The Flickcast – Page 438 of 1030 – Stuff Nerds Love

Game Review: ‘L.A. Noire’ for XBox 360

The open world feel of Grand Theft Auto along with the crime solving motif of CSI and add in the most realistic facial and character animations ever in a video game along with cameos of dozens of well known actors? Yes please. Sign us up.

Saying that L.A. Noire has a lot of hype to live up to would be an understatement. Luckily Team Bondi lived up to the Rockstar seal of quality to deliver a unique experience unlike anything seen in this or any previous generation of gaming.

Gameplay:

Being a detective in 1940s LA isn’t an easy task. Players need to search for clues, interrogate suspects and witnesses, chase down criminals both on foot and by car, mix it up with some good old fashioned fisticuffs and engage in the run of the mill shoot out on the streets. There is definitely some variety to keep your 40 forty hour experience in L.A. Noire from getting stale.

Investigations are the easiest aspect of the game as players comb the scene picking up on audio clues and vibrations from their controller to find evidence that could pertain to a case. To prevent players from missing out on evidence on a crime scene, the game will continue to play a specific piece of background music until all items have been found. While there isn’t much challenge to this aspect, it does give some credibility to the time that must be spent by detectives walking over every inch of a crime scene.

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Box Office: X Marks The #1 Spot with ‘X-Men: First Class’

With Fox’s reboot of the X-Men franchise, X-Men: First Class, tallying upwards of 90% on Rotten Tomatoes going into the weekend, it was no surprise that the film would take the number one spot in the Domestic box office. It was, however, a surprise that the film has the lowest opening weekend total of the entire X franchise.

The film totaled an estimated $56 million domestic, with an estimated $120 worldwide. The film still made $2 million more than the first film back in 2000, which made $54 million. That’s a bit different than the numbers we’re used to, as that 54 is more like $79 million adjusted to today’s ticket inflation.

Still, the film has legs and it will most likely retain its audience next weekend by word of mouth alone.

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‘Duke Nukem Forever’ Trailer, Illegal Netflix Accounts, & DCU’s Reboot are all On The Radar

Welcome to another edition of On the Radar where we delve into all corners of the entertainment, tech and geek Internets for news, views and whatnot that may have escaped our regular coverage during the week. Let is know if we missed something interesting.

Let’s get started!

• After 13 years of production and impatient waiting, it looks like Duke Nukem Forever is finally hitting shelves very soon. So soon that the first launch trailer has hit and already has us salivating.

• As if the laws in Tennessee weren’t crazy enough, a new law has passed making it illegal for people to share Netflix accounts. Bring on the legal grey area debates!

Green Lantern: Emerald Knights hits stores next Tuesday, but if you can’t wait that long, we totally understand. Here’s a way to win a free copy so you can spend that money on important things like tickets to Green Lantern in theaters.

• What happens when you mix classic horror and cult films with well-known cereal brands? The epicness of the Cereal Killers trading cards from Eye Wax. Names like “Clockword Porridge” and “Zomb’a Crunch” are enough to get us to buy several boxes.

• Just in time for the possibly huge release of X-Men: First Class, contributor Wally has put together a pretty comprehensive list of the Top 5 X-Men Video Games. Sadly, Marvel Ultimate Alliance doesn’t make the cut.

• In nerdy business news, Groupon has filed for an IPO, allowing it to become publicly traded. Rumor has it, there will even be a Groupon deal for stocks…

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E3 2011: Paramount Digital To Unveil New ‘Star Trek’ Game for XBox 360 and PC

If you are one of the people out there who’s love for Star Trek is only matched by your love of video games, this post is directly straight at you. Paramount Digital Entertainment announced today a brand new action adventure co-op game that will allow players to take on the roles of some of their favorite classic Trek characters including Spock and Kirk.

The game is set to debut next week at the E3 Expo in Los Angeles and will “continue the adventure that J.J. Abrams J.J. Abrams envisioned with Star Trek” andboasts a stand alone story filled with action-packed combat as Kirk and Spock must work together to stop a legendary enemy race bent on conquering the galaxy.”

“Star Trek challenges the boundaries of co-op gameplay with a galactic adventure that gamers and fans have never experienced,” said Tom Lesinski, President of Paramount Digital Entertainment. “Working closely with the Star Trek filmmaking team throughout development, the game is sure to deliver AAA production values, a wide variety of gameplay and all the action you would expect from the hit franchise. This will be the definitive Star Trek gaming experience.”

The game features an original story by BAFTA award winner, and God of War writer, Marianne Krawczyk, in collaboration with the writer/producers of the new Star Trek films, Bob Orci and Alex Kurtzman.

