back in the second half. We should be pressing forward trying to score a 2nd, 3rd or 4th goal. A team like England should be beating the Russians 3 or 4-nil.

Frankly I wouldn’t be surprised if we don’t qualify, and based on that performance we really don’t deserve to be in the competition.

RIAA sue single Mum for £108,000

In a bid to make themselves even less popular the RIAA (Recording industry of America) have just sued an American single Mum for £108,000. They claim that she shared just 24 songs online using Kazaa, making the fine seem rather excessive.

As far as i am concerned the RIAA can go and fuck themselves.

SOURCE