What is this?, "piss off the Paddy week?"

Right so after an eight month hiatus I've started... well attempted to DJ once again via Second Life. Had my audition on Saturday. Got the job despite a few stream problems.

Had a full DJ set for two hours that same Saturday night and again encountered stream problems.

Last night I attempted to do an impromptu set but again stream problems dashed that. Got the stream working again after an hour and a half.

Maybe streams don't like Irish people...... Either that or the other DJ's are scared of me being an absolutely amazing DJ.

Nah I'm not that egotistical.... Or am I?

Free plugs.

And no, I'm not talking about the items designed to make your electronic devices work.

No. I have decided to plug the club in Second Life that I usually hang out at and shall be hopefully DJing at regularly.

Here's their blog: http://exodusclub.blogspot.com/

Here's their forums: http://exodusrockclub.forumup.co.uk/

Here's the SLurl in which you can find them provided you have Second Life inistalled: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Four/49/80/24/?title=Exodus%20Rock%20Club

Ok, I'm done. There, happy?

When I'm not so lazy, I'll change those addresses into actual links.

R.I.P Paul Gray

I woke up yesterday morning and was greeted with a text from a friend of mine telling me of the death of Paul Gray, the bassist from Slipknot.

Having just got my internet back up and running, I've been reading various articles and unfortunately it's true. I'm not altogether sure as to what happened but to be honest I don't even really want to know. Unfortunately what's done is done.

A day of Slipknot videos was on 'Scuzz', a metal station on Sky Digital paying tribute to the 38 year old.

38.... So so young and especially from someone seemingly having so much energy about them from live performances.

I had the privilge of seeing Slipknot live and witnessed them in all of their energy and devotion. Sure, Slipknot's music may not have been everyone's cup of tea but you can't deny that they brought their heart and soul onto the stage every time.

R.I.P Paul Gray. You will be missed.

Alan Wake: Review

You play as Alan Wake. A troubled writer on supposed vacation with your wife until she whips out a typewriter, you go off and throw a hissy fit while she gets taken by the dark and your search for your wife begins. Just another typical day for a best selling author.


SYNOPSIS

Bright Falls is your choice of destination for your holiday with your loving wife Alice as you seem to be encountering some sort of writers block and need to get away from it all.

The storyline goes that you have to get a key from the local diner but you get a key from a mystery woman shrouded in funeral clothes to a lake that..... *dun dun dun*, doesn't exist. There you discover that your wife has another agenda when you discover that she has brought with her, a typewriter in the hope that you can find inspiration from the surroundings.

You then get pissed off, walk outside and Alice, your wife, starts screaming and you rush back to discover that she's been taken from the darkness... of which she has a terrible fear of.

You wake up after a week long blackout in a car accident and have to make your way through the forest fighting off strange enemies possessed by the dark with a couple of bullets and a flashlight. Lather rinse and repeat.

VISUALS

Visually Alan Wake is superb and the lighting effects in the water are unbelievable when you come across them first on the barge that brings you to the small village of Bright Falls.

Once you start the game for the first time you are prompted to adjust your display settings. It might be worth keeping the display low but not too low as later on in the game you come across brighter and brighter flashlights and mixed with bright lamps it can get a bit difficult to see where you're going sometimes.

The vast terrain and general surroundings are absolutely stunning and is a huge open world experience as you delve further and further into the great unknown.



Cutscenes are very very well detailed and even better when viewed in HD.


AUDIO


The sound quality in the game is amazing from the voice to the soundtrack. Great voice acting and the various whispers in the wind while you're making your way through the dark forest is very very eerie especially when you've got the sound turned up and running through a surround sound system.

The various distorted voices of your enemies A.K.A "The Taken" are haunting too especially the mindless babble from some of them.


GAMEPLAY


So how does it play? Well, it plays very very well. Controls are very fluid and quite responsive. Overall gameplay is good but a little bit repetitive at times.

Walk for ages, get ambushed from behind, blast torchlight to weaken enemies, shoot until they explode into fireworks. Repeat by a billion times.

The game lost a bit of its suspense at times when you could pinpoint the exact moment when the camera would pan around to show enemies coming at you from behind. The first couple of times I got a bit of a fright especially when there's a ton of enemies coming at you from all angles when all you have is a torchlight and 4 bullets.

At times Alan Wake reminds me of Resident Evil 4 with its claustrophobic nature with tons of enemies coming at you from all angles with little or no ammo.



