Gran Turismo 5 (GT5) update 1.05

Yes, I'm reviewing a game update. Why? Because I can, and because I'm quite impressed with what it offers. As you'll know if you've read my previous review of the game itself, I was pretty pleased with it though there were some problems. This update doesn't address many of them but it really doesn't matter. In the intervening time I've really fell in love with the game and play it regularly. This update offers a lot more functionality and fun. I'm still shit on-line, mind you.

By far the best thing in 1.05 is the ability to backup your save to a USB device. This essential omission was rendered vitally important by the fact that going on-line can result in lock-ups that occasionally corrupt your save. Whilst the lock-ups happen a lot less now it's still great to know your progression can be saved. You still can't swap saves with others, which is good, but it's not known whether they are locked to account or PS3 unit - pretty vital if you change PS3s and want to keep your save.

Seasonal Events are brilliant. They offer a lot of fun, close racing and lots of credit and xp. They are updated regularly, are open for around two weeks and let you race, time trial or drift. They tend to have very strict regulations and most of the race events restrict you to a single vehicle that you can hardly tune at all. This leads to very close, tough racing. I can only get silver at best but it's great fun trying to find just a second or two more out of a track.

The new Hot Car dealership offers you access to 12 cars (and trucks) that will help complete particular events. These will be occasionally updated. In addition, you now get credits and xp for on-line races where your distance driven and number of wins are now saved. Mine still reads 0. Oh, and the shadows have changed - they're slightly smoother but still pretty shitty.

Finally, until January 11th, we get more rewards for doing A- and B-Spec events. A really good gesture to wrap up a really good update. What's impressed me most is that these additions, for the main part, are neither fixes nor things they wanted to put in the game, they are genuinely new things to do. And they're a lot of fun. Nice one Polyphony Digital.

Playstation blog on the update.

Gran Turismo 5 (GT5) Review

I come to this game, as I do all games now, with the mind and body of a 40+ old gamer with very little twitch muscle left and all manual dexterity fading with age. Whatever enjoyment I can find in a game tends to be tempered with the idea I can never do well at the higher levels of the game and the fact that I'll not be winning on-line. So enjoy your read ahead with that in mind.

GT5 is the racing game that Jap studio Polyphony Digital have been making since before the Playstation 3 launched. Its tag is the real driving simulator and it's by that that it must be judged. Don't expect flashy explosive graphics, tracks with spurting lava, boosters and so on - this is a sim and it deals with real cars going around realistic -often real - tracks.

So how did they do? Well, they did pretty well but the game is not without some problems.

The menu system, for example, is an annoying piece of shit that should of been changed completely shortly after design with the subsequent public torture and execution of the designer and his entire family. It's unintuitive, doesn't group things where you would want them and forces you to endlessly traipse backwards and forwards as you just want to race.

The graphics and sound are great. With the exception of the trees which are a bit polygonesque and the shadows which are as bad as anything from the PS2 you can imagine. The engine does run at 1080p 60FPS though, so perhaps it's easy to understand why some compromises had to be made. Sound, on my system at least, comes out as Dolby Digital 5.1 48k and is as crisply appointed as one could want. The music on the other hand is techno, lightweight synth jazz, cheapo classical and generally a bit shitty and uninspired. Like it was chosen by someone who doesn't like music very much. There is no option to use your own music in the game - for shame, Polyphony Digital.

There are over 1000 cars in the game - one of its unique selling points, and due to implementation one of its critics' biggest bugbears. There are around 200 premium model cars and therefore around 800 standard model cars. The difference? The former are modelled in detail, look amazing and offer custom dashboards if you like to race inside the car. Standard models contain less detail and no dashboard. That said, they actually look quite good to my eye, just a little plain at times - it depends a lot on the specific car.

Damage modelling comes in two flavours in GT5: costume and mechanical. Both become progressively unlocked as you increase your level. Costume looks a bit crap, with areas of your car taking on a sort of distorted plastic look. Mechanical damage unlocks quite late on and actually effects your racing performance. So I can't tell you much about that apart from to say that update 1.03 just became available tonight which adds mechanical damage to on-line racing via the options.

