Daily Star, GTA Rothbury and Channel 5

To be honest with you I'd missed this story last week. Apparently the Daily Star managed to claim that Rockstar had started work on GTA Rothbury, a game based on the brief visit to the village by killer Raoul Moat. They reportedly went to members of victims families for comment an mocked up a cover for the game (shown to the upper right). Thinq reports on it here.

Now the Daily Star have had to publish a grovelling apology and give "substantial damages" to Rockstar, who are going to give them to charity.

I know what you're thinking, and I agree, it'd be a terrible game. The one playable character looks like an angry potato, and you only get to shoot four people - one of whom is yourself. The rest of your time is sat in a tent or drain writing letters.

And it's also a fucking disgusting thing to do to sell your piss-poor "newspaper". All of those involved should be absolutely fucking ashamed. That is Jerry Lawton, who wrote the article. Editor Dawn Neesom. And owner Richard Desmond. Take a round of applause all of you, in a theatre named simply 'cunts'.

Desmond, of course, has been in the news for other reasons recently. The porn , magazine and newspaper baron has gone the whole media hog and bought out terrestrial UK tv station, Channel 5. Whilst such centralised media ownership can never be a good thing, I'm not sure how Channel 5 could become any more low-brow and sensational. I await Mr Desmond's attempts with some interest.

At the very least we can expect some top quality video game coverage.

Tiger Woods Pro Tour 11 and the online voucher

Whilst I'd read about this new "online voucher" idea in the games press, this is the first title I'd bought that included the feature. In practise it works very simply, you get a code that you put in and it lets you use the on-line parts of the game. Buy a second-hand game or get your game without the code for some reason, you have to pay some money for the "voucher" (a new code) and you can go on-line too.

This is the games industry monetising the second-hand market and presumably an attempt at monetising piracy on those platforms which allow it. Many think it will destroy the second-hand market - not an area I know or care much about - but as far as I can see it'll just devalue your second-hand game by a few quid.

Morally it's less easy to justify. Without consulting us, the industry has taken away what we thought was ours and gained from the move themselves. Whatever they believe is the legal case - we never actually own these games remember, just a licence to play them - is frankly immaterial. In addition, it's not clear what will happen should your console break and you need to re-install your game.

On the whole, I believe that the games industry is right to bring in the vouchers. It doesn't effect the original owner (as long as new console reinstalls are allowed), it might keep costs of games down slightly and frankly it's a great idea from their perspective. And compared with the complete prostituting of the rest of Tiger Woods Pro Tour 11 it really is nothing.

Go compare moonpigs via Halifax, we'll buy any car dot com

If, like me, you happen to agree with Bill Hicks on the subject of marketing then you can't have helped being driven to distraction recently by the fucking dire adverts on the tv. Every vile out-of-work cunt actor or singer seems to have been combined with every gaudy visual or stupid fucking song to sell some cunt product that no cunt wants to fucking buy. I'm not alone either, a particular advert made a friend of mine spout out on Twitter recently, "This [advert] makes me want to self-harm."

Go Compare probably deserve a dishonourable mention here for one of the most annoying audio tracks to any advert ever - indeed, adverts aside it may be the most annoying sound ever recorded outside a South African Football stadium or U2's music studio. We Buy Any Car also deserve a mention for their up-tempo and frankly fucking awful piece of repetitive techno for their ads. No-doubt there's a Belgian Hardcore version of this track being played on a loop in some of the more dubious Hamburg torture bars.

Though there are many awful adverts about, it's my intention in this piece to focus on one of them: the new Halifax adverts. These are the adverts that caused my friend to threaten to self-harm and I share an intense loathing for them that goes beyond mere homicidal hatred.

In the old days (remember 2009, kids?) we had Howard, the highly bespectacled black bank functionary who we are meant to believe was plucked from obscurity to become an all-singing and mainly-dancing poster boy for Halifax bank, building society or whatever it is. Quite why we needed a poor vaudeville act to sell us banking facilities and mortgages is beyond the scope of this article. But Howard was fun, he was bouncy and he had a remarkably funny face. Label as inoffensive and move on.

Now we have something more terrible, something that makes me cringe inside as I watch and listen, wishing the torture would end or at least I could reach the remote. And the question I have to ask is why? There is nothing outwardly offensive about these adverts. Yet each time they're played a little bit of humanity dies. There is very little offensive sound, the visuals are tame and the people are all the type of well-scrubbed smiling folk you'd be honoured to introduce to your mother.

