by Mentalrage

Arkham Asylum pretty much set the standard for how good a game based on a comic book character and the world they inhabit could be. Previously, game’s based on comics were generally speaking either ill thought out, poorly executed, hurriedly produced tie-in’s with film properties or otherwise underwhelming and insulting to fans of both good games and the comics they were based on with very few exceptions.

Developer Rocksteady at that point had only produced the distinctly average Urban Chaos. Which made both their treatment of the Batman universe and it’s polished presentation and execution in Arkham Asylum all the more surprising.

Now the much-anticipated follow up Arkham City is upon us.

Simply put, Rocksteady has defined how to produce a follow up to a successful game. It builds on everything featured in the previous game, tweaking things here and there as well as adding plenty of new elements. Arkham City is an almost perfect example of digital alchemy, balancing deep lore that Bat fans will appreciate, but not to the extent that it will drive away gamers unfamiliar with the intricacies of Gotham City.

Arkham City finds a section of Gotham City partitioned off and transformed into a vast penal colony overseen by mysterious psychiatrist Hugo Strange. Bruce Wayne soon finds himself incarcerated in Arkham City for speaking out against Strange and it’s down to the Dark Knight to figure out what Strange is really up to and what “Protocol 10” is.

Chances are, unless you’ve been living in a cave for the last few decades, you’ll be familiar with at least some of the numerous villains that make up the Dark Knight’s rogues gallery (which is arguably the best in comics). Rocksteady has once again produced some great character designs with the Penguin re-imagined as a sadistic, eccentric Cockney wide-boy being just one of them. You can also look forward to seeing Mr. Freeze, Harley Quinn, The Joker, and Solomon Grundy, to name but a few, and that’s just the main story, there are side missions involving Bane, Mr. Zsasz, and The Riddler, plus additional Catwoman story missions which intertwine with the main story (her design is heavily influenced by Adam Hughes iconic take on the character).

The presentation all round is slick and highly polished. The Arkham facility which you find yourself in, with its array of buildings and alleyways, really feels like part of a city. It’s a gothic delight that’s equal parts urban decay and neon excess. These aren’t just random buildings either, Bat fans will pick up on numerous things like the building you first suit up as Batman in being Ace Chemicals. The voice acting is universally excellent with Kevin Conroy once again being a solid Dark Knight and Mark Hamil putting in another sublime performance as The Joker.

Unlike its predecessor you have a vast area that you’re free to explore open world style after the opening scenes. Gliding and grappling your way across the myriad of rooftops and perching upon a gargoyle before listening to a bunch of thugs debate whether crossing Two-Face or The Joker is worse before dropping out of the night sky and taking them all out is a thing of beauty it has to be said. If you’re so inclined you can actually spend a considerable amount of time just exploring before even starting any missions.

The downside of this new open world approach is Arkham City doesn’t have the claustrophobic story driven narrative of its predecessor, the varied selection of villains are battling each other for both territory and screen time it seems. Though I don’t think –– as impressive as Batman’s rogues gallery is –– there are many characters that would support a full story like The Joker, so in this regard Rocksteady has made a wise move.

To aid your navigation around Arkham City, Batman now has a divebomb move which can be used either as an offensive maneuver (once you’ve got the necessary upgrade) or can be used to gain height and speed by pulling up at the last minute before soaring into the night sky. Another addition is the line launcher, an adaptation to the Batclaw which enables you to travel horizontally between buildings and can even be fired mid flight to travel around corners.

Combat in Arkham City is built around the same mechanics as the previous game, but things have been tightened up with new options thrown into the mix too. Now you can use the numerous gadgets at your disposal in the midst of a fight easier. Watching a hammer wielding goon take out half his own men after being hit by the Remote Electronic Charge (a new addition) never gets old. Counter moves are a big factor in combat and learning the timing will literally save your life. Arkham City thugs aren’t completely brain dead either, they will team up on you and not just form an orderly queue while you take them out. Also if another gang of thugs is witness to your brawling, they’ll come steaming down the street and join the fray. This can result in facing a literal horde of bad guys where you can really show off your combat prowess.

