Watch 14 minutes of Watch_Dogs game play

Watch 14 minutes of Watch_Dogs game play 

Good news for you if you're hanging out for Watch_Dogs, the thrilling looking game coming later this year.

14 minutes of Watch_Dogs game play has been released for you to enjoy.

Watch the Watch_Dogs gameplay here

What Maisie Knew: Movie Review

What Maisie Knew: Movie Review

Cast: Julianne Moore, Alexander Skarsgaard, Steve Coogan, Onata Aprile, Joanne Vanderham
Director: Scott MCGehee, David Siegel

Based on the book by Henry James, but re-versioned for the cinema and modern day, What Maisie Knew is a powerfully perfect piece of film. 

Told from the point of view of Onata Aprile's young Maisie, it's the story of a child, pulled from pillar to post by divorcing parents. She's a rock star Susanne (Julianne Moore) and he's Beale, an art dealer (Steve Coogan) and their continual batting back and forth of Maisie, under proclamations of love is heartbreaking to bear.

When the pair inevitably split up, both get new partners - Beale takes the nanny Margo with him and ends up marrying her and Susanne winds up marrying on a whim to Alexander Skarsgard's Lincoln. But poor Maisie ends up going back and forth, taken in by various promises and let down by all prospective parents but never losing her prospective enthusiasm and hoping for the possibility of love.

When she starts to bond with the laid back Lincoln, a calming influence in her life, Susanne's insecurities come to the fore and things threaten to boil over which could have emotional consequences for Maisie.

What Maisie Knew is one of the finest dramas I've seen all year.

Haunting and emotionally gripping, the slow burning heart of this film is anchored by a wonderful performance from Onata Aprile's Maisie; a perfect encapsulation of a young soul lost in life already and who never loses optimism. Neglected by her parents, and loved really only by Margo initially, she saves the joy for the nanny and bonds subtly and in a heartfelt manner with Skarsgard's Lincoln. The duo have a wonderful chemistry and the relationship of protector and charge is beautifully played with adorable soul and simple sensitivity by both Skarsgard and Aprile. Underplayed and never exploited, it's a natural relationship which shines in among Coogan and Moore's utter loathsome selfish behaviour.

If anything, What Maisie Knew belongs to Skarsgard and Aprile - and while the story plays out exactly how you may expect, it's only because you're hoping for a perfect resolution for Maisie, a kind of wishful fulfilment which we perhaps seek for the young in our own lives. There's a tremendous poignancy here which proves difficult to ignore.

Utterly affecting and ultimately rewarding, What Maisie Knew is essential viewing.

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Gardening with Soul: Movie Review

Gardening with Soul: Movie Review

Director: Jess Feast

Kiwi doco Gardening with Soul has a simple mantra - "You can't be bored in a garden". It's a doco featuring gardening expert and nun extraordinaire, Sister Loloya Galvin.

She's the main gardener of the Home of Compassion in Island Bay in the capital. 

By all stretches of the imagination, she's a local legend - espousing gardening tips as well as beavering around the bushes and pottering in among the plants while inspiring others within the community to take up the gardening. 

But director Jess Feast has taken in more than just the magnificent gardens which Loloya tends to and landscapes she dwells in- and has woven together a story of social history in New Zealand as well as philosophical elements. 

Loloya worked as a nurse with sick children and also raised children with disabilities. What follows is an insight into a life gone by and a woman whose very soul has always been in the heart of her community. 90 year old Loloya has some great moments as she reminisces among the root veg, (She believes if everyone had a shed to go to, there would be no domestic violence within New Zealand).

Thanks to gentle Q&As from Jess, this quietly moving spiritual reflection on a life is beautifully shot, socially fascinating and completely charming. 

It's a social snapshot of a New Zealand which may be in the past, but whose roots, thanks to Sister Loloya, have continued to grow and flourish long after the winds of change have blown through.

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Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Blacklist: PS3 Review

Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Blacklist: PS3 Review

Platform: PS3
Released by Ubisoft

Here comes the sixth installment of the Tom Clancy Splinter Cell series.