Handling is a fucking dream, thank fuck. This is the very core of any racing game, without which any amount of snazzy graphics, explosive damage modelling and car tuning options would completely fall apart. It took me 3-4 days for the handling to click into place for me, and when it did it was a pure joy to be able to sling cars round corners, powerslide and all the other cool car stuff we love. It is not forgiving though, muck up your line or braking at a corner in a powerful car and you'll spin or go off-course - this is just how it should be in a sim.

GT5 is played in one of three main modes: GT Life, Arcade and On-line. GT Life is the full experience and involves entering races to win money and experience points to go up levels to get you faster cars which can enter more races, etc. You start with a small amount of cash and no cars and have to make your way up the rankings. It works well. Arcade gives you access to most courses and cars and is standalone with no xp or money involved. On-line is currently unstable and can cause your save game file to corrupt - though maybe 1.03 has fixed this. There's no info currently.

Two salient points here. The AI is rubbish. You'll either win by miles or be all but last, depending on the relative speed of the car. And the B-spec mode, where you build up a fictitious racer and issue race commands to him, is a massive time and credit sink and nothing else.

This is a massive game, I've only scratched the surface myself and have only been able to write of a few of the more important areas and more annoying issues. I've not told you about tuning, the used car dealership, special events, replay and photo mode, paint, race mods and so on. Sorry about that, but did you really want to read much more?

GT5 is a game that excels - mostly - in the areas that are most important to it: driving a car around a track. It offers little panache or flair and has some problems that are really unforgivable in a game with such a long development. That said, they appear to be listening and are bringing out updates at a rate of knots. I'm impressed, I enjoy the game and would suggest anyone with an interest in driving games buys it. I wish they'd fix the on-line though, that really is cuntish corrupting your save file.. oh and you can't back it up, it's copy-protected.

UPDATE: I was wrong, you can use your own music. It's hidden away in options/audio. Works well, called 'Personal Music' inside the game. Online seems much more stable to me with the new patch (1.03).

Musical Biographies #1 - Cheesie Knicks and Thickwood Muck

Formed in Them Days by an aging Mick Thuckwood and his Green Peter, Thickwood Muck started out peddling blue songs for crack cocaine to angry negroes in the bayous of pre-Colombian Venezuela. Their breakout hit Albatoss - written about masturbation in Scotchland - is an acknowledged blue classic. Mick, dissatisfied with his rock crystals, immediately set upon a quest to find ever refined levels of cocaine use.

With pop-stardom threatening, Mick dropped his Green Peter like a hot melon and along the way met an elf-child, a pixie and a pair of grim swingers who he invited into the band. They were united by a shared interest in the coca-leaf and the by-products thereof. Many tracks were laid down in the studio and all were snorted up as fast as possible. Critical reviews were made and the band soon found they preferred Peruvian flake. Some music written.

The elf-child found it could sing. Although the sound was ever-muted due to the billowing clouds of pink fairy dust (see above), cotton candy and acres of lace. Pupating into female form she lived in a huge fluffy castle full of unicorns, curtains and lots and lots of cushions. Persistent vaginal infections led to a substantial amount of brie and Mick found himself finally able to dub her with her name to this day: Cheesie Knicks.

Ode to cocaine, Oh You Make Bumming Fun written.

Hit followed hit, tour followed tour and before long mild-mannered cretins everywhere were being soothed and tweaked by Thickwood Muck's brand of super-jizzy pop-tastic pseudo-rock twadge. The band suffered, having to write and perform music was eating into valuable cocaine enjoyment time. They resolved to write one really big hit album that would pay off their dealers in one go and give them more time for their relaxing hobby.

Tango in the Shite was born. It was very smooth and less divertingly interesting than anything they'd recorded before. With absolutely nothing to trouble their minds, remedials everywhere lapped it up like little puppies with advanced brain tumours. Everybody was wildly happy, especially the dealers.

One more tour was planned. By now every band member was legally divorced from every other band member at least once and they refused to share the same continent with one another. This made touring difficult but a resolution was found when Lindsay Fuckingham the pixie-boy suggested each band member had their own trailer, stadium and three roadies devoted to blowing the coke up their arseholes all night.

