iOS Puzzle Games - Hoplite Review

I like iOS games for playing when I want to be distracted for a little while (except Hearthstone, which can keep me distracted for a long while), usually before bed or on a lunch break when not reading. That is why I love it when things go on sale and this is the best time of year for sales. I recommend, if you have an iOS device and like gaming, that you get a copy of the TouchArcade app and start "watching" all of the games you are interested in…that way you get notifications when they go on sale. Well this week two games I have been watching for a while went on sale for the massively low price of "free". The games, Hoplite (free thanks to Pocket Gamer UK) and The Nightmare Cooperative, are similar in that they are both turn-based puzzle games with RPG and definite Rogue-like elements. I thought for this week, I would review Hoplite.

Hoplite was created by Doug Cowley at Magma Fortress and it is a great game that was originally generated as part of the 2013 seven day Rogue-like challenge.. You are an adventurer on a quest to descend 16 levels into a dungeon to get the Golden Fleece and return safely. The game is played on a hexagonal grid and you try to make it safely to the stairs before being killed by the enemies on the board. You have to watch out as some will throw bombs or fire arrows or shoot fire at you. To help you, you have the ability to leap, bash, throw or stab your opponents. Unlike other games, you only have to move toward your enemy (ending your move next to them) in order to stab them to death. To also help you, there is a shrine on every level where you can heal or upgrade your skills (or get new ones).

Here I tapped on the enemy archer to see where he could attack next

The graphics are simple but effective. The touch interface is also simple, which means that a lot of effort was put into refining it to make it great. Touch where you want to move. Movement is one tile at a time when there are enemies on the board but then you can speed ahead once they are gone. Touch an enemy to determine where it can hit from its current location (they can only seem to attack if they don't move that turn). Touch to select or de-select a skill you might want to use. All working great and playing into the need to think through every move. The game gives you the feeling that with the right planning you might make it across every level uninjured and without killing an enemy.

Hoplite is also deep in its simplicity. While there isn't much in the way of an item system (it differs from the typical Rogue-like in not needing a lot of items to gather). There is an achievement system that helps you gain access to new and better skills that will then be available in game at the shrines. The strategy comes in when you have to choose between healing at the shrine or taking the upgrade to your throwing ability, allowing you to hit enemies from farther away (at a safer distance).

The typical game length (if you are as bad as me) will last you about 15 minutes at the most. I really like the simplicity and depth combination that the developer has come up with here. Looking through the achievement list, I know I will have a lot more to do in the game to get good enough to get all of them. Hoplite is a great addition to the grand old tradition of dungeon crawlers that didn't start with Rogue, but continues to drag people like me in with each new iteration. Hoplite gets 5 Mick Happies.

San Diego Zoo and Wild Animal (Safari) Park Review

 Fennec Fox at Safari Park

I have to admit that when it comes to zoos, I am spoiled. The first zoo experiences I ever had were at the San Diego Zoo and Wild Animal Park (now called the Safari Park, but will always be WAP to me). Since then I have had the opportunity to at least see a couple other zoos, such as the Minnesota Zoo and the only zoo in Connecticut, Beardsley Zoo. Neither of them hold a candle to the zoos in San Diego for the diversity of animals and the size/setup of the enclosures. I know there is a whole dialogue that can be had about animal rights and whether or not it makes sense to put animals in zoo and on display, but you can't deny that zoos like the San Diego Zoo have done a lot for preservation of animals. That out of the way, let's talk about the Zoo and Park.

Educational encounter at Safari Park

The San Diego Zoo is located just north of downtown San Diego in Balboa Park. It winds over a set of tree-lined hills with multiple valleys. The designers have setup the park so that as you walk down various trails you travel through different environments. You'll move through the Monkey Trail, Sun Bear Trail, Panda Canyon, Africa Rocks, etc. The zoo is home to many diverse animals from Giant Pandas, Gorillas, Elephants, Tigers, Meerkats, Fennec Foxes, insects, birds and reptiles. My favorite part is the Children's Zoo, where they have Meerkats and Fennec Foxes and a pretty wild insect house. My wife loves the monkeys and gorillas and could sit and watch them for hours. One of the best parts of the zoo is that they have setup some open areas like the Gorilla and Hippo exhibits where you can get very close to the animals with only a large window between you and them. In other areas they have some older enclosures that really need an upgrade, but they are working on it.

 Leafcutter ants at the San Diego Zoo

Other insect examples at the San Diego Zoo

The Wild Animal Park is a much larger zoo in North San Diego County. Way out on the east edge of Escondido, the WAP is a massive place with huge areas built out to be reminiscent of the Asian and African plains with herds of animals that would be found in those areas. Want to see giraffes and rhinos, this is the place for you. The WAP also boasts a great lion exhibit that uses the same window technique to let you get close to the mama and papa lion and their cubs. They also have a nice bird show and often have animals out with handlers giving up close educational opportunities. To help you get out to see the animals in the African exhibit, there is a tram tour that will take you around there. Unfortunately, the 45 minute monorail ride that used to show you both the African and Asian exhibits is gone. The only way to see the Asian exhibit is a lot of walking, paying a lot or a zipline ride or pay a lot for a caravan safari on a truck out to the exhibit where you get up close an personal with the animals. They also have the new lemur walk letting you go into a large enclosure with the lemurs.

Both of these zoos have a wide array of amazing animals on display. I used to think the WAP was the better of the two, but since seeing both of them recently, I think the Zoo is actually better. The Zoo is cooler (being closer to the ocean) and has more shade as you get a massive amount of exercise walking and seeing the animal. Both are great for that exercise. I also think the Zoo has slightly better animal diversity (less herding animals) but some of the enclosures are better at the WAP. One big downside of the WAP is that it has gone very commercial with things like their flight line safari, which will run an adult $75 (after park admission costs). Not to mention the safari tours that will run $50 - $155 a person. I appreciate that they need to support the park, but to have the best way to see the animals be an up sell from the park admission is a bit annoying. That isn't the case at the Zoo.

