Review: Tron Legacy

A sequel 30 years in the making, and almost no one, I mean no one (including me) in my generation have ever watched the original film. So, can the movie makes people with no clue about the 1980s film watch it? Yes, it did.

Let's start with the effects and presentation, which is the high point of the movie. The visual effects are beautiful and stunning. The Grid looks edgy and high tech look, the fight and the light cycle battle is exciting and looks very cool. One of the main highlights of Tron: Legacy is Clu, I mean of my god, his face is almost flawless. Oh, I forgot to mention that Clu is the exact face of Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges) 30 years ago, I will post a video soon about it. Although not all the sequences are in 3D, but most of the time 3D is available in The Grid, at least the movie makers are truthful with the 3D in the beginning. And the movie's Walt Disney's logo is one of the coolest and prettiest I've seen yet.

The story is decent, but is not going to win any awards either, the story has been here done that. The story will not make those who didn't watch the original movie blurred because in the movie they got explanation and prologue of Kevin Flynn tells the Tron world to his son, Sam.

In many ways, the movie does bring out my inner geekiness in me. I'm a tech enthusiasts and an avid video gamer. I do often think about what if we are able to enter the computer or the game itself, what can I do with it or in it. This movie captured my imagination.

Overall, Tron: Legacy is fantastic and is one of the popcorn flick you don't wanna miss.

Verdict: 4.5/5

Review: Red Dead Redemption

Wild West is dead, that's what modern life right now, Wild West is history, not until 2010...

Why I said this? Because Rockstar Games (publisher of Grand Theft Auto) bring one of the biggest game in 2010, Red Dead Redemption, and it is set in the Old West world and oh boy, it is magnificent. I tried out several Wild West games in the past, but no games get me that immersed into the world like Red Dead Redemption do.

Set in the 1910s, just before the World War I, the Wild West is dying, the game protagonist, John Marston sets out to find his former gang members in order to redeem himself and set his wife and son free from the federal agent. The story is one of the best I've seen in a video game and even better than some of the movies I've seen in recent years, it is immersed, believable and brilliantly written.

Besides the story been brilliant, the atmosphere and presentation is very well done as well. The graphics of the game, although not as advanced as other games, is very beautiful. The world feels like Wild West, with outlaws gunning around, people taking care of their ranch, Mexican going through revolution and many things to do and explore. While exploring the big land, it is helped by the brilliant soundtrack of the game to make the setting even better.

The most important aspects of gaming is controls, Red Dead Redemption got it right. The horse riding got stamina level, like most animals do. The combat and cover system is brilliant and the new "Dead-Eye" system is perfectly executed.

With 20+ hours to do and explore in the world of Red Dead Redemption, with the brilliance of story telling, voice acting, soundtrack, atmosphere almost spot on. Red Dead Redemption is the game of 2010.

Review: 5/5

First Batch of My Gran Turismo 5 Photos

One of the cool things you can do in Gran Turismo 5 is the photo mode, where you can take photos of your races and take your car to beautiful scenery for some photoshoot session...

Here are my first creations:

What do you think? I think not bad for first try...

5 Years of Waiting, Finally...

Been waiting this game since, erm... Let me recall again, hmmm.... Hmm... Oh yeah, the year PS3 was announced in E3 2005... I expected the game to be launched alongside PS3 in 2006 but it didn't make it. Several years after 2 major exams, purchased PS3 in 2009 and into 2010, the game is finally here in my hand, yipeee!!!

I actually planned to buy the standard version of the game, but only discovered first batch of games in every part in Asia are only available in Limited Collector's Edition. What the heck, I decided to buy it as a treat after all these years...

The Collector's Edition come packed inside a box (like a DVD box set), inside it contained the game blu-ray disc (duh), a 3D card contain code to unlock 5 more cars in addition to the 1,000+ inside the game and a special book called the Apex, which is a guide to everything you wanna know about cars...

The Apex book is something special, everything you inside is about cars, like chassis, engine, drive-train, suspension and all those technical stuff... Wonderful...

When I popped the discs into my PS3, I know i will have to install a huge 8 GB of data into my PS3... Although it is optional, but I still install it anyway because I know it is going to save me a lot of time next time I fire up the game... The installation took 40 minutes, I read through the Apex book while I wait...

Let's enjoy the North American Launch Trailer of the game, featuring My Chemical Romance's Planetary (GO!), which is also the intro song and the official theme song... Make sure you watch it in HD...

Ordered...

Yes, I did... Picking it up in the next few days... CAN"T WAIT!!!

Review: Scott Pilgrim vs. The World

I never heard of this adaptation before, maybe because the graphic title "Scott Pilgrim" is not popular here. Nevertheless, I interested with the movie when I saw the trailer for the movie. It is like a movie combined with comics and video game elements.

