A Fond Farewell...

It may be somewhat premature (story of my life...) but, as I am to become a regular contributor for the website www.moo-vfarm.com, I am hereby closing the blog for good. I will provide links to my own articles featured on the website but writing for the guys at the farm will take up much of time that I would otherwise be using writing for this here blog. It's been a good two years and for anyone who's taken the time to read any of the reviews or articles has my sincere thanks. But now I move onto pastures new.

Besides, I was starting to think I'd gotten ahead of myself. Finding the time to review EVERYTHING was becoming a struggle.

Peace out guys. Stay groovy.

Luke

Book: The Lost Fleet: Fearless (Jack Campbell, 2007)

It seems apparent that The Lost Fleet series will fall into a pattern. Much like a Star Trek style TV show, the crews of the epominous fleet will move from star system to star system whilst having to deal with threats from their Syndicate enemies as well as conflicts within the fleet itself. By the time I’ve reached book six, I’m worried this pattern may become repetitive but with each book clocking in at around 350 pages, there is very little, if any, fat to be found and as with true military space opera, the meat of the story is the chase.

With Fearless (book two), there is the prospect of mutiny within the fleet as a rescued prisoner of war has ideas above his station. Whilst this didn’t come to full fruition (the mutinous crew members separate from the fleet before any real fight for command can happen), it added an additional layer of tension on top of an already tense fight or flight scenario as the fleet still find themselves stuck deep in enemy territory. As with book one, there are space battles aplenty and coupled with the heated discussions within the senior ranks, the story moves at an unrelenting pace.

As I with book one, the prose isn’t great but much like the movie Unstoppable; you can look over the flaws with a novel/series as entertaining as this. At any rate, I’m still eager to find out what happens to Cpt. Jack Geary in his next adventure.

4/5

Game: Dead Island (Techland, 2011)

It was always going to be the case that Dead Island would never be as good as the announcement trailer. Debuting earlier this year, the trailer was a tight little story told Memento style involving the demise of a young girl. Both breathtaking and heartbreaking, it was masterpiece in short concise fiction and got everybody talking about the game. The only problem was it was a pre-rendered cinematic and showed absolute zero of the game itself.

For those who haven't played Dead Island, let me get to the point: no, it's nowhere near as good as the trailer. Is it, however, a good game? Yes it is, but it's also the most frustrating game around since Mirror's Edge.

There is no way it could be considered bad though. Whilst the story is paper thin (zombies plague holiday resort, you must escape), it doesn't mean the game's not engrossing. In terms of gameplay, it feel much like the bastard son of Borderlands and Dead Rising (1 & 2). From Borderlands it steals the RPG elements, with numerous missions that progress the story and reward the player with XP and upgrades and from Dead Rising it steals zombies and melee combat as well as modifications for your weapons. And the emphasis is on melee combat with plenty of items from sticks to machetes to use as killing tools. The player must balance the use of said tools though as continued battering wears them down and it aint cheap to repair them. Guns are available but their use is limited to only a handful of missions with most of said mission pitted against human enemies that have taken advantage of the disaster.

But the high emphasis on melee combat is also the game's downfall. Once you enter Act II and the city of Moresby, the difficulty curve rises sharply as, more often than not, you are surrounded by beasties from all sides. Whilst this in itself isn't a huge problem and is expected from city overrun with the walking dead, it quickly becomes apparent that Dead Island is a game built with four-player co-op in mind (further emphasised by every cut scene including all four playable characters). As such, many of the later missions are near impossible in single player as you are literally overwhelmed by flesh eating nasties. And, to add further frustration, once you die you respawn at the nearest checkpoint with the same horde of zombies waiting for you whilst your weapons retain their degradation prior to your death. Fighting the horde that killed you with weakened weapons does not denote a fun and flowing gaming experience.

