I-n-j-i-n

AHH. FRESH MEAT. But really, I thought just about all the other bosses were scarier in the end, because they were actually a big threat. The Butcher had the creep factor of being one of the first major bosses in the first game. Other than that, I don't think it was all that scary. It's just that it was one of the first of its kind and to make Sanctuary such a dark world. And really, I have no problems with the more colorful palette. The first game was a bit too dark in the sense that it was hard to really see. Diablo 2 fixed that for the most part, but even then it was a bit too dark (especially Hell). I think they can make a menacing world environment without literally being dark about it.

Then, an epitome in simplicity >insert smiley face< Sure. I'm not saying that they can't be. People make trash into art, I even heard of 'sound' museums where all you do is hear inane soundeffects turned into an appreciable form. That's the thing to me. Like Warhol painting a can of soup and www.IntoThePixel.com taking smaller artworks of games into a real gallery, it all comes down to taking it down to a concentrated level. Like your example, it's all about finding the grungier parts of society and turnings heads that way. To me, games as art is the same. Even the most hardcore of gamers won't call ALL games of ALL genres in ALL aspects as art, even though I'd personally say so as a gamer. Sorta like with martial arts. The aspect of fighting in itself is an art. But it just can't be appreciable to anyone who may not be a martial artist or a gamer as a form of art. But if you're to appreciate games as artforms, you have to pare it down to a specific aspect. Like you'd probably have to do with more obscure ways of showing art. I don't want to compare showing game as an artform to showing trash/obscure art, but I think that comparison might work. Because games are a product, obviously, you have to pare it down to something that people can appreciate in an aesthetic level. Like, is the game showing a cinematic aspect like Metal Gear Solid? Or a frantic array of colors and music like Rez and Every Extend Extra? Or is it a cultural milestone of some sort like Mario, Frogger, Space Invader? Or it has a wild fantastical look and vision like Planescape? Beyond, that even, is how the creative heads beyond the product in games have a lot of artistic talent and to sweep it all aside as 'can never be art', I think that does them a lot of disservice.

What loss in darkness? I thought D2 was plenty creepy enough. It's just that you couldn't run in Diablo 1 and every monsters ran circles around you.

I guess it's sorta like with some modern art if they somehow come out becoming incredibly iconic somehow. And Pong was. Yeah, you're right that it's not the only form of epitome of gaming. But maybe it's simply because there hasn't been many games as culturally important as Pong.

Are you kidding me? Pong is the epitome of games as art due to its simplicity and the way it moved an entire generation of new gamers. I've seen game museums feature Pong pretty prominently. In classical art museums no less. I agree that games does put forth the idea of having fun, being interactive, being 'sporty' with its competitive aspects (points systems, kill counts, race-finishes, etc). But objectively, it's no less an artform than most real sports, most physical activity of artistic expression such as some circus acts, or just about any human activity that can be judged according to their relevant aesthetics. Really, I don't think it's anything to do with 'loose definition of art'. There's nothing loose about it. There's the classical arts and there's the unconventional/interactive and other types of 'art' that goes beyond the strictly visual/physical art types. They're all just modality of creation. And if that includes sportsmen or people who excel in their craft or even an aesthetically pleasing building, they become something of an artform. A popular aesthetic feature that people come to admire. And that happens in videogames too, so I don't see why it has to be singled out as something that can't be an artform. But just about everything can be classified as art as long as there's a specific aesthetic vision of what to appreciate about them. I don't see the need to be 'cautious' when it's just an ethereal ideal. Nobody is going to force museums to feature sports stars as height of artistic expression, though that kind of stuff has happened in the past. So what is the argument to be had there? Okay. Since when was anything that was ever created and practiced by mankind not have their individual purpose and method to achieve their own aim? I have to disagree with that notion. Because when anything is viewed through a narrow scope enough to be considered to be a form of art, it comes under intense scrutiny and only the best examples typically are shown. Hell, even if it's to do with bad art, there's that certain scrutiny to them too. By that very mechanism of critiquing and presenting them, that idea that if anything is art, nothing is art just doesn't work. There is no such thing as an 'art museum of everything'. There's always a focus no matter how varying the topic is. Even critiquing sports figures as art figures, people typically tend to not really figure into the idea that the entirety of people practicing such sport is 'artful' or in top of their aesthetic form. If you're talking Golf, you have Tiger Woods. If you have a singer, you have Elvis. There's always scrutiny no matter how vast one can make each medium seem by considering everything as art. Because they are not presented indiscriminately. Again, I wonder why I'm even bothering to point all that out because there are a lot of 'off-beat', artistic displays in several prestigious art museums in the last decade and that definitely does include videogames. It wasn't too long ago in human history where photographs weren't considered to be art, or that video or architecture could be considered art. And today, it constantly is. Also to elaborate on why everything doesn't end up in museums is because it's simply not an appreciable aesthetic. You can have the best stroke to hammer down a nail in the world, but that doesn't mean anything artistic to the vast majority of people who can't appreciate it. With visual arts, it's very easy to appreciate in its simplicity. With games, it does take more of an effort to play and understand them, so obviously it's not going to be as an easy sell as traditional arts are. As for sports and other physical arts, I think one can see stuff like Hall of Fame and other sports-appreciation committees as a way of making them into an appreciable artform. The operative word being 'appreciable' since you are not going to have a museum on smashing a pancake with boots. Unless some crazy art curator is willing to take a quirky turn or something.

