Sunday, December 6, 2009

LegalCamp '09

LegalCamp09

I recently grew interested in different kinds of Internet-related events, because at the moment we are still working on the pre-production of this one web project, and it is quite important to make everything right. The previous event I attended was Media Camp (#mckyiv09 on Twitter), and now the same guys organised a bar camp to deal with legal issues.

If you are going to be in Kiev on Friday the 18th of December, you may wanna attend LegalCamp as well, so meet you there. Or, I will probably write about it anyway, so just stay tuned to my blog, I guess.

P.S. Oh, and the hashtag for LegalCamp is of course #legalcamp.

Saturday, December 5, 2009

Machinarium

This article was written as an example mini-review for my new media globe project



Machinarium is a perfect game if you like naive fairy-tale plots and great artwork. It also has some other good stuff, such as fun puzzles to solve and cool minigames to play. The game is what they call independent, and its marketing budget is only 1000 bucks, which is quite impressive taking how much work was done here. If you want a game reference of what has the most similar stuff to this puzzle-adventure, you are looking for a highly underrated game from a guy named Doug TenNapel and Steven Spielberg's studio DreamWorks Interactive called Neverhood. Developers took 3 mil tons of plasticine and created probably one of the best point-and-click adventures in the history of interactive media.

As you might have already guessed, Machinarium offers us the same level of greatness as Neverhood, which makes it simply the best adventure in like ten years. The coolest thing about both games is this unforgettable feeling of presence you get playing them. The game world in Machinarium is rather steam-punky futuristic, with only robots living there, which is quite odd if you think about it without the Robots cartoon comparison.



The plot tells us about a little robot, who tries to stop his city from being captured by a bunch of bad guys. I'm not going to spoil it for you, but there is one thing you should know about it and it is that there are no words in the game at all. All you get for dialogs is comic-like thinking bubbles, which look quite funny and atmospheric.



We also get hints via these bubbles and believe me, you want to get a hint here, because some puzzles in the game are quite hard to find a solution for. Speaking of which, you can always open an in-built comic-book, describing each scene of the game in detail, giving player a perfectly clear idea of what and how to do next. Some people might say that it takes all of the fun away, but I really don't think so. Instead, it makes the game absolutely suitable for kids and those adults who don't have much time to waste on a puzzle which is too hard to solve. In order to open the book, you have to win in a simple arcade game, which involves killing spiders with a shooting key. Sounds crazy, but looks quite natural in there.



The game also has a beautiful interpretation of the old arcade machine back from the 1978 called Space Invaders. Frankly speaking, I was not even born yet, when those were in use, but we all know how that kind of 8-bit oldschool is popular nowadays. And the best thing about it is that you don't have to pay coins for playing on it: you get money for winning instead! Isn't that like living a childhood dream?

All in all, the game is awesome and you probably should at least check out the free demo, which can be downloaded at machinarium.net/demo/. And if you haven't tried Neverhood back in the mid-90's, you must see it as well.

Tuesday, December 1, 2009

A Complete History Of My Sexual Failures



The movie is simply the best of those released in 2009. Well, frankly speaking, Chris Waitt's indie ex-girlfriend interview film was released in 2008, but in my country it was shown only in course of the recent British Movies' Week. The film is just as indie as it gets: cocks, asking strangers to have sex, real interviews and a bunch of really funny lively moments.

Chris himself is the most hilarious person I've ever seen on screen. Like my friend said, he doesn't have to say anything: you can tell that he's a total loser from the first look at him. Anyway, the plot develops while he (and his camera crew) tries to interview his ex-girlfriends each and every of whom has dumped him. One of them even said that she stopped dating white men after dumping Chris. Loads of laughter and totally real sad moments like discovering that he's still in love with on of his exes are included.

The bottom line is you should watch this film no matter what you think of indie movies, sexual comedies or dicks in the focus of the camera. A Complete History Of My Sexual Failures is a perfect movie to watch if your mood hasn't been so good lately (which is totally common in this crappy weather), however, if your mental state is okay, it is still highly advised.

And a little spoiler right here. That girl with the Russian accent is cute.