Comparing the two: I am Legend

This is a small series of entries where the movie "based off of the novel" is tested against it.


I AM LEGEND
-----------------



Lets start off with our main-man, Robert Neville. The book's/real Neville is tough and grungy. He does not have patience when things don't go his way, and resorts to violence and drinking to get out his anger. His days are spent repairing his house from the nightly attacks, and cleaning up his lawn of dead vampires. Later, if he has time, he goes and gets supplies to survive on. On these trips trough the deserted Los Angeles if he encounters some vamps (which sleep in the day) he puts a stake trough their chests; even the kids.

This life of his does take its toll though. On quite a few occasions he breaks down and weeps, often for no apparent reason, yet mostly about his deceased wife, Virginia and daughter Kathy. He hates to remember the past and wants to forget about it. It hurts him so badly that he does consider suicide, yet never follows through with it.

Now, If you have seen the movie then you remember Will Smith's Robert sleeping in a bath-tub with an M4 assault-rifle and a dog on top of him three years into the plague.

Now, in the book we are 5 months in, and Neville sleeps in a bed... alone, with vampires trying to find a way in his house and EAT HIM.

While out one day his watch stops working and he does not know how long he has been away from home, with night closing fast, or is it not?, he wanders. So he speeds through the empty, quiet streets and sees a vampire running out of a house after him. He now knows it's turning dark. He fears that they may be at his house when he gets there... And they are. They see him. He guns it.

(You can read what happens next, but I'll tell you he puts up one hell of a fight. Even after he gets in his house he goes back out to fight some more, out of pure rage.)

The movie's now... He decides to hit golf balls, and hunt deer. Then runs away from the... "dark seekers" (not vampires, which completely ruins the entire title "I am Legend". The movie should be titled "I am Wimp".)

Of course Robert himself is physically different...

Book's Neville
Ethnicity: White (English-German decent)

Height: 6' 3'' (In boots)

Eye color: Blue

Hair color: Blond

Will Smith
Ethnicity: Black

Height: 6' 2'' (Close to the book's, I'll give him that)

Eye color: Brown

Hair color: Black

I have no problem with Will at all; he's just not Robert.


Now for one of the most bothersome differences of all... ROBERT IS NOT A SCIENTIST!!!! Which is so great because most of us can relate to that. And therefore are forced to journey with him into learning about the vampires/the plague.

His former job was a factory worker. He's just a regular guy.

The vampires are described as having dark eyes, and of-course the sharp canine teeth. They are not bald, and in-fact their hair continues to grow. They are kind-of dumb, yet can still talk, and are heard muttering, and cussing amongst themselves.

As found out later in the book, the vampire is a bacteria which infects a host; humans, dogs, whatever. Robert never quite finds out what brought the virus to the world, yet it mentions something about test bombings, and there are many dust-storms that sweep trough often. As to why he is immune, he never finds that out either. He theorises that because he was bitten by a bat in a war in Panama, and that the bat had previously got the disease and transferred a small amount into him, causes him to become ill, yet his body fought it off and built up an immunity to it. He also got a tattoo of an ornate cross on his chest while drunk there also.

The music!! Not reggae!! But classical. Beethoven, Mozart, Schubert, you know!. I believe this music is completely, entrancingly perfect for this story. It described that Robert's mother taught him to appreciate this type of music. It passes the time well, he thought.
Oh, and he doesn't watch SHREK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It's 1976.

Don't get me wrong. The movie wasn't all that bad. I'm glad I hadn't fully read the book yet, or I might have fallen to the ground with a THUMP at the ending.

One of the better, emotional scenes of the movie was the dog, Samantha, being hurt, and dying. I, being a dog-lover, was in tears.

How can the book have a scene as sad as this without a dog?... It can't. Which is why it has a dog-scene. Possibly more saddening. I can't type it all out, so please just read it yourself.

The ending... Too cool to spoil, sorry. Though you may already know it.

The movie's ending can pretty much be described like this... He commits suicide. "He is our Legend".
:

Summer

.. Yep, the season. I couldn't really find another blog to post this on, so I'll do it here.

