Author: Doug Groves

dougplanet.com is his personal blog, which is withering on the vine. If you poke around it, you’ll find out that he’s an animator and broadcast designer by trade, usually pushing pixels in either After Effects or Lightwave 3D. If he absolutely had to pick a favourite all time writer, it would be Harlan Ellison more days than any other. If you don’t know who Ellison is, then Doug weeps for you. Doug also likes long walks on the beach, mainly to collect improperly discarded medical waste for an undisclosed project of epic proportions.

18 Games Worth Playing From 2010

December 20, 2010December 31, 2010 Doug Groves 2010 Games, Assassin's Creed Brotherhood, Kinect, Limbo, Mass Effect 2, Minecraft, review, Starcraft 2, Starcraft II, year in review4 Comments

Whether you’re a casual gamer or consider yourself hardcore, there’s no doubt that 2010 was a busy year, regardless of your system(s) of choice. Last week I asked the crew here at RGB Filter to send me a list with a few of their top recommendations, whether they were blockbusters or something the mainstream may have missed. The goal wasn’t to come up with a Top Ten or pick Game Of The Year, as such awards are about as relevant to the intrinsic quality of a game as winning Best…

Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood – polished to near perfection

December 17, 2010December 23, 2010 Doug Groves Assassin's Creed Brotherhood, Ezio Auditore, review, sandbox, Ubisoft, Ubisoft Montreal2 Comments

Before jumping into the review of Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood, here’s a little backstory. If you haven’t played the first two games, and are one of those “don’t offend my eyes with spoilers” type, you’ve been forewarned. Just skip ahead to where it says “The review” and you’ll be fine. Some of this just isn’t going to make sense. A quick backstory The original Assassin’s Creed is a science fiction game, in which modern day bartender Desmond Miles is kidnapped by a company called Abstergo and strapped to a machine called…

exp. – You should be reading this

December 13, 2010December 20, 2010 Doug Groves exp, expdot, Gamercamp, Mathew Kumar, minus infinity4 Comments

Mathew Kumar has proven time and again to have a unique insight not only video games, but what it is to be a writer whose main focus is games. We first talked to him at TCAF 2010, where he was selling exp., a printed ‘zine format video game periodical that really breaks the mold when it comes to games journalism. He also delivered a keynote speech at GamerCamp this year that was both funny and biting, and one of my personal highlights of the day. He also announced that he…

Kobo makes ebooks easier for Canadians to digest

December 9, 2010December 16, 2010 Doug Groves Android, e-ink, ePub, eReader, Google eBooks, iOS, iPad, Kindle, Kobo1 Comment

Though not able to attend myself, Kobo held an event in Toronto last night to demonstrate it’s new iPad ereader software Reading Life. This in itself isn’t huge news, unless you’re an iPad user looking for a new reader software (although it does include “an industry first social eReading experience”). Kobo already makes ereader software for just about every major platform, whether it’s desktop OSes like Windows and OS X, or mobile devices. The timing is pretty interesting though, as Google has announced it’s jumping into the fray with Google…

FX legend Douglas Trumbull appearing at Lightbox for two nights

December 8, 2010December 10, 2010 Doug Groves 2001: A Space Odyssey, Blade Runner, Douglas Trumball, event, FX, La Jetee, special effects2 Comments

Douglas Trumbull, legendary special effects supervisor for science fiction classics 2001: A Space Odyssey and Blade Runner is appearing at the TIFF Bell Lightbox December 8th and 9th giving back to back presentations on the effects of the two films, starting with 2001 tonight. Trumball, more than possibly any other special effects artist in film, has defined the spectrum of the future. From the clinical crispness of 2001 to the advertising splattered dystopia of Blade Runner, almost every film since has operated somewhere within those ranges. Chances are, if you…

Fable III Giveaway – UPDATED

December 6, 2010December 13, 2010 Doug Groves Fable III, giveaway, Microsoft, Xbox 3606 Comments

Just in time for the holidays, we’re announcing the first of a few giveways we have coming up. This time around, it’s a copy of Fable II for the Xbox 360. You can check out our review here. How do you enter? It’s easy. Simply post a comment below, but whatever you say, make sure the word ‘Fable’ is in there. The Disqus powered commenting system allows you to log in using your existing Twitter, Facebook, Yahoo or Open ID account. If you have a Disqus account, even better! Optionally,…

