Greystone's Weekly Pick 12-2-09

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WARNING: POSSIBLE SPOILERS!

Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2: Are you ready to fight epic battles with the help of Superman, Batman, Green Lantern, Flash, Wonder Woman, Booster Gold, and more to save the WORLD!?! Then you’re playing the wrong freakin game because then it would be called DC Ultimate Alliance 2 you mo-ron. Go play Mortal Kombat vs DC or that Justice League Heroes game that was on PS2 and original Xbox. That game gives me shivers just thinking about it and I never even played it. But I’m sure nothing compares to the Fantastic Four movie game. Anyways as the title or massive picture of Spider-man and friends on the cover implies, this is Marvel’s fourth group action/RPG title but the sequel to the first Ultimate Alliance. Unfortunately, though being a sequel it has nothing to tie it to its predecessor other than the 2 in the title. Although they make a slight mention to MUA1 if you talk to Thor in Stark Tower where he talks of Odin still punishing Dr. Doom and a tale of how he beat Galactus the Devourer of Worlds (WHICH IS IMPOSSIBLE CAUSE IT’S GALACTUS). Sorry. If you did play MUA1, then you may remember at the end where Galactus seems to have set his eyes on Earth as his next main course because nobody steals from Galactus and lives. Thankfully MUA2 didn’t get crappier the second time like X-men Legends 2 did coming from X-men Legends. I will admit that after having played Legends, Legends 2, and MUA I’d felt that I’d seen all that Marvel had to offer. MUA2 actually surprised me a bit.

The story this time around is based on one of Marvel’s greatest series Civil War written by Michael Bendis. Civil War is about how certain events happen causing a bill to be passed mandating that all super powered individuals must be registered and trained by the federal government. The result causes a split down the middle of Marvel’s heroes. Captain America becomes the symbol to rally those opposed to the registration and Iron Man is the leader for those pro-registration. Civil War is a powerful story that is still causing ripples throughout the Marvel Universe. Being such a big fan of the series and having read all the stories dealing with Civil War, I guess I can appreciate what they tried to do with MUA2 better than most. Although MUA2 follows the basics of CW, it still leaves out a couple major events like the death of Goliath by the cloned version of Thor and Spider-man publicly revealing his secret identity to the entire world. Also they leave out Iron Man’s implementation of the Avengers Initiative project; the purpose being to place a licensed superhero team in each of the 50 states of the US. MUA2 completely cuts out the end of CW and adds its own version. Supposedly the electronic device used to keep the supervillains in check develops its own AI called the Hive and tries to take over the entire world. But without trying to be nitpicky MUA2 does a pretty solid job conveying CW into a video game setting.

Visually it’s not much different than its previous titles except the usual smoothing out of graphics and such. Unfortunately, I’d have to say the CGI cut scenes didn’t look near as good as MUA1 or even Legends 2 for that matter. Granted in those games there was only like 5 CGI cut scenes but that just made you treasure their visual beauty that much more. If you’ve ever picked up any of the previous titles then you’re already familiar with MUA2’s controls despite a few changes. I can’t remember if it was this way for MUA1 but I noticed they replaced having to collect stamina jars to continue using attacks, with a stamina meter that simple runs low and forces you to wait a couple seconds to replenish (which makes the most sense). Once again you take control of 1 of 4 heroes that you have in your group that help you throughout the game. Sadly, MUA2 has maybe half the amount of characters to choose from that you could in MUA1. Among the characters you have, half of them you’ve already played with if you’ve played MUA1. Some of the new faces are Hulk, Songbird, Venom, Green Goblin, Penance, Iron Fist, and Cyborg Nick Fury. They are however slowly releasing additional characters as DLC (curse those money hungry SOBs). The biggest change that MUA2 tried to implement was its power fusions.

With its predecessors’ each hero would have their own special big attack but with MUA2 they wanted to form more of a team strategy kind of thing. Personally, despite a few different fusions I thought were cool, I didn’t enjoy the concept. The fusions fall into 1 of 3 categories: Clearing, Guided, and Targeted. Clearing was in case you found yourself surround but hordes of enemies and needed to quickly thin their ranks and make it more of a fair fight. Targeted are for specifically dealing a lot of damage to a particular enemy (usually bosses or mini-bosses). And guided is pretty much same as clearing yet with guided you’re characters are using the fusion to physically push forward rather than staying in the same spot. What I didn’t enjoy about it was that all the fusions were basically the same exact thing. I mean there’s like 7 different fusions and all the rest are just imitations of the same thing but with different color. For example, out of all the 23 other heroes Wolverine can do fusions with (freakin Wolverine) half of them are fast ball specials and the other half are him charging around with the other character slashing at enemies. Oops my bad. I just forgot that he has a couple where the other hero shoots an energy beam at his claws and he deflects it out to all the enemies around him, but still 3 moves out of 23 different heroes. What kind of crap is that!?!

As you play the story for the first time through and decide whether to be pro or anti-registration it limits some of the characters you’re able to play with during Act 2. I actually kind of liked that because what sense would it make if you went pro-registration, trying to kick Captain America’s teams butt while you had Capt in your party? Once you’ve played through either story once you can go back and play through it again using all the characters you’ve unlocked at whatever level they were. Unfortunately, you can only do that on the Legendary difficulty. Although by the time I finished the first time through I believe most of my characters were already like level 50 so it’s not that much more of a challenge but some of those boss fights can get aggravating at that difficulty setting.

Once I had unlocked all the heroes, the group I decided to stick with was Hulk, Human Torch, Captain America, and Thor. Hulk is by far the strongest character you can have in your group (as well he should be). But even on Legendary it was almost laughably so because he has this charging move that deals a lot of damage and usually ends with him tackling an enemy while pummeling them into the ground. What made it so hilarious was that 3/4 of the bosses were so much smaller than him that it allowed you to actually tackle them. Then once they started getting up you just charge them again and again until they finally died and they never got off a single punch. That’s why HULK IS STRONGEST THERE IS!!! I liked Torch’s fire abilities plus with all the explosions and fires in the levels it was good to know at least one person in your party wasn’t affected by it. Even though Hulk is the strongest, Thor could give him a run for his money on MUA2. Some of the blows Thor dishes out with Mjolnir deals almost as much damage as Hulk. His lightening attacks are pretty useful and he also has this great attack where he slams Mjolnir to the ground causing everyone to fly up in the air thus knocking them off guard and off their feet. The choice of Captain America was just because you gotta love Capt and ever since his death at the end of Civil War (which isn’t in the main CW issues but a separate Capt comic); I missed the ‘ol red, white, and blue (because I don’t like Bucky as the new Capt.).

