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<rss xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" version="2.0"><channel><atom:link rel="hub" href="http://tumblr.superfeedr.com/" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom"/><description></description><title>S.T.A.R.S Marathon Team</title><generator>Tumblr (3.0; @starsmarathon)</generator><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/</link><item><title>Game and MGS </title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;More news to cover in this limited space. Would you like to know how I decide what stories to cover? I pretty much just look back at and go through day by day. Except that I usually find enough stories to cover by a day or two before the day I write, meaning that when you look back the stories are usually from within a couple of days of the blog post going up. This means that it’s not so much a review of the weeks news, but instead a review of the last couple of days. I think I’ll start bookmarking sites to use later on, which hopefully will make me pick a more representative pick.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;First things first, it’s been a bad week for Game, the UK’s primary games retailer. First they had their credit reduced, so they had have to pay for their games up front, as opposed to having them on credit. And now it looks like they are closing 50 stores across the UK. It’s a real shame because Game and Gamestation (which is owned by Game) are the only real high street games shops at the moment, and it’s hard to find second hand games anywhere else, other than CEX, which is more expensive.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;On some slightly more positive news, it seems that Kojima may be opening a new studio, this time in California. Kojima productions are a great bunch of developers, and they make some awesome games, so maybe we will see even more titles from them. Speaking of great games, it seems that there will be a new Metal Gear Solid game, and that’s a series I love. Hopefully it will be more like MGS 2 than 3 or 4, but any game will do. The teaser picture features someone who looks a lot like Big Boss, and seems similar to 3, so I am assuming it’s a prequel to MGS 1. &lt;span&gt;         &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;Gabe Newell has acknowledged that Half-Life fans are getting frustrated, but has tried to explain why so little information has been given about&lt;span&gt;  &lt;/span&gt;a possible HL 3. He says it’s because he doesn’t want to make any promises till he’s actually able to keep them.&lt;span&gt;  &lt;/span&gt;I’m sure that won’t really comfort the fans though, since they have been waiting years for any form of news. This game is starting to run the risk of becoming a Duken Nukem Forever if it’s not revealed soon.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;This week seems to have been quite quiet for news, so there’s not all that much to talk about. In the next couple of days I will try to write up some mini reviews for some of the demos that have been released recently, more specifically the Mass Effect 3 and SSX&lt;span&gt;  &lt;/span&gt;demoes. &lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/18155673185</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/18155673185</guid><pubDate>Thu, 23 Feb 2012 23:57:04 +0000</pubDate></item><item><title>Review: Peace Walker - HD Collection</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;p class="western"&gt;&lt;img height="359" src="http://gamingbolt.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/metal_gear_solid_peace_walker_logo_c.jpg.png" width="423"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="western"&gt;So I got the Metal Gear HD collection mainly because I wanted Metal Gear Solid 3 because it’s one of the greatest games ever. Turns out it wouldn’t be the first thing I’d play. Instead fellow member of the stars team Sam suggested we play through peace walker together. Something we had planned on doing since we had it on the psp, unfortunately my psp never liked to connect to the internet making it rather awkward to play together. Now peace walker is actually a brilliant game, when I attempted to play it on the psp I really wasn’t that into it. Maybe it was the controls, or maybe because I was now playing it on a bigger screen it was better I have no idea but either way I’m glad to have completed peace walker. The narrative throughout the game was really intriguing and well scripted. The metal gear series has always had a compelling story to it and it’s really enjoyable getting to play through this part of the metal gear narrative. You play as Big Boss in events set shortly after Metal Gear Solid 3. I’m a huge fan of Big Boss as a character and as mentioned I loved 3 so this game is well worth the play through. If your a fan of the metal gear series of any of the games, this is definitely worthwhile playing and will help enhance your knowledge of the Metal Gear series as a whole. It certainly helped clear a few things up for me. So if your not entirely familiar with the ins and outs of the metal gear story, Peace Walker will certainly keep you on the edge of your seat.