Search
Azia (0 KP) rated the Xbox 360 version of Assassin's Creed 2 in Video Games
Jan 23, 2018
A Beautiful Game
A definite step up from the last game and a well thought out storyline made Assassins Creed 2 intriguing and eventful. The characters, I felt, were written beautifully and acted accordingly to their personalities.
I do have a few problems however and I understand that no game is perfect so I found ways around these glitches.
Ezio often failed to follow my demands as when I tried to freerun around the buildings, he seemed to favour jumping off them instead of safely landing on the next one. It took more than a few attempts to complete some missions because of this. It might have been me not using the controller properly or the controller being out of sync but no matter what I did to try and combat this, he still seemed to enjoy leaping to his death.
I do have a lot of praise for this game though as it made me laugh on several occasions and finally completing it felt amazing. Avoiding spoilers, the final scene made my heart race and made me maybe a little too excited for the next game.
The combat is designed well and fits with the style of the game. Although I found it difficult to get my head around, mastering fighting techniques took little effort and killing soldiers became easier the more I practiced. The health of Ezio and the soldiers was equally balanced and left you would a good and perhaps difficult at times fight but always one you could win with the right skills.
The graphics in this game are stunning and standing on a viewpoint to watch over it all reminds me how beautiful it is. The detail in the buildings and the general design are accurate.
The NPCs could get rather annoying at times with musicians running up to me in the squares and getting in my way tested my patience. The basket carriers were even worse. Soldiers would get angry with me if I knocked one over which would happen often as they liked to walk into my path.
Overall, a stunning game with a developed and intriguing storyline. While it took time to get around a few problems, this game is one of the only games I want to complete 100%. And if I can find all those feathers, I eventually will!
I do have a few problems however and I understand that no game is perfect so I found ways around these glitches.
Ezio often failed to follow my demands as when I tried to freerun around the buildings, he seemed to favour jumping off them instead of safely landing on the next one. It took more than a few attempts to complete some missions because of this. It might have been me not using the controller properly or the controller being out of sync but no matter what I did to try and combat this, he still seemed to enjoy leaping to his death.
I do have a lot of praise for this game though as it made me laugh on several occasions and finally completing it felt amazing. Avoiding spoilers, the final scene made my heart race and made me maybe a little too excited for the next game.
The combat is designed well and fits with the style of the game. Although I found it difficult to get my head around, mastering fighting techniques took little effort and killing soldiers became easier the more I practiced. The health of Ezio and the soldiers was equally balanced and left you would a good and perhaps difficult at times fight but always one you could win with the right skills.
The graphics in this game are stunning and standing on a viewpoint to watch over it all reminds me how beautiful it is. The detail in the buildings and the general design are accurate.
The NPCs could get rather annoying at times with musicians running up to me in the squares and getting in my way tested my patience. The basket carriers were even worse. Soldiers would get angry with me if I knocked one over which would happen often as they liked to walk into my path.
Overall, a stunning game with a developed and intriguing storyline. While it took time to get around a few problems, this game is one of the only games I want to complete 100%. And if I can find all those feathers, I eventually will!
Zuky the BookBum (15 KP) rated To Die in Spring in Books
Mar 15, 2018
Let me start this review with this: <b>I cried on the train because of this novel.</b>
Towards the end of WWII, the Russians and the Americans were closing in and Germany were desperate. Boys, as young as 8 !!, were being forced into becoming soldiers and pushed to the front to fight for a country that were losing, brutally. Thousands of children’s lives were lost.
In this book we meet Walter and Fiete, both young men, aged 17, who are forced into becoming SS soldiers. They are best friends, but they’re very different. Walter is reserved and respectful, Fiete is loud, sarcastic and happy to voice his opinion on what he thinks of the war. Unfortunately, Fiete gets pushed on the front line, fighting a war he thinks is idiotic, so he attempts to desert. Deserters get executed by their own men.
This novel is so beautiful yet so horrible. You can’t really think of this novel as fiction when you know the contents within probably happened to thousands of teenagers. It’s so distressing when you think about how people were treated and how they lived during the war and this book represents it perfectly.