Thought I’d close with some of my favorite boss battles even though this is probably the longest blog I’ve written so far and considered splitting into 2 blogs. But I’ve really enjoyed writing this one more so than the others I think (probably because I love Marvel so much). Most of the boss battles were ok but the 2 that stuck near and dear to my heart were the ones against Multiple Man and Colossus because they’re 2 of my favorite Marvel characters. I mean seeing Colossus wasn’t that much of a shock to me because I’d already played with him in the previous 3 games but I bout cut a flip when MM came on the screen. I sometimes think people tend to underestimate him but you can see how he could easily be a force to be reckoned with. The more his dupes kept popping up, the bigger the smile on my face became. MULTIPLE MAN ROCKZ! Though I will have to say Colossus gave me more of a fight than the last boss battle with Cyborg Nick Fury (which felt like one of the easiest battles in the game even on Legendary). The villain that gave me the most trouble in the game (on normal and especially Legendary) was surprisingly Crimson Dynamo. He consistently kept taking my guys down because I couldn’t really seem to find his weakness. The only other boss on Legendary that was kicking my butt was She-Hulk which pissed me off to no end because I had HULK and she’s just his half as strong cousin. She was also one of the bosses Hulk couldn’t tackle which is what made it so hard.


Overall, it made my Spidey sense tingle so I give it 4 Boop BOOPS out of 5.

EXCELSIOR!

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Greystone's Weekly Picks 11-20-09

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WARNING: POSSIBLE SPOILERS!

Star Wars The Force Unleashed: Well it’s time to dust off that retractable light up lightsaber that’s been sitting in your closet for about 10 years and embrace the dark side. Trying to have a good Star Wars jedi/sith game is like hoping for a good Batman game. The developers and team may have a good idea where they want to take the game but it just doesn’t give you the experience you hope for. Well The Force Unleashed (TFU) thankfully doesn’t suffer from that problem. Now while I’ll have to admit I’m not a big SW fan (but I’m familiar with the movies), I find that TFU actually pulled me into the SW universe like none of the previous SW games I’d played ever did. TFU actually made me want to go out and buy the complete SW movie collection just so I could get more (my friend can attest to that). As soon as the game started out with that classic John Williams score, with the yellow text scrolling up the screen, I knew that it was going to be an awesome game. Heck, when I was watching the cut scenes I forgot I was even playing a video game. It was like seeing the missing SW episode. Sure it looked great, but how did it play you ask.

The gameplay like most of the rest of the game was pretty dang solid. Using force powers felt like you’d been doing it all your life. I mean I even had a bit of a geek moment going around the first level force choking Wookies. I have to admit that trying to direct force push can be a little frustrating when fighting enemies, though. The force powers were so easy and fun to do that most of the time I forgot I even had a lightsaber and really only used it as a back-up weapon whenever I ran out of force energy. One of the problems I had was despite having all my force stats leveled up I still wished my force energy meter would replenish faster than it did. I mean when you have force grab and force lightening you don’t need anything else. All you quick-time event lovers should have fun killing the bosses/mini-bosses because it’s full of it. The only down side or good side (depending how you think of it) is that each different mini-boss has its own QTE but it is the same for each of the same creatures.

Something else that I wished they would have changed, but I can understand from a creators stand point, is that there are basically only 5 different levels. As Vadar’s apprentice he sends you to a couple different planets in search for jedi. Once you find yourself on the receiving end of Darth Vadar’s rage, you then go back to the same planets, now overrun with storm troopers, and try to liberate them. Even though there is only 5 unique levels it still does not take away from the beautifully detailed levels themselves. Probably my most favorite level is going through the Death Star and witnessing the inner workings of it.

Overall, I think the force is strong with this one and I give it 4 Boop BOOPS out of 5.

Crackdown: In anticipation for Crackdown 2 I figured the only way to tell if I truly wanted to buy it when it came out was to check out the first one first. Crackdown is a third-person shooter sandbox game. Before I played Crackdown I thought games like Spider-man 2 or inFamous were true sandbox games (which in their own regard are) but Crackdown is like a parent dropping their kid off at the beach then driving to the nearest mall to enjoy some alone time. You literally get dropped off into an open world and are told, “Have fun and do whatever you want.” Ok not LITERALLY but basically. Right at the beginning you have open access to go anywhere you want to go and kill whoever you want to kill. There are 3 islands run by 3 different gangs with your police HQ directly in between them all. The 3 different gang ethnicities are Mexican, Chinese, and Russian. The islands, in that order, are also slightly more difficult than the last. What the game wants you to do is eliminate all signs of gang activity from the islands. Each island has 1 head honcho which you can get to by killing off his 12 lieutenants’. That is the only thing linear about this game.

There are a variety of weapons which you collect from enemies and take to one of your scattered respawn spots to be added to your inventory. Despite having a dozen different guns in your weapon inventory you can only carry 2 at a time, not including grenades. Of course, once you find the massive machine gun and heat seeking rocket launcher you won’t find yourself using any other weapons throughout the game. Your character also has a handful of special attributes that you level up by doing things within those specific attributes boundaries. If I remember correctly the attributes are melee combat, explosives, driving, marksman, and endurance. So for example whenever you kill enemies using some kind of explosive means you get explosive points which go to leveling up your explosives.

There are 5 levels to each attribute. Level 5 explosives makes your explosions do more damage and in a larger radius. High driving makes handling vehicles easier and gives boosts to the 3 special vehicles you can get at the police HQ. High endurance allows you to jump somewhere around 30 ft and run faster. So forth and so on. The game offers rooftop races to help receive endurance points and street races to increase your driving skill. There is also hidden endurance tokens scattered throughout the 3 islands on all the buildings (similar to that of Spider-man 2’s skyscraper tokens or inFamous’ blast shards). I think I ended up finding like 197 out of the 200 endurance tokens. Even though Crackdown has online co-op, I did not know anybody else who had the game for me to play with. But I would assume it makes the experience that much better.

Overall it is one of the best sandbox games I have ever played and I give it 5 Boop BOOPS out of 5.

A Greystone Production

Greystone's Weekly Picks 10-12-09

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Resident Evil 5: Well it’s time to jump back in the saddles boys and girls and kill us some zombies. As any RE fan knows RE5 is far from being the 5^th title in the series due to the many split offs but it, like the other 4, follows the more direct storyline. Ever since a couple years back when an old friend of mine got me to play RE4, I’ve been waiting on a 5^th. RE4 is still held in high regards as one of my favorite games ever. I loved it so much I went back and bought the first 3 thinking they’d be just as awesome and that I’d really get into the stories but I couldn’t even make myself play through the first one. The bad graphics and terrible controls should have popped in my mind being PS1 games but I thought I could see past all that. Turns out I was wrong. The only PS1 game I can still make myself come to play is Metal Gear Solid and even that’s pushing it but that’s another story. Now I will say I was fortunate enough to have played the remade version of RE1 on the Gamecube. That was also a really great game and made me wish they’d remake 2 and 3 like that as well. But I’m rambling on and it’s not even about the game I’m reviewing.

