What You Want in The World is Not Enough N64

We love TWINE for the N64, as you know, and more than that we love games with replay value. TWINE has some fairly challenging time cheats you can beat to unlock additonal characters, weapons, maps and modes for multiplayer (w/ bots or without, though we prefer with). I have managed to get through most of them, though there are still a few that have eluded my grasp. If you take a look at GameFAQs portal for TWINE, you'll find a bevvy of tasks that seem nearly impossible to complete. If you want to prioritze them, I suggest tackling the following challenges, all of which will add fantastic maps and a nice weapon set to spice up your multiplayer options:

Unlike Renard here, who obviously feels no pain, beating
 these time cheats requires a high threshold for pain (at least
for emotional pain).

• The Air Raid multiplayer map. This is by far my favorite map in TWINE. A bit small, but totally worth beating the "Masquerade" level on Agent in under 3:05. If you need help in doing this, here's a video to help out:

• There's also the "Wildfire" weapon set, which you earn by beating "City of Walkways II" on Agent in under 3:00. Now, at least this one is on Agent: had it been on double-o, that helicopter at the end would have prevented even the most seasoned agents from earning this unlockable. Take a look at this if you need a spot of help:

• Finally, you can play the excellent Forest multiplayer map by beating "Night Watch on 00 Agent in under 2:20. I know this sounds insane, and for the longest time I believed it to be impossible, but watch this video and it will, at least, seem somewhat possible. I got it eventually, but you have to keep trying because Gabor appears in random places, and usually at the most inappropriate moments. This level is one of the best for Capture the Flag matches, so it's a must-have:

Thoughts On Scene It? 007 Edition

In lieu of a more traditional review of this DVD board game, I've decided to share with you a few quick notes on Scene It? 007 Edition. I was quite pleased to finally find this thing, and for the most part, it didn't disappoint. Here's a few thoughts on the game, based on my familiarity with the subject matter and the mechanics of Scene It?:

• First of all, 007 fans should only pick this up under the assumption that you anticipate finding willing and capable opponents to play against. Admittedly, it's fun for a while to run roughshod over the other players because you've seen every film in the series, but this soon becomes boring and there's no way to turn up the difficulty on your friends.

• As for the difficulty of the trivia, there's a good balance between questions drawn from inside and outside the films: that is, questions about the films' characters and plots are offset by questions about actors, directors, and theme songs. Furthermore, these questions range from the textually obvious (i.e. who played who in what film) to minute details which require considerable familiarity with the film. As such, it becomes obvious throughout the course of several games which films your friends/family members are more familiar with; for instance, I was swift in answering detailed queries on the plot of The World is Not Enough (or anything starring Pierce Brosnan), but struggled to recall the principle players of The Living Daylights, besides star Timothy Dalton. Still, the game is careful not to overwhelm casual viewers of the series with minutia, while at the same time keeping obsessed fans interested. It's a sufficient balance to insure broad appeal at your next party.

• Obviously, 007 Edition features clips from all official films in the series, from Dr. No to Die Another Day. They vary somewhat in length, but in general they are carefully selected and fun to watch or re-watch, as the case may be. My biggest problem with the clips is the volatile nature of the questions which follow them: too often these questions have little or nothing to do with the preceding clip. After watching a clip from TWINE, in which Bond and Christmas Jones escape from the exploding blast pit, I was asked, "Who played Electra King in this film?" Points for sticking with the same film, I guess, but minus several million for totally ignoring the content of the clip. On the other hand, these clips are sometimes followed by questions which only necessitate a player's attentiveness to seemingly arbitrary detail, such as the color of Bond's shirt in For Your Eyes Only. Rarely do the clips justify themselves within the game; instead, they only seem to be there for the purpose of visual distraction, and this is a complaint I often lodge regarding the various Scene It?s.

Nonetheless, if you have a cadre of pals willing and able to challenge your exquisite knowledge of 007, this edition of Scene It? is worthwhile. Daniel Craig was nowhere to be found in my somewhat dated version, but there's a Casino Royale Collector's Edition that brings things a little bit up-to-date.

