Thursday, February 02, 2006

“Big Bird never listened and as a consequence I grew up with a healthy loathing for (a) people wearing yellow feather outfits and (b) anyone who didn’t seem to be able to spot the difference between, say, a ferret and a hovercraft.” – Paul Jenkins (The single best writer to write Spider-Man in who knows how long)

I read the above and am left wondering just why I identify with it so much?  Why do I have such a great intolerance to people who can’t fathom the blindingly obvious?  It may explain why I get cross so much.  It may also explain why steam shoots out my ears every time I hear Edie Brickell claim that she’s “Not aware of too many things, I know what I know if you know what I mean” (that despite the fact that she’s hotter than hell in the video).  Goddammit, nothing is like the smile on a frickin’ dog!  BAAAHHH!  At least she had the sense to marry Paul Simon and not some goon with Baywatch abs and an American Idol intellect…

But the real trick is I want to be as thick as two bricks.  I wanna be dumb as fuck.  I aspire for lobotimization (as long as it comes with Lazick surgery too, but that’s a different story).  I wanna smile (like a dog) as things I couldn’t possibly fathom (nor would I care to) fly past my glass-glazed (and clear seeing) eyes.   I wanna out grow “nerd-cool”.  I wanna look good in a leather jacket.  I wanna think leather pants are a good idea rather than a one-way trip to chafesville.  I wanna have the vaccuous fun that three quarters of the blithering idiots are having as I watch them chat up all the good looking girls and make “rocker” faces to Final Countdown like they hadn’t heard it in ages.  Despite it having been on the jukebox 4 time in the last half an hour.

It’s tough being a smart smart-ass.  Woody Allen, save my soul.  Kirk out.

Peace – Sean

TODAY’S SOUNDTRACK (so far): Life on Other Planets – Supergrass; Big Shots – Charizma & Peanut Butter Wolf

Per gli appassionati dei Fumetti o Comics della Marvel ecco un’interessante collezione di 247 Immagini di copertine, personaggi e azioni. Un ottimo spunto per la realizzazione di un Blog o Siti Web, ma anche come Background o WallPaper degli stessi o del desktop.

Leggi tutto l’articolo, guarda e fai il download di Marvel Comics WallPaper.

via this isn’t happiness

Marvel Universe presents Spider-man with his famous foes like :

• Electro
  
• Green Goblin
• Hobgoblin

Hallo liebe Leser,

das Heft “Ultimate Spider-Man #116″ beinhaltet den 5. und damit vorletzten Teil des story arc “Death of a Goblin”.

Storytitel: Death of a Goblin Part 5

Inhalt: Während seines Kampfes mit dem Green Goblin stürzte Spider-Man zusammen mit diesem aus dem Fenster eines Hochhauses Richtung Strasse (Heft #115 siehe Review #32). Genau hier setzt dieses Heft wieder ein. Spidey hat seine Netzdüsen aufgebraucht rast dem sicheren Tod entgegen. Kitty Pride springt den beiden hinterher und bekommt Spider-Man gerade noch rechtzeitig zu fassen. Sie “phased” ihn und sich durch die Strasse in die Kanalisation. Zurück an der Oberfläche finden beide nur ein Chaos vor (jede Menge zerstörte Autos) und müssen feststellen das Green Goblin spurlos verschwunden ist. Die Shield-Soldaten machen sich auf die Suche nach ihm. Auch Spider-Man und Kitty Pride verschwinden vom Tatort. Auf dem Dach eines Hochhauses kommt es zwischen beiden zu einem privaten Gespräch. Spidey entschuldigt sich bei Kitty das ihre Beziehung so zu Ende ging (ich weiss nicht was zwischen den beiden war, ist ja erst mein viertes Heft dieser Serie). Später zu Hause stellt Peter fest, dass ein Van (sieht aus wie aus den 70er mit riesigen gelben Blumen drauf) vor dem Haus parkt. Darin befinden sich Shield-Agenten die ihn überwachen für den Fall das Osborn hier auftaucht. Zurück im Haus ist tatsächlich der Green Goblin, nun wieder als Osborn, da und überrascht Peter. Dieser will sein altes Leben zurück und sieht Peter und sein Dasein als Spider-Man als Beweis dafür das er (Osborn) ein Genie ist (im Ultimativen Universum ist Peter zwar auch durch den Biss einer Spinne zu Spider-Man geworden, allerdings war das hier ein Experiment von Osborn). Im T V sehen beide dann eine Pressekonferenz von Osborns Sohn Harry, der seinen Vater als Monster bezeichnet. Das macht Osborn wütend….

Story: Die Geschichte war nicht ganz so stark wie bei den letzten Heften dieser Serie, allerdings für mich als immer noch unerfahrener “Ultimate Spider-Man” Leser war sie immer noch ganz gut. Denn ich habe hier wieder einige interessante Dinge erfahren. Sei es das nicht einfache Verhältnis zwischen Kitty und Peter, die ja mal ein Paar waren, oder auch die Verknüpfung zwischen Norman Osborn und Peter. Norman ist ja indirekt für die Entstehung von Spider-man verantwortlich. Dies hilft darüber hinweg, dass die Story manchmal auch nur so vor sich hinplätschert. Etwas albern fand ich auch das der Van der Shield-Agenten rosa-grün mit riesigen Blumen darauf ist. Das ist ja sehr unauffällig Insgesamt eine immer noch ganz gute Story, die aber auch Schwächen hat. Also 6 Punkte hier von mir.

Zeichnungen: Bei den Zeichnungen ist es ähnlich. Insgesamt gefallen sie mir nach wie vor gut. Allerdings gibt es hier die ein oder anderen Panels die mir nicht so gefallen. Besonders Spider-Mans Kopf ist mir in der ein oder anderen Szene zu groß im Verhältnis zum Körper und auch seine Form gefällt mir nicht immer. Auch hier vergebe ich 6 Punkte.

