While I absolutely love games and novels, I’m very cautious about comics. Comics are short, and most comic stories are pretty shallow and seem too short to be fleshed out. What I love about comics is the art, and Hollow looks amazing. It captures the gore and violence of the games as well as the post-apocalyptic setting. However, it follows Jace, who is one of the worst characters in the series. Jace is just average; he isn’t memorable like Delta Squad at all. Of course, you follow Marcus Fenix as well as a new guy named Barrick. I wasn’t too keen on him either. He’s a roughed-up redneck who smokes a lot and has rusty lungs. A new Gear named Gil pops up for a couple issues as he went through boot camp with Jace. Cole and Baird make a short appearance on one issue, but that’s it.
Delta Squad (Dom and Marcus) are out looking for surviving gears through the first few issues. Marcus and Dom are trying to get to Montevado to find survivors after the Lightmass bombing in Timgad and the sinking of Jacinto (Hollow takes place after Gears of War 2). On their way, they find a stranded camp called “Fucked.Nice name. Jace has flashbacks from firefights about when he was trapped in his home during E-Day and how he was saved. I just can’t get into Jace, not even in the games. He’s a very average character and very boring. I honestly just wanted more of Delta Squad.
They find a little girl named Lily in “Fucked,” and Jace promises to find her mother, so they take her along. I found this a bit odd because Delta Squad knows they can’t do that. Taking a little girl is too risky and can get them all killed. They should have left her “fucked” and come back for her later or something. Of course, there are some firefights with Locust, and the art does a good job getting the violence across. I just feel that this story is pointless and wouldn’t make a difference to a Gears fan. I want to hear about a part of the war that wasn’t told in the games, not about some boring character trying to be sensitive.
Hollow is a decent six-part comic series, but the art is the best thing about it. The story is pretty average and just unnecessary. I can only recommend this to hardcore fans looking to increase their Gears collection.
This is the fighting game all Nintendo fanboys live and die by. There’s nothing wrong with that. Brawl is one of the most competitive fighters I have ever played. There’s a huge, lovable roster, tons of stages, and a lot of power-ups to turn the tide of the battle. With the addition of online play, this is any Wii owner’s dream come true.
Once you select your character, a choice of many, you can select the color and also various stages from Melee and different Nintendo franchises. You can choose which power-ups to disable as well, but I just couldn’t get the huge roster. Link, Peach, Mario, Luigi, Bowser, Kirby, Fox McCloud, Ganondorf, Sonic, Solid Snake, Samus Aran, Ness, Jigglypuff, Wolf, Captain Falcon, and a ton of others. This is a huge roster, and nearly every character is recognizable. Once you get into the battle, that’s where the fun begins.
The brawl was confusing at first. It doesn’t play out like normal fighting. There’s no health meter; instead, there’s a percentage meter, and your job is to keep yours down and get your opponent’s up. You can reduce yours by eating food that falls, but the ultimate goal is to get the most KOs in one round. The controls are fairly simple, but they take getting used to on the Wiimote. The best way to play is with a nunchuk. Using the C stick to move around, A and B are your main attacks. B is your projectile or special, and A is your normal attack. You vary the attacks but use different directions combined with these attacks. C allows you to jump, and Z is your shield. This may seem way too simple compared to standard fighters, but it’s kind of a breath of fresh air. The attacks look awesome, and the fighting is fast-paced.
Various power-ups fall on the battlefield, like melee weapons, projectiles, and the one super finisher, which is always fun. Hit this orb three times, and you can unleash a deadly power attack. Just stand still and hit B. Some characters need to be close, some far away, and some hit the entire area and can’t be avoided. These tend to be deal-breakers for hardcore players, but they can be turned off. Honestly, the worst part about the game was how many bad stages there were. The ones where the levels constantly move up and down or to the right make the game feel more like a platformer than a fighter. I hated these moving stages. It distracted me from the core of the game. Some areas were just way too small, and there was no room to move around. There is a large enough variety, though, so everyone will have favorites.
Some characters are also unbalanced and overpowered, while others are underpowered. I felt Kirby, Samus, and Ness were overpowered. On the flip side, Zelda was underpowered and felt boring to fight with; the same goes with Wario. This may vary between players, but me and my partner both felt the same way. There is such a large variety that everyone will find their main character to fight with. I also found there was a lack of modes, with just battle and online. The game is complete garbage with the AI; this game is only fun with another person.