I'm going to make a list of bad things about Summer. Here it is..
------

1. BUGS!
- Spiders! On the ceiling, floors, and in the basement. We had about 7 or 8 in our house this summer alone.

-Ants. For about 2 weeks in my brother and I's bathroom we had hundreds of ants all over the sink. We had to kill them, and watch them re-inhabit at night time. We finally realized they wanted the water from the sink. So every time we used it we had to wipe up every drop of water, and place little peppermint tea-bags down. (They don't like peppermint stuff)

-Ticks! My little dog had at least 3 on him every time he got to go out and play. I had 1 sucking my blood once; it wasn't "summer fun" at all! My dad had like 2 or 3, and we all had them on us all summer.

2. SUN-BURN!
- We don't even play golf in Summer cause of this. Stefan and I do NOT tan, we burn! And we all had a horrible experience at our cousin's football game last weekend. The sun was SO hot and bright we had to leave. Not even umbrellas helped.

3. THE STINK!
- Do me a favor... Ask someone from your house-hold to go outside in Summer for about 5 minutes or more. Now you stay inside, and have all the windows and doors shut or else this wont work. When they come back in give em' a sniff, and try not to gag.

4. BRIARS!
- Can't walk in the woods, PERIOD, cause of these, and because of bugs, and...

5. PIOSON IVY!
- My little dog is attacked by Summer again >: He breaks out in little pustules every time he goes out. And they hurt him. Just look at him..
He's just trying to have fun. :'[









6. SUMMER CLOTHES!
- I just don't enjoy showing my body off around my family. The floppy short sleeved tee shirts. And the stupid shorts (Which I don't wear but once or twice)... they show my hairy legs.
------

I'm just at a loss of why so many people like Summer. I have never enjoyed, just ask any of my family. It's impossible to play in! REALLY! Unless your swimming, but I don't like getting naked and soaked for no good reason. Think of all the kids urinating in that pool.
Stefan and I used to play camouflage with our cousins. We stared in Fall, and went through Winter. Then Spring came, and our cousin Jacob got stung on the thumb by a yellow-jacket and we learned then and there; it's just not fun at ALL to play in this weather.
The green-house effect on your car isn't too fun either.

This was just off the top of my head. I may find out more things about Summer/Heat that make our life horrible. I'll edit them in when I can.
I guess I'll pick something I like about it for you though... It's green, and Fall comes next!

- Joey

Chasing Darkness By Robert Crais (Our Father's Review)

I was a late starter reading Robert Crais. He has been writing books since 1987. Before that he wrote for T.V. shows like Hill Street Blues. A little back story: Elvis Cole is a private investigator. His partner's name is Joe Pike. The first book I read by R.C. was The Forgotten Man about 4 years ago. I actually listened to it on audio; I kept pushing the cassettes "remember those" into the car stereo and would drive to my destination slower and slower just to listen to more. After that book, which was very good, I started looking at R.C.'s back list. And the book that all of the critics said was his best was L.A. Requiem. Well I picked it up at a used book store and read it cover to cover in 3 days, which is fast for me. It quickly became one of my top 5 books of all time. OK back to Chasing Darkness. L.A. police find a corpse in a house, during fire season, trying to evacuate houses. The corpse is holding a photo album of murdered young women. From that point Elvis gets involved and there are so many twists and turns that you won't know who the real killer is until the last 20 pages. Crais is a great writer, his dialogue is some of my favorite, his books are relatively short, which I like. Elmore Leonard said once "leave out the parts that readers skip". Well Crais does, but that by no means takes away from his powerful prose. This is a good read and I enjoyed it, not his best, but very good. And the ending is very well done. There is also a scene where Cole visits a dead girl's family that will crack your heart.

Final Thought-Very good book-I love the Elvis Cole series.