BlackBerry PlayBook shows multitasking chops on video

December 3, 2010December 9, 2010 Doug Groves Blackberry, David Neale, PlayBook, Research In Motion, RIM, Rogers, TabLife, video3 Comments

Rogers today held their TabLife event, which invited a series of speakers to discuss the future of tablet computing in both the consumer and enterprise markets, obviously from a Rogers perspective. David Neale, Vice President of Special Projects at Research In Motion was on hand to demo the new Blackberry PlayBook and field some questions from the attendees. This short video shows the 7 inch PlayBook in action. While not yet optimized for dual core processing it nevertheless managed to show off it’s multitasking features rather well. While playing a…

Toxic microbe expands definition of life according to NASA

December 2, 2010December 8, 2010 Doug Groves announcement, arsenic, astrobiology, extraterrestrial life, GFAJ-1, microbe, Mono Lake, NASA1 Comment

A couple of days ago, NASA said that they would be holding a press conference that would “discuss an astrobiology finding that will impact the search for evidence of extraterrestrial life.” Any announcement from NASA regarding extraterrestrial life is going to be greeted with a lot of speculation, but the answer turns out to be a little closer to home. To the disappointment of some, NASA didn’t spill the beans on the alien captured at Roswell. Instead, the finding were a little closer to home, but not insignificant in their…

Great Canadian Cinema? Yep, at the Toronto Underground

December 1, 2010December 6, 2010 Doug Groves event, Good Canadian Cineman, Pontypool, Toronto Underground Cinema5 Comments

Starting December 2nd, the Toronto Underground Cinema is running a four day showcase Canadian movies, under the title Good Canadian Cinema? TUG ran an online survey, and the result is definitely an eclectic mix. Whether it’s the genre defining sex comedy Porky’s, which I haven’t seen since the days of mom and pop video stores, or the mind bending Naked Lunch, with David Cronenberg’s most under-appreciated film, it’s pretty clear that fans of the Toronto Underground have great taste when it comes to Canadian film. Friday’s co-presentation (with Rue Morgue…

Fable III review AKA grinding for the greater good

November 29, 2010December 7, 2010 Doug Groves Fable, Fable III, Lionhead Studios, Microsoft, Peter Molyneux, review, Xbox 360, Xbox Live4 Comments

I enjoyed the first two installments of Fable. Though never the most challenging gameplay Peter Molyneux and company managed to draw me into the world of Albion with their unique take on fantasy style role playing and a quirky sense of humour. Fable III is no different, and in many ways an improvement. I think there’s a fundamental flaw with the second half of the game, which can’t be talked about with spoilers, but don’t worry, you’ll be warned.

They Bleed Pixels teaser

November 24, 2010December 2, 2010 Doug Groves DJ Finish Him, Gamercamp, Miguel Sternberg, N+, Nidhogg, Shaun Hatton, Spooky Squid, They Bleed Pixels, Xbox Arcade Indies, Xbox Live2 Comments

At GamerCamp this year Shaun Hatton presented the teaser trailer for the new game They Bleed Pixels. Shaun, as DJ Finish Him, is collaborating closely with Spooky Squid Games in composing the music for the game. On Monday, Miguel of Spooky Squid released the teaser to the public, and describes the game as a “fast paced, gothic, low-fi pixel art, platforming beat’em up with a chiptune style soundtrack coming out on Xbox Arcade Indies”.

Sony Vaio P review

November 18, 2010December 2, 2010 Doug Groves lifestyle PC, netbook, review, Sony, Sony Vaio, Vaio, Vaio P, Windows 71 Comment

Sony first launched the subnotebook sized Vaio P line of computers back in early 2009, during the heyday of the netbook. At that time they sold the line as a ‘lifestyle PC’, and not to competitive to netbooks, though many of the internal components were similar to netbooks. Price was certainly one differentiator between the Vaio P and it’s component cousins, as the 1.33 GHz Vaio started at $900 US. Since that initial launch, Sony has made some much welcome tweaks, including a very handy touchpad and a faster CPU…