Wanna know how you can make even more money whilst regaining the respect of those few hardcore gamers?

...just think about it.

No one needs to go see "Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li" - it's AWFUL - but you might want to just so you can watch a movie literally come apart at the seams. It's pretty remarkable in that regard. It started out as part of an ambitious project to do a series of "origin" movies for various Street Fighter characters and then bring them together in a single massive "Street Fighter" movie for a climax; but that plan was seemingly jettisoned midway through and they were left to cobble what they'd already signed into a low-budget action vehicle for Kristin Kreuk with various characters running around with the names and "Mark I" costumes of Street Fighter bit-players.

For the fans: Neil McDonough and Michael Clarke Duncan are M. Bison and Balrog, Robin Shou (Liu Kang from the "Mortal Kombat" movies) is Gen and Chris Klein is Charlie Nash (the "Charlie" who's murder Guile is supposed to be investigating.) Vega turns up approximately twice, lamely. It's a weirdly schizoid adaptation, on the one hand trying to "Dark Knight-ize" the franchise by eschewing the game costumes and grounding the main backstory amid a ghetto-gentrification real estate swindle in Bangkok; but on the other hand Gen teaches Chun-Li to throw magical fireballs and Bison gets a REALLY icky origin story to explain super powers... that he never actually uses. FWIW, Nash survives the movie, presumably saving his death for the never-to-be-filmmed "Legend of Guile" movie. Quick mention at the end of a "Street Fighter Tournament" that Mrs. Li ought to investigate, and a "Ryu somebody."

The screenwriter on this was Justin Marks, currently just about the hottest writer in Hollywood apparently owing to his ability to turn out functional scripts for "fanboy" properties at a good clip thanks to a near-encyclopedic knowledge of - and legitimate enthusiasm-for - the material (he's also behind the initial scripts for the planned "He-Man," "Supermax" aka "Green Arrow in Prison" and "Voltron" movies.) For what it's worth, he DOES seem to have a knack for building a working narrative out of the largely-incidental backstories of properties like this. Whether or not his stuff can lead to GOOD movies remains to be seen, though I'll note that THIS one would've at least been campy fun if they'd been allowed to wear their game costumes.

On a totally different note: my absence is all down to one thing, and that's university. No time for blogs of epic length and themes. No time for ranting and raving about major releases like Watchman and Killzone 2. No time for silly narratives about my pyrokinesis skills. There's only time for banging my head against the wall in despair.

This, in short, means I have just joined the Twitter scene as a perfect form of procrastination and blog updating. However, my computer is being a huge bitch, so I can't actually get the widget on my blog page. Maybe some time in the future, eh?

The just-shy-of-whimsical title was kind of an ironic gag in and of itself in F. Scott Fitzgerald's original short story, "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button," since it was about as far from a fairytale as one could get given the material: A bleak story of alienation and discomfort centered on title character who's born a full-sized, fully-intelligent crotchety old man of 80 and ages backwards, mentally and physically, into and infant - failing at each step to "fit into" the world he's rewinding through.

This expanded, loosely-adapted film from David Fincher keeps the title, but swaps ironic for wholly-appropriate by changing-up the central gimmick: The film's Benjamin (Brad Pitt) is born as a tiny infant but with all of the physical traits (maladies, more specifically) of a near-death 80 year old man and ages "normally" in terms of his mind but in full-reverse in terms of his body - as a "child" he looks for all the world a frail, weathered old man; but as he ages he only gets stronger and better-looking.

The result, as you might expect, is that THIS Benjamin gets a certain number of benefits from his condition - 'old looking' enough to gain access to life experiences and information otherwise not offered to a boy, blessed with the body of a 20 year old with which to put a lifetime of wisdom to use in his waning days. He's less of a tragic walking-commentary and more of a magical being walking backwards through history; and the film is less of the expected allegorical ponderance and more of a biography of a man who can't possibly have existed yet seems to thanks to technical wizardry and damn fine acting from Pitt.

As you've probably heard by now, this one is a real stunner: A thoughtful, ultra high-concept art film doing a spot-on impression of a sweeping middlebrow epic. One imagines that many who see it will enjoy it right off the bat, but only discover later upon reflection just how unique and "different" the film they saw actually was.

It'd be unfair to dwell on the various colorful characters and fascinating times Button finds himself in over the course of his (you'd think) already unique-enough life, as I'd prefer people to discover them on their own. I will single out, however, how refreshing it is to see both Cate Blanchett (as Benjamin's almost-perpetually out-of-reach love interest) and Tilda Swinton - two actresses too-often tasked with playing icy, quasi-masculine hardcases - get to let their hair down as old-fashioned Hollywood glamour-gals.

