Posted by Notcot on Mar 4, 2011 in
Noir 
Night and the City (1950), directed by Jules Dassin and starring Richard Widmark, is the compelling story of a hoodlum on the make in postwar London. Andrew Pulver’s study of the film traces the film’s production history and places it in the context of British film noir and the urban mythology of its West End setting.
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Tags: City, Classics, FILM, Night
Posted by Notcot on Feb 26, 2011 in
Steampunk 
BioShock is a revolution in the shooter genre that will forever change the expectations for the FPS. Going beyond “run and gun corridors,” “monster-closet AIs” and static worlds, BioShock creates a living, unique and unpredictable FPS experience. BioShock is the Shooter 2.0.
After your plane crashes into icy uncharted waters, you discover a rusted bathysphere and descend into Rapture, a city hidden beneath the sea. Constructed as an idealistic society for a hand picked group of scientists, artists and industrialists, the idealism is no more. Now the city is littered with corpses, wildly powerful guardians roam the corridors as little girls loot the dead, and genetically mutated citizens ambush you at every turn.
- Take control of your world by hacking mechanical devices, commandeering security turrets and crafting unique items critical to your very survival.
- Upgrade your weapons with ionic gels, explosives and toxins to customize them to the enemy and environment.
- Genetically modify your body through dozens of Plasmid Stations scattered throughout the city, empowering you with fantastic and often grotesque abilities.
- Explore a living world powered by Ecological A.I., where the inhabitants have interesting and consequential relationships with one another that impact your gameplay experience.
- Experience truly next generation graphics that vividly illustrate the forlorn art deco city, highlighted by the most detailed and realistic water effects ever developed in a video game.
- Make meaningful choices and mature decisions, ultimately culminating in the grand question: do you exploit the innocent survivors of Rapture… or save them?
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Tags: ambush, art deco city, bathysphere, Bioshock, body, City, Ecological, experience experience, fps experience, gameplay experience, Genre, hand, icy, Impact, mature decisions, meaningful choices, mechanical devices, plane crashes, Plasmid, realistic water, revolution, security, shooter, shooter genre, static worlds, uncharted waters, upgrade, water effects
Posted by Notcot on Feb 26, 2011 in
Gadgets 
Elephant bean bags have been specially developed to enfold you in gigantic squashy comfort. Oversized and stuffed full of thousands of tiny beads they suspend you in blissful contentment and are perfect for relaxing into with a book or a late-night drink. Whether snuggling up in winter or basking in sleepy summer sunshine youll find sinking into an Elephant bean bag the comfiest way to unwind. And not only are Elephant bean bags big – theyre also beautiful! Available in a dazzling range of paint-box primaries and deep rich shades theyre a great way of adding a splash of colour to studio apartments sunny lofts family rooms teenage hangouts conservatories and living rooms – in fact anywhere you want to relax! Elephants look great as single bursts of colour but pairing them together or even investing in a whole herd can produce stunning effects. Here are a just a few of our favourite combinations: Zesty orange smoke grey and urban black make a funky set for city pads Team merlot red with real mocha for classy Italian-style interiors Set a neutral room alight with vibrant red shocking pink and zesty orange Pair ocean turquoise and shocking pink for a contemporary take on Eastern influences Couple smoke grey and urban black for a masculine monochrome effect Tone midnight blue chocolate brown or bottle green with classic decors Voluptuous adaptable reliable and strong – we think our bean bags more than do their namesakes justice. Beware imitations! *Please note that these items are shipped directly by the supplier and may be subject to slightly longer delivery times.
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Tags: Available, Bag, Bean, bean bags, chocolate brown, City, colour, contentment, delivery times, Eastern, Elephant, imitations, italian style, merlot, mocha, orange smoke, paint box, primaries, Range, rich shades, sleepy summer, splash, studio, studio apartments, stunning effects, summer sunshine, tiny beads, way, youll
Posted by Notcot on Feb 25, 2011 in
Steampunk 
There aren’t many games which list a critique of objectivism as one of its selling points, but then Bioshock isn’t like other games. Indeed the only titles it can easily be compared to are System Shock and its sequel, to which this is a spiritual successor. Instead of being set in a derelict space ship though the game’s story involves you exploring a mysterious underwater city after a plane crash. The city had been created as an art deco paradise for the intellectual elite but is now in ruins and populated only by grotesque mutants – both physically and mentally.