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="western"&gt;&lt;img height="283" src="http://images.wikia.com/metalgear/images/3/39/PW_cutscene.jpg" width="500"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="western"&gt;The controls of Peace Walker are so easy to get to grips with and it certainly feels very natural. It’s so easy to just pick up this game and get into, there isn’t really an adjustment period with the controls, vital if your going to drop in and out of playing this game. There are side missions with peace walker and they are well worth doing especially the fulton recovery missions which will gain you more staff members to build up your mother base. Mother Base is another important aspect to this game. Seriously don’t ignore it. The upgrades you can get from working on enhancing and improving your mother base are incredibly useful. So I would suggest if you are playing this game set aside 5 minutes after each mission or every other mission to improve your mother base it’s a great aspect to the game. I like all the side missions and all those aspects within this game. I love games that have re-playability or give you a reason to keep going back and continually playing them. Peace Walker certainly has that, including in your mother base are an army of troops which you can dispatch and send on missions. It’s a really fun aspect to this game, not necessary but it’s something cool and feels like a bonus. The soundtrack in this game is awesome, the Metal Gear series never gets it wrong and that’s what makes them such good games in there consistency. You know that whenever you pick up a game in the metal gear series it will be a brilliant and riveting game. Soundtrack is really important within a game, you may not always notice it but a good soundtrack will certainly make the gaming experience all the more better. I advise people to just listen to the soundtrack of metal gear, it’s amazing. Peace Walker is a very different style to the other Metal Gear games but don’t let that put you off. It’s a really nice change to the formula and is just as effective and compelling as the other games. Visually it’s a stunning game. Some of the cutscenes would make for brilliant artwork.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="western"&gt;&lt;img height="272" src="http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2010/183/e/0/MGS__Peace_Walker___Big_Boss_by_B4H.png" width="480"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="western"&gt;It’s a really beautiful game and I would advise anyone to play it, even if you’ve never played a game in the metal gear series I recommend you try this out. Now you could buy it for your psp, if you still have one and haven’t traded it in for a vita or you could buy the HD collection which I would recommend more because then you get a bunch of other metal gear games that are seriously worth playing. Even if you have those games already get the HD collection because it’s a worthwhile investment.  &lt;/p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/18136322848</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/18136322848</guid><pubDate>Thu, 23 Feb 2012 17:44:51 +0000</pubDate><category>metal gear</category><category>metal gear solid</category><category>peace walker</category><category>HD collection</category><category>big boss</category><category>snake</category><category>review</category><category>games</category><category>gaming</category><category>game</category><category>video games</category></item><item><title>The joys of level 100 sneak
Check back next week for a new...</title><description>&lt;img src="http://28.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lzi69l5yc21qi71ujo1_500.jpg"/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;The joys of level 100 sneak&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Check back next week for a new comic!&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/17768632677</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/17768632677</guid><pubDate>Fri, 17 Feb 2012 16:00:05 +0000</pubDate><category>webcomic</category><category>comic</category><category>art</category><category>gaming</category><category>skyrim</category><category>stealth</category></item><item><title>Schafer, Love Plus and LBP Karting.</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;Another blog that I have left too late to write up, when will I learn? Never, that’s when, because screw common sense.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;Firstly I want to&lt;span&gt;  &lt;/span&gt;touch on something that I mentioned last week, about Mojang and funding a Psychonauts sequel. The price that Tim Schafer came up with was a fairly reasonable (for current gen titles) $13million. Reasonable compared to other games being developed now, but still a huge chunk of money. A huge chunk of money that Notch seems willing to stump up. It surprises me that Mojang has that much money to invest in something. It’s quite amazing that Minecraft has made such a huge amount of money that the developers have $13million sitting around to invest. For an indie game that’s just insane.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;Another story about Tim Schafer has been around this week. Seems that everyone wants to throw money at Double Fine at the minute, seems people just love their games. Schafer started a Kickstarter fund, and made over $2 million for an as yet unspecified adventure game, like Schafer used to make. Kickstarter is a website that allows people to raise money for their project by asking people to give them money. In exchange they can give rewards to the people who donate, in this case things like signed poster or even lunch with Schafer and the dev team. It’s an interesting concept, and it’s readily apparent that you can make a lot of money doing it. It’s not quite the $13 million for Psychonauts 2, but I imagine it’s a very decent amount for a point and click adventure game.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;My next story is one that really makes me worry for the human race. You may have heard of a dating-sim from Japan called Love +. In it you date random school girls and, well, I’m not really sure. I guess that’s about it. Kind of a strange game in itself, not what I would usually play. Anyway, if that game isn’t sad enough, it’s about to get worse. Now, you will be able to sign up to a new subscription service, which will send you letters from your “girlfriend.”&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;I don’t get this. Who is so desperate they want to get letters from some game character, who doesn’t exist, who will be sending the same letters to (hopefully very few) other people. I just really can’t wrap my head around why you would want that.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;Another announcement is from the world of Little Big Planet. The next LBP game is going to be a karting game. I love the LBP games, they are quirky, fun and have a lot of replayability due to the user made content available. And now they are going to make karting game. A lot of franchises have tried to make karting games over the years, and most of them are fairly forgettable, apart from one.