Blackberry KeyOne ★★★☆☆

Blackberry is still alive! They’ve been coming out with one phone annually if you remember the Z3, Passport, Priv etc. As a brand, BB doesn’t make phones anymore but licenses its name and software to other companies. TCL is the major license holder and has launched the KeyOne with the classic Keyboard and Android OS, perhaps the one of the only phones to be launched recently with this combination. Read below to find out if you’d want to own one of these...

The unit I’m using is a Limited Edition Black - available only in India as of now, with a 4GB RAM and 64GB built in memory combo. The international variants have 3GB RAM and 32GB built in memory. The Keyboard below the 4.5” screen is the USP of this device that has the fingerprint scanner on the space bar to unlock the device. The power button is weirdly on the left while volume rockers and Convenience key are on the right. The 3.5mm jack thankfully is still here at the top while the charging port is now a Type C at the bottom with a speaker grill on the side. The Android navigation buttons are capacitive, sitting at the bottom of the screen just above the keyboard. Design wise, it’s rectangular from the top but curved at the bottom, the screen isn’t curved and the rear is the classic Blackberry rubberised grip that feels solid in the hands. The phone is a tad heavier than most phones today at 180 grams and when you want to use the physical keyboard to type, you’ll have to hold the phone at the bottom with both hands and it feels pretty awkward and heavy.

If you’ve never used a blackberry with the QWERTY keyboard this will be a challenge at first. The surface of the keyboard is touch sensitive so you can slide across it to scroll up, down, left, or right like a normal trackpad! Swype can also be enabled in the settings. An interesting feature is the ability to assign shortcuts to each key for an app. So a short and long press can be assigned to every key letting you trigger 52 shortcuts to apps or settings or music etc. 

In terms of processing power, the KeyOne uses a dated Snapdragon 625. It’s a hybrid single & dual SIM phone (india only), supporting VoLTE and Quick charge 3.0, NFC,and FM Radio.The camera has 12MP rear camera and front 8MP camera. On the software front, the Blackberry UI is atop the Android 7.1 OS that has quite a few customisation options and widgets that can be accessed just by swiping up on the app icons. The BlackBerry Hub is still here showing all your messages and emails across every account registered on the phone.

There is a chance that some apps and games might not work full screen. Although the screen is quite crisp and at 434ppi daylight legibility is good. All apps and games run smoothly but there are a few noticeable lags that not everyone will relate to unless you’re coming from a flagship device.The speaker output is good as well and surprisingly listening to music from the headphones felt great! Battery does last well over 12 hours on average usage and a full charge is done under 1.5 hours. 

The 12MP rear camera takes pretty good pictures without any oversaturation with respectable bokeh shots as well. Night photos are still a disappointment with grainy images and wavy autofocus.You can record 4K videos up to 30fps and also have the slow-mo option. The front 8MP camera captures crisp selfies as well without any filters. Overall at this price point, you’ll want to buy the KeyOne only if you need the physical keyboard. For every other feature in this phone, there are phones at almost half the cost that can do the same job.

★★★☆☆

Pritesh Khilnani

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Get Even ★★☆☆☆

Get Even is a great example of a promising new game that has been both completely misrepresented in its marketing, and that doesn’t manage to fulfil the potential of its own premise. Having been sold to gamers as a first-person action title, any players who might have been intrigued by this psychological thriller are likely to have missed the boat completely. Even categorising it as such doesn’t really cover this unique experience, which sadly gets as more wring than it manages to get right.

Playing as Cole Black, you are tasked with saving a kidnapped girl from an unknown location. Things soon get weird following a failed bomb detonation, and you awake in a requisite spooky abandoned asylum – not only with a rather major case of amnesia, but also with a creepy customised Virtual Reality headset strapped onto your face. Not exactly the ideal situation that anyone would want to wake up to. From here on out, the main thrust of the gameplay alternates between exploring the asylum and using the VR headset to revisit buried memories and re-play them from a different point of view - to work out exactly what happened to the kidnapped girl, why Black was there, and work out how the situation came to be. 

This scenario successfully grips you, keeping you on the edge of your seat to find out more, but the game fights against itself as hard as it can to ruin its own early good work. Most new discoveries do more to confuse matters further than help you uncover the truth – but still the desire to solve the mystery remains. The overly-complex swathes of information that you need to sift through and the thoroughly uneven pacing both combine to make investigation feel like a massive chore, only punctuated by an odd burst of action, or finding a remote hotspot that will push the story onwards.