Inevitably the situation couldn't continue. The swingers took permanent exile into a caravan park outside Lowestoft, Fuckingham grew his ears until death threatened, Cheesie disappeared up her own cunt after a roadie sucked rather than blew one night and Mick himself took to rocket science in a bid to find the first supplies of space cocaine. He remains very tall.

Casual Games for Sad Old Fucks #1

Three reviewlets of three games I've been playing recently. All were played on the Playstation 3, all are available on the Xbox and probably the Wii as well. Who knows, some might even be out there for the PC (one is). All are casual games, because that's what I'm playing at the moment, simple as that.

Monopoly Streets
£30 at Amazon
My latest purchase, what can I say, it's Monopoly. It's presented in 3D with excellent cartoony animations, it's all hopelessly family friendly and there's plenty of boards and pieces to earn to add to the interest (probably not enough pieces, truth be told). There are various game modes, from Official rules to Fast Game to Jackpot offering various rulesets. Graphics and sound are fine. So, is all hunky-dory in the Monopoly Streets world? Well no. Whilst it plays a great game you can sometimes get lost amongst the tight, close-in shots and feel a bit disconnected. But far, far more importantly, there's a big problem in the online mode where if one player drops the game ends immediately and you're sent to the main menu. This is shit. Frankly. That it got past QC is a sign that a fuck-witted numbskull was allowed to wank into the mix at some stage and left their stain behind. Patch please, quickly.

Rapala Pro Bass Fishing
£40 at Play, including rod peripheral
So to fishing, or Yankee fishing, without proper baits and that. That aside, this is an excellent game - probably the best fishing game ever, though to be honest that isn't saying much, I know. The big draw of this game is the rod peripheral which uses tilt switches and a reel (fitted either way for the right- and left-handed) to mimic the actions of a real rod and reel. It's not bad either. Obviously there's no feedback (the package is too cheap) but as you wave the rod about to move your lure in predetermined patterns or fight your fish you can squint and just about believe you're doing something approaching fishing. Visuals are great, sound good and the single player game seems quite well balanced and fun. The problem again lies in the multiplayer arena, and this time the problem is simple: there is no multiplayer. This could of been so fun and simple, fishing in a lake against friends or strangers for a predetermined time. Activision are indeed cunts.

Worms2: Armageddon
£13 or so, Playstation Network
This is part of the old Worms series that started in the 1990s, this is the cheapest game by far in these 3 games, this is in 2D and this is by far the best game I'm writing about today. In addition, and least importantly, this is the one game also available on the PC. You know the score, it's the old BBC computer artillery game with amazingly surreal landscapes, weapons ranging from the mundane to the insane and worms; lovely cute little worms with adorable voices. It's savage as hell, especially online where no prisoners are taken. The only problem with this game are the players - so many scurrilous toads are happy to besmirch their good name and honour by quitting games when they're losing that it can be quite rare to finish a game online. Apart from that it's wonderful, gloriously pretty in 720p and most importantly fun as hell.

There you have it, two not bad but flawed games and one prime jewel amongst games. If I had one general comment it would be this: please let me play my own music in my own games. None of the above let you play your own and that annoys the hell out of me. This should be such a simple requirement every game should allow it. The Xbox 360 has had this since year dot at system level. That's probably why these 3 ports don't have it.

That's all for now, poodle-tip.

Modern druids? Modern wankers.

If you believe in an organised religion through childhood indoctrination I regard you with pity. If you have come to believe in organised religion through your adult life I regard you as mildly retarded. If you have thrown aside organised religion for a belief in what they call 'Paganism' I regard you as a prime fucking wanker.

Druids, pagans and witches - tossers. Basing themselves on old religions we know next to nothing about, connections with mother nature that don't exist in any concious applicable form and believing that spells can do anything, ever, to anyone. Cunts. It's worse than most Christians, in that it's more active and a belief in superstition is even greater.

These are people for whom organised religion seems remote and disconnected - they're not quite stupid enough to believe. But in the void that appears in their lives lurks fear and superstition. The void has to be filled by bullshit. They're not quite clever enough to deny the urge.

Atheist Realities. Religious Necessities.

