Podcast Book Recommendations
Continuing a recent trend of podcast book recommendations, I’ve just picked up copies of “This Is Your Brain on Music: Understanding a Human Obsession” by Daniel J. Levitin and “Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain” by Oliver Sacks. The subject matter should be rather obvious from the titles.
I’m currently working on “This Is Your Brain On Music” in the garden at the moment and it wafts between somewhat heavy going music theory and general background on various brain related theories and observations. It’s an odd mix of musical definitions such as semi-tones, overtones, and fundamental frequencies, alongside optical illusions. Still, I now know about the white and black keys on a piano, something I never did before.
I wouldn’t say it’s fascinating reading yet. Some parts are more interesting than others and oftentimes it feels like a random wandering through a collection of the author’s thoughts, branching off into related areas before swooping back to his main topic.
Definitely a bit off the beaten track for my normal reading tastes.
A Tale Of Two Zombie Books
I love zombies. They make anything better in my opinion. Vampires, not so much.
A while back I was listening to a podcast when one of the podcasters commented that he was reading a couple of zombie-themed books. I immediately took interest and noted the titles and authors. Shortly after that they arrived from Amazon.
Unfortunately one of the books is in a larger format than typical paperbacks, something I find really aggravating as they don’t fit neatly on the bookshelf and, as far as I know, aren’t always ‘obvious’ from the online price. Publishers, stop with the mixed format sizing, please – I don’t get the need for it.
I’ll comment upon the two books in the order that I read them. There wasn’t any real preference for one over the other at the time, ultimately I just found one before the other on my bookshelf.
Patient Zero by Jonathan Maberry
“Zombies – The New Bio-Weapon”
This is an action adventure thriller that might as well be made into a Hollywood summer blockbuster – it’s certainly written like one. Super action hero with a troubled past who can put down a group of top military specialists – the best of the best – inside 5 seconds, that kind of guy. He’s sooooo awesome, /deep sigh. Also, mysterious boss dude running the show that can get the team whatever they need. English bird as love interest. That kind of thing.
The plot appeals to me though. Terrorist scientists have created a means of infecting people, turning them into mindless zombies. Release one such weaponised human person and it spreads like wildfire into a pandemic. On the other side a super-secret US military organisation are trying to counter this plot against the US. Fight.
It’s all very gung-ho, whoop-ass action, told from the good and bad guy perspectives. As it says on the back of the book, “Patient Zero is a heartstopping techno-thriller, a coming together of 24 and 28 Days Later on the page.”
World War Z by Max Brooks
“An Oral History Of The Zombie War”
This is a much better paced and nuanced telling of a zombie world war. Told in the style of interviews with a great many different survivors it covers the initial outbreak in China, the spread across the world, the retreat, the fightback and the conclusion of the 10-year struggle. Stories come from all manner of people around the world, from South Korea to survivors in nuclear submarines. From Joe Ordinary to Military Pilot via Astronaut on the Space Station.
Each survivor tells their story in short individual chapters that together build a picture of events across the entire timeline. And their stories don’t interlock (except for a few character references when they’re made more famous during the blight), so you’re never attached to a character for too long. Each unique tale never outstays its welcome: the character is introduced, interviewed and his viewpoint explained before moving on to the next.
I found some tales more interesting than others. Musings on North Korea and the tough decisions that have to be made by governments were fascinating. Being individually quite short I was often left wondering what happened next or how some of the gaps were filled, but that wasn’t always the point.
Grumble, Mumble, “I’m lonely… :(” Argh!
I was reading a piece on BoardGameNews about regrouping a game group. The writer was complaining about having around 50 people on a game group mailing list but nobody was actually bothering to get involved. He was struggling to get even 4 people to turn up to gaming events. Out of Fifty!!! My first thought was why on earth are these people even on a list if they can’t be bothered going occasionally? He said that they still wanted to be on the list and receive notifications of events. Why? They’re lurking and not contributing anything by not going along. Get involved or get out I’d say.
Then he said, “To make up for it, I have been attending other local game groups, but my wife would prefer that I have people over to game rather than going out since she gets lonely.” Because she ‘gets lonely’?! Aarrgghghh!! Find something to do or make some friends, woman! Obviously I know nothing of their situation but this just frustrated the hell out of me. I know I’d have very little tolerance for somebody telling that to me!