RE5 is hard to classify, I guess you could say, because while it has very strong qualities it also gives you that “been there done that” feeling whilst playing it. Being such a fan of RE4, playing RE5 wasn’t that big of an adjustment. A few of the controls were switched around but nothing you couldn’t get use to and it generally felt the same as RE4. The inventory system has also been revamped. Where in RE4 you could buy items to give you a larger inventory thus making it to where you hold more weapons, health herbs, etc.; RE5 only gives you 9 slots. At the beginning of each level or upon restarting after being killed, you’re able to fill those 9 slots with whatever you have stored in your main inventory and then are forced to make due with whatever else you get in that particular level. Which when you think about it sounds bad but that’s one of the perks of having Sheva as a partner is you can make her be your mule and carry whatever you want her to. Plus they did away with having weapon attachments taking up inventory slots and thus having you carefully arrange your inventory like in RE4, which use to be a real pain.

Back when I first saw that the game was going to give you a partner, I had mixed feelings and was a bit hesitant. Having played it, I kind of liked having Sheva around. But she does have her pros and cons. While she can be dead accurate, she wastes a lot of bullets shooting at more general areas like the chest rather than head shots. When I went through I only gave her the basic pistol letting her pick up all pistol ammo and have at it, while I had the shotgun and such. I also let her hold on to all the health items because she was good about healing herself around me thus healing us both instead of wasting them solely on her. Unfortunately, she’d tend to use a stronger health item to heal a not so threatening wound rather than use a single green herb that she also had.

Another good thing having a partner allowed you to do was have 2 player co-op campaign, which once my friend and me played was really fun. One of the bad things is that the game doesn’t allow shoulder switching. So if you’ve gotten use to always aiming over Chris’ right shoulder and then jump on with a buddy and are forced to play as Sheva then you’re forced to now constantly aim over her left shoulder. But in general both characters are the same and neither provides any different skills from the other. Visually, RE5 is one of the best looking next generation console games I’ve seen. Also the quick time events are back like in RE4 but thankfully aren’t quite as grueling except when fighting the giant, which on harder difficulties really gets on your nerves (especially the PS3 version because of the red circle and pink square looking similar). This was actually one of the few games that I played on both PS3 and my somewhat newly purchased Xbox 360 and honestly I couldn’t tell a difference. Perhaps the load times were shorter on 360 due to me installing the game on the hard drive but that’s probably it.

Really the only thing that disappointed me about the game was how blatantly similar the game play was with RE4. I mean it was like the only thing they changed was the character designs and level settings. Like in RE4, you’re making your way into town by car, the first person you really encounter tries to attack you like in RE4, the enemies used almost exactly the same weapons, enemies both talked in different languages you didn’t understand, both have parasite things popping out of their heads, both have chainsaw wielding people, have big giant guy with thing you have to shoot on it’s back, you work your way from town into a secret underground lab, etc. etc. I mean yeah I understand if you have a good formula you don’t want to change it but you don’t necessarily need to do it verbatim (that’s my big word for the day). About the only difference was that this time the girl with you was able to help you kill enemies rather than you walk her around the level telling her to go, stop, and hide.

Overall I really enjoyed RE5 and I give it 4.5 Boop BOOPS out of 5.

A Greystone Production

Greystone's Weekly Picks 10-8-09

Hello everyone. As it may be evident, I haven’t posted in quiet some time but I hope to try and change that. If you’ve read any of my other posts you know I like to talk a fair amount on comics. Unfortunately I’ve somewhat lost my appeal for them, I believe mainly due to the lack of good stories. So I'm going to concentrate more on video games and movies/TV series. I'm sorry to leave you with such a short post just starting back but I'm writing this somewhat late and will hopefully have a lot more for you soon.


Greystone’s Flicks:

Reviews:

Watchmen Motion Comic: As you can see I have quite a list of things I’ve seen that I feel like commenting on. And just having finished that last sentence I had to chase my cat out of my room as he was trying to secretly throw up behind my computer whilst I was at it. Now where was I…ah yes the Watchmen Motion Comic. Well back when Watchmen was fixing to come out I decided to pick up the Motion Comic in my excitement to see the film. I had also previously bought the graphic novel and read through it so I knew nothing would really hold any surprises for me. I never finished the Motion Comic because although it was interesting seeing the comic frame for frame with added motion and voices, the thing is 2 discs long with like 5 hours of viewing because it shows frame for frame and you have to watch it slower than if you were to read it yourself. Something else that kind of put me off to it was I started to realize that EVERY character in the movie was voiced by the EXACT SAME PERSON! Yes, 1 man does the voice of every man, woman, and child. But still if you’re a die hard Watchmen fan I’d find it hard for you not to pick up.

Watchmen: I’d have to say that Watchmen is probably my favorite movie of 2009 thus far. I thought it was way better than 300 and right up there if not perhaps better than Sin City. Now I figure if you’ve read the comic that you should love the film and if you haven’t you probably won’t enjoy it as much. But I’ve heard dislikes from friends of mine from both parties which really surprised me. Maybe I just have a strange taste in movies which would be true but it doesn’t make me love them any less. One of the things I loved so much about it was its pretty much constant following of the comic except for a few things, which I thought was done better in the movie. But it was also a bit more graphic/violent than the comic in certain scenes that I thought was a little much. Either way, despite a few scenes I found the movie to be, like the graphic novel, a work of art.

Dragonball GT: So I’ve been buying all the recently released seasons of Dragonball Z which has each season comprised of 6 discs of every episode of that season; rather than the 12 set DVD volumes they use to have (some years back) that took up a whole shelf space because they only put up to 4 episodes per DVD and each costing $20. So for all the fools out there who bought every volume back then, I bet you’re feeling pretty retarded about now but at least you have some pretty DVD art* to look at. Well I’ve been revisiting my childhood by going back through the DBZ series and finally seeing some of the episodes I never caught on TV like half of the Freeza Saga.

Anywhozzle, they also decided to do the same with Dragonball GT which is the series following the events of DBZ, so of course I had to pick those up as well. Having finished the 2 seasons of DBGT, I didn’t really enjoy it as much as DBZ. I mean I was looking all forward to Super Saiyan 4 Goku kicking some serious butt but as always after he reaches a new peak in perfection, someone else comes along and pwns him like he was still using his Kaioken technique. And poor Vegeta gets taken down as soon as he reaches level 4, feeling happy he’s finally able to match Goku again. And the thing that really upset me was that you only see Super Saiyan 4 Gogeta for 1 episode and then his fusion time runs out and they can never fuse again despite trying the rest of the episodes. But the Dragonball series is definitely one of the most popular animes out there and it’s easy to see why.

*A reference made that only those who know what I’m talking about, know what I’m talking about. Because out of those 12 DVDs you’d have to buy, each DVD’s side of the case has a piece of a picture. Then when all 12 DVDs were lined up side by side it made a somewhat cool picture which pretty much depicted what went on during that season.