Reading this book, the fear and melancholy of being a soldier fighting a losing battle creeps through your bones. You’re there, stuck in a rotting basement, scared of death yet willing it on, just to get out. I applaud Rothmann for making those feelings so real in me… A young woman, sat on her train going into another day of work, of safety, but with goosebumps, because in her mind, she’s stuck outside in the cold, desperately trying to find a hiding place from the American war planes flying over.
This novel is an emotionally charged story about the brutality of war and the awful things young men were forced to do, just to have their pathetic Fuhrer shamefully kill himself and the battle be lost. I urge any person who likes to read war books, to read this one. The writing is stunning, the characters are real, and the story is harrowing.
<i>Thanks to Picador Books for providing me with an arc copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.</i>
Towards the end of WWII, the Russians and the Americans were closing in and Germany were desperate. Boys, as young as 8 !!, were being forced into becoming soldiers and pushed to the front to fight for a country that were losing, brutally. Thousands of children’s lives were lost.
In this book we meet Walter and Fiete, both young men, aged 17, who are forced into becoming SS soldiers. They are best friends, but they’re very different. Walter is reserved and respectful, Fiete is loud, sarcastic and happy to voice his opinion on what he thinks of the war. Unfortunately, Fiete gets pushed on the front line, fighting a war he thinks is idiotic, so he attempts to desert. Deserters get executed by their own men.
This novel is so beautiful yet so horrible. You can’t really think of this novel as fiction when you know the contents within probably happened to thousands of teenagers. It’s so distressing when you think about how people were treated and how they lived during the war and this book represents it perfectly.
Reading this book, the fear and melancholy of being a soldier fighting a losing battle creeps through your bones. You’re there, stuck in a rotting basement, scared of death yet willing it on, just to get out. I applaud Rothmann for making those feelings so real in me… A young woman, sat on her train going into another day of work, of safety, but with goosebumps, because in her mind, she’s stuck outside in the cold, desperately trying to find a hiding place from the American war planes flying over.
This novel is an emotionally charged story about the brutality of war and the awful things young men were forced to do, just to have their pathetic Fuhrer shamefully kill himself and the battle be lost. I urge any person who likes to read war books, to read this one. The writing is stunning, the characters are real, and the story is harrowing.
<i>Thanks to Picador Books for providing me with an arc copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.</i>
She Landed by Moonlight: The Story of Secret Agent Pearl Witherington: The Real Charlotte Gray
Book
On the night of the 22 September 1943 Pearl Witherington, a twenty-nine-year-old British secretary...
Allegiance (Star Wars Legends)
Book
Never before has the incendiary mix of action, politics, and intrigue that has become Timothy...
When Men & Mountains Meet: Like the Desire for Drink or Drugs, the Craving for Mountains is Not Easily Overcome
Book
'We had climbed a mountain and crossed a pass; been wet, cold, hungry, frightened, and withal happy....
Debbiereadsbook (1303 KP) rated Forged Decisions (Tribal Spirits #2) in Books
Jan 14, 2019
not quite as good as book one
Independent reviewer for Archaeolibrarian, I was gifted my copy of this book.
This is book two in the Tribal Spirits series, but you don't need to have read book one: Forged Alliances, for this one to make sense. It would HELP, but not totally necessary.
Finn is beta to the Red Rock pack, but is restless since his Alpha, Sierra, mated Dax, Alpha of the Silver Springs pack. The Tribe are in town to bles their union, and Navi takes advantage of Finn's local knowledge to crack a drug smuggling ring. The more they work together, the more the attraction builds, and soon neither can deny it. When Finn's past comes crashing down around him and clashes with Navi's mission, will she let him have the revenge he so desperately needs? Will Finn be able to walk away from Navi, when her mission is done, now she holds his heart??
I LOVED book one, loved it, and looked forward to reading this one. But while still a very VERY good read, it doesn't quite hit *THAT* spot that Forged Alliances does. And *insert wailing* I don't know why! And ya'll know how much the drives me nuts!
