Roderick

The EU has no say about healthcare, that's mostly a national thing. And yes, the first thing Farage did was say, yes, no, it probably was a mistake to say we'd give money to NHS, oopsie, sorry for misleading everyone. Another 'hilarious' thing is reports today of Leave voters regretting their decision, saying things like 'I wanted to give a protest vote, but never expected Leave to actually win'. You know, probably about that 2% that pushed it over the top. Look, let's all be reasonable and finally acknowledge that most people are extremely bad at making political decisions, which is why we outsource that shit to people who(m we hope) actually know what they're doing (or otherwise just have nice bleached hair and make fun noises with their mouth holes). Referenda are a one way ticket to poor decision making, we've seen that again and again and again. They are a divisive tool that usually serves to polarise the public even more, and often gets hijacked by populist asshats.

If I read things correctly (it's reported here and there on sites like the Guardian), this was also in some ways a generational conflict. Young people overwhelmingly voted Remain, while old people (the much-maligned and mistrusted Babyboomers) voted Leave. Because hey, if you're gonna kick the bucket soon anyway, you might as well blow up the country based on misinformed bullshit on the EU and rampant xenophobia.

W A R C R A F T (spacing concurrent to movie title, which is weird since Warcraft has always had closely tucked together letters): what a strange film! It had all the outward appearance of a Blizzard cutscene that occassionally strayed into schlocky Dungeons & Dragons movie territory. Not necessarily by overacting, but more by its staging and weirdly super flat story. And yet, I totally loved it while seeing it, and now that I've been home for 24 hours I am still digging it. Usually my brain uses that time to figure out what it really thinks of a film (and perceptions can then totally skew from what I thought in the cinema), but Warcraft firmly stays in the 'good' range. I wonder why. For years I was unsure how to even approach a Warcraft film. How to keep it from being too pulpy? Would it focus on random characters adventuring in this huge, huge world? Instead the film more or less follows the events of the first game, with the addition of the Medivh storyline and taking into account the retconned story of the Orcs as noble shamans instead of bloodthirsty savages. Duncan Jones does a fine job translating this to a briskly moving tale with perhaps one too many male lead character with long hair and a beard, but hey, that's fantasy video games for you. The audience sported diehard fans howling at the sight of a Murlock in the frame, and people who knew nothing of Warcraft but were thoroughly entertained as well. Make no mistake: this is a cartoon. There are few noteworthy themes, emotional development is absent and the characters that are present are as two-dimensional as cardboard cutouts. This in itself is unfortunate: the likes of Lothar, Garona or Khadgar have enough going on that you could construct a valuable narrative out of them, but perhaps the movie too slavishly followed the existing narrative. Beyond actually fleshing out backstories and motivations, there was potential for Medivh to be much more of a comic relief as a rambling magic addict, or Lothar as the pained hero struggling with raising his son. As it is, the most human of them all is the Orc Durotar, burdened by an invasion while he'd rather see his own son grow up in peace. Still, the movie whizzes by with lots of fun and excitement. The best scenes, I think, are the ones where you start to see the traditions and systems in place in the Horde, and how the Orcs are in fact torn by their old ways and the new-found demonic savagery. The scant moments when Gul'dan tries to have his way, but crashes on his men's scorn for being dishonorable, are kind of exciting. Now that it's over, I can't wait for a second film. And more specifically, for the moment when they get to the events of Warcaft 3, when things'll get really interesting with Arthas, Blood Elves, the founding of an Orc state and the undead. Alliance, ho! (Or what was it again?)

Forza Horizon is a super fun openish worldish racing game series. All the relaxation of Midtown Madness with the fun racing mechanics of a kart game.

I've not ever spent any time thinking about Call of Duty, but now they're apparently going into space and there's a dogfighting sequence?? Is CoD:InfBlops going sci-fi? Is this something that I should play when it comes out? like, a shootier version of Mass Effect or something, with colonies attack, so like Gundam except without Gundams?

I'm kind of with Osmosisch here. If you'd put them side to side, I'm sure Breath of the Wild is actually super better looking, but the feeling I got from the trailer was that this art style is less brilliant than The Wind Waker at the time. Though I'm somewhat excited they're breaking the mould for a Zelda game (as far as we know), I have to wonder if this is going to be all that great. The world doesn't feel very rich and detailed, if you compare it to other open foresty worlds like The Witcher 3 and, heck, No Man's Sky. But, maybe, this is still the Zelda overdose talking. I'll have to see way more to pass any kind of informed judgement.

But hey, maybe it's also my relative ignorance of the genre that I think BInet's approach is super novel and interesting. It wasn't until reading this book that I ever spent a thought on the struggles and process of writing a history. In that respect, it's a job well done for babies like me. (Having said that, last evening I did come across a passage I didn't much care for. In it, Binet slags off a certain book for using flowery prose, saying he'd never write like that, except that he does all the time. Alright, Frenchy, your pluck can bring you only this far.)

