This is The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited

This is The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited

Today we are kicking off a new video series entitled This is The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited! This series will offer insight into the vast world of The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited - which is available now on PC/Mac and arriving on console on June 9, 2015.

Check out the first video - Freedom and Choice in Tamriel – which explores the freedom to forge your own path and the countless choices you’ll face along the way including deciding your race, alliance, class, play style, and ability specializations. You can download the video from the link below.

The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited, is the latest chapter in the award-winning franchise and brings the legendary experience online for the first time. The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited includes all the great gameplay from the original PC/Mac game, plus all the updates and content additions. Players will make a one-time purchase of the game and play, without restrictions, for as much as they like – without game subscription fees.

Tamriel Unlimited will be supported with special, optional downloadable content available for purchase and an in-game Crown Store for convenience and customization items. In addition, Bethesda will offer ESO Plus™ to players who wish to pay a single monthly charge for  a premium membership service, providing exclusive in-game bonuses, a monthly allotment of crowns to use in the store and access to all DLC game packs while a member.

Horrible Bosses 2: DVD Review

Horrible Bosses 2: DVD Review

Rating: M
Released by Roadshow Home Ent

Horrible Bosses 2 posits the theory that in order to not deal with Horrible Bosses, it's better if you have to branch out on your own.

In theory, self-starters are a great economic boon; but in cinematic practice, this second outing for the inept (and borderline annoying) gang is nothing short of once over lightly again, with the jokes stretched as repetitiously thin as the first time around.

Nick, Kurt and Dale (Bateman, Sudeikis and Day respectively) are sick of working for the man, so decide to become the man by starting up their own ShowerBuddy company. However, when they get ripped off by Christoph Waltz's CEO Bert Hanson and his son Rex (a brilliantly cast Chris Pine who steals scenes left, right and centre), they're suddenly facing a massive crisis.

So, brainstorming they decide the only way out of the predicament is to kidnap Hanson's son...

As with Horrible Bosses, Horrible Bosses 2 sets the bar low early on with a series of visual gross out gags that involve showers, shadows, Day and Sudeikis and doesn't really aim much higher throughout.

While the bond between the trio is still evident and the comic charisma is there among these starting -to-grate Three Stooges, the material simply isn't enough to propel this flick through. And things get worse when the characters from the previous film are rolled out to up the ante on what they did before; so Jennifer Aniston's sex-addicted dentist gets to be filthier, Kevin Spacey's jailed boss gets to rant and seethe through the other side of the prison glass and Jamie Foxx's criminal gets extended screen time, but none of them really add to the mix.

Waltz is wasted and Pine is the only one who actually helps propel the all-too familiar daddy- doesn't-love-me-how-can-I-get-his-attention storyline along with a unchained performance that actually brings some fire to the screen.

To be fair, a couple of moments hit their target including an amusing car chase that plays with the perceptions of what it should be and takes things to their logically absurd conclusion. End-credits come with the usual yuks and fluffs, but given the material wasn't that strong in the first place, even they feel tired.

Mediocre and just not funny enough, Horrible Bosses 2 is a massive disappointment.

Rating:

Ride: PS4 Review

Ride: PS4 Review

Released by Milestone
Platform: PS4

Get your motor running and head out on the highway indeed for this simulation that puts you front and centre on two wheels.

It's the enticing prospect of Ride, the new simulator that may give you a little feeling of deja vu when you head out with this game. Leather yourself up, get on your bike and get going - it's a simple enough idea and one which we've all seen before, thanks to the likes of progression through the game and passing through the tracks.

But with over 100 bikes, plenty of courses, time trials, world tours on offer, there's more than enough to keep you satisfied on this sim - which is perhaps a good thing, given the amount of time I spent enjoying the scenery while I skidded through it.

With a tutorial level built into the track, you can pretty much take the game at your own pace, whether you're new or not, but it's really when the racing starts that you can get into this game. If you know your physics. As I mentioned I ploughed off the seat a fair few times, but a gradual learning curve helps you to hit your straps and prevents you from coming a cropper when you go round the bends. It's infuriating though that you don't get any warning of when you're likely to head off (except for the obvious skidding into stones or smashing into the barriers) the bike so you can adjust your trajectory.

It's a very simple game, and in some ways, feels very old school - but visually it's up to the job, with the backgrounds simply looking stunning and no sign of any glitches. However, long loading times between courses and even crashes mires the title a little and slows the overall game flow, which for a simulation is not the best thing.

Granted, Ride is fun and fairly easy to get into - but it's probably more suited to the bike racing fraternity rather than all players.

