BlogAllAlong » Entertainment

Toy Story 3 Video Game, Just How All Movie Games Should Be

Bashar — Sun, 15 Aug 2010 14:49:37 +0000

How many movie games are released each year? How many movie games have you tried in your life time? How many did you really like? The answer would be I bet very close to zero! Well I can say I added one to mine. The moment I saw Toy Story 3 video game trailer it felt like something different. Like something with a hope of enjoying it. Having gone through the story mode game now, the game really delivered the promise, setting an example of how video games should be made.

First of all, voice actors are all real not a replacement like many other Disney games I tried, this by it self tells you the company is taking the game seriously. Graphics was really great as well, and the game followed the real story to a very good extent, and added some extra fun levels as side stories that won’t really spoil the game, but rather add extra spice to it. Yes there were some critical scenes I thought should be included, like what happened to the bear. They made it look like he was no evil or anything, just a side character you pass by. Other characters were also missing, but nothing that spoiled the joy in my opinion.

What’s the best part for me was the multi-player mode. For the first time I’m really able to enjoy a game with my kid, playing together through the story mode, making our through the obstacles, helping each other, and most of the time, the lack of one player doesn’t hardly affect the other. You die, the other player resumes play until you respawn at next point. So this was for real a family + gaming time in one. I was kinda pushing him to play it over other games toward the end really :).

Is this because of the Avalanche Software? I never liked THQ games, but UP demo sounded a bit nice for kids.

Either way, I hope this isn’t an incidental success but a sign of better Pixar movie games to come. And why don’t other movie studios give such focus to their games? Have you ever heard of a good Harry Potter game? Yes Lego version was probably fun for kids, but that’s a lame shift after the successive failure the movie games have seen. I guess massive movie game failures have given them a bad reputation. It’s just something they have to get done, get quick cash from and leave.

NOTE: Zurg character is playable on PS3 version of the game.

It’s happening… 3D Bluray Movies

Bashar — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 10:15:27 +0000

That’s one movie I definitely wanna get.

Monkey Island Playground

Bashar — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 10:49:58 +0000

Without any relation to the game (but it should), HERE IT IS!

Why not real one? You know with hidden dirty T-Shirt treasures, lovely governors, spit contests, real grave digging and all. That would be much cooler.

Monkey Island II Tie

Bashar — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 16:23:20 +0000

Remember those Monkey Island sneakers? You do? Wow.. your life must be so empty! But anyways, I got an email that seems from the same shoes designer and you can now wear ties that match your shoes while going to work.

You can read her Spanish page if you like (or use Google Translate). And to bid for the Monkey Island tie (currently standing at 99 EUR!), you can do that here.

Don’t you wish now you wear formal?

Quake 2 on HTML5

Bashar — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 14:43:33 +0000

Unbelievable huh? If you know me very well you’ll know how much I hate April Fool, and this video was released the same day. But so was Gmail! I hope Gmail isn’t a long time joke as well cause I’ve been swearing my life on it for years. So anyways, this is the official Google Code page for the project. There are people saying it’s April Fool, and even TechCrunch was confused about it. But if you look at the Wiki and people’s comments, you will see people really trying and building it. No single comment from someone who tried it telling it’s a fool. So it seems pretty real, an for the sake of the future of the web, I really hope it remains real. This could be a serious threat message to Flash.

Careful Which “Life” Documentary to Buy

Bashar — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 09:18:47 +0000

From the creators of Planet Earth, one of the most astonishing, and I would say best, documentaries ever made, and also the creators of Blue Planet, comes the new highly anticipated documentary, “Life”.

Item is already available for pre-order on Amazon, and ofcourse such quality only deserves the Bluray version. But BEWARE. I was surprised to see the item starred 1 only.

But if you look closely, you realize this is all because of the narrator. Oprah Winfrey? Seriously? There is no one else more qualified to narrate the most anticipated documentary of the year than her? The thing is good enough to stand by it self without celebrities polishing it, and what you want is the best in this field… Get the David Attenborough version.

Mac Vs PC The Movie

Bashar — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 09:31:44 +0000

It’s been going for too long now… a war that dates back to more than quarter of a century, and the final battle is about to unfold.

Judgment day is coming.