Overall, Brawl is a solid fighter that’s fast-paced and breaks away from the normal fighting formula. There are too many bad stages and overpowered or underpowered characters, and the game gets boring really quick due to the simple fighting system. The many power-ups will keep you busy, and there are a lot of customization options, but in the end, the game has limited appeal unless you are a hardcore Smash Bros. fan.
Honestly, for such a “new” series, it sure has repeated a lot. I think the new part should have dropped off long ago. We are seeing the same formula from New Super Mario Bros./Galaxy, and it hasn’t changed, not one bit. There are just a few additions to accommodate the Wii U gamepad, and those aren’t even that impressive or necessary.
If you have played games from the series, you know what you’re in for. This time around, the difficulty of the game is ramped up to 11, and the addition of a four-player co-op can either help or break the game. The biggest addition is the Boost Mode from the gamepad user. You can see everyone on the screen and tap to lay blocks that your buddies can jump on. You can defeat enemies for them, help with bosses, stop items from running away, and even help block obstacles. This is both a blessing and a curse. With just one or two people, it’s easy, but with three or more, you can’t keep track of everyone. If you lay successful blocks, you get a rainbow star, which makes you invincible and allows you to defeat anything. A lot of times you will place a block wrong and kill everyone because Wiimote players rely on the Boost guy a lot.
It’s also mindless fun, but the game’s difficulty will make everyone throw their controllers. I restarted levels 20+ times because I just could not get through them. Nintendo continues to offer cheats, and the worst one yet is the Luigi demo. You can literally hit a green block and watch Luigi complete the level for you, so you can move on. What kind of crap is that? Is this what we’re teaching the new generation of gamers at Nintendo? That game will beat itself? Half the time, I didn’t care because, after losing 25 lives and rotating the gamepad with friends, we just couldn’t beat the level. There is a large variety, and there are some fun power-ups like the ice flower, but most people will give up early on.
Another feature added is the Miiverse. It’s, honestly, just very annoying. People can post what’s on their mind if they lose or beat a level, and it just feels like Nintendo’s version of Twitter, but 5–10-year-olds can post on it, so you get incomprehensible words and strange drawings, and it just feels really annoying. Of course, only the gamepad player can post and see other people’s posts. You can also play as your Mii, which is fun, but these aren’t anything that would make someone buy a Wii U. Once again, Nintendo fails to sell their consoles for their own games.
The graphics really haven’t changed much from the Wii; they aren’t groundbreaking like Mario 64 or Galaxy was. I really feel this series is now dead in the water, gameplay-wise. Mario just needs a serious reboot. It doesn’t help that the game is overly difficult and all the new hardware features are forced, which can actually make the game feel worse to play. Even the star coins are nearly impossible to get this time, and there’s still no reward for getting them all. Going from one level to another just made me feel dizzy with Deja vu.
As it stands, NSMB U isn’t a console seller and doesn’t advance the series at all. The Wii U hardware features feel forced and sometimes break the game. It’s also the most expensive Mario game since the 64-bit era. $60 for a game you have played many times before isn’t a bargain. If you are already tired of the series, this won’t change your mind at all.
LEGO games have always had a charm, with large franchises like Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Pirates of the Caribbean, and Harry Potter. While they were all easy, they were just plain fun for all ages and had humor for the grown-ups as well. Undercover is about as close to a kid-friendly Grand Theft Auto as you will get. Being the spiritual successor to LEGO Island from way back in the day, LEGO City actually has a very memorable cast of characters and a fun story. The city is full of life, and there’s a lot to do here.
You play as Chase McCain, a LEGO City cop who has to bring Rex Fury back to jail, but it’s a bit more complicated than that. Chase goes undercover and works for various mob bosses to bring himself one step closer. In the meantime, his shaky love for Natalia Kowalski drives him further, as he needs to find her father. My favorite character is Frank Honey. He’s the stupid comic relief for Chase, and the dialog is just downright witty. The very first cutscene had me busting up laughing. Despite the child-friendly LEGO sheen, the game has humor for adults. I honestly really enjoyed the lengthy story, but the gameplay satisfied me as well.