Although at first sight the game appears to be a first person shoot ‘em-up it is not primarily an action game. Your goal is survival, not extermination, with ammunition limited and many enemies far more powerful than yourself. You are able to upgrade your abilities though, both physical and psychic, by collecting Adam – the mutagen which was the cause of the disaster in the first place. Even so the best way to defend yourself is to play the creatures and environments against themselves, tricking one group into fighting against another or taking control of security robots and devices.
The game gives you full freedom to play the game exactly as you want, while at the same time creating a living world which carries on with or without you – with many creatures not even bothering to acknowledge you unless you attack them. With stunning graphics, especially the water effects, and an extremely disturbing atmosphere this could well be the most intelligently macabre video game ever made.
HARRISON DENT
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Tags: action game, aren, Bioshock, case pc, Cause, City, edition tin, freedom, full freedom, intellectual elite, mutagen, objectivism, person, plane crash, security, ship, sight, space, space ship, spiritual, spiritual successor, story, stunning graphics, successor, system shock, time, underwater city, water effects, way
Posted by Notcot on Feb 17, 2011 in
Steampunk 
Ichnographia urbis Londinii… (A Plan of the City of London, after the great FIRE, in the Year of Our Lord 1666.)
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An extremely scarce 1744 map of London showing Sir Christopher Wren’s plan for reconstructing the city following the 1666 Great Fire of London. In 1666 the Great Fire swept through the old Roman portions of London, laying waste to most of the original walled city. Christopher Wren, a well known architect of the period was quick to respond to the disaster as a opportunity to dramatically redesign and modernize London’s center. Wren having been schooled in Paris envisioned an elaborate classically influenced reconstruction of the city with broad avenues meeting in a series of Piazzas. Despite, or perhaps because of, Wren’s promptitude in producing a plan for a major post-fire reconstruction, his plan exhibits a number of dramatic errors. Wren did not take the city’s topography into account and consequently much of the this plan is unfeasible. Despite claims to the contrary in the document itself, Wren’s plan was never seriously considered by either the King or the Parliament.
Today Wren’s original 1666 plan is lost. This version was drawn in 1744 by the once fashionable engrave P. Fourdrinier, who claims to have replicated exactly a scarce 1724 original owned by the Earl of Pembroke. This map covers London along the north side of the Thames River from Strand Bridge to Great Tower Hill. Shows Wren’s detailed reconstruction plan, along with the regions originally destroyed by the Great Fire. Identifies the proposed locations of parochial churches, markets, piazzas, bridges and warehouses. A vignette in the lower left quadrant depicts Thamesis, the river god for which the Thames River is named. The upper left quadrant bears the image of a phoenix, suggesting that, like the mythical bird, London too would rise from its own ashes and be reborn in fire. The lower quadrants of this plate include the map’s title in both English and Latin as well as a detailed “Explanation of the Plan”.
This plan is highly uncommon and rarely appears outside of institutional collections.
Date: 1744 (dated)
References: Yale University, British Arts, Folio A G 11. British Library, Maps CC.5.a.197. Folger Library, MAP L85c no. 25.
Cartographer: Christopher Wren (October 20, 1632-February 25, 1723)
Christopher Wren was an English architect and geometer active in the later 16th and early 17th century. Wren is considered to be one of the most prolific and highly acclaimed English architects in history. In the late 17th century architecture such as we know it today did not exist, rather it was considered a branch of mathematics and as such was consequently an acceptable hobby for the gentleman of distinction. Wren acquired an interested in architecture as a young man and developed his interest through varied studies at Oxford. Wren career as a architect received a significant boost from the Great London Fire of 1666, which facilitated an almost complete reconstruction of much of the city. Wren is responsible for some 55 churches as well as numerous other significant works. In recognition of his accomplishments Wren was knighted on November 14, 1673. He was also a founding father of the Royal Society. Though sickly as a child, Wren lived to a ripe old age 90. Wren is said to have passed away after taking ill on a trip to London in order admire his greatest masterpiece, St. Pauls Cathedral.
