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Source: Babbel

Far Cry 4 is coming in November

So Far Cry 4 has been announced, and the location revealed to be a fictional Himalayan region called Kyrat. From the initial cover art (which caused a bit of a stir) we got our first glimpse the well dressed man, who is presumably the game's villain, seated on a dilapidated statue, with the vast expanse of the Himalayan  mountain range in the background. There are various weapons leaning against the statue, and a follower/ captive of the 'antagonist' kneeling in front of the statue. 

Offensive version of the cover

What caused all the fuss then? Apparently the cover was racist, as the 'white antagonist,' who actually isn't white, had his hand placed on the head of the Asian-looking, kneeling fellow. If the story is set in a fictional region, why couldn't the villain be of some fictional race/ tribe/ ancestry too? I mean, that's what they in Far Cry 3 for the Rakyat people. Secondly, the villain was assumed to be gay, due to colour of his suit. If someone can be labelled as gay, simply for wearing purple clothing, then there are a lot 'gay,' professional athletes in the United States, not to mention all their supporters too! Just look at how many teams wear purple jerseys; Colorado Rockies, Los Angeles Kings, Minnesota Vikings, Phoenix Suns, and the list goes on.

As a result of all this hullabaloo though, it looks as though the Far Cry 4 team has decided upon a new cover with the kneeling 'native' removed. The purple suit has remained in place, and unwrinkled though. Perhaps the second cover revealed the version for the 'Limited Edition' release, but I think that's quite unlikely.

More likely, the development team were pressured into removing the offending elements from the cover in order to avoid more negative outpourings about a game for which we have yet to even see any gameplay stills of. Speaking of gameplay, we should get out first look when Ubisoft take to the stage at E3 on 9 June. 

Offensive, or not, the cover art has done it's job; it's gotten people talking about Far Cry 4. I for one am looking forward to hearing more about the game, and seeing it in action next month. I'm actually quite tempted by the pre-order 'Hurk missions,' just to find out how events from the tropical island setting of Far Cry 3 have been interwoven into the bonus storyline of Far Cry 4. I guess we'll get to find out, come release day in November.

Now for the next perceivable controversy surrounding the game, how will the graphics/ game experience be hindered as a result of the 'cross-generation' release?

Killer Be Killed: full stream of the self-titled album

Killer Be Killed, a new supergroup comprising Max Cavalera (Soulfly, Cavalera Conspiracy), Greg Puciato (The Dillinger Escape Plan), Troy Sanders (Mastodon), and Dave Elitch (The Mars Volta), has appeared almost out of nowhere. The first I heard about the group, was when a link to stream the self-titled album appeared in my Facebook feed.

I've finally gotten around to listening to the album, and it's easily one of the best offerings from a supergroup in recent years. If I can find this at my local record store, then I'll definitely be adding it to my collection. Otherwise I could always ask my future brother-in-law, to grab a copy for me in the States, and bring it back with him next time he comes to visit.

Details on next Foo Fighters album, and Dave Grohl's TV show

I'm too lazy to write my own post tonight, so here's Consequence of Sound's take on the Foo Fighters' eighth studio album, set for release sometime during the Northern Hemisphere's autumn, and their post about Grohl's the HBO series.

If 'Studio Album Eight' is only half as good as Wasting Light, and the accompanying TV documentary series, only half as good as Sound City, then boy are our eyes and ears in for a real treat come autumn. The only news that could possibly be better than this, would be if Foo Fighters announced a three city tour of South Africa, starting off with a small gig at my wedding. I seriously wanted to invite the band to the wedding, but my fiancée said no because she didn't think they would come. I think Em said no because she didn't know who we were going to seat them with. I reckon we could just seated them at the bar.

My Hero

Games I've 'clocked' recently, and a poll

I recently completed the single player story of Far Cry 3. I even managed to do so without liberating any of the outposts on the southern island. So after completing the story I spent a few hours wrapping up all the optional missions, liberated all the outposts, and searched high and low to find all the remaining relics and chests.

I probably spent more time 'cleaning up' in Far Cry 3, than I did playing the entire story of the third game in this post. I even went so far as to unlock all the trophies related to the single player campaign, that's just how much I enjoyed exploring the islands of Far Cry 3. There is still the matter of achieving the six co-operative mission trophies before I manage to gain my first platinum trophy, but those will have to wait until I have someone to play the co-op. missions with. Perhaps I'll get a chance to complete one or two of the co-op. missions next month when my brother comes to visit.

Shortly after finishing Far Cry 3, I jumped back into Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag, and completed all the story related missions too. I had previously played through about 65% of the game, so thought that I still had quite a few more hours if the story left to play. Hence it came as quite a surprise that the final chapter was so short, possibly even shorter than the credits sequence.

Turns out the majority of the remaining 35% of gameplay was all the naval contracts, assassination missions, and hunting down of the remaining collectables. Unlike Far Cry 3, I probably wont be getting round to completing too many of these any time soon, as I didn't find sailing the Seven Seas in Black Flag as enjoyable as traipsing the jungles of Far Cry 3. Maybe I'll give it another go in a few weeks time, after taking another break from Black Flag.

A few days after finishing Black Flag I completed X-Men Origins: Wolverine, which had a much shorter, but still enjoyable story. The shortness of Wolverine came as quite a relief, as the previous three games I'd completed (Borderlands, Far Cry 3, and Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag) had all taken a vast number of hours to finish, not that I'm complaining.

