Why some of the people complaining about the bullying in Eastenders piss me off.

So its been some time since I have done a post about the news or politics so some people might have assumed that either nothing has annoyed me or caught my eye lately or that I have either stopped paying attention or have mellowed out. Well the truth is I read a lot of news items particularly on the way to and from places such as work or my girlfriends, a lot of the time though I figure that there are others far more qualified to discuss it than me, sure if it pisses me off I might jump in even if im not the most informed but in general I like to have a grasp on the fundamentals of what im going on about.

At this point I should probably make it clear that I dont really do soap operas, I tend to see them as the green scum that collects on the top of the pool in the world of television, they somehow manage to be a mix of some people cheerily getting on with day to day life waving hi to there neighbours and then other people suffering whatever illness or social issue or random plight which is the current cool thing to talk about. Quiet often the problem is that these things are handled with all the grace and subtleness that Elvis Presley apparently used to turn off the television (apparently he shot them if rumours are to be believed).

Apparently on Eastenders two girls have been bullying another girl and making her life well a living hell. Well this is right up my street, I spent 8 months working as a mentor for bullied kids, I also long before that spent a long time studying both the sociology of education and child development so this is a topic I feel I can dive into. Now I havent seen any of the episodes so it's not them I am going to comment on, nope its actually some of the online reactions to it I want to talk about.

Now a whole bunch of people appeared on Twitter and other similar online services to voice there opinions and thoughts on the matter, there were those who didnt seem to know the difference between fiction and reality who couldnt believe that Sarah McGuffin face (I have no desire to even try to remember character names) was being treated in such a manner and those who complained that they didnt want to have to watch someone being treated in this way, that it was somehow hurting or offending them.

I want to answer the complaints of both sets of people here first to those sad about Sarah McGuffin face and her situation, I hate to tell you this after all im sure you have only just recovered from the tooth fairy and easter bunny thing but shes not real, she is in fact an actress paid cash to pretend this is happening, no matter what happens to her on screen shes as happy as larry most likely getting paid to do a job she hopefully loves. If you really want to get sad then realise that these kind of things are happening to real kids and cry out about that, think what you can do that can help, be it check your younger relatives are ok or even donate to a charity, or take a long hard look at how you treat others and the views and attitudes you promote through your own actions.

If you are one of those other people one of those who has complained that you have been forced to watch this character be bullied as part of a TV programme oh dear poor poor you, you have had to sit by in front of your proberbly large LCD television screen and watch someone be bullied on a TV show on a channel one of many many channels, you couldnt have possibly have changed to another channel if you didnt like it, no you were frozen there in the headlights wishing you didnt have to watch it. Well you know something if you were stuck watching it then it was you who had impresioned yourself, you were your own jail guard and you made yourself see something but hey wait a minute stop and think about it there are actually real people out there who are actually being bullied and they are not there own jail guards they do not decide to be bullied, they do not have the option of changing the channel or turning the TV off. So stop blooming whining and again think about those who are really suffering and ponder if there is something you can do to help the situation, to try and fight back against bullying instead of burying your head in the sand and complaining when you see something ficticious which is based of a real life event which happens every single day in schools all over the globe on the TV.

The Problem of being a Switch owner.

So as the owner of a Switch, or as I call it at the moment a Zelda box, largly because thats all mine gets used for I wanted to talk about what happening with mine so far. I do own Bomberman R, 1 2 Switch, and have recently got Mario Kart but havent done much with any of them, well apart from written 1 2 Switch off as a steaming bag of crap. So far I have loved the new Zelda but I find myself in a very simmilar situation to which I have been in with previous Nintendo consoles, basically playing a really good Nintendo made game waiting for the next really good Nintendo game to come out because there aint much else to do. What do I mean by this well I am basically saying that 3rd party support is hardly buzzing, so far we have some games that have been ported either from the Xbox One, the PS4 or Nintendo's previous console the switch and some that have released on the Switch at the same time as the PS4 but cost far more on the Switch.