But where is Google I say? Maybe those people are just playing for the runner-up.

Google Opt-Out Privacy Feature

Bashar — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 09:04:27 +0000

To all those who question Google’s ethics, fear their privacy violation, and have DOUBT about “Do Not Do Evil” motto, Google proudly gives you this.

Google Opt Out Feature Lets Users Protect Privacy By Moving To Remote Village

Is Sony Vegas Movie Studio Windows 7 Supported Or Not?

Bashar — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 04:37:20 +0000

Few years ago, I got this HD Sony Camcorder to enjoy HD video quality family videos, and it has served me quite well, despite it’s few short comings. Sony, which have developed the technology with Panasonic, use the AVCHD high definition recording format to record their HD videos, making it compatible with Blu-ray Disc format. But here comes the problem. Dealing with these large HD files turns out to be not easy at all.

For first, sharing these videos files with others is not easy because of size, and the difficulty to find a suitable player for it. Converting it to regular formats would always compromise the quality. Second, editing these HD videos, on top of being intensive on resources, is not easy to accomplish at low cost as well, for there is a huge lack in good reliable free or cheap AVCHD editing software out there. But having made the huge investment already in the camcorder, I swallowed the extra bullet and bought what seems the best AVCHD editing tool out there that is affordable, which happens to be Sony Vegas Movie Studio. Mac Final Cut handles AVCHD files, but only directly from the camcorder while they’re in their original file structure. Pretty silly if you ask me.

Sony Vegas Studio could make better conversion than the freely provided tool with the camcorder. Something to wonder about really, given that it’s from the same company selling the camera. Looking the other way however, I managed to enjoy a slow-life video editing on my old XP machine, until it could handle no more all the pressure. Now I have a new Quad-core Windows 7 machine, a beast hungry for giant task to do. But what I realized when I started editing 5 Gigs of videos is that Vegas Studio kept crashing on me on and on. I split the videos into halves, and then into 3 parts, to no avail. And here I wasn’t even dealing with HD videos, but normal SD ones from the same camcorder. It would get to the point where it crashes once I open the project, giving messages like:

Exception 0xC0000005 (access violation) READ:0×0 IP:0x0In Module ‘VegasMovieStudioPE90.exe’ at Address 0×0 + 0x0Thread: ProgMan ID=0xDF4 Stack=0x5DBF000-0x5DC0000

I Googled and found this is a pretty common error, to which Sony tries to claim has nothing to do. Some say it doesn’t support multi-core hardware, others say it’s Windows 7. But if you go to Vegas Movie Studio System Requirements, you see that it supports Windows 7.

And frankly, multi-core is old stuff now, and for such video editing, you would assume they will support it. But hey, let’s ask them just to make sure. I filled up the long form, answered all questions, and once I submit, this is what I got.

Really? It’s “not supported on any Windows 7 operating systems”? That’s weird, cause I could swear your page still reads Windows 7 supported! So now I’m like out of luck?

Ohh well, guess I’m gonna have to upgrade my self to Vegas Pro 9… for FREE ;).

Top 100 Anticipated 2010 Games

Bashar — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 21:58:13 +0000

Games Radar have published a list of top 100 anticipated games of 2010. I’m extremely thrilled to see Prince of Persia: Forgotten Sands there. Hope it matches the old trilogy in quality, and it seems will be between Sands of Time and Warrior Within. Also, Mafia II. Sequel but not related to best Mafia game ever, Mafia. If you haven’t played Mafia I already, I say do it. There is also the long awaited StarCraft II, ohh and… Metal Gear Rising. That came out fast I think.

Ruins of “Friendster” Civilization Uncovered by Internet Archaeologists

Bashar — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 11:35:24 +0000

I really sit down and ask my self from time to time, how would future generations if we get wiped out uncover us?

Kuwait Cinescape Patenting New Technology?

Bashar — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 10:16:34 +0000

Kuwait Cinema Company, Cinescape (a.k.a KNCC), seems to be filing a patent for a new technology, that will revolutionize the world of censorship as we know it. Cinescape says the new technology cuts down the editing time of the movie, and allows for dynamic re-censoring on the fly without having to go back to the execution chamber.

