Movie Review: Breaking Upwards

Album Review: Mighty Tiger's Western Theater

What's in the Inbox: Stat Quo "Success (Back to U)"

Who knew actual arrests would ever get made over some online scamming of video game accounts? Last week a 23 year-old chap was arrested somewhere in England for in-game fraud. Olde English spelling aside, the actual report states he was arrested for “computer misuse offences.” The game in question is long-running, free-to-play MMO Runescape, a fantasy RPG launched in 2001 (and we thought WoW was old!).

The subterfuge included phishing e-mails and tricking players into releasing account information. Much like MMO-account hacking of old, the players were then stripped of items and sold for cash. The Runescape developers are pursuing arrests in the US eventually too.

What’s more interesting: this relatively obscure (and definitely lackluster) game has 1,000,000 active users still.

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The BBC Four is currently cobbling together a new John Lennon biopic entitled Naked Lennon. It will reportedly chronicle the life of the late singer between 1976 and 1971. During that time his first marriage ended and he began his relationship with Yoko Ono, so odds are it’ll be a fairly dramatic affair.

Geeks will be glad to know that Christopher “Doctor Who” Eccelston has been cast as Lennon. Whether or not he’ll be performing any music in the film has yet to be mentioned.

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Not to be content with only a week of “Black Friday” deals, Amazon will be running even more deals all day long for the latest of the made up holidays, “Cyber Monday”.

Gold box deals are running all day on the Cyber Monday page, and there are several other deals that will run all day long. Because some products are in high demand, they have conveniently added a little tracking bar to show you how many of each product they have left.

SyFy has ordered 13 episodes of Haven, a new series based on Stephen King’s novella The Colorado Kid. According to a press release sent out by the network, the series takes place in a small town in Maine (big surprise coming from King) which folks with supernatural abilities have migrated to over the years due to its ability to dampen their powers. Immediately after an FBI agent visits the town to investigate a murder, the resident’s once-muted powers begin to reveal themselves. Heroes meets Eureka, maybe? It sounds like they could have a winner.

Members of the show’s production team were partially responsible for The Dead Zone and Tru Calling, so they do have some credibility. Let’s hope they give it enough of a chance to catch on.

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It is with great sadness, but little surprise, we report that filming of Guillermo Del Toro’s The Hobbit has been delayed. “We’re currently working on the second script which we hope to have completed by the end of this year or beginning of next,” producer Peter Jackson tells a German newspaper. “We hope to start filming in the middle of next year. However, we’ve received no green light from the studio yet.”

MGM’s financial difficulties seem less at fault here than slow writing. As our source link mentions, Jackson didn’t say if this would affect the film’s potential 2011-2012 release date.

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(If you’re a comic publisher and wish to have your new releases posted here, email us)

Comics On-Sale:

ANITA BLAKE, THE LAUGHING CORPSE – EXECUTIONER #2

BLACK WIDOW & THE MARVEL GIRLS #1

CAPTAIN AMERICA THEATER OF WAR: PRISONERS OF DUTY

…This Week In Comics: Marvel Edition

As we reach day five of Steam’s early holiday sale we are given another set of dramatic discounts on a myriad of titles from now until 11A.M. EST on Tuesday. December 1 (That’s tomorrow, folks!).

This batch of sales is selling several titles for 30% off the standard price, such as Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood ($20.99) and Dawn of Discovery ($34.99). Several other titles are on sale for 50% off, such as Section 8 ($24.99) and The Chronicles of Riddick Assault on Dark Athena ($9.99).

Other deals include 75% off Mirror’s Edge ($5.00), Evil Genius ($2.49), The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition ($2.49) and 80% off the puzzler Quantz ($2.00).

It appears that we’ll be treated with another installment of Rare’s Killer Instinct after a thirteen year absence. The company’s Mark Betteridge recently said in an interview with Games TM that a sequel is coming and that it will be “different.” He indicated that they’re considering adopting Microsoft’s much bandied about Natal into the title.

So, a fighting game that would require players to engage in physical activity might eventually see the light of day. Could this give Wii Fit a run for its money? Stay tuned.

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Continuing it’s trend of introducing new holiday sales for day three of their five day sale, Steam is now offering large savings on a whole new selection of games.

For today only, you can score a copy of City of Heroes, Trine, Ghostbusters, Resident Evil 5 and Spore for 50% off the regular price. Joining those games is Order of War and the original Left 4 Dead for 75% off, and Borderlands for 33% off.

If you’re interested in any of those titles in the slightest, it would be stupid not to grab them today while they’re available.

Normally press releases bragging about sales figures find their way to the Insulinfunk trash folder relatively fast. That said, we can’t help but devour anything Activision sends to us in regards to the Call of Duty series, Modern Warfare specifically. The company announced this morning that the entire CoD franchise have surpassed $3 billion in retail sales worldwide.

“Call Of Duty has become one of the greatest entertainment franchises of all time,” says Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick as he lights his Cuban cigar with a flamin’ $100 bill. “If you consider the number of hours our audiences are engaged in playing Call of Duty games, it is likely to be one of the most viewed of all entertainment experiences in modern history.”