Fennec Fox at San Diego Zoo

(this little guy needs more space and no mesh fencing and a friend)

If you are in San Diego or live here and don't know about these parks, you should go if you like animals. The best way is to get a zoo membership that will allow you access to both parks. If you can go multiple times, it is the best deal and makes it easier to see everything as that is difficult in a single trip. Next time you're around the area, go check in on my Fennec Fox friends. The Zoo and WAP get 4 Mick Happies.

Quick Movie Reviews and Does the Dog Die...

I have to start this post stating that I am not a Peta member or vegan or anything like that. However, I do have strong opinions when pets are depicted being killed in movies or TV shows. I just don't like it. It will make me actively avoid a given movie because I just don't need to see that. For instance, I "was" interested in the Keanu Reeves movie John Wick. Then I learned what drives his character's actions and I was like, "I'm out". I will probably never see that movie. So when I know it is going to happen I will avoid it. When I don't know it is coming, I tend to like whatever movie I was watching a lot less than before. That brings us to this week's movies…

Space Station 76 - This movie looks at the lives of people living on the Omega 76 Space Station in a future that looks a lot like what would have been envisioned in the 1970s. You have holograms and space ships, yes, but catalogs from stores come on ViewMaster disks and people smoke pot and see their therapist robot for Valium, etc. Plus just about everything is colored in white, yellow, greens or browns. Space Station 76 stars Liv Tyler, Patrick Wilson, Matt Bomer and Jerry O'Connell, among others. All of the actors do a very good job with the material they are given. The movie also gives an interesting view of a retro-looking future and could have been really great if it had swung more to straight comedy rather than trying for a bleak version of comedy. You have the narcism and neglectful parenting, a little bit of the loose morals of the 70s being shown, but it could have been even better if those things were exaggerated even more. Instead what you are left with at the end is just feeling down. Oh yeah, and then there is a bit with a cryogenically frozen dog that could have been left out and I would have probably been able to give this a 3 Mick Happy rating. Instead I have to go with 2.

Automata - This film stars Antonio Banderas as an insurance agent for a company that supplies androids to help mankind. This is set in an apocalyptic future where solar flares and activity have burned up most of the vegetation on the earth and reduced earth's population by >99%. Here Jacq (Banderas) finds some androids have somehow circumvented the two rules that regulate their activities (1. can't hurt humans or allow them to hurt themselves and 2. can't modify themselves). As he investigates the things his world starts to unravel and he begins to suspect that the company he works for may not be doing good things. The main problem I had with this movie started very early on when Jacq goes to investigate a complaint that an android has malfunctioned and killed a family pet. It didn't, and the family was using that as an excuse to try to get money. The film didn't need to go there. They could have injured one of the people and said the android hurt them instead. That is just frustrating as they hurt the pet just to drive an emotional reaction that they could have gotten in a different way with a little more effort. Anyway, this is a bleak future movie and weird. It also gets 2 Mick Happies but mainly due to the choices of the screenwriters than any other major shortfalls.

Which leaves us with this. If you are like me and don't like it when the pet is the one who gets it in the end. There is a website that can help us. It is DoestheDogDie.com and they have over 700 movies listed and will let you know if the pets are okay, injured or presumed dead but end up okay or are killed. They obviously don't have all the movies and didn't have the two listed here but they do have a lot of favorite movies listed. Check it out.

Edge of Tomorrow Movie Review

This weekend I finally got my hands on a DVD copy of Doug Liman's Sci-Fi action movie, Edge of Tomorrow. The movie is set in the near future where mankind is in a fight for its life with alien invaders called Mimics and based pretty closely on a Japanese manga novel called All You Need Is Kill by Hiroshi Sakurazaka. Enter Tom Cruise as the main character, Major William Cage, a PR guy who gets himself put on the front lines of the human invasion to stop the aliens. There he is killed but not before he comes in close contact with one of the aliens and acquires the power to reset his day when he dies.

As Cage relives his day over and over he comes in contact with Rita Vrataski, played by Emily Blunt, who is a war hero, the one person who has killed more than a hundred Mimics in the battle of Verdun. Cage learns that Vrataski had also had the ability to reset until she lost it and together they try to figure out how to stop the Mimics. Through in some powered exo-skeleton armor and you have a party.

The movie plays on the usual theme of time repeating, which is of course classically portrayed in Groundhog Day. Here we see Cage living through a horrible couple of days over and over. Liman does a great job of depicting the frustration of trial and error and growth for Cage as the movie progresses. The interactions between Blunt and Cruise are also terrific with Vrataski's single-minded focus on defeating the aliens a very nice contrast to Cage's reluctance to be at the front lines. Vrataski as a character is pretty bad-ass though you don't get to see enough of her kicking butt.

Overall, I really liked Edge of Tomorrrow. I think the movie got a little rushed at the end and lost some of the deliberate, very well done, build up that the early parts had. At the end I thought that Vrataski's character might have been the more interesting and it would be nice for Liman to film a prequel about her experiences at Verdun. I know it won't happen because, a) they have already mentioned the highlights to the story in this film and b) it wouldn't have Tom Cruise's star power behind it to get it made. It would be awesome, however, as Vrataski doesn't have a mentor to guide her at Verdun the way Cage does here. Also some of the trials she mentions would have been interesting to see on film but Cage doesn't repeat those trials.

If you like Sci-Fi action films or just want to see Tom Cruise die, a lot, then Edge of Tomorrow is a great way to spend 2 hours. Could the film have been even better, sure, but what you do get is at least 4 Mick Happies worth of butt kicking for goodness. Now where can I get some time resetting powers as there are a few mistakes I would like to do over yesterday.