Nobody Reviews It Better: The World is Not Enough (1999)

Nobody Reviews It Better returns once again, this time with Chicken Man's look-in on the third Brosnan-Bond, The World is Not Enough, one of the most prominent films in the CRN firmament. Brosnan was probably at the peak of his powers as 007 in this one, even if the material surrounding him was, as C-Man notes, uninspired. Considering the prior two films in the series, Brosnan put together a string of absolutely solid (or better) performances before nose-diving with his final film, Die Another Day, something which Thrasher will take up later this week. For now, though, enjoy this latest installment in our lead-up to November's Skyfall.

"I heard you hated Mamma Mia! too."

We have reviewed The World is Not Enough before. This was several years ago, but my opinion of it hasn't changed much (though I hope my ability to communicate has). As expressed previously, this is truly an action-heavy Bond film. It involves a bank escape via window, a boat chase, a skiing ambush, a gunfight in an underground nuclear research facility, a bomb defusal/chase inside of an oil pipeline, a face-off against buzz-saw wielding helicopters at a caviar plant, and a takeover of a submerged nuclear submarine. It seems as though Bond has adapted to the audience attention spans of the times. The Bond girls, as well. In the case of Christmas Jones, I find myself less impressed with Denise Richards these days, but she had amazing self-awareness for a Bond girl in that she even acknowledged the possibility that one could form jokes about her name. And, as Thrasher so astutely observed, the plot is predictable, and I would even go so far as to say uninspired. As was the case with The Spy Who Loved Me, the villain is an "anarchist" who wants to use nuclear subs to blow stuff up. This seems simply lazy to me, as it explains nothing in terms of their motivations. Instead, they are just one step up from the balaclava-wearing Molotov-throwing stereotype of anarchists. It is a misrepresentation of those who advocate non-aggression in human relationships and ironic considering the only use of a nuclear weapon in history has been by a state. Other than that, a villain who has no sense of touch or pain is very interesting and almost embodies the physical equivalent of a totally non-empathizing sociopath. This is how Bond villains should be (though "Dr. No" and "Goldfinger" might make better movie titles than "Renard"). He is a fitting adversary for Bond, who it seems struggles with his own demons of being a hired killer while also dealing with the aftermath. As he says to Renard, "I usually hate killing an unarmed man..." contrasting the lack of emotion Craig-Bond claims to have towards ending lives. I must say I find the former more interesting. There are enough Rambos for whom "killing's as easy as breathing." Make no mistake, TWINE is a great Bond movie and an even better video game. Sadly, though, this is Desmond Llewelyn's last hurrah as Q, with John Cleese being his short-term replacement. Q leaves us with some of his best work: his retirement fishing boat, winter coat with side curtain air bags, and a decked out BMW Z8 with remote control and guided rockets. He should have been working for Toys'R'Us rather than MI6. Clearly, grad student Q has big trousers to fill in the upcoming Skyfall. Can he do it?

"Now pay attention, 007." *Record scratch*
"My name is Q, and I make the toys
You're on a secret mission... now make some noise!"

PS1 Review: 007 Racing (2000)

 

It's not a bad idea, right? Perhaps 007 Racing is somewhat misleading as a title (it's not as if Bond has joined a Formula 1 circuit), but it's a bankable project theoretically. In execution, however, things fall apart rather quickly. Remember, 007 Racing was released on PS1 roughly a year before Agent Under Fire arrived on PS2. AUF had a much more refined "racing" component, thanks in no small part to the first draft sensibilities of Racing. There's not much of a story going on here, just a collection of mission briefings and vague allusions to the films. Similarly vague mission objectives present frustrating and artificial levels of difficulty. Replaying the missions so often (while Q repeatedly yaps in your ear with the same three or four disapproving soundbites) wouldn't be problematic if the graphics didn't insist on muddying the waters even further. Everything is so pixilated and poorly animated that it all becomes a nauseating, low-speed blur. Furthermore, there's little sense of urgency or speed; proceeding through the missions at little more than the pace of brisk walk is not only enforced by the cramped level designs themselves, but it's strategically necessary as well. More often than not, missions devolve into a demolition derby with stinger missiles that routinely do more damage to your Astin Martin than your adversaries. And it's not as if your car handles like a dream, either; it's slippery at "high" speeds and prone to ignoring your button commands whenever. It's hard to say which of these aspects make 007 Racing so difficult, but their gestalt certainly makes you want to turn it off with the quickness. This is not Spy Hunter; stick with that one instead.