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;Mario Kart must be a looming spectre over every developer who thinks about making a kart racing game. It’s incredibly well known, very popular, and great fun. Then again, since it’s a Nintendo exclusive, it is only competing with LBP-Kart in the sense that if it’s worse it’ll just be another inferior clone.&lt;span&gt;  &lt;/span&gt;But with the user created content, and knowing the creativity of the user base I’m sure as long as the basic gameplay is fine, then the game will be great.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;That’s it for another week, I’ll be back next time.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/17727769464</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/17727769464</guid><pubDate>Thu, 16 Feb 2012 21:48:16 +0000</pubDate></item><item><title>Dead Space Aftermath</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;img height="248" src="http://fanboyz.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/dead-space-aftermath.jpg" width="505"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Omg this film is so ugly. I seriously did not want to review it. The only time the animation looks good is in the flashback sequences the rest of the time its just ugly like seriously ugly. It was totally unecessary to distinguish between the flashbacks and the presents because the characters clearly established that they were talking about past events. It just ruined the film completely. It’s not a good film it’s really terrible. I expected it to be okay after watching the other dead space film but no this is just terrible. Don’t bother to watch it. It was all really pointless, granted it filled in some information between Dead Space 1 and 2 but seriously your better off just checking out the internet for the information because the internet will not scar you. I didn’t bound with any of the characters, I wasn’t interested in the story. It’s just a terrible film. It has so many flaws, the first major flaw is one of the characters daughter vivian, in the flashback sequences she’s white yet in the rest of the film she clearly isn’t like what on earth happened there she just kept switching ethnicities. This film just confuses me, like who worked on this film and thought that they were making something good because it’s clearly terrible. This review is starting to just feel like a culmination of insults but unfortunately thats all I can say about this film. You make a crappy film, you’ll get a crappy review.&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/17609530245</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/17609530245</guid><pubDate>Tue, 14 Feb 2012 16:02:06 +0000</pubDate><category>Dead Space</category><category>Dead Space Aftermath</category><category>games</category><category>video games</category><category>review</category><category>starsmarathon</category><category>tanya tuesdays</category><category>films</category><category>adaptations</category></item><item><title>But the internet told me that the ladies love...</title><description>&lt;img src="http://27.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lz4rr8Wtxp1qi71ujo1_500.jpg"/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;But the internet told me that the ladies love pikachu…&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Check back next week for another comic!&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/17374136719</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/17374136719</guid><pubDate>Fri, 10 Feb 2012 16:00:05 +0000</pubDate><category>comic</category><category>webcomic</category><category>art</category><category>gaming</category><category>pokemon</category><category>pikachu</category></item><item><title>Bleach and Mojang</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;Another week, another blog. I feel I should start to plan these out a little ahead of time, instead of flying by the seat of my pants and just writing it an hour before I’m meant to put it up. That would probably stop me reporting on news that have happened in the last day or two, as well.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;That being said, my first little piece is on something non-gaming related. Bleach is something that fellow nerds may be familiar with.&lt;span&gt;  &lt;/span&gt;It’s a very popular manga/anime series in Japan, and it’s been going for years and years. It’s one of those seemingly perpetually released series that they have in Japan, along with the likes of Pokemon and Naruto. Well, that is no more. It’s been announced that Bleach will finish after the current arc has completed. Whilst I am glad that the writer, Tite Kubo, intends to give the series a proper finish, I can’t help but feel a little sad.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;Don’t get me wrong: I know that Bleach is a little lame, and probably intended for a slightly younger audience than me, but I still like it. It’s pulpy and doesn’t require much deep thinking, and sometimes that’s just fine. Anyway, so the manga is going to finish. At some point. Thing is, I don’t know how they categorise the arcs. In broad strokes you could say there have only really been 2, possibly 3 different arcs since Bleach began, 2 of which are about 180 chapters long. At that rate there could be another 3 and a bit years of Bleach.&lt;span&gt;  &lt;/span&gt;I guess 3 and a bit years is a long time, and after that maybe I will be wanting the series to finish.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;So that’s my bit not on gaming. Secondly I want to address a mistake I made last time. Sony didn’t make those $2 billion losses in the quarter, that was for the whole year.&lt;span&gt;  &lt;/span&gt;So it isn’t quite as bad as I made out, still not great though.