Lego City for example has just come out for the Switch but its just an update of the exact same Lego City that was on the Wii U, heck even Mario Kart 8 deluxe released by Nintendo is the old Wii U game with some bells and whistles thrown on to it. You can Preorder Skyrim which is proberbly going to be about £50 on release maybe more in some shops or you could basically go grab it now for Xbox One or PS4 and finish it before its even out on the Switch and only pay £25, its a good game but its old now. You can buy Troll and I for the PS4 or XBOX One now for £20 to £25 or you can wait till its out on the switch (apparently around christmas) and pay what looks like it will be £39.99, heck Puyo Puyo Tetris has released on Switch and PS4 at the same time but its £25 for the PS4 version and £35 for the Switch. If you really want to get into how your paying more for the same on Switch Rayman Legends is coming to the switch for £59.99 and thats been free on Xbox Games with Gold (yes the Switch one is supposed to be a definitive edition but still).

I know some people will think I am being a little premature in saying this but I dont think that the Switch has really been handled in a way which will make it either the number one choice or the only console for most people, its going to be a secondery console in almost all cases I think. If I can get a game much cheaper or sooner on the PS4 or Xbox One then that is what I am going to do, as for Wii U remakes well I will only get them if I can get them cheap or if something is added to the game that I really feel I need and I cant help but think that this is how the majority of people will feel.  One of the games I saw that most excited me that I was in fact planning on getting was I am Setsuna but then I learned that this isent just a switch game, nope its on the PS4 and Steam and to be honest I know that sooner or latter it will be dirt cheap on either steam or the PSN store.

I know some people will think that I am being unfair to judge Nintendo so early on in the game, they will argue that great and new intresting 3rd party games could be right around the corner, games which wont be available on anything but the Switch due to the way they use the machine but this is something that I have heard about past Nintendo consoles and the more times you hear it and it doesnt come true the harder it becomes to swallow it each and every time. Originally I set out to just write a blog post about the Capcom Five because I thought it was a really intresting subject but in order to do so I started to think about and talk about the current situation with the Switch to try and use it as a starting block to explain where Nintendo where with the GameCube when the Capcom Five were announced and the subject just took on a life of its own. For those not in the know the Capcom Five were 5 games which were orignally announced to be coming out as GameCube exclusives something which a lot of people pinned an awful lot of hopes on and a topic I may return to in the future.

Now I am not trying to knock Nintendo here or say that anyone shouldnt buy a Switch, heck I got one at release but I am trying to say that Nintendo could have handled things better, they could have with a small investment courted various indy developers to get new unique and quriky indy titles on the system early on, sure there is Snipper clips and a few other bits and pieces but not nearly enough, also why when Nintendo have over 30 years of classic games to look back on why is the Virtual Console currently nothing but a Neo Geo showcase? Ok now I know that they proberbly want to drip feed old games on to the service so I am not saying throw SNES game after SNES game at us one after another but surly one juicy one a week wouldnt hurt now would it? Still lets end this post here with the simple phrase ''Time will Tell''.

Hammer: Brides of Dracula

Last night I watched The Brides of Dracula which is another Hammer horror film and well its the sequel to The Horror of Dracula which I reviewed recently. It in some ways is a strange sequel particularly when you realise that despite having the name Dracula right there in the title doesnt actually feature Dracula at all. So if this films not about Dracula then who and what is it about and what makes it a sequel? Well Peter Cushing returns from the previous film once again playing Doctor Van Hellsing and thats what ties the films togther. At one stage apparently the film was going to be called Disciple Of Dracula which I actually think would have been a better title for the film as the Brides are not really the main Villian of the piece or what the focus point of the film in general.