Lost: So I’ve recently, within the last couple months or so, discovered that Lost is one of the best things made since television and if you think I’m lying then see for yourself. And if you still think I’m lying, I want you to say it to my face so I can hit you up side the head and leave YOU stranded on a deserted island. Honestly it’s a little hard to explain without having watched it yourself but it shows the story of the passengers from a flight that went down somewhere over the Pacific and stranded them on a “deserted” island. That’s right…air quotes around the word deserted. Because they soon find that they are not alone. But the story is just freaking fantastic and its awesome seeing how all this stuff is tied together. The writers of Lost should have won freakin Oscars for that stuff. Actually I think they probably won a couple Golden Globes or something. I've watched all of seasons 1-4 and am desperately anticipating the 5th one which should be coming out around December, I believe. I command ALL to watch it!

PS: It is CRITICAL that you start at Season 1 episode 1 because if you don't you'll probably be Lost. LMAO. Ok so it wasn't that funny but I didn't care how corny it sounded.

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Greystone's Weekly Picks 3-4-09

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Finally finished my February 2009 issue of GameInformer and besides Singularity, the only other games that looked interesting was Bayonetta and Dark Void. Granted they had some others that I’m not too sure on yet such as X-men Origins: Wolverine and Bionic Commando.

Bayonetta: But basically Bayonetta was created by one of the guys who created Devil May Cry which is very evident when you watch a trailer of it. So your character is a female witch who has magical hair powers and not only dual wields guns in her hands but has a gun attached to each leg as well. So she technically I guess quad wields. She wears this fairly scandalous skin tight outfit which is actually made of her hair and when you do magic hair spells it takes away some of her clothing because she’s using that hair to perform a spell. So she’s a good witch out to kill evil angels (that look like something from Pan’s Labyrinth) is all I gathered from the article. So if it’s anything like DMC4 then I think it would probably at least be worth renting to check it out.

Dark Void: Personally, I don’t think I’m excited about Dark Void because I don’t think I have a reason yet to be. Mean maybe if I see a trailer or something then it will help get me energized. But just from the screenshots, it looks like what I saw of Mass Effect which could be cool I guess.

X-men Origins: Wolverine: I’m trying to think of something to say about X-men Origins: Wolverine. Personally, I don’t think I’ve ever played a good Wolverine game. Honestly the best X-men games period, in my opinion, are the X-men Legend games which rock SO HARD! And in the first Legends I did have Wolverine in my party simply because of how powerful they made the character compared to all the others. In Legends 2, I said F that I can have Juggernaut AND Colossus (2 of my most favorite characters) on my team!?! Who else do you need…really. I’m pretty sure the other 2 were Magneto and Iceman. I always liked having 2 up close brawlers and 2 long distance projectile characters. Plus Magneto could make bridges and fly and Iceman could make bridges and make ice tracks or whatever it was called. Think in Legends 1 I always had Cyclops, Storm, Wolverine, and Colossus. Then in Ultimate Alliance I had Capt, Thing, Human Torch, and Spider-man. I’m kind of excited to see Ultimate Alliance 2 coming soon. Sorry but back to Wolverine. The X-men 2 movie game or whatever that was a bridge between X2 and X3 looked like the biggest piece of crap. And Wolverine’s Revenge was pretty bad as well. I will say I really liked what they were trying to accomplish in Revenge but unfortunately they didn’t. So basically I have no expectations for Origins which perhaps might be just as well. Because who knows, it might just sink its adamantium laced claws into me and really surprise me. Visually from the screenshots it looks beautiful but not too sure if the combat will be spot on. One cool thing about it I guess is that it appears that your health meter is shown based on how much damage your body takes. Like for instance, you’re closer to dying if Wolverine has bullet holes all in him and is covered in blood than if you had say a hole here or there. It reminds me of what I saw in the Afro Samurai demo in that your health on there was based on how red Afro got (which I guess was suppose to be blood). So if it has trophies then I’ll definitely at least rent it but I’m sure the millions of Wolverine fans will buy it when it’s released.

Bionic Commando: Now Bionic Commando I’m 95% sure will be a bunch of crap, although there were thousands of fans of the original (me not being one of them because it was before my time I think). Probably the only cool thing about it, if they get it right, will be the whole grappling through the city like Spider-man 2 which I could just as easily do by playing Spider-man 2. Only time will tell.

Games coming out this week 3-3-09 for Nintendo are as follows:

• We Ski & Snowboard (Wii)
• MLB 2K9 Fantasy All-Stars (DS)
• Peggle Dual Shot (DS)

My mom actually has some kind of Wii Ski game which is quite fun once I played it the other night. You use the Wiimote and Nunchuk to act as your skiing poles and go through the motion as if you were actually pushing off and where you turn the Wiimote determines where your characters ski’s move. It’s actually quite peaceful and serene. Any who I’m not sure how We Ski & Snowboard will be compared or anything.

Games coming out this week 3-3-09 for Nintendo are as follows:

• Halo Wars
• MLB 2K9

Pretty much like the same overly rated hype that Wolverine gets follows the Halo games. Mean IF I were to buy a 360, Halo would be no where near my top 20 games to buy on the 360. I played multiplayer and all that and I just don’t get why it’s supposedly the best thing since sliced bread. And Halo Wars isn’t really anything like the other 3 because the first 3 were first person shooters while Wars is a Command and Conquer (I guess) type game. Honestly I would have loved nothing more than to have seen some twit go out and buy the game once it was released (simply because it had something to do with Halo) and totally be like, “WTF!?!” only to realize that it’s nothing like the first 3. So go buy it like most of you 360 owners will because it’s definitely sold out at my Wal-mart. And for you people who actually know something about games and know you would or wouldn’t like it because you understand what the game is really like, then I salute you for not being some blind mindless ignorant freak.

Games coming out this week 3-3-09 for Sony are as follows:

• MLB 09 The Show (PS3, PS2 & PSP)
• MLB 2K9 (PS3 & PS2)
• Tom Clancy’s HAWX (PS3)

Nothing really about any of these titles excites me. Personally I wish that every sports game ever made would disappear and that none would ever be made. Can you tell I’m not big on sports? Granted that would drop the number of console owners by probably half. My thing with sports games, and really almost any game, is why would you want to play a game of something that you could actually do in real life? Granted you’ll probably never be hit a grand slam at the World Series or make a touchdown in the Superbowl or Toilet Bowl or whatever but you can still do that stuff in real life. Why not just walk out your front door and DO IT rather than “imagine” throwing and hitting a ball? Although I will say for the MLB 09 The Show being PS3 exclusive…BOOYAH 360!!! Sorry but it sometimes frustrates me how little exclusive content PS3 has and whenever they manage to get one it makes my day a little brighter.