The Gathering Book Review

Like many "gamers" of a certain age, Magic the Gathering holds a special place in our hearts and minds. In 1993, I was introduced to the game by some college friends and we proceeded to shuffle and trade and scheme around these crazy fantasy game cards with amazing art on the front. My wife and I met in 1994 and I was still playing. She suffered for many years with me going off to "play cards" and sit in rooms with many kids younger than me. Its been more than 10 years since I sold off the bulk of my Magic cards, and looking back it was the right thing to do at the time. However, that doesn't mean I don't miss my Beta Serra Angel, Mox Sapphire and the other "bombs" I had opened in those early packs. Knowing that, and being the best wife anyone could ever have, she bought me The Gathering - Reuniting Pioneering Artists of Magic the Gathering for Christmas last year.

The Gathering is a book that combines a retrospective on some of the art from the early days of Magic with short essays from the artists who brought the vision of Magic to life. It was originally a successful Kickstarter project back in 2013. Not having been involved in Kickstarter at all, I had missed any opportunity to back this project. My wife, however, is a ninja when it comes to thoughtful gifts and tracked down the folks at Full Steam Press who published the book and picked up a hardcover copy. She also convinced them with her Jedi mind powers to send along four of the promotional standard edition sketch cards that included a sketch by Doug Shuler of…the Serra Angel! Major points for the wife.

The Gathering is a little over 100 pages and gives some insight into the early days of Magic when artists were paid less than $100 per piece of art and, I am glad to have learned, were given some shares of stock in Wizards of the Coast. It's great to think of these artists who were making 5" x 7" art that went on to be printed on millions of cards all over the world were able to share in the success of Magic over the years. It is also nice to hear a little about the guidance given to the artists for the cards they illustrated and how they might have done things differently if they had known then what a success this would become. Many of the artists in the book have moved on to other genres or are focusing on different media these days, but their contributions to Magic and pop culture will remain for years to come if the past 20+ years of Magic are any indication.

You can still get a copy of the The Gathering from the Full Stream Press site here. I recommend it for any long-time fan of Magic or casual fan of art in general. Great gift for those of us who were in college  right when Magic first unleashed itself on our world. The Gathering gets 5 Mick Happies for awesomeness. If you do get the book, you even get contact info for many of the artists if you want to look into their art in more detail.

Le Chef Review

As I continue to read Honor Harrington books and really only play Path of Exile, many of my recent reviews have been things I have watched on TV (or on TV off DVD). This week is no exception. On Friday night, the family and I sat down to enjoy Le Chef, a French comedy written and directed by Daniel Cohen and starring Jean Reno.

We have liked Jean Reno movies for a long time, starting with The Professional and continuing with roles in French Kiss, Couple Retreat and others. We also have enjoyed several French movies in recent years like The Intouchables, so a comedy including Reno and cooking seemed like a good bet (and turned out to be much better than The Tasting Menu, which we watched a few weeks ago).

Le Chef is the story of Jacky Bonnot, played by Michael Youn, a cooking enthusiast who has had difficulty holding down a job, causing much consternation for his pregnant girlfriend, Beatrice. Jean Reno is Alexandre Lagarde, a famous chef with a 3-star restaurant and a cooking show who is under pressure from his restaurant's owner's son who wants to make the restaurant avant-garde. As the story progresses, Jacky and Alexandre are thrown together with their love for cooking after Jacky is found cooking clandestinely at a retirement home where he is a painter. Alexandre gives him a trial at his restaurant while Jacky tries to hide the fact he isn't painting from his long-suffering girlfriend.

The movie has many funny moments when Jacky and Alexandre clash over Alexandre's reluctance to give up control in his restaurant and Jacky's complete lack of a filter when it comes to what he thinks should be done. Throw in a trio of somewhat bumbling but completely fun cooks at the retirement home and some over the top bad modern cuisine to compare against Jacky and Alexandre's more wholesome fare, you have an interesting mix that comes out tasting good.

Nothing overly special or really new is on tap here, but there are pretty restaurants, food that looks like something you might actually eat and lovable characters. All in all, you can't go wrong with Le Chef. With all 3 of us at my house, Le Chef gets 4 Mick Happies. Now we are all looking forward to Jon Favreau's Chef next weekend.

X-Men: Days of Future Past Review

I waited a long time to see X-Men: Days of Future Past. I had intended to see it in the theaters when it released, but things conspired against that happening. Then it was available to download on iTunes for a couple weeks and I almost purchased it then. Finally, with the DVD release this past week my wife put me out of my misery and bought me a copy. X-Men: Days of Future Past (X-M:DoFP) is the latest installment in the X-Men franchise, directed by Bryan Singer and based on the classic Chris Claremont and John Byrne The Uncanny X-Men storyline, Days of Future Past.

X-M:DoFP continues the story from both the X-Men: First Class and X-Men: The Last Stand films.  X-M:DoFP starts with a view of a grim future where mutants, those who help them and those who might become them are held in internment camps and are pursued by giant robots called Sentinels. We find out that those who remain of the original X-Men (Iceman, Professor X, Magneto, Kitty Pryde, Wolverine) are hanging on by a thread with the support of some new mutants, Bishop, Blink, Warpath and Sunspot. They devise a plan to stop their future by using Kitty Pryde's ability to send the consciousness of Wolverine back to the 1970s to stop a killing that leads to the Sentinels being activated to protect humans from mutants.

The storyline of X-M:DoFP has some timey-wimey bits that you have to either think too hard about or just go along for the ride on. No, we don't see how Professor Xavier is alive in the future, but hey, that's okay. There are bits of the movie where you see something happen then it hasn't happened - but that is explained. It is interesting to see the younger and older character versions in a film that does a better job of things than Star Trek: Generations did - which also starred Patrick Stewart.

