My big stupid idea has finally become reality, and I guess I'll color the logo to make it suitable for wallpaper purposes (maybe even make it into a banner for my GS account here - ACII made me mad anyway). There's a little problem though.

I have three variants to choose from, three different permutations of the logo which survived the thorough recreating and redrawing. Presenting:

Version N1, the first result, kind of looking stylish:

Version N2, more symmetry, grittier lines and more tone on the Decepticon aspect.

Version N3, the initial design, perfect harmony of the two images but overall loss of the general shape of both logos.

So, which one of these should I color? Of course, I can do all three, but just for fun, which one do you like most? :P

And by the way, in case you missed my updated Sideswipe I edited into my last entry:

All details on the Deceptibat and new Sideswipe are in the previous blog post (including the pics that I took inspiration from AND the link to Sideswipe beta), so please be kind to read through there if interested, I really can't retype now.

I know its my second blog in one day, but clarification of my inspiration to do this piece will take up some space, so I decided to post separately. Sorry! :)

So, below are two logos from VERY well-known franchises, namely:

Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen, the sign of the Decepticons, or the simplified version of the Fallen's face;

The Batman logo used since Batman: Begins, the best one so far in my opinion;

So, the idea to merge these guys came unexpectedly in my head. First, I saw the similarities between the Decepticon head top and the batman cowl, then I thought that spreading the first logo into wings would neatly mimic the batman one, and that's when I decided to draw it.

Naturally the first thing I did was to google it, then search on Deviantart to see if anyone has come up with the idea before. Finding no results, I moved on to sketching. A LOT of sketching, mainly in my notebooks when I had free time. The major problem was that one of the logos was eventually becoming a bit shifted and not true to the original, and the flaw soon became unavoidable. The sacrifice was the decepticon face, since the batman logo seemed more of a perfect form to me.

All the further detail, like wing breaking, eye changes and such came in drawing progress. Here's the result so far:

EDIT: Made a quick change, redirected the upper corners of the lower wings so that they are parallell to the con's ears. Makes the transformer look more organic and whole. I' keeping the original for you to comment the differences. New version:

Ok first things first, regardless of the more or less straight lines, I decided to do this in Artrage like my other pics. It looks more hand-drawn and effective this way, but that's just my opinion. After much labor, I simply decided to do one half, then duplicate and flip it (basically a cheat against realism, but I was reaaally "lazied" out).

What I'm still pondering about is the necessity to break the upper wings from the sides of the decepticon head. I didn't want them separately at first, but the idea seemed better if the decepticon's pointy ears were to stand out.

Anyway, this all is just W.I.P, no clear lines, no corrections, nothing yet. Hell, I might even re-do it in Flash or something, to make it more accurate (and decent for a wallpaper!). The version above is downscaled, the original will be 1600x1200. The project is simply named "deceptibat" , pardon me for the lack of imagination.

I sincerely ask not to duplicate or use this pic in any way, with the exception that you'll link to this page. However, do whatever you want with it once its finished :P

Comments please!

P.S. Sideswipe is frozen, sorry guys. This one just seems more interesting. The outlines I posted a while ago are right here, check them out.

EDIT2: And since SGTiD1NG0 here was upset with the aforementioned being somewhat "cancelled", I post this more recent pic for assuring him that sometimes I do re-work old things :P

Well it has been like this for a while now. And the coloring sucks, I know, don't mention it please....

As for the changes, well, I flipped the right hand (had a hell of a time re-aligning the fingers), which led to the utter removal of the back doors, since they clashed with the arm (resulting in an unclear mess). I guess the original pic isn't needed anymore, nothing to compare really. This one is practically a standalone project now.

Oh, and full size is right here in my new album if anyone's interested.

Main Event:

With Republic Commando and Batman finished, I'm left with practically nothing to play and review. And until some other blockbuster hits the shelves and purchases my attention, I've decided to get back to my Sideswipe pic and color it (it is already done - more or less, but looks like crap. I'm gonna need to apply more shadows/lighting). I've also come up with a veeery original logo idea (of what, how, and why - not gonna say), I'll probably post it soon enough.

