In his latest movie, The Woman In Black, Dan traded his Hogwarts uniform for a totally new role as a Dad.
Natalia brings you the latest news on Adele’s interview with Anderson Cooper, Kristen Bell’s interview on Ellen is auto tuned, Ladyhawke’s latest music video and much more!
Natalia discusses what’s new with Pharrell Williams and her thoughts on Karl Lagerfeld’s mean comments towards Adele’s weight. She also shows a roster of animals behaving like humans and, wait until you see the new size of coffee available at Starbucks!
Natalia dishes the latest news on the Juno Awards nominees, the upcoming Spiderman 3D film starring Emma Stone and Andrew Garfield and is Katy Perry hooking up with Tim Tebow? Watch today’s episode to find out.
When The Kooks are in the studio they’re focused and most importantly, sober. Watch Hugh and Luke explain their reasoning below.
The Kooks released a new album called “Junk of the Heart,” and you would think Hugh and Luke would be very excited about it. Well, they seemed rather indifferent to be honest. We spoke about that and why they don’t care about critics.
Natalia dishes the latest in entertainment news on Joan Rivers, Lana Del Rey and a brand new trailer for the movie Hunger Games.
Natalia talks about how Snooki might be pregnant, Nicolas Cage’s Cage Rage, Elisabetta Canalis is dating Steve-O and more for Feb 1, 2012.
Natalia dishes the news on Miley Cyrus breaking her tailbone, a 100 year old woman who plays the Nintendo DS to stay young and Houston, Texas contemplating a statute of Beyonce.
David Beckham debuts a new line of underwear, the worst dressed celebrity – Shy’m and Matthew Broderick is back as Ferris Bueller with a brand new commercial airing during the Super Bowl on Feb 5th 2012.
Daniel Radcliffe is back with his new movie The Woman In Black. It’s a bone chilling remake of a film from the ’80s. Ironically, Daniel actually scares very easily but he’s not afraid of ghosts. In this interview he tells us what really gives him the creeps.
Next time you’re struggling to make conversation, try asking this question: “If you could invite anyone (living or dead) to the perfect house party, who would it be?”
Graffiti6 is starting to make their North American invasion, and they are hitting up the Tonight Show. Does this sound familiar? Well the Beatles made the exact same journey over 40 years ago. Naturally, @jordans_life had to make some comparisons.
Nick plays World of Warcraft. Not only that, he’s the head of his guild, demonstrating that it IS possible to juggle being a hardcore gamer with being a top-selling recording artist.
During a LIVE interview on andPOP.com Nick Carter gave out a number and took phone calls from his fans. These were real phone calls from real fans who we gave exclusive access to one of the biggest recording artists of our generation.
There were great questions about music, fitness, the backstreet boys but the most popular question, however, was about his underwear. In this clip Nick talks about his his ‘Haynes’ and covering his fans with glow in the dark paint.
When releasing new music today, half the battle is online promotion. However, contests, signed merch and giveaways aren’t always the best solutions. When working on their latest album, Hedley came up with a brilliant idea, they decided to make trailers.
It’s hard to prepare for an interview with Hedley. So in this interview, we threw caution to the wind, got a 24 of beer and broadcast the interview live on our USTREAM (andPOP.tv). Eventually Jacob, Dave and @jordans_life ended up talking about hairy legs, their newest music video and more.
Diamandis from Marina and The Diamonds talks to us about her very serious disease. It’s called synaesthetic. And we lied, it’s not a disease. More like a cool condition. Diamandis explains further.
Would you be embarrassed if someone scrolled through your iPod? We sit down with Spee and Brendan to talk about the diverse music on their playlist.
Don't be scared, you won't need all of those. At once.
Nerd Games (Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love RPGs)
You start work at a new office. You meet someone on the subway or a streetcar, and conversation starts. For someone like me (men in their early twenties), mentioning to someone you play video games still has a bit of a nerdy connotation to it. Although video games have definitely become a mainstream form of entertainment for boys and girls alike and even more significantly men and women, if you ask someone you just met if they’ve played Fallout 3 or Oblivion, you run the risk of sounding like a nerd (not that there’s anything wrong with that). You may even come across as childish, although it’s become popular opinion that video games can and are played by men and women of all ages. All said though, it’s not really too big of a deal.
Now try the exact same situation, but instead of asking your new-found friend if they have played the new Call of Duty or Batman: Arkham Asylum you ask them if they know what Dungeons and Dragons is. Completely different story. Telling someone in 2009 that you play Dungeons and Dragons is like telling someone in 1989 that you play video games – or Dungeons and Dragons, for that matter.