Ruling: 8 out of 10

The Brass Verdict (our father's review)

I bought this book on E-Bay (ARC) . For some reason I just Can't wait for the release date of a Connelly book. The main character of the book is Mickey Haller from the Lincoln Lawyer. I don't enjoy Mickey as much as I do Harry Bosch another character Connelly writes about and that also launched his career, but I'll take what I can get. I got excited about this book because the synopsis said Harry and Mickey have to team up to solve a crime. Well Harry wasn't in much of the book but he's in there and that's enough for me. Back in 1993 Connelly wrote The Black Ice (probably my favorite Bosch book in the series. Certainly in my top 3). In that book Connelly wrote that Harry had a half brother that he did'nt know from a father he had only met once,it was only about a half a page well from that seed came the book The Lincoln Lawyer . Oh yeah Mickey is Harrys half brother. They do get together to solve a crime in this book. And during the whole book I was rooting for them to discover that they are half brothers. They do find out at the end of the book.
O.K. Connelly can't write a bad book as far as I am concerned and this one is good. About 3 quarters of the way through there was about 8 or 9 pages where it got bogged down by some courtroom scenes and I was thinking crap I paid $23.00 for this and it looks like Connelly has lost some of his MOJO. However I plowed on (I mean I paid $23.00 and gas is four dollars a gallon) and oh man then it happened the plot twist I usually can figure out how a mystery is going to end and who the bad guys are. But in the Brass Verdict Connelly threw a sucker punch and a twist that I did not see coming. I finished the last 100 pages in one sitting.
FINAL THOUGHT
Connelly has not lost any of his MOJO. And that is why I will be buying his books on E-Bay probably from now on , before the scheduled release date.
Cause I just can't wait for Connelly to sucker punch me again.

Ruling: 9 out of 10

- Jackie

The Bourne Ultimatum (book)

This is the third novel I've read. I love the bourne series so much and am kind of sad that this was the last Bourne book Robert Ludlum wrote. I really did enjoy all three books very much.

But anyway...

Like I said I'm kind of sad this is the last one Ludlum wrote and was hoping (before I read it) that it would be good and a nice finish to the original trilogy. Well now that I've read it I can say that it did, and didn't live up to my expectations. But don't get me wrong I loved it, but it could have used a little more action to me.

First off, I love that Bourne is 50 years old in this one. There's just something about a sort of old guy that can, and does kick a** that I find awesome.

Secondly, the story was good, interesting and pretty cool. Bourne after Carlos again was fun. Alex Conklin and Mo Panov are lured into a trap by Carlos and barley escape. They tell David Webb that Carlos is after him again and David makes the choice to become Jason Bourne again and find and kill Carlos once-and-for-all. Pretty cool.

Thirdly, the book starts off pretty slowly and to my surprise never really sped up. It did a little, but not much. There are quite a few times where it gets really boring and throws unnecessary political situations, political people, and political organizations that I just could not understand or keep up with. And ended up scanning very quickly, or skipping those parts almost completely. But when it gets back to Bourne (which of course is mostly why I read these books in the first place) it gets very easy to read, fun, and awesome.

Fourthly, when action does happen it's pretty intense and, well, Bourne like, I guess.

It took me a while to finish this book because it was kinda slow at points, but all-in-all it was a good and fun read. And of-course, since it was a Bourne book it was awesome! But, as much as I hate to say it.... The Bourne Supremacy maybe, maybe, was the best out of the three. but I really did love the premise of this one, and in ways this book was better and worse than the others. And, again, like I said, I love the fact that Bourne is 50 in this! I guess all I can say is, in a lot of ways all three Bourne books were really good and awesome in their own ways. So, with that said, I would recommend you read all three!

And maybe I'll read the other, newer Bourne books out there even though they're written by another author. Besides I think they are based on notes Robert Ludlum made up for new Bourne books he planned on doing before he passed away. So..... we'll see.

Ruling: 9 out of 10
Reread Value: Good

- Stefan

'Salem's Lot (Book)

Embarrassingly, this is the first novel I have ever read in my 19 years; so when I say it's the best, you know why. Until a few months ago my mind travelled only in the land of visual, non-thinking entertainment, only to be freed from it by I Am Legend, which I have read nearly 3 times since then (great novella).

The first 200, or so, pages of 'Salem's Lot are more about character introducing, and character development, with not much action. But it is still very interesting and fun to read, in areas.