Without going too deep into the technical details of this technology, the method works in a way where a movie is screened it seems just once before the real show, and points of desired censorship are marked down. That’s all they need to deliver the movie to the fans. During the show, and when the specified not-yet-censored scene approaches, the magic starts to happen. A guy standing near the projector places what seems to be a piece of cardboard (Cinescape officials refused to confirm what it is exactly) to block the offensive scene from showing, and then removing the so-called cardboard when the scene is gone.

The new dynamic-censorship technology has already been put to practice in-mix with the old fashioned way of pre-editing, in the 3D IMAX screens of the blockbuster movie Avatar. The new technology might have been developed to overcome the technical difficulties Cinescape spoke of a week earlier, that caused the delay of the 3D IMAX version of Avatar.

Nevertheless Cinescape officials say this new technology delivers more than just a solution to a one-time problem. As on top of providing quick and dynamic censorship, it also allows the audio to go by, thus giving the viewers an idea about what’s happening, and keeping them in the action mood, as well as keeping the movie’s official showtime duration close, or same as the original movie, thus giving customers more minute value for their money.

Cinescape added then that the new technology have been well received by viewers with laughters, calling the competitors claims of deciphering laughter oddly as mocking total non-sense.

Neighbor countries such as Saudi Arabia and Iran have already shown great interested in licensing this new dynamic censorship, but Cinescape says they’re still early in the process, and want to improve the technology even further, before licensing it to the outside world. Couple of challenges Cinescape noted are being tackled right now. One is the redundancy of MCG (Manual Censorship Guy) who will be responsible for all the censorship, as in the case of emergency like restroom visits, Cinescape needs to ensure another MCG is in his place to do the job.

“This is too serious of a thing to play with. While viewers are enjoying the movie, we are working very hard behind the scenes to make sure this country stays intact. Single uncensored scene might bring more chaos to the parliament, and might even dissolve it once more.”

Another challenge is the audio censoring during for example sexual scenes, but Cinescape are hopeful they will soon relocate the primary wire feeding the audio, and be also able to kill it during such scenes. And as the technology gets better, I guess we can all hope to see full length dynamically censored movies by the holiday season of 2010. Here is one to Cinescape’s new year resolution.

UPDATE: Here is a call from MBH to officially boycott Kuwait cinema.

Clicker – What’s On Online

Bashar — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 06:37:19 +0000

Lots of online TV shows are being broadcasted, and lots of other movies, documentaries, and other video material. Clicker.com is the place to “find the right show, right now”. It will group the shows for you, and then show you the sites showing the specific show/episode you’re looking for.

Now ofcourse for most of us living outside the US, there will be a lot of disappointment, for lots of shows are from sites like Fox and HULU, which are US only. But I can still find other material available from public open sources. And while you can filter your search results by source, it would be more neat if I could get results available for my geographic location, or to say the least, US, UK, and Other category might do just as good.

[via All Things Digital]

Assassin’s Creed 2 Lineage

Bashar — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 13:10:40 +0000

Prequel to the upcoming Assassin’s Creed 2 game. The short film is not a spoiler for the game, but rather an intro to it, you should watch it before you play the game.

NOTICE: Contains some blood scenes, so do not watch if you can’t tolerate it.

Embed is disabled, you can watch the three parts here.

9 [Blu-ray] Coming End Of This Year

Bashar — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 08:29:42 +0000

Looking forward to it.

PS3 V3.01 Slowness Fix

Bashar — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 22:59:43 +0000

If you’ve updated your PS3 to the latest V3.01 and are facing some problems in performance, this simple fix might help. Note that I immediately updated to 3.01 passing 3.0. I suffered from slow game response for several games like Ghostbusters even at 480p, and Uncharted 2, while other won’t run at all like X-Men demo. FIFA 10 was running fine though. The main PS3 menu was also so slow in showing the icons. So see if this helps.

Backup all your important data. For me, this was just the save games and I could manually transfer them to a USB stick. Note that PS & PS2 game saves may not backup automatically through the Backup utility, so if it’s just saved games for you, you may wanna do manual backup
Make sure you followed Step 1 and have all valuable data backed up.
From PS3 menu go to Settings -> System Settings -> Format Utility -> Format Hard Disk -> Full Format.