The irony is that Se7en always installed my hardware by itself, even my Chillstream (which REQUIRES a driver CD to work) was recognized automatically, so I decided to just plug in my tablet. Sure enough, it installed all by itself, with one little flaw: the surface had touchpad-based interactivity. I had to uninstall those invisibledrivers from God knows where, dig up my original CD, and only then plug the tablet back(which worked - hopefully).

Gaming Progress:

RC was finished yesterday, and I gotta say, even the ending is masterfully crafted, climatic inthe way it should be. How you leave your team members, one after another, behind and your strength literally drops off while the enemies grow stronger. The time when you and Scorch alone battle a Dwarf Spider Droid (and even a Bodyguard I think) was a true test of one's skills. And of course the surprise at the end of the mission. Very atmospheric.

Reviews:

Dead period guys. I may do another oldie-review, but its unlikely. Maybe review a movie again...? Anything can happen. But expect nothing in particular from me, at least for another week.

Trailermania:

Yeah, I decided to make my trailer-rant a blog sub-category rather than a whole entry altogether. So, I watched the SECOND ACII gameplay trailer AND the assassination arsenal trailer right now. What can I say, the music choices are good this time, and, like everyone, I was surprised to see that Leonardo was not a witty grandpa with long grey beard, but a young, passionate inventor being a good friend of Ezio's.

Yet it seems that a valid trailer move would be to show a new location. Regardless of their size, Florence and Venice alone seem... not much. We need a third town!

News:

• Am I the only one finding that Adrien Brody playing in Predators is a joke? I mean, he's a great actor and everything, even managed King Kong, but come on.
• Oren Peli, the director of the excellent horror movie Paranormal Activity, is soon gonna shoot a kind-of-sequel, with the unsecretive name, Area 51. Launch speculations.... now.
• Ubisoft bought Nadeo. Ring any bells? Trackmania, people. Coming up from Ubi. Gonna be fun.
• Another PC-delay: Modern Warfare 2. We're gonna need to endure an additional 2 weeks to play it. Not as bad of a shock for me as Assassin's Creed II, but still, people are gonna get crazy.

Reviews:

It happened really quickly honestly, wrote it in about two or three hours. I haven't even finished the game yet, but the memories became more and more clear while I progressed, even remembering the atmospheric ending,and had a formulated opinion by day's end, so I decided to have a shot and review it. The text is not as long as I usually write, and almost none of the gameplay nuances are throughoutly explored, focusing instead on all the nostalgia and value I had experienced. I really need your opinions on this one guys, because its highly probable that I missed out something important.

Still, it was a powerful game at its time. Really impressive in all aspects.

EDIT: Just reposted the review on Gamefury, as well as the Reviewers Union. Both are screen-reinforced editions!

By the way, here's my Resident Evil 5 review on Gameobserver.

Gaming Progress:

Currently on Kashyyk in RC, level 3 from 3. Just defeated Bodyguards in the first encounter and freed the Wookie leader, who's name I've already forgotten, damn it.It begun with a "T", that's for sure. I really get irritated by such minor memory flaws :P

News:

None today, happens wih frequent blogging. Forgive please!

Main Event:

So after beginning to read Hard Contact, I got crushed by a formidable wave of nostalgia, so it was only natural that I started rummaging through the house until I discovered my 2-disc set of Star Wars: Republic Commando. It seemed like the perfect way to drift back into the universe and get somewhat ready for The Force Unleashed USE.

One interesting thing is that I've already tried reinstalling it about a year ago, but my new system had problems causing crashes and artifacts. Now, with Windows 7, it runs flawlessly. It's a truly amazing game, I still remember how I constantly replayed the Star Destroyer level just for the fun of teamless exploring, and the ending on Kashyyk... good times. Hopefully soon to be reprised!

Gaming Progress:

I'm currently about halfway through the Geonisis level (that's the first of three), prior to entering the Core Ship. Got pwned by Super Battle Droids at the entrance, decided to have a break :P

I've also just discovered the last Arkham Secret in Batman: Arkham Asylum. It appeared to be... well, without spoiling anything, I'll just say I was not surprised to learn the identity of "the Ghost". I mean, they used the same voice actor and such...