One of the best parts of X-M:DoFP is getting to see the bleak future and the cool skills of the mutants as well as getting to see all of our old X-Men movie favorites. The skills of Bishop (played by Omar Sy) and Blink are colorful and excellent on screen. It was good to see portrayals of the older Kitty Pryde (Ellen Page) and Wolverine (you can tell he's older by the grey hair). However, the best character in the film, hands down, has to be Quicksilver, played by Evan Peters. The incredibly fast mutant is snarky and portrays the character's suffering because everyone else is so much slower than him well. His character also gives the most awesome special effects moment in the movie.

Which actually leads to the main niggle with the movie. We don't get enough variety in the mutants except in short spurts. The thing that made X-Men and X2 even more fun was the diversity in mutants and their powers. Here we spend a lot of time with Magneto, Professor X, Beast, Wolverine and Mystique and unfortunately they aren't the most interesting of the characters (see note above about Quicksilver). However, there is hope that X-Men: Apocalypse will broaden the number of focal characters again and hopefully will be even better for it.

X-M:DoFP is a great entry into the X-Men movie franchise. I found it better than X-Men: First Class and X-Men: The Last Stand and certainly it was worth the wait. Overall, X-M:DoFP gets 4 Mick Happies. Now, when is the Quicksilver movie going to happen?

iTunes Festival London 2014 Comments

Paolo Nutini at House of Blues, San Diego

Surprisingly enough I often have problems coming up with what to review each week or so. Sometimes it is because I am mainly playing a game I have already commented on in the past or reading book 6 in a series of 10 and reviewing it might be a little difficult. Today's post comes from one of those weeks where I have things I could write about but nothing "feels" important enough to share. Except that this week the family and I have been "watching" (read playing and skipping forward 2 -3 minutes to get through the parts we don't care about) the iTunes Festival that ran in London at the Roundhouse for the month of September. The festival, which has run for several years, is hosted by Apple and has different artists performing every night for the month of September (there is also a second iTunes Festival that ran earlier in the year in Austin, TX as well this year). Tickets to the show are free to those who can get one to be there for a show live.

This year's list of performers is a broad spectrum of musical genres and generations with everything from electronic/club music to classical and rock and pop and alternative in between. Seriously, we're talking Placido Domingo, Tony Bennett mixed in with Maroon 5, Robert Plant, Lenny Kravitz, Jessie J and Deadmau5, David Guetta and 5 Seconds of Summer not to mention Pharrell Williams, Mary J. Blige and a whole hoard of newer acts opening each night. Great thing for you is that for the month and a little time afterward you can watch any of the shows for free through iTunes or on an Apple TV.

For the last few years, we have cherry picked the few acts that we cared about and fast forwarded through the usually 60 - 90 minute shows to get to the songs we really were interested in seeing. The best parts are often when the bands are interacting with the audience rather than the performances. This year we gave a listen to a few of the acts and I am summarizing them here:

David Guetta and Calvin Harris - I am not much into the club DJ type music, can take it or leave it. However, both of these guys have songs that I do like (Titanium and Summer, respectively). Those were the songs that I was looking for when watching and both were there, of course. In between you have pounding base and strobing light shows. Being at the performances of either would probably be like going to a giant night club, which if that is your thing you would probably have really liked it.

Lenny Kravitz - Lenny has a great catalogue of excellent rock songs and he was belting them out. It was surprising to find out that this was the first gig that he had played with the latest configuration of his backup band because they sounded really good and worked well together. Certainly worth giving a listen to and he definitely made a couple songs into massive jam sessions that are fun (but easier to handle when you can move things along a bit with the clicker).

Blondie - Debbie Harry and the band were fantastic. Hard to believe that she is 69 years old when she is out there playing hit after hit. Almost every other song I turned to my wife and said, hey I forgot Blondie sang that one. For several songs, even after all these years, her vocals were almost identical to how I remember them on the radio. Worth checking out.

Paolo Nutini - The girls in our house have been fans of Paolo for a couple years now and they like a couple songs on his latest album as well. We had actually bought tickets to see him live at the House of Blues in San Diego in September, which happened to be a week or so after he performed at the iTunes Festival. Paolo puts on a soul/blues-vibe infused concert, which we watched live in San Diego and then went back to see if the iTunes performance was the same. Other than the sound and power of the performance being much better live than through the TV, Paolo ran through the same set list for both shows. If you can't get to a live show yourself, the iTunes Festival replay isn't a bad way to go.

Paolo Nutini

All-in-all, being able to see interesting shows from the comfortable confines of my living room without having to go to a festival and mosh around with 100s of people all lifting their phones to take pictures/video is pretty nice. You give up a bit in the audio quality, but maybe that would be better if you watch it on your computer with headphones. Hey and you can even move past the songs you don't care about and try out some bands you may otherwise have never had a chance to hear about. For free, you can't beat that. iTunes Festival gets 4 Mick Happies.

RIP Saturday Morning Cartoons on Broadcast TV

Blackstar

For those of us who grew up in the 1970s and 1980s, there were four things we looked forward to each week. 1) Going outside to play with our friends, 2) morning cartoons, 3) afternoon cartoons and 4) Saturday morning cartoons. It seems that somewhere over the years as Saturdays have become filled with shuttling kids off to sports games and College Football or Golf or other events to show on TV, cartoons have become less and less important. I don't have any way to watch broadcast TV, so I haven't been able to watch this change as it happened. That's why it was such a surprise to see this post by Cory Doctorow regarding the CW being the last broadcast network to do away with the Saturday morning schedule. Yes, there are still kids shows on here and there, but gone is the four or five hour block of fun that our parents probably hated to see us sitting in front of each Saturday.