NOTE: This may take few hours, and I haven’t tried Quick Format. So if you wanna try it first, please do so and let me know how it goes.
Do the first time PS3 settings.

That should be it. For me, now the PS3 menu works quite fast, and I’m enjoying Uncharted 2 now.

Good luck!

If it’s not broken, don’t fix it!

Bashar — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 00:31:49 +0000

That’s the motto to live by, at least when dealing with PS3, and I should’ve known from the last PS3 update. But hey, I’ve given Sony more faith than they ever deserved.

My plan to beat sleepless night with some gaming to finis Ghostbusters and get ready for Uncharted II turned out to be worse than I could’ve imagined. Since I’m having problems with so several games after the latest PS3 v3.01 update, I opted to install the latest Ghostbusters patch thinking it may be related to the problem and actually fix it. Well it didn’t. And not only did I waste 15 minutes waiting for it to download and install, but it actually somehow deleted my saved game progress! How on earth and what kind of a patch would delete your saved games?

Fact is, I could see a saved game file from the PS3 menu, and obviously from the date, here is my saved game mocking me. It’s just that the new patch doesn’t pick it up.

I tried deleting the game, re-installing it to the original version but that didn’t help either. Is there a way now? There is no way I’m gonna replay the whole game. And hey, we I still have the flickering thing.

Would a demo be a good test drive to tell if game will work or not before I buy it now?

UPDATE: Fix For Save Games

This really made me laugh out loud. If you turn your Display Settings by Custom to 480p you can find your saved games and resume the game. Set it back to anything higher and you lose it! So the smart guys tied the save of the game to the display settings?

With 480p, game still loads much slower than before, but game play seems tolerable. Now how about Uncharted 2! I gotta do more testing to know how ugly it’s gonna be.

BBC Earth Collection Bluray One Day Amazon Offer

Bashar — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 09:09:43 +0000

The great Planet Earth documentary in Bluray plus Earth: The Biography from BBC is on one day sale from Amazon.com.

Lawsuit against Sony PS3 v3.00 firmware update

Bashar — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 04:39:03 +0000

You would think things are supposed to get at least better with newer updates and upgrades, but a quick look at reality tells you, you’re wrong! Vista is the successor of Win 95 in it’s disastrous results, and is being phased out with a new fancier Windows 7 named one. Snow Leopard with all the hype is yet to amuse me once, and last time I updated to latest PS3 v3.01 the totally unexpected happen.

All of a sudden I noticed short trailers I downloaded are not playing smoothly, and they pause for a second or so every now and then. Playing some simple games as well like Wall-E, the game was flickering a lot that you can’t focus. (Note: Wall-E game is my punishment for getting my kid into PIXAR world)

Now it seems that’s not only me, but a whole group are filing a lawsuit against Sony for their latest firmware update which apparently is damaging some PS3 units, costing $150 to repair! So I guess I should be thankful, and perhaps slow down on PS3 usage until a newer fix comes in. The funny thing is, the lawsuit is coming from v3.00 and Sony claims it’s v3.01 fixes most issues, while I never had the chance to try v3.00 as I installed v3.01 directly, and yet I’m able to get these problems.

Guess I was lucky not to turn on my PS3 so often lately. I should do that more often. Ohh wait, I didn’t buy my PS3 as a souvenir!

Movies in 3D, finally of high quality

Bashar — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 18:20:26 +0000

After the positive feedback I got about it from a friend, I decided to give Cloudy With A Chance Of A Meatballs a try (what a silly name huh? They couldn’t just call it “Meatball Clouds”). My first impressions from the trailer wasn’t up high, but I thought it could be worth a few laughs for a computer-animated movies fan like me. What my friend told me about the IMAX 3D glasses experience however made me determined to go and try it, and I’m so glad I did!

For the first time in my life, this is a real good clear 3D view that I can enjoy. The 3D glasses there are so good, and you can see some high quality 3D picture. You do see the double picture however at the slightest of a head twist, so you gotta keep your head straight. Also, your eyes might get a bit tired, I took the glasses several times for a few seconds just to relax my eyes. But it’s a great experience I don’t think anyone should miss. Cinema had good crowd even though it was only in the early afternoon and in a working day.