When the story gets a kick into action, it's a very good one, which only gets better. It starts when Matt Burke (a teacher) finds Mike Ryerson (a student of his from a while back) sick and sleepy at a local.. bar.. or concert place.. [sorry, not sure what it is], and takes him home to sleep, and watch over him. Well what happens next is too cool to ruin, and I don't feel like typing it all out.


Reread value: Good
Ruling: 9.2 out of 10

- Joey

The Bourne Supremacy (book)

Alrighty. I'll try to make this quick and simple. This book was easily one of the best things I've ever read. Completely awesome. The ultimate Bourne experience. If you like Bourne read this book! I highly recommend it.

I read every page. Awesome Bourne action! Awesome, tense, interesting story. Though it can get a little slow and political at times, it's still pretty interesting. Just read the book, that's all I can say. Bourne kicks a** in this book!

I'm about to start reading the Bourne Ultimatum book, so I'll see how it turns out! :]

Ruling: 9.2 out of 10
Reread Value: Good

- Stefan

MK vs DC Idea

This is for me to get this off of my chest.

First off this game was such a bad idea in the first place, they had to hire comic writers to think something up for them. Well they thought up a story! MAGIC! Oh yeah, that's explains everything! How much are they paying these guys anyway?
This is the biggest, most pitiful excuse for a "new" game I've ever heard of. Ed said it would be new and never thought of... Uhhhhh, crossover games have been thought of before. And we never thought of this idea because we never thought they would do something so stupid to this already dying franchise.
I really don't understand why any real fan would support this "new" game. People say there making it teen to appeal to other audiences so they can get more money off of it. OK, so why the heck would you support such a thing? Why are you buying this game? Is it to give them money for a bad idea, or to get an awesome new MK? Talk about prejudging the game! Giving it a chance and saying it may be good is prejudging it!
The people that say this game is going to be good base their thinking on non-facts, false hopes, and imagination. The ones that say it's probably going to be a stupid and a useless game (like me) base what we say on facts, what's been presented to us, and an idea that's absurd; and we don't like what we see, it's as simple as that.
So if you go around saying "Give it a chance! It's gonna be cool!" are you basing what you are saying on fact, or imagination?
But I guess we will see.

- Stefan

Grand Theft Auto 4

After the impressive awesome expansiveness of GTA: San Andreas, this newest instalment has a lot to live up to and beat. Thought we are not done playing through the missions, I can tell you what I think so far..



First things first..



Vehicles The detail put into the sound and look of them is very nice, such as bullet holes, tires busting, the vehicle stalling. I'd say there are 2 things that are very wrong with them.

One is it takes nearly 30 feet for the car to stop after you press/hold the brakes, which will result in the failing of many missions and extreme frustration.

Two is Niko (the main character) seems to have a dislike of seat-belts, which means some of the times you wreck, you simply eject out the windshield of your car. Also this will result in the failing of missions, and also death.

Stealing/getting into vehicles is relatively the same as it was for GTA:SA, you press Y and Niko walks up, opens the door, throws whoever is in out if anyone is in there, and gets in. The problem is if you even so much as accidentally press Y near a vehicle that's not yours, Niko automatically approaches it and starts to steal it, if you jerk him out of the animation before he steals it or touches it, and if a cop is around, you will become wanted and they pursue you.

..Great automobile detail..
Getting in a taxi has problems too. Taxi's are a quick, and affordable way to get around the cities but how you get in them is by holding Y. And that will lead to accidental tappings of Y which will lead to you stealing the taxi instead of getting in it. Very frustrating. Also if there is a taxi and has someone is in it, they won't stop for you when you whistle (LB). This will lead to you running around wildly in the streets looking for another taxi.

..Car explosions are better than ever..


Walking/Running It can be quite clumsy at many times. When you walk out in front of a moving car, whether it is going 1 or 100 MPH, you instantly go into rag-doll mode which can take up to 7 or more seconds to recover from. You will also run into just about everything because of the clumsiness of the walking and running. But the animations of the way he walks is better that previous GTA's.