Now I’ve downloaded the demo for HAWX but have yet to play it. Although I would desperately like to have an awesome jet fighter game, I pretty much gave up on airplane games a long time ago. I did think it was kind of funny/weird that they made a Clancy fighter pilot game after all these 3^rd person shooters. So I’ll try and hit up that demo this coming week and let you know what I think.

Gamer Review:

WARNING: POSSIBLE SPOILERS!

Dead Rising Chop till You Drop: Ever since I rented Dead Rising on my brother-n-law’s 360, I’ve only ever wanted to tear through hordes of undead with everything I see at my disposal. It’s been the only reason I’ve considered getting a 360. Then when I heard it was coming to the Wii but still nothing for PS3; I was furious. But then remembering that my family had a Wii I decided to check Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop out. Of course I already had set my expectations too high from the 360 but a guy could still dream. From the opening cut scene I thought the graphics weren’t that bad but there was definitely a difference. I quickly discovered after skipping the part where you’re suppose to take pictures of the town as you’re being helicopter to the mall, that the camera portion of the game was out. When I saw the first game footage I kept telling myself that it was ok as long as the game play was still good. Then quickly discovering that I could not climb on anything I would like, as on 360, I started to cry inside.

Unfortunately I only played it a hand full of hours due to school and work but it was sufficient enough to grasp what the rest of the game was like. Compared to the 360, the Wii’s version felt very linear. You didn’t have nearly the amount of weapons in this one. While on 360 you had an infinite supply to pick off of walls that looked like it was carrying the weapon of your choice, the Wii had it to where you could only pick up the weapons it had laid on the ground. The in-game dialogue was replaced by text. The mall was a bit limited in paths you could take since it took away your ability to climb over any and everything. Before I had to take the game back I got to see it change to night which is pretty scary like on the 360 version having limited visibility and all. But when it went dark on here I couldn’t see a blasted thing. I mean I doubt it was my TV but I’d find myself running scared as I would try to avoid what looked like the outline of a zombie, only to sometimes find out it was a poll. In addition to zombies, you find yourself constantly under attack by killer zombie parrots and poodles which are extremely frustrating given the controls. The controls were interesting trying to use the Wii remote and Nunchuk. You hit the same 2 buttons for every action except actually fighting which you could use the A button or attack by waving the remote. I will say it was a bit aggravating when I’d scratch my nose and see my character go berserk. And the shooting…holy crap don’t get me start on the shooting. Using the remote to aim and shoot is about the most nerve racking thing when you have zombies coming after you and you’re trying to make the sensor recognize you’re pointing at the zombie killing you and not the sky.

In closing, Dead Rising Chop Till You Drop is definitely nothing like the sweetness on 360. It kind of curved my appetite for buying a 360 but then again it almost made me go out and play the REAL thing so I could try and get that bad taste out of my mouth. So if you have a 360 and a Wii buy the 360 version. If you have a 360 period you need to buy it. If you just have a Wii, sell your Wii, buy a 360 and play the real thing. j/k And if you have a PS3 I guess wait until Dead Rising 2 is to be released hopefully within the next year or so.

Greystone’s Flicks:

Movie News: Marvel has finally signed a contract with Samuel L. Jackson to continue playing Nick Fury in the upcoming Marvel films. Apparently after having him do his little cameo appearance after the credits of Iron Man they had not had him on contract and so had to go through a lot of crap but looks like they’re finally back on top of it.

There seems to be a new Superman movie listed as hopefully being worked on in the future. It appears to perhaps continue along the same path as Superman Returns rather than being completely revamped but it hasn’t been written in stone.

Coming on the heels of DC’s other animated films Superman Doomsday, Justice League: New Frontier, Gotham Knight and the new Wonder Woman will be Green Lantern: First Flight July 28^th, 2009 as announced at WonderCon.

In Watchmen news, I read that the Watchmen has already broken its first record because its 3,611 theater count is the most ever for an R-rated movie. 1,600 locations starting at midnight Thursday and 124 IMAX count is included which all will have midnight showings.

Rosario Dawson who was in the first Sin City tells reporter that Frank Millar has recently finished writing the script for Sin City 2. So let’s hope they can start filming as soon as possible.

I just watched the final X-men Origins: Wolverine trailer and what excitement I was lacking before has hit me in full. You ask anyone who knows me and they’ll tell you how much I dislike Wolverine. Ok it’s not that I dislike the character but all the praise and almost godhood that he’s obtained when there are far better characters in the Marvel Universe. I hate how a majority of people don’t even pick up anything unless Wolverine is in it and that about anything sells with him in it. Only reason I enjoy the movie version of the Wolverine is because I really like Hugh Jackman. I’ve been trying not to watch trailers as of late so as not to spoil anything for myself but I had to watch this one. Man if it didn’t spoil some things for me. STUPID TRAILERS!!! I got excited because it showed a young Scott Summers but I wish I hadn’t known about it till I watched the film. Any who I’m definitely gonna be checking it out this May.

Although Heroes unfortunately isn’t doing so well in the ratings this season, it’s been said NBC plans to make a 4^th season. So let’s hope for another sweet season to come.

In Theaters:

Unfortunately I wasn’t really able to see Push in theatres but I’ll definitely be looking forward to renting it when it comes out on DVD. But I suggest if you see any movie this year then see Watchmen. Although I haven’t seen it yet, if it’s anywhere near what the comic was like then it’s going to be one heck of a film. I’ll try and post my review of it next week. Also try not to read the Graphic Novel before you see it, just because it might make you not enjoy it as much since of course they probably won’t show everything. Mean I loved the Graphic Novel and I’m hoping I’ll love the movie just as much. Mean the flip side is that if you’ve read it then you get to see how cool it looks going from page to film. So do whatever you want but think about it before you do it.

On DVD:

March DVD’s:

• Transporter 3 3-10-09
• Punisher: War Zone 3-17-09
• Twilight 3-21-09
• Watchmen: Tales of the Black Freighter 3-24-09
• Bolt 3-24-09
• Quantum of Solace 3-24-09
• Marley & Me 3-31-09
• Seven Pounds 3-31-09

DVD’s I’ll be checking out this week are Watchmen: The Complete Motion Comic and the animated Wonder Woman film.

Greystone’s Weekly Pick:

3-4-09

Batman Cacophony #3: At first look, I didn’t think there would be anything interesting about this 3-part series to grab my attention until I read the Joker was involved. Of course being such a huge Joker fan as I am, I figured that was reason enough for me. Joker’s not the only problem Bat’s has to deal with but also Onomatopoeia whom I’ve heard of but never read anything on. I picked up issue 1 the other week and I’ll give my review on that within the month.

Solomon Grundy #1: It seems in the DC Universe I find myself attracted more towards the villains of the comics rather than the heroes and Solomon Grundy is no exception. Now I must admit my love for Grundy is pretty much based on seeing him in the Justice League and Justice League Unlimited cartoons. I mean anyone who can pretty much go toe-to-toe with people like Superman gets his name in my book.

