Recognition

So, a good friend of mine has already linked to me from his blog at The Raging Tech.  He follows technology (something I like to keep up with myself), among other things, more thoroughly than most people.  Check out one of the fastest growing technology blogs around!

Thanks for the recognition!

The Point Blank Critic

Video Games: Pain, PS3

One of my passions in life is gaming.  I love most genres and can appreciate a wide array of games.  And, at times, the sort I like is just a simple destruction game.

Pain is that, and more.  Developer Idol Minds targeted a genre, and hit it dead on.

You may have been piddling around the internet and stumbled across a slingshot game.  One where you launch a character at some combination of angle and power and see how much damage they cause.  Some offer subtle amounts of control.  Others have highly interesting graphics in their objects.

Pain is worlds above these games.

The setting of Pain is a small city block populated by street mimes, monkeys, and explosives among other things.  With beautifully interactive elements all throughout the zone, and the ability to glide slightly and control your flight, you can spend hours just trying to find more and more objects to target.  The inclusion of some excellent multiplayer modes, including bowling and horse, give the game a party oriented purpose that keeps the game from becoming entirely monotonous  as you spend hours of doing the same thing over and over.  It's still entertaining.

The game may have a small number of boards which are just rearrangements of the objects on the original city streets; but as I already stated, just one board could keep you searching for targets for hours.  And the ability to add more content through download promises to keep the fun coming.

My only major concern with this game is the camera.  For the most part it does a fair job of getting you an optimal view of your carnage position.  However, if you bounce backwards off of something landing under, say, an elevated train railing, all you will see is that track.  Trying to nudge out into traffic blindly is just too difficult.  Also, when you get near the far edges of the maps, the camera just wants to stay in the center.  This isn't too bad since there is almost nothing to interact with out there; but getting around the corner of one of these buildings could put you in front of a car if you can properly place yourself.

At a $10 price tag, it should be everything you expect from it and more.  I rate it at 9 Cramped Fingers.

The Point Blank Critic

Free Drink Friday #1: Samuel Adams Cream Stout

So, for my first entry, I would like to start with something I have decided to do every week; Free Drink Friday. Each week, I aim to review a different beer in hopes of keeping the general public from having to subject themselves to cheap, flavorless beers. I hope to review many local breweries and microbreweries, as I feel these people truly do what they do for the love of beer. I, of course, won't leave out a major nationally sold beer, because some of these are truly works of art as well.

For my first installment, I would like to talk about one of these major breweries' beers: Samuel Adams Cream Stout. This is one of my personal favorites, and at the time, the only beer in the fridge.

For those of you who don't research this stuff like I do, a cream stout (or milk stout) is often similar to other stouts except for the addition of lactose. Lactose sugars are not able to be fermented in the beer, and so they add a sweetness to the beer.

Samuel Adams produces very flavorful beers, and in this tradition, their Cream Stout holds true. With its use of chocolate malts, the flavor is close to that of a chocolate stout, except that the creamy sweetness of the lactose adds a richer finish to what would have otherwise been a bitter bite. It has a creamy body and rich texture. The finish is almost that of a lingering milk chocolate; a decadent taste after each creamy sip.

I feel pressured to come up with a rating system for this, and so I will base it on my favorite unit of beer: The 6 Pack. I hope there aren't any reviewers using a 0-6 rating scale already, but I feel it is an appropriate scale. A full 6 pack will be top rank, and that is what I would like to start this off with.

I give Samuel Adams Cream Stout a full 6 Pack.

Thanks for reading this weeks Free Beer Friday. I hope to lead you on your way to flavorful beer in the future.

The Point Blank Critic