Weapons The aiming first.. I'll put it simply.. crap. When in an intense shootout, (naturally) you tense up, pressing the left trigger hard which switches you to lock-on mode, and can mess your aim up horribly. Pressing the left trigger slightly is how you free-aim, our preferred method.

The action of the weapons is pretty brutal.. as in the people you shoot don't die instantly, if you don't hit their heads. As always in the GTA series the animation of the firearms is undetailed.. the automatic pistol's slide doesn't move, to reload the AK-47 he simply cocks it..?



Hand to Hand Combat Ridiculous



Missions I'll try to sum this up quickly. Repetitive, annoying, frustrating, boring, similar, expected, and not fun. The same crappy missions you have always had to deal with with the GTA games. You go to someones house, cut-scene, they follow you out of the house, get a car!, drive them to a destination at the other side of the map, cut-scene, go to another point close by, cut-scene, kill everyone!, get something, pickup your tag-along person, drive to a certain point across the map again, cut-scene, mission done. Almost Every Freaking Time! And of course you will fail these missions almost every time the first time, and even the second, and maybe a third. You do get a text massage on your phone that lets you press A and retry the mission, which does help the frustration, a tad bit.

By the way, you will constantly be called countless times by the people that get you missions and asked to do something, or go eat with them, or play darts. This gets really stupid and of course frustrating.

And of course you will have to beat a ton of stupid missions to unlock the next city/island, so you can play in it. Why don't they just let you NOT do the missions?! I mean come on Rockstar! We don't like them! Let us just have every place to begin with...... Oh well.



Environment Alright, I'm gonna try to go into detail about this. There are three major cities/islands. We've unlocked two already, but have crossed-over into the third for a little bit (having 6 stars while we tried to drive through as much as we could before dying). And from what we have experienced they are basically all the same. The scenery is all nice and pretty (graphics wise). ..Yes you can still swim..

But here are the huge problems: Not only are they extremely hard to get around in, it's just darn impossible to! It's so darn cramped! A building here, a building there, oh a car!, another person! Oh look, another freaking wall I just ran in to again! and again, and again, another light post, another immovable tiny object that flipped my car over! You can't move!

And you certainly can forget about stealing whatever car you want, whenever you want it, because 7 out of 10 times there's a cop or two right there with you! Many times I have gotten wanted with no cops within a mile, and even 10 or so seconds after I even stole the car, or committed any other crime.

Oops I bumped a cop, I'm a criminal! oops I bumped a pedestrian, I being cursed at! Oops I ran into a building, and another, and another. Oh man, I hit a little white picked fence going 100 miles an hour, it didn't move and totaled my car, I flew out of the windshield and hit pavement! What's that in front of me?... Oh, ha ha, IT'S MORE PAVEMENT!!!!

The places are pretty big but I don't think as big as GTA:SA's expansive awesome and free-roaming nature. That was what we liked, not city, after city.

Uh-oh, I'm wanted again for firing a pistol, run! I crossed the road, a car bumped me out of nowhere, rag-doll mode. Get up Niko! Get up! He's up. Run! Another bump, rag doll, up Niko!... Are you getting the picture?

The environment may seem impressive for the first few hours, but then it just becomes a huge hassle and hugely "same-old same-old". I'm not impressed with it.

You can't go in to almost every building, just a very select few. Such as: Clothes shops, restaurants, umm.... strip-clubs, bars, bowling ally, um.. internet cafes........... yeah that's about it. Yeah there are "Pay and Prays", but that's it! No automobile up-grader places at all, and you can't choose the color of your car like you could in GTA:SA, what's up with that?!

..Blood graphics look good..
The cites are lively and sound nice though.

One more thing.. we gave Niko eye glasses, but we quickly found out when you die, or go to jail they disappear, forcing you to go to a safe-house, and re-apply them. Just some stupid glitch I guess.

Verdict Yeah, the game's good, NOT new-gen to me at all. It simply feels like a tweaked, slightly up-graded, hugely down-graded San Andreas. GTA:4 is fun, there's things to do. If you like GTA like we do, for it's free-roam, and play around ability, get this game, you won't be disappointed.