Reviews:

Star Wars: RC coming in about a week, since I know of it's reputation as being quite short (though in my days I tried to stretch the progress as hard as I could). I reckon it's my first review of an older-than-usual game here, so it'll be an interesting writing experience for me.

My Resident Evil 5 review is due to be posted at Gameobserver shorty, as well.

News:

• For me, the main news was Michael Bay announcing Transformers 3 for 2011 (was aimed for 2012 originally). Pleasant surprise!
• Just watched the GT review for Uncharted 2. MINDBLOWING game, absolutely mindblowing. I was genuinely amazed, I haven't really seen much videos before, but the scale, the action, even facial expressions were astounding. The 9.3 score seemed... sorry, but low. Give it MOAR!
• Bad news from piracy. PS3 has been chip modded, "officially", but the process is very intricate and there is no guarantee for it to work constantly. But still, that sucks. Source.
• There may be constant rivalry between the visuals of Forza Motorsport 3 and Gran Turismo 5, but these screens permanently bought me to the latter. Gran Turismo just looks... real. Forza 3 is amazing. GT is real. That's my opinion.
• Learning about new games being made into movies is satisfying, but not always. Guess who's getting a movie this time? SPORE! Fox and EA team up to CGI the thing. One question demands answering: Storyline...?
• And lastly, in case you're interested, a formidable preview of one of Halo Legends episodes.

Yep, you heard it. First review in a long time, for Resident Evil 5. Be free to check it out, it's soon gonna get reposted at the Reviewers union and Gamefury.

I know the blog's short, it's just that I'm kind ofin a hurry. I'll probably edit it sometime later.

EDIT#1: So I'm back now, phew, might as well stop by and clear things up.

So this review was, in my opinion, a standard article from me, 3 pages, from someone not THAT interested in Resident Evil, but pretty experienced with the series. It isn't forced or overly-fanboysmed (ew. Horrible new term), and I tried to use all the terminology I could to make it sound pretty :P Though my word dictionary was never enough for me... anyway.

Here it is on Gamefury, aaand soon will also be reposted on Gameobserver (with a less rounded-up score of 88 ).

Not really much to add to this blog really. Probably some news:

• A Collector's Edition SC: Convictionhas beenannounced, lots of goodies inside like comics, exlusive in-game weapon codes and a figure of good old Sam.
• Uncharted 2 is practically the most positively-reviewed game AT ALL TIMES on the PS3. On Metacritic, anyway, with an average score of 98%, on par with GTAIV. For comparison, LittleBigPlanet has 95%, while MGS 4 has 94%. Amazing.
• COD: Modern Warfare 2 hype grows Halo 3-styIe - energy drinks. I-I mean,what's next? :P
• Shooting of Resident Evil: Afterlife has started in Canada. Fingers CROSSED. DON'T screw this up, people....
• ...Especially after the writer of Silent Hill 2: The Movie got arrested for causing a car crash! A year in jail. He was also gonna shoot Castlevania. So unfortunate.
• And lastly. I actually LIKE Borderlands now, even consider it as a buying candidate. Oh, decisions, decisions...

Main Event:

I guess that me posting here counts as an event for itself. I've been completely absent and inactive for a few days, sorry for all those uncommented blogs and uncontributed unions everyone :( I guess I'll try to compensate what I can while I'm at it.

Surprises:

Physical first, I got myself (whoops. "They" got me) a new USB flash drive, 8 gigs. As opposed to my previous Cruzer Crossfire (4GB), the new Super Talent onehas twice the capacity and is more than twice smaller. Observe. Never really had time to try it out, read/write goes at a standard USB 2.0 speed, all I know so far.

Got me some nice additions here as well. It seems I got the Bracket Emblem after all, though I heard many users got theirs glitched (due to a weird bug of not showing leaderboard results, of the fact that a winner wasn't chosen in the bracket). Nice to see Gamespot working hard on fixing things, thanks again! Never would complain, but was surprised pleasantly.

And another level gained. 18, Flicky. Catchy designation. Wonder what comes next...

