New single from Zebra & Giraffe

Zebra & Giraffe have been relatively quiet for quite some time now, but that's mostly because they've been recording their fourth studio album, Knuckles. I wasn't able to make their recent stint of acoustic shows in Johanesburg, but that doesn't mean I'm not looking forward to their new album any less. In fact, after hearing the new single, I've been bad, I'm looking forward to the new album even more, and regret not making the at least one of the acoustic shows last month.

The video shows the band performing for a group of people who wouldn't look out of place at a Sons of Anarchy barbecue.

Mad Max - fourth movie, and a game coming in 2015

For the last couple of weeks I've spent most of my gaming time exploring the desolate future of Rage. In my opinion this game is an absolute gem. Yes, it has a few niggles, like a lack of an autosave feature, and the texture pop-ins, but it was exactly what I was after as my next game to play.

Rage is an open-world shooter with a terrain that essentially looks like a more realistic rendition of Pandora (Borderlands), with the vehicles and weaponry of the original Mad Max movie. In fact the game shares a lot of features with the original Borderlands, such as the bounty boards, looting, and of course, the various bandit enclaves.

Before I found out about the existence of Rage, I was getting quite excited over the future release of the open-world Mad Max game being developed by Avalanche Studios. While the in-game Max looks very little like Mel Gibson, and more like Joel from The Last of Us, I'm guessing the game's Max is actually modelled to look more like Tom Hardy.

What does the Bane actor have to do with Mad Max? Well Hardy is playing the titular character in George Miller's fourth instalment, Mad Max: Fury Road, which is also set for a 2015 release. I'm guessing it makes more sense for the game's Max to look more like Fury Road's Max, than like the original Max, Mel Gibson. This will help the game and film tie-in with one another, even if that was not the initial intention. 

We'll have to wait to see how these new additions to the Mad Max franchise will be marketed. But it looks like my desire for another open-world game, set in a dystopian future will be satiated by Mad Max. In the meantime though, I'll quite happily continue to get that fix from Rage.

All rise...

Yesterday, Foo Fighters shared the following 8 second clip.

While there aren't too many details concerning the clip, it's likely the either the opening vocal of the record, or part of a verse or chorus for one of the new tracks, possibly the first single. Either way, I'm really stoked for the release of 'Studio Album Eight,' especially since I'll get the chance to hear some of the new songs from the album being performed live in December. 

Fincher's 'Seven' as an 8-bit video game

I'm a big fan of David Fincher, and Seven (sometimes stylised as Se7en) is easily one of his best works. If you haven't seen it yet, then here's a summary re-imagined as an '8-bit,' side scrolling adventure game. Actually, if you haven't seen the original yet, go watch it first, then come back and watch the 8-bit version. You'll appreciate it a lot more.

If you liked this video, here's a similar one for Iron man 3.

Announcing 'Assassin's Creed Rogue'

This year Ubisoft will giving the gaming world a double dose of Assassin's Creed, hidden-blade stabby stabby. Earlier this week the "old gen." exclusive title, Assassin's Creed Rogue was confirmed, with a release date for November this year.

Rogue is said to include sailing (a popular feature from Black Flag), wrap-up the North American storyline, and tie-in with the "new gen." exclusive, Assassin's Creed: Unity.

While Rogue might sound a bit like a 're-skinned' version of Black Flag at first, after watching the trailer I'm sure the darker, potentially more interesting storyline will attract a lot of interest.

To be honest, based on the trailers alone, Rogue is a bit more appealing to me in terms of the story. Add the fact that I don't have a "new gen." console, and Rogue becomes the obvious choice for my next third-person, stealthy, stabbing, sailing game.

Unlike Unity, Rogue will not be getting a PC, or Wii U release.

Evolve delayed till February 2015

Evolve, the game that I was most looking forward to coming out this year, has had its release delayed until early next year.

I guess one of the advantages to the postponement, is that I'll now have more time to play Diablo III: Reaper of Souls, Alien: Isolation, Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor, Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel, Far Cry 4, etc.

The new release date is set for 10 February 2015, which means that it'll be out just before Valentine's Day. I've already been dropping my wife some massive hints about wanting this game, I hope she's been taking note...

Far Cry 4 will have honey badgers

You may be asking yourselves what's so special about a honey badger, well it's probably the most bad-ass animal of all time, Well at least according to this video:

I get the impression that the honey badger will take the role of the Komodo dragon from Far Cry 3, i.e. if there's long grass/ tall vegetation around, you're more likely to hear it than see it. And by the time you see the little blighter it'll be too late to run.

The distinctive 'hiss' of the Komodo dragon in Far Cry 3 is definitely what creeped me out the most while playing the game. I'd be aware of their proximity because of the hissing, but due to the vegetation I'd have no idea which direction the fast moving lizards would be attacking from. Even once located the buggers would absorb quite a bit of lead before dying mere metres from my feet. It seems I'm not the only one who felt this way about the Komodo dragons either.

I'm really looking forward to hearing more about Far Cry 4 before it's release, especially regarding how the "old gen." versions stack up against the "new gen.' versions with regard to gamelplay. I imagine there may be quite a bit of texture pop-ins, but if the PS3 version offers the same solid gaming experience, without the need to cut any content, then I'd consider a compromise in graphics acceptable. I mean both Borderlands and Rage (two of my favourite PS3 games) have noticeable texture pop-ins, but these don't have any negative effects on my gaming experience.

I'm still waiting to see whether I should consider placing a pre-order for Far Cry 4, especially since the Kyrat Edition looks pretty bad-ass itself, or wait for the first few reviews to come out.