Ruling: 8.5 out of 10
Replay Value: Great

- Stefan and Joey

......................................
Quick video showing some of the bad, and the good. (With a few misspelled words, sorry.)

The Mist (book)

Alright, we bought the mist book last week and I read it. And all I have to say is wow. Not only does it have all of the good elements that the movie does but it takes those elements and makes them realistic, grosser, more exiting, and just awesome! Stephen King is without a doubt one of my favorite authors, and this story does not disappoint.
I loved it! The creatures in the book are gross, terrifying, and just how you would want them to be, at least for me.
For instance, the spider like things in the pharmacy were black, and had yellow stripes down their bodies. They had like over a dozen hairy legs and were on average the size of a big dog. And they didn't make that stupid sound all the time that they did in the movie. In the book they made a low weird sound when they were injured. Now why didn't they make them that way in the movie?!
The other creatures were also much grosser and realistically bug like. The tentacles had big suckers on there underside and those suckers were mouths! The things on the windows were like 3 feet long and and eyes on the end of 2 stalks, much more bug like. And the bird like things were albino white and had reddish eyes!
There of course were other creatures that were different in the books, like the thing that killed Ollie towards the end, it was lobster red and had a body like a scorpion that drug on the ground I think.
It also described they saw the shadow of a nightmarish "kite like" creature that flies over them. There were more creatures in the book than there were in the movie.
The book was much more realistic and interesting. If you like creature type horror things, please read this. It was a really cool book, and it's not that long.

Reread Value: Good
Ruling: 9 out of 10

- Stefan

The Mist (our review)

We've always loved Stephen King's stories and movies. Our father has been a big fan of his stuff for a long time. So since we couldn't find anywhere close to rent this movie, we went ahead and bought it. We watched it last night, and here's what I think.

The movie starts off showing the main character (Tom Jane) painting an image of Roland, a rose, and the Tower, from the Dark Tower Books by Stephen King. And that was really cool. Anyway. We liked the movie a lot. It was a little old school, but it still felt new and original.

The directing was just right. The creatures were cool and creepy. The dialog was very realistic, and the acting was good. Thomas Jane did the best acting i think I've seen him do. The effects were a little cheesy but realistic. And the ending was unexpected, a little unrealistic, but still shocking.

Re-watch Value: Good
Ruling: 8.5 out of 10

- Stefan

The Mist (our father's review)

This is a guest post from Treadstone 71. I am going to review The Mist . I really liked the movie I thought that the gore and effects were really on point . They were kind of old school cheesy but just the right amount of blood. I also thought that the creatures were cool and creepy especially the spiders coming out of the M P. in the pharmacy scene. The ending was sad however I think it was better than just having the people go into the mist and the movie ending there. More reviews to come from Treadstone 71. The mist

Re-watch Value: Good
Ruling: 8.5 out of 10

- Jack

Oblivion 4

Ok, we're not much for RPGs but this one got our attention. Re read good reviews about it and we finally got it hoping for a good roam-around type game with swords and bows and lots of stuff to do. Boy did we get that and much, much more.
Not only are there weapons but you can enchant them with for own created enchantments! Not only is there a place to roam around in, but it's huge and full of awesome nature scenery. You can also create a character and choose just about every thing about them.
Me and my brother have each created our own characters on different profiles and each of us has taken different paths and quests and there's still so much more to do. Joey has gotten to Listener level in the Dark Brotherhood, and I have gotten to Master level in the fighters guild.
The action is descent and at times a bit frustrating and repetitive but real time, which is a good thing. The quests are most of the times similar but pretty diverse. We really like this game but it does take a long time to do things on it.

Replay value: Very Good
Ruling: 9 out of 10

- Stefan

Call of Doody 4

10 out of 10 Official Xbox Magazine! WHAT! Ok, that's really pushing it.

We bought this game and discovered it was NOT all the glory it was said to be. There is no split-screen co-op, no realistic cambering of rounds, no ability to stop the stupid typical blaring music, no ability to change the weapons rate of fire, and only one air strike killing mission, WHAT! The action is Call of Dutyish, alright. The story, well there is none. A good play around type game, that's all.