Back in the day, there were so many shows that I enjoyed seeing. I didn't get a chance to watch every Saturday, but I was happy when I did get to catch an episode here and there. Yes, they were probably just there to get me to convince my parents to go and buy some toy or other but I didn't care. Nowadays, there are entire networks devoted to kids shows all day long, but back then we had morning, afternoon and Saturday morning. Plus all of the shows were "free" - at least if you didn't mind watching commercials - and you didn't need a cable subscription to watch. Here are a few of the shows and characters that I would have never known if it wasn't for networks running Saturday Morning Cartoons.

Thudarr the Barbarian - a classic of post-apocalyptic adventure where Thundarr and his friends Princess Ariel and Ookla the Mok. It is a bit cheesy and has a sort of Color-forms over a static background feel but it was awesome. Don't believe me, take a look.

Thundarr the Barbarian

Dungeons & Dragons - Anyone who was pre- or early teens in 1983 - 1985 and liked fantasy probably saw this one. A group of kids on an amusement park ride are transported into the world of Dungeons & Dragons. It was cheesy and too little kid friendly over all, but it was so cool to see D&D on TV. Here's a clip and a link to the script pdf for the unproduced final episode of the show.

Dungeons & Dragons

Super Friends - Of course Saturday morning was littered with Super Heros of all kinds. Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends and untold others all had their slots in the morning lineup, but one of the best was the Super Friends. Yes, the Wonder Twins and their pet monkey were also cheesy, but I can't count how many times my wife and I have said, "Wonder Twin powers activate!". Add in Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman and even Aquaman and we are going to have a good time.

Super Friends

Wonder Twin Powers Activate

There were of course many many other shows, some included the many versions of Scooby Doo, others were all new like Blackstar. You also had Bugs Bunny Show/Road Runner Show. In between cartoons we also got edu-ma-cated with probably one of the best shows ever, Schoolhouse Rock!. No matter what you think about TV rotting your brain, it didn't, it doesn't and cartoons should be part of everyone's childhood. Yes, I know that looking back they are all dated and nostalgia has elevated them to a status they might not deserve if looked at for the first time today, but they were all Awesome or Rad or Cool and no one can take that away from me.

Conjunction Junction

I'm Just A Bill

Sherlock v Elementary

In the past, I have posted reviews of the BBC show Sherlock and the CBS american Sherlock Holmes adaptation, Elementary, all based on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's original works. Recently we have been re-watching (mainlining one episode a night of) Sherlock with our daughter (who I think is a Benedict Cumberbatch fan) and the differences between the two versions of the Sherlock Holmes/Watson stories have been interesting to note. Therefore, I give you this set of ramblings about what makes the two shows so intriguingly different.

For those who don't know, Sherlock, starts with Dr. John Watson dealing with his experiences as a doctor in military service when he decides to share a flat with Sherlock Holmes. Watson is then pulled into Sherlock's job as the world's only consulting detective. The show is presented in three ~90 minute episodes per season. Elementary, on the other hand, begins with Dr. Joan Watson becoming the live-in sobriety companion for Sherlock Holmes, a brilliant recovering addict, who consults with the NYC police department. Elementary is presented in the standard american police procedural/crime drama format of 22 episodes a season each ~44 minutes in length.

To get the easy comparisons out of the way, Dr. Watson, is obviously different in each adaptation due to the gender chosen, but their differences go much deeper. In Sherlock, John is a man with a military past and is solid, dependable and able to deal with the physical aspects of being Sherlock Holmes' partner in crime-solving. John is also more of a chronicler of Sherlock's cases through his blog whereas Joan is more of a cerebral partner to Sherlock in the American version. Joan, over the course of the series begins to train almost as Sherlock's protege, becoming a bit of a detective in her own right. That isn't to say that John doesn't also show insight and deductive skills, but his relationship with Sherlock is more as a suffering friend, conscience and chronicler than companion and trainee.

Sherlock himself is also different in many ways. The BBC Sherlock Holmes seems to be a younger Holmes. He is still making his name and beginning to deal with the notoriety that comes from his skill and capabilities. The CBS Sherlock seems older, weathered, he has a past and demons that he is dealing with. We are told but very rarely shown that the CBS Sherlock we find is after his days supporting Scotland Yard and Detective Inspector Lestrade. Both Sherlocks have keen deductive minds and we see both training their minds and bodies on numerous topics. Both have minds that store in numerous facts that they can access as needed. Another interesting difference is how that capability is shown in the two shows. For the BBC Sherlock, we get to see how his mind operates through the use of on-screen text and cutting edits in the video helping us "see" what he is picking up from his observations. The CBS version does similar things but less overtly. Given the longer format of the BBC episodes you are also given more explanation in some instances on how Sherlock comes to his conclusions.

Both shows also have different takes on the other classic characters of the show such as Holmes' brother Mycroft, Irene Adler and, of course, Moriarty. My wife and I both think that the CBS version's take on Adler and Moriarty is more novel and possibly more interesting, however, Andrew Scott's portrayal of the uber-villian is outstanding. Even Detective Inspector Lestrade is quite different between the shows and interesting in both cases. Finally, there is the format of the show itself. By having longer run episodes, Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss and team are able to craft more dense and intricate stories for the BBC show than you see with the American one. However, you may get slightly less on-screen evolution of the characters. The CBS show seems to be more linear in its timeline with less gaps than are seen on BBC.

If you like crime dramas or layered mysteries or a good police procedural, you can't go wrong with either show. The BBC show is available on-demand through Netflix and is fantastic story-telling. The CBS show is about to return for its third season and we have already purchased our season pass off iTunes to ensure it is available to us (without commercials) the day after it airs. Same characters, same pairing of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, very different takes and characterization. Watch both and enjoy.

Spellfall - Puzzle RPG Review

I like a nice match-3 game with RPG elements. Dr. WHO, Puzzle Quest, 10000000, Hexic all have sucked copious amounts of my waiting time over the years. Take a little move the pieces to make color, item matches and see things blow up and add some battle trappings and power-ups and we are going to have a good time. That made it very easy for Spellfall™ - Puzzle RPG (Spellfall) from Backflip Studios - free on iTunes - to jump right onto my iPad mini.