The game consists of having several different disguises. From a cop to a fireman, astronaut, robber, miner, construction worker, and various others. Each of these has abilities you need to play through the story and find secret, hidden Super Blocks, costumes, and vehicles. You will see an icon on the ground for the tool you need. A fireman can chop down boarded-up doors; the robber can pry open doors; use his stethoscope to crack safes; and have a color-changing gun. The cop has a grappling hook, and the miner can use dynamite to break open boulders. Every disguise has a purpose, and by the end of the game, you will be swapping them constantly to advance through the levels.
Now, the game is very easy and simple, but it’s still fun. Combat consists of just pressing Y and countering with X. You can throw enemies, but you need to cuff them with an A once they are down. You can’t really die in the game; once you lose all four hearts, you just respawn in the same spot with no penalties, like in all LEGO games. Combat just gets tedious because of how easy it is, but it’s broken up with lots of platforming. Advancing your way requires you to use your abilities, but there aren’t any hard puzzles in the game at all. You just open this safe, take this key here, pry open this door, gather the required amount of superblocks, build this super build, and various other platforming shenanigans. Nothing really complicated, but it’s all just plain fun and relaxing.
When you’re not on missions, you can drive around in dozens of vehicles, jack them from people a la Grand Theft Auto, drive around finding hidden items with your disguises, and that’s about it, but there are dozens of hours of gameplay if you’re a completionist. Because the Wii U doesn’t have an achievement system, you may blow through the main story and never look back. There are 450 gold bricks that are gained by doing various tasks around LEGO City; some people may not have that kind of patience.
What about the Wii U gamepad? There are some interesting ideas put into it, like using it to scan the city for hidden bricks by holding it up to the TV, taking screenshots, and using it as an audio scanner during the story. Your contacts will call you on your gamepad, and they will appear and speak through it, which is neat but not necessary for gameplay. There’s no gamepad-only play, which will disappoint some.
This game is obviously geared toward kids, but adults who love platformers or even sandbox games will have a blast. The story has many references for adults, like a Morgan Freeman sound-alike during the prison stage, just like Shawshank Redemption. Towards the end of the game, a site foreman sounds like Arnold Schwarzenegger and uses his movie titles as puns. Kids wouldn’t get this, but parents would, and it’s just hilarious. There are other funny story elements, like the Italian mafia dealing in ice cream instead of drugs, and a Starsky and Hutch-type duo showing up halfway through. It’s all very funny and has some characters that have more depth than violent AAA games for adults.
In the end, Undercover is just a fun, relaxing game that doesn’t take itself seriously. It has solid mechanics, dozens of hours of gameplay, great graphics, and a lively city to play around in. The characters are memorable, and while there’s not much of a challenge, it’s just fun and full of solid gameplay.
Here we are again. Another Mario game to prove how good the new Nintendo system is. Super Mario 3D Land is another addition to the New Super Mario Bros./Galaxy formula that pushed Mario into a new generation. Honestly, I’m tired of it, but it still proves to be solid and entertaining.
The game has 8 worlds to play through, and each stage is completely different, so at least there’s variety. Each world feels like a mini-game from Super Mario Galaxy mixed with a New Super Mario Bros. level. The whole point is to just get to the end, but there are 3-star coins in each level. Here’s the problem with collecting all those: There’s absolutely no reward for doing so; it’s just to scratch the completionist’s OCD itch. Mario has his usual NSMB abilities, like the fire flower, Tanooki suit, Boomerang suit, and white Tanooki suit. Honestly, the game lacked any new abilities, which is a shame. I found that the Tanooki suit was vital to winning some levels and even getting some star coins.
At the end of each world, you fight Bowser, but there’s no variety to it. You work your way up to him, then you just avoid his attacks until you get to the button that knocks him into lava. Every so often, you will fight Bowser Jr. or the Koopa Twins, but they are all very easy. Speaking of easy, the first six worlds are a breeze with nearly zero challenges. The enemies are easy to avoid, and if you die more than five times, you get the White Tanooki suit, which makes you invincible through the whole level. They basically just let you cheat your way through. I really hated this, but at the last word, I found that I needed it because the game went from super easy to extremely difficult in no time flat. It took over an hour to beat the final Bowser level.