Fazit: Das Heft ist sicher nicht so stark wie die Vorgänger dieser Serie, allerdings bin ich immer noch ganz zufrieden. Ich bin an dieser Serie weiterhin dran geblieben.

Die Künstler: Autor Brian Michael Bendis, Zeichner Stuart Immonen, Tuscher Wade Grawbadger, Farben Justin Ponsor, Cover Stuart Immonen

Die Bewertung Story 6/10, Zeichnungen 6/10, Gesamt 6/10

Ahora les dejamos unas imágenes del globo de Spider-Man que participa en el tradicional desfile de acción de gracias que se celebra en New York, a disfrutarlas:

Please join hands and bow your heads for the blessing.

Dear Heavenly Father,

We thank you for this day, a day when we can all be together to marvel at your works and the bounty you’ve set before us.  We are humbled by this feast and we ask that it be a blessing to our bodies as we partake of it together.

But above all, oh Lord, we, like so many other families gather together around dinner tables this Thanksgiving Day, thank you for Mr. Sam Raimi; a man who, in this world of imitators, hacks and fast-food cinema, is a true auteur, whose influence can be felt in whatever project he touches, whether directing, writing or producing.

We thank you for his roots, working in shared editing rooms with the Coen Brothers, while taking his homemade horror flick “Evil Dead” from theatre to theatre by hand all the while earning the cult classic status it still enjoys today.

We give thanks for the genius that is “Evil Dead 2: Dead by Dawn” and “Army of Darkness”, films that taught us that a chainsaw, a shotgun and a high school physics textbook are all the tools one needs to defeat the denizens of the damned.  We especially give thanks for the “Medieval Dead” director’s cut which gives us a glimpse at Ash’s fate as the last man on earth.  We love the extra drop of sleep potion gag, oh Lord, as it remains a classic to this day.

We are grateful for his succulent side dishes, “Hercules: The Legendary Journeys” and “Xena: Warrior Princess.”  And we are even grateful for the vegetarian lasagna-like offerings of “Jack of All Trades”, “M.A.N.T.I.S.” and “Cleopatra 2020.”  We realize that although no one seems to enjoys those dishes, they were still made with love.

We thank thee for appetizers “Darkman” and the genre-bending western “The Quick and the Dead.”

And finally, Lord, we thank you for “Spider-Man,” my all-time favorite super hero brought to life on the big screen in a way that not only honors the source material, but improves upon it – we’re lookin’ at you, organic web shooters.  We also thank you for “Spider-Man 2″, one of the undisputed greatest comic book movies of all time.

To hell with “Spider-Man 3.”

Heavenly Father, I could go on and on about all the wonder, style, laughs, scares and iconography Mr. Raimi has brought into our lives, but people are hungry and I’m starting to get the stink-eye from my nephew Darrion as well as my pregnant wife who is impatiently waiting to eat for two.  So I’ll just wrap this up by paraphrasing a line of dialogue written by the man himself, which I think, summarizes nicely how this quirky, Hollywood outsider became one of the most beloved creative minds of a generation:

“Sure, I coulda been king.  But in my own way, I AM king.  Hail to the king, baby.”

Amen.

Oh, and please bless his weird brother Ted.

Amen.

El fin de semana fue la convención de cómics aquí en Monterrey y compré muchos cómics muy baratos, a $5 pesos, menos de 50 centavos de dólar americano, claro que para esto tuve que comprar más de diez, pero me surtí de cómics de Punisher y Uncanny X-Men, uno de estos de la serie de los número doscientos veintitantos. El Thor de la foto andaba en la convención, era un indito con peluca rubia, bien nórdico se veía el Odinson Región Cuatro.

En mi trabajo me bloquearon muchas páginas, pero no sé porque ahorita si pude entrar al blog, así que aprovecho para subir la lista.