If we can find this booth at E3 next week we’ll try to get a look at the game itself and bring you more details.

Film Score Friday: ‘X-Men: First Class’ By Henry Jackman

Big summer super-hero movie scores carry with them a certain set of expectations. The broadness of the source material opens the doors for large and exciting music that should play with the imagination and enhance the very feel of the movie. Of course with great expectation comes great pressure and not all blockbuster scores can resonate beyond the background of the scene. The X-Men franchise has always been one to deliver the goods on the soundtrack, and the newest installment continues that trend nicely.

The franchise has yet to have a single recurring composer, and the new film doesn’t break tradition with Henry Jackman stepping up to the podium for this round. Jackman has not done much as yet in his career, but has written music with Hans Zimmer on some high profile projects and has two other scores later this year. As a relative unknown he is a wild card, it is hard to know what to expect.

Well, we now know that we should be expecting great things from Mr. Jackman. The score for X-Men: First Class is a solid and often rousing musical experience. One that stands shoulder to shoulder with most super-hero scores of the past decade. It might lack the bombast of Spider-Man or the sheer scope of X-Men 3, but it packs a serious punch and excels in all the right places.

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Get Your First Look at Syfy’s New Zak Penn Series ‘Alphas’

Syfy has seen fit to send us some info, pics and a trailer for a new series dubuting on the network in July. The series, created and written by comic book movie writer Zak Penn (X2, X-Men: The Last Stand, The Incredible Hulk, The Avengers) and Michael Karnow, may seem a bit familiar to you.

However, that doesn’t make it bad. Besides, Penn is a smart guy, I’m sure he can make it work.

Here are the details from Syfy so you can judge for yourself:

The series is a procedural thriller about ordinary people with extraordinary mental and physical abilities that operate within a special branch of the Department of Defense and are tasked to investigate cases committed by others with Alpha abilities.

Emmy® winner and Academy Award nominee David Strathairn (Temple Grandin/Good Night, and Good Luck) headlines a cast of both familiar and new faces including Warren Christie (October Road), Malik Yoba (New York Undercover), Laura Mennell (Watchmen), Ryan Cartwright (Bones) and Azita Ghanizada (Castle).

And yes, Callum Keith Rennie of Battlestar Galactica, 24 and late of The Killing guest stars in the pilot. That guy ends up in lots of things. Why don’t they just let him be a series regular in something? Doesn’t seem fair.

Check out the trailer and some pics after the break. Catch Alphas in action July 11 at 10/9c on Syfy.

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Music Labels and Publishers Ready for the iCloud, Hollywood Next?

It was just a matter of time but according to reports, Apple has completed negotiations with all four of the major record labels including Warner Music Group, EMI Music Group, Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment and signed contracts to enable their upcoming cloud music service to go forward. Contracts with the music publishers is reportedly set to follow on Friday.

The new service, which will be called iCloud, will be offered for a free period initially to people who buy music from Apple’s iTunes digital download store. This will allow users to upload and store their music and then be able to play it from a Web browser or Internet-connected Apple device such as an iPhone or iPad.

Even though the service will start out free, the company plans to eventually charge a subscription fee, about $25 a year, for it. Apple would also sell advertising around its iCloud service. So, $25 bucks and advertising? Kinda lame Apple.

Of course, the service is initially to store uses music on the cloud but you can clearly see Apple’s intent here is to eventually offer storage of TV, Movie and other digital content as well. After all, why stop at music when the real money to be made is with other tyopes of content?

With the service set to debut soon some questions have to be asked including how much storage will be included and how easy will it be to upload your iTunes library should you choose to do it. I don’t know about you but my iTunes is very large and it would take a long time to upload. With a large library like that I can’t quite see the utility of this service, especially when I can already sync my music and more to my iPhone and iPad.

I guess we’ll see how well it works, or doesn’t, soon enough.

Check Out a Preview for Sunday’s New Episode of ‘Game of Thrones’

HBO’s Game of Thrones gets more interesting and compelling each week. Last week’s epiosde also gave new meaning to “getting crowned” and, let’s just say, put us off buying gold for awhile.

Anyway, the show is back this Sunday with a new episode and, of course, we’ve got a preview of it for you. In this one, which is entitled “The Pointy End”, those evil Lannisters press their advantage over the Starks. Meanwhile, Robb (Richard Madden) rallies his father’s northern allies and heads South to war.

Also, or so it would appear from the photo of this week’s episod above, Kahl Drogo has a couple knives and isn’t afraid to use them. Perhaps that explains the title of this week’s episode. We’ll find out soon enough.

Click through to watch the preview. Game of Thrones airs Sunday at 9/8C on HBO.

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