Sam Fisher's back as the leader of 4th Echelon, an elite counter-terrorism unit, whose job it is to hunt the terrorsts behind the Blacklist, an increasing number of attacks on US interests worldwide.

As ever though, there are a whole heap of people in the way to him and his team completing that mission - and needless to say, you hold the power in your hands to save - or lose - the day. It takes the form of various missions - from springing people from CIA safe houses to sleeper cells in London - as the espionage thriller game goes global.

But it's stealth which you will need plenty of to ensure that you can get through each level; along with gadgets, guns and cunning, the game yields to a player who's in touch with their first person shooter feelings and enjoys the thrill of the chase. For example in one mission, you're faced with insurmountable odds - until you realise that by centring your attack elsewhere, it'll distract the guards and leave you free to go about your business.

Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Blacklist is exactly what you'd expect from a game like this - and perhaps more. A cinematic feel and some crisp, clear graphics makes the overall product feel like you're watching a combat movie in places, a thriller with edge and if you want to go nuts with the gun (not recommended) you can.

While the single player story mode offers up benefits to the solo gamer, there are co-op missions as well which provide a group of mates the chance to discuss tactics before powering into the level, ensuring that you're able to complete it with a minimum of fuss.

Enemy AI is relatively solid too - normally, in games like this, a momentary throwing off of what the enemy's expected to do can ruin the atmosphere, but thankfully, this is sparse throughout with you feeling like at no point can you let your guard down at all.

All in all, Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Blacklist represents a real thrill to the spy / espionage thriller genre - despite being six games in, it shows no signs of creatively slowing down - and while some of the elements of the story are all too familiar in this day and age, the gameplay is engrossing, involving and utterly thrilling.

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Killer is Dead: PS3 Review

Killer is Dead: PS3 Review

Platform: PS3
Released by Deep Silver

What a weird game this is.

From Suda51 who brought us the disposable bubble gum pop of Lollipop Chainsaw, Killer is Dead is a rather bizarre hack and slash game which struggles a little to make any kind of rational sense.

You play Mondo Zappa, an executioner with a cyborg arm, who's given jobs to do by a government organisation. Mondo's favourite weapon of choice is a sword which he hacks and kills people with, but he's got an arm to be powered up as well.

Bizarre seems to be the order of the day with this one, as Mondo's sent out to some rather odd missions including a house which appears to be uninhabited but suddenly comes alive with hundreds of bug creatures after you've spent time giving a girl various gifts from around said mansion. That then turns into a major boss fight and a chance for Mondo to kill his way to victory.

Once you've completed levels, you get paid and can use that cash to buy extra lives (a Mika ticket, so called because when used, your assistant Mika comes hurtling to your aid, pumping your chest until you're back to life) or gifts, such as perfume or roses. You may be wondering what a hardened tough as nails assassin would want with perfume....well, these are for the rather pervy Gigolo Missions which happen on the outskirts of the game.

In these, Mondo finds himself in a bar, given the chance to ogle a girl and try and seduce her. This is done by timing your looks at her breasts, crotch and face just perfectly, to fill up your love meter. Ply her with gifts and this cold-hearted killer is likely to be in for a night of hot-blooded passion courtesy of a pneumatic lady. A failed ogling garners Mondo a slap across the face, out of pocket and out of the bar. It's rather odd, slightly sexist and degrading and actually made me feel a little uncomfortable. While you get upgrades to your cyber-arm as this happens, I'm not quite sure what the creators were thinking.

If it all sounds a little oddball and nonsensical, then perhaps you're beginning to understand the gamer's plight with Killer is Dead. It's confusing, bizarre, weird and quirky without ever fully exploiting anything other than a juvenile's obsession with the lovely ladies and breasts.

The only level that this game truly soars on is with its graphics, which are just stunningly beautiful, achingly difficult and utterly dreamlike. The mix of pastels and dreamy feel look like nothing else I've seen on the gaming spectrum all year. Stylistically, it's a potently impressive piece, but yet it sits at odds to the rest of it because of a lack of cohesion and sense.