Now that my gaming backlog is thinning out a bit, I'm on the lookout for another open-world, first person shooter. I've been having a look, and the three titles that come recommended as being similar to both Borderlands, and Far Cry 3, without being sequels/ prequels are Dead Island, Fallout 3, and Rage.

As such, I'm setting up another poll to see which of these three open world shooters you think is the best. In the meantime I'm going to take a bit of a break from playing PS3, as there is quite a lot happening in my life over the next  four weeks, culminating in a week long trip to an Indian Ocean island (or two).

Dying Light's release pushed back

Dying Light is no longer one of the next gen console games I'm looking froward to being released this year. Why? Because a recent press release (in full below) has the release date pushed back to February 2015.

Dying Light - Release Timing Announcement

Dear Gamers,

We know you've been waiting on a Dying Light release date for quite some time now. After careful consideration, we have decided to release our upcoming game in February 2015. Since this means Dying Light will launch a few months later than originally planned, we feel obliged to explain the reasons that influenced this important decision.

When we started the development of Dying Light, we were committed to innovation. We wanted to give you a freedom of movement unprecedented in open world games. After many improvements and months of hard work, we have now come so close to realizing our initial vision we feel we cannot stop before it is ready.

We believe the Natural Movement element of our game will change what you expect from the genre, and we don’t want to sacrifice any of its potential by releasing too early. This quality-focused thinking underlines all our development choices and we hope you share our belief that the gameplay must always come first.

The new date ensures that we can fully realize our vision of an innovative open world game. We won’t need to make compromises or trade-offs on any of the five platforms we’re working on. For you, it means an outstanding, original game that makes the wait more than worthwhile.

Finally, we would like to thank our publishing partner, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, which fully supports our decision. It’s a real pleasure to work in an environment where quality is universally accepted as the top priority. We believe that this is the only way to make truly incredible games.

We also have an additional announcement for you: starting next month at E3 2014, we’ll be telling you much more about all the exciting features and different aspects of Dying Light. Stay tuned!

-- Dying Light Team

I'm quietly enthusiastic about Dying Light. It looks like it'll be an impressive game, given the gameplay videos that have already been shared. The fact that there were already videos of the gameplay surfacing two months ago, makes the delay in release quite surprising. I'm guessing the developers wouldn't delay this release, unless they felt that the game would benefit from the delay quite drastically.

At least now I'll have more time to play either Alien: Isolation or Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor, depending on whether the PS3 versions of these games do titles justice. I'm hoping that there wont be too much of a difference between the PS3 and PS4 versions, although that be a little too optimistic on my part. Either way, Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel should keep me busy for quite some time.

Free EP from Rodrigo y Gabriela

It's been a quite while since I've downloaded anything from Noisetrade, but today's newsletter featured an EP from Rodrigo y Gabriela, which I couldn't resist. 

The Soundmaker EP features five tracks as follows;

The soundmaker (originally from 9 Dead Alive)

The Russian messenger (originally from 9 Dead Alive)

Hanuman (originally from Live in France)

Santo Domingo (originally from 11:11)

Diablo roja (originally from Rodrigo y Gabriela)

If you have not heard Rodrigo y Gabriela before, then this is a great introduction to their particular brand of music. 

Also The Soundmaker EP is available as a free download, so there is no reason as to why you shouldn't give it a listen.

DRK & LVLY Records - Beauty and the Beats Volume 1

If you've enjoyed the compilations from the Gravy Crew I've shared in the past, then you'll probably want to give the DRK & LVLY Records compilation, Beauty and the Beats Volume 1 a listen too.

DRK & LVLY Records is a Cape Town based, multi-genre record label established by artist, DJ, producer, and member of the Gravy Crew, Slabofmisuse. A lot of other Crew members, such as The Watermark High, and Card on Spokes also feature on the Beauty and the Beats Volume 1 compilation, which is available as a free download.

Listen/ download below...

Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare reveal trailer

Originally only meant to be released on Sunday, the reveal trailer for "Blacksmith" was leaked earlier today. We now know that the next instalment in the Call of Duty franchise will b called Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, possibly following on from the timeline established during the CoD: Modern Warfare series. The reveal trailer stars Kevin Spacey, who seems to portray a power hungry antagonist, in a high government position, who is planning to attack somewhere in the Middle East, but really has the people, whose land they are about to invade's best interests at heart.

The visuals looks great, although the story line may be a little dated, and or predictable from the initial looks of things. Maybe I'm just being too cynical, and jumping too conclusions.

Gary Clark Jr - Blak and Blu: The mixtape

It's been some time since I've posted anything music related, but here's a music post with an awesome Gary Clark Jr mixtape. Clark won the award for 'Best Traditional R&B Performance' at this year's Grammy Awards, and was also nominated for 'Best Rock Song.' Clark's music ranges from soulful R&B, to all out rock, and he puts on one hell of a performance. I was fortunate enough to see him perform live last year in Portugal, and it was one of the best shows I've seen.

This compilation, mixed by D-Nice, showcases Clark's repertoire of bluesy, R&B tracks. Some have been slightly reworked to add even more soul to them, and some have additional contributions by the likes of Big KRIT, Talib Kweli, Balil, and Alice Smith.

If you're already a fan of Gary Clark Jr, like R&B, or simply like good music, I really suggest heading over to Dat Piff to download the Blak and Blu: The mixtape for yourself.