Reviews:

Resident Evil 5 is still in works. I don't really want to rush it, not before I've completed the game. I recieved khoofia's telegram about recent union inactivity, and I'm afraid I've got nothing to reassure him with :( No time. Sorry. But the review will come, eventually. Word of a Flicky!

My older review reposting has begun on Gameobserver.com, starting with Prototype. Remember it having many grammar errors and mistakes which I've hurriedly tried to fix? Well, the GO version is almost perfected now.

News:

• LOADS of new details on ACII. Costume element changes/reskins, faster and more delicate parkour system, the ability to play through different key moments in Ezio's life (not all of them taking place after he joins the Brotherhood). Why, oh WHY is it delayed till '10? (read: Delayed for PC).
• A DS version of the aforementioned got announced, dubbed "Discovery". Grats to the platform owners, but to be honest, it looks like anything but decent.
• Resident Evil: Director's Cut turned out to be an enhanced version for PS3 with the Motion Controller support. No worries, X360 owners, word's out you'll get some exclusive DLC as well.
• NO Modern Warfare 2 demo till release, a sad, confirmed rumor.

...Because they make ME feel uneasy, that's for sure. Mainly because of the gift problem. Anyone have the same issue? Being put in an uncomfortable position as of everyone asking you what would you like to get? No, really.

Main Event:

So, my birthday is tomorrow (25th), and my parents have been pretty persistent onasking me what I wanted them to get for me. I may be odd, but I hate it when people do that (I mean, I don't have any objections with the politeness, but I prefer a surprise to something chosen and most probably inappropriate for them), and a veryfortunate shipment arrived yesterday, saving me.Two of the three books I've ordered previously on Amazon.

Transformers: The Veiled Threat proved to be a pretty generic, short, but entertaining read, I had it finished by day's end. It's basically a bridge between the two movies, starting half a year after the first and ending with the beginning of the Shanghai mission. There was some underdevelopment and a literally overpowered image of one of the main antagonists (Starscream), but other than that it was a satisfying read for a fan.

Honestly though, if Michael Bay wasn't looking for excuses to direct Super-VFX-heavy scenes, this book would've made a much better script for the second movie.

Star Wars: Republic Commando Hard Contact, on the contrary, is a seriously written novel most probably focused on squad relationships of other commandos (the book is based, if someone doesn't know, on the best FPS in the Star Wars universe IMO), I'm gonna start reading it this evening. It has three more parts which I hope to order soon after I finish th first, because every review praised the writing style and it will most probably grip me no less than Halo did (I have eaten all six books based on the latter).

Gaming Progress:

Resident Evil 5 proved to be unnaturally organic with level design, and the appropriate pacing and diversity really kept the oil flowing, regardless of the fact that I've only just begun the third chapter (school's limiting my time). I've already said this, but it's a strange mix of slow, sloppy controls with lightspeed action and tension. The level in the tunnels (with Sheva carrying the flashlight) was frightening with its unpredictability; and that chainsaw guy was just impossible to bring down until I remembered that a dozen grenades existed in my inventory. I can't wait to try it out on coop LAN, as all those segments with Chris covering Sheva/vise versa are screaming for a live partner.

Reviews:

My Batman: Arkham Asylum review is up on Gameobserver.com. Feel free to check it out.

News:

• The PC version of Assassin's Creed II has been DELAYED!!! I can't believe that after so much false promises the devs did the same as for the first part. I hope it's just for the fear of MW2, because I'd hate if that becomes their "traditional" trademark. It is due to come out for PCs Q1 2010.
• Gran Turismo 5 has been moved, too, and will release in March 2010.
• PS3 250GB bundles will show up soon, with games like InFamous and Uncharted 2. No word of any Slim bundles whatsoever.
• The God of War Collection will include a demo for GoW III. That's... nice.
• Forza Motorsport 3 demo is available on Xbox Live! Well, on the Netherlands version at least, but you can download it wherever you are just by following this link. The download link is below on the page. It looks like it weights a formidable 1GB.
• What's even more, in October, a Left 4 Dead 2 demo will surface as well.
• A Director's Cut Resident Evil 5 is practically confirmed. Waiting for news!
• Halo 3: ODST sold 2 million copies IN ONE DAY. For comparison, Batman: Arkham Asylum needed two weeks to reach the same amount. Fanpower.
• Speaking of Batman, have you seen the PhysX comparison video? I'm still looking for my jaw.