But hey, I’m not terribly tolerant as most folks well know.
End of whinge.
Voice Actors and a Blast From The Past
I was watching a promo video trailer for an upcoming Castlevania game on Xbox last night. It clearly had a cast of characters as the first voice I heard was that of Patrick Stewart. I instantly took note and heard another I knew, Robert Carlyle. As the video progressed more characters and their accompanying voice actors were introduced. Then up popped the name “Sally Knyvette,” which gave me immediate pause. “I know that name,” I thought.
I’d not recognised the voice this time so the brief voice clip was gone but I was struck enough to go check the memory that had been nudged out of my mind: Jenna Stannis from the extremely old BBC SciFi series Blake’s 7. And he scores! That’s a series I only watched when it was first released on VHS some years back, and one I’ve recently partially revisited on DVD. Seems like she’s only done the odd thing here and there since.
Prince of Persia: Finally Finished, Finally Free!
I had another bash at the final boss in Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands last night. I’d tried repeatedly previously and left it for another time. Another series of attempts and I just couldn’t figure out a reliable method of avoiding a particular attack. I had the rest of the long pattern memorised after umpteen attempts, but this particular swipe would more often than not tag me, fling me sideways and do enough damage that I could take maybe one of these hits before the next would kill me.
Why?
Because my character was a basic level 1 dude with next to no upgrades because of that sh!tty obvious XP buglette that’s been affecting me all the way through the game.
After another umpteen attempts I had a look at a video online. That dude got repeatedly twatted by the boss but because his health bar was so high it didn’t matter. His other upgrades meant he had a superior chance of refilling his health too. A double whammy against me.
Eventually I was successful though, through gritted teeth I completed the final steps of the battle. You know, those birdy-num-num jumps are just daft and I really don’t like them. Wall running and transforming surfaces feels under my control. Jumping from bird to bird is merely timed button pressing and doesn’t feel at all substantial.
Anyway, it’s all over, and I decided to sell the game on rather than wait to see if any DLC comes along. I mopped up a few Achievements and noted several that were impossible for me to gain as they required levelling up that actually works. At least when there’s an Achievement for using the LiveCamera that’s encouragement to try the h/w and I have no problem with those sort of Achievements. An incredibly obvious buglette that prevents access to some successes is frustrating however.
Despite all my moaning I fair enjoyed the game. Like all these games it’s ultimately linear, but this one feels especially so. Turns out there are some advanced combat moves I never knew I could do, but luckily that aspect (my least favourite for this style of game) was never onerous.
Prince of Persia: The Final Sands
I’ve been mentioning this buglette in Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands a few times lately. Well, the final battle, and the game has levelled me down to level 1 again. FFS. I amp up the health storage on the rare occasions that it lets me and it keeps resetting the damn thing.
This is super frigging annoying.
In fact an awful lot about the game irritates. The final big room you have to ascend has some seriously frustrating aspects that seem very random whether it works or not, so it’s tough to proceed. Tough enough that after traversing the entire game without too much trouble I’m suddenly repeating the same sequence 50 times hoping this time I’ll get it right as I’m not clear on what I’m doing wrong all of a sudden.
“Exaggeration much,” you say? Errr, no, not at all (give or take 3 or 5 or so). I actually had to mute the sound because the repeated whining from the Prince and the response from the Djinn companion got really, Really annoying. The checkpoint comes just before a cut-scene (fair enough, you need a reminder of what to do if you’re returning after a break), but they coulda/shoulda put the final couple of spoken sentences inside the cut-scene so it too gets skipped on attempt #38.
Then I had to climb up somewhere but deactivate/activate a power in quick succession. I don’t know what was causing me to fail but it seemed like I made it one in every 15 goes. Of course I’d then fail at the next segment of the jumping sequence seconds later and be sent all the way back down again for that dreaded spoken bit.
After getting through that I hit another bit where I swear it was random which direction I’d jump so I’d entirely miss a pillar 80% of the time without being able to tell because of the sodding camera angle.
I’ve just got to beat the final boss now and it’ll all be over. Despite my moaning and whinging I’ve fair enjoyed the game. It’s tremendously linear and the decent platforming puzzles are few and far between (a clock type system being among the highlights). I have no desire to go through it again though.