One of the best things about combat in Arkham City is it doesn’t fall into the all too familiar problem of tedious repetition. Performing the same few moves over and over can quickly go from exhilarating fun to boring chore in a combat oriented game. Thankfully the combat here is influenced by your surroundings, find yourself up against a wall facing a mob of goons, and your counters will take this into account with Batman slamming faces into said wall until you move away from it.

Stealth quite rightly is also an important part of surviving in Arkham City. Even the Dark Knight isn’t invincible, so taking on tooled up goons head on will just lead to a quick demise. Vantage points are key and so is patience. Learning patrol patterns and picking your moment to strike before disappearing into the shadows will lead to goons freaking out and firing at shadows, which will lead to an intimidation experience bonus when you clear the area. If things do go a bit awry you can employ a new smoke bomb to cover your escape.

It’s not quite as easy this time around though, with goons later in the game sporting some hi-tech gear. For example they’re equipped with thermal imaging headsets which make you visible even if you’re hiding in the shadows, and have signal jammers which screw with your Detective Mode, meaning you have no access to the usual readouts on enemies in the vicinity.

Experience will allow you to level up where you can upgrade your Batsuit and gadgets, and learn new special combat techniques, amongst other things.

As for the Catwoman missions I mentioned earlier, they’re just as well executed. In fact they’re so good you’ll find yourself wishing there were more of them. Navigating Arkham City as Catwoman is a completely different experience as you utilize her whip and pounce from rooftop to rooftop or scale larger buildings in stages. Combat is different too. Catwoman is faster, but takes more of a beating if a goon connects. Her combat style is similar to Batman’s but the counters and stealth takedowns (dropping down off the ceiling for one) are more graceful and acrobatic in their approach and there’s a different set of gadgets to have fun with. I think Rocksteady may have gone a little overboard on sexing up Catwoman, I don’t think her catsuit needs to be zipped down quite that far to be sexy.

There’s plenty of other little details like Batman’s Batsuit taking damage as you progress, radio communications with both Alfred (with his trademark subtle dry humor) and Oracle. And listening to Penguin or Joker berate their goons as you take them out is highly amusing in a twisted way. “Batman’s never killed anyone but that doesn’t mean he won’t start with you,” quips The Joker.

Added to all that, there’s Riddler trophies to find, challenges to complete, and did I mention you get to punch a shark and can hitch a ride on a helicopter?

By Nicole Powers

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, General Motors’ EV1s were the Apple Macs of cars. Ahead of their time, they were only driven by an enlightened “different” thinking few, but those that did felt passionately about their high tech machines.

A fully electric plug-in vehicle with a range of between 70 and 140 miles depending on model, the EV1 was first introduced into the marketplace in 1996. Available in limited test markets on a closed lease-only basis (whereby no actual purchase was allowed), it was developed by General Motors partly in response to the California Air Resources Board’s requirement that the seven major auto companies in the US had to make at least 2% of their output zero-emission vehicles (ZEV) by 1998 in order to sell any cars within the state (with further graduated steps stipulated up to 10% in 2003).

Though grudgingly produced by General Motors, the vehicle was beloved by the few consumers lucky enough to rise to the top of the company’s reportedly vast waiting list. But it was likely a car that was never intended to succeed. General Motors seemingly put more effort into fighting the CARB mandate in court than meeting existing demand for vehicles or marketing the EV1 to create even more. It was therefore not uncoincidental that the demise of the EV1 occurred in tandem with the gutting of CARB’s ZEV rules. The EV1 program was officially cancelled in 2003, and a total recall was put in motion, with repossessed cars being not only compacted but shredded for good measure too.