Rating:

Pitch Perfect 2: Film Review

Pitch Perfect 2: Film Review

Cast: Anna Kendrick, Rebel Wilson, Hailee Steinfeld, Elizabeth Banks, Skylar Astin
Director: Elizabeth Banks

The pitches are back in the sequel to the phenomenally popular Pitch Perfect.

After a humiliating command performance at Lincoln Center, the Barden Bellas enter an international competition that no American group has ever won in order to regain their status and right to perform.

But Anna Kendrick's Beca's mind is on other things as she looks to move on from the Bellas, graduate from college and get a life.

Pitch Perfect 2 rarely hits the harmonious highs of the first flick, which perfectly mixed sentiment, warm fuzzies, acapella musical goodness and a deft sprinkling of characterisation as well as some damn funny laughs.

The problem is that this time around as the movie negotiates that difficult second album, the group's already known and so it's more left to the newbie Hailee Steinfeld (whose mum was once a Bella and whose desire is to follow in her shoes) to provide some of the life and vitality as the next generation of the Bellas to come to the ball.

But, it's not quite handled as well, with Steinfeld's Emily feeling very much one-note rather than the whole aria, with not the slightest hint of character coming through for most of the time she's on screen.

Equally, Anna Kendrick's Beca, the slightly acerbic yet eminently likeable character from the first, is forced to the sidelines a little, despite having the only real chance to develop away from the group, thanks to an internship at a music producer's company providing her a lifeline after the Barden Bellas.

Predictably, Aussie comedy behemoth Rebel Wilson gets her fair share of the awkward and offbeat funny lines, from her opening Wrecking Ball turn offending a certain Commander in Chief and precipitating the Bellas' fall from grace. But she's also saddled with a romantic subplot with the first flick's Bumper that really goes nowhere aside from one perfectly executed sequence that wraps it all up, leaving you feeling the movie has wasted too many opportunities.

The problem is this difficult second album doesn't feel like it has that much to the story, as it lurches from one musical number to the next with the flimsiest of threads, with each set piece energetically directed by Elizabeth Banks, delivering the frenzy and high energy you'd expect from music videos. Banks has an astute eye for the comic moments though, and the musical scenes fizzle where the rest of the film fails to crackle.

However, that's not enough to stop the energy levels sagging when the movie heads away and back into the rather underwritten Bellas' quest to regain their position at the top. There's no ebb and flow between these moments and it cripples the feel-good factor as it bounces between yet another excuse to launch into more singing.

There are two sequences in the film that remind you of the glory of the first; the opening dance for the president has the amusement factor of both the Bellas and Banks and her erstwhile co-commentator (and occasionally racist and bigoted) John Michael Higgins delivering the slightly bizarre laughs for maximum effect. The second collects all the girls together at a campfire as they try to re-discover their mojo, with a version of that Cups song and a slapstick punchline that mixes both the sweetness of the relationships and the broader laughs that the first Pitch Perfect captured so perfectly.

By not keeping the gang together, reducing most of the Bellas to stereotypes or punchlines of their own gags or ignoring them completely, this frothy over-long, over-stuffed feels like an excuse to launch Now That's What I Call Pitch Perfect - The Album, whereas in fact the second Pitch Perfect hits too many bum notes throughout.

Rating:

That Sugar Film: Film Review

That Sugar Film: Film Review

Cast: Damon Gameau, Stephen Fry, Jessica Marais, Brenton Thwaites, Isabel Lucas
Director: Damon Gameau

This documentary, screening at the New Zealand International Film Festival's annual Autumn Events gala weekend is looking to capitalise on the polemic themes launched years back by Morgan Spurlock.

This time, it's Aussie director Gameau, a kind of Johnny Barker / Russell Brand lookalike, who decides that having foregone sugar for years, he will now eat 40 teaspoons of the white stuff a day as an experiment to see what effect it will have on him.

With a new born on the way, Gameau's keen to show it's sugar not anything else that's the food demon, so complicit in the global boom of obesity and sugars within so-called low fat food and their healthy ilk. So, Gameau decides to eat only the so-called healthy food to see what effect that will have on him as he negotiates his 60 days' quest.

That Sugar Film is no Supersize Me.

Gameau is an eminently watchable type with his outlook driving the high paced film along, but he seems a little awash with what exactly he wants to say with this doco - and more importantly, how he wants to say it.

A lack of science proving his facts and experimental conjecture derail the movie, which revels in some didactic interludes from the likes of Stephen Fry but goes for easy laughs - such as his sucking down an energy drink while attending pre-natal classes with his girlfriend - rather than using the research and science to validate his opinions.

