Author: Steve Murray

1 Comment Posted on by Steve Murray Video Games

Sang-Froid: Tales of Werewolves Review (or Cold Blooded Action)

sang-froid-box-artFor Canadian Gaming week, we’re looking at reviewing three games. Two will be indie efforts and one will be published by a major studio. We start our Canadian Gaming Week reviews, with the indies. It’s a recently released game from new Quebec-based developer that touches on early Canadian culture and throws it into a game that hits three different genres.

I’ve never been interested in tower defence games but I’m willing to give one a try if it’s from a Canadian developer so rookie dev Artiface Studio was able to take my $15 based on my Canadian pride. By the end, I’d say that Artiface’s Sang-Froid: Tales of Werewolves certainly earned it.

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IndyCar – Long Beach GP: Break On Through

indycar-2013-long-beach-sato-victory-laneIt’s been almost twelve years since Takuma Sato last won a race. That was the legendary Macau Grand Prix in November 2011. AJ Foyt Racing hasn’t run a race since an oval race in Kansas in July 2002. All it took for the two to break their losing streaks was to find each other as Takuma Sato picked up his first IndyCar win by taking the chequered flag at the Grand Prix of Long Beach.

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Is There Anything Jennifer Hale Can’t Do?

If you’ve play a video game anytime over the last 15 years or watched an animated TV show or movie over the last 20, you’re more than likely to have heard Jennifer Hale’s voice. The Canadian voice actress is one of the preeminent voice-over talents in the business today. She was even named “the most prolific videogame voice actor (female)” by Guinness World Records. I think that award might have to do with the 140+ games she’s been in during her career. In the last month alone, you could have heard her in Gods of War: Ascension, BioShock Infinite and Injustice: Gods Among Us.

Not only is Hale a video game voice actress, her voice has also appeared in over 60 TV series and over 25 movies.

Since this week is Canadian Gaming Week, I felt it was only appropriate to pay tribute to one of Canada’s greatest contributors to gaming and the queen of video game voices, Jennifer Hale.

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1 Comment Posted on by Steve Murray Video Games

2013 Canadian Videogame Awards Winners

canadian-videogame-awards-bannerThis past Saturday was the fourth annual Canadian Videogame Awards which celebrated the best of the Canadian video game industry for 2012. Having previewed and predicted this year’s awards, we kick off Canadian Gaming Week on The Lowdown Blog by bringing you the winners of the 2013 CVAs.

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F1 Bahrain GP: Yes, They’re Still Running This Race

Since the Arab Spring protests that started in 2011, Formula One’s stop in a country with protests has been very controversial. Many think that the race should be cancelled because a Grand Prix is just a way to legitimize the Bahrain government because of the economic impact of the race. Other’s think that making a decision based on political reasoning isn’t something F1 should do because it’s a sport.

Still, the race took place again amid the protests. For the second year running we had an all Renault engine podium and it was actually the exact same podium in the exact same order as last year as Sebastian Vettel picked up his second straight Bahrain Grand Prix win.

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Sunday Link-Off: Be Right, Not First

alison-brie-esquire13-03Tomorrow is the start of Canadian Gaming Week on The Lowdown Blog. We’ve got some reviews, columns and other features on Canadian games and the people who make them. I’m hoping that it’ll be a lot of fun and that we can do something like this again.

Anyway, it’s Sunday so it’s time for the end of the week links. For the third straight week, the Sunday links feature a star of Mad Men. This week, it’s Alison Brie.

For people trying to keep up with the news story of the Boston bombing, there was a massive problem. Some media organizations consistently kept screwing up the story by trying to be first rather than trying to be right. CNN might have been the worst. (BuzzFeed)

On the print side, the New York Post was consistently wrong. If there was a fact in this case, the Post got it wrong. (Capital New York)

And then the Post slandered a couple of high-school runners by claiming they were the bombers. Just a bit wrong there. (Gawker)

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Another 25 Reasons To Celebrate Earth Day

Monday is the environmental awareness day called Earth Day. It’s purpose it to increase awareness of the effects of pollution on the Earth. However, it also provides us an excuse to post a gallery of beautiful women from around the world that would also give you an incentive to save the world. It also gets us clicks which helps us keep the site viable.

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1 Comment Posted on by Steve Murray Video Games

2013 Canadian Videogame Awards Nominations And Predictions

canadian-videogame-awards-bannerNext week is going to be Canadian Gaming Week here on the blog. We’ll be looking at London, Ontario’s Digital Extremes’ Star Trek: The Video Game. The plan is also to put up reviews of Canadian indie games Sang-Froid: Tales of Werewolves and Papo & Yo in addition to a column or two.

First up, this weekend is the 2013 Canadian Videogame Awards which celebrates the best the Canadian gaming industry developed and released in 2012 as determined by a committee of developer executives and a couple of programmers. As we are wont to do with big awards shows, we have the nominees and predictions.
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F1 Power Rankings: Bahrain Grand Prix

Formula One supremo Bernie Ecclestone likes to claim that the World Championship isn’t used for nor is allowed to be used for political purposes. However, the Formula One World Championship returns to the Kingdom of Bahrain, the land that the press covering the Arab Spring forgot. From the sounds of it, things haven’t gotten better for the people of Bahrain.

I’ll write a bit more about that during my race and news recap. For now, here are this round’s Power Rankings, assuming that this race is allowed to go ahead. Since Bernie appears to be oblivious to how Bahrain’s leadership is using the Grand Prix to portray a positive public image, let’s just assume there will be a race this weekend.

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Wednesday Link-Off: The How-to’s of Business

chrissy-teigen-beachbunny13-14If it’s the middle of the week, it must be time for some links. Let’s start today’s post with Chrissy Teigen.

Filing tax returns is probably everyone’s least favourite activity. Even less so than going to the dentist. Naturally, TurboTax, a company that profits from allowing people to do their own tax returns, doesn’t want filing your taxes to be any easier. They even lobbied to keep from getting tax filing any easier. (ProPublica)

Meanwhile, Samsung has gotten to the top spot in the smartphone market through more legitimate means. (Businessweek)

There might be some political career threatening rumours over Marco Rubio’s head. The only problem is that some outlets aren’t willing to say what the rumours are because they probably aren’t true. That begs the question: Why are you mentioning that these rumours exist if you know they aren’t true. (Gawker)

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