The James Logan Courier

By Abraham Rangel, Courier Staff Writer

Shirock, an up-and-coming band out of Nashville, is blazing the scene with a very well-rounded album, Everything Burns.

Their single and lead track of the album, “New Solution”, is a strong message of finding out one's true self. Great guitar riffs just make the song have an empowering flow.

By Tish Wells, McClatchy Newspapers (MCT)

The further they get from Jane Austen, the better the zombie mash-up books become.

Enter "Dreadfully Ever After" by Steve Hockensmith, book three in a zombie trilogy that started with "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies," which was a combination of Jane Austen's classic novel of manners set in the early 1800s and contemporary zombie movie mania.

The first in the series was "Dawn of the Dreadfuls" by Hockensmith. Here the five Bennet sisters became trained in the ninja arts to protect England from brain-chomping zombie hordes known as "dreadful."

"Pride and Prejudice and Zombies" follows and is more directly based on the Jane Austen novel. Here, not only do the sisters do battle but they try to find husbands. Elizabeth Bennet meets Lord Darcy - a scion of a notable zombie-battling clan - they fall in love and marry.

By Nataniel Lazaga, Courier Staff Writer

"Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood" starts at the end of "Assassin’s II". It returns to the 16th century, and players play as the character Ezio, although the location has been changed to Rome because the city is three times the size of the old cities in the past game. A new location means a new enemy, and his name is Cesare Borgia, Rodrigo Borgia's son. Like the past title, this game still shifts into two different time periods. There’s a lot to do in this game, by playing either the main story line or contracts/missions.

The city is divided into 12 districts. Each has a Borgia tower, representing the control of Cesare. As long as the tower stands, the soldiers are out in force, and the shops will remain closed. Assassinate the tower's Captain and burn it to the ground and the area will open up for business, and players also get an open slot to hire an assassin. Ezio is then able to renovate blacksmiths, banks, stables and more, and these all add to his income, in much the same way that renovating Monteriggioni did in the last game. The more shops that one opens, the more items become available for Ezio to use.

By Billy O'Keefe
McClatchy-Tribune (MCT)

There may be no harder needle to thread than the one that forces you to take a great but steeply difficult tennis simulation ("Top Spin 3") and scale back in a way that makes it more accessible without leaving the devoted feeling alienated.

Fortunately in this case, "Top Spin 4" could teach a class on how to do it right.

In essence, all "TS4" does is level out the mountain without making it a shorter climb to the top. Anyone who wants to simply press the face buttons to return standard-issue shots may do so — and if you're quick on your feet and smart about your shot selection, you can win this way as well.

By Glenn Gamboa
Newsday (MCT)

When Alicia Keys declared herself a "Superwoman" on her last album — with an "S" on her chest, oh, yes! — she certainly had good reason. She had competed by herself, more or less, against one prefab pop singer after another with teams of handlers and armies of producers and songwriters for the better part of a decade and come out on top. From "Fallin'" to "No One," Keys had proved she was the real deal.

Maybe that's why "The Element of Freedom" (J) sounds a bit disappointing and shockingly incomplete. Though Keys is in fine voice, as usual, and has constructed even more of her trademark soaring soul anthems, the bulk of them sound a little short.

By Billy O'Keefe
McClatchy-Tribune (MCT)

Sports games have gone down the storyline route before, but typically it's in the form of a branching career mode that tells its story through boilerplate text. "Fight Night" has done that for years, and with the Legacy mode, "Fight Night Champion" does it again.

This time, though, the Legacy mode plays second fiddle to a new Champion mode that, while short and linear, goes all-in in terms of storytelling.

Instead of text, "Champion" offers up full-blown cutscenes, complete with plot twists, crooked refs, villainous promoters and, waiting at the end, the scariest bad-guy boxer since Ivan Drago.

By Arthel Cargill, Courier Staff Writer

A sweet, modern day twist on the tale of Beauty and the Beast, Beastly tells the story of Kyle Kingson, an egotistical teenage boy living in the upper East side of New York. Kyle has money, style, connections, girls, and, most importantly, good looks, but he runs out of luck when he stands up his misfit, goth girl classmate Kendra.

After giving Kyle one final chance to repent of his prideful ways, Kendra casts a wrathful spell on him that transforms him into a hideous creature. The spell can only be broken if Kyle can make someone love him for who he is.

By Julia Ortiz, Courier Staff Writer

In the new animated film Rango, the once-home pet and aspiring thespian, Rango, must now play sheriff to save the lives and homes of hopeless cowpokes.