A 2006 documentary, Who Killed The Electric Car, chronicled the crushing demise of this groundbreaking car. In it filmmaker Chris Paine highlighted the collusion of the auto industry, oil companies, and politicians, who all had a vested interest in seeing the electric vehicle die an untimely death alongside CARB’s environmentally prudent directives. Catching the zeitgeist, Who Killed The Electric was the third highest grossing documentary that year (Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth being the first).

However, a decade after General Motors presided over the funeral of the EV1, the killing of the vehicle has proven to be a costly mistake. With gas prices rising, Toyota filled the rapidly increasing fuel-efficient void with their hybrid Prius, which went on sale in Japan in 1997. Following its worldwide debut in 2001, Toyota have sold over a million Prius cars in the US alone, and the rest of the auto industry has been scrabbling to catch up.

With revenge being served on a platter less than a decade on, Paine and his documentary team were compelled to reexamine the fortunes of the electric vehicle in a follow up film. The first had centered on activists working from outside the industry, with this film Paine chose to follow a diverse group of instigators working from within. Revenge Of The Electric Car therefore features four EV evangelists (some of whom were more recently converted than others) who are attempting to drive the future of the automobile into the present: Bob Lutz (General Motors’ Vice Chairman up until May 2010), Elon Musk (Tesla Motors’s CEO), Carlos Ghosn (Nissan’s President and CEO), and Greg “Gadget” Abbot (a DIY electric engine retro-fitter).

SuicideGirls recently visited Paine at his ultra green home to talk about his cinematic “I told you so” and the electric awakening of a sluggish car industry that was in need of a shock. After checking out the 2008 Tesla Roadster parked in Paine’s garage, the irony was not lost that we were conversing about, and anticipating the dominance of, the gas-free vehicle in the heart of LA’s oil country amidst the pumpjack nodding donkeys of Baldwin Hills.

Read our exclusive interview with Chris Paine on SuicideGirls.com.

by ExAddict

The first four were tight. Real tight.

It’s a late night sometime during the ‘90s at any one of the millions of households, college dorms and computer labs across the planet…Productivity is at an absolute standstill because much caffeine, Doritos, freewill and time have been surrendered to what was simply put, the greatest game ever.

Fast forward to today and an entire generation of gamers await the next chapter in the series. But like the adventures of Duke Nukem before it, this one may end up stuck in the design stages for a vaporware eternity.

The game was SimCity. Or should I say SimFuckinCity. The ingenious city building and urban planning series created by software company Maxis and designer Will Wright. Sadly, since January 14th, 2003 – the release date of the last true SimCity title – the series has been dead in the water.

Sure there have been newer interpretations and incarnations of the Sim brand, especially since the 1997 acquisition of Maxis by the giant gaming conglomerate Electronic Arts. Despite SimCity’s incredible sales success and cult following, gamers have been crying for the next edition for close to nine years. Yes, believe it or not, it’s been almost nine years since SimCity 4.

So what happened? Mainly, a ton of platforms, iPad this. Nintendo 3DS that. While the original SimCity and it’s four true sequels (SimCity 2000, SimCity 3000 and Sim City 4) kicked serious ass on PC and Mac for fifteen years, the arrival of powerful handheld gaming systems, and later the iPhone and tablets have meant a new audience for an old standard. Afterall, as the piss-poor Duke Nukem Forever proved having tempted fans for 15 years, if it ain’t broke, why fix it?

Thus a legion of first-time gamers and business users going portable are spending countless hours creating and exploring exciting and worthwhile cities in an essentially unchanged gaming environment. Recent releases of SimCity have been based mostly on SimCity 3000, a.k.a. the crown jewel of the Maxis empire, released in 1999.

Something deep within the development teams of Electronic Arts must be clinging to the assumption that good code can always be recycled. While recent remixed versions and deluxe editions of the best of the series stand to bring a flood of fans to this legendary world-creator, we still don’t have what we want – SimCity 5.