There are moments which land though - a 17-year-old American youth called Larry whose addiction to soft drink Mountain Dew has left him with rotten teeth undergoes a Marathon Man style dentist visit that will have some squirming and others shouting at his mother who claims never wanting her son to be hurt but never stopped him drinking it; and an examination of an Aborigine community (and its scheme Mai Wiru) that's been ravaged by their addiction to Coca-Cola shock.

But there's nothing in this film that personal advocacy and common sense couldn't prevail over (maybe, perhaps that is the point, there's a lack of personal responsibility in this day and age); there's certainly no real smoking gun evident other than a series of conjecture and some candy coated hypothesis. It's all wrapped up in some pretty sweet visual stylings; talking heads emerge from food containers and espouse arguments and some graphics reek of their ADD stylings to appeal to the young.

As a beginner for debate, That Sugar Film is a reasonable place to start; there's no denying the consumption of sugar affects Gameau's moods, waistline and outlook, but a lack of a real robust argument - or any comments from any of the companies peddling low fat wares - means this isn't as sweet as perhaps it could be.

Rating:

Paper Planes: Film Review

Paper Planes: Film Review

Cast: Ed Oxenbould, Sam Worthington, Deborah Mailman, David Wenham
Director: Robert Connolly

The director of Balibo has gone in completely the opposite direction with this family friendly movie that's refreshingly retro in many ways.

Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day star Ed Oxenbould is Dylan, a young kid living in Western Australia, whose dad's mired in grief following the death of his mother five months ago.

With his father (played with Aussie outback blokiness by Sam Worthington) refuses to move off the couch or show any interest in life around him, Dylan finds his interest piqued in a paper planes championship. When he makes it through to the national finals, Dylan discovers he faces threats and friendships in equal measures from those around him.

Paper Planes wears its heart on its sleeve with a gently refreshing naivety that some will find endearing, and others will find frankly infuriating.

Reminiscent of the gentle Children's Foundation dramas which used to play back in the UK on a Friday afternoon, its retro charm has certain limited and likeable appeal if you're willing to forego some of the lulls and some of the faintly sketched out characters.

Messages of competing for fun, not just for winning and the bonding of fathers and sons are likely to cause as much a ripple in some emotions as the frankly gravity defying CGI planes cutting through the air provoke incredulity.

Skewing young with its overt messages and earnestness, the piece is carried by the almost everyman behaviour of Dylan - as personified by Oxenbould's lispy, heavily cow-licked haircut kid. There's a certain charm to his turn as we celebrate the traditional kid in the Aussie outback (one early scene sees him playing Snake on an analogue phone while all his classmates turn in their latest iDevices to the teacher) and his underdog status.

But if Paper Planes stops from soaring, it's due to moments which demand the audience draw the dots and overlook the gaps in character development; Worthington spends most of the movie moping, Dylan's friendship with a chubby classmate barely progresses along the "let's put our differences aside and be mates" level, and the villain of the piece is more cardboard and stiff than the paper the planes are fashioned out of.

Ultimately, with its heart-on-its-sleeve earnestness and with a target of youngsters purely in mind, Paper Planes will hit its demo square on. It could have done with an expeditious trim here and there though, and some parents may feel the nostalgia of the past isn't quite enough to see them through - but you can guarantee that most of the kids watching this will be planning their own papyrus based miracles of aviation after the credits have rolled.

Rating:

The Congress: DVD Review

The Congress: DVD Review

Rating: M
Released by Madman Home Ent

Sci-fi and satire are the order of the day of The Congress, from the director of Waltz with Bashir, Ari Folman.

Starring Robin Wright, and inspired by Stanislaw Lem's novel The Futurlogical Congress, it's the story of the actress Robin Wright, considered washed up by the Miramount studio. Unable to secure work for years, due to demands and concerns over looking after her son, Robin's offered one last contract by the studios to hand over her digital image so they can do what they want with her.

The only condition is she can never act again...

The Congress is a surrealist piece of cinema, that dances the line between head-scratching and reality with ease. But in among the animated weirdness, there's also a satire that hits at Hollywood and current pre-occupations with digital rights and intellectual property. Half animated, the film waltzes a line between Yellow Submarine with some truly gorgeous animation that is psychedelic and intoxicating to look at, as it mixes the line between sending up characters you know from Hollywood via classic WB animation with a dash of Ren and Stimpy.  It's the visual style which soars here initially before you immediately become accustomed to it.

And once you do, you realise that The Congress is quite a sad piece and potentially a warning to Hollywood over where it's going - there's no way that Folman's not constructed a piece which fires a shot over their bows telling them that the extremes they've painted in this picture could signal an interesting debate somewhere down the line. Pre-occupations with Hollywood fads, women in movies, ownership of properties - it's all up here for the discussion. There's a lot to debate and think on after this film - and that's no bad thing.