New Found Glory Impresses At Cincinnati Show

“Pop punk’s not dead,” their fans cry. Perhaps not — it’s my favorite genre of music — and legendary quintet New Found Glory did its best to prove that at Cincinnati’s Bogart’s club Friday night.

With opening act H2O (who I did not get to see) and co-headliner Alkaline Trio, the venue was absolutely packed. Alkaline Trio roared through its set, delivering a high-energy performance quickly moving from one song to the next, and guitarist Matt Skiba only briefly broke to sip from a bottle of water and introduce songs to the crowd. The live sound mix was also slightly off, with the bass too loud and the vocals a little bit quiet, but the band was in top form. Although I’ve never actually sought out an Alkaline Trio show, this is the second time I’ve seen them play live, the first being Warped Tour 2010.

But we were waiting for the next act, and the crowd went nuts as the lights dimmed and New Found Glory launched into “All Downhill From Here.” The next hour was pure pop punk heaven, with Chad Gilbert and Jordan Pundik leading the band through hits like “Don’t Let Her Pull You Down,” “Dressed to Kill” and “My Friends Over You.” The band also played its new single “Connect the Dots,” which resulted in a louder-than-expected applause.

And just when we thought the show was over, the band returned to the stage to play my personal favorite New Found Glory song, “The Story so Far.” It was a kick-ass end to one of the most energetic pop punk shows I’ve ever seen. New Found Glory is proving that pop punk is still alive and well.

‘South Park’ Brilliantly Mocks The Console Wars In Latest Episode

I’ve lost interest in South Park over the last few seasons, with many of the the more recent episodes just not delivering the laughs. However, Wednesday’s “Black Friday” saw Trey Parker and Matt Stone at their absolute peak.

The PlayStation 4 launches in mere hours, and the writers used this as an opportunity to do what they do best: take a timely event and intertwine a pop-culture parody that is completely unrelated. In this case, Cartman and Kyle, along with the majority of their friends, are planning to buy the Xbox One following Thanksgiving. Stan, on the other hand, wants the PlayStation 4, and the two sides fall into a Game of Thrones-style war of clans.

This could have been hit or miss, but Stone and Parker clearly know their stuff, mentioning the PlayStation 4’s touchpad and the Xbox One’s multitasking. They even took jabs at the fanboys amassing on both sides, with several characters making overgeneralized claims about the other side’s fans.

This isn’t the first time South Park has focused an episode on games. Past topics included the Nintendo Wii (Cartman freezes himself to help pass the time), Minecraft, and perhaps most famously, World of Warcraft.

Last night’s episode ending in a cliffhanger, so I expect to see a follow-up before the release of the Xbox One. Make sure to watch this one soon, as they don’t stay up on the official website for the entire season.

 

World Of Warcraft’s Next Expansion Gets Trailer

Today Blizzard Entertainment revealed the latest expansion in its mega-successful MMO series, World of Warcraft.

Titled “Warlords of Draenor,” the trailer opens with “War, it is the lifeblood of this world. We are its children.” It appears to taken players to a diverse array of locations, including fiery depths, a barren wasteland much like Burning Crusade, and snowy regions similar to that of Wrath of the Lich King.

New features mentioned in the trailer include the ability to upgrade garrisons, new character models (far improved from past installments), and a level cap of 100.

Players will also be able to immediately boost level 90, which is likely a strategy by Blizzard to encourage newcomers and old players to rejoin the game.

It was just revealed yesterday that World of Warcraft has dropped to 7.6 million players, and as one of the few MMOs still using a subscription model, it may have a hard time ahead of it in the face of blurred-line MMOs like Destiny and The Division.

Mists of Pandaria — the current expansion for World of Warcraft released last September — received largely positive reviews from critics, but nowhere near as high as previous installment Cataclysm.

The game is currently playable on the Blizzcon show floor. Check out the trailer below.

 

blink-182 To Play At Blizzcon

World of Warcraft and Diablo developer Blizzard Entertainment have announced that pop-punk legends (and my favorite band) blink-182 will be ending popular event Blizzcon this year. The show begins this Friday and ends with the concert the following night.

Blink-182 — or at last co-frontman Mark Hoppus — is no stranger to video games. His Twitter is regularly full of jokes and pictures about Animal Crossing, Pokemon and other 3DS titles.

https://twitter.com/markhoppus/status/391526429080694784

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Blink hasn’t released a new album since 2011’s Neighborhoods, a divisive record that drew influences from other projects, such as the short-lived band +44 and guitarist Tom Delonge’s other band, Angels and Airwaves. The band plans to go back into the studio early next year to record a follow-up, which they have claimed will be an “edgier” record. They’re currently celebrating the ten-year anniversary of the “Untitled” album, a more experimental release featuring hits like “I Miss You” and “Feeling This.”

Blizzcon veteran and comedian Jay Mohr will once again host the event, which was cancelled last year to the dismay of many fans.

Jay Mohr, on the other hand, could probably not host this one and I’d be totally fine with it. He’s pretty awful in everything.

Here’s a music video for After Midnight, one of my favorite songs from Neighborhoods.