MARVEL CÓMICS

Amazing Spider-Man 613 SS MU

Avengers the Initiative 030 SS MU

Criminal the Sinners 02

Dark Avengers Ares 02 SS MU

Dark Tower Fall of Gilead 06

Dark Wolverine 080 SS MU

Enders Shadow Command School 03 SS MU

Fantastic Four 573

Guardians of the Galaxy 020 SS MU

Halo Helljumper 05

Hulk 017 SS MU

Immortal Weapons 05 SS MU

Incredible Hercules 138

Invincible Iron Man 020 SS MU

Marvel Adventures Spider-Man 057

Marvel Previews 076 SS MU

Models Inc 04

Ms Marvel 047 SS MU

New Avengers 059 SS MU

New Mutants 07

Powers 01

Secret Warriors 010

Son of Hulk 017

Son of Marvel Reading Chronology

Spider-Man Clone Saga 03

Thor Giant-Size Finale

Ultimate Comics Avengers 04 SS MU

Uncanny X-Men 517 SS MU

Web of Spider-Man 02

Wolverine First Class 021

Wolverine Magazine 04

X-Men Forever 012

DC CÓMICS

Arkham Reborn 02 SS MU

Batman the Brave and the Bold 011

Billy Batson and the Magic of SHAZAM 010

Blackest Night 05 SS MU

Detective Comics 859  SS MU

Gotham City Sirens 06 SS MU

Green Lantern 048 SS MU

Justice League Cry for Justice 05 SS MU

Justice League of America 039 SS MU

Justice Society of America 033 SS MU

Superman Secret Origin 03 SS MU

Superman 694 SS MU

Teen Titans 077 SS MU

Web 03

Wonder Woman 038 SS MU

Worlds Finest 02 SS MU

Madame Xanadu 017 SS MU

Northlanders 022

Unknown Soldier 014 SS MU

Free Realms 03

Starcraft 06

Wildcats 017

Lobo – Highway to Hell 01 SS MU

North 40 05 SS MU 

OTRAS COMPAÑÍAS

Cyberforce Hunter Killer 03 SS MU

Heroes 154 MU

Star Trek Nero 04 SS MU

Hercules The Knives of Kush 04 SS MU

Tarot Witch of the Black Rose 059 SS MU

Archie 603 SS MU

Project Superpowers Meet the Bad Guys 04 SS MU

Uncle Scrooge 385 SS MU

Buck Rogers 06 SS MU

Beasts of Burden 03 SS MU GS

Creepy Quarterly 02 SS MU GS

The Goon 33 SS MU GS

Usagi Yojimbo 124 SS MU GS

Futurama  046 SS MU

Image United 01 SS MU 

Star Wars – Legacy 042 SS MU

Below you will find my review for Spider-Man: Web of Shadows for the PlayStation 3.

Introduction
I haven’t played a good Spider-Man game since Spider-Man 2: Enter Electro was released for the PlayStation 1. Ever since Tobey Mcguire was dubbed “Spider-Man”, I’ve been reluctant to embrace the games that used the movie storylines and Tobey sound-alikes. Since Web of Shadows was supposed to lean towards the comic version of Spider-Man, I decided to give it a chance.

Gameplay
The game centers around missions, quests and the ability to freely roam the city.

I did not spend much time freely roaming the city because there wasn’t anything interesting to do. You can save people from enemies and kill things. Its boring and not worth spending your time on.

Missions progress the game’s story and side-quests give you tiny bits of non-essential story and experience points. When playing through the game, I started off trying to do all of the missions and sidequests. Quickly I became disinterested in the sidequests because I did not need the experience they offered or the mini-bits of story attached to them.

Most of the missions feel repetitive since they usually revolve around killing something, saving someone, or escorting something. The missions do throw a bit of variety in there, but ultimately you’re still doing the same thing over again.

Spider-Man can learn different moves or combos by purchasing them with experience points. Experience points are earned by defeating foes. The object is to get more combos, consecutive hits, in order to raise the amount of experience points that you earn. I did not bother trying to get a high hit count because most enemies died after a few hits and because I easily obtained all the experience points I needed to purchase upgrades. These upgrades or rather combos are very easy to learn. I was especially fond of the mini-videos in the profile that showed the skills being used.

The game also features a “Spider-sense” feature. This feature lets you locate enemies and to move out of the way of incoming attacks. The spider-sense feature also allows you target specific enemies. The targeting system is flawed since it does not work well during boss fights or aerial fights. I had a lot of problems with it during the Symbiote infused Electro fight. There were several electrolings (Electro symbiote infused spawn) around Electro during the fight. These enemies frequently teleported and that made it a pain to try to target them. I ended up not using the targeting system during the battle since you could not change targets fast enough or efficiently.

Most of the boss fights are boring, repetitive and unchallenging. The boss fights usually involve killing several symbiote pods. Once these pods are destroyed, the boss is weakened and can be pummeled to death. Many of the boss fights are easily won by using the same repetitive moves over and over again. I found myself using the web strike technique, a technique that draws you to the enemy, and then furiously pressing the square button until the enemy was dead.

The rest of the enemies are also quite easy todefeat. Enemies will attack you, but they won’t make it their life mission to kill you. Most of the time I found myself ignoring them if I wasn’t going to be required to kill them. I also want to mention that you can leave during fights to regenerate your health. This makes the game pitifully easy and it gives me no incentive to try to dodge harmful attacks from the enemy.

Even though the game is easy, the game developers decided to add an ally system. During fighting you build up what is referred to as a “special” bar. This bar is built up by doing combos or simply attacking everything. This bar is used to activate an ally of your choice. Certain allies will only be able to appear in certain situations. The allies you receive are also determined by whether or not you chose to use the red or black suit when you first encounter them. Once you activated, allies follow you around and attack things close to you. This ally system works well, but I would have preferred an option to dictate where my ally goes during battle. It would have been very handy in situations where I had to defend two places at once.

I also want to mention that the PlayStation 3 version of the game seems to have a glitch in the “Fat Man Sings” mission. In the mission, you are supposed to disable generators on Fisk’s building. You are supposed to be able to disable a generator by crawling on it and pressing square. My initial thoughts were that the area had to be clear of enemies in order to be activated, but I repeatedly cleared the area and was never able to activate the generators. I ended up having to reload my save file several times before the game would let me disable the generators.

The game also suffers from strange camera problems. There is one mission in which you have to remove bombs from a building and take them to bomb containment areas. The bomb containment areas were located on side streets by the bomb covered building. When I went to one of the corners of one of these streets, the camera would vertically move back and forth. (Like a weird windshield wiper affect) The camera would also do this when attempting to use the Web-Zip ability. (Web zip allows you to scale a side of a wall instantly without you having to slowly crawl up it.) This was really troublesome and often left me literally wondering which end was up.

The camera also locks up or won’t move (rotate) while you’re doing random things in the game. I found that this happened a lot while I was webslinging through the city.

Story (*Major Spoilers*)
The comic book based story in Web of Shadows revolves around Spider-Man trying to figure out how he can destroy Venom and the massive amounts of symbiotes in New York City. The story also lightly touches on being good or evil aka using the red or black Spider-Man suit. The game also features encounters with different heroes and villains from the Marvel Comics universe.

