Price: $14.99
Release Date: August 3, 2004
Tags: activision, playstation 2, third person action, video games
In True Crime you take on the role of a young and brash Asian cop by the name of Nick Kang who’s been kicked off the force for breaking the rules one too many times. In the opening moments of the game you’re asked to join up with a new division of the L.A. Police known as the E.O.D.—I don’t recall what it stands for and, honestly, it doesn’t matter—precisely for the qualities that got him suspended in the first place and turned loose on an unsuspecting populace. We’re told that Nick’s father was also a cop and disappeared some years earlier and given the hint that we may discover his fate during the course of the story as Nick takes on warring Chinese and Russian gangs and attempts to make the streets safe once again.
It doesn’t take more than a casual glance to realize that True Crime looks and plays a lot like the massively popular Grand Theft Auto series. There’s a huge city to explore (based on real-world L.A.), you can take cars from random citizens at will, there’s plenty of shooting with various firearms, and you can get out on foot to put the beat-down on folks if you should feel the need. The folks at Luxoflux didn’t want to just put out a “me too” imitation of GTA in hopes of cashing in on the concept while it was still popular, though, so they put a good effort into trying to improve upon the ideas that made GTA so popular. Were they successful? Well, yes and no.
3 comments • PermalinkThe Butterfly Effect
Author: Ashton Kutcher, Melora Walters, Amy Smart, Elden Henson, William Lee Scott, J. Mackye Gruber, Eric Bress
Price: $9.99
Release Date: July 6, 2004
Tags: dvd, movie, sci-fi
This movie was pretty much trashed by the critics when it was released back in January and as such I didn’t bother to see it in the theaters. The fact that Ashton Kutcher was the male lead wasn’t much of a motivation either considering some of his previous films where he pretty much plays the same idiot he plays in That 70’s Show. He was getting so type-cast that I was beginning to wonder if he wasn’t acting. I also tend to be overly critical of time travel movies after too many years of watching Doctor Who. Given all of that I was willing to wait for this to hit DVD before sitting down to watch it.
11 comments • Permalink
Cowboy Bebop - The Movie
Author: Aoi Tada, Gara Takashima, Norio Wakamoto, Miki Nagasawa, Tsutomu Tareki, Shinichirô Watanabe
Price: $14.99
Release Date: June 24, 2003
Tags: anime, dvd, movie, sci-fi
I so wanted to see this in the theater when it came through the Detroit area, but never managed to make it out to Royal Oak to the one single friggin’ art house that was showing it. When I saw the DVD at the local Best Buy I snatched it up with all the speed and desperate grace of a crack junkie who’s not had a fix in almost two weeks. I loved the TV series. CB is probably my all-time favorite anime series.
For those of you who are uninitiated, Cowboy Bebop is an anime series that follows the exploits of a crew of space-faring bounty hunters in a future where mankind has colonized the solar system and Earth is little more than a garbage dump. Each of the characters has a past that they’ve never fully gotten away from and the series moves between silly comedy and serious drama with a fluid grace few stories are able to achieve. Even folks who aren’t big anime fans tend to like this series and the English dub, if you’re the sort that doesn’t like subtitles, is probably one of the best dubs you could hope for.
Cowboy Bebop: Knocking on Heaven’s Door takes place somewhere along the time line of the TV series for reasons that are obvious to anyone who has seen the entire series. It has the crew of the Bebop coming up against a bio-terrorist with an unusual motive on Mars during a Halloween festival. The story is good, the pacing fast and the animation simply stunning at times. If you’re already a fan then you’ll love this movie. If you haven’t already seen the TV series you could still probably get into the movie without too much trouble though the behavior of characters like Ed might seem a bit difficult to fathom. OK, even if you’ve seen the series the behavior of Ed is difficult to fathom. She’s just cool. At any rate this is a worthwhile flick that is a must-buy for any fans of the original series.
7 comments • Permalink