‘Key and Peele’ Is A Huge Success…Sort Of

Following the premiere of the critically lauded sketch-comedy show Key and Peele in early 2012, we’ve encountered a very odd issue that hasn’t been seen in other Comedy Central programs. While the sketches that Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele perform are hits on Youtube — with the “East-West College Bowl” skit at the top of the list — this success has not translated nearly as well to television ratings.

According to TV By The Numbers, last week’s episode of the show was well below other Comedy Central shows such as South Park, The Daily Show and The Colbert Report, even though its time slot, sandwiched between South Park and The Daily Show, should keep it at least at the same level of those two programs.

Batman Shows No Sign Of Slowing In Games Or Movies

With the release yesterday of both Batman: Arkham Origins  and Batman: Arkham Origins Blackgate for handhelds, it appears that the Batman brand is now more popular than ever before. Both Batman’s games and his movies have had very big ups and downs. Most fans of the Caped Crusader died a little inside when Joel Schumacher took Tim Burton’s film series and destroyed it with an overly campy tone and nippled costumes, and well, this was once a Batman game.

Chinese Food Quickly Becomes Humanity’s Biggest Threat

Loyal readers, the entire internet-capable human race is at war — not with an unjust government or a group of terrorists — but with Chinese Food. Why is that capitalized? Because it’s not the MSG or salt that has everyone up in arms; it’s the latest in a long line of child-starring music videos from Patrice Wilson, otherwise known as “Pato” or “Fat Usher.” Does that name sound familiar? Remember the rapping guy in Friday?  Well, he’s back, and this is his latest piece of…work.

Let that sink in.

Alison Gold isn’t actually new to Wilson’s work. She’s also part of the hippest hippity-hop group that ever did hip-hop!

The subtitles at the bottom of the video inexplicably change from English to German to Russian to Hebrew and there are geisha in the Chinese restaurant.  And of course, who else would be inside the panda suit but Patrice Wilson himself!

“Get me broccoli while I play Monopoly.” They just don’t write lyrics like that anymore. And by that, I mean that no one has ever been stupid enough to write lyrics like that before.

Chinese Food already has over 10.5 million views in about a week and a half, and it doesn’t look to be slowing down. This level of international cooperation for the destruction of evil hasn’t been seen since the second World War.

And now I’m hungry.

Games Industry Has Three Bad News Pieces In One Week

In addition to the delay of Watch Dogs, which I detailed over on Gurwin’s Wordin’ yesterday, Ubisoft has also reported that Splinter Cell Blacklist and Rayman Legends — two of the company’s best titles thus far this year — have not performed to expectations, lowering projections for 2013 to roughly $1.4 billion.

While a reduction in projections is never a good thing, this number is actually roughly the same as the company’s 2012 gross profits, which were bolstered by the released of Ghost Recon: Future Soldier and the runaway success of Far Cry 3. This also means that there is a good chance Watch Dogs, The Division, The Crew and a new Assassin’s Creed game will all release in 2014. For this holiday season, Ubisoft will be relying on the success of Assassin’s Creed and South Park: The Stick of Truth, which was originally supposed to release earlier this year while still under THQ’s control.

Today it was also revealed that 2K Marin, the developer behind Bioshock 2 and The Bureau: XCOM Declassified, has undergone “massive layoffs,” with one source telling Polygon that the studio may be completely closed. The Bureau was previously predicted to flop, and the game was a pretty big disappointment for me. One also has to wonder how this will affect development of future Bioshock projects, as 2K Marin had previously helped with development.

 

Controversy Surrounding Captain Phillips And The Fifth Estate

With the numerous “based on a true story” movies being released in the past few years, there have been quite a few controversies surrounding them. Recently, The Fifth Estate and Captain Phillips have both been had their truthfulness challenged by those portrayed in the movie.

https://www.mediafire.com/listen/7yyz3p3cuhoa6np/NathanandGabemoviesegment1.wav

Have any thoughts on movies that are based on a true story? Then leave a comment below with your thoughts.

Pokémon Appealing To First Generation Of Fans With New Game And Animated Special

Image Credit: Nintendo

After over 15 years of sprite-based handheld games, Pokémon will finally be going 3D with the series’ latest installments, Pokémon X and Y, when the game releases tomorrow. Players will have access to the brand-new Kalos region and a new type of Pokémon: fairy. The game will also feature mega-evolutions,” giving certain Pokémon enhanced abilities for the duration of a battle.

However, with this new leap in technology, Nintendo also aims to win back the older gamers who had previously loved the series. The original three starting Pokémon from Red and Blue will be available for the player to choose, suggesting that Nintendo realizes how anticipated the games are.

In addition, an animated special is scheduled to launch on November 15th, hence this post’s inclusion on this blog and not my other blog, Gurwin’s Wordin’. Unlike the longtime show starring Ash Ketchum, Pokémon Origins stars Red, the protagonist from the original game. It’s expected to be much more faithful to the original games than the popular animated series has been.

While the main games in the Pokémon series have always been well-received, the recent spinoff titles have somewhat tainted the brand. Pokémon Rumble U currently sits at a score of 48 on Metacritic, but X and Y look to continue the trend of excellent, family-friendly role-playing games that we’ve come to expect from the series.