I am a..ninja
Hi everyone, my name is April Apoong and I’m the new intern writer at andPOP.com. Yes, I am their first female game reviewer. I am currently pursuing creative writing at a Post Secondary level and reviewing and writing about games was a natural choice for me. Trust me, I’m no pushover, have you finished Tenchu Wrath of Heaven on the highest difficulty 100 percent? Ever gone on a 30 to 1 winning streak in Dead or Alive 2? Well I have! For these reasons and more I am bringing my zany writing talents to the shores of andPOP. So prepare to see some well written unapologetic video game centric works of literature.
Parent’s Just Don’t Understand… Yet?
Hey Ethel! I killed those Nazi zombies with my, uhh... I killed those Nazis!
Our parents are great, for the most part. When we are too small to defend or feed ourselves, they take care of us. As we grow and mature, they guide and nurture us so that we can become fully functional human beings, and not the equivalent of lower primates, sitting in trees flinging our own crap at each other (thank you Red Forman). But one area where most parents don’t quite have the ability to be the all-knowing influence they would like to be: video games.
When I was growing up playing tag and hide-and-seek, my parents totally understood. They would ask how the game went, where I was hiding, what kind of tag rules I played with – they were very involved, because they could relate my experience to their own. However, when I picked up my first Genesis game, they watched Sonic the Hedgehog like he was an alien from outer space (wait, was he?), shook their heads, and left the room. Thus ended my parent’s ability to fully understand me – from that day forward, there would always be that barrier between us – the invisible yet impassable wall made of 1-ups and gold coins. (more…)
I'd hate to see the result of this guy losing rock paper scissors.
You know, I have recently become enamored with the idea of the Top 5 List, as I’m sure you have gathered from the numerous past blogs in that fashion. I think that it’s interesting to see what trends and relationships different games share. However, it’s only a matter of time before these lists devolve into trite ideas like “The Top 5 Headshots in Video Games” or “The Top 5 Witty Remarks in Video Games”.
So I think I’ll take a break from my beloved yet frivolous Top 5′s, and talk a bit more directly on a more serious subject that affects people all over the world, gamers and non-gamers alike: Game Rage. (more…)
Helllloooooo!
Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen. This week we’re going to take a look at a group of malevolent, disgusting, and just downright horrible creatures who have terrorized mankind for years. What’s that? No, not lawyers. Not even politicians. This week we are ranking the Top 5 Straight-up Meanest Aliens in Video Games. Almost as long as sci-fi and space opera have been around, there has been the alien creatures to terrorize or befriend the valiant heroes and heroines. Well, forget about your friendly little green men, suckers, because we’re not talking about Starman or ET tonight, we’re talking War of the Worlds and Jabba the Hutt. Let’s do this.
‘Ere we go! (more…)
Hey, doesn't that cloud look like... a person being impaled?
A Movie You Can Control: Cinema’s Effect on Video Games
Ever been watching a movie and wished you could tell the actors that what they’re doing is stupid? That you have a much better plan that would totally work, and if they would only do that instead, maybe the zombies wouldn’t eat them, or the comrade that was clearly going to inevitably betray them wouldn’t get the chance? Well I have. But with the advent of video games in recent years that seemingly make a conscious effort to mimic the pacing and immersive experience of a film, it’s almost like we have the ability to watch a movie that we’re also able to play through and control. For a classic narcissist such as myself, this is clearly the greatest thing to happen to video games since the B-button. (more…)
This is what's known as a bad day.
Batman vs. Punisher: Arkham Asylum vs. No Mercy Impressions
I don’t want to get anyone’s hopes up by giving the impression this is a review of Batman: Arkham Asylum. It’s not. But I’ve been doing some research into the game, and wanted to rant a bit about the character of Batman as compared to other heroes, specifically the Punisher. A friend of mine recently compared Batman to the Punisher as being very similar, and I couldn’t disagree more. Why? Let’s take a look. (more…)
This week’s topic: Top five video game clichés
Hey readers,
For this week’s rant, I thought I would take a page out of the Brett blog and do a top five list. Not to steal his thunder, but a topic like this has been nagging in my head for a good long while now. This week, I’m going to take a look at the top five clichés that annoy me but often pop up in video games. Perhaps because it works well in that specific title, perhaps because the story writers or coders or someone along the supply chain was lazy, perhaps we will never know but until that point, at least you, the viewers will know how I feel about them. (more…)
Bullets and Blades – The Top 5 Weapons in Modern Gaming
What would Link be without his sword? Samus Aran without her patented arm-mounted gun that doesn’t resemble Mega Man’s at all? Other cliches without their weapons? With the possible exception of Street Fighter and/or Mortal Kombat, many games have legendary heroes and villains that wield weapons and armor of a similarly epic nature. This week, we’ll be looking over another Top 5 List, this time focusing on the greatest gear in gaming, and who wields it.