I think there have probably been more but the three adverts in this series I clearly remember are as follows. All seem to be based in some kind of fucking awful commercial radio station of the type I'd not be caught dead listening to. This radio station advertises nothing but various products the bank supplies.

1. The 5 Quid advert - various cunts try to get a word in edgeways whilst the useless fat unfunny hyper-cunt who runs the breakfast show (who could this possibly be?) breaks in to repeatedly tell us that Halifax will give you five quid for some reason I can't recall.
   
2. The ISA advert - some bloke who looks a lot like Russell Howard tries to talk about the benefits of a Halifax ISA while some odd looking tart with big eyes plays Vanilla Ice's "Ice Ice Baby" over the top (clever huh?)
3. No idea what this is for, The Coffee Cup advert - two birds presenting the show talk about some shit so vapid I have no memory of it and at the end the handle off one of the slag's cup falls off.

So I had a think, cup of tea, bit of spliff and that and tried to analyse what I found so offensive about this particular series of adverts. It aint the product they're selling. It's not the sets, or the music, or even the inclusion of Vanilla Ice. It's not the actors, mainly 20-somethings you'd imagine having degrees and cosy mortgages from their own employer. They just sit and chat in their sensible pastel tops about nothing really.

Then it hit me. The reason these adverts reach a new depth of low for me is the very fact that they are so fucking terribly astoundingly dull and fucking inoffensive. Nothing troubles the eye or ear, indeed nothing troubles the mind. Horrible bland cunts just jabber on about nothing; an achingly appropriate metaphor for the paucity of their lives. And they themselves may well be nothing but a mirror image of our society.

I know one thing's for sure: I won't be a Halifax customer any time soon. Unless they up that free fiver to a tenner.

Modnation Racers - a review of sorts

No-one of sane mind is ever going to claim that Modnation Racers (MNR) is the best game ever made. I don't even know if it's the best kart game ever made, having not played them all myself. Certainly plenty of other reviews have mentioned the rubbish attempt to add a story into the career game, the difficult career passage as the AI becomes mentally aggressive and above all the long loading times.

But it's a good game, there's no denying that, and to me, it's a great game. Those other reviews will tell you the cartoon graphics are great, sounds fine, menus workable and will then almost always turn to the modding tools, which are excellent.

That they miss out on the aspect that makes the game great is no surprise. The lot of the professional or semi-professional game reviewer is not always a happy one. There's not always time to spend dissecting the game as much as they could, as much as the games player does by the natural dint of his playing, for example.

So, I'm 517 on-line games in and have just won the trophy for winning 100 games (silver, btw) and would like to report in. What makes this game great is how balanced the on-line racing is. Seemingly every race ends with a tight finish, good players will always fight one another and you're never left miles behind simply going round an empty track. And this all seems a perfectly natural part of the game, not leveraged by any deus ex machina but just something that happens.

So if you have a PS3 (or PSP) and fancy a blast, get a copy of MNR and join me on-line.

A condom for the iPhone?

Is this some kind of metaphor for our times? Has the hand-held device finally come of age? I doubt it but Steve Job wants to put your iPhone4 in a big rubber johnny. I don't know if Durex have been approached, or if the sheaths will feature different flavours, but I'm fairly sure a spermicide of some nature is involved. At least, users are unlikely to breed.

The obvious question is this: is the dobber designed to keep out malicious viruses or to keep in the foul evil mind-sperm of the user? As it spurts out of their Facebook, Twitter, Bebo, MySpace apps (and blogs) and floods the 'net with it's unwanted muck, maybe, just maybe it's a good idea.

Message jism. Information come. It soaks every area of the 'net. From dull Tweets to duller blogs, word after word, page after page of self-important turdery not another being on the planet is interested in. Not even your mum.

So why don't you just shut the fuck up. Stop your Facebook crap, I don't give a shit about your life. Just keep to leaving appreciate comments about mine. Who cares what your favourite music is on your Spotify list, just go to mine, it's much better. Write your blog? No, just come here, it's all you need.

Kay Burley now watcheable?