Finn and Navi had that one night together, after Dax gets his pack back, and it plays on both their minds. They are both profoundly affected by that night and the passion they shared simmers along for the first half of the book. They fight it, oh BOY do they fight it, but it really is inevitable, working in close quarters, that they will give in. It is just a matter of when.
Finn is dealing with some emotional baggage, after his parents death when he was a child and the restless feeling he has been carrying for the last month. Navi too, but hers is different. Being raised as Tribe from a very young age, she had no childhood, she has no attachments save the other Tribe members. She cannot have a mate, since she has to leave all the time. Yes, she has a powerful panther spirit within her, and she can control water, but once, just once, she wants someone who sees Navi the WOMAN, rather than Navi of The Tribe.
And by god, does Finn SEE Navi the woman!
Loved that, while it broke her to ask the words of Finn, she does.
The next book is laid out very nicely, thank you, and I suspect that might be more of an emotionally difficult read, given what Raven goes through here, and with the hints to her past.
A really good read, just not as good as book one, so...
4 solid stars
**same worded review will appear elsewhere**
This is book two in the Tribal Spirits series, but you don't need to have read book one: Forged Alliances, for this one to make sense. It would HELP, but not totally necessary.
Finn is beta to the Red Rock pack, but is restless since his Alpha, Sierra, mated Dax, Alpha of the Silver Springs pack. The Tribe are in town to bles their union, and Navi takes advantage of Finn's local knowledge to crack a drug smuggling ring. The more they work together, the more the attraction builds, and soon neither can deny it. When Finn's past comes crashing down around him and clashes with Navi's mission, will she let him have the revenge he so desperately needs? Will Finn be able to walk away from Navi, when her mission is done, now she holds his heart??
I LOVED book one, loved it, and looked forward to reading this one. But while still a very VERY good read, it doesn't quite hit *THAT* spot that Forged Alliances does. And *insert wailing* I don't know why! And ya'll know how much the drives me nuts!
Finn and Navi had that one night together, after Dax gets his pack back, and it plays on both their minds. They are both profoundly affected by that night and the passion they shared simmers along for the first half of the book. They fight it, oh BOY do they fight it, but it really is inevitable, working in close quarters, that they will give in. It is just a matter of when.
Finn is dealing with some emotional baggage, after his parents death when he was a child and the restless feeling he has been carrying for the last month. Navi too, but hers is different. Being raised as Tribe from a very young age, she had no childhood, she has no attachments save the other Tribe members. She cannot have a mate, since she has to leave all the time. Yes, she has a powerful panther spirit within her, and she can control water, but once, just once, she wants someone who sees Navi the WOMAN, rather than Navi of The Tribe.
And by god, does Finn SEE Navi the woman!
Loved that, while it broke her to ask the words of Finn, she does.
The next book is laid out very nicely, thank you, and I suspect that might be more of an emotionally difficult read, given what Raven goes through here, and with the hints to her past.
A really good read, just not as good as book one, so...
4 solid stars
**same worded review will appear elsewhere**
Ali A (82 KP) rated A Multitude of Dreams in Books
Sep 6, 2023
Trigger Warnings: plague, death, blood, racism, murder, self harm, genocide, survivors guilt
A Multitude of Dreams is a reimagining of Edgar Allan Poe’s The Masque of the Red Death. Four years ago, King Stuart gathered his royals, noblemen, and daughters and locked them into the safety of the castle walls. Every window was boarded up and every door sealed shut - all to protect those within of the horrible mori roja plague ravaging the land outside.
Told in third person, this novel follows Seraphina, a Jewish girl, who is also the (fake) Princess Imogene, and Nico, who once lived a comfortable life but now works for Lord Crane, the man who saved his life after he lost everything. When Lord Crane sends Nico and two others on the search for survivors, Nico meets a princess who wants out. But both are living in giant webs of lies and deception that they must unravel if they’re going to survive.
I wanted this title because I read The Poison Season and I really enjoyed it. So, when I saw Mara Rutherford had another YA novel coming out, I immediately put it on my TBR list. It’s also listed as Fantasy Gothic and
I was all about it and also the cover - like, I love it!
