That guy's a Maniac...

Flame rounds lets us fulfil our yearning passion to be Frank Skinner, taking on his role as Judge, Jury, and Executioner in Room 101. We will be presenting a case for a particular Trope/Character/Item/UI element that pisses us off and then trying to justify whether this thing should go into room 101 (get flame roundsded?). Cunzy1_1: What're you flaming? Richie: So you have completed the story of this sandbox game. Congratulations! Now go to all these places on the map and find 100 of this thing. I hate this! So many games, specifically around the advent of achievements and trophies, would have this additional achievement to walk round the map finding glowing orbs or such.  They dub it in the name of exploration, but is just often descends into a nightmare of keeping track of an online item location guide. This is also usually coupled with a lack of any reward short of perhaps a 10GP blip. Tacked on and just annoying. Cunzy1_1: But Richie, people spent a long time meticulou

So I fucking bought San Andreas... Again. (Currently owned: PS2, Steam, Windows Phone, now 360) It was really just on a whim, £2.99 on XBox Live seemed well worth a punt. I had a dick-about with the iOS/Windows Phone version and as cool as it is to have San Andreas in your "pocket" the controls are just wank. Nobody likes a fake dual analogue stick game. But the 360 version is worth it. Its prettier than 10 years ago, it now has achievements, it actually stands the test of time! Downside is after playing the iOS version I am very aware that this is the port of the iOS version and now a newly reconditioned version, there are obvious giveaways with the controls. And it crashed a couple of times. Love and Hot Coffee, Richie

Good machinima is very thin on the ground so it's with great joy that we direct you to go and watch a feature length filum called The Trashmaster, filmed inside GTAIV. Watch it here . The plot is as schloky as a Gears cutscene but the machinimatography is second to none. There's no hyperbole here but there are so many amazing shots crammed into 88 minutes you can't help but wonder at the eye for detail shown here. I've lived in that city but the filmakers have noticed details that makes me want to visit Liberty City again. Some of the shots in this film are ridiculous and we're willing to overlook sub-par narrative to congratulate the makers on a really really stunning piece of machinima. God knows how many hours were spent trying to set up the perfect shot and hopefully a bloopers reel will pop up sometime soon. Not only is it beautifully shot but this film is really a testimony to the highly detailed city that Rockstar built. Tiny little details that when highligh

Prostitutes. More specifically, killing prostitutes. Having sex with a prostitute and then killing her and getting your money back. This is but one thing you have been able to do in Grand Theft Auto games since GTA III. Sure, you could view a thousand beautiful sunsets, save lives as an ambo paramedic, drive a motor bike off of a fuck-off great mountain and parachute to earth or, if you were so inclined, elope with a white priest on a yacht to a secluded stretch sea for some serious inter-racial homosexual making out sessions*. There were thousands of things you could do in GTA which is one of the many many reasons why the games flew off the shelves. It's kinda what 'sandbox game' means. Sadly it seems none of those other possibilities piqued the interest of newscasters, alarmist journalists or lazy politicians quite so much as the prostitute scenario. To labour the point, you could, if so inclined, you could just drive real slow and careful, looking for blacks . But of

Sooo, Kotaku have posted this... The analysts at DFC Intelligence have gazed into the crystal ball to receive word from the future of the European console war and the news is somewhat of a downer for Sony. But it's far worse for Microsoft. A new report calls for "strong" sales of the PlayStation 3 but that Sony should expect to lose a "big chunk" of the PS2 install base. Wii is expected to dominate, but won't move software like the PS3 may. The analyzing wizards at DFC see an Xbox future filled with doom and gloom, with the 360 "continuing to struggle" in Europe, despite UK acceptance. They have better news for the Euro industry as a whole, with 2008 expected "to break all kinds of sales records." And they all lived happily ever after. The end. "Release the GEGH!!!! DFC Intelligence. Perhaps the three letters stand for ‘Donthavea Fucking Clue’. Similarly, I’d wager the ‘Intelligence’ part comes filed under ‘oxymoron’. FROM HE

Soooo GTA4 then? Might as well get this review out of the way before it “officially” comes out on Tuesday. So for today’s review we are going to set it out in a classic divvied up review with each section out of ten. Section 1. Gameplay. Well this one is quite easy, have you played GTA3, VC, SA? It’s pretty much the same: run, shoot, drive. Except this time they have added some spanky tweaks, including GPS system, a better aiming system, and being able to hide behind cover. There isn’t much wrong with the GTA formulae, it’s non-stop fun and they have not strayed away from this standard. Score: 9/10. Good to see GTA back again, with so many sandbox rip-offs its good to go back to the roots, new and improved roots at that. Section 2. Graphics . Graphics eh? I honestly don’t know how to approach this one… I have always had gripes with GTA’s (rockstar’s?) graphics. I remember when San Andreas was out on the PS2 and everyone was banging on about how great it looked, but