Irish Dancers off to Scotland

Christchurch is rocking to the sound of an Irish jig right now. These four Irish dancers are raising funds to travel to the 2010 World Irish Dancing championships in Glasgow. Check out the video below.

Medal Of Honor Trailer

The Medal of Honor hype has begun.

Yesterday an exclusive debut trailer was premiered at the Video Game Awards on America’s Spike TV. All the footage is claimed to be in-game and, compared with Modern Warfare 2, the graphics are looking pretty polished and rounded.

In the video you can see there’s plenty of MW2-style aerial action, as well as some drivable vehicles. The helicopter controls are looking a lot more like you get to be in the pilot’s seat and rain down some awesome carnage.

SOCOM: What’s the new patch like?

I recently wrote a post on whether SOCOM: Confrontation was worth a look in while we wait for new toys to play with at Christmas (Yes, I am still waiting for Modern Warfare 2!)

It really does seem like now is as good a time as any to get into SOCOM if you missed out the first time round. The new patch has added a decent amount of fresh playability and cleaned up a few issues that plagued the earlier versions.

Don’t start thinking that it’s bug free. With Slant 6, that just ain’t gonna happen. A bug-free SOCOM would be like a Santa-free Christmas. It’s just not the same.

So as well as a much larger range of which mode goes with which map (it’s nice to play Control on Fallen for a change, for example), there’s also a new faction and new weapons.

Assassin’s Creed 2: World’s Shortest Review

Sometimes, here at NZ:RAW, it’s time to go to the pub. For that reason, I have decided to write the world’s shortest review.

Assassin’s Creed 2 is what you get when Shakespeare, The Matrix, The Da Vinci Code and Infamous all get together and have a child. This is a good thing.

Enjoy this quick video while I go for a beer. And hey kids, see the bit in this video where the guy falls 300 metres into a haystack? Yup. That happens in real life too. You can try this at home.

The Official World’s Largest Scrambled Egg

Sir Edmund Hillary
Lord of the Rings
Beautiful Mountains
Sheep
… and now eggs.
New Zealand is known for a few things and now it has an extra notch to its belt.

This morning, crowds gathered in the rain at Christchurch’s Cathedral Square in New Zealand to watch the official weigh-in of what is now the World’s Largest Scrambled Egg at 1.2 tonnes. That or they just came for the free breakfast. Article at www.redarmband.com

SOCOM: Confrontation – Still worth a look?

Can’t afford MW2 just yet? Need something low-cost to satisfy your thirst until Christmas? Haven’t tried SOCOM yet? Now is the time! Search through the PS3 or SOCOM forums and you’ll find a hell of a lot of people that have a problem with SOCOM. SOCOM Confrontation is the child we all love to hate. [...]

Protestors Could Learn from the French

These guys just walked past my office, heading along the freshly laid tram track of Christchurch’s Cashell mall.

The rally was organised by New Zealand’s Public Sector Union and supported by the Green Party. Sue Kedgley, Green Party MP, said in a speech to the rally:

The disability support workers, who are on strike today; the hospital orderlies, cleaners and kitchen staff, also on strike today, who earn as little as $14.62 cents an hour; Parliamentary services workers, clerical workers, school support staff, teacher aides and librarians, who are also taking protest action today and marching up Queen street tomorrow. Many support workers are working with the most vulnerable children in our schools, doing God’s work, yet they earn as little as $12.94 cents an hour -barely above the minimum wage. It is obscene.

Now I hate politics with a passion but thought that this particular subject was worth mentioning. Sue’s after raising the minimum wage from $12.50 an hour to $15 and that sounds fine to me. Good to luck to you all. Article, photos and video at www.redarmband.com

Christchurch. City of Tyre Smoke.

What Makes Christchurch Famous?

Yup, there’s a car in there somewhere. These are the people that I have the unfortunate pleasure of living next to. Is it a coincidence that we also tell them to turn their music down at least once a week? (And we’re no old fogies – I’m 27 and my wife’s 24).

You may think this looks like fun – when I was 17 I used to do the occasional wheel-spin from a junction but nothing like this. We had too much respect for our cars. You get over it when this happens about 4 times a week, and usually at 3am. We have to close our windows to stop the house filling up with tyre smoke and we both have to get up early for work. Remember the last time you got no sleep and felt bad all day at work? That’s us most of the time. See article and the result at www.redarmband.com

Borderlands Review

Two days ago I made a post on my first impressions of Borderlands. Since then, I’ve pretty much been playing it solidly.

I’m now up to around level 22 and can understand the ins and outs of the game a lot more than when I started.

At the beginning, it’s pretty tough to do any decent damage to anyone. Despite starting with the sniper rifle, I could have done the same damage to enemies but telling them their pals were calling them rude names. More at http://psgameface.wordpress.com

Killzone 2 Face Mine

Back in the day when we were all regularly playing Killzone 2, I noticed that you could stick C4 mines to other people.

Armed with this knowledge, I set myself a challenge. To place a mine on the face of an enemy player.

I documented the results and created the above video, which has been viewed over 2,000 times and counting, and tweeted about by Killzone’s own development team!