The Dark Tower

Guns vs magic = Pretty cool!

When Jake (Tom Taylor) starts getting vivid nightmares of another world everyone suspects he is just batshit crazy. In a good news, bad news situation, he finds out he isn't which means those visions of a powerfully evil man in black (gloriously portrayed by Matthew McConaughey) trying to destroy the multiverse an ominous looking tower is true! One of the last gunslingers (played by Idris Elba) is the only one who can stop him and his evil scheme.

Don't mess with this gunslinger!

Right off the bat I'm going to say my wife and I really liked this movie. Decent acting, good effects, great fight sequences and not a bad story all make for a really entertaining flick! That said, we haven't read any of the books where as people who have, seem to absolutely hate it.

I guess that just means, if you haven't read the books and have zero expectations - you'll probably like this movie, otherwise stay away! I give it three incredibly rare bullets out of five and would definitely watch it again.

MGSV: A Quiet Devil

[Part of the MGS Diary]

While developing D-Walkers, Dr. Emmerich gives us a lead that Skull Face is up to something in the wide open plains of Africa (as he was shipping walker gears there) so we naturally start accepting missions from there too. While the good doctor is quite the blabber mouth, Quiet doesn't break her silence and soon freaks out the men so much that they want her off base.

I take Ocelot's suggestion to take her on missions with me and she quickly proves to be a valuable asset, easily taking down heavy Skulls infantry and capturing guard posts single handedly making her my favorite companion.

We soon find a lead to Skull Face's operation at "the devil's house", a remote facility filled with people dying from an unknown disease. Skull Face himself makes an appearance here, but once again retreats upon spotting me - instructing his pet fire monster to deal with me instead.

Hello again you flaming bastard.

His fire balls easily destroy my first extraction chopper so I follow Jack Bauer's example from the hospital and stun the enemy by exploding the nearby water towers. I also put him on a fulton balloon just to further delay his recovery while Quiet and I escape on chopper number two.

Insight: If you aren't bringing D-Horse, bring a jeep to cut down travel time.

Neverwinter Online: Four Life Hacks

Here are some easy tips to speed up the grind which you may or may not already know about.

Press 1 for OK, Press 2 for Cancel

This usually applies even when the option isn't denoted, like when you are trading bounty currency for something and there is no quantity slider. Instead of clicking on OK each time, press 1 to speed up the process.

Aim above the person/item you want to interact with

Helpful if there's a stack of players (or just one mounted on a T-rex) in front of that banker, vendor or gate transition.

Check old campaign stores

Especially if you've been doing the weekly legacy quests, you may have enough to trade for boxes of AD. While you are at it, visit the seal vendors in the market as they hand out AD as well, and if you are really desperate - gold bars are more readily available in Protector's Enclave now to trade on auction.

Avoid fighting if you can (now easier with the free faster mount speed)

Fighting eats up most of the time. If you can brush off the damage and don't need to interact with anything, just run past. In those instances even if the trash does catch you, its quicker to annihilate them simultaneously rather than handle each individual group. Remember you can also speed up some vertical drops by simply jumping down - and if your character can evade, you can even negate all of the damage.

MGSV: D-Walkers

[Part of the MGS Diary]

With Quiet no longer guarding the pass, I had a clear shot to get to one of Skull Face's scientists working out of a major encampment in Afghanistan. Getting past all the patrolling guards, helicopter, and walker gears (mini-robot weapon platforms) was easy thanks to D-Dog.

Getting out with cripple, Dr. Emmerich, was also pretty easy thanks to the spare walker gear he had in the lab as it moves fast and is able to carry him while firing its gatling gun. Obviously the Dr. likes his robots too much though, for his giant metal gear creation - "Sahelanthropus" came to stop us outside the camp.

Complete with crotch cannon!

Fortunately the big guy is pretty slow and easily distracted by helicopters so it doesn't take much effort to escape from him. It does try jump for us as we fly off, but a sustained burst from the door gun severely damages to robot, sending it crashing back down into the ground. Back at base, Emmerich agrees to develop walker gears for the Diamond Dogs and gives them a predictable code name: D-Walkers.

Insight: If he doesn't see you Sahelathropus will go for your chopper. Use this to bait him away before calling in the real extraction point.

Pathway

The journey is more important than the destination.

The desert is full of ancient ruins that hide alien tech which has drawn Nazis and strange zombie making cultists to the area. It is up to your intrepid team and a trusty jeep to beat them to those priceless relics!

Or, you can just show up late and shoot everyone...

After selecting your squad most missions involve traversing a map and dealing with random skill challenges or more often, strategic combat ala X-COM, which is what will take up most of your time.

As always, using cover is often vital and since your characters do level up you want to try make sure they all survive each encounter. Not a bad little game, but it is rather short. Pathway is a decent distraction if you like that type of game play, and one I give 2.5 fuel cans out of 5.

Insight: Always buy fuel. If your jeep runs out of fuel you can still continue on foot but will take severe damage in doing so.

MGSV: D-Dog Duel

[Part of the MGS Diary]

It would be awhile before I encountered Skull Face's troops again, during which time one of the animals I previously fultoned out has grown to become a really useful ally under Ocelot's training - D-Dog!  

This one eyed mutt has a great nose for detecting medicinal herbs, wild life hunt targets, mines, and enemies - making it very difficult for anyone to get the drop on me, with one exception being the female sniper known as Quiet - who is accurate, able to turn near invisible and is as fast as the Skull soldiers from before.

Our duel in the ruins is a long one, and one I only win thanks to D-Dogs nose and a sandstorm. When she's finally KO'ed, Miller pleads with me to kill her but Ocelot asks that I capture her instead. Since she's easy on the eyes I take Ocelot's advice.

We make a good team too!

On the chopper she inexplicably frees herself from her cuffs and helps shoot down an enemy MiG by sniping the pilot - saving our lives. She then quietly goes to a cell on the rapidly expanding "Mother Base". The little oil rig is now looking more like a giant Hydra with the multiple platforms in place.

Insight: It costs money each time you deploy into the field. How much varies based on what you are bringing with you.

Savage Dog

No one likes to play fair.

Somewhere in Indochina during a period where the most wanted and evil men could retain power, a group of them happens to piss off the wrong kick ass guy (Scott Adkins).

To be fair, the movie actually tried to make them seem ok for a while there - almost making me believe they were not going to go down a predictable path but alas, nope.

It's like a rematch for Boyka!

It's a standard revenge fair with a lot of martial arts which are obviously the highlight, especially with Cung Le and Marko Zaror. I'm a little sad Juju Chan doesn't bust out any moves in a role which makes her almost unrecognizable from Wu Assassins.

Anyway, if you are a fan of martial arts or of the guys above then you might enjoy this. For everyone else, there's very little content that for some reason is fully narrated, very silly gun play and is on the cheaper side of production.

I give it 1.5 out of 5 and would probably only watch the fights with Cung Le or Marko again.