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;You might have heard of Notch, the creator of Minecraft. Love him or hate him, it’s pretty hard to deny that Minecraft is a global phenomenon. His small indie game has made him millions of dollars, to the point he no longer considers himself an indie dev. So much money, in fact, that he is seriously offering to help fund and publish an AAA rated game. A game that apparently no other publisher will touch.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;The game in question is Psychonauts 2. I never played the first, made by legendary developer Tim Schafer, but it has a fan base who love the game a whole lot, and it was apparently one of the best games of the PS2 era. Tim Schafer must have a lot of pull in the industry, so it seems strange that the only person to offer to publish a sequel to the game is Mojang. To me it suggests that despite all his success, Notch just doesn’t have that keen a business sense. Maybe I am wrong, but it seems like, if this does happen (which is no where near certain), he will just be throwing a lot of money at a wall. &lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;So that’s my thoughts for the week, I’ll be back next Thursday.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/17340000052</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/17340000052</guid><pubDate>Thu, 09 Feb 2012 23:17:29 +0000</pubDate></item><item><title>Dead Space Downfall Review</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;p class="western"&gt;Sorry for the late posting I had completely forgotten about uploading this review yesterday. So for this week tanya tuesdays is now tanya wednesdays. I shall however, make sure that next tuesday there is definately a review up for the site. Even if I upload it a day early and put it in a queue. Anyway enjoy the review&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="western"&gt;&lt;img height="200" src="http://www.the-other-view.com/images/dsdlogo.jpg" width="487"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="western"&gt;Dead Space Downfall (2008, Chuck Patton) is an animated prequel to the Dead Space game. Crew members of the Ishimura, a mining spacecraft, discover an artefact called the marker. The artefact is moved onboard the spaceship and a series of disturbing events occur. Crew members exploring the planet where the marker was uncovered, become violent, suicidal and mentally unstable. All hell breaks loose as one miner brings his dead wife, who commited suicide, onto the Ishimura unaware that an alien, a necromorph lies attached to her dead body.  This necromorph then spreads throughout the ship and the body count and alien infestation rapidly rise. Vincent a crew member and her security team attempt to save members of the ship from the outbreak, slowly her team falls prey to the necromorphs and Vincent learns there is no hope for her or anyone on board the Ishimura.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="western"&gt;The film is really quite enjoyable. There isn’t a lot of story of character development, the film is just essentially a gory bloodbath. It’s enjoyable though because the gore is not approach in a tacked on way. There are some quite gruesome moments within this film, you see peoples jaws ripped off and the like. The animation is well done, I wasn’t expecting the film to be so well animated.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="western"&gt;It was quite unusual watching this film, firstly because Jim Cummings does the voice for one of the characters and unfortunately for me I will never be able to separate Jim Cummings and Tigger. I know he does a lot of voices for films besides Tigger and he is a good voice actor. Unfortunately throughout this film which was obviously supposed to be a horror film I kept seeing Tigger. That’s something more personal for me though. Secondly knowing the ending of the film because I was aware of the games ruined it slightly for me also. There was no climatic moment because I knew they were all going to die, I wasn’t concerned as to whether the characters would make it through the film because I knew they wouldn’t. The film is actually quite good though, I believe you can get it pretty cheaply and you can also watch it on netflix (like I did). It’s definitely worth a watch if your a Dead Space fan, or a fan of gore and violence. It’s even a film that now I’ve seen it, I’d go out an purchase myself actually.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="western"&gt;&lt;img height="284" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-M6Y2GJ2YqUk/TYUY1wznFnI/AAAAAAAAEiY/-TGbdncgfBU/s1600/dead1.gif" width="499"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/17263799912</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/17263799912</guid><pubDate>Wed, 08 Feb 2012 14:20:21 +0000</pubDate><category>Dead Space</category><category>Dead Space Downfall</category><category>games</category><category>video games</category><category>films</category><category>reviews</category><category>starsmarathon</category><category>tanya tuesdays</category></item><item><title>Phoenix doesn’t need DNA to catch a murderer
Check back...</title><description>&lt;img src="http://26.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lyq0u2FizJ1qi71ujo1_500.jpg"/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;Phoenix doesn’t need DNA to catch a murderer&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Check back here for a new comic every week!&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/16977529118</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/16977529118</guid><pubDate>Fri, 03 Feb 2012 16:00:00 +0000</pubDate><category>comic</category><category>webcomic</category><category>art</category><category>gaming</category><category>ace attorney</category><category>phoenix wright</category><category>maya fay</category></item><item><title>HD remakes, Sony and Ubisoft</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;Yesterday I went into Gamestation. I occasionally like to peruse that shop and pick out bargain games. Also, I went in to trade my games, to get new (not new new, but new to me) games. All that’s mostly irrelevant, my point is coming. Whilst I was in the shop, making idle chat with the (very pretty) girl stood behind the counter, my mind went to the Metal Gear Solid HD remake, so I asked about it. I was told it was out on Friday, but if I wanted it I would have to pre-order.