I’ve managed to play through the game twice with each of the different suits. In game, you are given the choice to use the black suit or red suit in certain situations. These situations provide different outcomes that don’t alter the story very much. Basically, if you defeat a bad guy and chose the black suit, the bad guy will become your ally. The same is true for the opposite. I was disappointed to find out that these choices had little affect on the over all storyline. The only huge affect you see is divulged in the game endings. I’ve managed to play the game through twice and I have received a black suit and a red suit ending. The red suit ending was the trite typical superhero saves the day ending. The black suit ending was much more interesting. Spider-Man decides to partner with Black Cat to destroy the city. S.H.I.E.L.D decides to use a Symbiote-infused Wolverine to take out Spider-Man. The game ends at this point. Its quite a shame, because this would have provided an interesting story and more incentitive to play.

Overall the story is not engaging and is disappointing since choosing the black or red suit seems to have no real affect on the game’s story.

Graphics
When I first turned the game on, I was blown away by the graphics. The city looked as if it was similar to Liberty City in Grand Theft Auto IV. Upon further exploration of the city, I found that I was mistaken. The game lacks the intricate details found in Grand Theft Auto IV. The city primarily consists of buildings, free roaming enemies, cars and people running in the streets. Every inch is completely indistinguishable from the next. Despite that the city is rather bland, its still looks good and is an enjoyable place to webswing around.

The characters in the game aren’t detailed. Everyone seems as if they’re walking around in a stiff plastic suit. Facial expressions seemed limited, but in the end it doesn’t take away from the game.

The game suffers from minor graphical glitches. A few times I notice windows in buildings turning into solid black squares. Alternatively, there would be gaps of black space in corners of walls.

Sound
The character voices in the game are mediocre.The guy playing Spider-Man sounds like a pre-pubescent version of Tobey Mcguire. The rest of the voice actors aren’t as bad, but they still leave something to be desired. For example, Black Cat’s voice during boss fights does not come off as sultry. It comes off as a drunk voice actress simply reading lines off a paper. Its a terrible shame that the voice actors used in the 1990’s television series were not used in this game.

The game’s music and sound affects are adequate and don’t stand out at all. I have no complaints or compliments to give about either.

Replay Value & Extras
There isn’t much incentiveto play through this game over and over again. There are no trophies, unlockables, costumes or anything extra in the PlayStation 3 version of the game. The only reason to replay the game would be to see all four endings. Considering how disappointing my endings were, I can’t say I’ll be motivated to play through it any time soon.

Overall
Spider-Man: Web of Shadows is a sub-par action/adventure game that I don’t recommend purchasing because of the dull story and the lack of difficulty. At the least its the kind of game you should rent if you’re bored and have a few hours to kill.

Dark Reign: The List – the Amazing Spider-man

Norah – C’mon Spidey! Beat the crap out of him!

Ben – Norah, at Front Line, we’re journalists, and we strive to be impartial and fair-minded.

Norah – Who’re you kidding, Ben?  We’re a lefty rag and proud of it.

Ben- Ah, you’re right.  Kick his teeth in web-head!

Real of Kings: Inhumans #1

Devos the Devastator – War is anathema. Peace is the only true state.

Heroclix is the game that made me a tabletop gamer.Without question.

Sure, I had played Magic before. Had several decks, as I would imagine most geeks my age would. It was a fine game, to be sure, but the cash investment and the cut-throat nature of competitive play ensured I would pretty much never actually take my casual enjoyment of the game to the next level. And so the status quo continued – I’d buy a theme deck or a booster now and then, but that was about the extent of my analog gaming.

That all changed when I visited the local comic book shop one day and inquired about the odd little superhero figures littering the front counter of the store.  I was dimly aware of the game, but had never really put any thought (or money) into it. That was soon to change. The game, as was explained to me, was pretty simple – each figure had a dial on its base that represented its statistics and super powers. A dice roll added to an attack value compared to a defense value determined if an attack landed, every point of damage caused the dial to be “clicked” that number of spaces…it all seemed perfectly sensible. So I bought the Marvel Universe Starter Set (for a clearance price of $5, I believe!) and the girlfriend and I sat down to play it.

Within days, I was already at the store scouring the bins for figures of characters I wanted to play, buying boosters, and looking into playing in the tournaments. The game had its hooks into me, and deep – being able to field teams of characters I loved reading about in a tactical strategy game (three of my favorite words) with easy-to-understand rules and an element of chance that kept those with the most expendable income from dominating with particular team builds was very enticing. The fact that it combined those strategy game elements with the ability to make collecting little plastic superheroes somewhat more socially acceptable ensured that I was in for the long haul. I played (and normally lost) in tournaments, checked the Wizkids website religiously, and was a regular participant on the message boards.

Then, for some reason, my interest in the game waned. I’m not sure why. Very likely it was financial in nature, but I wasn’t really playing any other games at the time save for a brief dabbling in Magic again. Perhaps it was due to the actual complexity of the game – I began to realize as I played that the rules were far more intricate than I had previously believed, and in fact learned that I was playing much of the game wrong. I got out of the game after the release of Secret Invasion, my attention pulled elsewhere by other games and responsibilities.

Around that time, the hammer dropped and Wizkids was disbanded by its parent company, Topps, who arguably had no business running a gaming company. Heroclix was effectively canceled after the release of the Batman-themed Arkham Asylum set in late 2008. This news put me further off returning to the game – after all, my superhero gaming itch was comfortably being scratched by the VS system, a game that clearly had a bright future and an established company behind it. Miniature gaming? That was covered by Star Wars Miniatures, which I got into on a whim. Clearly, there was no need for me to come back to Heroclix.

