You know what the coolest thing is about Half Life 2 (and by extension other Source powered games)? It’s physics system. As fun as it is throwing glass bottles at combine soldiers, how cool would it be if we could just play around with it without having to worry about some goal or plot? That’s what Garry’s Mod is. It’s a standalone title that requires at least one Source game (Half-Life 2, Left 4 Dead, Team Fortress 2, etc) to play. You basically have two guns: The Physics Gun, which allows you to pick up and move objects, and the Tool gun, which is used for various tasks, such as combining objects. Players can import objects from other source games, and can even download community made props from the web. Multiplayer play is also possible, as players can team up to build contraptions. A recent update allows players to download community-created objects in game via the Toybox. Players can even modify game scripts using the LUA programming language. Garry’s mod is a cool way to show off the capabilities of the Source engine, and it’s a fun distraction for gamers. If you have HL2, Portal, Team Fortress 2, or Left 4 Dead, check it out.

Just a reminder folks! Today is MattyCollector Day for the month of April 2011. This week sees the offerings of Sy-Klone, Panthor, Re-issue Moss Man (unflocked ears), and the long awaited Weapons Rack. It should be a tough day for all since the Weapons Rack was not included in the Club Eternia subscription service so brace for MattyCollector impact and lots of White Screen wait times.

More pictures after the jump.
[Read the rest of this entry…]

Warner Bros has made many popular modern DC books into animated features over the last 4 years, and after getting their feet wet with fare like Under The Red Hood and New Frontier, they’re finally going to go for one of the biggest, baddest comics in their library: The Dark Knight Returns.

Returns tells the story of a 55 year old Bruce Wayne returning to his Batman identity after a decade’s absence. He confronts Harvey “Two Face” Dent, The Joker, and Superman at various points in the story, and takes on a new Robin as his partner. The series, written and and drawn by Frank Miller, is one of the most highly regarded in the DC canon, and helped lay the blueprint for the dark and gritty Batman that is best known today.

WB had a real misfire in their first animated production, re-writing and altering The Death and Return of Superman into a standalone 75 minute feature. Literally dozens of issues and hundreds of characters were cut from the story, and the movie still felt rushed. By comparison, choosing shorter stories (no more than 6 issues) to adapt has worked well for WB, and the bulk of The Dark Knight Returns should make into a fine animated feature. There are some thematic elements that may push WB beyond their usual PG-13 rating, but I certainly hope the original story makes it through unmolested.

Elements of The Dark Knight Returns were present in a Batman The Animated Series episode, “Legends Of The Dark Knight.” In it, 3 children share stories about what they know about Batman. One of the kids is a dead ringer for TDKR’s Robin, Carrie Kelley, and her tale depicts a 5 minute sequence almost directly lifted from the page of Batman fighting the Mutant gang. Michael Ironside provided the voice of Batman in this sequence, and would honestly make a fine choice to reprise the role in a full feature. See a clip at the bottom of this article.

An animated production of Frank Miller’s Batman: Year One is already nearing completion, and is expected to premeire at Comic Con 2011 in San Diego, with a DVD/Blu Ray Release following.

Tip via Joey O and [Bleeding Cool]

Didn’t read the original book? Its never too late to catch up on the classics.

Mortal Kombat comes out next week, but there is still more to be seen. G4TV had a trailer up for Shang Tsung gameplay, which I believe we have not seen yet. Be sure to pre-order your copy here before it comes out on April 19th!

USAToday had the first trailer for Rise of the Planet of the Apes coming to theaters in the United States on August 5th, 2011. James Franco, John Lithgow, Andy Serkis will be among the cast with Serkis voicing Caesar as well providing motion capture for the character.

Shadow Beast bio can be found after the jump! Be sure to let us know your thoughts on Shadow Beasts and their peculiar affection toward Teela in the comments.

[Read the rest of this entry…]

Warning, the topic of this open letter centers around crucial plot points of this film also known as “spoilers”. Read on only if you have seen the film, or have no interest in doing so.

From the Desk of aDam Gardner: Sad Asuka Fanboy

Dear Mr. Evangelion movie,

Thank you for the Asuka nude scene, 18 instances of Asuka fan service and last but certainly not least, the pervy unit 03 test suit which will forever be immortalized in pervy toys and merchandise by our friends in the east who have wisely decided that such a thing is culturally and socially acceptable…

I certainly appreciated that this film was a departure from the source material, while the first film was a less than compelling rehash of existing scenes. While certainly some details can be changed, there are certainly some things which are so fundamentally Evangelion that they should not be touched.

Simple themes like Shinji being a bitch with daddy issues, Rei being cold and boring, Evas fighting angels and… oh that’s right…

[Read the rest of this entry…]

A lot of stuff is coming out of Captivate 2011 now that the embargo has been lifted on their media spills. One of the tidbits that got out was a trailer for the game “Dead Rising 2: Off the Record” which looks to be an alternate scenario of the Fortune City outbreak, though instead of DR2 protagonist Chuck Greene, we have it told through the actions of DR1’s star reporter, Frank West.

Frank has already made an appearance as a secondary character along with Chuck in the DR2 DLC “Case West”. Looks like that wasn’t enough for some of Frank’s fans at the Capcom offices, because Dead Rising 2: Off The Record looks like it will be a full game separate from the original Dead Rising 2 game. (at least, that’s what the pre-order pricing on Amazon would lead you to believe) It’s currently listed to come out in October.