This is already the surprise-hit of the Holiday season, so I probably don't NEED to tell you... but if you haven't seen this yet, you really should. It's one of the ones we'll be talking about for awhile (though I'm ALREADY dreading the innevitably "fun" the "Epic Movie" guys will have at the expense of the old-man-who-says-he's-a-toddler concept.)

...sucks balls. Another horror-remake misfire from Platinum Dunes, the cadre of Michael Bay cronies who've already blown it with Texas Chainsaw and The Hitcher.

I dunno what movie everybody else on the web has seen. Mine had a decent prologue and a couple of shapely boobs, but the rest? Pure shit. The kills are lame, uncreative and shockingly bloodless. The cast of victims-to-be are broad and unlikable even for THIS franchise. And since when is Jason Vorhees a ninja? Not only can this character we're told is a shambling, mentally-handicapped hulk scramble up a bulding like Jason Bourne, he's a crack-shot archer and a master of electrical-espionage. And why the hell does Jason, of all movie-monsters, need his own Batcave secret lair? That's like if The Wolfman had a helicopter.

Thhe only downside of the internet (besides it being extremely easy to spend money you don't have on it) is that you have to encounter ignorant peoples opinions...

Is it actually possible to take pride of this country.. We have 13 year old kids coming forward to say they're the father of a baby from some skank, those stupid scummy chavs that live off benefits because they messed around in school are living off our tax money.. And they have the nerve to try and intimidate people that walk past them and listen to their stupid RnB/hip hop/MC whatever it's called music? LOL.. What happened to the strict schools that used the cane, capital punishment? I've seen so many wimps in my school say to the teacher "but we were talkin bout the work sir" BS. They just talk about some skank they're going to sleep with then dump a day later. Seen it all before Burberry Boy and I wouldn't take any stick from these kids if I were their teacher.

Who actually would want to live in this country? Apart from Top Gear, F1 and Football.. Why should we live in this country, the economy is poor, the education of many people are in the toilet and company's are going bust and making more and more people redunant every day, you'd be lucky enough to get a job at McDonalds or Burger king these days.. If it's going to get worse I don't know how I might get a job in a Law Firm

I wish it was the 1950s, capitol punishment.. The cane and kids that had manners..

What a load of crap.

I have spent about half an hour with the Resident Evil 5 demo. In that short time period I realised that the police can’t reload and move at the same time, they move like they’re wading through a delicious pool of treacle syrup, a vast majority of the African population is white and punching zombies in the face is incredibly satisfying. I also got killed by a guy wielding an axe the size of a compact car… five times.

This trial version is the prime example of why I usually avoid downloading demos: There’s the opening screen disclaimer about how the game isn’t finished and might contain bugs (If you've ever taken a writing workshop, you’ve probably encountered several people who try to temper expectations for their work by muttering something like, "I didn’t work very hard on this," or, "I just wrote this last night, so it’s not really done." And you think, "Great, thanks for valuing my time, douche." That’s the same impression I get from disclaimers like this. You know, sort of.). You’re dropped right into a scene without any context or build up, although presumably it’s intended to showcase the very best the game has to offer. There may be important gaps you're not even aware of. All in all, this is not the ideal way to experience a game. Let’s not forget the cursed ‘end demo’ sequence, which forces you to watch a trailer displaying the date of release every time you die…

…I hate demos.

Saying that, I played the Valkyrie Chronicles demo last night and loved every second of it because it had NONE of the above faults! Now that's what I call a demo!

1) Become an Insomniac
2) Go househunting
3) Go to the pub to celebrate your new house prospects
4) Tell them you're going home at 11 so you can do the following:
-Wash hair
-Do work
-Pack for going home
-Book a ticket home
-Sleep well
5) Stay up until 5:53 am
6) Write a blog.
7) Get two hours sleep
8) Repeat

It's really creepy when you can't sleep- it feels like your the only one awake in the whole world. If anything I should be streaking down the road and doing all those things I have dreamed of doing if I were the only survivor of a Nuclear Holocaust.

But instead, I'm gonna post my desktop because loads of other people have and I feel left out:

GRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh, apparently the 'Angel of The South' is gonna be a giant...horse. Yeah, I dunno about that.

I?m gonna make a confession right off the bat. I?m 20 years old and I love Pokemon!

From what I've seen altogether too often, this might come across as an odd combination to many people. After all, Pokemon's just a thing for little kids. One would think that I would have outgrown it by now, and would be on to bigger and better things, like Gears of War, or Call of Duty, or any of the other examples of mature games that exist in the market today. No such luck.