The story is not bad, but not really special either... It is about story of a slacker, Scott Pilgrim (Michael Cera) trying to fight off 7 evil ex-es (exes or whatever the spelling of it) of the girl he wants to be with, Ramona Flowers (Mary Elizabeth Winstead). Although it is nothing special really, but it is good to see story be able to progress through.

The visual effect is quite brilliant, not in the way we always see movies. The movies' effects usually are those retro gaming style effect added into the movie, like Mario, Street Fighter, Bubble Bobble and "combos", making the movie progresses like video games. These effects make the movie special in it's own right. But I'm not sure it will please old generation of audiences, because those stuffs only exists since the Nintendo and arcade era.

Overall, I feel the enjoyment of the movie is pretty satisfying. For a gamer like me, I feel like the movie is actually made for person like me...

Verdict: 4/5 (Fun!)

Review: Skyline

Alien invasion are always cool in entertainment world, Independence Day, Men in Black, Halo, Transformers and the list just go on... This year, is Skyline who comes in and fill the void, and are really disappointing.


Let's just start with the basics, plot. This movie lack even the most simplest form of alien invasion storyline, that is the purpose of the alien. In Men in Black and Transformers, aliens (or robots you say in Transformers) comes to the Earth to find something that is lost to the galaxy and discovered on Earth. In Skyline, there's nothing explaining why there are lights up in the air sucking people up. NOTHING!!! The story feel completely disjointed and all over the place...

The cast are not good as well... In the prologue already you know that this movie's dialogue and acting are weird and in complete mess.

For a budget around $20-30 million, it has a very good visual and sound effects, for a sci-fi movie... But for everything else, go watch another low budget sci-fi movie, District 9...

Pros: Brilliant visual effects, sound effects and action sequences
Cons: Everything else

Verdict: 2/5 (Skip)

Crasher Music Awards and Crasher Movie Awards 2010

Well another year, another awards... This has become an annual event here at Crasher, make sure to check back for the awards, coming out soon...

Review: Megamind

"I try to use a much more humble name, Megamind", This is what Megamind said when in the prologue of the movie. Megamind is not a movie under 12-years olds, but for someone older (like me), it was a really a fun and laugh out laugh movie. Movies typically tells a story about a hero and his struggles. But in Megamind, Dreamworks decided to put villains as protagonis, in a good way.


The story is not as brilliant as it seems, the story is very predictable with its directions. The only surprise of the movies is what happened to Metro Man (Not a spoiler), the rest just go along.

Why I said 12-year-olds won't find this movie funny? Well, the humours in the movie are very adult orientated, for example politics, love triangles, musics, tributes to other movie... These jokes usually don't work towards kids and I know it by seeing those children's response to the jokes, only 6 of us laughing most of the time (the audiences sure felt weird). For me, the jokes are really nice and me and my cousins and sisters laughed really loud at the cinema...

Verdict: 3.5/5

A Very Good Drug to Forget Gran Turismo 5 Delay

Well, I'm not in a good mood whenever I hear Gran Turismo 5, because ever since the delay, I've been cursing and blaming Sony for whatever reason I can find. I just can't accept it. Waiting for 6 years, already bought my own PS3 to wait for the game, have to wait again...

Now, I just found one perfect drug to forget about it, Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit. I've been a Need For Speed fan for quite awhile, but for the past few years EA been experimenting with the franchise, which I hate... Now at least EA know that the series is better suited to the roots, so they created Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit.

NFS: Hot Pursuit is like the original Need For Speed, very fast cars and very crazy cop chases. I played before on the PlayStation and PlayStation 2, and I love it. See the trailers for it:

Review: The Other Guys

I watched it few days ago and I have to say, I had a very good laugh at the cinema... Haven't watch cop comedy movies in quite a while and I really enjoy this one.

The movie is about two underachieving cops, starring Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg solving a case in New York City. What so funny about the movie is because of the drastic differences of characteristics between two of them...

While the story of the movie is really so-so standards, it also lost it's way in the middle of the movie. Although it is still hilarious, you just can't help to notice the drop in storyline quality halfway through.

Comedy wise, I think the movie nailed it. Many of the lines are hilarious, some memorable and funny scene really help the movie. The intro of Samuel L. Jackson and Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson is funny as well...

Verdict: 4/5 (Laughing out Loud with some bumps on the way)

A Song: Fuck you

Sorry if feel offended, there's songs with title "Fuck You", I heard a few of them already. So far I think the best is Cee Lo Green's new single, erm "Fuck You".

I have to say, I'm surprised with song.... Listen to it:

Delay?!?!

