Cinematics

It’s not a game, but it so abunds with mood that I found it worthy of appearing here. I don’t want to spoil things for you. Just warnings: don’t let yourself be misslead by the title, or by the poster… it’s not a sci-fi, … at least not in the sense you’d expect it. Don’t expect amazing special effects… it’s more a mental piece… something like a play (btw, I totally recomend The Cube… this might be in the same niche?). That being said this movie blew me away… in a quiet kind of way… but it totally made it’s way to that special spot for me, the movie that defines a period of 3-12 months… I wish they came more often but I’m afraid things that blow me away like this are much more rare. Anyway, just wanted to give a buzz out for likeminded people out there: The Man from Earth. I doubt you’ll find this one in any blockbuster list, or movies with high ratings… but then again that’s why we started artsygamer: so that when one of us discovers a hidden gem the others may skip years of searching and just enjoy it. This is one of those few movies that made me think about stuff…
An interesting wikipedia quote I found on it:

The Man from Earth is a 2007 independent film written by Jerome Bixby and directed by Richard Schenkman. In what may be an unprecedented move, the producer of this film, Eric D. Wilkinson, has publicly thanked users of BitTorrent who have distributed the movie without express permission, saying that it has lifted the profile of this product far beyond the financier’s expectations.

I wonder if this will recur in different mediums (music so far?).

(more…)

I’ve just read this very exciting article on Gamasutra "Opinion: Is The Industry Ready For Its ‘Game Noir’?" … I don’t know if it is… but i soooooooooooooooooooooo hope so! And no, I’m not talking about little casual-like games, I’m hoping for games focusing on story more, games daring to invent the kind of gameplay I keep hoping for: games in which fighting enemies is less than 50%, ideally 20%, instead of the 99% that it is these days. From the article:

What we’ve got left is a huge gulf between popular, full-experience 3D action/adventure games that need to be financial blockbusters to survive, and marginalized casual/handheld/movie licensed games that don’t register on the mass consciousness radar.

We need our B films. We need that freedom to explore truly meaningful new avenues of interaction, quickly and nimbly, without the pressure of an eight-figure budget and multi-year dev schedule weighing down on the whole enterprise. Noir already scouted this territory for us.

Check out the full article! Another ray of hope!

(more…)

Is it just me or is this a great add, particularly for those who know the media references and have been on the edge.
From the same campain, but with the focus moving from games to multimedia:

And in response to the music I’ll go with “i know i don’t need it… but i want it” :P