Spellfall is set in a fantasy world where spellfall has started and monsters are pouring out to take over the land and only duskwalkers (like you) can cast the spells needed to stop them. You cast spells by matching elements on the game board by swapping elements (fire, water, air, electricity, plant) or collect coins. String together more than 3 tiles and you can get powered up elements that can change all the tiles around them when matched. There are also glowing tiles that when matched will give you a special attack. The element structure also comes into play since monsters may be weak to one element or another. You get a certain number of moves before the monster will attack. Monster attacks will lower your hit points, run out and you lose the battle.

In addition to the basic mechanics of swapping and matching tiles, you have equipment you can bring into each battle - armor and weapon - that can also have runes equipped that will give you further power-ups. Equip a heal rune and you can power it up by matching water tiles allowing you to eventually cast a heal and recover hit points in the middle of a battle. You can only have one active rune at a time, so its best to switch to the one you want to power before you make a move on the board.

Being free to play, the main timer in Spellfall is your hit points. If you are low, you can just wait a while and they will recover. Luckily this is not an all at once type recovery and you can choose how long to wait before proceeding to the next battle. You can also spend some of the coins you earn to heal quickly. Coins are pretty easy to come by as you can get them in your battles as well as from areas of the world you have already cleared of monsters. I am only a few areas (about 50 battles) into the game but I am always hovering about 10,000 coins. Coins are also used to buy equipment (which comes in different rarities - of course) and runes from the store - you unlock new items in the store by defeating monsters (one per battle). The inventory rotates so things are constantly entering and leaving the store.

There is a lot of customization you can make to your equipment depending on the runes and items you equip. During battles you also earn experience and rune points that help level you and your runes up. The further along you get into the game, you will run into monsters too tough for you. If so, you can always go back and redo battles you had previously completed to get more experience. The longer the game goes on, monsters can retake areas you have already cleared. Re-clearing them will be harder but give better rewards.

You can play through Spellfall just mindlessly matching tiles, but the real benefit is through deciding the right equipment for the monster you are fighting and carefully deciding which rune to have active before you move. The way Spellfall is monetized is the typical - spend money to get more equipment or to retry a battle ($0.99 per) if you lost. Some items are outrageously expensive (see the $79.99 price per Claideahm sword), but I recommend you avoid them as the one I have doesn't seem to make that much of a difference in battles. To help you get items without spending cash, the game also offers you a mystery box containing one item for free per day. There are also rewards for login in each day - get 20 days in a row and get a Claideahm sword.

Spellfall is a fun match-3 with RPG elements. A lot of work has been put into adding depth in the strategy of equipping your character and choosing which load out to use against each monster. There are also 3 save slots in the game in case you want to run different games on the same device. While not quite at the level of some of the games I mentioned at the start of this review, Spellfall gets 3.5 Mick Happies.

Weekend Movie Round-Up

Pretty much every weekend you will find my family with butts firmly planted on couch or chair with the dog watching TV. Netflix delivers 1 - 3 new videos for us to watch or we rent something from iTunes or dive into our own collection of DVDs. What better way to spend some time than with the whole family doing something we (typically) enjoy while having a bit of popcorn or frozen yogurt dessert. This weekend has been no exception with 3 new (to us) movies from Netflix and one from our own library. Here are some quick reviews of each.

From the Rough - We started with Pierre Bagley's bio-pic about Catana Starks, the first woman to coach a college men's golf team. The setting is Tennessee State University where the administration has just decided to start a golf program. Coach Starks takes over and has to search far and wide for members of her fledgling team. This is a typical feel-good sports movie with a scrappy coach working hard, running into major challenges mid-way through the movie, and then…(well you know). Tajari P. Henson is very convincing as Coach Starks and our favorite character was Roger played by the great (and unfortunately, late) Michael Clarke Duncan. If you want a sports movie that hits all the right notes, you can't go wrong with From the Rough, it gets 4 Mick Happies. Side note, my family usually won't watch sports-based movies with me but they watched this one and enjoyed it.

Draft Day - To follow one sports movie with another, I was on my own. Draft Day stars Kevin Costner as the General Manager of the Cleveland Browns, Sonny Weaver Jr., on the fictional 2014 NFL Draft Day. Joining Costner are Jennifer Garner as his co-worker and girlfriend and Dennis Leary as the Browns Head Coach. In this movie, we are given a glimpse into the high-pressure behind the scenes work at an NFL franchise on one of the biggest days of the year. It is hard to know if what is portrayed on screen is accurate to what goes on in real life, but what you get in Draft Day is compelling and will keep you interested all the way through. Weaver is tasked with making "a splash" to help put fans in seats or it may cost him his job. We get to go along for the ride as Costner deftly plays a man who is on the edge of losing it on the biggest day of his GM career. By the end of the movie, both my wife and daughter had joined me to see how things wrapped up and asked questions to be caught up on what they missed. There are many many ESPN cameos and interesting characters. Draft Day was an excellent movie and never seemed to have a slow point. Draft Day gets 4.5 Mick Happies.

Moms' Night Out - We followed up the sports movies with a comedy about stressed moms and incompetent dads thinking that would be fun. The Andrew and Jon Erwin directed film includes some familiar actors/actresses/celebrities including Patricia Heaton (who we liked from Everybody Loves Raymond), Sean Astin and Trace Adkins. Sarah Drew plays the lead, Allyson, who is losing her mind trying to deal with 3 kids and needs a break. What follows is a car crash of a night as Allyson and two friends try to get a little down time. The movie started off well and hit many of the right notes with some sharp (and accurate) portrayal of the modern stay-at-home overworked mom. It then proceeds to be less fun as the film progresses with the husbands being nearly useless - it's bad with the men without kids are the ones with the most common sense. Trace Adkins is fun as Bones, a tattoo artist the ladies run into. Another quibble with the film is that it is a bit over the top with the presentation of Christian values - I am completely okay with faith-based films, but this one tends to get a little preachy at times and wastes screen time that could have been used for more laughs or wrapping up minor plot points. Overall, Moms' Night Out was the weakest of the films this weekend at 2 Mick Happies.