Atheism has a problem. It exists as a reaction against religion, and is in an unstable position because of it. In its worst incarnations it can look like a religion in itself - if you look at some of the extreme atheist forums you can understand why. Things aren't helped by the fact that scientific theory forces us to admit we can never prove if there's a god or not. We're all forced to believe something even if it's in nothing.

I am an atheist, but these days I prefer a gentler form of the game. I've never believed, no indoctrination was attempted as a child - I'm not even christened. So in my later years I find myself living without a religion as purely natural; you should be good to people as an acknowledgement of the society you enjoy and live your life for the benefit of that society.

But what of fighting the good fight? Shouldn't I be trying to create other atheists, protesting about the latest knuckle-dragging cluster fuck of a Papal decree, and generally attempting to destroy religion?

I don't think so. Other than setting an example by leading a decent life without god, I don't think any longer it's my place to do these things. Partly it's because those acts smack of religious activity, and partly it's because of a new realisation that struck me a few years ago and has been growing in my thoughts recently.

People are fucking thick. Even in a relatively rich society like the UK the average person leaves school with a poxy 2 GCSE grade C's. That means that the great masses of this, and presumably every other country, are deeply stupid people. People who without religion to rule their lives instantly seem to devolve into braintards believing in magic crystals, wicca, the cult of scientology or whatever other fucking rubbish someone is flogging to fill the religious void.

So could religion be necessary for a healthy society that consists mainly of sub-moronic halfwits? Could a lack of it be why UK society suffers from various form of anti-social problems? Could it be a creation of social evolution (in Dawkinian terms) that favours the continued existence of that society? I'd say it's worth considering.

New toys - Amazon Kindle

I'd wanted an e-reader for a long while, I don't have the best of eyesight and the tightly set text of many modern book imprints had basically stopped me from reading. This also made e-paper an essential - other screens refresh themselves constantly and make reading a lot of text a chore. My other criteria was price, around £100 seemed fair to me.

So when Amazon advertised the new 2010 Kindle at price points of £109 (wifi only) and £149 (including 3G mobile data facilities) I literally pre-ordered mine on the day. As I have no need to download books on the move I saved my money and ordered the wifi only model. Both share a 6" screen, 4GB of memory and the same form factor.

It arrived on time, was unpacked and powered up. It had a protective sheet of adhesive plastic with some warnings about use printed on it.. soon removed.. and.... it wasn't printed, it was text on the Kindle screen. Text of quite amazing clarity and quality. It's not like text in a book, it's far better, like a very high quality print on very high quality paper. I worked out the DPI of the 16-shade grey-scale screen and it's just about twice that of the monitor I'm using now. Impressive stuff.

It is, of course, monochrome. That doesn't worry me, this device is for reading text and for that you don't need colour. While we're about it, it's not touch-screen either - everyone who has handled my machine has tried to touch it. Sorry, but not at this price-point. Not yet.

Whilst you can find e-books to read all over the web, the Kindle Marketplace on Amazon is your central site to buy Kindle books, newspapers, magazines and blogs. You can buy a book either on your Kindle or via your PC browser. It's all very very streamlined - buy on the browser and next time you turn on your Kindle it's downloaded and you can read in a few seconds. I should note that there are many free books on the Marketplace, mainly older texts but very welcome indeed.

Reading itself is a pleasure. Large buttons on the side of the device offer page forward and back (on both sides to cater for lefties and righties alike). You can select sections, bookmark them, make annotations (using the excellent keyboard at the bottom of the device), select words and look them up in a dictionary, send quotes to Facebook or Twitter and generally do anything you could do with a book and so much more.

The tricks don't quite end there either. Hit a key combination and your Kindle will start reading back your book for you. Okay the Stephen Hawking voice will never be as good as hearing a well spoken audio-book, but it's a cool feature nonetheless. In addition you can play MP3s and there's even a basic Web browser available which works reasonably well.

The Kindle is a quite excellent machine. I can't compare it with other e-readers, having never used one, but this device does everything I'd expect from an e-reader and a lot more I didn't. It's a well-made machine and makes reading easy. Using one text size above default I find reading books is once again available to me - and that's worth a lot.