The 3D effects are pretty nice and work well here. There are a few instances in levels where 3D will benefit you to see the level layout better, but just like most 3DS games, it’s just for flash and not gameplay. I did find the graphics to look crisp and very pretty for a 3DS game, but they still look like Super Mario Galaxy and haven’t changed one bit. I’m bored of it. There are no extra modes, and once you beat the game, it’s hard to have a reason to come back. The story in the Mario games is pretty simple, so I won’t even go there.
The severe lack of challenge through 70% of the game just really brings the experience down. Enemies are a breeze to avoid, and there’s just nothing new to the overall Mario formula to make it groundbreaking like Mario used to be. Nintendo has been riding this formula for so long that it’s no wonder people keep buying it. I thought this would be kind of like Mario 64 in the sense that it revolutionized the genre and console; this game had that potential. While the game is just plain fun, I wanted a challenge. I wanted something new, like more abilities, a new art style, new enemies, and just a larger challenge. When you hit World 7, you will be in for a world of hurt because the game is just so damn hard. It’s the way the level is laid out; enemies are placed in tricky spots, but it’s not the fair type of hard.
Overall, Super Mario 3D Land is a fun game, but not the genre-changer that everyone thought. It sticks with the same tired NSMB/Galaxy formula that everyone is getting tired of. There’s no challenge 70% through the game, and the bosses lack variety. There are no extra modes, and the star coins offer no reward. What we have is just a fun Mario game with great graphics and 3D effects, that’s all.
Now that gaming on tablets and phones is becoming more serious and popular, companies are coming out with dedicated controllers for your devices. PowerA was one of the first ones out of the gate with their Moga series of controllers. This is the mobile version that holds your phone while you play. It’s Bluetooth, so there are no cords tethered to your device. The controller is very well designed and sturdy; it doesn’t feel cheap at all.
I love the ergonomics of this controller. The middle of the controller has a flip-up phone holder. It can hold up to 6″ phones, so everything up to the Samsung Note II. The top and bottom of the clip have rubber grips so your phone doesn’t slip out, and it keeps it from getting scratched. Getting the controller to connect is a breeze. The initial setup is done with the Moga Pivot app, which also scans your device for games that can be played with the controller. You can also navigate and launch these apps with the controller. The controller sits well in your hands and is powered by 2 AA batteries, each housed on either side of the controller. PowerA went for minimalism with this controller, and they nailed it.
The only issue with the controller is that it feels too rigid. The buttons aren’t very soft and make a loud clicking sound. The thumbstick nubs are a bit stiff, and there’s no D-pad. I like the L and R triggers, which feel great for shooting games and racing. I wish the controller had analog sticks rather than nubs. It’s really hard to adjust to these in a shooter; I had to turn the sensitivity way down in the game to make it feel somewhat normal. The controller is also lacking bumpers, which could have fit just fine. So there’s a bit of a learning curve with this controller.
At least it comes with two free games: Pac-Man and Sonic CD. It also includes a really nice leather case to hold your controller in. The biggest issue of all is that there aren’t many games that support this thing. There is a free universal driver app to use in emulators, which is probably the main reason why someone would buy this. I was able to play a GBA, SNES, PS1, and Genesis emulator with no issues. Other than this, this is well worth the $40 for anyone looking for a controller without having to buy special cables, root, or buy expensive apps.
The first Red Steel was a highly anticipated on-rails shooter. Back when the Wii came out, people were excited for the arcade-style FPS experiences it could bring home, but Red Steel failed on that delivery with bad controls, a bad story, and uninteresting enemies to kill. Ubisoft must have just thrown everything out the window because they took the same characters and put them in a Chinese/Japanese/Wild West format with a new art style. There’s still not much content, and it’s pretty bland, but the use of the Wii Motion Plus is top-notch and shouldn’t be missed.
The story is pretty quick and basic. You are the last of the Kusagari clan who is trying to stop the Katakana clan from getting a hold of ore to forge another powerful Sora Katana. Yeah, pretty boring; the characters are underdeveloped; and the whole story is a toss-up. Nothing memorable here at all. You’re here for the action. The game has two basic mechanics: swordfighting and gunplay. The game does a good job of auto-locking on enemies while you switch around with Z. Thanks to Motion Plus, you can swing with 1:1 accuracy, unlike any other Wii game out there. Hold your arm all the way back for a power attack; holding A+B allows you to charge your attack. Swing up to throw an enemy into the air, and swing down to throw them down. It’s pretty cool to see and do, but you unlock other powers and make moves along the way.