Artistic rendering of 007 Racing.

Nobody Reviews It Better: Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)

How do you follow up something as seminal as GoldenEye? For Pierce Brosnan, you kick back and settle in for the ride. In this installment of Nobody Reviews It Better, Thrasher catches up with Brosnan-Bond as he relaxes in the well-earned comforts of formula.

i totes got a licenz 2 kill, lol

Pierce Brosnan's 007 loves his toys, even more so than Sean Connery, and the scenes in which he remotely, and so deftly, maneuvers his new car with a cell phone is likely the best evidence of his growing technophilia. Though GoldenEye had its share of pocket-sized gadgets, Tomorrow Never Dies is tops in Q-labs exhibitionism, and yet, despite the increased sophistication of the electronics, it's a tried-and-true, traditional Bond film. Elliot Carver may be an intriguing, and very contemporary, take on the megalomaniac super villain, but he's still seeking out his worldwide empire, just like Dr. No, Goldfinger, Blofeld, and others. He plans to further his news supremacy via yellow journalism; specifically, he coordinates the disappearance of a British warship in the territorial waters of China, thereby pushing the UK and China close to war, and thereby putting himself in a position to assume the exclusive broadcast rights once the smoke has cleared. Bond is quickly sent abroad to sort things out before it all goes sour, and that's where he runs into Wai Lin (Michelle Yeoh), one of the more respectable (if not exactly well-rounded) female cohorts in the entire canon. Bond and Lin make for a pretty good team, and their motorcycle chase through the crowded streets of Saigon is a ludicrous, enjoyable sequence. All the action is handled competently, even though some of the special effects and CGI have not aged gracefully (this is especially noticeable when Bond and Lin use one of Carver's banners for a makeshift escape). Still, though, it's obvious Tomorrow Never Dies is little more than a routine mission for Bond. Eventually Carver captures him, tells him far too much of his nefarious schemes, fails to kill him when it would be advantageous to do so, and so on. Maybe that's part of its charm; Dies may play it safe, but it proves the formula is still satisfying when followed properly. As Bond tells Carver, "You forgot the first rule of mass media, Elliot: give the people what they want!" And who would know this better than Bond? He's been doing it (better) for fifty years.



Nobody Reviews It Better: GoldenEye (1995)

We now move into the era of Pierce Brosnan, the Bond we grew up watching. As Chicken Man intimates in his review, we came to appreciate Brosnan-Bond in GoldenEye through an inverse method: it was the N64 shooter of the same name that turned us on to the film (and, eventually, all the others in the series). That's probably not an uncommon phenomenon for our generation. Nevertheless, whatever the course of our affective relationships with the multiple texts of GoldenEye, the film is unquestionably one of the finest in the series. Indeed, if the Code Redd Net Awards and its Best Bond Movie prize were the last word on the subject, we'd have to say GoldenEye is tops.

 

 

For myself (and I imagine for a few others) GoldenEye is the movie adaption of a very popular N64 game. Though not saying much, it is probably the best movie adaption of a game ever made. Kidding aside, I find GoldenEye  to be everything a Bond film should be. If we think of James Bond as the man men want to be and women want to be with, Pierce Brosnan plays this part succinctly. I find him to be the most "charming and sophisticated secret agent" of the Bonds, as Valentin Zukovsky suggests. Unlike Moore, he is not upper-crusty, but fits well on the cover of Cigar Aficionado.