At times it's a challenge when there's a swarm of enemies after you while you attempt to get to your safe haven..... i.e a street lamp while you brandish your slow recharging flashlight with no battery packs in the hope that they'd piss off.

The game itself is good bar a few things:

1) It's too repetitive. Walk through darkness, get attacked, push buttons, start generators etc.

2) The game is too short. 6 chapters is all the game has. Bit annoying seeing as the game took an age to be released. There will be DLC for it but why not include it into the game? They had the time.... Damn money hungry bastards.

And finally my one big gripe with the game.



Why?? Just why? These coffee thermoses add nothing to the game at all yet I couldn't resist just collecting them.

Anyway moving onto the positives.

1) Expansive map

2) Visually amazing

3) Sound is superb

4) Brilliant storyline

5) Claustrophobic feel when you've no ammo really adds a superb aspect to the game.

6) Pieces of manuscript you encounter on the way.


VERDICT

Overall it is a good game but it's extremely disappointing that the game is so short. Yes, there'll be DLC soon but I don't understand why the game couldn't have these already included.

- Gameplay is repetitive.
- Collectable coffee thermoses adds nothing to the game.

+ Stunning visuals.
+ Sound quality.
+ Storyline.

Overall I'd give it a 7/10.

I bought it and wish I had just rented it but had no idea how short it really was going to be.

RIP Ronnie James Dio

I was just browsing through a message board I regularly use and came across a thread about Ronnie James Dio and I was shocked to read that he had died.

I was never a huge fan I've got to be honest but rock has lost a true idol.

Heaven and Hell were due to support Iron Maiden later on this year in Dublin. Very sad time for all of his fans and family.

RIP.

Games, their price and downloadable content.

One thing that really annoys me about games these days is that games seem shorter and developers seem more keen on focusing on downloadable content (DLC).

I bought Alan Wake which is an Xbox exclusive and paid €50 for it.

It's a good game yes but it's ridiculously short. However there will be DLC available soon for it but DLC really is a hidden payment hidden behind flashy Microsoft points.

So basically that's €50 for a short enough game + €25 or maybe more for a few more episodes via DLC.

Seems a bit steep to me.

Why oh why must we continue to fork out for DLC? Yes, it's a business at the end of the day but we've already forked out a hefty sum for the original game in the first place. Why not just stick the extra episodes in along with the game?

Or include them in a special edition and charge €15 extra?

Pure greed from Remedy and Microsoft with this game. They're not the only ones. Oh of course not but this is the most recent example of money hungry glutens.

Microsoft offer a great service with the Xbox and Xbox Live.

Just a little bit of a rant.

Alan Wake

Ok, I've purchased Alan Wake, played a little bit of it and I'll post up my review soon.

Watch this space.

Youtube video sizing

I should really figure out how to make the YouTube videos smaller so they don't crush the borders on either side.... Ah well.

I'm not even sure if anybody's even reading but meh.

Friday Tunes

Yes the weekend is once again upon us. What better way to kick off the weekend with a selection of tunes to put you in the weekend mood.







And of course, no Friday would be complete without this.



Kinda makes me wanna have one of these to be honest.

Infectious tunes.

Wee bit bored so I thought I'd share some of the tunes that have been getting a constant play on my mp3 player over the last couple of days to anybody on the interweb who stumbles across this wee blog.

Anyway. Came across this song on the radio the other day and I had to get it. Incredibly catchy so I downloaded the album alongside it.
The one track that stands out for me is this though.

Oh yeah, the band is Plan B and the song is called "Stay Too Long"



I've also been listening to a lot of Dubstep recently. For those who have no time for the specifics then Dubstep is just really heavy and low bass. A bit like the "brown noise" from that South Park episode.

So I decided to pick up Ministry Of Sound's new compilation album, "The sound of Dubstep".
There's a lot of really cool remixes and original songs on this but the two stand out songs for me are, "Bass head" by Bassnectar and the Calvin Harris dubstep remix of "I'm Not Alone".

**DISCLAIMER**

I am not responsible for those who may end up destroying their underwear having listened to the following two dubstep songs.





Away from all that dance music, I've also rediscovered the band that got me into punk and rock in general thanks largely to my dad..... The Clash.

I'm still of the opinion that they've made no bad song in their time as a band.

Anyway my two favourite Clash tunes that I've been playing on my mp3 player are.....





That's it really.

Until next time.....

Having meatloaf for dinner.

I'm cooking some meatloaf for myself this evening for dinner and it got me thinking.

I have now decided to make meals which either have artists or songs named after it.

Today is the turn of Meatloaf and so I give you this.