Dark Reign Tie-Ins out this week are:

• Agents of Atlas #2
• Black Panther 2 #2
• Dark Reign Fantastic Four #1
• Deadpool #8
• New Avengers Reunion #1
• Secret Warriors #2

Pretty much check out all the Dark Reign tie-ins if you like to keep up with every little thing that happens related to the series. Tie-ins can be really good if done well but they can also suck if it has no real relevance to the story.

Hulk Broken World’s #1: Not exactly sure what the basis of the story is about but it sounds like it’s going to be re-telling some of the more popular alternate versions of the Hulk which could be something worth reading.

New Avengers Reunion #1: Not sure really what to think of this. I mean if it’s just a little mini-series about Hawkeye getting Mockingbird back then I doubt I’ll find it interesting but if it really has some input as to some things that went down back in Secret Invasion then it could be real sweet.

Ultimate Wolverine vs. Hulk #3: IT’S FINALLY ARRIVED!!! I’ve been waiting on this issue for probably little over 2 years. It pissed me off so bad when this series was abruptly stopped after #2 only to be made referenced to in other comics. I guess they figured out a way to put Wolverine back together from being ripped in half. THAT’S MY BOY HULK!

War of Kings #1: Two words…Black Bolt. Nuff said. j/k But seriously I’m really hoping this series isn’t going to let me down. Granted I can’t stand the 3^rd Summer’s brother Vulcan, but I’ll be danged if he thinks him and his little Shi’ar empire are going to take my man Black Bolt and the Inhumans down.

Well that's my picks for this week. What's yours?

Also which is your favorite cover of 3-4-09. I'd have to say War of Kings #1 for Marvel.






























A Greystone Production

Greystone's Weekly Picks 2-25-09

Welcome everyone. If you’re reading this because you’ve stumbled upon my first Greystone’s Weekly Picks, Greystone’s Weekly Picks was to basically let you know what comics were going to come out the current week that I personally thought would be interesting to check out. Then I was considering making 3 more separate blog’s, one for games, movies, and one for monthly comic reviews. But then I realized that was too much of a hassle and I didn’t wanna have to do all that writing cause I’m too lazy. So I decided to make an Amalgam and have it all in one blog. So let’s begin. then I’m glad you decided to check out what else I had to offer. But if this is the first blog you’re reading of mine, then that’s perfectly fine as well. My initial intent for

Gaming with Greystone:

I’ve recently subscribed to GameInformer, partly due to my friend who used to get it for the past who knows how many years. But also cause I’ve always thought it to be an interesting magazine. Plus I kind of got my year subscription for free but you’ll just have to take my word on that because I won’t go into details. I’m pretty slow when it comes to reading my GameInformer’s because I use it for reading material in the bathroom. But let me try and change that mental image with that of what I’ve recently been reading about.

Singularity: Pretty much the first “inside look” game in February’s 2009 issue is the game Singularity. Singularity is set to release on the PS3, 360 and PC. Now I’ve yet to finish the article but from what I’ve gathered so far I’m kind of on the fence. Ok basically it’s trying to be similar to games such as Fracture, Timeshift, etc. where you have this cool gimmick you can use that pretty much shapes the game play. Basically the gimmick is that your character has this special device that he can use in 4 different ways.

1. Fast forwarding the time of an object or person causing it to rapidly rust or age.

2. The same thing but backwards thus causing old things to become new and people to revert into a placenta type existence.

3. Pulling an object out of a separate timeline and freezing it in your own.

4. Violently pushing an object away like your using force push which can also stun enemies it’s used on.

The thing with the separate timeline which is probably making you say, “WTF Greystone!?!” is because the game is kind of based in 2 different timelines at the same time. Basically, something happens on the island you’re on where time is kind of split in two, so it’s constantly changing back and forth from the 1 of 2 timelines. And they open up a portal to hell and now you must walk down into the basement to close the door back and this time lock the deadbolt. Ok so the whole hell portal thing isn’t true but you know most games always have something to do with opening up hell. Mean people tried building staircases to reach heaven and all this stuff but hell is just a door knob turn away.

But back to what I was going with earlier. Having such a gimmick is what initially makes me pull away from it. My friend would some it up nicely by pretty much saying that games with gimmicks aren’t necessarily bad but it depends on how you use the gimmick. Let me explain. Let’s take Fracture for example. If the gimmick of the game is re-shaping terrain then you need to have the gimmick add to the game play rather than have the game play revolve around the gimmick. Because if the game play revolves around the gimmick then it basically becomes all about the gimmick which usually is very limited in what it can do. Taking Fracture again for instance, you had like 4 things you could do to change the terrain in the game. Make it rise up, sink down, rise up into more of a peek, and I forgot the other thing. But it was almost so freakin linear that you were using certain techniques in situations that were made for the technique. I’m not really sure if I’m getting my point across accurately. I guess I’m kind of trying to say that I think the game play needs to be able to stand out on its own, without the gimmick but have the gimmick add a little pizazz.

Any who, I think if they can hopefully pull it off right, then it should be something definitely worth checking out. And even if perhaps it’s not that great, if it has trophies added (which I think most games from now on will) then I’ll probably be renting it simply because I am a trophy whore. So be on the look out for that sometime in the coming year if you’re big on games like Fracture or Timeshift or any other game that’s similar but not coming to mind. Now in all honesty I’ve only played the demo’s of both Fracture and Timeshift. I fairly enjoyed the Timeshift demo but heard it was pretty bad but I hated the Fracture demo and just seeing how it’s now priced at $20 this soon is also a big sign of it being crap.

I’ve recently heard and read that Nintendo is going to be coming out with a newer version of the Nintendo DS Light now called DSi. The handheld is mentioned to launch this April 5^th for $169.99 rather than its previous version which was $129. Initially it’s said you can choose from either the colors blue or black. It’s going to now have cameras added to it so you can take pictures of yourself or of those across from you who simply think you’re playing a game. As if camera phones weren’t bad enough. Also it’s said to house 256 megabytes of rewriteable memory inside the unit, used for pictures, music, and downloaded software.

In other Nintendo news, the Wii is said to be the only console for the second installment in the Dead Space series called Dead Space Extraction. From what I’ve seen of the teaser trailer it looks like it’s going to be very intriguing for that of a Wii game. Now it does personally frustrate me that it’ll be a Wii exclusive rather than being on the PS3 but my family has a Wii, so I don’t think I’ll really be left out. I heard it was suppose to be a rail shooter which I took to mean something similar to the Wii’s recently re-released versions of the arcade games The House of the Dead. So if that is the case then it will be interesting indeed to see how they go with that. I know I’ll definitely have my calendar marked for that, however.