All in all, while Killer is Dead may be some kind of riffing on the whole 007 theme (developer Suda51 has described it as "Dark side 007") it doesn't work as an in depth game play on many levels at all. It's too out there to be engrossing and too uncomfortably juvenile at times to be anything sophisticated.

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Brand new Robocop trailer is here

Brand new Robocop trailer is here

It's finally landed.

The first trailer for the upcoming remake of Robocop.

You have 20 seconds to comply - and watch the new first Robocop trailer below:

Riddick: Movie Review

Riddick: Movie Review

Cast: Vin Diesel, Katee Sackhoff, Jordi Molla, Matt Nable
Director: David Twohy

Riddick returns.

In the second sequel to the thrilling Pitch Black (which bowed 13 years ago), Riddick finds himself left for dead on sun-scorched planet after being betrayed by the Necromongers from The Chronicles of Riddick movie.

Firing off an emergency beacon as an impeding horde of aliens close in on him, Riddick sets in motion a chain of events as two sets of mercenaries head to the planet to kill him and claim the bounty on the head of this criminal.

On one side, there's the vile (potential rapist) Santana (Jordi Molla) and his crew of scumbags; while on the other, there's Matt Nable's Boss Johns, who's been hunting Riddick for 10 years and shares a personal connection to his prey.

While they try to track down Riddick and form an uneasy and uncomfortable alliance, Riddick's lurking in the shadows, engaged in a long term game of cat and mouse.

However, when a new threat arises on the planet which threatens them all, all three sides have to work together to survive.

So, here we are with a film which in no way meets the highs of the anti-hero of Pitch Black but is a major improvement on The Chronicles of Riddick.

Vin Diesel is dialled down and damn near silent in the first part of this film, where he channels his inner Bear Grylls to survive the scorched wastelands after being betrayed by the Necromongers of the last flick. Where Tom Hanks had his Wilson in Castaway, Riddick has a dingo / hyena / leopard striped dog creature to help him get through the days as he bonds and bounds around the landscape.

But it all heads south when Riddick activates an emergency beacon and two teams of scumbag mercenaries show on the scene to claim the bounty on him. And not just on screen either - because the turgid script takes a dive and turn for the uglier. As their quarrels and mistrust escalates, the game of cat and mouse eventually escalates (after a lot of slow meandering that doesn't build on tension but serves to drag it out) before a greater menace than all of them shows up.

Visually and technologically impressive, at its leanest, Riddick is a great movie; a taut game of suspense potentially there for the taking as the aliens' marauding menace places our protagonists under siege. But no, thanks to neanderthal dialogue, and an appalling treatment of a ballsy woman in a sci-fi film (Katee Sackhoff's character is apparently a lesbian, so they just have to make unnecessary comments about it; claims that Riddick will go "balls deep" into her are just utterly disgustingly repugnant, ugly and hideously out of place despite the character being an anti-hero and criminal); add into that, an unwarranted topless shot of Katee Sackhoff and further comments here and there, it all adds up to the squandering of what real potential it could have had for a great moody and atmospheric outing. It even equates to a backward step in terms of the treatment of women in sci-fi, which is disturbing, given how much ground's been covered - and how Katee Sackhoff helped redefine that with her role as Starbuck in Battlestar Galactica.

With interest waning after a stunning opening half hour that pits Riddick against nature and the elements, Riddick generally loses the way and the plot, falling into a horde slaughtering mentality a la Tremors that lacks in visual prowess and feels limp in terms of spectacle and emotional connection. 

Overly dour, lacking in humour and way too long to feel anything other than stuffy in parts, Riddick is more a film about some great tech visuals and a few slo-mo kills than a return to form for Vin Diesel's gruff crim. Even a gag from the Fast and Furious series fails to raise too much of a smile amid the attempt to provide visceral thrills on a pared back budget and scope.

A smarter choice of direction, some more expeditious editing and better scripting to remove some of the more morally repugnant undertones could have seen Riddick reach the highs of Pitch Black. 

Instead, despite some impressive sequences and moments, it serves as a queasy, misogynistic and uncomfortable slice of sci-fi that doesn't remotely hit the mark and even scotches any chance of redemption for the film franchise.

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