Hackers - Last but not least, my wife wanted to end on a proven good movie after Moms' Night Out didn't quite leave us happy. Hackers is the classic 1995 film written by Rafael Moreu, directed by Iain Softley and starring none other than Jonny Lee Miller and Angeline Jolie (both looking very much like teenagers - or at least early 20-somethings). The film also has Jesse Bradford and Matthew Lillard along with Lorraine Bracco and Marc Anthony (yep, that one). This is the fictional story of some high school hackers who get into some trouble when they tap into the wrong company's computer and have to fight the company and the FBI to save themselves. Miller plays a hacker who 7 years previously had been indicted for crashing over 1,500 computer systems with a virus. Jolie plays his present day nemesis and, of course, erstwhile love interest. As I said before, this is a classic. There is chain-smoking teenagers, weird outfits, edgy computer geekery, a laughable visualization of the interior of a computer system and generally a lot of fun. Including one of our favorite lines ever about Spandex. You can't go wrong with a movie that has a character named Cereal Killer who proclaims "Look at that pooper". Hackers is a must see if you haven't already and gets 5 Mick Happies. If only 1995 was really like that.

Path of Exile: Forsaken Masters First Impressions and Beyond League Tips

The folks at Grinding Gear Games have done a fantastic job with their free-to-play (except your time) action RPG, Path of Exile. They are consistently tweaking things and have recently released their second expansion, Forsaken Masters. Like their last expansion, Sacrifice of the Vaal, Forsaken Masters (FM) adds new content and changes the overall game in some fundamental ways. FM adds the idea that there are 7 Exiled Masters running around Wraeclast that the player can encounter and can undertake missions to help. The missions might be to recover something, protect something, kill something, etc.

Completing missions will give you favor with that master and get enough and they will level up (up to level 8). At level 3, you will unlock a hideout for your character that is basically your own town area to use as a home-base. Okay, great, Path of Exile now has player homes. However, the key here is that each Master also comes with their own inventory of goods you can buy and can help you modify your existing equipment to add additional "affixes" to make them better. All great. It should be noted that the Master missions are not easy and do require you to play in different ways than you may have in the past (you can't just tank your way through all of them).

Alongside the release of FM, Path of Exile has also added two new challenge leagues, Beyond and Rampage. Rampage is a standard league (you die and can resurrect and keep progressing) where as you string kills together you get more and more outrageous effects. Beyond is the new hardcore league (you die and your journey is done - character transfers to the standard league) where if you kill a large number of monsters in close proximity to each other, a portal may open that brings 4 over-powered demons through to Wraeclast. This mechanic adds a big challenge as the portal could open at any time (often at the least advantageous time for you). I can easily see the Beyond portal mechanic making its way into the regular Path of Exile game after the Beyond league ends. So Beyond is hardcore and has demons popping out all over the place - how can a newbie (which I pretty much am as well) survive and compete?

Well I have a couple suggestions:

• Play multiple characters. I have found it good to run a character through most of Act I (up to or after killing Brutus). Then start another character and run them to the same point. This means if you die trying to kill Merveil you will not have to start over from the very beginning. 
• Plan ahead. Save items that look decent for characters at or below your current level but are best for a different build/character class. This will make it easier to level up your 2nd and 3rd characters. For instance I found Meginord's Girdle unique with my 2nd character and built a Marauder around it and a rare staff I had in my stash - that character is now my highest level one in Beyond after only a few hours playing.
• If you tend to go face-first into fights and tank your way through, load up on life and resistances early. The Marauder I mentioned is currently running over 800 life at level 24 (which is good for me) and helps keep me alive when I have to wade in with heavy strikes.
• Don't be afraid to run away and come back later (or just leave). You don't have to kill everything on screen and in some cases it's best if you don't try. Especially in some of the Haku missions as they are best if you just speed run to the spirit and high-tail it out of there.

I still have a lot to learn and am worried whether or not I can actually get myself out of normal difficulty with any of my Beyond league characters, but I am having a great time trying. If you haven't played Path of Exile or have not been back in a while, now is a good time to give it another shot. The Forsaken Masters expansion gets 5 Mick Happies. See you in Wraeclast.

The Secret Life of Walter Mitty

I know I read the short story, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, by James Thurber sometime during middle or high school. I enjoyed it quite a bit. It is the story of a man taking a shopping trip with his wife but who continuously gets distracted with vivid fantasies where he is involved in or doing amazing things. I think if you asked my wife, she would say I am a lot like Walter in that I am often lost in a book or game. In 2013, Ben Stiller starred in the latest adaptation of the story based on a screenplay by Steve Conrad.

I am a bit hit or miss with Ben Stiller movies. I have really enjoyed movies like Along Came Polly, the first Night at the Museum and Mystery Men while others have fallen flat for me. I was interested in seeing how The Secret Life of Walter Mitty would turn out as the trailers had me thinking that the special effects might be way over the top. Luckily for us all, the actual movie was much better than I was expecting.

In the story, Walter Mitty (Stiller), works at Life magazine managing photograph negatives and has been tasked with prepping the cover shot for the final issue. Unlike the original short story, this Walter Mitty is single and love lorn, quiet and reserved but just as prone to daydreams. This is where the over-the-top special effects come in as we are whisked between Walter's real life and his imaginary one. Enter a really horrible take-over manager at the magazine who chooses to pick on Walter when he is found staring blankly off in his own dream world. What follows is the search for the negative and Walter's own character arc from dreamer to doer.