The real catch is, there is always one, you have to set in family section, and go back furthest you can, avoiding side seats I guess is a better choice as well. Bachelor seats are so poor they should not be sold, or sold for half the price with a message saying “We cannot guarantee best picture from this seat”, or else just say it “We guarantee a hardly enjoyable experience from that seat”. There was one poor guy only in the bachelor section. I felt sorry for him.

The fascinating experience makes me regret failing to catch the Monsters Vs Aliens in 3D, even if it was only available outside Kuwait. And hey, I just got this two days ago from Disney.

Sad to miss such an opportunity. Now what movies would I love to see again in 3D? Hmmm…:

Wall-E
Incredibles
Finding Nemo
Monsters Inc.
Should I just say PIXAR?
Monsters Vs Aliens (received strong feedback for it’s 3D release)
Coraline
Dinosaurs

In terms of non-animated movies, I’d love to see Pirates of the Caribbean and Iron Man. Transformers? I’m sure it’s gonna be great, but their sequel kinda makes me lose the passion for it.

Monkey Island 2 Special-Uber Edition

Bashar — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 20:20:09 +0000

I can’t believe I call my self Monkey Island fan and I haven’t heard about this proof of concept for Monkey Island 2 Special Edition with 3D environment. And I haven’t even played the Tales of Monkey Island yet. I shouldn’t blog about this or else… Err, what do you mean I just did? Umm… back to topic.

Enjoy the videos.

Happy Eid Ye Filthy Scallywags

Bashar — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 17:30:53 +0000

Not every year does the two collide ehh? Well almost! And now ye can have yer self extra special Eid celebrating the Talk Like A Pirate Day. Telltale Games is offering the first episode of their Tales of Monkey Island this Saturday for FREE. Offer lasts for only 24 hours, so “Take All You can… Give Nothing Back”.

The even better Monkey Island Special Edition is also made available for half the price from Steam until Monday.

Enjoy the Eid, and insult your opponent safely.

Pirates of the Caribbean – On Stranger Tides

Bashar — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 09:29:22 +0000

Finally, Jack Sparrow is gonna ride the seas to stranger tides! Just wonder why don’t they get Ron Gilbert to enhance the story, and win even more fans? Arrgh!

UP Blu-ray 4 Disc Combo Pack

Bashar — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 11:31:07 +0000

The previously announced high-priced pre-order from Amazon for the PIXAR animation UP has now got a a lower price, and more details about the item contents. The new price guarantee now for pre-order is $31.99, and it comes as a set of 4 discs that includes a DVD copy, and a digital copy that you can play on your PC, Mac, or iPhone. One is ofcourse for the movie it self, and a fourth for the bonus materials, like several original ideas about Muntz’s end. Amazon page has all the details.

Sounds cool, and is a fair price now. Only bad thing is, it’s still two months to go!

PS3 120 GB Slim Officially Released for $299

Bashar — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 11:19:37 +0000

Today is the official release of the new slimmer PS3 120 GB Blu-Ray player, which can also play some awesome video games. At the cost of $299.99, I really find it a smart buy.

The Force Is Strong With This NERD!

Bashar — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 12:26:33 +0000

I think we should have large scale game of this style. That would be the only fighting game I’m really interested in!

UP Available for Pre-Order on Amazon

Bashar — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 09:24:21 +0000

Knowing Disney however, I bet this will take sometime before it’s released. And hey, when are we going to get the previously promised PIXAR movies like Finding Nemo & Monsters on Blu-Ray?

Coraline DVD/Blu-ray released!

Bashar — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 19:59:46 +0000

It’s finally released, Coraline on DVD single edition, DVD two-disc edition, and a combo of DVD + Blu-ray, and a digital copy that you can play on your PC, MacBook, or even iPhone. And they all come with 3-D version, along with the glasses. Although these 3-D home glasses usually bring disappointment before anything else, but let’s see how it goes.

Harry Potter 1-5 DVD or Blu-ray One Day Deal

Bashar — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 11:11:06 +0000

Either on DVD or Blu-ray for $56.99! Frankly the DVD collection looks much more fancier though.

He should be named mayor!

Bashar — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 20:08:46 +0000

This guy took the game a bit too seriously!

Quite amazing huh?

Steven’s RCT3 Page

BlogAllAlong » Entertainment

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