So in my review of the first Hammer Dracula I talked about how well Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing worked alongside each other and thats sort of the downside of this film. Peter Cushing gives a fabulous performance once again but there isent really anyone around him who comes even close so it really is a one man show. Dont get me wrong Cushing acted the living crap out of the role, I dont fault a single line he utters or movement he makes the man is an acting legend and once again he puts on a motion picture acting master class but it just doesnt equal the previous film as there isent the same feeling of it being an equal battle and the same sort of on screen chemistry. I will try not to spoil to much of the plot but I want to go back to what I said about the brides not being the main antagonists of the piece. The main Villian is actually played by an actor called David Peel and is a character called Baron Meinster, who and I say this more because of the possible title than anything I noticed in the film is apparently a disciple of Count Dracula. Now anyone who has watched a lot of horror and vampire films will instantly be able to tell you that not all Vampires are equal or actors for that matter. No offense to David Peel but he is a poor subsitute for Christopher Lee, Baron Meinster apart from possibly one scene largly comes across as a cardboard cut out monster, in my oppinion you could have lifted him straight out of the film and dropped anyone dressed as a vampire in to his place and given them some simple instructions, Cushing tottally carries him (and the whole film).

I know some people might have issues that this whole review has just become a piece in which to praise Cushing but heck its my review, watch the film and see what you think.  I just feel that Cushing had really gotten the role of Van Helsing and made it his, he had become the character and knew how he would act and what he would say. The ending to this film originally was going to be that all of the vampiresare killed by a swarm of bats released straight from hell via a black magic  ritual. This ending was rejected by Peter Cushing, who said that Van Helsing would never resort to using black magic, that it didnt fit the character and I have to admit that I do think it would have been tottally out of context and well jaring to see this version of Van Helsing do something like that (Hammer did stow the idea away and use it in a latter Vampire film). To me this is the mark of a good actor, one who gets a real feel for the characters they play and begins to breathe real life in to them and make them more than just an image on the silver screen. So I guess I will leave things here, its not a bad film, in fact it is enjoyable, heck if you like Cushing you will proberbly love it, it just doesnt compare to the first entry in the series.

Hammer: Horror of Dracula

I have often found myself talking about Peter Cushing on this blog, I have talked about him as an actor I admire, I have talked about his image being used after his death in a StarWars film and I have talked about the rose he commisioned for his late wife. I guess you can say that he has become one of the most repeated subjects on this blog, the last time I mentioned him was when I talked about the birth of the film studio Hammer and there birth. I ended this piece by talking about The Curse Of Frankenstein stating that it was a genre defining picture,which allowed us brits to usher in the return of gothic horror. I couldnt help but mention that this was due to three individuals one of which was  the director Terence Fisher and the other two were the fabulous actors Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing.

Well the success of  The Curse of Frankenstein gave Hammer the freedom to explore more adaptations, this led to them making Dracula (AKA Horror of Dracula) which was released in 1958. It stared Christopher Lee (Dracula) and Peter Cushing (Van Helsing), again as well as once more being directed by Terence Fisher. 


This film is a brilliant piece of cinematic history and as far as I am concerned it sets the standard for further Hammer vampire films. If you have never seen a Hammer horror film, then you are in for a heck of a treat filled with impressivelavish costumes and sets, plenty of buxom ladies, some of the red stuff (in this case, very bright red) and a penchant for period settings. Dracula presents all this with gusto. So just like in Curse of Frankenstein, Lee is the monster, and Cushing is the doctor but unlike that film Lee is not a sympathetic Monster here, no he is a dangerous Vampire to be feared while Cushing is a much more sympathetic Doctor, in curse of Frankenstein he was a man who thought he could play God but here he is a man who feels like he is serving the will of God and protecting people from the unholy. Both of these actors give brilliant performances here and they play against each other brilliantly, they dont seem to try to out act each other or to be the star of the piece no instead they seem to work in harmony feeding each other perfectly.