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;Apparently, they don’t stock HD remakes except copies for people who pre-order them. In fact, they didn’t even have any advertisements for it. They had advertisements for FF XIII-2, Mass Effect 3 and SSX, amongst others, but not for a game just about to be released. I found this very strange. Do they not make much money from these sorts of games? Is it that the only people likely to buy this sort of game are people likely to already know it’s coming out and anticipating it weeks beforehand?&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;I will say that I don’t know whether they meant they didn’t stock the game in all their stores, or just in that one. I will admit, it is a small shop, and the space for new games is very much limited to a few select titles, often with the words “Duty” or “Battlefield” in their title. I suppose that in a larger shop they probably will stock some copies, but I think that this shows that HD remakes maybe don’t sell as well as other games. That’s all speculation though.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;I have also heard that there is the possibility that next year Game will go down, meaning there would be no games shops on the highstreet here in Britain anymore. That would be a real shame, since I need used games because I can’t afford to buy all my games new. Although I suppose by then I’d hopefully have a job.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;Anyhow, Sony, a company you might have heard of, has just announced its 3&lt;sup&gt;rd&lt;/sup&gt; quarter takings. They made a loss of $2 billion. An entire $2 billion dollar loss, that’s just an insane amount of money. What makes it even more amazing is that this is on revenue of $20 billion. Over a year that makes $80 billion in turnover. That’s more money than the entire budgets of some countries. The fact that someone can make a loss of that much money just astounds me. Apart from that, I don’t have much to say on this story, because I don’t really know much about business.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;My last story to comment on is the fact that Ubisoft is about to start some server maintenance on the 7&lt;sup&gt;th&lt;/sup&gt;. What with a lot of Ubi games having “always on” DRM, &lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;that means people won’t be able to play their games. Games these people have paid hard cash for.&lt;span&gt;  &lt;/span&gt;What I am saying is that this is bullshit. I mean seriously, this is exactly the reason why people straight away said that this system wasn’t going to work. I would suggest anyone that has any of these games cracks them so that the can continue to play.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;DRM is a bad idea. All you need is a CD key for online play. DRM is going to get hacked, it’s going to be released onto the various torrent sites, and people are going to pirate it. What you have to make sure of is that you have something to offer paying customers. Multiplayer is one thing. Most games won’t work online if pirated, so you’ll need a new version to play online.&lt;span&gt;  &lt;/span&gt;What a waste of money it is to have servers running constantly, and developing the programs and whatnot. How do company execs not realise this?&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal"&gt;Anyway, that’s enough for this week, I’ll be back next week with a new post.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/16948723834</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/16948723834</guid><pubDate>Fri, 03 Feb 2012 01:01:44 +0000</pubDate><category>Sony</category><category>losses</category><category>Ubisoft</category><category>DRM</category><category>HD</category><category>Metal Gear</category><category>$2 Billion</category></item><item><title>Batman Arkham City</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;p class="western"&gt;&lt;img height="318" src="http://collider.com/wp-content/uploads/Batman-Arkham_City_Batman-Harley.jpg" width="570"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="western"&gt;I finally got around to playing and finishing this game! Horrayy! So anyway I think it’s unnecessary to spend ages talking about the game like the story and such because I’m sure you’re already familiar with it so this will just be a really short review. The events of this game take place shortly after the first game, the Joker is infected and dying from his use of titan in the first game. Bruce Wayne gets thrown into Arkham City a section of Gotham cut off to create a new type of prison. Batman spends his time trying to control the violence within Arkham City but gets caught by the Joker who infects Batman with the same deadly disease he is dying from. So Batman sets out on a mission to find and recover a cure. So that’s the basic story of Arkham City. It’s a really good game, in some ways I find it more enjoyable than the first. The introduction of a larger array of characters, is very enjoyable then the focus isn’t just related on Batman vs Joker. I like being able to explore the stories of the other villains some more because some of the characters are actually really interesting, have very enticing stories and deserve the screen time. The Batman and Joker story or conflict is so overdone in some respects, don’t get me wrong I love seeing the Joker and Batman clash, so getting other characters more involved with the story was a brilliant idea. One of the downsides is that you spend so much time in that detective mode. It is quite frustrating. I love being able to examine and be amazed by the scenery and world of Arkham City unfortunately playing the game in detective mode makes it so much easier. With the first game because it the map wasn’t so open and big you didn’t need to use it all that often however, with this game it is useful to