The shooting feels great and works really well. Besides shooting enemies, you can break stuff open to collect gold, which is used to buy upgrades, powers, armor, and health. There are side missions peppered throughout the game, but they are pretty uninteresting, and by the end of the game, you will just want it to end. See, the whole 1:1 sword fighting is fun, but there aren’t very many moves, and the game is extremely hard until you unlock them all. The enemies are pretty generic, but there is enough variety to which you have to adjust your strategy. You can’t just go around flailing your arm and hoping to win. You also can’t use every attack on every enemy. There are finishers you can use, and you must use them to your advantage. Some moves are nearly instant kills on some enemies, so learn which attack works best on what enemy.
The art style reminds me a lot of Borderlands, but it looks nice for a Wii game. While the art may look nice, it’s very bland. There are just a lot of blank, brown deserts and empty towns. The game is also very linear; while you can climb up a ledge to find some coins, it doesn’t go beyond that. After about 1/4 through, it just felt like the same thing and never ended. I wish there was more variety because the fighting system is excellent and shows how great the Wii can be. Once you beat the game, it’s hard to have a reason to come back. There’s no multiplayer, but there are challenge missions.
In the end, Red Steel 2 gives players a solid fighting system, but it’s wrapped around bland level design, linearity, underdeveloped characters and story, and a sheer lack of content. That’s not to say the game isn’t worth playing; by all means, go ahead. The Motion Plus tracking in this game is fantastic and really makes you feel like you’re sword fighting and shooting a gun. If only Ubisoft had spent six more months fleshing the game out more, it could have been one of the top games on Wii.
The Android family is growing exponentially and feels like a train hurtling down the track at 200 MPH with no stop in sight. The whole platform has grown in just a couple of short years with a quality market (and market storefront), more quality apps, and games, and now the addition of books and movies just makes the Android market feel like something to compete with the App Store. The devices are also really utilizing the system, and thanks to Google allowing open resource development of the platform, we get some really great apps and features on the phone that the iPhone, Blackberry, and other phones just can’t do.
Out of the Box
The Bionic has a great-looking box, but there’s not much beyond that. It comes with the standard battery, charger, USB cable, and 16GB micro SD card (cha-ching!) (I’ll cry if a phone comes with a car charger.) The phone came with a SIM card, which is new to Verizon and Droid phones. This is a 4G SIM card and is needed to activate 4G. When you boot it up, you can act like normal, but there’s one feature that was enabled on my phone that kept me on the phone with Verizon for over an hour until I scoured the internet myself. A certain little voice privacy feature was enabled that keeps your 3/4G off and, for some reason, was also enabled on my old Droid. Thankfully, disabling this turned my 3G back on, but that wasn’t really a problem with the phone itself. Once that’s all done, you’ll notice how fast the phone boots up (there’s even a neat Droid Bionic logo animation and sound!). Transformers anyone?) So let’s go over some of the hardware features.
Hardware Features
The first thing you’ll notice is that the speed of the phone is as fast as a computer. That’s the 1 GHz dual-core processor running everything for you at lightning speed. Why dual-core? Everything is just twice as fast and lets you multitask like never before without any type of slowdown or lag that you might even get on single-core 1Ghz phones. Compared to the iPhone 4S, it’s actually faster with an ARM Cortex-A9 processor. Yes, the iPhone 4S does have the same processor type, but it’s under-clocked at 800 MHz per core, so you’re losing about 25% speed over the Bionic unless you jailbreak your iPhone and overclock the processor.
The GPU is also slightly faster than both the iPhone 4 and 4S (they both have the same GPU) with a PowerVR SGX540 at 304 MHz, while the new iPhones both have an SGX535 model. The Bionic has faster and more memory with 1 GHz DDR2 memory, which is as fast as a computer, while both iPhones still use eDRAM and only have 512 MB. This means extra speed, faster app switching, and the ability to have more apps open without suffering from slowdown, lag, or crashes.