Games coming out this week 2-24-09 for Nintendo are as follows:

• Blue Dragon Plus (DS)
• Imagine: Ice Champions (DS)
• Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop (Wii)

Blue Dragon, I believe, will be a big hit with the anime/RPG type fans. Imagine: Ice Champions is just another title to the “Imagine” series which is pretty much geared towards perhaps 8 year old girls and younger. Other “Imagine” games they’ve released are “Imagine: Teacher,” “Princess,” “Movie Star,” “Babysitter,” “Cheerleader,” etc. Ok now some of this stuff I could see how you might would sometimes “imagine” what it would be like to be or do some of these things. But if you’re trying to “imagine” what it’s like to be a cheerleader why don’t you get off your butt and try to join a squad. If your answer is because I’m too fat or whatever then that’s probably a sign that you shouldn’t waste time sitting around playing games to help you “imagine” because that might just be adding to the problem. And if you’re that desperate that you wanna “imagine” what being a babysitter is like, why not try and find someone who has kids that you can baby sit in REAL life. Yeah I know it won’t be nearly as fun perhaps and you don’t have to worry about the real life consequences that could occur but it’d help you to earn a little cash and help you buy the next “Imagine” game. Oh and if you actually land that babysitter job, don’t forget to turn the bathtub water off because you’re too busy focusing on playing your “Imagine: Babysitter” rather than focusing on the REAL kids. This has been a public safety announcement from XSE_Greystone.

And Dead Rising…oh where art thou my Dead Rising. Ok I was gonna go on a long Romeo rant but figured you’d rather want something with actual information in it. Basically in my opinion Dead Rising is close to if not the #1 funnest game I’ve ever played in my life. Now I’m really referring to the original one on 360 WHICH PISSES ME OFF NEVER HAVING COME OVER TO PS3!!! But I digress. Even though I’m certain the graphics won’t look like the 360 and the game play will probably be dubbed down compared to the 360. I think it would be very freakin hard to screw up a game like that and if they somehow managed to do so on the Wii then I shall forever spit in the face of Nintendo until my saliva glands dry up and blow away. Though I probably should spit at Capcom but I like Capcom too much. So if you have a Wii then you better bloody rent it or buy it or get your hands on it anyway you can (that is legal) or I’ll come after you if I have any spit left.

I’ve read that Microsoft is trying their best to buy out some kind of 3D company in order for them to start making what will be similar to it’s Sony counter part the Playstation Eye. Their new camera is also said will be a heck of a lot better one than that of the Playstation Eye. So once again Microsoft is being a B because they can’t stand for anyone to have something they do not.

Games coming out this week 2-24-09 for Microsoft are as follows:

• 50 Cent: Blood on the Sand
• Stoked
• Shellshock 2
• Star Ocean: The Last Hope

Now granted even though I don’t have a 360 (but secretly thinking of owning one…well not secretly anymore) I still wouldn’t be interested in any of these games if I did have one. Mean really, a 50 Cent game? I’d almost rather buy all the unsold copies of The Golden Compass than give 1 cent to 50. Couldn’t think of anyway to make a good joke about me giving him a cent now making him 51 cent…*crickets in the background* anyways shut up. So yeah if I had a 360 I might check out Shellshock 2 but my thing is once you’ve played 1 war game you’ve played them all.

Back onto my love for Dead Rising. There has been leaked a video which seems to be footage of a Dead Rising 2 which is said to be thankfully coming out on both 360 AND PS3. Mean you have no idea how excited I am at that possibility. Just wish they’d port over the 1^st one to PS3 as well. Really the only thing I wanted to check out this week from the Playstation Store is the Zuma and Afro Samurai demos. Upon playing Zuma I decided it was such a cool little demo that was worth holding onto (cause I usually delete demos once I’ve had my fill). I’m really glad that put out a Bejeweled 2 and Zuma demos. They’re so freakin fun and they almost make me wanna buy the games if they weren’t both $10 a piece.

But Afro Samurai is a whole other story. Now the only Afro Samurai I’ve ever seen was a short part of an episode where I wasn’t too keen on the art style and course didn’t really know what was going on so I changed the channel. But from what I gathered from the demo I think I’d get real tired of the combat very quickly. The combat seems very repetitive and fairly boring. I also had no idea what the tutorial was trying to tell me to do during the focus attacks. I did kind of think it cool that your health bar was pretty much yourself. The more you got the crap beat out of you the redder your body became. Really the only good thing I thought about it was Samuel L. Jackson’s voice work on the characters cause the characters were funny as mess.

Games coming out this week 2-24-09 for Sony are as follows:

• Killzone 2
• Eat Lead

Now of course I’d be a complete moron if I didn’t check out Killzone 2 but I’m not sure what to think of Eat Lead. I will say I wasn’t really excited about Killzone 2 coming out cause I had no need to be but after playing the recently released demo, it made me change my mind. So now I am curious to check it out and finally get a real taste of it.

Gamer Review:

WARNING: POSSIBLE SPOILERS!

Street Fighter IV: Well I picked up Street Fighter IV this past Friday and was very excited about checking it out because it looked so beautiful from what footage I’d seen. Of course I had to wait till Friday rather than when the game came out Tuesday because apparently rental stores don’t get new releases until the Friday after it’s released. Might be a little bit of important info for all you people big on renting or starting to be. Granted if you were already big on renting you probably knew that. SHUT UP AND REVIEW THE FREAKIN GAME GREYSTONE!!!

Ok ok…sorry. Now I, like probably 98% of gamers, remember back when I was a kid and had Street Fighter II for the Sega Genesis. One of the best acclaimed fighting titles still to date. While I had SF II and knew the basic “Down-to-forward punch,” moves and rapid button pressing of Chun-Li’s kicks; I still could not consider myself good at 2D Fighters. I wasn’t terribly horrible at Marvel vs Capcom but that’s another game for another time perhaps. As one would assume, yet I foolishly did not, if you’ve never been good at fighters you’re not going to miraculously kick A because you had some fond memories. Again, it was quiet apparent that I sucked at fighters the second I started my first match in Arcade mode. I somehow had the crappy luck of fighting against Zangief who, even on MEDIUM, felt the need to rub my inadequacy in my face by continually pill driving my head into the ground. But did I give up that easily…NAY!!! I pulled myself together for round 2 and once again tasted the utterly humiliating defeat at the hands of the Red Cyclone. After a couple rounds of this (a couple being a bit loose) I almost drove myself back to Hollywood Video to demand another rental. After a nights sleep I decided that I would have to find the character who best fit my personal style of play….button mashing. It was to my amusement to find the character I connected most with was none other than Zangief himself. I found myself tearing through almost all of the competition except if the CPU chose Zangief. They have like 7 varying difficulty levels ranging from Easiest to Hardest and where you’d think Medium were in the middle but when playing it felt like I had mistakenly switched it to Hard. I actually went back and checked a couple times to make sure I was reading it right, thus I decided to stick with Easiest. But let me get more into the game itself.