Main Event:

Today after school I decided to run around the few decent gameshops and find a cheaper copy of RE5. One of the best deals was a 1C Russian dubbed copy for a mere ~15 bucks, so I went with it. It's a real shame that there's no language change option, but the translation is unusually great, with perfect actors for both Chris and Sheva as well as nicely translated menus. So I guess no atmosphere will be lost.

As for the gameplay, well, one of the first games in a long time to grip me with the sheer hardcoreness of the process. Its unique mix of sloppy yet fast-paced action is impressive in practice. I went through the first chapter, and, well, the main surprise was even more diversity. As opposed to RE4-s exploring, even asomewhat meditative gameplay, decorations change with dramatic speed in RE5, mechanical similarities aside.

Gonna review it soon, but probably after completing AND re-playing it on the high difficulty setting, along with most unlockables and hopefully a chance for a LAN play. Great game, in all. Really immersive, and a profitable deal.

Gaming:

I, umm, uninstalled Fallout 3 today, along with all the add-ons (left the savegames of course). I'm not the kind of guy that focuses on collecting games on his HDD, and I really feel satisfied when the drive is at least half-empty. As soon as I noticed I had stopped playing it, I decided to move it, temporarily,to history. Hopefully another expansion, or just boredom will make me return to it.

Got all 240 riddles in Batman: Arkham Asylum at last. The first time I used a game guide for a long time, I discovered that a bunch of toughly hidden chattermouths were "deliberately glitched" to be silent. Got 'em anyway.

Downloaded the NFS: Shift demo, and, unfortunately, the age of my GPU starts to show itself. While RE5 runs at a steady 40 FPS with medium-high settings on my screen's resolution, Shift spat me in the face. I don't consider it badly optimized, but the port is definitely a little unmerciful to low-ends (car models in particular are in an almost-fixed state on all settings), and I had a terrible 25 FPS on low-medium settings on a really shameful resolution. So yeah, DiRT 2 it is.

Reviews:

I'm still not working on anything right now, but a general outline of the RE5 overview is already forming up in my head. I'll definitely have a draft ready in a few days after completion.

Gameobserver.com kindly published yet another review of mine, of yet another add-on for Fallout 3. You can check out the Broken Steel review on GO right here. Batman: Arkham Asylum will also appear there soon (as a PC-only review).

News:

• Batman: Arkham Asylum stepped over 2.5 million sold copies for all three platforms, a really great result. Rocksteady, we want a sequel even more epic!
• Gran Turismo PSP will have a custom music import option, quite a rarity for PSP users.
• Officially confirmed, a Street Fighter IV sequel is in works. Hooray!
• Rumors have it that GRIN's Final Fantasy project is still in works, so anyone who had hopes should bring them back up. Miracles do happen!
• Blur has been postponed till 2010. I'm pretty sure that Modern Warfare 2 and Split/Second are directly involved... which is great, because the latter beats Blur at almost everything.
• Some concept arts have been released for the cancelled Halo MMORPG project. To be honest, never knew something like that was in works. The art is pretty impressive, Mass Effect meets Halo scale.
• An expansion is in works for Warhammer: 40,000: Dawn of War 2, entitled Chaos Rising. I didn't particularly like the swing of the series towards top-down RPG rather than full-scale RTS, but a formidable fanbase has been collected anyway. So I guess this is hilarious news for many.

Main Event:

So, what ARE Indies? To me, they are the secret moving force of the industry from the creative side. Indies are what bring new ideas (something people believe to be dying out in the industry), which are sometimes adopted into larger scales (Portal), or left the way they are due to their imaginative innovations (Audiosurf). Regardless of my thoughts, I was never really attracted to them. The only one I've actually tried out is the aforementioned Audiosurf, which, in my opinion, is a must have to anyone who listens to music in general. Anyway, back to topic. Games like Crayon Physics, Braid, or the upcoming Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet, carry innovations screwed over the core gameplay, which still feels quite primitive itself. And that is my main problem with Indies. Can't they take something universally acclaimed, extremely hard to adapt, but at least try? I got an answer yesterday, when I stumbled upon a tiny article for an absolutely ingenious game, Achron.

