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6 Things With Da7e [9/13]

• Sep 13, 2010 from Latinoreview(Latino Review) in *
  Happy Monday folks!
  I spent some time with my 3D glasses on this weekend, so either way you cut it - ironically or unironically - I'm part of Resident Evil's box office win this weekend. It was also a weekend for festivals of fall, farmers markets and a surprising amount of fur and faux-fur being sold on the streets of New York. It seems odd to me that someone would buy any sort of fur off the street, but I guess that's where you have to get it these days.
  I'm tempted to discuss my friend Rachel Paton who used to send me dead things through the mail, but that's be a digression we can't afford this week...
  Dark Tower's mammoth deal got left out of my Things this week, as did True Blood, because I've done my best to keep this post under 4,000 words (sorry about last week, I guess I had a lot to say about Entourage, which also wrapped up last night, and didn't make today's list).
  But for all the TL ; DR, I did get a few interesting conversations out of last week's column, and also a few recommendations that will be popping up in the coming weeks.
  Get psyched! This week we get some TV premieres and next week: BOARDWALK EMPIRE. And if anyone managed to score extra tickets for the NYFF screening of The Social Network, I'd love to go. I know they've already scheduled and overflow show, but I don't know when. ARGH! I'm going to have to wait until 10/1! NOOOOO!
  
  [#6 - Resident Evil: Afterlife]
  
  The Resident Evil series and I don't really get along because of Paul W.S. Anderson. Many times, I've railed on the fellow for not being able to elevate his movies to anything beyond semi-enjoyable visual exercises in special effects photography. The two movies that carry his name that I actually enjoy (Mortal Kombat and Event Horizon) are movies where he's brought on to direct other people's material. My big beef with Paul's Resident Evil franchise was with the first movie, a movie where they had a George A Romero draft of a zombie mansion script, based on the plot of the video game, and instead decided to make it a chicks rock action film that wasn't at all about zombie horror.
  My brother was really into video games growing up. While my father taught me hand-eye coordination by sending me in the backyard with a tiny skillet and a pack of ping pong balls I'd have to bounce endlessly for an hour, my brother was allowed to play video games. He was into Broadway and RPGs for awhile, so parts of my gaming youth are really confusing, like watching my brother in the Water Temple in Ocarina of Time while Jean Valjean's Who Am I/The Trial from Act One of Les Misables played on the stereo. Some of the more vivid memories I have of lazy summers involve making freezer corn dogs and watching my brother play video games. He was good enough at it (and invested enough in it) that you could watch him play video games like a spectator sport. ESPECIALLY the Resident Evil games, when we'd turn off the lights and I'd read a walk through by flashlight, helping when I could.
  When Resident Evil became an action franchise, I was taken aback. I probably trashed it because I was expecting a Tyrant or Nemesis or something, but instead I got a holographic British child and snarling Michelle Rodriguez. Not to mention that Milla Jovovich's Alice and her team all start the film with Plot Device Amnesia that allows them to remember key parts of their past when the overall plot gets stale. Any film that would be a completely different movie if none of the characters had amnesia (or if they had realistic amnesia) is not a good movie in script form.
  Plot Device Amnesia pops up again in Resident Evil: Afterlife, this time striking Ali Larter's Claire, effectively making her a completely different character than she was in Extinction. Wentworth Miller comes aboard for this film as Chris Redfield, Claire's brother, for no apparent reason whatsoever. The fact that those two are brother and sister in this film makes me realize how much bullshit about a brother/sister relationship these two have been spewing in the press. There is no brother/sister relationship. Chris says something like: Don't you remember me? I'm your brother! Alice says: If it's true, you'll remember and Claire spends the rest of the running time near dialogue-less, never getting a side scene to mention that yeah she remembers her brother. There is an inexplicable lack of any dialogue where these two characters acknowledge that they are actually related to one another. Just baffling.
  There are many, many, many, many reasons to dislike Resident Evil: Afterlife. So let's talk about why I ended up not disliking this one at all: 3D. I've been very against up-conversion for 3D and I've managed to have a good half-dozen conversations with filmmakers about how shooting in 3D requires a different way of thinking than run-and-gunning on digital video or setting up meticulous shots on film. Resident Evil: Afterlife doesn't show the audience anything new in terms of special effects or zombies (oh,...