The heroic Rango, voiced by Johnny Depp, a small reptile who dreams of a great beyon becomes entangled in a mess far greater than he can handle. He must makes friends to lead the way to the true spirit of the west, but along the way also makes enemies in the desert.

By Billy O'Keefe
McClatchy-Tribune (MCT)

This is what happens when a developer with big-budget talent and an independent spirit flourishes on a platform that allows it to flex both characteristics at once: You get a game in which you play as a Russian nesting doll.

(In case the term isn't ringing a bell, Russian nesting dolls are those little wooden dolls that fit inside each other. You open one, and a smaller one is inside. Open that one, and an even smaller one is inside.)

"Stacking" brings those dolls to life, starring you as a tiny stacking doll named Charlie and tasking you with rescuing your family from an evil baron who has kidnapped and sentenced them to involuntary servitude.

By Amy Kaufman
Los Angeles Times (MCT)

LOS ANGELES — "Battle: Los Angeles" is expected to wipe out the competition at the box office this weekend, leaving "Mars Needs Moms" searching for any signs of life.

Sony Pictures' "Battle: L.A.," an alien invasion story starring Aaron Eckhart, could open with ticket sales of $30 million to $35 million in the U.S. and Canada, according to people who have seen pre-release audience surveys.

But the biggest news at the box office this weekend is projected to be a disastrous debut of "Mars Needs Moms," a big-budget animated movie from Walt Disney Studios that is on track to open at just $10 million.

By John M. Glionna
Los Angeles Times (MCT)

TOKYO — Looking back, says the pop singer called Jero, the songs were a soundtrack to his childhood, the strange and sorrowful melodies enjoyed by his Japanese-born grandmother — traditional folk ballads he came to know as enka music.

In the early 1990s, Jerome White Jr. was a skinny mixed-race kid — three-quarters African American, one-quarter Japanese — who found respite from the tough streets of Pittsburgh's North Side in the mysterious music that emanated from his grandmother's living room. "It was in the background ever since I can remember," he says.

By Tish Wells
McClatchy Newspapers (MCT)

There is a lot to like in "Couture in the 21st Century," a collection of essays by prominent fashion designers edited by Deborah Bee, and produced in conjunction with the British department store, Harrods.

It's an excellent way to get a feel for the history of the century-and-a-half-year-old fashion industry started by Charles Worth in the mid-1800s.

However, it also provides some stark contrasts between the past and the present that might have been inadvertent.

By Billy O'Keefe
McClatchy-Tribune
(MCT)

"Killzone 3" cannot possibly surprise people like its 2009 predecessor did, so there's no honest way to write about it that achieves the level of awe those lavishly complimentary "Killzone 2" reviews achieved.

But that isn't to imply "KZ3" underwhelms at all. It tops "KZ2" in almost every respect, and while the story continues to fall short of its potential, the game's handling of moment-to-moment action — seeking cover without changing perspective, a noticeable weight and impact to every action taken, a vicious depiction of warfare — still sets it apart from any other first-person shooter.

By Brian McCollum
Detroit Free Press (MCT)

DETROIT — Spider Stacy knows it's been a while.

"Sorry about that, Detroit," the Pogues cofounder says immediately after picking up the phone at his London home, sounding almost sheepish. "It's been way too long."

For Michigan fans of the Pogues, the iconic group that singlehandedly launched the Celtic-punk genre in the 1980s, it's been an eon indeed: The band's definitive lineup hasn't played here since a 1989 show in Ann Arbor, when vocalist Shane MacGowan — one of rock's all-time debauched front men — was too drunk to make it through the night's first song. He was booted from the band two years later.

By Tish Wells
McClatchy Newspapers (MCT)


In "Willful Blindness" journalist and businesswoman Margaret Heffernan asks, "Why, as individuals, companies and countries, do we so regularly look at the mirror and ask how, 'How could we have been so blind?' "

When she asked people about the concept of 'willful blindness,' they gave examples on their own — abuse, divorce, Ponzi schemes, subprime mortgages. "Almost everyone mentioned the Iraq war and global warming: big public blunders caused or exacerbated by a reluctance to confront uncomfortable facts."

By Billy O'Keefe
McClatchy-Tribune (MCT)

In 2006, "Test Drive Unlimited" gave console racing game fans something — an open world swimming with other players driving and racing freely — they'd never had before.
Then four-plus years passed with no one else even trying it again.

So to call "Test Drive Unlimited 2's" arrival welcome is to understate a bit, especially when the sequel produces two freely-explorable islands (Ibiza and Hawaii) instead of one, adds storytelling and structural enhancements to the single-player side, increases event diversity, and fixes just about everything — from vehicle handling to interface design — that had room for improvement.