The Bionic also has 8GB of internal memory with the option of SD cards (up to 32GB), so with the standard model, you get 22GB of memory (maximum 40GB), while the iPhones are stuck with just the internal memory and you have to pay huge dollars for more space. The camera is about on par with the 4S with 8MP and 1080p support that lets you take panoramic photos, super high-quality video, and photos, and has an excellent flash. The front-facing camera is just 1.3 MP for video calling.
The only thing that the iPhone really trumps the Bionic on are the displays. The iPhones have 960×640 resolutions with 326 ppi, and the Bionic has 960×540 resolutions with 266 ppi. It’s not much, but it does make a difference when you compare the two. The Bionic does have a huge 4.3″ screen, which stomps on the iPhone’s 3.5″ screen, and is a true qHD screen (true 16:9 ratio), which is perfect for watching movies. The Bionic also has a mini-HDMI port for connecting to your TV, and even other high-end phones don’t have this yet. The Bionic has a higher contrast ratio of 800:1, while the iPhones have 800:1. This means it can display more colors and resemble more of an HDTV than a phone display.
Software Features
When you start using the phone, you will see it has so many great features over old Android phones, the iPhone, and Blackberry. First off, let’s talk about data management and sharing. The phone now comes with a file manager, so you can transfer files from your internal storage to your SD card as well as connect to your computer wirelessly and share files. The phone also supports DLNA, which can sync your media via Wi-Fi and upload media to your computer. The phone also gives a few options when you connect to your computer via USB. Instead of just the mass storage device option, you get a PC Mode that allows you to connect via a Motorola laptop or installs the MotoHelper driver on your PC and lets you access the SD card and internal storage. The software will also show any missed calls, texts, etc., which is a nice touch.
There are some nice pre-installed apps, such as the built-in camera apps, which give you a good range of options for video and photos; you now have a download manager; and MotoPrint, which allows you to connect to a wireless printer via W-Fi. There’s also a task manager, which is very useful to kill stubborn (read: poorly programmed) apps that won’t close. It also has an auto-kill list for when the screen goes out for 2 minutes. This helps preserve battery life (you’ll need it), but the phone does a good job of doing this on its own. You can turn the phone into a mobile hotspot (remember, it’s extra per month for this feature), plus all the standard apps like the task scheduler, calculator, and alarm are nice.
The market has a great storefront and has tons of quality games, apps, books, and movies now. The market just allows you to really make the phone your own, reflects your personality, and gives you so many options. The phone really has just so many great features built-in that make things so much easier for transferring data and media, as well as using the cameras and all the nifty hardware.
One thing I have to mention is that the games run smoothly on this phone. Using the PlayStation and SNES emulators, I can get games to run at 400 FPS with all the quality options enabled. All the high-end 3D games run without a hitch, and you will be unstoppable game-wise, especially if you can switch from a hardware-hungry emulator to the browser to check an FAQ, switch back, answer a call, or text someone, all without any slowdown and with all those running in the background.
When it comes to the basic phone features, it sounds great; the speakers sound sweet; calls are clear; and typing on the keyboard is easy with the huge screen. You won’t miss a pull-out keyboard with this phone.
It’s Not Perfect
The phone isn’t perfect; however, the battery is probably the biggest issue with this monster sucking it dry within a few hours. Sure, you can use battery-saving apps, and the phone has a built-in battery saver, but if you surf the net a lot or play games all the time, have a charger with you at all times. There also seems to be an issue with mobile networking, because it fades in and out a lot. I’m not sure if that’s my area or the phone itself. While 4G LTE is lightning fast (there’s a world of difference in speed), it’s only available in a few areas (mainly big cities), so I don’t even get it in my area. By 2013, Verizon said the whole country would get it, so we’ll have to see. There also isn’t a camera button on the phone, and a lot of people are used to this. The volume and power buttons are also really small and sometimes hard to press when you’re not looking. Other than that, this is an amazing phone and should be bought by every Android lover!