It is art, and I don't understand why people need to equate art as something being 'classy' or snobbish. Most art movements came out of the desire to go beyond the classics and into new territory. To me, videogames are art the same way movies and television shows can be. Not all classical art are 'classy' either, so I don't understand the need to shoe-horn videogames into a single category like that. What I find funny is that those who do create categories like that usually do that to demean videogaming or to categorize into something easy to understand. I fail to see a reason to do that either with classical art. It's all a big, stupid popularity contest in the end. If people in the future looks back on our videogames and calls it a high form of art, that's their choice.

1- Warcraft 3 had a pretty decent engine. Compared to some in its time, it was leaps above Command and Conquer engines. And it ran fast and without chugging out like other 3D FPS games like Age of Mythology. 2- The StarCraft 2 and Diablo 3 engines are TOTALLY DIFFERENT. You don't have reactive physics in WC3.

I think forgoing the potion system could be brilliant. Because the game was totally broken by the time you start having access to insta-heal potions. Also, it can be a pain to get potions too. I'm glad to see them trying to change that old potion-habit of dungeon crawling games.

More like yes Beat, yes Beat and yes Beat.

Really? Because I have a pretty high regard to the Mike Judge (King of the Hill, Buttheads) effort in Idiocracy. And I really didn't mind the beating-the-message-over-your-head aspect in Wall-E even when they happened. Because it was all done so slickly and cutely. Oh, and the infusion of real life acting was brilliant too. And the far/near vision blur was really cool.

Yeah, but they were popular *comparatively*. Almost all those examples seem to still be regarded as a niche over there or even a popular fad for a little while. I guess the most popular of them all are their various unique codecs which doesn't seem to make a transfer overseas in their popularity, and yeah, the mini-disc. Also, I think the way the Bluray and HDTVs in general are being pushed internationally puts them in a distinction compared to some of the crossover technology trends of the past. Just to be on the record, I don't think Sony is exactly doing the best job because of the way they're downright being wasteful about the business side of things. Maybe it was a good thing for Toshiba to back off from HD-DVDs for now.

I think the message of the movie was pretty good even if it was really a bit overhanded, but you have to remember that it's basically a CG cartoon. Basically, this movie is like Idiocracy + a CG Charlie Chaplin movie. Idiocracy beats you over the head with its stupidity and message that we're all headed to becoming idiots (even the giant pillars of trash was in Idiocracy), but Wall-E has the cute factor in there. I wish they did more of the space scenery because those were truly breathtaking. The entire theater was silent for the space scenes.

I don't know about the downloadable media being the sole player. People still prefer physical storage formats and storage for high definition files are still relatively expensive to the prospective lower price of Blurays by then. I do think downloadable media will be there to stay though. But I still think physical formats are pretty safe as far as movie discs go.

I thought Legends games were great. I still think it's one of the best 3D conversions ever and it's funny since it was one of the first of its kind as well. Also, I still am befuddled that the game series gets flack for no real good reason other than that it was unique. Character-wise, I thought it had the best Rock, the best Roll and one of the best villains in Tron. I'd imagine a modern spin on it could make its very good gameplay into something truly great as well. And the Tron Bonne spinoff was also one of the most unique spinoffs I've ever played.

High Def will start taking off after the Japanese do with theirs. Obviously, technology nowadays still follows Japan like a kart on a donkey. PS3 obviously wasn't going to be an overnight Bluray converting machine, but they had to start somewhere. Also, as slow as the process has been, the conversion rate is still increasing steadily and high def is creeping up even in TV stations. It's a matter of time. Just not as shockingly fast during the VHS/DVD transfer.