There were a few twists in here I didn’t quite see right away, which was nice. And, even some of the ones that I did see coming, I still enjoyed Rutherford’s storytelling and it kept me interested. And yes, there is some romance in this, but it wasn’t the main focus of the story - surviving and getting out of the castle was.
Overall, I would recommend this to anyone who’s in need of a good gothic fantasy with a hidden identity, Jewish representation, a masquerade, and the fight of survival.
*Thank you Inkyard Press and BookishFirst for a copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review
A Multitude of Dreams is a reimagining of Edgar Allan Poe’s The Masque of the Red Death. Four years ago, King Stuart gathered his royals, noblemen, and daughters and locked them into the safety of the castle walls. Every window was boarded up and every door sealed shut - all to protect those within of the horrible mori roja plague ravaging the land outside.
Told in third person, this novel follows Seraphina, a Jewish girl, who is also the (fake) Princess Imogene, and Nico, who once lived a comfortable life but now works for Lord Crane, the man who saved his life after he lost everything. When Lord Crane sends Nico and two others on the search for survivors, Nico meets a princess who wants out. But both are living in giant webs of lies and deception that they must unravel if they’re going to survive.
I wanted this title because I read The Poison Season and I really enjoyed it. So, when I saw Mara Rutherford had another YA novel coming out, I immediately put it on my TBR list. It’s also listed as Fantasy Gothic and
I was all about it and also the cover - like, I love it!
There were a few twists in here I didn’t quite see right away, which was nice. And, even some of the ones that I did see coming, I still enjoyed Rutherford’s storytelling and it kept me interested. And yes, there is some romance in this, but it wasn’t the main focus of the story - surviving and getting out of the castle was.
Overall, I would recommend this to anyone who’s in need of a good gothic fantasy with a hidden identity, Jewish representation, a masquerade, and the fight of survival.
*Thank you Inkyard Press and BookishFirst for a copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review
Ryan Lakey (48 KP) rated Iron Man 3 (2013) in Movies
Oct 27, 2019
The true main villain is a let down with his absolutely poor motivation being somewhat repetitive of the previous series especially as we will never see a confrontation between Tony and his archenemy (1 more)
Also having stark quit at the end seems pointless as we knew he was in the next avengers film
Iron man 3 a mixed final film
Contains spoilers, click to show
So here it is the final film of marvel's iron man series with Tony stark unlikely to return due to his death in endgame which means we will never see him fight the real mandarin look for him in shang chi however Downey is his usual great self and stark character arc is nice nod to avengers about him being just as heroic without his suit and his ptsd and the supporting cast are just as great.
The film is a fun action piece and has many hilarious moments.
It's shame the film has such a lame villain the twist while being funny you soon stop laughing that your left with another crap mcu villain something marvel is improving on fortunely his motivation are poor and he is a let down also the film with stark giving up being iron man felt redundant given we knew he was in age of ultron
Overall this still an enjoyable watch and will thrill the family
The film is a fun action piece and has many hilarious moments.
It's shame the film has such a lame villain the twist while being funny you soon stop laughing that your left with another crap mcu villain something marvel is improving on fortunely his motivation are poor and he is a let down also the film with stark giving up being iron man felt redundant given we knew he was in age of ultron
Overall this still an enjoyable watch and will thrill the family
Gareth von Kallenbach (980 KP) rated The Foreigner (2017) in Movies
Jul 11, 2019
STX Films is releasing the film The Foreigner this weekend, and stars Jackie Chan and Pierce Brosnan. It is directed by Martin Campbell who also directed Casino Royale.
This film is full of action from the first few minutes on. It made me actually tear up within the first 20 minutes, when Quan, the main character, loses his daughter in a bombing.
The bombing is politically motivated, and is under investigation by British officials both in London and in Ireland. Quan just wants the names of those responsible, in order to exact revenge on the death his daughter.