Meanwhile, though, actions were being taken behind the scenes to ensure that Heroclix would return. I’ll spare you the details in this post, though there’s a really good writeup here. Long story short, entertainment collectibles company NECA snapped up all the Wizkids assets and decided to put out the long-dormant Hammer of Thor set for which most of the playtesting and design had already been done, as well as any future Heroclix sets. The old designers were re-hired and set back to work. And, still frustrated with the death of VS System and growing bored with the occasionally stale Star Wars Miniatures (seriously, how many Obi-Wan Kenobis do we need?), the chance that an old favorite might be coming back was enough to get me to start playing again.

So what is it about the game that’s still engaging after all this time? A few things:

• Dynamism – Heroclix is a game that is dynamic in virtually every regard. The ever-changing dials and the different powers and stats they present continually alter the game situation and create new opportunities and challenges at every turn. Your strategy must continually adapt to the situation – if Superman loses his Hypersonic Speed ability to run up, hit someone, and run away, what do you do with him? The addition of Special Powers to the game, which combined existing powers and abilities to create even more comic-accurate figures and occasionally provide game-changing options, only sweetened the deal. Compare this to something like the Wizards of the Coast miniatures games, where a character will always have a 15 attack and 22 defense regardless of how much damage they have taken. In Heroclix, your actions have tangible consequences, and the game changes depending on how you choose to play.
• Comics, man – Setting this game in the realm of superhero comics ensures that there will never be a lack of characters to create or games to play. The Marvel, DC, and indie universes create a sort of infinite playground that keeps things fresh and interesting. The sculpts on the figures are big, bright, colorful, and occasionally gorgeous, as well, with several poses ripped straight from iconic panels and covers. In short, if you like superhero comics, there’s a significant chance you will like this game as well. 
• Affordability – The crash in the Heroclix market post-cancellation definitely made catching up with past sets and filling out collections much easier on the wallet, but the game was never terribly expensive. Boosters generally sell for $8-$12 depending on the set and the retailer, compared to $15-20 for other games. Fielding a team of your favorites won’t put you in the poorhouse for the most part – Super Rare and Chase figures can often command a premium, but generally there are lower-cost, more easily-attainable versions of those characters to use. Unless you’re really hung up on playing the Earth-2 version of Superman that fetches $70+, you can find a cheaper version of Superman from an older set that works just as well for less than a tenth of that price. Moreover, if you buy a “brick” of ten boosters sealed together from your retailer of choice, Wizkids throws in a special exclusive bonus figure to sweeten the deal. Most online retailers also sell very useful figures and popular characters for less money than you’d spend on a cup of coffee.



• Accessibility - As mentioned, the rules of the game are pretty complex. However, the game is designed in such a way that it can be played at whatever level you like, though such modifications are generally done on an individual level. Want to ignore elevation rules? Go for it. Something doesn’t make sense in terms of the flavor of the game? Change it. Granted, tournament and competitive play is very strictly by-the-book, but if you want, the game can be adapted to make it simpler to play with significant others, friends, or children who may not be power gamers (Wizkids did this themselves with the Batman Alpha set, which reused old sculpts and made the rules less complex…reaction was mixed, but the fact that the figures were fully compatible with the main game helped a bit). This is really important, because as a result of its subject matter, Heroclix is a game that has lots of “gee-whiz” to it, from the enormous convention-exclusive figures of characters like Fin Fang Foom, the Spectre, and Galactus to some gorgeous sculpts and concepts. People who might not be interested in a game like this otherwise might want to jump in because one of their favorite characters is in the game and they want to build a team for them. The ubiquity of comic book characters in modern popular culture makes Heroclix more accessible in terms of content than other games, and the scalable difficulty level can help encourage newbies or casual players to stick with the game. 

I plan to write some stuff about Heroclix for the Hemisphere for a while – tournament reports, team suggestions, reviews of new sets, etc. I had originally hoped to start with a review of the new Hammer of Thor set, but unfortunately my brick of boosters was delayed a week so I don’t have any to actually talk about right now, much less play games with to test out. So stay tuned for that, and hopefully some of you will join me in rekindling an old flame.

Next Time: Hammer of Thor, the most metal Heroclix set ever made

-Bryan Carr is the creator and coordinator of the Geekspeak Network, an assemblage of totally bitchin’ podcasts that can be found here. His primary problem with Heroclix is that we have yet to get a proper Nextwave team.

All images courtesy the fine folks at HCRealms, and their fantastic and free time-destroying “Units” section.

It’s now a known fact that teenage girls drooling over vampire hunks have the ability to smash box office records.  Disturbing?  Yes.  Surprising?  Not so much.  More after the jump.

$142,839,137 later, the second chapter in the much hyped Twilight series managed to blow previous opening weekend box office records made by juggernauts such as Spider-Man and the ever lackluster Pirates Of The Caribbean:  At World’s End out of the water, both of which managed to pull in $400,000,000+ by the end of their theatrical run.    Axed Twilight director Catherine Hardwicke’s head must be rolling right about now seeing as how the first Twilight only managed to pull in about $70,000,000 it’s opening weekend last November.

It just goes to show that the combination of Robert Pattinson’s good looks, Kristin Stewart’s horrendous acting and Dakota Fanning dressed up like a teenage girl at an Evanescence show circa 2003 is truly box office gold.

Which one is your favourite?

These excellent supercute superheroes are by JSalvador and you can buy them for $20 each over on Etsy.

When asked if Spider-Man 4 will start filming early next year at a press conference for his latest film Brothers, Tobey Maguire’s response was a simple “Yes!” Peter Parker himself states it will swing into production around February or March of 2010. At least we got some confirmation from a legit source.

Fiesa International Sand Sculpture Festival recently wrapped up on the beaches of Pera, Algarve in Portugal. Have a look at the amazing sculptures created! This year’s theme was Hollywood, so these were movie based.

