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Most gamers know about Manhunt 2 being rejected by the BBFC and getting rated AO by the ESRB, effectively stopping the game being sold in both the UK and US. Predictably, the reaction’s been pretty strong across the web, with opinions ranging from anger over the censorship to accusations of unfairness towards the game to acceptance and ambivalence. And I’m about to add to it.

The thing is, in pretty much every opinion piece I’ve seen as to why this was bad or good or whatever, nobody seems to be acknowledging something crucial to their argument:

Nobody has played this game.

99.9% of the people who have an opinion on this have not seen anything that can justify it. I currently know of only four groups who have played the game – Rockstar, the BBFC, the ESRB, and NGamer Magazine, who wrote a review of the game before the news broke.

This is crucial for obvious reasons. Censorship is an issue, but is it possible that a game can be so fundamentally “wrong” that it would be irresponsible to release it? Without playing the game, I can’t say, and so this is why I get slightly wary when people say they should have gone with a simple 18 or M, who haven’t played the game either but instinctively know that it cannot be worse than anything they’ve seen before. I do know Rockstar really wanted to push the envelope with Manhunt 2, so it’s entirely possible that this could be a lot worse – but I don’t know, because I haven’t played it.

I’ve hear people compare Manhunt 2 to Saw and Hostel, and then complaining because these were allowed through because of either games prejudice or hypocrisy., but I’m not sure that’s a good comparison to make – because I don’t know what I’m comparing. Nobody can say it’s anything like those without playing the game themselves (NGamer did say it contained Hostel elements, but that’s hardly saying the game is a Hostel clone), and potentially the game could be perhaps even more shocking or unsettling – but I don’t know, because I haven’t played it.

You may be reading this and thinking “Why are you on their side?”, especially since I’ve been critical of games protesters in the past. For a start I’d like to say that I don’t consider myself to be on anyones side, although I will say that I’ve trusted the BBFC in the past. I just want to point out that there seems to be a growing number of people defending something that they really don’t know anything about. Rockstar have been known for pushing the envelope in the past, and at some point we have to accept that they might have created something that may have been completely unacceptable. Of course you can argue that the game still shouldn’t be censored, by any means, but the BBFC may not have exaggerated what they played. Don’t fall in to the trap of assuming this game is like something that’s gone before when it could easily be something a lot worse.

I’m sure you’re probably fed up of my Doctor Who raving now, but tonight’s episode had such a great ending that I had to invent a new word for it. It was that good.

And if you want to be reminded as to why it was so mofubaglobaflobaAHHHy, the spoilery bits can be found here and here. Next Saturday can’t come soon enough….

Recently I’ve been subject to a bit of bad luck – for a start, there was the rain, which I foolishly managed to find myself stuck in yesterday, meaning I ended up completely drenched in the ten minute walk from campus to my flat. I actually don’t mind rain generally, but this was nasty stuff, as you’ve probably seen.

Perhaps slightly related to the weather was the loss of power to the flat this morning, which is potentially devastating to my technology warped mind. Fortunately it came back (for us anyway) reasonably soon afterwards, but unfortunately my laptop was now refusing to connect to the internet for whatever reason, so no luck there. And then, the news comes that the power is going to be off again while they to fix the unknown fault, so cue digging and darkness.

OK, so it’s less bad luck than a series of mild inconveniences, but it’s annoying and unusual (making it perfect blog fodder). Some good stuff has come out of it, though, since it gave me a good excuse to get out of the flat and head to the COGS LAN party, where I am now and likely to remain throughout the night. I don;t know whether they’ve fixed the fault or not, but I don’t intend to trawl back through the rain in order to try and navigate my way through a flat which is hard to see in at the best of times when at the very least I have power here.

So that’s that, I guess. That, and taking far too much pleasure in the directors commentary for Hot Fuzz than I really should take from a bunch of people talking over a film. And it’s good to hear that I’m not the only one who wants to have the music cues played when I walk down a street.

I’ve just realized that the music for Hot Fuzz and Casino Royale was done by the same composer, David Arnold, so good for him.

I’ve also discovered that apparently “Royale” is a not a word according to gaim’s spell checker. Not so good.

I’ve talked about a few things on my LiveJournal yesterday, and since I have the opportunity I figured I might as well go into a bit more detail. Pick and choose whichever you want to read about.

Blink, the Doctor Who episode shown on Saturday, is supposedly one of the scariest episodes of the new series, and after seeing it I’m inclined to agree. Credit for this has to go to Steven Moffat, who I believe to be the best writer on the crew. The “Doctor-lite” tone of the episode meant that the supporting characters had to be strong enough to carry the complicated plot (temporal physics and time travel make for great stories), and fortunately Steven does this well – something proved by Billy Shipton, a character who’s given at the most ten minutes of screen time and yet still manages to leave an impact on the viewer as… well, you’ll have to watch it if you don’t know. And those statues…who says Doctor Who’s not scary anymore?