Such a weird gaming era too, I mean, ODAMA, a tactical pinball warring game by Nintendo.

Maybe I just saw Binet forcefully, wistfully drawing smoke from a cigarette whenever he did it

Yikes. It was so incredibly likely that this would happen, but I'd hoped that Jones would've made it his own thing as well... Haven't seen the film yet (and in all likelihood I probably will soon because I'm going with a group), but I'm lowering my expectations accordingly.

I am reading HHhH (Himmlers Hirn heisst Heydrich) by Laurent Binet and it is destroying me. It's a 2010 historical reconstruction of the events surrounding the assassination attempt on Reinhard Heydrich, the Nazi top intelligence guy (and de facto orchestrator of the Holocaust), but it's so much more than that. For starters, author Binet, using every ounce of his French, sardonic sense of ennui, often injects his own (mis)adventures into the tale - which turns out to be told by an unreliable narrator. In a history book. He'll often recount some super interesting detail about Heydrich, only to correct himself a few chapters later on - wait no, it didn't happen the way I said it. I read a new historical document and it turns out I was wrong. Then he'll give us a literary impression of a scene between two figures, getting frustrated afterwards that no one believes this actually happened. Only to follow up with another writerly scene that he admits is totally his own imagination! He does this again and again, and the effect is intoxicating. For some reason it doesn't even hurt the story, but helps cement the living, breathing, elusive nature of history. Written in ultrashort chapters (hundreds of them), skipping back and forth between times and places and styles with the apparent intention of painting a picture composed of whatever strikes the author's fancy - HHhH is unlike any history book I've ever read. And I'm only halfway. It's gotten so bad I don't want to read for fear of ever finishing this delight.

A must-see experience of high quality:

I don't know what I was expecting, but I was vaguely enthusiastic about the prospect of E3 happening again. Then I read predictions for what the big conferences would hold and oh shit what up

Jeff Vandermeer (along with his wife Ann Vandermeer) was in Holland last month! Visited one of his lectures and at the Harland Awards he did a wickedly funny, half-hour oration about fresh-water squids. Seemed like a really good-natured guy.

This week I've felt particularly close to Jeff Goldblum for no real reason.

I played (and finished) this a few months ago - and have since forgotten all about it. You're quite right that the setting is about the most interesting thing about it, though I liked the flow of combat once you get the hang of it. It's almost like a rhythm game in that you're tapping into a silent rhythm to keep the combo flow, and the music does a good job of reinforcing that by means of a trick that Zelda: The Wind Waker first brought to the table. (Which is, as soon as you hit a person/maintain a combo for long enough, the music reacts by getting more bombastic with every following move.) I dig that. But man, does this game straitjacket you into doing whatever it wants to do, instead of giving you any freedom. At first I loved the idea of exploring Neo-Paris and all their weird new Capitol-like fashion (loved the brand stores and whenever you sneak into people's appartments to see how they live), but then it turns out to be so dreadfully linear. Mind you, I don't dislike linear games, not necessarily! But this just felt so confined. I wanted to love this game way more than I ended up doing, though I played through to the end. I think Don't Nod made a smart more making Life is Strange afterwards, shying away from epic games where they don't have the budget to go all the way (i.e. making it fully explorable, open world) and instead refocusing on what was really good about Remember Me - shifting around with time, personal stories and interesting characters.

Agree about Ex-Folk: Armageddon. Enjoyed it while it lasted and it had some cool shots and moments (see spoilers), but overall a forgettable thing and completely without the cool 'mixing X-Men and American history'-vibe. I'm being a little harsh on the film. I did enjoy it just now, but the critic in me just doesn't find a whole lot to latch onto.

Good podcast! More than anything it got me curious to try out Stellaris, especialle because of the discussion about how non-agressive the game apparently is. That's a plus to me. I'd love to explore the galaxy without being forced into tough spots all the time.

So, is this happening, or...?

I'm excited! Haven't kept up with the regular casts, purely because in the recent year my life changed to such an extent that there's, weirdly, no room for regular podcast listening (no commuting, no regular visual work at the computer, little gaming time that allows for a podcast to run during), but a short run of HP casts (grenades?) deffo has my interest. It's been too long for me to have an original thought about it at this point for the reader mail, but maybe the discussion will spark something into being.

Yesterday I watched Hosoda's The Girl Who Leapt Through Time. Pretty amazing.

SecretAsianMan, I had an absolute blast playing up the whol #TeamCap versus #TeamIronMan angle in the weeks running up the film. I even wrote a blogpost about it (in Dutch, HAH, take that!!). Wore a Cap shirt in the cinema. It's a fun way to interact with each other during the movie. Granted, you can take it too far (by taking it too seriously), but if you play it right it makes for great sport.

Oh shit, Swords & Soldiers II is an excellent game. What a great addition to the bundle!

The Gaping Dragon is one of my favorite fights in the game. Feels very much like a 'boss' battle should, epic without being impossible. The scale is huge.

I really enjoyed Captain America: Civil War! Wrote a bit about it here.