I caught myself watching Holocaust – a mini-series from 1978 on Fox Classics (it’s continuing tomorrow night if anyone’s interested). Meryl Streep and that lovely actress that plays Aunt May in the recent Spider Man movies. They’re both so very believable. And Nigel Hawthorne (of Yes Minister fame) makes a surprise appearance as one of the upper-echelon type Nazis tasked with murdering Jews at every town and village they enter. It shows how they scoff at this ridiculous order from Hitler y’s’v – but they still carry it out. It’s interesting that like in Star Wars, the ruthless, efficient bad guys are also here played by English actors by and large, whereas the good guys are American-accented.

It was of course difficult to watch.

It’s hard to believe that I’m what they were after, only 60 years ago.

I thought a number of things. I’ve dreamt about being hunted by Nazis.

In real life, there were actually helicopters outside my parent’s place tonight for a few hours- search and rescue. I said a prayer to G-d that whoever was being looked for would be found safe and sound. I thought of what it would be like with choppers chasing me with spotlights (yes, I guess I’ve seen too many movies – the Nazis wouldn’t have used them much, if at all). But I did recall the words to one song that ‘gets’ me every time I hear it, I Was Only Nineteen:

“And can you tell me, doctor, why I still can’t get to sleep?
And why the Channel Seven chopper chills me to my feet?
And what’s this rash that comes and goes, can you tell me what it means?
God help me, I was only nineteen.”

As one can tell, it deals with a war veteran’s ongoing trauma, decades after. It was on one of my Dad’s famous (to us kids) compilation tapes from when we were young; it had a major impact on me growing up.

That’s certainly what it is like to be a Holocaust survivor too. The dreams haunt you every night. My own grandmother has suffered this especially in recent years.

Part of the curse in the Torah, should we stray from its dictates, is that when the night time comes, we will say ‘please give back the day’, and when the day comes, we will beg for the night. How can a survivor close their eyes comfortably for sleep, and how can they open them in the morning? Hope? Forgetfulness? – I’m sure such things play a part.

A friend from work told me about an Andrew Denton interview she watched with her Mum on ABC’s Elders. A Holocaust survivor, Helen Bamber, was the interviewee. One thing Bamber laments is that humanity is so terrible at learning. She says the stories have to be told over and over again, and less and less people want to endure the pain of listening. She is a ‘witness to the vulnerability of humanity’, and what else is protection against such vulnerability than the inoculation of moral education? My colleague said she and her mother were so greatly unsettled by Bamber’s harrowing story. And it is – they all are, unsettling stories.

I just keep wondering, after all we’ve been through as a people, how come every Jew doesn’t cry for a few minutes each and every morning when they wake up? I’m just amazed that we all don’t ‘have it out’ every morning a little, before we put on a face for the world and everyone in it, pretending everything’s alright, and that we aren’t changed, and that we can still smile brightly, and certainly the world has progressed and isn’t after us anymore? (Because we know it’s not so).

And now I remember, there is a law, that every Jew is to awaken at midnight almost every night, and sit on the floor, put ashes on their head, and weep and mourn like we do on the 9th of the Jewish month of Av (over the loss of our Temples, and all the tragedies that have happened to us over our long history). It is codified, but few people I know actually do it. It’s called Tikkun Hatzot – the Rectification at Midnight. Rectification of our actions, of the world around us and so on.

With just a few tomes and movies and such produced, I think I’ll leave the bulk of this particular task to Elie Wiesel and others. They are eminently more capable. But these were some of my thoughts tonight. Perhaps they are indicative of what many of us – Jew and Gentile alike – think about and feel from time to time.

Tiffany Little Canfield
Telsey + Company, New York
Broadway: ‘Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark,’ ‘Tarzan,’ ‘The Addams Family,’ ‘Rock of Ages’

With Peter Parker [in "Spider-Man"], it’s interesting because he’s sort of the anti-superhero. He’s the nerd who becomes powerful against his will. When you think of casting a superhero, you’re thinking of strength and confidence if you think of someone like Superman or Batman. But this is actually the opposite of that. We’re looking for vulnerability.

Of course, the actor plays Spider-Man too, but he’s in a mask—for a limited amount of time while singing and dancing, and stunt doubles in full costume take over for additional tricks—and in terms of the acting range, you need someone who can then also be physically confident to fly all around the stage and do all the extensive physical work they have to do. We did flying auditions and looked for expression within the body. A lot of the harness work is strength-based for agility and comfort in the air. That’s strength, but it’s also balance and being able to hold yourself so that you can continue to act. And luckily in a musical, you have the music, which does a lot to convey emotion.

Those defining elements of who Peter Parker is are crucial. But does that mean how tall or how short he is? No. Hair color? I’m not as concerned about that. That’s up to the creative team, to figure out what are they going to make him physically look like, which I have no interest in. I’m looking for the essence of Peter Parker. He’s a very complicated hero.

This is a character who is an American hero, an American figure that is more than just a literary figure. It’s in every element of our culture, pop art, movies. It’s a character that Americans deeply identify with, so you definitely don’t want to reinvent the wheel when you’re attempting to tell his story in a new way. Marvel is one of the producers, and their Spider-Man is very important to them. So there was always someone there really defining who Peter Parker is alongside the creative team, to keep us on the track of being true to the original source material.

Randi Hiller
Randi Hiller Casting, Los Angeles
‘Thor,’ ‘Iron Man 2,’ ‘Iron Man,’ ‘The Scorpion King’

It’s a whole world. I mean, I didn’t even know it existed before then. But then you start watching videos and you get the magazines and you start to see the culture, and you’re trying to match a culture.

You just want to make people proud. I feel like, in a sense, there’s more pressure, because it means so much on such a deep level to a lot of people. That whole world was a little new to me, and how serious people are about this. But the executives at Marvel are really knowledgeable and fair. They’re very accessible for questions and histories of the characters and allowing you to see things to help you understand the world that you’re in.