The Addictive Pre-Installed 3DS Games

• Mar 30, 2011 from streex(Ninfest) in Gaming
  Did you know your 3DS has a game slot so you can play other games? Joking aside, there are so many reasons why someone 3 days later wouldn’t have used it yet. When it comes to pre-installed games alone, there are 3 very addictive titles; Face Raiders, AR Games (which is really 6 games), and StreetPass Games (which is really 2 games).
  
  Face Raiders is a shoot-em-up game that uses the 3DS camera and motion sensor/gyroscope. The background is your surroundings and you move the 3DS around you to shoot the enemies. These aren’t your typical enemies either. They’re your friends and family (you took pictures of them prior right?) swooping in for a kiss or tossing bombs at you. Luckily you have an unlimited supply of tennis balls to keep them at bay.
  
  Once you’re done with that, you move onto AR (augmented reality) Games. Put one of the 6 cards that came with your 3DS on the table in front of you and be amazed. The surface the card is sitting on looks as if it morphs into something else as it creates a little environment right before your eyes. Depending on the card you use, you’ll be shooting a dragon, fishing, playing pool, archery, among others, all while walking around the table for the best position to complete your mission. Easily my favorites.
  
  Finally close up that 3DS and take it for a stroll while it is in sleep mode because you have 2 other games to enjoy. The StreetPass Games require your 3DS to grab Mii’s from others walking around with their 3DS in sleep mode. Nothing has to be done on your part. When two 3DS’s in sleep mode come in close proximity of each other, data is transferred. Without you even knowing it. Once you get back home, open it up and see how many Mii’s you acquired.
  
  One of the games named Puzzle Swap calls on you to find Miis that have puzzle pieces that you are looking for to complete a picture. Once complete, you are rewarded with a wonderful 3D image. In the other StreetPass game, Find Mii, your Mii is captured and you

PS3 Playstation Move Review

• Sep 19, 2010 from Projectcafe in *
  I must be getting outdatedPlaystation Move came out on Friday and I didnt even know! Anyway, I passed by EB Games at Eaton Centre and found out it came out that daybut sold out. I went over to GameShack over at Atrium on Bayalso sold out. I was pretty sure Best Buy would be sold out too, but for some reason, the last place to be sold out of them is usually Future Shop, so sure enough, they had some left. I asked and apparently the best deal is to get the pack with the Wii Sports equivalent game, Eye Toy camera, and one Move Controller for $99. I picked up a second Move controller and also a Navigation controller (the PS equivalent of the nunchakus). But we were out the entire weekend, so I didnt have a chance to try it out till this afternoon:
  
  Opening the Move controller, the build is very similar to the PS3 Dualshock controller. There is the famous four PS buttons as well as an Enter button in the middle and the PS button to sync your controller to the PS3. It also comes with a wrist strap. The white ball is plastic squishy.
  
  There is an additional trigger button on the back and the Select and Start buttons are on either side of the controller. The thing looks and feels like a microphone, actually.
  
  The Navigation controller has a lot more buttons for more intensive games. Unlike the Wiis nunchakus, the Navigation controller is wireless. At launch, I dont believe there are any games that use this controller. I bought one anyways, coz for sure therell be some good games thatll use this.
  
  There is another trigger button behind the Navigation controller as well as a shoulder button.
  
  The camera is used to sense motion, and it can also (in future games) take photos of you so you can map your face into your game character. At launch, there is a Pet game that has a virtual pet that layers on top of a live video feed of you so you can play with it. It looks as though the top of the camera may have a microphone. The camera also has a standard and wide angle mode.
  
  So when you sync the Move controller to the PS3, the ball lights up in different colours to denote your player colour. Good thing I picked up twoapparently although you can play a lot of the sports games with one controller, its better to play with two. Here is me playing Beach Volleyball. The sports game comes with Frisbee, Bocce, Archery, Beach Volleyball, Table Tennis, and Gladiator. I really like the Beach Volleyball; its much more in-depth than the games that came with the Wii. There is actually quite some strategy to them and the motion sensor system is much more accurate.
  