The character arc for Walter is one of the best parts of the movie, followed by his interactions with Patton Oswalt's character, Todd. Kristen Wiig also plays his co-worker and potential love interest and is very subdued and good in the role. Another good part of the film is the smooth transition Walter takes from dreaming to doing that at first leaves you wondering is he dreaming this or is it really happening. Some of the early dream sequences are almost laughably overdone, but then subtly things change and you are left with a somewhat poignant, possibly predictable story of Walter's journey. If you haven't checked this movie out, you should go ahead and rent it right now. I give The Secret Life of Walter Mitty 4 Mick Happies. Now I am off to my fantasy land or in other words, Path of Exile.

RV Movie Review

We were all very sad to hear that Robin Williams had died earlier this week. I grew up in the 1970s and saw Mork & Mindy first hand and then later watched so many movies and comedy specials with Mr. Williams. He has always been a favorite for my wife as well, with his frantic energy and quick-talking banter. Therefore we were all on-board for re-watching one of our favorite Robin Williams' movies, RV, as a way of remembering the laughs he brought us over the years.

RV, is the typical family road-trip movie where the husband, wife and two kids are thrown together in a rolling house ostensibly to spend time together. In the background, of course, Robin Williams' character of Bob Munro is trying to keep his boss happy while keeping his family happy. As anyone who has ever tried to do both without cluing their wife and family into what they are going through, it never goes smoothly.

RV is not the best movie or even best performance Mr. Williams has ever been in/given. What sets it apart and keeps it as a favorite at our house is the family in-jokes, the struggles of sharing a confined space while traveling across the country and the unique people they meet on the trip. As a family that has driven cross the United States twice together, you get into a lot of interesting situations out there on the road. Imagine doing that in a huge rented vehicle that you have no idea how to truly operate. That should give you some insight into what you are going to run into with RV.

The characters around the Munros (Williams' family) are quirky and funny. The awkward interactions of the family with those around them will amuse. Plus there are some laugh out loud moments. My wife is sore today from laughing and this is at least the third time she's seen the movie. RV gets 4 Mick Happies in our household. It is one of the movies we have on DVD and periodically revisit and it is fun every time. Lucky for any fans of Robin Williams we will have a few more films coming out to enjoy.

Dystopian Future Movie Reviews

Lately, when not reading Honor Harrington books by David Weber (just finishing number 3), I have been catching up on dystopian future or apocalypse films. I find that I am morbidly interested in people's views on how the world will be after some cataclysm or other. Probably because I think one will come some day though it is more likely going to be socio-economic rather than environmental in nature. That leads us to today's quick reviews.

Goodbye World - this is one of a number of apocalyptic near-future movies that have come out in the last year or so (and most of them are starting to be available on-demand through Netflix). In Goodbye World, we are given a glimpse of a family living off the grid in Northern California and their "friends" who converge on their home when disaster strikes. The movie stars Adrian Grenier (Entourage), Gaby Hoffman and Ben McKenzie. The basic premise is a virus takes down the power grid and cell phone network, etc. and riots ensue and society breaks down. Meanwhile we get to witness the narcissistic friends who have come to James' (Grenier) home. There are also neighbors to deal with and things generally getting worse. What really was annoying about the movie was the sense of entitlement by some characters that those who stockpiled supplies/medicines should just give them up with no say. When did personal ownership go out the window? When was your lack of planning my problem? I was also annoyed by the opportunistic price gouging and taking advantage of those weaker than you. It was probably so irksome because I can imagine that all of these things will be exactly how many people will act with the crap really hits the fan. A sometimes slow, frustrating thought experiment of what people would be like during an apocalypse - Goodbye World gets 2.5 Mick Happies.

Divergent - This is the first film based on the Divergent Series by Veronica Roth. Divergent is the latest in a group of dystopian future young adult series like Hunger Games that have taken over the post-Harry Potter reading world. In this case, we have future Chicago surviving behind a wall and everyone distributed into 5 factions based on their defining character traits: intelligence, selfless, brave, honest and peaceful. The main character, Beatrice (Tris - played by Shailene Woodley), was born into the selfless faction but at 16 chooses to join the brave team. Thing is that she actually is divergent, having 3 key character traits. This makes her a threat to the status quo in the society where faction boundaries are important to keeping people in line and things running smoothly. Of course there is a broader story going on in the background. Joining the brave group, Tris is put through training, which is often brutal both physically and mentally. What caught my eye in the movie and is probably based on the young adult nature of the source material is that most people focused on in the movie are under 25. Yes there are parents and some older people but most of the leaders are not shown and the story focuses on those in the 16 - 20 age range. Why do future societies put so many of their children into danger (a la Hunger Games) and when did 16 become an age where readers/viewers are so angst ridden that they would choose to leave everything they know to join another group? Is that a thing and I have just missed it? With all the things I know the story is trying to pull off, Divergent isn't bad at all. I thought the casting was a little odd (I don't buy Shailene, who is a fine actress, as a bad-ass) but okay. The movie and setting are compelling if far-fetched (I can't imagine a society being setup like this) and so I give Divergent 3 Mick Happies. It is okay but not as visually compelling as the Hunger Games films (which I have issues with many due to the violence to and by children).

So there you have it. The two dystopian films I have seen recently. I hope that the world won't devolve into jerks and society broken down based on single characteristics. I would like to think we would do better than that, but I think I know we won't really. Seeing these types of movies always kicks off thoughts of moving to a spread in Idaho or Wyoming and living off the land. Not sure if the family would buy into that, but on days when my internet service is giving me fits or I am sitting in traffic for 40 minutes to go 5 miles and I hear about another company laying off 5,000 people while their stock price shoots up on the "news" - I wonder if I might not be better off out there milking a cow.