I think in the case of Robert Downey Jr. as Iron Man, yay for Marvel for being open to it. Basically, Iron Man’s weapon, among other things, was his brain, and Robert’s very quick-thinking, he’s very bright, and he sprang loose very quickly. We came up with it, but Robert embodied so many of those traits, and he’s such a phenomenal actor. And that was all a really important part of Iron Man.

Andrea Romano
Voiceover casting director, Los Angeles
‘Batman: The Brave and the Bold,’ ‘Green Lantern: First Flight,’ ‘Teen Titans,’ ‘Justice League’

The writing and the character design, for the most part, come before the voicing. So that gives me my core materials to jump off of. It’s specific to each hero, because they each have certain abilities and skills. But there is some quality about a heroic voice that typically has broad shoulders; a large, defined chest and pec muscles; and a bass sound in the voice that is not necessarily deep but has a strength and a security to it that makes it sound like this is someone you would listen to. This is someone who knows what’s right and what’s wrong. This is someone who has some kind of authority. Those are the things that I look for.

I have discovered over the years that theater actors make the transition to voiceover acting for animation easier, smoother, and faster than feature-film actors. Many performances are barely more than a whisper in on-camera acting, but in animation it’s got to be bigger and broader.

There are projects where we have to decide, “How different are we playing Bruce Wayne from Batman vocally? Do we want to be able to tell that it is the same guy, or do we want the voice to be so disguised that we can’t possibly tell it’s the same guy?” That has always been one of those funny things. Now, Batman wears a cape and cowl, so at least he’s got that disguise to help him separate.

The first Batman series I did was “Batman: The Animated Series,” where I began a whole journey into the DC universe and have never looked back. Here I am 20 years later, still working in that universe and loving it, and still learning. The audiences that watch my cartoons are my real bosses. Those are the people that I am truly working for. I have to please the audience. I like knowing what they like and don’t like. It can be a little bit scary, because some of the fans are obsessed. I am a fan myself of so many things, and so I understand fandom obsession. But part of my job that I take very seriously is making sure that these shows based on comic books are still accessible and interesting and entertaining for people who didn’t or still don’t read comic books.

This “Ask a Casting Director” column was published in the Nov. 19-25, 2009 issue of Back Stage.

Introduction
I haven’t played a good Spider-Man game since Spider-Man 2: Enter Electro was released for the PlayStation 1. Ever since Tobey Mcguire was dubbed “Spider-Man”, I’ve been reluctant to embrace the games that used the movie storylines and Tobey sound-alikes. Since Web of Shadows was supposed to lean towards the comic version of Spider-Man, I decided to give it a chance.

Gameplay
The game centers around missions, quests and the ability to freely roam the city.

I did not spend much time freely roaming the city because there wasn’t anything interesting to do. You can save people from enemies and kill things. Its boring and not worth spending your time on.

Missions progress the game’s story and side-quests give you tiny bits of non-essential story and experience points. When playing through the game, I started off trying to do all of the missions and sidequests. Quickly I became disinterested in the sidequests because I did not need the experience they offered or the mini-bits of story attached to them.

Most of the missions feel repetitive since they usually revolve around killing something, saving someone, or escorting something. The missions do throw a bit of variety in there, but ultimately you’re still doing the same thing over again.

Spider-Man can learn different moves or combos by purchasing them with experience points. Experience points are earned by defeating foes. The object is to get more combos, consecutive hits, in order to raise the amount of experience points that you earn. I did not bother trying to get a high hit count because most enemies died after a few hits and because I easily obtained all the experience points I needed to purchase upgrades. These upgrades or rather combos are very easy to learn. I was especially fond of the mini-videos in the profile that showed the skills being used.

The game also features a “Spider-sense” feature. This feature lets you locate enemies and to move out of the way of incoming attacks. The spider-sense feature also allows you target specific enemies. The targeting system is flawed since it does not work well during boss fights or aerial fights. I had a lot of problems with it during the Symbiote infused Electro fight. There were several electrolings (Electro symbiote infused spawn) around Electro during the fight. These enemies frequently teleported and that made it a pain to try to target them. I ended up not using the targeting system during the battle since you could not change targets fast enough or efficiently.

Most of the boss fights are boring, repetitive and unchallenging. The boss fights usually involve killing several symbiote pods. Once these pods are destroyed, the boss is weakened and can be pummeled to death. Many of the boss fights are easily won by using the same repetitive moves over and over again. I found myself using the web strike technique, a technique that draws you to the enemy, and then furiously pressing the square button until the enemy was dead.

The rest of the enemies are also quite easy todefeat. Enemies will attack you, but they won’t make it their life mission to kill you. Most of the time I found myself ignoring them if I wasn’t going to be required to kill them. I also want to mention that you can leave during fights to regenerate your health. This makes the game pitifully easy and it gives me no incentive to try to dodge harmful attacks from the enemy.

Even though the game is easy, the game developers decided to add an ally system. During fighting you build up what is referred to as a “special” bar. This bar is built up by doing combos or simply attacking everything. This bar is used to activate an ally of your choice. Certain allies will only be able to appear in certain situations. The allies you receive are also determined by whether or not you chose to use the red or black suit when you first encounter them. Once you activated, allies follow you around and attack things close to you. This ally system works well, but I would have preferred an option to dictate where my ally goes during battle. It would have been very handy in situations where I had to defend two places at once.