have it switched on pretty much permanently. Another disappointment I found was that there were not nearly enough Catwoman missions. I just expected there to be more. Then again I suppose that’s just me being fussy. Despite these two areas the game was excellent. If you haven’t played this game yet I seriously suggest you do. It’s so much fun. the story is compelling, voice acting within the game is superb. It really is an amazing game. The attention to detail and all the little aspects really do add to the whole ambience and feel of this game. This is how good all games should be. Plus with all the Riddler trophies it’s a game that will last. I haven’t completed it like 100 percent there’s still side missions and Riddler trophies I need to attain and I know it’s a game I will go back too. To me that proves how good of a game it is, if I want and can’t wait to get back to playing it again then I know the game is good!&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/16820783488</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/16820783488</guid><pubDate>Tue, 31 Jan 2012 15:50:12 +0000</pubDate><category>game</category><category>video game</category><category>review</category><category>batman</category><category>Arkham City</category></item><item><title>Juggernaut is the worst thing in MW3, unless I have it, then...</title><description>&lt;img src="http://30.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lygzm10VRU1qi71ujo1_500.jpg"/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;Juggernaut is the worst thing in MW3, unless I have it, then it’s the best thing in MW3&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/16587081685</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/16587081685</guid><pubDate>Fri, 27 Jan 2012 18:34:46 +0000</pubDate><category>webcomic</category><category>MW3</category><category>modern warfare</category><category>cod</category><category>call of duty</category><category>comic</category><category>art</category><category>gaming</category></item><item><title>Onlive and ACTA</title><description>&lt;p&gt;I finally have a properly working laptop, and now I shall get back to writing stuff for the site. I will try to keep it weekly from now on, it doesn’t take long to write and I have plenty of free time. This column is mostly for discussing the current gaming events, but occasionally I will include other things that I think are interesting. Such as today where I will discuss OnLive, and ACTA.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;OnLive is something which you have probably heard of. It’s a service that allows you to stream games from a cloud computer over to yours. This means that you can play brand new games using an old PC, because it’s streamed over the internet like a video. I received a free OnLive console and some codes for free games on the service at EuroGamer expo.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Let’s start with the basic premise of the service. It’s an interesting concept. It allows you to play games without having to own an expensive PC. That’s pretty much the only upside, however. I can’t see why anyone would want to use OnLive, unless they couldn’t afford a decent PC or a console. I suppose the subscription is one thing. It allows you to pay a flat monthly fee and be able to play a lot of games as long as you like. There are some pretty big, if somewhat outdated games in the Playpack, titles like Bioshock 2, Saints Row 2 and Arkham Asylum. Certainly worth a month’s subscription fee in order to play and complete them, but other than that, a fairly useless investment unless you really can’t afford a console or PC.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I am enjoying using the free games I have been given. Arkham City, Assassins Creed Revelations and Saints Row the Third are all great games, but this isn’t trouble free gaming. I have a 20mb braodband connection here, and it still occasionally has network issues, which either severely decreases the quality of the game, or completely disconnects from the game. That sort of thing just doesn’t happen in the more usual gaming platforms.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Then there is the pricing structure. The games costs pretty much the same whilst new, but the older games cost much more than they usually would in a shop or second hand. I know most people haven’t figured this yet, but digital games should cost less than a real, disc version. And that’s not even considering the fact that you don’t own the games. Even if you pay full price, if your account becomes inactive they have the right to remove all their games from your inventory. Whether that’s just something they can theoretically do, or something they will actively do I don’t know, but the fact that they could do it is bad enough.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;So, my review for OnLive isn’t glowing. I think it’s a neat idea, but the execution is mostly wrong. At the moment, the way it is, it is no match for the traditional methods of playing games.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Now onto ACTA. This is the new “law” that people are saying is going to kill the internet. After what just happened with SOPA and PIPA I think people are high on the sense that internet can do anything, and that people are out to destroy the internet.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I am going to say right out: ACTA is not the threat to the internet that SOPA and PIPA were. Firstly, remember that this law was signed 3 months ago in some countries, notably the anti-piracy heavy USA, and nothing has changed.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Firstly, let me tell you what ACTA actually is. It isn’t a law as such. It is a framework. By signing it, a country is not making any changes to their current laws. All it is is a framework for countries to work to, in order to make tackling piracy, and more importantly counterfeiting. the same in all countries.