I’d like to mention right off the bat that the Mega Man Blaster or the Master Sword won’t be making an appearance in this list. When I say weapons in modern gaming, I’m talking new games from the Playstation 2/Xbox era forward. As much as I would like to mention epic weapons from times past (cough – Masamune! – cough) let’s stick to the more current list. With that in mind, let’s take a look at our list! (more…)
He can remix a song before the original band has finished recording it.
High Score: Music in Video Games
Dah-dah-dah doo dah-da – duh. If you totally called that as the beginning of the Mario theme, then you’re one step ahead of this article. If you didn’t, prepare to be schooled baby.
Music has always been a part of video games, with a few minor exceptions (Pong, anyone?). From the classic themes of the Mario franchise to the epic scores of Halo and Metal Gear Solid, music has provided a strong influence on the tone and theme of the game in question. By the way, Guitar Hero doesn’t count. (more…)
Spider-Man has an equal opportunity costume in Web of Shadows.
Ok, so for the past week or so I’ve been on a Spider-Man: Web of Shadows binge. Nothing but web-slinging through New York, symbiotes and ass-kickery. It has been awesome – definitely the best “comic-book superhero” game I’ve played in some time, if not ever (I wasn’t going to include comic-book just now, but then I remembered inFAMOUS and Prototype). So that got me thinking how many bad superhero games I’ve played. That got me thinking about how much worse those games could have been if they were about even crappier superheroes – I mean, even Spider-Man 3 had Spider-Man in it, right? So, with that in mind, I’d like to present:
5 Superheroes That Should Never Be in Video Games
*disclaimer – if a game has already been made that should contain one of these characters, then there’s no need to mention it – the damage has been done. (more…)
Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games. Have you heard of these? MMORPGs and they’re sucking the life out of us one by one. Sure, they were harmless enough back when only a couple of your friends would ever play Everquest, but now… now they’ve become mainstream, and as such, I wouldn’t be surprised if you could think of at least a dozen friends that drain away (I won’t say waste) at least 3 hours a day playing in these virtual worlds.
For those unfamiliar with MMORPGs, they’re role playing games, where you create and customize a character with a specific race and class, and battle though quests and explore vast lands. The difference between these kinds of RPGs and traditional RPGs are that a) MMORPGs are played exclusively online with millions (and I mean millions) of other people around the world, and b) they do not have an end. No matter how long you play, no matter how far you get and how strong you become, there will never be a final battle, there will never be an ending credits sequence, and there will never be a “the end” screen. If you get close enough to beating everything and a high enough level that you’ve done everything there is to do, you can always create another character, get all the best items, or even wait for the next expansion that give more quests and sometimes a higher level cap. (more…)
This past week on Penn and teller’s show, “Penn and Teller: Bullsh*t” they tackled the topic of video games, and namely video game violence. Now, I’ve dabbled in my own research dissecting violence in video games and their effect on the youth from a strictly ethical point of view (no psychology or any other brain rape involved) and it all came down to a small number of children not being able to tell the difference between real life and fantasy… Either that or negligent parents who provide their kids with M rated games at the age of 10 (more on this later).
In this episode, Penn and Teller (I still don’t understand why a show that revolves around debate and speech has half their talent being a mute) talk about the huge amounts of revenue flowing in from video games, the wave of violent crimes depicting video game copying and those deemed to stop them (Jack Thompson, Hillary Clinton, and some guy with a balding pony tail) but also take the reverse approach and provide a 9 year old gamer with a real assault rifle… how can it go wrong? The 28 minute video begins by making a strong comparison, video game violence to us is like three stooges violence to our parents, makes sense already doesn’t it? With every generation there comes a form of entertainment (or violence) the generation before doesn’t quite understand, while three stooges rarely ever dealt with guns or murder, I peg this as just the progression of the times, desensitization from the news, and newer technologies taking precedence. (more…)
This is the summer of the Fighting game!! YES it IS!!
So today I will be going over some of the new releases in the last four months or so, and give you reasons to pick up a controller and knock the other guy out.