So is this Dracula a film adaptation of the classic Stoker novel? Well the best answer is not exactly. It taskes characters and themes but it is not a beat for beat adaption. The film takes place in Germany and Van Helsing and Harker are colleques studying the legend of Vampires.  The location of Dracula is found out and Harker takes a post working at Dracula's castle, he kills a female vampire (A bride of Dracula I guess) but then before he can find out the Count gets his revenge by biting and Killing Harker.  Van Helsing goes in search of Harker, finding his diary and his corpse the second of which he stakes. Van Helsing then visits Arthur Holmwood and his wife Mina to inform them of Harekers death. Arthurs sister Lucy was engaged to Harker and was living with them due to her recent illness, one which has left her pale and weak. I wont go further into the story and what happens as well I strongly think that this is a film that needs to be seen (yes I am avoiding spoilers for a very old film here).

So is Christopher Lee a better or worse Dracula than Bela Lugosi most people will ask, well he is a totally diffrent kind of Dracula. Lugosi was hypnotic and charming and to a certain degree sympathetic but Lee in this film was something else he came across as violent, dangerous, physical and well animalisti, he was a sex and violence Dracula. Against this we have a Van Helsing who instead of a little old man who happens to know the truth and is just wise and holy we have a Van Helsing here who is not just an expert but also an action hero, to me this film is the start of the idea of the kick ass vampire slayer which is now so common in all forms of media.

Once again I find myself toasting the work of Christoper Lee and Peter Cushing and this is only the first film in Hammers Dracula franchise.

April's Retro game purchases 2017

I started the months retro purchasing of nice and early on April the 2nd I finished work and on the way to my bus walked past a Game shop, there on a little podium they had a copy of Pokemon Stadium 2 but sat in front of it was a sign saying Pokemon Stadium £15, I looked again and yes it was the second one, so I ran inside and asked to buy it and thats how I got Pokemon stadium 2 for N64 cart only for £15, I dont know how theyd missed that it was the second one but its a great price for it and in honesty it was a cart I didnt particularly think I would ever get.

I got two other games that day but credit has to go to my daughter for them, she phoned me up and told me she had seen them in a charity shop and offerd to grab them for me , so thanks to her I got Dead N Furious for DS complete for £1 and Pokemon Battle Revolution for Wii complete for £3.

On the 6th of April I had a intresting day, firstly in a charity shop I grabbed Scrabble for the ZX Spectrum complete for 50pence and Bugaboo the flea for the zx spectrum complete for 50pence. I find it intresting when I come across really old stuff like this because it seems to fly under the radar of a lot of collectors, lots of people seem to believe that gaming didnt start until the NES came out which is crazy when you remember that the NES wasnt that big in the UK really, we were a very micro computer driven culture and this seems to be something a lot of people have glossed over.

After this I headed to an indy store where I grabbed a whole host of diffrent bits and pieces, I grabbed Dungeon Explorer for the psp complete for £2, Cyber Speedway for Saturn disc only £2, The Jungle Book for Master System complete for £2, Tom and Jerry The Movie for Master System complete for £2, World Grand Prix for Master System cart only 80pence andTroddlers for the SNES complete for £10. I think the strongest purchase of the day was proberbly Troddlers I mean its not often you get a complete SNES game for such a low price and it was an intresting one at that, not something mainstream which you would see on a regular basis, I would talk about it more but I recently reviewed it so I guess I have coverd it enough already.

On the 7th of April I went to a few charity shops and managed to grab, Tomb Raider (platinum version) complete for PS1 for £1, Final Fantasy X for ps2 complete for ps2 for £1, Burnout revenge for ps2 complete for ps2 for £1, Ben 10 Protector of earth complete for psp for £1 and Motor Storm arctic edge complete for psp for £1.

On the 9th of April on the way home from work I managed to grab 3 wii games for £28 Inzuma eleven strikers, kirby epic yarn and marbles balance challenge. This was partially down to Games buy 3 games get the cheapest game free stickers. What is intresting to note is that CEX charges around £35 for Inzuma Eleven strikers so yes although I already brought this recently it seemed to be one worth grabbing a second copy of to hold on to, and yes this is the second copy of Marbles Balance Challange I have grabbed but this version is a purly english copy, my original has a german manaual and a german case, sure if It had been paying loads Id have been happy to keep the german one but when its a semi rare game for what I paid its kinda cool to have another copy.