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;This framework is not designed to break the internet. In fact, the latest draft would have pretty little effect upon the individuals. What it is designed to do is stop large scale piracy for commercial purposes, or basically, to stop people profiting from other peoples work. It’s really a very solid basis for a law, because it’s not right to profit off the work of others.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;When it gets to us as individuals, very little would change. People are worried that border crossing but that wouldn’t be affected. ACTA discourages searching personal items for counterfeit or copyright goods. Again, I will state that this is about big scale operations looking to profit from piracy. We should stop over reacting to this if we don’t know what it is actually about.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Especially considering the fact that this doesn’t even change anything, it’s all blowing steam for no reason. Just keep an eye out for the acts that actually get made by each company to enact the parts of ACTA, and everything will be fine. Read more here, it gives a much better account of what ACTA does than my short summation: &lt;a href="http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/or8ag/ive_read_the_final_version_of_acta_heres_what_you/"&gt;http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/or8ag/ive_read_the_final_version_of_acta_heres_what_you/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/16549037810</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/16549037810</guid><pubDate>Fri, 27 Jan 2012 00:28:17 +0000</pubDate></item><item><title>Tomb Raider Film Review</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;p class="western"&gt;&lt;img height="327" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/9/98/Lara_Croft_film.jpg/220px-Lara_Croft_film.jpg" width="220"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="western"&gt;Tomb Raider follows Lara Croft and she goes on a journey or adventure to obtain this artefact which gives the possessor the ability to control time. The film establishes that the planets are coming into alignment an event which occurs only every 5000 years. The Illuminati seek to obtain a treasure which will give the person power to control time, however, this artefact must be recovered before the planets align. Lara Croft sets out to gain this relic for herself to stop it falling into the hands of someone dangerous who could use it to potentially destroy the world. So I’ve got to say I have a major dislike for these films and watching this one over reaffirmed my beliefs that Tomb Raider is both a terrible action film and a terrible adaptation. For starters Angelina Jolie, I can’t stand her as Lara Croft. Often I think she’s a terrible actress too often looking like a prissy stuck up cow, like get the rod out your ass love! anyway her acting ability is almost always mediocre and I don’t think she’s a good actress in this film. I don’t think she’s the right person to depict Lara Croft. She doesn’t even seem anything like Lara Croft, I just can’t believe in her as a character. Secondly the story, it’s just boring. It’s like they tried too hard with all the action, it’s just constructed in such a way it seem overtly artificial. And with like a shower scene within the first 5 minutes sure I expected there would be one but it’s timing seems so odd. It just makes all men or gamers seem really perverted. I’m fine with shower scenes just make it a bit more relevant or time fitting. I really dislike this film, I can’t seem to find anything good about it. I can’t even take Daniel Craig seriously in this film, I love him as James Bond but seriously why was his acting so insanely terrible in this. It really makes no sense to me. Just don’t watch this film seriously, it should be avoided.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/16408981478</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/16408981478</guid><pubDate>Tue, 24 Jan 2012 15:26:34 +0000</pubDate><category>Tomb Raider</category><category>Lara Croft</category><category>Angelina Jolie</category><category>Film</category><category>Film Review</category><category>Games</category><category>Video Games</category><category>Adaptation</category><category>Gaming</category></item><item><title>It’s finally over! Part 69 of the sonic next gen...</title><description>&lt;iframe width="400" height="300" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/_Sx7D4kgkbE?wmode=transparent&amp;autohide=1&amp;egm=0&amp;hd=1&amp;iv_load_policy=3&amp;modestbranding=1&amp;rel=0&amp;showinfo=0&amp;showsearch=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen&gt;&lt;/iframe&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;It’s finally over! Part 69 of the sonic next gen let’s play is the end. Thats it we’re all done, thanks to everyone that watched &lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;Wanna see the other parts? check out the playlist right here:&lt;a class="yt-uix-redirect-link" href="http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall" rel="nofollow" title="http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall"&gt;http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/16181499761</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/16181499761</guid><pubDate>Fri, 20 Jan 2012 19:33:00 +0000</pubDate><category>let's play</category><category>lets play</category><category>sonic the hedgehog</category><category>sonic 2006</category><category>next gen</category><category>games</category><category>gaming</category><category>gameplay</category><category>ps3</category><category>xbox 360</category></item><item><title>It’s all coming to an end in part 68 of the sonic...