Replay value: Descent
Ruling: 7.9 out of 10

-Stefan

Rainbow

The Rainbow six series has always been our favorite series in all of video games. We're all for realism and tactical shooters, and Rainbow takes the cake. As a kid I loved playing Rainbow Six on the Nintendo 64 with Stefan. Then as years passed we went on to the Xbox, and..

Rainbow Six: 3. This is the first game I remember playing and being completely amazed. The graphics were top notch (and still are, compared to some games released today), the action was intense, realistic and loud. The large selection of weapons were incredibly modeled, and the reloading of their magazines have never been beat by any other game, in terms of realism. The map designs were very diverse and gritty. On one map there is Opera music playing over some speakers within a tropical estate type building. In any other game this may have came off as comedic, in this, it only added to the cold hearted feeling that you are a killer; tactically moving through this house, commanding your team, and leaving a bloody mess in your path. The only downside is there was no co-op, split screen play, for me and my bro.
Replay value: Excellent
Ruling: 9.2 out of 10

Rainbow Six: 3 Black Arrow. Now this one was made about a year or so after RS:3. Stefan and I first saw an advertisement in a magazine about this game, which showed a small screenshot of some split-screen action, which hyped us up. Well we got it when it came out, and to our horror you couldn't see your weapons when playing the co-op. But we tried to ignore it and find other things to amuse us. That only led to the discovery of worse graphics, and bad map design, that kind of made us depressed feeling. So we returned it after a while, and returned to playing RS:3.
Replay value: Sorta good
Ruling: 6.3 out of 10

Rainbow Six: Lockdown. (Not made by the same team as RS:3) I'm going to sum this up in one sentence. A horrible nightmare of cheapness.
Replay Value: None
Ruling: 1 out of 10

Rainbow Six: Critical hour. Pretty much the same as Lockdown, but with old Rainbow Six music to try and make it feel more tactical. It didn't work.
Same as Lockdown

Rainbow Six: Vegas. (Made by the RS:3 team) In the utter embarrassment of Lockdown and Critical hour they try to make up for them with a new revamped Rainbow Six game, for next-gen consoles. It worked. The action, weapons, tactics, and sounds are great, and you CAN see your weapons on the spit-screen co-op! The level designs are ok, but a bit too repetitive. The ability to take cover behind stuff and going to a third person view works well. We had loads of fun on this until this newest one came out...
Replay Value: Very Good
Ruling: 8.9 out of 10

Rainbow Six: Vegas 2. I know, the title is a bit cheap, but the game is going pretty good. The addition of the P.E.C (persistent-elite-creation) to the single player, and co-op really help this game a ton. And the level design (although repetitive) is fun, and more open that Vegas 1. The newly added weapons are a bit cheap, but cool. But there is this one reading animation that is VERY cheap where your character takes a mag out and puts another one in very stiffly, ok, but then he hits it again with NO SOUND EFFECT ADDED!!! AAHHHH!!.. sorry. We are almost finished with the campaign, and are on a very cool, tropical map that is refreshing after the mazes of Vegas buildings. So, I will put the verdict up for this one when we are done with it.
Cya then.
OK, we just finished it and it was pretty good. At the end there was a battle between you and a helecopter that was tough, and very skippy, and glitchy. But it was still good fun.
Replay value: quite good
Ruling: 8.8 out of 10

- Joey

Halo 3

Alright, I'll start off by saying we love the first Halo and still play it a little to this day, just because, in our opinion, they haven't made a Halo game that surpasses it.

But, this is about Halo 3 so... The first time we played it, and shot the weapons we literally took it out, and started playing Rainbow Six Vegas again, because of how quiet and NON realistic they were, which is a huge down side to us. But later we gave it another shot and tried to ignore the bad weapons as best we could. The action is good and there are some cool moments that leave you saying: "That was cool." But there are no new aliens, and you STILL have to kill those darn veggie people again, which really gets annoying.