  All in all, its an interesting addition to the PS. I really prefer not to play on the Wii as the resolution sucks a lot. I cant say how they can use it to their advantage, as there are only a couple of launch games. The good news is they are releasing new downloadable content for some of the heavier games to convert them to Move-compatible. Games such as Resident Evil 5 and Heavy Rain. Ive always been interested in Heavy Rain, so Ill pick up a used copy and try it out. I heard Socom 4 will also be for the Move. Hope the games are good.
  Anyway, time for bedI almost finished all three medals for Beach Volleyball!
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  I must be getting outdatedPlaystation Move came out on Friday and I didnt even know! Anyway, I passed by EB Games at Eaton Centre and found out it came out that daybut sold out. I went over to GameShack over at Atrium on Bayalso sold out. I was pretty sure Best Buy would be sold [...]

Sony PlayStation Move

• Sep 06, 2010 from stuartmiles in *
  Did the earth move for us?
  
  
  
  
  Any review of PlayStation Move is going to have to admit the same thing: this is the first step on a long journey. As such, there is understandably a degree of discomfort that comes with writing about something so new, with so little real material to work from. It would be a little like Christopher Columbus describing the Americas as "a little small" having only just planted his feet on the shores of The Bahamas.?
  In our case we've had Start the Party! and Sports Champions get us a moving in the living room. As we've seen from both those games, neither is particularly exciting in its own right. Sports Champions is the better of the two, demonstrating a wider, more serious side to PlayStation Move, whilst Start the Party! attempts to give us a taste of fun family-friendly gaming.
  PlayStation Move is composed of two core parts. The first is the PlayStation Eye camera (?24), the second is the motion controller (?29). You can buy these things separately, or in various bundles as an expandable system. The basic camera and single?motion?controller?bundle is ?49.99. The system effectively gives you a huge range of control dynamics, because it not only knows how you are manipulating the controls thanks to the on-board motions sensors, but also knows exactly where the controller is thanks to the glowing balls being detected by the camera.
  
  A comparison to the Nintendo Wii controls is not lost here, as essentially they do the same job, with the Wii Remote having an optical sensor to determine position for on-screen pointing. The PlayStation Move feels more substantial, more grown up, and more accurate, but then it is a much newer product, even accepting the Wii MotionPlus that was added in 2009.
  The Move Motion Controller is wonderfully sculpted to fit into your hand comfortably. The black plastic fits in with the rest of the PS3 world, pulling across recognisable design points from your regular PS3 controllers. Like your existing controllers it is wireless with an internal battery, so you'll have to plug it in via the Mini-USB socket in the bottom to charge, although in the future we're guessing that using a charging cradle will be the popular option - we've summed up a range of accessories here.
  The top of the Move Motion Controller is topped by the distinctive soft glowing ball, which already has something of an iconic look to it. There is something funky about its changing colours, and returning home on a dark evening to see through the front window two glowing orbs engaged in what looked like some sort of exotic mating ritual is a sight to behold. This is something that Microsoft's controller-less Kinect will never be able to boast about. Not yet, anyway.?
  Being able to see those glowing balls also lets the system know when you've done something like cross your arms: it can determine the relative position of one controller to another (see Sports Champions Archery aiming for example) which allows you to accurately aim along an axis.
  
  The Move Motion Controller also provides vibration feedback which can provide some degree of impact recognition as well as being put to atmospheric uses. We don't expect that vibration will really be used any differently from the way it already is.?
  Setting up Move is simply a case of plugging the camera into a USB slot on your console and placing the camera in a suitable position. For many this will be front and centre beneath their TV, and the stand provides plenty of movement to get the angle you want. The Eye camera lens offers two positions depending on your room set-up. We chose the wide-angle setting, which is better suited to smaller rooms.
  When you start playing a Move game you'll have to calibrate the controllers. The camera will give you a location overlay to stand in, so you have the correct position in front of the camera. Depending on your size, if you a playing against a child, you might need to stand either closer or further away. The same applies with two-player games (such as Table Tennis which we played). It becomes quickly obvious that you'll need quite a lot of space to play Move,?especially?when using two controllers. With Archery, for example, we had to move furniture aside to get far enough from the camera to "draw the bow" back.
  You then have to calibrate the controllers. This entails pressing the button whilst holding the controller on various positions - shoulder height, by your side and at your belt buckle. You'll also have to let the game know if you are left or right handed, and in games where you can use two controllers you'll be asked to hold them together and press the button, so it knows which controller is in which hand.?
  