But, when all is said and done, it made me want to keep playing. More so than Gears of War 3 at any rate as at least Dead Island featured enough variation to make me want to come back (as opposed to sitting through the deafening rattle of continuous gun fire from Marcus Fenix and pals). Much like Mirror's Edge, Dead Island is a flawed yet, ultimately, very entertaining foray into the survival horror genre. Any game that can keep you on edge during day light confrontations is doing something right.

4/5

Book: The Lost World (Michael Crichton, 1995)

I always try to make an effort to read a book before seeing the movie adaptation as I have this odd thing where I find it difficult to read the book if I've seen the film first. Unfortunately this was next to impossible with Michael Crichton's Jurassic Park novels not least because, upon the release of both films, I was only eight and twelve respectively, with Crichton's penchant for in depth talks about all things science going way above and beyond my intellectual capacity.

It's fortunate then that both books are vastly different from their film counterparts, more so with this, Crichton's only sequel and one that, on the outset, seemed wholly unnecessary. Written for the same reasons as all of Thomas Harris' post Silence of the Lambs novels, The Lost World has "cash in" written all over it. The reasons for there being a second island with dinosaurs are weak and many of the character motivations for getting there, especially with the antagonists (stealing dino eggs to use as test subjects for genetic experiments? Really?) are on the wrong side of silly.

With the source novel being so widely different from the movie though it was like I was reading a totally unrelated story that just so happened to have the same setting and the same characters. As with all of Crichton's work, the science jargon and philosophical arguments concerning the nature of life and extinction are layered on thick, but all this becomes secondary when the action starts. Crichton is a master of building tension and when the principals makes it to the island, the thrills come in spades. With the exception of the T-rex attack on the trailer, the latter half of the novel is totally different and, most crucially never leaves the island (I have major issues with the T-rex rampage in San Diego at the climax of the movie). As such, there's an extra sense of vulnerability as our heroes are well and truly stuck in a hostile and unforgiving environment.

It's definitely not as good as the first novel but, for what it's worth, The Lost World is near equal to the likes of Pirate Latitudes and Disclosure in terms of thrilling Crichton reads.

4/5

Book: Allhallows Eve (Richard Laymon, 1985)

It’s quite apparent at this stage that I will never consider Richard Laymon to be in the same league as, say, Stephen King or Clive Barker, but have read four of his books now, I can safely say that he’s something of a guilty pleasure. Despite the overtly explicit sexual nature of his characters and the childish glee in which the grue is liberally sprayed, his work reminds me of the days of Point Horror as his style carries the same cheesy, sleazy, exploitation aesthetic as the teen horror catalogue. As such, you feel like a naughty teenage whist reading them.

Allhallows Eve effectively revolves around an axe murderer dispatching victims on the build up towards Halloween. You can’t ask for a hokier premise than that.

3.5/5

Game: Gears of War 3 (Epic Games)

There's been some minor controversy concerning one Cliff Bleszinski, head honcho of Epic Games, as he made his upset clear when some critics stated that Gears of War 3 is not as good as it's predecessor. In his own words, he said that "Gears 3 is better in every way to Gear 2". With this amount of hyperbole and self assurance (some would actually call it arrogance but to each his own) and even the fact that the first two games were terrific, you'd think you were in good hands.

Unfortunately, after three years development, millions of dollars and thousands of man hours, Epic have produced a game that is not only pedestrian but thoroughly un-engaging and uninteresting. I'm definitely in the minority with this opinion as, for some reason, most reviews have showered it with a near jizz worthy amount of praise. But I legitimately can't see why. The great strengths of the first two entries were their sense of pace. Whilst the series hallmark is heart pounding and relentless action, this wasn't the be all or end all as, for the most part, they aimed to keep you on your toes. In Gears 1 if you weren't slaughtering Locusts you were tiptoeing into lit areas to avoid being dismembered Pitch Black style by Krill or sneaking through an abandoned and terrifying factory with Wretches around most corners or engaging in a fire fight with Locusts on a mine cart. Gears 2 had you making your way through a sunken city with panicked residence fleeing in terror or, again, sneaking through and abandoned and terrifying laboratory or getting into gunfight amidst razor hail that'll dismember you in two seconds or even fighting your way through the digestive tract of a giant worm. Either way, there was enough variation to keep the player tense and engaged.

