Author: Steve Murray

2 Comments Posted on by Steve Murray Man Lab

Man Lab Showdown: Hannah Davis vs. Nina Agdal

With Sports Illustrated’s annual Swimsuit Issue having just been released, I thought that now was a good time for a themed edition of the Man Lab Showdown. As I’ve mentioned before on the blog, I didn’t peg Hannah Davis near the top of the list of favourites for the cover so my original plans for this Showdown didn’t come to fruition. That being said, I’m borrowing the idea from that for this edition and I’ll use another version of that idea for the next edition.

So for today’s Man Lab Showdown, it’s a battle of Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue cover girls. In one corner is the current SI Swimsuit Issue cover star and American sweetheart, Hannah Davis. In the other corner, the 2014 Swimsuit Issue cover model and Danish superstar, Nina Agdal.

More pictures and the poll after the jump.

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Battlefield Hardline Open Beta Impressions: Arrested Development

battlefield-hardline-bannerIt’s been about seven months since we last seen Battlefield Hardline. Back in June, EA tried to capitalize on the post-E3 hype of the BFH reveal by almost immediately launching an early beta of two game modes and one map for the upcoming game. At that point in time, the game was due for an October 2014 release.

In the time following that beta, EA, DICE and Visceral announced that the game would be pushed back five months to March 2015. As February began, EA took Hardline back to beta one more time in order to get a last big batch of feedback before it is launched in March. It looks like some lessons from the first beta were learned by Visceral has many more to take into account over the next month.

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Wednesday Link-Off: More Equal Than Others

miranda-kerr-wonderbra15-14Orwell once wrote, “All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others.” The frightening thing is how prophetic Orwell’s writing is today. I was actually just saying that Orwell’s 1984 is more relevant today than it was when it was published. The man was good and his books are just getting better with age.

And I realized something while putting this post together. I was supposed to do a Valentine’s themed picture to start the links. Let’s ignore that I forgot and just pretend I was on time with this photo of Miranda Kerr.

The fall and rise of American inequality. (NPR)

And your leading House Republicans aren’t rushing to change things. Paul Ryan thinks that the poor need to comply with the tax code more strongly. Of course. They’re the ones who can afford tax loophole finding accountants. (Washington Post)

Meanwhile, in Canada, the Quebec Education Minister says that strip searches of high schoolers is allowed if they’re “respectful.” If that isn’t among the most ridiculous things you ever heard, I don’t know what is. (Montreal Gazette)

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Coming Soon: The 2015 Hottest Canadian Bracket

Three years ago, we tried a little experiment on the blog. We got into the swing of March Madness with our first bracketology tournament, the Hottest Canadian bracket. At the time, it was the first bracket dedicated to determining the people’s choice for the hottest Canadian woman in the world. After a few weeks of competition, Kristin Kreuk was named the first Hottest Canadian.

After a short hiatus, the Hottest Canadian showdown is coming back in 2015! There’s just one thing missing: the nominees. We have a draft list ready and ranked but we’re not going to get everyone that should be on the list on there and in the right spot.

Hit the jump for a nomination form and stay tuned for the first round in March.

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Leave a comment Posted on by Steve Murray Humour

Facebook Fails of the Week

Every so often, we look at the most spectacular fails that the internet has to offer. Well today, we look at the most spectacular fails that Facebook has to offer. This week, we have five of the best fails Facebook has to offer.

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Leave a comment Posted on by Steve Murray Entertainment, Sports

NXT Takeover: Rival Review

nxt-takeover-rival-logoWhile the first stop on the Road to WrestleMania 31 was a disappointment, the WWE’s developmental territory was here to save the day last week. The last time NXT had a live special, it completely overshadowed the main roster pay-per-view that followed only a few days later.

NXT Takeover: Rival was the fifth NXT live special and it had massive expectations to live up to after the critical success that was R-Evolution. Fortunately, NXT doesn’t have to live up to this weekend’s WWE Fast Lane pay-per-view because it’s likely to be terrible. But could NXT live up to its own standards?