Update (6/17/13)
Now that I have had this phone for a full 2 years, I hate the thing. I have the same problem I did with the original Droid. I went through two years of crappy firmware updates, 4G constantly dropping out, sluggish, unresponsive everything, but at least the battery issue got fixed, but it took an entire year. I don’t know what happens with Motorola phones, but after 6 months, they just tank on you. I tried resetting the phone to factory defaults and replacing the phone, but neither worked. It would sometimes take minutes for a browser to load, and typing would be delayed up to 10 seconds, and it was frustrating and annoying. It also doesn’t help that the phone is huge and heavy compared to phones that are out now. It finally got the 4.2.2 Jellybean update about 3 months ago, but it runs worse on that OS than the 2.3 it came with. I will never buy a Motorola phone again. Sometimes the language would change randomly, but at least it didn’t reboot on its own like my last phone. While the Bionic is discontinued now and has been replaced by the Droid Razer and Razer Maxx, I feel mad about Motorola abandoning their Bionic users. The phone was the last to get the 4.0 ICS update, and even that had bugs of its own. Just don’t ever buy a Motorola phone; they are all the same.
Apple finally met its match; the Samsung Galaxy S III has sold more units than the iPhone 4 and 4S combined. That’s a serious feat. Why do you ask? Because Android OS gives you complete freedom to do what you want, not what Samsung wants. There is no iTunes that you are tethered to; you can put what you want on your phone; you can buy expandable media; the choice is yours. People loved that, and the S3 took off due to the form factor and Samsung’s smart marketing ideas. With the S4, Samsung has created the most powerful smartphone on the planet. Honestly, I won’t even compare the S4 to the iPhone 5 much because it is more powerful than that phone and the iPad 3.
Out of the Box
The box itself is actually pretty nice. It has a wood texture on it, letting you know you bought something classy, something with character—not a robot clone like the iPhone 5. Like wood, you can shape it and do what you want with it—make furniture, do some wood burning, or break it into pieces. Like wood, the S4 has endless customization options. The S4 comes with earbuds that are better than the iPhone earbuds, as well as three different earpieces for different size preferences. You will also have to put the battery in yourself, the back cover, and for some carriers, the 4G SIM card. Assembling your phone also lets you know that it’s yours; it’s not assembled in the box like an iPhone, and it gives you a bit more attachment to your phone. This sounds weird to some people, but it’s true; there’s a reason for all this.
Welcome to Android
For people who have used Android for a while (like me since 2.2), you will love the 4.2.2 Jellybean OS. Samsung’s personal touch is amazing, with many power-saving options, a great shutter menu, and the speed and precision of a high-end PC. Think I’m kidding? There is virtually zero lag even with multiple apps open, but that’s not the first thing you will notice.
The phone itself is the thinnest and sleekest phone around. Especially for the power under the hood. The 5″ Super AMOLED display is gorgeous and rivals that of high-end HDTVs. It has a 1920×1080 resolution; that’s a full 1080p resolution, which is the same quality as a TV. The screen is also 441 PPI, which is twice that of most other high-end phones. You are looking at pure, eye-catching, crisp visuals for movies, games, and photos. Nothing out there beats it. It also feels great; it’s a perfect rectangle with rounded edges. It has aluminum sides to make it look modern, and it also comes in black and white. I prefer the black because it looks sleeker, and the white makes it look like a stretched-out iPhone 4S. The volume rocker is very thin and blends in with the phone, and the same goes with the power button. The S4 has a home button like the iPhone and is unlike most other Android phones. It has a menu and back soft key, but no search soft key like other phones. I found this simple, and honestly, it looks like a better iPhone.
Under the Hood
For people who care or don’t care, the S4 is one of the most powerful phones on the market. It has a 1.9 GHz (there are 1.6 and 1.4 GHz models available) quad-core Krait 300 CPU. That is damn fast, even faster than most high-end tablets. It sports an SGX PowerVR 544 GPU, which will let you play the best games out there but is also extremely fast, and current games don’t quite push it to its limits; it’s a tri-core GPU to boot. In fact, it’s just one up from the PlayStation Vita GPU, and everyone knows it can produce near-PS3-quality graphics. The S4 has 2GB of LPDDR3 RAM, which means tons of room for app switching, and you won’t have any slowdowns. You also get a 13 MP camera, yeah. It’s the same quality as a high-end point-and-shoot, and the quality is amazing. There is also a 2 MP front-facing camera, which is better than most phones’ 1.3 or 0.3 MP FFC. This allows extra precision when using the smart gestures later. The battery also has a Near Field Communications chip, which allows for NFC to beam to other devices. You can also mirror your screen on another device to show them something. The S4 also features DLNA file sharing for computers and other devices.