  The main controls that fall naturally under the fingers are the trigger on the underside and the "Move" button on the top. As you hold the Move Motion Controller you can't help but place your fingers on these buttons, so they are ready to use. Your four standard...

Why FIFA Refuses to Sanction Goal-Line Technology

• Jun 28, 2010 from fastcompany(Fast Company) in Business
  Technology is everywhere in soccer. From hi-tech fabrics, divot-defying cleats, and dynamic new ball technology, sports firms such as Adidas and Nike are constantly pushing the boundaries for new and innovative products. And the matches you see on TV are the best yet, with FIFA, who owns the television rights, sticking cameras everywhere they can possibly stick them so that TV spectators can enjoy the hits--and misses--from every conceivable angle.There is, however, one blind spot. And perhaps it is where the game needs it most: on the goal line. And on Sunday morning, at approximately 10.38 EST [Ed: And at least once in every U.S. match], we had glaring proof that FIFA needs to move with the times and start using technology as a fifth pair of eyes. On Saturday the footballing body's secretary general, Jerome Valcke, stated that the next World Cup might well have an extra pair of assistant referees, one behind each goal, "to have more eyes helping [the referee] to make decisions."[youtube qNE48UTRcm0]The decision to disallow Frank Lampard's goal may or may not have been disastrous for England (let's face it, they haven't exactly been excelling at the beautiful game in South Africa), but the U.S. had their third goal ruled out in their match against Slovenia. So why is FIFA being such a bunch of Luddites on the situation?Other games, such as tennis, cricket and snooker, all use Hawk-Eye technology. It consists of a minimum of four high-speed video cameras dotted around the sports arena and, based on the principles of triangulation, calculates the 3-D position of the ball in each frame of the camera. It is not without its critics, who claim that the systems's statistical margin of error is too small. Hawk-Eye has been proposed for use in Football, but as yet, FIFA seems unwilling to take the idea up. Another idea is Cairos goal-line technology, a hook up between Adidas and tech firm Cairos. It consists of bathing the front and back of the goal area in magnetic radiation. When the ball, which has a sensor built into it, crosses the line, a watch on the referee's wrist indicates whether it's a goal or not. You can see a simple explanation of it here.FIFA's train of thought is that the rules of football should be the same everywhere it is played, from the different leagues in each country, to pub teams having a Sunday morning kickabout. But spectators of matches worldwide get the benefit of replays and virtual goal line technology. And, according to sports journalist James Mason, FIFA's reasoning is pointless. "Anyone who plays football on a Saturday or Sunday on Hackney Marshes, well, we don't have a linesman--and sometimes we don't even have a referee. So it is different. At the higher levels, there is so much money involved now the technology should be introduced."Back in March of this year, the football world waited to find out just what FIFA's stance on using technology at the forthcoming World Cup. This was part of their statement. "No matter which technology is applied, at the end of the day a decision will have to be taken by a human being. This being the case, why remove the responsibility from the referee to give it to someone else? It is often the case that, even after a slow-motion replay, ten different experts will have ten different opinions on what the decision should have been."That doesn't even address the issue. FIFA also pontificated on improving the quality of refereeing and mused about just how technology might change the game. "IF the IFAB (International Football Association Board) had approved goal-line technology, what would prevent the approval of technology for other aspects of the game? Every decision in every area of the pitch would soon be questioned." Clearly they're scared of Japan being the first nation to field a 23-robot squad for the 2030 World Cup (to be held on the moon).The referee must make the decision on what they see or don't see at the time--but, judging by the Uruguayan linesman's reaction when he saw the replay yesterday--it's possible that they may be petitioning FIFA for a change sooner rather than later. Given that dodgy decisions from match officials have led to death threats against some referees, which led to the early retirement of Anders Frisk after a Champions League match, and a Facebook campaign against Tom Henning Ovrebo four years later, it may be a welcome move.Unsurprisingly, FIFA is keeping very quiet on the matter. They do have a point that having to stop the match while officials pore over a video screen will slow the game down to a point where both players and spectators may lose out. However, when all the fuss over the 2010 World Cup has died down--the disallowed goals, the goals that stood when they shouldn't have, the play-acting of the sportsmen--if you want to go back to the 2006 tournament, the three yellow cards--when it's all quiet again, FIFA should start an investigation into using technology. And next time, draw a different conclusion.