Gears 3, in trying to up the ante, throws so many fire fights at you that it just becomes stale. There is literally no variation to speak of, just get from point A to point B and kill everything in between. In fact, after begrudgingly enduring all of Act 1 and most of Act 2, I found myself on a barge taking down Locusts with a mounted cannon. At last, I thought, this game has finally hit its stride. Imagine my anger then, when the next level literally had me greet my superior, speak all of two words before being told that the Locusts were attacking and that Delta Squad would need to help. Thus ensued a laborious gun fight in which waves of locusts poured into the base, only for said gun fight to end twenty minutes later with a giant explosion that could've taken place during an extended cut scene. Delta then huddle around Hoffman and continue their discussion from where they left off, you know, before the twenty minutes of needless padding.

The thing is, with the game being made up of padding like this, there is literally nothing memorable about it. There's no stand out set-pieces ala the giant worm level in part 2 or the night-time levels from part 1. There aren't even any interesting locales to take note of as we go from one trash city to another, or through a barren desert that is just as dull as it sounds. I even found I missed the underground hollows from the first two games.

In short, Cliff Bleszinski's claims that Gears 3 is better in every possible way from Gears 2 is, quite frankly, bullshit. What we have been presented with here is a pedestrian and repetitive shooter that ultimately feels gruelling rather than entertaining. Gears of War 3 goes so lazily through the motions it's almost insulting. If it were any other franchise, it'd be a passable effort but considering it's supposed to be the epic conclusion to one of the most successful franchises of this console generation, the fact that it doesn't surpass the first two is totally unforgivable.

Hand's down, the biggest disappointment of 2011.

2.5/5

Book: The Lost Fleet: Dauntless (Jack Campbell, 2006)

A good couple of years ago I sat and watched a three-hour TV movie that was the prelude to what would be the reboot to Battlestar Galactica. Whilst it didn't persuade me to watch the rest of the TV series (not because I didn't enjoy it, I just don't have the patience anymore to dedicate the time to invest in a long running series), it had me enthralled. Part space opera, part military sci-fi, part end-of-the-world horror, it presented space wide military conflict on a scale I had never seen before. It could be said that my love for epic space opera began then (excluding my love for Star Wars) and has been further emphasised from reading the likes of The Forever War and the works of Peter F. Hamilton.

It comes as no surprise then that I really enjoyed Dauntless: part one of the six book series The Lost Fleet. It wont win any points for originality as it's basic premise borrows heavily from Battlestar Galactica (the epominous Lost Fleet is on the run from certain annihilation deep within enemy territory) and the prose is workmanlike yet, despite the timeline for book one spanning over the course of a couple of months, there is a great sense of immediacy that gives weight to the conflict. Alliance (good guys) and Syndicate (bad guys) forces have been at war for well over a century and the throws of war are all but apparent in the clichéd but battle-hardened characters.

Yet the devil is in the details. The book excels in its military elements (unsurprising as the author was in the U.S. Navy) and when our heroes aren't talking strategy they're putting said strategy in practice, all of which is fascinating and utterly gripping. The intricacies of the combat are also just as interesting with the added element of space time adding a further layer to the proceedings (battle formations in zero gravity, the lack of friction in space as a deadly element, making decisions on events that are light minutes old, etc). Campbell knows his stuff, with each conflict akin to adrenaline pumping moments that feel more like the submarine battles from Crimson Tide than the dog fights from Star Wars.

It's apparent from book one that The Lost Fleet fits into a very specific niche and if you're not a fan of sci-fi or war then this really isn't for you. But if you look past the basic prose, what Campbell has presented is a flawed yet thrilling sci fi experience. It's nowhere near as good as, say, The Forever War (few books will be) but, for what it's worth, Dauntless is an excellent and exciting read.

4/5