Some might be asking, what about The Sims? Isn’t that a logical sequel to the brand? Nope, not even close. Even though The Sims, Spore, SimEarth, SimFarm, SimTown, Streets of SimCity, SimCopter, SimAnt, SimLife, SimIsle, SimTower, SimSafari, and SimPark all offer the Will Wright brand of world-building and exercises in environmental simulation, nothing beats the very first time your city comes alive, the moment you power up the transformer to bring electricity to your city. And many of us have hundreds, if not thousands, of hours of game time to prove it

Besides, although The Sims is in fact the highest selling video game of all time, the engineers and architects hidden inside all of us clamor for a return to world-building, not romantic plot-lines involving debates over purchasing a new couch and nonsense gibberish conversations with neighbors. For that, we have reality.

And then there’s the matter of Civilization.

First released in 1991, Civilization 1 through 5 have consistently offered a new and expanding universe for fans of extended (and time-consuming) adventures that revolve around the gamer playing the role of deity. The last Civ title was released in September 2010 and for some hardcore players, a new PC or Mac chapter of Civilization often means a complete upgrade in system hardware.

Will SimCity 5 ever see the light of day? Hard to tell. In 2007, EA released SimCity Societies, billed by some as the theoretical next sequel, but not a true SimCity 5. A review in two words: It sucked. Focusing far too much on being a bastard hybrid of both The Sims and a childish version of SimCity 4, SimCity Societies left a bad taste in many mouths.

Core to the reason why we may never see another worthwhile installment of this gaming classic, designer Maxis let the series design rights slip to Tilted Mill Entertainment, so they could concentrate on EA’s Spore, an underwhelming creature-builder also inspired by Will Wright.

If it ever is to see a real release, SimCity 5 may be born through the decision in 2008 by Maxis to release the SimCity source code under a free software license. If there’s one thing the free software community knows how to do, it’s fork the fuck out of original code.

If the fifth chapter in the book of SimCity is to be written, it might be authored by a fifty-six year old Senegalese crop worker or a banker riding the subway booting Ubuntu.

Maybe it’ll be worth the wait.

Other recent gaming notes…

* Will the Angry Birds movie threaten to score big box office or go down as yet another example in the long history of video game to big screen adaptations that have totally flopped? * Ever since my Xbox 360 surrendered to the red ring of death, I’ve been putting off investing any more money in Microsoft for this generation of gaming. But Battlefield 3 (from EA) just dropped and may change all that for me. I’m sick of waiting for a PS4. * WWE ’12 (from THQ) for PS3, Nintendo Wii and Xbox 360. Demolition and the Legion of Doom have been added as legends and I can see myself picking this up for the deepest Create-A-Character mode in the history of gaming. Throw in Brock Lesnar and the return of the F5 and my dollars are done.

by Yashar Ali

My friend Karen (all names changed to protect privacy) was confused and frustrated when she called me on a Friday night.

About a year ago, she met a guy, Michael, through work. They met a few times for drinks with colleagues and then one night, she met him for dinner, which ended with the two of them “hooking up” (whatever that means).

She liked Michael a lot, and wanted to see him again.

After they had dinner, a week went by when Karen got a text message from Michael, “What’s up? How are you?”

She was happy; he wanted to hang out again.

Now, Karen wishes that was the last time she ever heard from him.

As she explained the manner in which she and Michael were communicating, I realized Karen was dealing with a situation several other women very recently talked to me about.

Since their last night together, Michael kept in touch with Karen on a regular basis. Every couple of weeks, Karen received a text or email from him. The messages always started out the same way, “What’s up?”

Karen would always respond.

“How are you?”

“Good, what’s up with you?”

Karen would proceed to fill him in on her life and Michael would always respond with the same short answer, “That’s cool.”

After one or two text messages, Michael would usually disappear. But a couple of weeks later, he would show up again. Sometimes their conversations would go deeper — ten minutes of texting back and forth. Karen would find hope in those longer texting sessions, thinking that he was finally engaging with her.

