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Let Tom Francis tell you all what it's like, being male, middle-class and white.
 

 

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He was accompanied at all times by a hulk of rotting flesh and exposed bones, and carried a long, undulating, bright orange dagger called Pentadact's Screaming Cinquedea Of Pestilence - a single stab from which would send huge enemies scrambling away in fear, but infected with a poison so virulent that even if they escaped the inevitable corpse explosions, Poison Novas and Bone Spears, they faced certain death. 		 

 

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Bracing Oneself

 
 

Both GTA IV and what the common people call an ‘electronic gamer console’ are now waiting patiently with me in the office. I discuss with PC Zone’s Log about how to prepare for this revolution.

Pentadact: Do you have it yet?
Log: Picking it up after work
Log: I want to see to what extent, precisely, it redefines gaming
Log: I’ve pulled up the tent pegs from my existing definitions
Pentadact: Now you’re hovering anxiously over the terrain of possible human experience, looking for some soft ground to plunge them into.
Log: And my tent flaps are moisturised for a thorough stretching <- too far
Pentadact: We’re going to need new dictionaries.
Log: I’m going to buy a rule book just so I can watch as the pages shrivel with obsolescence.
Pentadact: I’ve removed the rubber grommets from my paradigm, just in case it needs shifting.
Log: Idiot, you’ll scratch the floor of your preconceptions
Pentadact: Oh, those are due for demolition tonight.
Log: I forgot. You’re absolutely right
Pentadact: I just hope it doesn’t raise the bar. Mine’s already flush against the beading on my kitchen ceiling.
Log: I feel like I’m in the opening sequence to Torchwood

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Andrew: Hilarious, hahahahahaha :D

I really, really dislike review scales and these reviews of the game since the 10's cannot be true from a critical perspective. GTA4 is polished not "definition redefining" or "innovative", hahaha :) what a load of buzzwords :)

Grill: *SOB&. I've not finished GTA 1 yet so don't spoil the plot!

Lukasa: Speaking of all of this GTA based craziness, Samus Young over at Twenty Sided has done a good blog regarding the Official XBox Magazine's coverage of the game. Well worth a read, especially as he talks about games reviewing, and I'd like to hear your thoughts Penta.

URL: http://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=1629

(NB: I'm too lazy to do any HTML with it)

Pentadact: Ah, another heroic whistle-blower has spotted the word 'Official' in a magazine title and blown the scandal wide open! And they thought we'd just go along with the story that the latest huge-budget installment by an incredibly talented developer in a series adored by millions would merit a very high score in the magazine those people read.

Ten doesn't mean perfect on a ten-point scale. Jon played the same code as everyone else who reviewed it that early, loved it, and as far as I've read, was the only one of them with the decency to be upfront about the stage the code was at.

But it's great that people who've never played the game have decided Jon couldn't possibly think it was worth 10/10 if there's a rare inconsistency with the cover system. And I really respect that they pick the novel, under-criticised target of an Official magazine, and ignore IGN giving it ONE HUNDRED PERCENT.

Andrew: Hehe, I think they're all equally guilty, although they ususally say their scales are the games "at the time of publication it couldn't be improved and/or is the best there is", which is hackneyed, making the reviews historically pathetic, since you could award a game 100% every year, or whenever a new console comes out, heh.

Shame, it'll take a while to get to a decent level of criticism where a perfect score (on whatever scale!) truly means a critically perfect game. I could be wrong, this could be it, but it surely doesn't push the boundaries of the genre or do much that hasn't been done before (nor provide a experience with much depth, rather then breadth, nor by defacto appeal to everyone), although a lot of polish is nice I guess, making it shiny and all :)

Reminds me of the catchy tune for 7/10...hehe. Why isn't 8 considered a truly great game? "We must give 95%'s and 100%'s else we don't consider this game worthwhile since our scale is pretty crap!" Hehe :)

Tentaculat: Ridiculous hype aside, GTA IV is by far the most entertaining... entertainment I've experienced in a very long time. And with that statement includes favourite movies, books, TV shows etc.

I must lead a very sheltered life, but I don't care - I have a new one in Liberty City!

Iain “DDude” Dawson: This is odd.. I appear to have got to this a day late, and as such Ross's appearance has been replaced by new news...
Is there any other way to watch the clip?

Iain “DDude” Dawson: How did I manage to post a comment in the wrong blog post...? Forgiveness please...

 		 
 

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