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Tags: architecture, bridge, center, christopher wren, City, fire of london, fire reconstruction, fire swept through, fourdrinier, great fire of london, Ichnographia, King, map of london england, mythical bird, North, Parliament, parochial churches, promptitude, reconstruction plan, river god, Series, sir christopher wren, strand, strand bridge, thames river, today, upper left quadrant, version, waste, year
Posted by Notcot on Feb 17, 2011 in
Steampunk 
Follow-up to BioShock, 2K Games’ critically acclaimed and commercially successful 2007 release, BioShock 2 is a first-person shooter set in the fictional underwater city of Rapture. As in the original game, BioShock 2 features a blend of fast-paced action, exploration and puzzle-solving as players follow varying paths through the overarching storyline based on the decisions that they are forced to make at various points in the game. In addition to a further fleshing out of the franchise’s popular storyline, players can look forward to new characters, game mechanics, weapons, locations and a series first, multiplayer game options.
Set approximately 10 years after the events of the original BioShock, the halls of Rapture once again echo with sins of the past. Along the Atlantic coastline, a monster somehow familiar, yet still quite different from anything ever seen has been snatching little girls and bringing them back to the undersea city. It is a Big Sister, new denizens of Rapture who were once one of the forgotten little girls known as Little Sisters, known to inhabit the city’s dank halls. No longer a pawn used to harvest ADAM, the dangerously powerful gene-altering lifeblood of Rapture, from the bodies of others and in turn run the risk of being harvested herself, the Big Sister is now the fastest and most powerful thing in Rapture. You, on the other hand are the very first Big Daddy, in fact the prototype, that for some reason has reactivated. You are similar to the Big Daddies familiar from the original BioShock, but also very different in that you possess free will and no memory of the events of the past ten years. The question is, as you travel through the decrepit and beautiful fallen city beneath the waves, hunting for answers and the solution to your own survival, are you really the hunter, or the hunted?
The original shocked the video gaming world by not only being a great first person shooter, but also an intelligent one. Now one of the greatest stories in interactive fiction is getting another chapter, with a sequel set ten years later.
The most literate first person shooter of 2007 returns |
 The multiplayer mode features a completely different story and even developer |
 Will you save the Little Sisters or exploit them? |
 As a Big Daddy you can now venture outside of Rapture and onto the sea floor |
You play the original Big Daddy – a more independently minded prototype to the giant deep sea divers from the first game. The undersea world of Rapture has been taken over by the mysterious Big Sister, who has begun to kidnap children from coastal cities around the world.
A much larger range of plasmid powers are now available, as well as more standard weapons and the Big Daddy’s iconic rivet gun and drill. The game’s real conflict is emotional though, as you are once again forced to make a decision between sacrificing Little Sisters or protecting them and making your task even harder. Bioshock 2 will make you think, and not just about tactics.
Key Features
- Atlas shrugged: The award-winning story-telling of Bioshock continues with a new hero and a new threat in the underwater dystopia of Rapture.
- Evolve yourself: New plasmids, including new dual-wielded attacks, let you unleash amazing powers but at the cost of your humanity.
- Cry Little Sister: As the first Big Daddy you are far faster than the other lumbering giants, but equipped with the same weapons and the ability to venture onto the ocean floor.
- Big boss: Defend yourself against the constant attacks of Big Sister by setting up traps and ambushes, but always making sure you have an escape route!
- Separate lives: For the first time Bioshock has its own multiplayer mode – featuring a completely different story and created by developer Digital Extremes (Unreal Tournament 2004).
About the Developer: 2K Marin
Although founded in 2007 specifically to create new, original games the first release from this Californian developer will be Bioshock 2. The studio is relatively small and designed to work with Take-Two’s other developers, such as 2K Boston and 2K Australia in the case of Bioshock.