Don't get me wrong. I'm not suggesting Kay Burley has become any better at her job. That would seem an impossibility to me. Her right wing bias, corpse hunting, unprepared, uninformed and unintelligent reporting, with particular reference to her live interviews with unsuspecting fools, remains unchanged. It might be getting worse.

But I can watch her now. Because she's become a parody of herself. That pointed nose, so happy to sniff out a disaster in any situation and the shrieking voice asking stupid questions no longer grate. In fact one takes pleasure in them, all the gaffes, embarrassing moments and nonsense. Each is weighed against the others and shared like a tasty morsel with friends over twitter or whatnot.

Unusually, I think I know the exact moment when things changed. It was, of course, the interview she gave during the election during which she was heckled. "Sack Kay Burley. Watch the BBC." was the cry, and followed by the classy, "Sky News is shit. Watch the BBC."

I'd like to thank that protester or protesters and shake him or them by the hand. I'd probably buy him a meal if he isn't a vegan (or they aren't).

And I think we should take it further. Go and find yourself some pompous buffoon, a puffed up poser, an idiot doing their job badly and shout at them "You are shit. Watch the BBC." This needn't be on camera but that's always better isn't it. Do this persistently until they stop. If they cry you get double points.

Piers Morgan, Simon Cowell, George Osborne, and tens of thousands of British shop workers and council officials take note. And Noel Edmunds.

Raoul Moat and his great mate Gazza

There is no doubt that the funniest aspect of the Raoul Moat story is Gazza. He turned up in the middle of the siege with some supplies for Mr Moat and an urge to talk him into putting the gun down. The police wouldn't allow him to talk to the surrounded man but unfortunately were unable to stop him talking to Real Radio.

There is some great material here, truly surreal and funny. Here is the full transcript. Here are some highlights:

PG: Doesn’t matter. He’s killed someone. Which is not nice, really. Obviously he must have been on drugs, errrm, and he’s shot two people right. Now I’ve heard on the news that obviously the drugs must have worn off. Now he’s willing to give in. Right

...

PG: I’m willing to sit down, to shout, “Moaty, it’s Gazza”, all I want to shout is “Moaty it’s Gazza, where are you” and I guarantee he will shout his name out, “I’m here” and me and him could sit and chat, have a little bit of fishing and all I’ll tell him, Moaty. Listen.
...

PG: Listen, I drove from Newcastle in a taxi to Rothbury, cost a lot of money. I brought a dressing gown for him, I brought a big jacket, I brought some chicken, some bread, I know you’re going to love this one, I brought him a can of lager, I brought him a fishing rod cause I heard he’s by the river. And I brought a fishing rod too, we’ll fish together, I’ll have a chat with him…..just talk and, cause I think I’m the only man…I can help him through this cause I’ve…

Surreal, funny and of course tragic. The delusions of a man run low by fame, money and a gigantic thirst. It's so sad. But not as sad as the current re-writing of Moat as anything but a thug and small minded bully. Don't let it happen. It's bullshit. Don't let the scum win.

UPDATE: The News of the World (shit) have some pictures of Gazza at the scene.

A message to the people of the future...

It's become increasingly obvious to me that some time in the future I shall almost certainly become a major global religious figure. It becomes painfully clear that in the years to come the depth and breadth (not to mention width) of my utterances will in some way be pooled together from IRC, forums, blogs and so on to form a body of work that shall touch people deep inside. Their emotional response shall trigger the supernatural side of the imaginative human brain and a religion shall form that shall change the world forever.

As that's the case, it's only fair of me to directly address these people in a probably vain attempt to explain some truths:

I am not a divine figure; I'm just a cunt. Your religion is shit, as are you. Every one of you should throw your selves off a cliff. A very high one. Your bankrupt pathetic search for 'meaning' is as vain as it is hopeless. There is nothing 'after' your life. You're just a lump of rotten meat or swirling ash. Stupid twats.

Of course, they'll just think I'm testing their faith. Toodle pip.

Bollocks

I like the bacon sandwich as a food and art form. It brings me off orally and sends the dopamine swirling. I feel for our Jewish and Muslim friends who are disallowed by their god to eat this vital food (and some other stuff like shellfish). The poor pig, to suffer the hatred of so many people 'cos it carried ticks and diseases that hurt humans in hot climates. The vegetarians and vegans too really don't know what they're missing out on. The wonder that is the pig, the glory of the curing process.

Enable it, ennoble it, cut it into strips and fry it.