Can't say that it fits my indie needs (its gameplay is, ultimately, an RTS; with a few corrections, however), but the concept is so fascinating that I was absolutely blown away. I warn you that what I'm gonna write right now may be difficult to comprehend, so anyone fearing over-intellectual expressions may skip the Main Event. This game is, in one word, about time.

And forget Braid, for God's sake. Braid, or even the upcoming blockbuster Singularity, is absolutely nothing compared to Achron. It's an RTS where you can LITERALLY travel in time, create fighting strategies using different time paradoxes and calculate the possibilities of the future. I'm gonna try to put this as short as I can:

So basically apart from the primitive HUD you get an actual "Time Bar", where the Past takes the left half, the Future takes the right half, and the present is a slim line travelling along like a slider in the middle. You can set specific points on the bar and send your units exactly WHEN you want them. A few available time paradoxes include:

1. Chronofragmentation: if a unit teleports in time to the exact place where it was situated, one of them eventually gets annihilated. Using this tactic against your enemies is crucial: using a specific type of weapon (Chronobomb)you can send their units in the future, and after a few minutes they appear on the same spot in the battlefield, crushing anything they land on. The aforementioned weapon can also be used for more creative purposes, like halting a nuclear explosion to literally buy time.
2. The Grandfather Paradox:, the main concept is that the Present and Future are independent, and if a unit is killed in the past, it has two possible fates in the present: either it reappears and dies from the past, or it survives but doesn't appear at all. In the game, it's all about the balance of the gameplay, a choice ofWHEN you need a unit most.
3. The Butterfly Effect, or, more scientifically, the Time Waves: A temporary disturbance in the present caused by a contradicting event in the past. For example, you travel back for 20 seconds and manage to wipe out your foe's assault force and save a building from being destroyed. Upon returning to the present, the building is still in ruins, and only after the time wave has passed will it change and become intact.

It is obvious that while doing such travels someone has to, well, take on your role in other time periods. The automated player AI is good, but ultimately unreliable when confrontations are taken to such, pardon me, timely scales. So we are given a resource needed to perform these time jumps, Chronoenergy, making us thing before we leap.

And lastly, the most hilarious trick available, is to play in the past in a slowed or quickened rate. Imagine, you play in the present for a minute, then go back in time for 30 seconds and replay that minute. From 0:00 to 0:30 you've played once, from 0:30 to 1:00 twice, but from 1:00 to 1:30 - never. Why did I say 1:30? While you were playing those 30seconds in the past, the present wasn't frozen! And when you got back after those thirty seconds it was 1:30 already. The thirty seconds of the present become lost to you. And those 30 seconds are played by an AI, instead of you.

This game is, I assure you, the first from many focusing on understanding the bond between the future and the past. Experimenting in the gameplay may even reveal some new time paradoxes actually possible in the physical world, and so on. I honestly can't wait to try it out. The developer, Hazardous Software, has been laboring upon this tiny masterpiece for no less than ten years. And we still don't have a release date. If you became interested, visit the official site, achrongame.com

Gaming Progress:

Nothing in particular. I've finished Batman and started replaying on the Hard difficulty setting. Also had fun with some costume skins including Capt. America and Owlman :P

While I'm having trouble with choosing between NFSS and DIRT2, I decided to get RE5 and worry about racing arcades later. I'm planning to traverse the shops tomorrow to find a low-priced copy.

Reviews:

Nothing right now, the aforementioned Resident Evil 5 may come in a week at best.

News:

• Uploaded a couple of screens showcasing the Batman: AA skin mods.
• Halo 3: ODST got its first reviews, and appears to be a worthy add-on and an interesting take on the famous story.
• Doug Lombardi is angry with L4D2 being banned in Australia. Let's hope he does something physically.
• Risen has gone gold, but the X360 version is postponed till 2010.
• Wet epicfailed miserably. 6.3 on Gametrailers, not good.
• Trackmania 2 is officially announced, targeted for 2010 exclusively for the PC.