While the areas/maps are quite open and in some nature (which is great), it still feels like your being forced on a track to much. There are some new weapons, and new vehicles that are pretty cool. In Co-op campaign player 2 plays as the Arbiter, which is cool but, in my opinion adds nothing to the story, besides the fact that the Elites have teamed up with the humans (man-kind).

We found the game to be much more enjoyable when we played our own music from our hard-drive, and then paused the music so that no music was playing in the background. We found it funny how it said something like: "Hey! your playing music! This could take away from the experience of this game!" HA! have you ever thought about not putting any stupid music over top and making the game and battle loud, intense, gritty, and realistic! Now that would be next-gen. But instead they didn't change the game-play one bit. What a shame.

So, if you like the Halo games (like us) yeah, id say buy it if you want, It's definitely better that Halo 2, and has a lot more to it than i discussed. Also the ending is, well, expected in a way, but pretty cool. And you'll probably play through the campaign more than once because it's a decently fun game.

Replay value: Good
Ruling: 8 out of 10

-Stefan

No Country for Old Men

We've heard a lot about No Country for Old Men, and everyone said it was a good movie. So we rented yesterday and watched it. And I have to say it was pretty good.

I'll have to admit some of the killings were a little cheap looking and the acting of some of the victims was not good. But on the other hand, the rest of the killings were pretty cool. The first one is pretty intense but after seeing the Bourne Supremacy and Ultimatum fight scenes, it's nothing I haven't seen done better. The bad guys acting was good and the other actors were good. The story seems simple yet complex at the same time somehow.

There is some dialog that made us laugh which makes it hard to place the Genre of this movie, it's part comedy, part drama, part Thriller, part crime mystery.

The area the movie takes place in [Texas Desert] is nice and interesting. Also the movie does not have a lot of music which makes it more intense and realistic, and were happy about that!

It's based off of a book so we may buy the book and see how it matches up.

Re-watch value: Good
Ruling: 8 out of 10

- Stefan

I am not legend.

(This post contains spoilers. so if you haven't read the book, please do so, but do it after you see the movie, cause you will just be disappointed.)

If you have read the book, I Am Legend, then you probably are wandering if the screenwriters for the recent movie with the same name did as well.

I'm pretty sure this was their process..

"We need to write I Am Legend into a movie. Should we read the book?" .. "Yes!" They start to read the book .. "OK, his name is Robert Neville, he is blond headed and blue eyed!".. "I think I have an idea for the role of Neville!!!" .. "who?" .. "Will Smith!!!" .. "why?" .. "Cause he will get this movie the most money." .. "HEY! I have an idea also! Lets not read this!!" .. "You are so right."

OK, done with that.

What sounds more interesting to you?-
[1- He gave a vile of cured blood to another uninfected human, and her uninfected son, going to an uninfected group of people in Vermont, and then blows himself up with a hand-grenade. He is their legend.]
[2- He looked out over the new people of the earth. He knew he did not belong to them, he knew that, like the vampires, he was anathema and black terror to be destroyed. And, abruptly, the concept came, amusing to him even in his pain.
A coughing chuckle filled his throat. he turned and leaned against the wall while he swallowed the pills. Full circle. A new terror born in death, a new superstition entering the unassailable fortress of forever. I am legend.]

Movie- I am infected. I loose my hair and my mouth grows wide. i also can now jump higher, run quicker, and throw full grown men with my mouth.

OK. The movie wasn't bad, it had some emotional, well acted scenes, but here is what we are trying to tell you. The book purely translated into a movie would have been a film beyond amazing. Instead, it was turned into a greed-hole that erases any hope of ever seeing the book to film soon. We personally think we would be a good choice to write and direct it if it ever happens, just to ensure that no greed is involved.

The book sucks you in and forces you to finish, and you like it the whole way. It's intense, interesting, emotional, and a classic that even today, hold its own. It is written in a way that still sounds gritty and modern. The character of Neville is tough, relatible, and perfect for the story. You'll be coming back and reading it over and over even after your done. A true masterpiece.

Movie: Re-watch value: Descent
Ruling: 6.7 out of 10

Book: Reread value: Excellent
Ruling: 9.2 out of 10

- Joey and Stefan