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Sunday Link-Off: Valentine’s Hangover

Good news, guys! Valentine’s Day has come and gone and it’s safe to come out of hiding again. Hopefully you didn’t screw it up and if you did, we’ll need your ex’s phone number. For research purposes only, of course… I think everyone bought that.

Anyway, it’s Sunday which means that it’s time for the links. Let’s continue going through some of the SI Swimsuit issue with Canada’s Kate Bock.

Global News was going to run a report on the Koch brothers’ connections to Canada. Then it was suddenly killed. What happened? (Canadaland)

Even more of Brian Williams’ reports are being questioned in the aftermath of his suspension. (Gawker)

How much is the legal weed market in Colorado? Only $700 million. (Washington Post)

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Leave a comment Posted on by Steve Murray Entertainment, Link-Off

Entertainment Link-Off: Valentine’s Surprise

anna-kendrick-thelastfiveyears15-04Hello, entertainment links fans. Steve here in for Jackie. While Jackie is dealing with the arduous task of hot Australian summer weather, I’m taking a break from shoveling snow to take care of the ELO this week. He’s lucky I didn’t show up at his front door unannounced. Since Tuesday, I’ve dug out from over a foot of snow. Jackie? The worst that’s happened to him is turning the air conditioning down a degree because it got a wee bit nippy. Yes, I’m incredibly bitter about winter and no, I don’t intend to complain about 40° weather this summer.

Anyway, it’s Saturday night and it’s time for the links. No, I don’t have a lot of Valentine’s themed links today which is the surprise. Okay, that’s a terrible surprise but there’s TV, movie and celebrity gossip news for your perusal today. But for something Valentine-ish, let’s start with The Lowdown’s official celebrity crush Anna Kendrick.

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Leave a comment Posted on by Steve Murray Columns, Video Games

Heroes of the Storm: Early Access by Any Other Name

blizzard-heroes-of-the-storm-logoHave you heard of H1Z1? It’s the latest MMO from the artists formerly known as Sony Online Entertianment (now called Daybreak Games). While SOE’s MMOs are all free-to-play, H1Z1 has launched as an Early Access title on Steam for $20. That price gets you immediate access to the game along with a few other perks. By all accounts, it’s quite obvious that it’s in the alpha stages of development.

The problem most people are having is that it’s a triple-A company that have gone the early access route. SOE has a few popular MMOs on offer already and with their financial backing from Sony and now Columbus Nova, it’s not like they should need the funding from Early Access sales to complete and polish the game.

But H1Z1 is the popular example of Early Access gone wrong. They aren’t the only example out there right now. Imagine my surprise a couple of weeks ago when I launched Battle.net and saw Heroes of the Storm waiting for me to click. The problem was that it wasn’t there to download. HOTS got a spot on my Battle.net launcher so I could spend $40 on the Founder’s Pack which includes immediate access to the game along with a few other perks.

So how is SOE and H1Z1 getting blasted for releasing an alpha of their game as early access while Blizzard is getting a pass for Heroes of the Storm?

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1 Comment Posted on by Steve Murray Columns, Video Games

The Bad, The Ugly and The Worst: A Look at Evolve’s DLC and Pre-Order Plans

evolve-bannerI don’t know how many times that people have to be told not to pre-order games for it to sink in but I’m not sure that it will matter. For all the convincing pitches that game companies themselves make with games that are broken on launch or otherwise in need of a lot of work to be considered of triple-A quality, publishers are coming up with ever more convincing pitches to get you to pre-order games or upgrade to more expensive editions of the game and it all comes down to money.

It used to be that pre-order perks were limited to things like skins or weapons or other little bonuses that didn’t really make that big of an impact on the overall game. Those traditional pre-order bonuses should not be confused with the setup that Turtle Rock Studios and 2K Games have come up with their latest hoped triple-A money printer Evolve.

In order to move pre-order copies of Evolve and to sell the various deluxe editions of Evolve, Turtle Rock and 2K have come up with one of the most complicated and ridiculous DLC schemes in recent memory. People have actually come up with charts in order to keep track of what is included with which version via pre-order, purchase, season pass and a la carte. Evolve might be one of the better games this year but its DLC will make it one of the most controversial at the same time.

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