Air Gestures
With the combination of the gyroscope, front-facing camera, and smart screen, you can do things on your phone without even touching it. One feature lets you wave your hand in front of the screen to answer a call, hold the screen with two thumbs and use the gyroscope to look around your pictures, wave your hand in front of the screen to scroll pictures, and various other features. One other feature lets you hover your finger above an image to preview it before pressing it. Honestly, these features are gimmicks and nothing more than something to show off to the public. The biggest issue is that there is a serious battery drain. Keeping the FFC and smart screen features on just sucks your battery dry in a few short hours.
Smart Screen
A few features are here, including scrolling pages with the tilt of your head or tilting your screen. It doesn’t respond as well as you think and sucks your battery down. You can also use Smart Stay, which will turn the screen off when you look away, and Smart Pause, which will pause the video when you look away. This all keeps your FFC on and will drain your battery in no time as well.
The Little Things That Matter
In the end, there are little things that are there for customization. Multi-Window allows you to quickly switch apps with a drawer at the side of your screen. There’s a great power-saving mode that underclocks the CPU and can turn off haptic feedback as well as dial back the color resolution on the screen. You will need these because the battery does not last long in the S4 with everything turned on. There’s also a little feature that lets you make your own vibration patterns, which are really interesting. You can have widgets and shortcuts on your lock screen, which most phones need third-party apps for; you can control the phone with your voice; and you can unlock the screen with your voice. This may seem pointless to some people, but the fact that Samsung put it in here means they care about the consumer. They give you all these tools, and you can decide if you want them or not; they are not forced on you. One thing that I do need to mention is that there is a lot of bloatware on the phone that needs to be disabled. I disabled nearly 30 apps that I would never use and just used up space and resources.
In the end, the Galaxy S4 is one of the most customizable and powerful smartphones on the market, and I would go as far as to say THE most. I have never had a phone that gave me so much freedom, so much power, and such great picture quality. The biggest problems are with the battery and the gimmicky features that help drain that battery. The air gestures and smart screen are for lazy people or people who like to show off; it actually takes more effort to use these than to just use the screen. Despite this, the S4 gives you endless possibilities with the most powerful and efficient mobile OS on the market. You are a fool not to own this phone.
The siege on Anvil Gate has always been a mystery to Gears of War fans. Mainly because the Pendulum Wars are never talked about in the games. The Pendulum Wars was a 70-year war between the Coalition of Ordered Governments and the indies, or independent nations. They didn’t want to be ruled under the COG, so they fought for it. The book jumps between just before the events of Gears of War 3 and a few decades prior as Colonel Hoffman during the siege of Anvil Gate. The recent events are the continuing survival of humanity, the search for more immunization, and the discovery of polyps and lambent stalks (seen in Gears 3).
I have to say that Anvil Gate doesn’t really go anywhere. It’s a more descriptive narrative than anything else. There’s not as much dialog as in other Gears books, and that’s a shame. The book doesn’t really focus on Delta Squad as much, but mainly Hoffman and Baird. All the events seen in Gears 3 are told here in this book, which is a great insight. The constant shaky line between the COG and Gorasnaya (the COG’s main enemy during the Pendulum Wars) is interesting to see, as is how they deal with the indies wreaking havoc and making things harder for everyone. I honestly can just say that Anvil Gate really shows you how hard it is to survive in the Gears universe. Not something the games can really portray. Sure, it looks hard to survive, but the day-to-day stuff isn’t really talked about.
There really aren’t any new characters if you have been reading all the Gears books, which is fine with me. The relationship between Hoffman and Mataki, as well as the occasional quips of Dom thinking about Maria, are interesting. We also get to see more about Marcus’ childhood and how Anya Stroud’s mother, Helena, and Marcus’ dad, Adam, served together. It kind of brings all the little strands together and ties the knots. All the little questions that you get from playing the games are answered here in a nice, cohesive tale.
I just wish there was some more action and some more shocking twists. The story just kind of ends and is really just a tale that puts all the pieces together for you—nothing spectacular or complex—but non-Gears fans won’t appreciate the novel at all. If you really love the Gears universe and want more insight on the Pendulum Wars (besides Aspho Fields), then give this a gander.
thebinarymessiah.com 
Clearly you have been blocking everything you or haven't played the game at all. Maybe pay attention to the story…