"Mirror, mirror, on the wall, Jean-Claude Van Damme I'm fine!"

 

His enemy well chosen: an MI6 agent, Alec Trevelyan, 006 (Skyfall seems to be trying to replicate this villain device). Trevelyan is also a personal friend; one who grew tired of serving a government that betrayed his family. He wants revenge and thought of asking Bond to join him, but accuses him of having greater loyalty to the mission than to his friends. As I've mentioned before, it interests me when Bond's servitude to the state is put into question. It would have been better had Trevelyan's plan not intended to harm so many innocents, making Bond's decision not so clear cut. Regardless, it is so much more enjoyable when the Bond villain is a respectable adversary. It is somewhat refreshing that he doesn't have some ridiculous scheme involving the destruction of Earth, but an EMP space weapon that seems plausible and reasonable in furthering his objectives. Bond is really being unfair in calling him "nothing more than a common thief."

The surrounding cast is good as well. Female villains are always interesting, especially when they have not-so-subtle names. Xenia Onatopp is one of the most vivacious of Bond chicks, along with May Day, and is as easily remembered. Boris Grishenko is a likable, though arrogant computer programmer who, like Baron Samedi, is "invincible." Quite a team, they are.

A (mostly) required element to a good Bond movie are the gadgets, and Q keeps it pretty simple with a belt containing a rappel cord (I enjoy how Bond asks about a possible contingency, considering my criticism in the past of Q's perfect foresight), a grenade pen, and a watch that can detonate mines and shoot lasers.

The final requisite is the action scenes, and I find GoldenEye to be unsurpassed in this regard. It certainly is more violent (according to my count, Bond shot more people in his escape from the Russian military archives than Connery did in whole movies), enough to make a game out of it, but this isn't what makes it good. It is the frequency and the way in which it is done. During the tank chase scene, the Bond theme music is well incorporated (something noticeably missing in previous films), especially with its dramatic flair in the crescendo with the timpani drums. Fantastic work.

It's all here. Bond seems like Bond. The villains are cool and scary. The plot is high stakes yet believable. The gadgets are practical. The action is constant. GoldenEye is what a 007 movie should be.

Bond On Display

As you may very well know, Code Redd Net is currently in the process of reviewing every 007 movie before the release of Skyfall in November. We are not the only ones commemorating Bond's legacy. Greater than 400 items are on display in the Barbican Centre in London (possibly including Scaramanga's third nipple). We thought you might be interested in checking out more of their display, in addition to a video at the Daily Mail.

Xbox 360 Review: James Bond 007: Blood Stone (2011)

In my estimation, two things made Everything or Nothing great: variety and replayability. These two items seem paramount to a game's success with our staff, and EoN, in our minds, represents the height of 007 in video games for those reasons (and probably more, because how else do you win our awards for both Best Bond Game and Best Co-Op Multiplayer, as well as selections to both my own and Chicken Man's top ten lists?). It's strange to reflect on the evolution of Bond games in the eight years since EoN and see nothing less than an outright rejection of variety and replayability, much to the detriment of the games, and despite their increasing graphical sophistication.

Blood Stone does seem quite similar to EoN, at least initially. It's a third-person shooter with an ostensibly original story, featuring big, cyberscanned stars like Daniel Craig, Judi Dench, and Joss Stone, emphasizing gun fights, and utilizing many of the same gameplay techniques, like the ever-ready tactical stand-by, wall-hugging. For the first few stages, Blood Stone is a fun reminder of what made EoN so refreshing. The graphics are wonderful, especially the character models and backgrounds. Gradually, however, it all starts to get really repetitive. Only a few levels call for stealth, and only a few levels let you step away from the gunplay to pilot something fast, and only a few levels put Q-labs to work with the requisite gadgets. No variety, and no real replayability, either. Complete the game and you have achievements to earn, sure, but there's no gold, silver or bronze awards to chase after, no medals to achieve, no 007 bonuses to collect, there's not even tedious time trials to slog through. There's really no reason at all to play through this game again unless you play online or want to relive the story, but the plot is so barely there I'm hard pressed to remember anything about it. Bond fans could do with a weekend rental, but that's about all.