Prince of Persia: More Forgotten Sands
Argh, it’s done it again. A while ago I noted that the Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands game features a fundamentally broken skill upgrade system. It ‘forgot’ my selected upgrades from XP gained through the game. Sort of appropriate given the sub-title of the game, The Forgotten Sands, don’t you think?
It managed to ‘fix’ itself by deleting the few upgrades I had been allowed to select and resetting my XP score to zero. This was easily half-way through the game when I was starting to need those little bonuses. Gee, thanks game.
So I chose a few new upgrades … and then logged into the game the other night and found the same flaw had struck: selected upgrades partially lost, XP reset, here we go again. But this time … right at what appears to be the end of the game!!!!! I got to a level, The Final Climb it says, which suggests such anyway.
At this point I’m usually scraping through the battles with chuff all health. I had to battle the bigger monsters in a ‘get hit once more, reload from start of battle checkpoint’ mode. I was chugging my rewind time orbs (what little I have thanks to being downgraded) to correct those little errors when I rolled this way or that to avoid a charging bull type monster and got his by his compatriot, instant death.
Combat isn’t that challenging. It looks good and plays simply enough which suits me fine as that has never been what I’ve been interested in these games for. But it irks me that there are all these powers that I just don’t get to use because the game keeps turning them off.
This seems like such a fundamental problem I am aghast that it can slip through the QA process. I’ve been afflicted with it from near the beginning of the game, twice now in a single run-through. I’m imagining there are more difficulty levels unlocked upon completion and I’m wondering about speed runs and such. If these require a boosted hero then they’re not something I can really tackle with the game so broken.
Very annoying.
And speaking of annoying, OMG the frigging camera angles sometimes… these make it really, really awkward to make some jumps as you’re never quite sure which direction the game wants you to push the stick in to accomplish something. Very occasionally the view is highly restrictive, to the point that I didn’t know where I was going, and quite often the view is nigh on unadjustable, especially when you’re hanging off something.
I do like the game though – I keep coming back to it. I even turned it off for the night recently, wandered away for a few minutes to doing something else … and turned the game back on again before going to bed! The later environments are more interesting for the puzzles and complexities they introduce too, but it’s a firmly linear experience.
Rock Band: Green Day? Where’s my Rock Band: Megadeth?!
You know, other than the odd mention here and there, I can’t honestly say I’ve really heard of Green Day before this new Rock Band: Green Day game got announced. Before this news I couldn’t have named you a Green Day song, recognised their tunes on the radio or even told you what musical genre they fit into. I was, and for the most part still am, utterly clueless and uninformed. They have completely passed me by and I would never have known that apparently they’re the biggest band in the world! Well, they’ve got their own Rock Band game that follows Rock Band: Beatles.
So why the heck did I just buy the Rock Band: Green Day game when I don’t know the first thing about the band?!!! A few possible answers:
1. Blogs. People like Joe Rybicki over at PlasticAxe.com and the dude who runs the excellent RockBandAide.com have blogged repeatedly about the game, reviewing it promptly too. This essentially ‘free’ marketing really works as it has hugely raised my awareness of the game.
2. Harmonix. It’s a new Rock Band game. The Rock Band series is, to my mind, vastly superior to the Guitar Hero brand they left behind. Even with that it was frankly inevitable that I’d pick up a copy. But I knew I could wait on a nice price later on after its initial release…
3. Dornorn. The evil monkey only goes and points out it’s available for £30, cheaper than I had expected. Factor in a bit of QuidCo and bonus cashback for future purchases and it would work out another couple of quid off.
So the game arrived today, just ahead of its Friday release date. A quick HDD install, calibration, and I have a go on drums. I really don’t know any of this music, which doesn’t help, but I’ve bought tons of unknown tunes on Rock Band. Overall it looks like it takes the essence of the format of Rock Band: Beatles and adds in a few small tweaks.
I only managed to play about 6 or 7 songs before I felt the need to head over to Rock Band to get a Megadeth fix of all things. A quick pound on “Peace Sells…” and “Hanger 18″ took me back to more familiar territory. No doubt I’ll report more when I explore the new game a little more and we’ll see how I get on with a disc full of tunes that probably don’t fit my usual musical holes.
Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands
I’m a long time fan of platform games. Prince of Persia has long been a platformer infused with combat. A few years ago I enjoyed the crap out of Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time. It mixed gorgeous 3D graphics with some excellent platforming in often epic rooms that produced puzzles to solve – “how do I get over there from here?” That’s what particularly appeals to me about Tomb Raider games as a matter of fact – epic rooms and traversal problems.
Sadly the two follow-ups to Sands of Time, Warrior Within and Two Thrones, were more combat oriented. I finished and loved Sands of Time, I got about half-way through Warrior Within and I confess I can’t remember much of Two Thrones. Partly that’s because I’ve been losing interest in PC gaming for the past several years though.
Anyway, the recent reboot from a year or two ago saw a new cell-shaded graphical style that I thought was absolutely wonderful. More platform than combat oriented, its balance suited me just fine. Now we’ve got the latest Prince of Persia release, a follow-up to The Sands of Time entitled The Forgotten Sands that precedes the original sequels, Warrior Within and Two Thrones. Forgotten Sands has a similar graphical style and a return of the voice actor for the Prince from Sands of Time I believe. Weirdly this leaves the last Prince of Persia game as a branching storyline that may get completed in a future release perhaps? Oh well.
So, The Forgotten Sands. It’s tremendously linear with lots of straight forward fighting. I was battling the combat mechanics in the original Sands of Time, much to my frustration at the time, but this is much easier. The last game featured combo’s while this one seems thinner: jump, light attack/heavy attack, roll. Some of these can be combined; jump on top of an enemy and then swing down an attack, along with a few finisher type moves. This combat level suits me as I’m not all that interested in the fighting monsters aspect of the game – mostly I can just mash away, roll out of danger and it’s over soon enough.
The platforming however is very much ‘follow the road signs’ with little need to pause to figure out what to do next. There are lots of traps to dodge past, but these are all staged in layers that build up in complexity until you’re through the set. Platforming moves require that you sometimes need to chain button presses together to activate something, deactivate it temporarily, then re-engage for the next part of the sequence. Ultimately it’s still more follow the path than run around exploring. Shame.
My major problem with the newest game is, I think, due to a bug that struck almost immediately. The game features an upgrade system where you convert experience from combat into upgrade points to customise your character with various powers. This worked to let me choose a couple of powers at the very start of the game, then broke. Each time I’d reach the next XP level to gain an upgrade point, I wouldn’t have it to spend – I remained at 0 upgrades points throughout. Thus no more powers, no option to customise my character, no way of gaining benefits I might well need in the latter portions of the game. Arse.
Then, for some reason I’m unsure of, the other night it somehow ‘fixed’ itself. I may have let the Prince die to force a reload of the level. I lost the two powers I had managed to gain, went back to a grand total of Zero XP, and am now levelling up properly. From deep within the game. Meaning that I’m never going to get my character up to the level he ought to be at by the time I’m fighting the big bosses. Frustrating. I really hope this doesn’t mean I’ll struggle with the end-game.
My other problem is camera related. Sometimes the camera takes a 45degree angle which makes determining which direction to push the stick to go over there a little awkward. Factor in the ‘quick jump’ feature where you can chain jumps from pole to pole without having to swivel around them 180degree and you can easily leap off in completely the wrong direction.
Sometimes you have to jump towards an enemy to use a special power. Mash that B button and most of the time it works fine. Most of the time, camera depending. Hopefully for this jump the camera position, which you can hardly adjust at all, lets you see the thing you need to see.
There’s more moaning here than complementary stuff. I like the game, it looks good, moves fairly well, and these are just frustrations, but ultimately I prefer the previous games, both in terms of Sands of Time and the last one.
Lost – The Greatest Hits
The final season of Lost is a bit like a Greatest Hits album from some band that’s been going five years and have released an album each year in that time.
[At the time of writing] I’m only about half-way through this final set of episodes but it seems like every actor who had a reasonable role in past seasons is getting to reprise their appearance, however briefly. Well, most of them anyway. The hot gal who wanted to sunbath after the plane crash in S1 hasn’t shown up at all [yet - but she did later! It's kinda nice to see old faces reappear actually].
So all these characters get a new flash sideways alternative reality storyline that shows what might have happened if they hadn’t gone to the island. It’s kind of interesting, but it feels like padding, some closure, but ultimately rather unnecessary.
Xbox Live