I also hit a charity shop where I grabbed Casper for ps1 complete for £1 and Baldurs gate Dark Alliance complete for ps2 for £1, they had lots of other games but these were the only ones in good condition, I really dont understand charity shops trying to sell some of the CD's DVD's and games they do sometimes when you can look at them and see in 3 seconds flat that there is no way they will play but I guess thats a subject for another post in the future.

On the 13th I got Gurumin for psp through the post it was £5 for it complete postage included (its an NTSC American version) I had heard a lot of good things about this game but usually when I have seen it its been £40 and in awful condition. I am not sure why but I have ended up with quiet a bit of a PSP collection with a lot of the machines best and brightest titles. I never really set out to collect Sony stuff at all my PS1 collection started purly by accident, I was looking for N64 stuff and practically triping over PS1 stuff and not being able to ignore it when the prices were good.

On the 14th I went in a few charity shops and managed to grab Guitar Hero 1 and 2 complete for PS2 for £2, outlaw golf 2 complete for xbox for £1 and project gotham racing (classics edition) complete for 49pence.

On the 16th of April I did something I have not done for a long time and thats go to a carboot. I havent been to a carboot for a long time for a lot of reasons one of them being my working hours make it very difficult but it was one of the main ways I used to get a lot of my retro stuff, but as more people learned the value of things the carboots kind of dried up. I made it three quarters of the way round the boot without picking anything up at all and then on one of the last stores I grabbed the following Halo complete for xbox for £1, Hitman blood money complete for xbox for £1, Star Wars episode 3 revenge of the sith complete for xbox for £1, Black complete for xbox for £1 Tenchu return from darkness complete for £1, Half life complete for ps2 for £1, GTA san andreas complere for ps2 for£1 and Cool Boarders complete for ps1 for£1. None of them are exactly standout titles but it wasnt a bad little haul really and it was nice to have a decent walk and go around a carboot again doing a little bargain hunting.

On the 25th I got Puggsy for the MegaDrive complete for £5, I have had a cart of this for ages but figured that for a full version in good condition £5 was a great price and so I jumped on it.

The very last thing I brought during April was got on the 27th and it was a cart only copy of the Japanese GameBoy Advance game Genius Boys Academy (Tennis) for £2. I have heard nothing but good about this game and figured that as it was never released here that I should grab it when I saw a copy for so little.

I figure this out to me having spent £91.99 which is actually one of my bigger monthly spends. I would normally be concerned about having spent this much but there are a lot of what I consider very important purchases for example Pokemon Stadium 2 for £15 was a complete and utter steal, and the same can be said about Gurumin for £5, spending £28 on Inzuma eleven strikers, kirby epic yarn and marbles balance challenge was also a heck of a deal, were those 3 worth buying though when I already owned them, well I guess time will tell.

Megadrive Box art, my love of the Japanese art: Teenage Mutant Ninja/Hero Turtles Tournament Fighters

So I figured I would keep on pumping out posts about Box art mostly because I love it, its a cool mix of art and advertising which I think often does not get the credit it deserves. Now the thing you need to remember is that back when these MegaDrive games were coming out there wasnt the internet like there is today, sure there were a few magazines which you could get information from and the odd TV programme now and then but the front Cover of a game was arguably much more important when it came to selling games.

Recently I have been watching a lot of a programme called Cake Wars with my girlfriend, now you might be wondering how thats relevent but hear me out. In cake wars four teams will be given a topic and they have to make a cake which fits this topic, now as you watch these cakes being made and decorated then even before the judges go near them you will have decided which one you like, which one you hate, which should win, why it should win. You get used to seeing certain things though and hearing certain terms. One of the things you always hear is that the cake must tell a story and there must be a sense of movement (They also say it must be obvious what the cake is made for). This is one of the things that made me think about Video game box art again, I wonderd if the stuff I liekd the most told a story and/or contained a sense of movment.

