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Breezieana and I just got back from seeing Insidious 2.  We plan on filming a long review about it but just as a quick blurb I thought I’d come by and write that I enjoyed it.  I thought it was a fairly decent follow up to the first film.  Obviously I feel the first film is the best but this one had an interesting twist and gave a lot of backstory.  I enjoyed seeing some of the stuff that was mentioned in the first film in a flashback.

Scare-wise though, this film didn’t really deliver.  I didn’t jump at all in this film.  It didn’t bother me psychologically.  If anything, it seemed rather average in that department.  Having said that, the story was what drove the film not the boo’s and ahh’s!

If you liked Insidious 1, you will more than likely enjoy Insidious 2.  I would suggest checking it out.

And as I said, Breezieana and I will do a much longer review in the future that I will come post here for everyone to see.

This is the start of a series of reviews of Ghost Apps (detection, communication and what have you).   Our interest in doing this stated with an app known as Ghost Radar that we later discovered was completely fake (thanks to the guy who decompiled the code and explained it all in full).  I was always a little on the fence about that app but it made me wonder if there’s any apps out there that are legit or not.  Bri and I will be trying various Ghost Apps on both Android and iOS.  We’re determined to find out if there’s any legit apps out there that will actually aid people in ghost hunting or spirit communication.

So let’s get started with today’s app:  Ghost Detect Pro.   It is available for iOS.  Here’s what iTunes has to say about the app:

As you can see, when you start the app you’re treated with a plethora of meters, numbers, radar sweeps and graphs.  It looks legit enough.  The radar sweeps through and eventually, just like Ghost Radar, finds a blip.  The blips can be different colors, just like Ghost Radar.  Eventually it might even spit out a word.

The silliest feature of this app is the ghost detection via camera part.  Randomly the app will tell you “ghost detected” and switch to the photo section so you can take a picture of it.  After a few seconds it snaps a picture and overlays some orbs or a shadowy looking figure on it.  oOoooOooOo, spooky, right?  I mean, oh snap.  Orbs!  And sometimes a shadowy figure!  IT MUST BE REAL!  Only, you can cover up the camera completely and it will still snap a picture and add the overlay of orbs/figure.  Gee, ghosts sure are thin if they can get between the camera lens and whatever you use to completely block the camera.

If they had left out the photo part perhaps it would be more convincing, but I already know from experience that the radar part is total BS and the other meters don’t seem to really read anything real.  It is true that phones (or at least some phones) can detect some EMF but they’re not really designed to act as an EMF detector.

It also seems that ghost hunting app makers just love the word quantum flux.  This is the second app I’ve seen that claims it can read and detect variations in the quantum flux.  Well, the iPhone (and Android phones for that matter) do not house any type of laser micrometer; its chronometer is not accurate to within one millionth of a second (as would be required for quantum measurement), it doesn’t have the hard memory necessary to house the highly complex calculations and mathematical theories needed to quantify any such fluctuation, and simply put it doesn’t have the ability to see quantum particles.  So yeah, keep using that word guys.

Final verdict?  As a joke app, this one is pretty good.  You could probably scare someone who isn’t in the know about it being a joke app and convince them their house is haunted (and hey, you’ll have picture proof after it snaps a pic!).  For real ghost hunting this app is rubbish and isn’t going to help you detect your way out of a paper bag..

Cost: free
Rating: 0/5 for actual ghost hunting, 5/5 for joking around.

I had the pleasure of seeing the live action Rurouni Kenshin movie and thought that I’d share some of my opinions on it as I’ve been an RK fan for quite a long time now.  Go below the jump to see if they did it justice or if it turned out to be a waste of time!

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DmC: Devil May Cry.  I think this is the first time I got a new game when it was released and beat it within a reasonable time in years.  I swear it normally seems like I’m the last person on the planet to get a game and it usually takes me forever to beat them. I guess this goes to show that I actually enjoyed the game quite a bit.

Most of the points in the demo review I did still stand.  I would like to add that I did see quite a few textural issues during the cutscenes while playing on the PS3.  It seems like the game glitched a lot on shadows and occasionally things would just pop up and out randomly (like grass and trees).  I don’t know if it’s just my PS3, the fact it’s running 30fps, or what.  It was noticeable though and that’s probably the biggest complaint I have with the game at the moment.  It was only during the cutscenes that this occurred as well; the in-game graphics ran fine and smooth.  I never experienced any slow-downs, clipping issues, or anything else with the actual in-game graphics.

So with that said, I actually had a lot of fun with this game.  I’m really anxious for the Bloody Palace DLC now (always enjoy going through those except for DMC 2’s lol).  And I still have a lot of stuff to go back and collect that I missed the first time around (mainly due to trying to finish the game’s story).

I’ve had a few people ask me if I’d recommend this game and my answer is this:  are you an expert DMC player? Can you Royal Guard everything to perfection? Do you know how to jump cancel and basically can beat the games backwards and forwards in your sleep?  If so, you will more than likely find DmC  too easy even on the harder difficulties (and may find it boring due to it being too easy).  If you’re like me and you’re just an average Joe player at DMC, you will probably have fun with it.  It’s not overly difficult to the point where you want to ragequit but I found myself dying at least a few times in the game (so it’s not a total pushover as well).  The story is cheesy but it’s partly based on They Live, a cheesy B-movie cult classic, so it’s expected.  Besides, who really plays a DMC game for a deep story?  I do think the ending of the story is a bit rushed though.

I got it for half off thanks to an X-mas gift card and I’d honestly say $30 is probably about the right price for this game.  Unless you just really want to have it now, I’d say wait and get it at half off or so.  But yeah, I’d recommend it.  It’s fun and I didn’t feel bad about wasting those 10 or so hours playing it.  With the Vergil story add-on DLC, the Bloody Palace DLC, and a new costume pack  (including a Classic Dante look) all coming around the corner, it doesn’t seem like I’ll be putting DmC on a shelf and out of the way any time soon.

Just for fun, here’s a few of my favorites (some spoilers below the cut, don’t read these unless you’ve beaten the game or don’t mind some spoilers):

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I had a chance to sit down and play the DmC demo that was released yesterday.  I’ve been watching DmC since they announced it. Initially I thought it was going to be terrible but as time has progressed, they’ve improved it quite a bit. Still, I wanted to try it for myself.  Thankfully they’ve given us that opportunity…so here I go.

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Iyouboushi and Breezieana sit down and talk about Insidious. There are no spoilers up til about 3:50 into the video.

I decide to try and review five things as fast as I can!

Or watch it on Youtube

A while back Bri and I were looking over IMDB one night looking at upcoming movies for the year. This movie stuck out to me as we read what it was about. It sounded, to me, like a combination of the Bourne movies and Taken. Apparently the critics also thought the same. But was it any good?
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What do you get when you take some of the more popular characters from two different franchises and pit them against each other? A successful series of games! This topic is about the second one, Marvel vs Capcom 2 as it’s the only version I can play (since MvC3 isn’t for PS2).
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Breezieana and I sit down and talk about Paranormal Activity 2.