And if none of the new releases tickle your fancy, then I have got a list of old greats that are sure to keep the fighting spirit ALIVE!!!! SO BROTHA LETS GET THIS STARTED!!!
In the last little while we have had some old franchises return, some new updates, and some classics sent our way. In fact, if I can honestly count the number of hours I have spent playing a fighting game this year; it would rival if not beat the combined total amount of time I have spent sleeping last year. THAT’S A FACT! (more…)
Franchise Games We’d Like to See – Firefly
I’ll be 100% honest with you. I’m totally watching Firefly right now, as I write this article. Such a rich universe, interesting characters and amazing balance between action and comedy, the short-lived cult hit TV series Firefly and it’s cinematic companion Serenity completely blew me away when I first encountered them. It never occurred to me whether or not they would make a good video game until just now, as I sat down to write my latest blog. In that spirit, here is the first in (hopefully) a series of articles I like to call “Franchise Games We’d Like to See”.
**disclaimer – I realize that one of these articles may be posted after an announcement of an actual game coming out in the future. In that case, I don’t care. (more…)
Now, I’m just gonna start typing and see where it takes me. This is a free for all blog rant and I have no intentions of a specific topic this week.
I just stared at my computer screen for five minutes… this isn’t going to work.
I like video games, I like them alot. Not to a point where I would rather sit down on a weekend evening and play instead of being social… but a few titles out there have gotten me close to that point. I also play a lot of games, one of the perks to this job is that playing games and reading about gaming news is part of my job description! So this past week I went to my local EB games to trade in a few titles and pick up something new, I must have spent a good 45 minutes looking through the Xbox 360 used section, new section, PS3 used section, new section, Wii used section, new section, DS used, new, PSP used, new (as you can tell, I try to save some cash where I can) and after going through every one of these sections, I didn’t really see any titles I would be willing to spend the cash on! (more…)
Swords and Shields, or Cyborgs and Clones?
When you’re walking down the aisle in the store, shopping for a new game, do you pick up Oblivion or Fallout? Are you looking to fly a dragon or a hovercraft, swing an axe into someone’s face or kneecap them with a laser pistol? This week our big question is… fantasy vs sci-fi?
I myself am not really sure which I prefer. I was at Games Day Toronto 2009, which showcases the tabletop wargame Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000 (and also the MMORPG Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning), I find myself to be drawn to both equally. So to put my personal curiosity to rest, and hopefully provide some entertainment in the process, here’s my List of Why Sci-fi is Better than Fantasy (or vice versa). Enjoy! (more…)
Today boys and girls we will look at an issue that has been debated by almost every games media outlet.
It’s an issue that’s very complex and honestly deserves to be dissected by a careful assessment, backed by numbers, by a group of very well informed analytical minds in the industry. Only then can such an issue be solved. Assuming there is a possibility of a solution. What am I babbling about, you ask? The Wii and its hardcore following.
Notice I said hardcore following, not titles. (more…)
There are three things I love about this job: being able to talk about gaming all the time, getting a chance to play alot of the newest titles and write about them, and special events. Now, these special events…well, they’re very special. They could be as big as going to E3 (maybe next year?) or as small as a demo station in a hotel lobby. Either way, it’s a break from the ordinary and it can lead to very unique experiences (such as playing NHL 10 with Patrick Kane and John Tavares likes we did earlier in the week).
Recently we were invited to another special event, the E3 of the North as they called it. We got a chance to not only sit down with Matt Ryan of Nintendo Canada (along with other members of the Nintendo family) but we also got an opportunity to try out some of the biggest titles that were revealed at this year’s E3!
Lets start with the DS titles. (more…)
What’s your favourite game? I know, it’s a tough question to answer for some of us, and a question I get asked almost every time I have an interview regarding any form of game related activities. In fact, it’s such a difficult question for me to answer that I often ask people I interview for andPOP positions just to watch them squirm as much as I do when I have to come up with a quick meaningful response. Do you base your answer on memory? What’s popular at the time? Do you want to sound sophisticated so you refer to some obscure art title? What if the game you say is your favourite turns out to be a personal worst for the person asking you? With such a simple question comes so much drama, and to a point, it gets a little ridiculous.
Personally I would probably have to say my all time favourite video game would have to be Punch Out for the original Nintendo… or Final Fantasy 7 for the Playstation… or Metal Gear Solid for the Playstation… or General Chaos for the Sega Genesis… or the latest Smash Bros title. At least I can narrow down my choices to my top five favourites of all time. Why did these become my favourites? (more…)