I feel like I'm the only person still playing Katamari Damacy and Sky Gunner. And Advance Wars (Days of Ruin) keeps finding its way back into the DS.

Just when I thought he was starting to look senile in recent shows, that happens. 71's slightly sooner than usual, but he had a good run. I was never a fan of Carlin, but it's sad to see celebrities go.

I don't think you can call it a retcon when it's an outside company with loose connections redoing a game. Badly. Also, I wish Kojima just flatout said the game is not canon because it simply can't be with all its extra stuff padded upon it for no reason. Other than how the script in Twin Snakes is supposedly a bit more loyal to Kojima's than the slightly revised MGS, I still think the original was the definitive version. Taking out a few violent (not the silly kung fu action) scenes, even, I can't understand that at all if other than the Nintendo conspiracy.

Silicon Knights had free reign a bit, and yeah, Nintendo politics pretty much helped muss things up. I thought it was still a good move overall for introducing gamers to the series, but Nintendo's fingerprints were all over it since Silicon Knights was a part of Nintendo's development teams back then. I still blame Silicon Knights mostly though. Basically, any time Kojima doesn't help make the game (or one of his closest Metal Gear developers like Shinta Nojiri), the exact feel of the game can't be converted perfectly. I really hope if and when they decide to port MGS4 for the 360/PC, we won't see all of this unnecessary drama.

I can't believe some are saying the Sons of Liberty engine was a plus for Twin Snakes. Because the game isn't really meant to handle being purely 3D. Even MGS2 and MGS3 felt like they had no business being played with the strange 3D camera systems. I think you should probably play both, but starting from the original and best version in the old PSX version. And everybody has chimed in again and again in many Metal Gear threads, but the subtle touch of the original PSX version is lost with Twin Snakes with its heavy emphasis on making it over Hollywood-style. Then again, I honestly think one of the best versions of Metal Gear was Ghost Babel. Because the camera doesn't bastardize the way the action was meant to be. MGS1 came the closest to the formula, and by that, I mean the PSX version obviously.

Iron Man was rote. So was this. Though one can argue that this is passable because it's a summer movie. Then again, I watched Kung Fu Panda and I thought it was leagues ahead of either. It's somewhat ironic that I cared more for cartoon characters than the human beings playing live action movies.

Yeah, but other studios also did the earlier X-men, Spider-man and other Marvel movies much more justice than they would do so otherwise. I honestly couldn't care any more if Marvel has the property 100% or not. If the movies are going to be this bland and streamlined (in a very, very bad way), I think something is wrong with that picture. Apparently Marvel has messed around with their comic industry with their extreme corporate image, and I guess the same thing is happening with their movies. No surprise I guess. As for Norton playing the Hulk, that is the very basis of the problem. If Spider-man/Peter Parker wasn't torn about his duty and superstar image, that would not be spider-man. If Hulk's alter ego is not torn up about his monster alter-ego, something isn't right there. At least Iron Man had a charismatic (if extremely predictable and cliche) Tony Stark. I just found it hard to care for Norton's Banner.

The movie was a tad worse than Ang Lee's Hulk IMO. Which says something. Also, I'm not anticipating the whole Captain America and Avengers thing. After Fantastic Four movies and the latest X-men movie, they're digging themselves a grave for the quality of Marvel movies. That, and Iron Man was only serviceable and nothing really special IMO. They worry too much about the token formula of slapping a superhero with a female co-star who has no real role to play, then fighting an inconsequential super villain. I think I'm mostly done with comic book movies now. I have no faith in Marvel Studios. At all. Speaking of Edward Norton versus Eric Bana, I think Bana did a way better job because he was pretty disturbed by his Hulk transformation. Norton? He just whines like a schoolkid about it.

I'm the biggest pirate out there but I can see this coming a mile away. There's copyrights, technology is being caught up by the various companies, this happens. I don't understand why people think it's illogical. Because it's perfectly logical. It doesn't mean I have to like it though.

Almost all the reviews from casual viewers have been positive which could basically mean everything, but I think Dreamworks is decent. It's simply unfair to compare anything to Pixar since Pixar is in the top of their game for like, a decade now. I simply hate the idea of the entire animation industry jumping in on the bandwagon to easy-to-create/churn 3D animated movies, but I think spoofing a kung-fu movie is a bit more inspired idea than usual. I think I'll have to watch it in theaters soon. Though I'm sure the movie will go on movie channels less than a year later.