Yep, I'm back again... Another broken promise that I will be active on this blog again. Sorry for that, but you need to blame my time and Facebook for that, because Facebook status update is so easy to show that what am I doing right now...

Okay back to the topic, the delay... You know that my most anticipated game in recent years? Gran Turismo 5? Remember that? I have so many post about the game and I can really put it under a new category on my blog, because I just can't wait for that...

 You know what? Few days ago Sony in Japan announced that the game will be delayed for the time being.... What the F*** was that?!?! 2 weeks away from the launch and you said you're not ready?!?!

Apparently, many more fans that are crazier than me began to call Sony or make up speculation about what had happened. According to Sony, they are unable to meet the demand of consumers (not enough copies ready) and the game missed the Blu-ray production window. But other speculation is Sony is preparing to update PS3 to newer software along with the launch to curb hackers for the system and even some say they want to avoid the busy and packed November...

No matter what, I still want that game badly...!!!

Another Gran Turismo Trailers

I haven't blog for almost a month.... Yes, yes, I'm sorry... I just busy for no reason and Facebook is really killing my blogging vibe, because I just status update my profile and done!

By the way, back to the topic... Anyone knows that I love cars and I love games, so Gran Turismo 5 is a sure buy title for me... It feature ultra realistic graphics, realistic physics, car customisation and contain well over 1000 cars to collect. It's called car pornography, and I really mean that...

Is it real? Gosh...

Here are the new trailers:

Look at what features they announced at Tokyo Game Show that ended last month (although I know many of you guys are not interested, but I'm gonna post it anyway):

• Laguna Seca has been completely rebuilt and will return for GT5. Trial Mountain has also been confirmed.
• “Gran Turismo Anywhere” will allow you to manage B-Spec races, right from your computer. You’ll be able to hold B-Spec races with your friends from anywhere in what are called “Remote Races”.
• GT5 will feature a series of special events such as the Karting Experience, the AMG driving school, The Stig Challenge, Jeff Gordon NASCAR School, Sebastien Loeb Rally Challenge, and Gran Turismo Rally.
• Point-to-point rally stages will be automatically and randomly generated – you’ll have to depend on your co-driver to give you the best instructions about the road ahead.
• Rally mode can be played either on or offline.
• Weather changes include temperature differences, air pressure changes, and humidity, affecting the surface conditions of the track dynamically.
• Weather conditions are randomized. Forecasts for your race will be available but may not be entirely accurate, just like the real world.
• Polyphony Digital has helped Red Bull Racing’s Adrian Newey design the X1 Concept – an “ultimate” racing car, free of any technical regulations.
• Polyphony Digital has worked to improve engine sounds.
• Yamauchi admits that, in certain situations – such as standing race starts in the rain with 15 other cars on the screen kicking up spray in front of you – the game may not be able to hold 60FPS. Otherwise, it will strive to hold 60FPS as often as possible.
• The Volkswagen Kubelwagen, which has a drive system like the first beetle, and the amphibious Volkswagen Schwimmwagen will be in the game.
• Many things didn’t make the cut in Gran Turismo 5, and work on Gran Turismo 6 has already begun.

Got a new webcam

Got a new webcam for my PC today. As you all know, I use Windows 7 for my desktop, so I got a lot of software update to made my stuff compatible with it. Unfortunately, my old webcam is bought from China by my sister, which ONLY support the classic XP, so I have to buy a new one... Geez!!!

CRAP!!!

The new one is Logitech C200, with microphone and 1.3 MP camera...

 The box of it...

Fits perfectly onto my monitor... =)

What about the old one?

Making new friends with the rubbish I guess

This is the Way to Excite Your Testosterone

No, I don't mean that, I mean a movie to excite that... An action movie that consist of 3 action stars, 1 Kung Fu master, 2 Martial Art Champions, 1 professional wrestler and 1 retired American football player. Besides that, got 2 more classic action stars making a cameo appearance together. Tell me, is there a way to get your ____ excited if you don't get excited by this...

This movie is called The Expendables, which is right now I think is the biggest cast ever assembled in recent years. It stars (Drum Roll Please) Sylvester Stallone (Rambo), Jason Statham (The Transporter), Jet Li (Lethal Weapon 4), Dolph Lundren, Randy Couture (both Martial Art Champions), Steve Austin (Professional Wrestler), Terry Crews (NFL Player) and Mickey Rourke (Iron Man 2). The cameo I mentioned earlier are Bruce Willis (Die Hard) and Arnold Schwarzenegger (The Terminator). This could be the manliest movie in the history of the industry.