Michael would sometimes get more creative, giving Karen the impression he cared about her and her life.

“What’s up? How was your holiday weekend?”

“What’s up? Saw your Facebook post, so funny.”

A couple times he even texted, “We should have dinner soon.”

But every time Karen agreed to dinner, Michael would tell her about his really busy month at work, delaying the need to schedule a real date. Then, he would never follow up.

This faux-relationship wasn’t going anywhere and Karen was left feeling confused and frustrated about Michael’s intentions.

But these sporadic texts weren’t even about sex. Michael never even proposed any sort of rendezvous. And Karen’s motivation was certainly not friendship. “I have enough friends,” she said.

“He’s not even trying to sleep with me, what’s the point of all this?”

I told her, “Karen you’re being e-maintained”

“Is that an official term?” she laughed.

The week before, I had come up with the term as a joke, but the idea actually made sense. Michael was maintaining her — keeping her, in his mind, satisfied — and he was doing it electronically.

My friend Julia was dealing with the same issue. She was subject to these short, rapid bursts of texting with men on a consistent basis and she always got her hopes up that something was moving forward, but there was nothing. No substance at all.

“Are these actual adult men with responsibilities or are they children? I can’t figure it out,” she said to me.

I’ve always been fascinated, and disgusted, by the notion that in order to be happy, women need to be “maintained” in a sexual and/or romantic relationship. This kind of treatment of women is on par with our taking care of a car in need of an oil change or dealing with a wood deck in the backyard in need of a coat of varnish.

The concept of maintaining women is billed, through the conditioning our culture imposes on men, as a solution to keep women from being hysterical. According to mainstream social ideas, women are illogical and crazy when it comes to relationships and dating. Men engage in conscious maintenance as a way to “calm” women down so they can get what they want from their women partners (sex, attention, etc.).

This is why so many men are in a rush to cram their love and affection into holidays, birthdays, anniversaries. We don’t teach men or boys that day-to-day affection is equally, if not more important, than special dates.

And what has always been alarming to me is that this so-called maintenance of women has defined behavior that shouldn’t be considered “extra” in any kind of relationship or partnership. Acts of maintenance consist of behavior that should be inherent and the foundation of all relationships: basic human respect, affection and attention.

So, if men are taught about certain critical steps to keeping women happy, “duties” that are treated not as normal behavior, but as annoying, time-consuming steps, how does this make women feel?

My friends, who are or were dealing with e-maintaining, or even just dealing with good-old-fashioned maintaining, are left in a strange, emotional limbo. Women who are “maintained” by men, electronic or otherwise, are made to feel legitimate for short periods of time and then left to question their position with their partners, and sometimes themselves.

Are these women supposed to be happy with a guy who stays in touch every-so-often on his terms? Are they supposed to be satisfied when their spouse buys them an expensive piece of jewelry or remembers their anniversary? Even though their love and/or attention come in waves — inconsistent and sometimes abrupt — are my women friends ungrateful for expecting something more, something more substantial, something more basic? Does any form of maintaining make up for days, weeks, months, years of emotional silence from men?

We’ve always conditioned men to maintain women — this isn’t something new. What’s different is this “maintenance” has become completely electronic for some men, and the men doing the “maintaining” aren’t seeing or even making an effort to see the women they connecting with. Men are just texting, emailing or using social media to give the impression they are checking in or they care — in order to maintain these women.

For these men, the definition of “maintenance” has shifted from traditional strategies like sending gifts and engaging in the occasional dinner, drinks or movie, to this incredibly convenient and empty form of communication based on text messages, emails, and social media: e-maintaining. And it is a mode of communication that isn’t even based in reality.

For some of my women friends, this kind of texting/emailing communication was keeping them engaged until they discovered what e-maintaining really means.

Some of the men I spoke with didn’t even realize their e-maintaining of women was a pattern of behavior. Most of them admitted to doing it when they were bored: waiting at the doctor’s office, in bed at night when they couldn’t sleep, at the airport.