Quan zeros in on Liam Hennesy (Pierce Brosnan), an ex IRA leader and current high ranking official Irish Diplomat who answers to the British government. Hennesy claims to have no knowledge of who committed the crime, but investigation reveals that the parts of the bombs are stolen from old weapons stores that only his group would have knowledge of.
Quan demands names, Hennesy repeatedly refuses, and Quan reverts to desperate and ingenious measures. He rigs up bombs out of what looks like regular groceries, inside Hennessey’s business offices and rattles Hennesy into fleeing / retreating to his farm in the countryside.
Quan follows and consistently picks off Hennessey’s men, always beating the odds in creative ways to come out ahead in the fight against men that are younger and outnumber him, at times 10 to 1.
Hennesy, meanwhile, is actually actively trying to figure out who set off the bombs, and sets up a plan to try and catch the bombers the next time they attempt a bombing, but somehow the next bomb goes off without any of the given code words that were assigned, which leads Hennesy to discover that at least one of the perpetrators is in fact directly tied to him, and helping the terrorist group.
Hennesy and the British police track down the bombers holed up in an apartment building, but Quan gets to them first and takes care of business, leaving one bomber to be able to tell the Brits where the last bomb is, and where its headed.
Whether they manage to get to the last bomb I will leave for you to find out……
I really liked the film, as did my husband. I thought that some of the Irish accents were a bit horrid, but overall the film was enjoyable, full of action, and we thought that it had a good storyline too. It had enough twists to be interesting and a few “AH HAH” moments, but not so convoluted as to be annoying.
The fact that Jackie Chan is still able to pull off hose stunts was amazing to us and we loved watching him get his revenge and overcoming seemingly impossible odds.
The only part we both we taken aback by was how “quiet” the very end of the film was. It wasn’t a big deal, but after the action of the movie it was definitely a different “feel”
This film is full of action from the first few minutes on. It made me actually tear up within the first 20 minutes, when Quan, the main character, loses his daughter in a bombing.
The bombing is politically motivated, and is under investigation by British officials both in London and in Ireland. Quan just wants the names of those responsible, in order to exact revenge on the death his daughter.
Quan zeros in on Liam Hennesy (Pierce Brosnan), an ex IRA leader and current high ranking official Irish Diplomat who answers to the British government. Hennesy claims to have no knowledge of who committed the crime, but investigation reveals that the parts of the bombs are stolen from old weapons stores that only his group would have knowledge of.
Quan demands names, Hennesy repeatedly refuses, and Quan reverts to desperate and ingenious measures. He rigs up bombs out of what looks like regular groceries, inside Hennessey’s business offices and rattles Hennesy into fleeing / retreating to his farm in the countryside.
Quan follows and consistently picks off Hennessey’s men, always beating the odds in creative ways to come out ahead in the fight against men that are younger and outnumber him, at times 10 to 1.
Hennesy, meanwhile, is actually actively trying to figure out who set off the bombs, and sets up a plan to try and catch the bombers the next time they attempt a bombing, but somehow the next bomb goes off without any of the given code words that were assigned, which leads Hennesy to discover that at least one of the perpetrators is in fact directly tied to him, and helping the terrorist group.
Hennesy and the British police track down the bombers holed up in an apartment building, but Quan gets to them first and takes care of business, leaving one bomber to be able to tell the Brits where the last bomb is, and where its headed.
Whether they manage to get to the last bomb I will leave for you to find out……
I really liked the film, as did my husband. I thought that some of the Irish accents were a bit horrid, but overall the film was enjoyable, full of action, and we thought that it had a good storyline too. It had enough twists to be interesting and a few “AH HAH” moments, but not so convoluted as to be annoying.
The fact that Jackie Chan is still able to pull off hose stunts was amazing to us and we loved watching him get his revenge and overcoming seemingly impossible odds.
The only part we both we taken aback by was how “quiet” the very end of the film was. It wasn’t a big deal, but after the action of the movie it was definitely a different “feel”
The Abyssal Plain: The R'lyeh Cycle
1.0
Rate It
Book
With The Abyssal Plain, Holloway and Talley have managed to transform the Cthulhu Mythos into...