I think we all went through a certain phase during our childhoods. When we were little kids, the sky was the limit as far as our imaginations and fantasies. It was all perfectly well and good, too, because we were kids, and that's what kids do. But then, at some point, we were all confronted with the same dreaded query that heralded the beginning of the end of our childhood:

"Aren't you getting a little old for that?"

It would become a progressively more familiar refrain as we grew older, starting as a simple question and growing more and more into a stern demand. Eventually there were several actions and desires that simply became too socially unacceptable for them to continue. So, they stopped. For some, this repression is more subconscious and automatic; for others, it's more along the lines of being dragged kicking and screaming into reality. But, at the end of the day, we all arrive at the same location - children become teenagers; teenagers become adults. Our old desires are stamped out and replaced with new desires that are more in line with the expectation of our peers based on our age.

And whenever this happens, it usually comes with little protest or question. It's just the way things are - of course people desire and enjoy different things as an adult than what they did as a child. But there's an obvious question to ask: why? Why does one's age dictate what one ought to partake in, or what one ought to enjoy? At its heart, it's really a very peculiar notion to say that something someone has enjoyed for a long time, and which that person still enjoys to this very day, ought to be ceased on account of the fact that the person has existed on Earth for an arbitrary number of years.

This widely accepted phenomenon becomes even stranger when one considers the nature of something like Pokemon. If one watches the anime, one will find that it expresses things that are applicable at most any stage of life: friendship, loyalty, humility, good sportsmanship, and a wide variety of other qualities.

I'll always remember when Gabe from Penny Arcade recounted his experience going to a Gamestop Pokemon tournament. Most of the competitors were, as expected, children, but the real notable point that he took away from it was the demeanor of the kids: with few exceptions, the losers never failed to lose gracefully and thank the winner for the game, and the winners never failed to stay humble and compliment the loser on their abilities. It seemed as though the children had really taken the Pokemon experience as a whole to heart in a way that left a lasting impression on Gabe and the way that he approached the games.
One can then compare this to the experience one receives through the more mature games like Gears of War, a game that enables the player to take a chainsaw to a bad guy's head, with predictable results or Grand Theft Auto, which allows the player to re-enact any number of crimes within the bounds of the games. Given the temperament of your average Halo 3 player compared to the temperament of your average Pokemon player, I don't think it's exactly a tough decision regarding which I'd prefer to play with.

Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not intending to rag on mature games, as that would be awfully hypocritical - I play them too, and heck, I own and have enjoyed both Gears of War and Grand Theft Auto 4. There isn't anything wrong with them; they just offer a different experience from the so-called "kiddy" games.

What I do want to rag on is this strange notion of needing to "outgrow" things like Pokemon. It would be fine if there was something obviously bad about Pokemon and something inherently better about Gears of War, but really, the opposite is kind of true. Nearly everything that we're supposed to outgrow are things that exude and express happiness, joy, friendship, and other positive qualities that would make life better if more of it existed. Conversely, the things that we're supposed to grow into are things that exhibit death, darkness, killing, blood, violence, and other such wholesome things.

The bottom line? In effect, we're being told that we must outgrow kindness and friendship and replace it with violence and death. I hope I don't have to go into detail regarding why this is, well, kind of messed up.

This effect doesn't just manifest itself with video games, either. Harmless pastimes we enjoyed as children are expected to be replaced with things such as sex and alcohol. Open emotions are replaced with repression and callousness; childlike friendliness is replaced with suspicion and apprehension. If I were asked to name one single thing that I felt was fundamentally wrong with the world, this would be it.

I'm not here to tell you to put down the mature games. That's not my intention, because I recognize as well as anyone else that there's an undeniable satisfaction derived from blowing some guy's head off in a video game. What I am here for is to ask people to please bring to a halt this notion that there exist "kiddy" games that they're too old for. Pride in what is good is a positive thing, but pride for the sake of pride can only lead to a darker, unfortunate place, and pride is the only thing preventing the enjoyment of such things. They haven't changed - we're the ones who changed, and needlessly so.

If you see yourself at all in what I'm saying, I encourage you to stop yourself the next time the thought wells up in your brain that something is beneath you due to your age. If you honestly, truly don't enjoy something after having given it a fair chance, then that's fine, but otherwise, the only person hurt as a result is yourself. It's a difficult barrier to break, to be sure, but those who succeed in doing so are universally happier for having done so. One of the surest signs of true maturity, and one of the first requirements for profound contentedness in life, is reaching the state where you no longer care whether or not what you're doing in private is mature.