Pretty much the Story mode or Arcade or whatever you wanna label it is the same as it’s been. Choose your character fight about 6 or 7 other characters until you reach the final boss, who back on ST II was Bison now in SF IV is the dreadful Seth. Seth looks like Dr. Manhattan with a Ying Yang sign substituting for a stomach. He’s supposed to be an amalgam of all the best fighters or at least all the best moves…yet he has the blah name of Seth. Who tries to make one of the most powerful people on the planet and names them Seth? Each character has somewhat of a storyline but it’s so vague almost, that you wonder why they bothered trying to tell you at all. Each character has a different opening and ending animated clip which doesn’t look too bad and I think if it were done correctly could have been really sweet. There is a Training mode which I originally started in but after looking at the different screens trying to explain the character’s move sets I decided that it would be easier to become a rocket scientist and work for NASA. Honestly, the training mode is a complete waste of development by the programmers. The game also has a Challenge mode which I personally found to be the finest part of the game. The Challenge mode is further broken down into 3 categories Time Trial, Survival, and Trial (not 100% sure on the names). Time Trial consists of giving you a set amount of time which you have to go through a set amount of matches thus beating all the opponents while still having time remaining and not having died yourself. Survival, like it sounds, gives you unlimited time to kill as many opponents as you can before either dying or running out of opponents. Lastly, Trial is the #1 thing that proved most useful in SF IV. Trial has the computer set you in the training room with a dummy opponent where you are to complete the moves or chain attacks that it gives you. This is the reason that I found the Training mode to be completely useless for. I mean why have a training room that doesn’t do crap when you have a challenge that’s whole purpose teaches you the character’s move sets? Finally, the game does of course support online battles which I cautiously approached but soon found were pointless because no one was playing online.

In closing, Street Fighter IV is very stunning visually but I don’t recommend it unless you’re a hardcore fighter fan or find yourself wanting to be a hardcore fighter fan. But if you find yourself wanting to be a hardcore fighter fan then I’m gonna try and find that number for NASA and give it you.

Greystone’s Flicks:

Reviews:

Death Note: I recently stumbled upon the anime Death Note which I would highly suggest to any anime fans out there and even to those who aren’t that big on anime yet still like slightly more mature cartoons. But I only recommend it if you watch it in its original Japanese version. Yeah I know I’m not the world’s biggest fan of subtitles either but the character’s voices done by the Japanese actors is SO much better than the clips I saw of it in English. There just seems to be a more serious vibe about the story and depth to the characters in the Japanese version. So check it out.

Appaloosa: Now I pretty much grew up watching old John Wayne movies and all cause of my mother’s love for them and over the years there have been a handful of good western movies since. Tombstone was probably the last good western I’d seen in years until I saw the newer version of 3:10 to Yuma which I personally thought was very good. So I figured having such a good western in this day and age was a rarity of its self. When I watched Appaloosa I knew that the people of 3:10 to Yuma weren’t the only ones who could make a good western in the new millennia. Although I personally didn’t think it was as good as 3:10, it was still something that I was glad I watched. What personally drew me into as much as it did was the relationship displayed by Viggo Mortenson’s and Ed Harris’ characters. That type of friendship that could be described as brotherly love and the strength of such a bond were very well done.

Greystone’s Weekly Pick:

2-25-09

Origins & Omens Tie-ins out this week are:

• Green Lantern #38
• JSA #24
• Superman #685
• Teen Titans #68
• Wonder Woman #29

Batman: Gotham After Midnight #10: Honestly, I couldn’t tell you why I decided to pick up the first Gotham After Midnight comic a while back. No wait I remember…I believe because it first mentioned something about Scarecrow who, like almost all Batman villains, is a character you find to be very intriguing. Though it’s the mysteriously new Midnight Killer who’s the main villain arching through this 12 part mini-series rather than the Scarecrow. Now I’ve only personally read through the first 3 issues but it really only took issue one to grab my attention.

Green Lantern #38: Just the cover of this issue makes me wanna read it but as anyone who’s read more than 5 comics knows, it’s the cover that the artist uses to try and grab your attention though sometimes what the cover tries to show is a lie. It seems to be running still in the storyline Rage of the Red Lanterns. Now we all know there’s a Green Lantern Corp. and anyone who knows Green Lantern knows Sinestro. Well I’ve seen the covers recently of the whole Sinestro Corp. where all these villains have yellow power rings which I’d really like to check out sometime. So more or less we have the Green Corp. and Yellow Corp. but now from I don’t know where there seems to be a Red Corp. And then if you look at the following issue’s cover, it has what looks like a new Orange Corp. I’m just waiting for them to announce that all the corps. were made by the Skittle gods.

Dark Reign Tie-Ins out this week are:

• Avengers: The Initiative #22
• Dark Reign Files #1
• Mighty Avengers #22
• Ms. Marvel #36
• New Avengers #50
• Thunderbolts #129
• War Machine #3
• Wolverine Origins #33
  

Avengers: The Initiative #22: I’ve loved this series ever since issue 1. I highly suggest it if you haven’t read it, to really try and start at #1.

Dark Reign Files #1: It seems ever since House of M, Marvel publishes some kind of “Files” one-shot issue. Basically it’s like an encyclopedia for the event described in the title. It usually show cases some of the major characters dealing with the event and what there status is based on what’s going on at the time.

Dr. Doom and the Masters of Evil #2: Sure it sounds like something from He-Man but whatever. I’ve personally not yet read #1 so I honestly couldn’t tell you if it’s worth following or not but hey it’s got Dr. Doom in it.

Hulk #10: Even though this series has been as crazy as it is I still think it’s freakin awesome. Red Hulk or Rulk as some in the comic call him (yeah I know…retarded right?) is totally bad A. I mean he freakin walked up to Uatu and punched him in the face!

Mighty Avengers #22: This series and New Avengers have really made me an Avenger fan.

Ms. Marvel #36: Now I’m not a big Ms. Marvel fan but the Secret Invasion tie-in issues I found to be real good. Here’s hoping the Dark Reign tie-in issues are good as well.

New Avengers #50: I wonder what the 50^th issue will have in store.

Thunderbolts #129: This series is somewhat surprisingly good but I mainly follow it for Venom, Penance, and the occasional sighting of Bullseye.

Ultimate Spider-man #131: USM is, in my opinion, one of the best comic series ever made. Nuff said.

War Machine #3: The last I saw of War Machine in Avengers Initiative he was pretty F’d up physically wise. I can’t remember if that necessarily had anything to do with the O*N*E mini-series or not but he was looking rough. I’m curious to see if this War Machine is still Rhodes or a new character.

Wolverine Origins #33: As if Wolverine didn’t have ENOUGH series to be apart of. It appears there is no where in the Marvel Universe that Wolverine can’t stretch his claws into.

Well that's my picks for this week. What's yours?

Also which is your favorite cover of 2-25-09. I'd have to say Superman #685 for DC and Thunderbolts #129 for Marvel.

A Greystone Production