For a movie with this scale, I opt to go for the action and a lot less emphasize on the story. For a movie like this, the action is superb. Explosions, bone crushing, dismemberments, knife throwing and cursing are all in the movie. All the set pieces and sequences are so nicely arranged, it feels very smooth and makes you say "Woah, that's cool!". If you are in for action, this is the perfect movie for you this year!!!

The story is just as typical as any other action films, a story to trigger a hell lot of action scenes, but with the star cast that big, it could have been better. I do like some of their dialogues, they feel cheesy and use it as comic relief of the film. My particular favourite dialogue is where Sylvester Stallone, Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger in the scene church talking about contracts, mocking each other and refer each other's films. I had few good laughs on that scene.

The sound effect is brilliant as well. With a good theater room, you can really enjoy the explosions and those action scene whoosing and booming around you. I highly recommend this movie for cinema viewing...

Conclusion, The Expendable is one of the summer biggest highlight, and it succeed to deliver. For those who is looking for a classic action film, this is it.

Verdict: 4/5

P.S. This is really an 18 movie. I mean, seriously...

One Ridiculously Sarcastic Review

This review is a bit old, but it is funny nonetheless... The review come when a Top Gear viewer mailed the crew to tell them to make a proper and serious review. The Top Gear host, Jeremy, take it seriously in a sarcastic way... Video after this:

Part 1:

Part 2:

Review: Inception

Okay, I won't write any spoilers in my review. But one statement, Inception is one of the boldest, mind bending and the most intelligent film I watched in a while.

Summer blockbusters usually don't make the viewers think about the plot and the mystery of the movies, but in Inception, director Christopher Nolan wanna makes us think deep into the movie, into the dreams.

Twisting plot line, which is carefully and nicely presented... I don't wanna talk more about this, but the ending is so intriguing, I still think about it for hours and hours already, and it's still in my head. The cast is perfectly balanced and well sorted to their roles.

I don't wanna talk much about it, the less you about it, the better... Get surprised by the surprises...

In the end, Inception is the gem and the most original movie of this summer.

Verdict: 5/5

A Video Game Trailer that can really Match Movie Trailers

Man, I just love video games trailers these days, they are so finely made they feel like they are movie trailers. This $100 million sequel to Starcraft did just that, pure epicness!!!

Is Music Industry on the Decline in terms of Sales and Quality?

It really makes me wonder, is the music industry is going downhill, not just in terms of sales as we know it, but also suffer from quality issues. I say that because the new decades is underwhelming compared to 2000s, 1990s and 1980s...

First, let's see the sales perspective. Music is one of the big three in Hollywood, including movies and video games, and make a bucket load of money for the industry alone. And like any other form of entertainment, music suffers from the rise of computers and Internet. As we all know, all are suffering from the piracy issues, but music suffers the worst among the three.

Piracy can hurt billions of dollars in all stuffs, ie movies, music, games, books, gadget, you name it. But why music is the worst of all? Music don't have any special anti-piracy software to curb the increasing piracy. Movies have Blu-ray installed with special DRM that makes it hard for people to hack into and burn into a Blu-ray disc, although that doesn't stop piracy, but with the quality have to be down-scaled to DVD quality and time consuming, it does slow those pirates down. Video Games have several methods: online authentication, always online to ensure it is genuine and the harshest method, lock down your whole system down so you can't play it. Music is ridiculously easy to pirate, pop the disc into a PC, click rip and upload to sharing sites.

Besides piracy, people buy music no more. Since the born of Internet store and Internet radio, people are less likely to buy a whole album. Take iTunes for example, when you listen something nice on the radio, you go to the iTunes store and download that certain song, instead of the whole album. Some stream the song instead of download it. Album sales in the past can reach tens of millions during their lifetime, now they are just a fraction of the number. For example, 2010 most critically received and the biggest debut so far, Eminem's new album Recovery first week sales was under 800k, while the past he can sell millions in a week (others artists included)

Quality side, I do see a decline as well. I have a lot of 2010 songs in my Windows Media Library, but most of the time I still scrolling down the year, 2009 and before, to click and listen instead of 2010 playlists. I also play a lot of past years songs on my phone and iPod instead of 2010. Don't be mistaken, I still love 2010 songs, but the number of "favourites" list are significantly less compared to 2009. Some artists took a eternally long hiatus to make their new album and still don't see a new release since 2006 (Justin Timberlake focus on others instead of his music), artists' comeback that is disappointing (Christina Aguilera new album, Bionic is disappointing after few years of anticipations and compared to her Jazz entry, Back to Basics) and some even come out a few years and never heard of them ever again.

So, in conclusion. I think the music industry's effort this year is lacking the spark of creativity and face tough battle against music purchase and piracy people choose. Artists these days makes more money on tour rather than on album sales, no wonder the concerts are getting more and more these days...