Well the cover is very obviously for Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles Tournament Fighter, what with the words being on the cover, in fact to my knowledge no game has been released without its title being on the box so thats kind of a given. There is a large Turtle face in this case Raphiel and there is also an image of him clearly fighting with an enemy and the fight does have a good sense of movement. Yet despite all of this 9I find it rather dissapointing, there are after all 4 Turtles and a number of other characters, if something is Turtles related then you kind of expect to see the 4 of them. One more thing I have to add bonus points for though is the Turtle on show being shown with the pure white more serious and dangerous looking eyes I think this being a fighting game thats the kind of right way to go  with the characters as apposed to the more comical cartoon varients.

The American case has the same basic art work but with a red border piece and a white back, it has a few more screenshots but thats because it doesnt have to have the same information on it again and again like the European one does with there being mutliple languages. I basically see these two cases as more or less equal though, there basically slight varients on the same theme. I dont have much to say that I havent said above so lets leave this one here.

Ok so I will off the bat just straight up admit that this cover the Japense one is my favourate cover, it has all 4 Turtles on it and 4 other fighters, you can see the action of Leanardo slashing with his sword and other characters brandisdhing there weapons, its almost like they are going to rush out of the cover and towards you and I think that makes it feel epic. It is not without fault though, the main thing being that the turtles have actual human style cartoon eyes so look a little less menacing than they could, also when you look at the Turtles skin theyve been given these spots of diffrent coloured skin which almost makes them look a bit like little old bald green men.

So I figured that I wanted to do my own Custom cover, basically it is what I would have liked to see be the European cover if it had been up to me. I kept the originals back and spine as I didnt have any issues with either of them, to me they were both classic MegaDrive. I then took the Japanese front cover and made a few alterations, for one I removed the Japense writing but then I made two stylistic changes, for one I gave the Turtles the plain white Styles eyes, but I also smoothed out there skin to remove the ''liver'' spots. So what does everyone think, which is the best cover for this game, which one would have had you pulling it down off the store shelves and taking it to the counter?

Megadrive Box art, A piece of Japanese art I dont like so much: Art of Fighting

So I wanted to continue with my previous topic and talk about Various bits of MegaDrive box art, but I thought for a change I would look for Japanese case that I dont like as much as the American or European case, surly there must be at least some games where the Japanese art is the worst art? Well here is what I believe to be just such a case, and its for Art of Fighting.

Well what can I say, its one of the latter blue boarderd MegaDrive Covers, which some people seem to like more than the old black ones because of them being brighter but in other ways I think they loose some of the class of the old black ones.  Overall I quiet like this case the art is good and large and very well placed, I cant complain much at all. I dont think its the perfect case I dont like the fact that the picture in the background on the back is just an enlarged part of the front art but its a fine case overall.

Well here we have the American case, if you take a look the main image is the same piece of art as the European but flipped with the contrast turned up and pulled back slightly so you can see more of the fighters, I also think the way the Logo is handle makes it pop out more and I like that. Also with the image being very blue tonned I think the red boarder works a lot better.

Now to start with I like the back of the case, I also dont hate the front of the case but I do think its just too darn plane, the central piece of art is a very nice logo and would look great on the back of a T shirt But I dont think it is right for the front cover of a fighting game especially not when this leaves the majority of the front filled up with plane black space.

I did think about building my ideal cover and what it would entail but I kind of figured it would be beyond my skills. So what did I want to see in my idea of a perfect case? Well the American front picture and the words Art of Fighting from off that cover but with a classic black Megadrive border and on the back I would like the main Japanese piece of art of the main two characters, and I would also like to throw the logo in but in a much smaller capacity. Such a dark bland front for a Japanese game when so many of there cases have such awesome bright pieces of art on the front was just so dissapointing for me to see