I also want to mention that the PlayStation 3 version of the game seems to have a glitch in the “Fat Man Sings” mission. In the mission, you are supposed to disable generators on Fisk’s building. You are supposed to be able to disable a generator by crawling on it and pressing square. My initial thoughts were that the area had to be clear of enemies in order to be activated, but I repeatedly cleared the area and was never able to activate the generators. I ended up having to reload my save file several times before the game would let me disable the generators.

The game also suffers from strange camera problems. There is one mission in which you have to remove bombs from a building and take them to bomb containment areas. The bomb containment areas were located on side streets by the bomb covered building. When I went to one of the corners of one of these streets, the camera would vertically move back and forth. (Like a weird windshield wiper affect) The camera would also do this when attempting to use the Web-Zip ability. (Web zip allows you to scale a side of a wall instantly without you having to slowly crawl up it.) This was really troublesome and often left me literally wondering which end was up.

The camera also locks up or won’t move (rotate) while you’re doing random things in the game. I found that this happened a lot while I was webslinging through the city.

Story (*Major Spoilers*)
The comic book based story in Web of Shadows revolves around Spider-Man trying to figure out how he can destroy Venom and the massive amounts of symbiotes in New York City. The story also lightly touches on being good or evil aka using the red or black Spider-Man suit. The game also features encounters with different heroes and villains from the Marvel Comics universe.

I’ve managed to play through the game twice with each of the different suits. In game, you are given the choice to use the black suit or red suit in certain situations. These situations provide different outcomes that don’t alter the story very much. Basically, if you defeat a bad guy and chose the black suit, the bad guy will become your ally. The same is true for the opposite. I was disappointed to find out that these choices had little affect on the over all storyline. The only huge affect you see is divulged in the game endings. I’ve managed to play the game through twice and I have received a black suit and a red suit ending. The red suit ending was the trite typical superhero saves the day ending. The black suit ending was much more interesting. Spider-Man decides to partner with Black Cat to destroy the city. S.H.I.E.L.D decides to use a Symbiote-infused Wolverine to take out Spider-Man. The game ends at this point. Its quite a shame, because this would have provided an interesting story and more incentitive to play.

Overall the story is not engaging and is disappointing since choosing the black or red suit seems to have no real affect on the game’s story.

Graphics
When I first turned the game on, I was blown away by the graphics. The city looked as if it was similar to Liberty City in Grand Theft Auto IV. Upon further exploration of the city, I found that I was mistaken. The game lacks the intricate details found in Grand Theft Auto IV. The city primarily consists of buildings, free roaming enemies, cars and people running in the streets. Every inch is completely indistinguishable from the next. Despite that the city is rather bland, its still looks good and is an enjoyable place to webswing around.

The characters in the game aren’t detailed. Everyone seems as if they’re walking around in a stiff plastic suit. Facial expressions seemed limited, but in the end it doesn’t take away from the game.

The game suffers from minor graphical glitches. A few times I notice windows in buildings turning into solid black squares. Alternatively, there would be gaps of black space in corners of walls.

Sound
The character voices in the game are mediocre.The guy playing Spider-Man sounds like a pre-pubescent version of Tobey Mcguire. The rest of the voice actors aren’t as bad, but they still leave something to be desired. For example, Black Cat’s voice during boss fights does not come off as sultry. It comes off as a drunk voice actress simply reading lines off a paper. Its a terrible shame that the voice actors used in the 1990’s television series were not used in this game.

The game’s music and sound affects are adequate and don’t stand out at all. I have no complaints or compliments to give about either.

Replay Value & Extras
There isn’t much incentiveto play through this game over and over again. There are no trophies, unlockables, costumes or anything extra in the PlayStation 3 version of the game. The only reason to replay the game would be to see all four endings. Considering how disappointing my endings were, I can’t say I’ll be motivated to play through it any time soon.

Overall
Spider-Man: Web of Shadows is a sub-par action/adventure game that I don’t recommend purchasing because of the dull story and the lack of difficulty. At the least its the kind of game you should rent if you’re bored and have a few hours to kill.

By Mark Waid (writer), Paul Azaceta (art), Dave Stewart (colored art)

The Story: Spider-Man is swarmed by a mob.  Electro finds the money he needs for his treatment.  Thinker gets his money.  Spider-Man races against time to find Electro.

What’s Good: Firstly, this was a fun ride, from the lynch-mob at the start, to Peter as the sleepless genius, to confrontation with Electro and the Thinker.  This book was wall-to-wall action, with lots of moments for character to show through.  Spider-Man had about five zingers I wanted to show, but picking one would do a disservice to all, so let’s just say that Peter’s in the zone on trash talk.  The Thinker and Annie have a few moments that reveal what kind of people they are and what they worry about with just a few brief lines of authentic dialogue.  Electro, especially half-looney, sparking over a bathtub full of water, is great.  Manic.  Alive.  Dangerous.  Unstable.  You can’t take your eyes off him.

Secondly, the art, while not a stirring example of realistic draftsmanship, fits the kind of story Waid wants to tell.  The grit and the roughness, and the art’s stylized sparseness and even retro computer and household tech, all give this series a particular look that really works.  Azaceta tells a whole story in one panel of Peter squeezing through a crowd because this artist really gets body language.  I wonder if that’s why his action scenes work so well?  I’ll keep you posted as I get to see more of his art.

What’s Not So Good: I was going to trash the backup feature again, but there is none, so no complaints.

Conclusion: I stayed away from Spider-Man for a long time because after forty-five years (and even after thirty), his world had become so convoluted that I felt I needed a playbook to keep up.  This current Spider-Man doesn’t feel like that at all.  In fact, with classic villains and a soap opera background, this feels far more like the Lee/Ditko Spider-Man I love, just brought up to date.  That’s a huge compliment to Mr. Waid and Mr. Azaceta.   Pick it up.  You’ll like it.

Grade: A-

-DS Arsenault