But many of these men knew exactly what they were doing.

“You can’t write about this, you are literally ruining the greatest scam of the century,” my friend Carlos told me over breakfast.

“What’s the scam?”

“I can keep these women satisfied by just texting or emailing. I don’t have to do anything else.”

“It’s like walking a dog, as soon as you do it, they just calm down,” a progressive friend (more on that later) told me via email that same day.

So why not move forward, especially if some of these women are willing to sleep with them?

“Its about options, possibilities,” a friend added.

“I do this because I don’t want to hear her bitching about how I just call about sex, so this way I have a history of having stayed in touch.”

My friend Josh gave an example, “Last Thanksgiving when everyone was out of town, I had someone to hookup with, we even went to the movies.”

In this age of digital communication (texting, Facebook, email), our way of connecting has obviously become more frivolous. While our random, electronic check-ins with friends are usually made with good intentions, the men who engage in e-maintaining don’t want to be friends with the women they text and email (the women don’t want friendship either), and more significantly, their texting is not filled with good intentions.

So, is e-maintaining ultimately about men and women placing different weight on communication? Do women believe that communication is about moving forward — are they being practical and mature? And do men see communication in this form in a more flippant manner, that it doesn’t necessarily lend legitimacy to their desired outcomes?

Is e-maintaining more evidence of gender imbalance in our culture? Does this virtual maintenance of women show the lack of respect our culture requires or expects men to have for women?

Last week, I checked in with Karen to see if she was still pining for Michael and frustrated by his e-maintaining.

She has moved on.

And from now on, Karen’s policy is very simple when it comes to communicating with the men she is interested in, “Where’s the beef?”

The lack of substance in an e-maintained relationship no longer satisfies her.

Yashar Ali is a Los Angeles-based columnist, commentator, and political veteran whose writings about women, gender inequality, political heroism, and society are showcased on his website, The Current Conscience. Please follow him on Twitter and join him on Facebook. 

He will be soon releasing our first short e-book, entitled, A Message To Women From A Man: You Are Not Crazy — How We Teach Men That Women Are Crazy and How We Convince Women To Ignore Their Instincts. If you are interested and want to be notified when the book is released, please click here to sign-up.

Related Posts:
He Doesn’t Deserve Your Validation: Putting The Fake Orgasm Out of Business
A Message To Women From A Man: You Are Not Crazy

by Steven-Elliot Altman (SG Member: Steven_Altman)

Our Fiction Friday serialized novel, The Killswitch Review, is a futuristic murder mystery with killer sociopolitical commentary (and some of the best sex scenes we’ve ever read!). Written by bestselling sci-fi author Steven-Elliot Altman (with Diane DeKelb-Rittenhouse), it offers a terrifying postmodern vision in the tradition of Blade Runner and Brave New World…

By the year 2156, stem cell therapy has triumphed over aging and disease, extending the human lifespan indefinitely. But only for those who have achieved Conscientious Citizen Status. To combat overpopulation, the U.S. has sealed its borders, instituted compulsory contraception and a strict one child per couple policy for those who are permitted to breed, and made technology-assisted suicide readily available. But in a world where the old can remain vital forever, America’s youth have little hope of prosperity.

Jason Haggerty is an investigator for Black Buttons Inc, the government agency responsible for dispensing personal handheld Kevorkian devices, which afford the only legal form of suicide. An armed “Killswitch” monitors and records a citizen’s final moments — up to the point where they press a button and peacefully die. Post-press review agents — “button collectors” — are dispatched to review and judge these final recordings to rule out foul play.

When three teens stage an illegal public suicide, Haggerty suspects their deaths may have been murders. Now his race is on to uncover proof and prevent a nationwide epidemic of copycat suicides. Trouble is, for the first time in history, an entire generation might just decide they’re better off dead.

(Catch up with the previous installments of Killswitch – see links below – then continue reading after the jump…)

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