Cleared: Up in the Air (film)

I've been reading through Up in the Air, and it's been... ...odd. There doesn't seem to be all that much plot, and it has a kind of unfocused, dreamlike quality to it. For contrast, I decided to try the movie, which was just heartbreaking. That said, it's a very effective movie. The characters, acting, cinematography, writing and directing are all top-notch. I would recommend it, just be prepared to feel some real despair when the truth behind various things reveal themselves.

Vacation!

Well, stay-cation anyway. ;) I'm off work until a week from Monday; I should be able to clear a couple things in that time.

Addition

PC Game:
Sniper: Ghost Warrior

Cleared: ReWork

ReWork is a very cool little business book aimed at would-be entrepreneurs, the basic premise of which is that businesses don't need to be such a daunting thing. There's a lot of advice that goes counter to conventional wisdom about business. It will be fun to put some of this into practice someday. There's a lot there that indicated that much of what I find miserable about business needn't be so. It's an easy read, too. The concepts are explained in easy-to-grasp language and are free of jargon and "corporate-ese" and it's also broken down into manageable chunks.

Cleared: Singularity

Wow, was that ever cool! I just finished playing through Singularity, which, now that I've played it, has got to be one of my top 3 FPSes of all time. Time travel, alternate histories, and the coolest gimmick device I've ever seen in a game all rolled into one. The game is pretty, polished, and smart, and while you'll wish the TMD was even more versatile and could be used on anything in the game, it's still a very enjoyable and interesting experience. It bears noting that there's probably nothing you haven't already seen somewhere else in here in terms of mechanics, but the blend is very solid and the execution is quite polished. The writing was also really good and fills you with an eerie sense that things aren't quite right as you jump back and forth between 1955 and 2010. The influence of Valve games (particularly Half-Life 2 and Portal is evident in the storytelling and gameplay, and that's a good thing.

Cleared: No More Christian Nice Guy

This was an especially powerful book to me, because I've often struggled with what the author refers to as sins of omission. I've often done nothing when I should have done something. I have allowed myself to be cowardly, paranoid, and fearful at times, and I tend to value the known and stability. I shun risk. None of this is doing me, or anyone else, least of all God, any good. And this book just blew that wide open for me. Paul Coughlin makes a wonderful case for courage, assertiveness, and righteousness over passivity and not rocking the boat. Implementing what I've learned in this book is going to be hard, but It's going to be worth it. I'd recommend this without reservation to any Christian, and that goes double for any Christian man.

Cleared: Shatter

Shatter is a nifty little evolution of the brick-smashing game genre. The game has a surprising amount of variety, the ability to attract or repel objects with the mouse buttons, and some really entertaining bosses. It will definitely keep you entertained. Not much else to say, but I sure had fun playing it.

The new way of doing things.

Okay, so the "credit" system is making me stagnate and/or cheat. That's no fun, so I'm going to the following, much simpler system.

1. I can add whatever I want, whenever I want.
2. Whenever I finish something, I'll do my little capsule review.
3. I'll keep a running total of things I've cleared since the reboot.


Here's some more stuff:

PC Games:
King Arthur: The Role-playing Wargame
Singularity
Avencast
Darkstar One
King's Quest III Redux
Zombie Shooter 2
Battlefield 2
Shatter
Infernal
Hitman: Blood Money

Fiction:
Robopocalypse
Point of Impact
Daemon
Spook Country
The Passage

Nonfiction:
No More Christian Nice Guy
Why?
ReWork

Movies:
The Mechanic
Sucker Punch
Kick-Ass
Salt
Up in the Air

Cleared: The Hurt Locker

I just finished watching The Hurt Locker, and I'm trying to sum up how I felt about it. The film was very well constructed and rings true with what I've heard from friends who have served, military parents, etc. The cinematography is excellent, and the whole thing feels very authentic. I can see why it won awards. And yet, it didn't really resonate with me all that much. I didn't love it. I didn't hate it. It just kinda... ...was.