I also got to see Pirates Of The Caribbean: At World’s End this weekend, and following the general pattern I’ve seen, I like it while critics hate it. It was everything you expect from a Pirates film – swashbuckling, epic voyages, all that jazz. It also had a nicely complicated plot, which critics are getting annoyed about. I’m a little confused by this, given that the same critics are usually among the first to cry out that Hollywood is producing unoriginal uninspired film with linear plots. If a pirate film didn’t have treachery, shaky alliances, and mutiny, I’d be severely disappointed. Go and see it.

You may remember me going crazy over Hot Fuzz a few months ago so it shouldn’t be a surprise that I now possess the DVD. The film’s as great as ever, and a quick glance over the extras has shown a few gems. Of particular hilarity is the edited for TV “Hot Funk”, and the usual selection of outtakes and features. Get it now.

I’ve been wanting to use that quote so much. Doctor Who was awesome.

I’m back in Birmingham now to sort out my final year at uni, which hopefully should go smoothly provided I’ve got the marks and provided I can find a decent final year project. I’ve been sort of hoping the worry over the results would have gone by now, but annoyingly it seems to be getting worse. Not that I can do much about it, of course, but I’m not sure this year has gone quite according to plan.

On the plus side, I’m enjoying the free time, along with the money I got for my birthday, which is being reserved for Hot Fuzz on DVD. Looking forward to that, it’s an amazing film. I also got to see Pirates 3 over the weekend, and I enjoyed it. And I also got to buy Kaiser Chiefs and Clash albums. Go me.

I shouldn’t be so worked up about these exams, but as people keep telling me, I’m an over-thinker. It’s like living with another version of me in my head telling me what to do, and I know for a fact that I can be exceptionally annoying. Still, life goes on.

The new “brand” for the London Olympics in 2012 has been revealed, and the reaction has been…bad, to say the least. And it’s not hard to see why – the thing does not exactly scream “Olympics”, it’s jagged, it’s garish, it’s not right.

So why is it I find myself liking it?

It’s ridiculous. Every sensible part of my body is telling me that this is a train wreak of a brand and a logo, but for some reason I’m drawn to it. And not in a “so bad it’s good” way, I mean actual, genuine “this could work” sort of like. This is not acceptable – I can’t like this, I shouldn’t like it, but I do. And apparently, I’m the only one.

Self delusion is in these days, so I’m going to try and justify it, despite how stupid it is. The people behind it are keen to state it’s a brand, not a logo, which I interpret to mean that we’re likely to see more of the squiggly lines all over the place – websites and phones particularly. Looking at the logo as a logo for the games on its own, it seems stupid, but as part of something else, perhaps not. Looking at some of the newer websites that have popped up over the last year or so, the new logo is not so far from the norm (Twitter, Odeo, and last.fm spring to mind…). And perhaps in that context, it just might work.

Of course, I’m not a designer, and I’m hardly what you would consider the average person either, so I don’t think I’m qualified to talk about branding with any credibility. And I’m also in elation after finishing my exams, so perhaps I’m just taking everything with a smile. But despite every reason not to like it, I do. I like the jaggy logo. I like the “London Jaggies”.

Save me, please.

Right now I’m feeling really good. Not just because I finished my exams, but also because by complete accident I managed to find The Great Wil Overton(TM)’s deviantArt account. And naturally, it contains Great Wil Overton(TM) art as well, which is always a good thing. Admittedly, this is only likely to be of interest if you are a long time reader of NGamer (formally NGC, formally N64, formally Super Play), but if you are, you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about.

The final exam took please today, and went…reasonably. I say reasonably because this particular module has gained something of a loathing among the second year CS students for a number of reasons, and no one I’ve talked to has a good feeling about it. We’ll have to wait and see, I guess. I’ll be heading back home at some point this week as for an end of exam/late birthday celebration, which should be fun, before heading back for third year induction, and hopefully good results.

And now, I shall commence with absolutely nothing. Please do not disturb.

Just a quick note to say thank you to everyone who’s said happy birthday. Exams aside, the day was fun and I had a good time, so thanks again to all you folks.

Now, enough about me and go and have a look at what Alan Davies and his camera-phone are up to on QI. It’s here and here. Get going.

You may or may not know about the new applications that Facebook are letting all over their site, with various degrees of usefulness. While I love the idea of them and how some of them work, I’m a little concerned as to how they are affecting me.

For a start, it’s immensely addictive looking at them and putting new stuff on my profile just to see what it looks like. Slightly more worrying, though, is the fact most of these things are turning me into some sort of competitive maniac – “So Matt thinks he can beat with his 567 points on iLike, well I’ll show him, I’ll show them all, yeah, take that Matt!”. That rock paper scissors thing is potentially dangerous too – “We’ve both been rock for the last two goes, so she’s gonna go for paper, so if I go…YES! WOO! I WON! I’M THE GREATEST! YOU THOUGHT YOU COULD TAKE ME, BUT MY SCISSORS HAVE TRIUMPHED OVER YOUR PAPER! I WON! I WON!”

I like Facebook, but maybe there should be some kind of warning on these things?