For Your Viewing Pleasure, Chickenman's Top Ten Video Games (Part 4)

To Recap: Day one was The Sims (PC), day two was Star Wars: Battlefront, day three was Hitman: Blood Money. But today, nobody does it better.

Everything or Nothing is the best game of the world's greatest spy. Better than any other it captures the James Bond experience. Though most famous for first-person approaches, anybody can shoot a gun. It is only EoN that has any semblance of capturing Bond's martial arts skills. Also irreplaceable is the ability to jump off of ledges with reckless abandon (with or without a rappelling device). EoN offers some of the best and most challenging co-op gameplay as well. Check out the review here.

Honorable Mentions:

The World is Not Enough (N64), GoldenEye (N64), From Russia With Love (PS2)

Netflix Instant Movie Review: Seraphim Falls (2006)

As I browse through the available selection of Netflix Instant, I often find myself unable to find movies or shows that I had hoped would be available. However, there also seems to be a glut of options that I had never heard of before or had but seem to be pretty old. For those familiar with Code Redd Net, you know that we do not discriminate by age, and we enjoy things that are a few or even several years old. Consequently, I think a fitting service might be to sift through what is available on Netflix Instant and perhaps offer our readers some suggestions of worthy films.

More than anything else, what drew me to this movie were the leading actors (forgive the lack of sophistication of this approach). I saw it as a face-off between super-killer Bryan Mills of Taken and the second most recent 007. And what better setting for a showdown than the American West (especially for two Irishmen)? But the movie involves less of a "showdown" than of a chase. I really don't want to give away any more than that of the story and, if you do intend to see this film, would advise against watching the trailer. Part of the fun is being in the dark about the motivations of the characters. But regardless, westerns aren't particularly known for their complex plot lines, but for the aura of their elements: tough men (and women) in tough country doing tough things. And Seraphim Falls is just that. In fact, it seems for me to be redemption for Pierce's masculinity after seeing that joke called Mamma Mia! (which happened to be the first part of a drive-in double feature. Coincidentally, the second film was Taken). He pulls of some pretty B.A. things, which were themselves justifications for watching the movie. That being said, it can get pretty long in some stretches, and can be exhausting from the constant cat and mouse game. But for fans of westerns, especially of more modern ones, I would give Seraphim Falls the thumbs up, as well as for fans of both Neeson and Brosnan.

Friday From the Archives: Die Another Day (2002)

I never used to detest this movie. In fact, I can remember enjoying Die Another Day quite thoroughly with my crew in the theater. But time, and a second viewing, have not been kind. I’m a fan of the Bond film series, but Die Another Day is just a disreputable mess. While the action is solid, and the special effects are on point, the plot is nonsensical garbage. I’ll see if I can sort this out: Bond is captured by the enemy in a secret mission in North Korea, and from there he goes to Cuba to follow some guy named Zao, back to England to trail Gustav Graves, and then to Iceland, presumably for no reason except that the setting is a neat place to film stuff. See, I sorted the narrative out. Well, mostly. But these things don't matter to me, and shouldn’t matter to you. Halle Berry does absolutely nothing for me, but that may be due to the fact that she is a movie star, and I’m a lowly student from the Midwest. I suppose that I’m digressing, aren’t I? I mean to say that she is clearly not very good in her role as Jinx, and together with Bond they are content to trade insipid sexual innuendos throughout the film, something that was immensely annoying onw my second time through. At times, Die Another Day seems to wonder if it wants to go a completely different direction than the past films, or if it wants to pay homage to them. Frankly, I couldn’t care enough to hope for either route. I give the film credit for some fun action sequences, a rare humorous dialogue or two, and Pierce Brosnan for at least trying to make Die Another Day anything else but a chore to slog through. Unluckily for him, he isn’t successful. Try to avoid this one, people.