</title><description>&lt;iframe width="400" height="300" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/gEFXYgXWyso?wmode=transparent&amp;autohide=1&amp;egm=0&amp;hd=1&amp;iv_load_policy=3&amp;modestbranding=1&amp;rel=0&amp;showinfo=0&amp;showsearch=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen&gt;&lt;/iframe&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;It’s all coming to an end in part 68 of the sonic let’s play&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;Wanna see the other parts? check out the playlist right here:&lt;a class="yt-uix-redirect-link" href="http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall" rel="nofollow" title="http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall"&gt;http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/16064249455</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/16064249455</guid><pubDate>Wed, 18 Jan 2012 16:00:05 +0000</pubDate><category>let's play</category><category>lets play</category><category>sonic the hedgehog</category><category>sonic 2006</category><category>sonic next gen</category><category>gaming</category><category>video games</category><category>gameplay</category><category>ps3</category><category>xbox 360</category></item><item><title>Still fighting solaris in part 67 of the sonic let’s...</title><description>&lt;iframe width="400" height="300" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/lFaB0jpl7KM?wmode=transparent&amp;autohide=1&amp;egm=0&amp;hd=1&amp;iv_load_policy=3&amp;modestbranding=1&amp;rel=0&amp;showinfo=0&amp;showsearch=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen&gt;&lt;/iframe&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;Still fighting solaris in part 67 of the sonic let’s play&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;Wanna see the other parts? check out the playlist right here:&lt;a class="yt-uix-redirect-link" href="http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall" rel="nofollow" title="http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall"&gt;http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/15777536049</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/15777536049</guid><pubDate>Fri, 13 Jan 2012 16:00:05 +0000</pubDate><category>let's play</category><category>lets play</category><category>sonic the hedgehog</category><category>2006</category><category>next gen</category><category>gaming</category><category>video games</category><category>gameplay</category><category>ps3</category><category>xbox 360</category></item><item><title>We start the final boss fight in part 66 of the sonic...</title><description>&lt;iframe width="400" height="300" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/E-pFJZCu5kg?wmode=transparent&amp;autohide=1&amp;egm=0&amp;hd=1&amp;iv_load_policy=3&amp;modestbranding=1&amp;rel=0&amp;showinfo=0&amp;showsearch=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen&gt;&lt;/iframe&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;We start the final boss fight in part 66 of the sonic let’s play&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;Wanna see the other parts? check out the playlist right here:&lt;a class="yt-uix-redirect-link" href="http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall" rel="nofollow" title="http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall"&gt;http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/15673107030</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/15673107030</guid><pubDate>Wed, 11 Jan 2012 16:00:05 +0000</pubDate><category>let's play</category><category>lets play</category><category>sonic the hedgehog</category><category>2006</category><category>next gen</category><category>gaming</category><category>gameplay</category><category>video games</category></item><item><title>We’re getting close to the end of these missions in part...</title><description>&lt;iframe width="400" height="300" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/FHb3vRxnYIo?wmode=transparent&amp;autohide=1&amp;egm=0&amp;hd=1&amp;iv_load_policy=3&amp;modestbranding=1&amp;rel=0&amp;showinfo=0&amp;showsearch=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen&gt;&lt;/iframe&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;We’re getting close to the end of these missions in part 65 of the sonic let’s play&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;Wanna see the other parts? check out the playlist right here:&lt;a class="yt-uix-redirect-link" href="http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall" rel="nofollow" title="http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall"&gt;http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/15582195285</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/15582195285</guid><pubDate>Mon, 09 Jan 2012 21:41:04 +0000</pubDate><category>let's play</category><category>lets play</category><category>sonic the hedgehog</category><category>2006</category><category>next gen</category><category>gameplay</category><category>gaming</category><category>ps3</category><category>xbox 360</category><category>video games</category></item><item><title>So many deaths in part 64 of the sonic let’s playWanna see...</title><description>&lt;iframe width="400" height="300" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/guzDmsLhRTE?wmode=transparent&amp;autohide=1&amp;egm=0&amp;hd=1&amp;iv_load_policy=3&amp;modestbranding=1&amp;rel=0&amp;showinfo=0&amp;showsearch=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen&gt;&lt;/iframe&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;So many deaths in part 64 of the sonic let’s play&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;Wanna see the other parts? check out the playlist right here:&lt;a class="yt-uix-redirect-link" href="http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall" rel="nofollow" title="http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall" target="_blank"&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall"&gt;http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL06AB4FC2A54805A0&amp;feature=viewall&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/15401190984</link><guid>http://www.starsmarathon.com/post/15401190984</guid><pubDate>Fri, 06 Jan 2012 16:04:05 +0000</pubDate><category>gaming</category><category>let's play</category><category>sonic the hedgehog</category><category>Sonic Next Gen</category><category>sonic 2006</category><category>gameplays</category><category>let's play</category><category>lets play</category><category>ps3</category><category>xbox 360</category></item></channel></rss>