Action scenes are too often made up of cheap jump-scares and or stereotypical horror set pieces that are more likely to make you snigger than scream - and don’t get me started on the fighting. Gunplay is unsatisfactory and the controls poor. The innovative Cornergun (which does exactly what you imagine, and lets you shoot around corners) is useless in most situations, only really coming into play when on-screen tutorials ask you to use it – which of course removes any excitement in deploying the weapon. A lack of melee combat options further hurts the title, especially when you find yourself battling unarmed opponents in confined spaces.

Get Even has plenty of early promise and there are some interesting gameplay devices at work. Getting the chance to re-play different memories and discover new information is a clever idea, offering the chance to make different choices that will alter the outcome of the game. This is all let down thoroughly by the disappointing combat, uninventive action scenes and worn-out horror tropes. If the gunplay had been removed entirely and the focus concentrated more on the aspects of the title that work well, perhaps Get Even would be a more attractive prospect, but as it stands – this is not a title I could easily recommend.

★★☆☆☆

Robin Parker

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Brooklyn Nine Nine: Season 4 ★★★★★

At the end of season 3 Jake Perolta (Andy Samberg) and Captain Holt (Andre Braugher) had been forced to take on alternate lives in Florida, and at the start of season 4 they have settled into their new lives well – both now have steady jobs and they are fully knitted into the community. Of course the real focus is taking down Figgis, while the rest of the squad back at home are being punished for the previous season’s events by undertaking the dreaded night-shift.

The first few episodes feel quite strange, what with Perolta and Holt being separated from the rest of the squad, but you’ll be pleased to know that this isn’t a permanent thing. Once they’re back from witness protection the team are in full-force again, yet some things have changed quite drastically since the pair last saw everyone else. 

Season 3 was really good, as all of the seasons have been, but the further I get into a series the more I worry that it’s going to fall flat (sadly not every season can be as iconic as comedies such as ‘Friends’, and so on). I was concerned that it might be time for ‘Brooklyn 99’ to lose its brilliance, but just a few episodes in and I could tell that we were still at top-quality comedy again. The jokes and one-liners are hilarious as always, and still Goor is finding ways to make us laugh when you’d think it would have got old by now. Braugher steals the show again as Captain Holt – the moments where he breaks character are particular funny in this season, and we get to see the bond between him and the squad deepen further.

Each season has a similar formula every time but comes up with slightly different ways of presenting it, be that through introducing new characters, reintroducing much-loved old ones, or mixing up things completely with unexpected scenes, such as a very dramatic experience for Gina (Chelsea Piretti) just before the mid-season break. This time round it’s less ‘Jake with another character’ and more focus on the rest of the team independently, such as Rosa (Stephanie Beatriz) and her hectic relationship with Adrian Pimento (Jason Mantzoukas), and several mini-crises that have to get resolved around the main story. There’s actually one really serious episode featured this season focusing on racism within the police force after Terry (Terry Crews) gets profiled by another cop – it’s very different to the usual style of Brooklyn 99 but it worked really well and made the viewer think between the gags.

One of the best parts of the season is getting to meet even more of Boyle’s (Joe Lo Truglio) crazy family – they’re so ridiculous that you can’t help but laugh, and despite the weirdness of the bunch you find yourself warming to them. Talking of weird, Hitchcock (Dirk Blocker) and Scully (Joel McKinnon Miller) are also excellent yet again this season – they don’t really change much, but it works. The most interesting change to see is how Charles develops after he becomes a father – and, how it impacts his relationship with both Jake and Terry in particular. In classic Goor style the season ends on another explosive cliff-hanger, meaning we’ll all have to wait  Autumn to find out how on earth it all gets resolved.

If you haven’t started watching ‘Brooklyn 99’ yet and you want something that will have you laughing until you cry every time, then you really need to get to it. As well as the humour the connection you develop with the characters is particularly strong, making the series one of my all-time American comedy favourites.

★★★★★

Hannah Read

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The Elder Scrolls: Online ★★★★☆

‘The Elder Scrolls: Online’ is one of those MMOs where its users have a penchant for complaining about it (myself included), but we keep coming back to it because deep down we really do love it. ‘Morrowind’, the newest expansion to be released, is based on ‘The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind’ released in 2002 but set 700 years beforehand, and is both a love letter to those that have played the original game, and an exciting new instalment for those haven’t.

Vvardenfell, for those who haven’t set foot in it previously, is a beautiful landscape adorned giant toadstools and tentacled plants, but contains many political issues within. Houses and Gods all harbour problems here, and it is up to you as the lone hero to save the place from a series of different destructive situations. In a similar format to other ESO games  you follow quest lines, and there a multitude of different quests that can be played either all at once or separately (depending on how many disputes your brain can handle at any one time!). 

The storyline itself is really interesting, and I found myself thoroughly engaged… I have been known to skip vast swathes of text when playing ‘The Elder Scrolls: Online’ so I can get to the more interesting bits, but I didn’t find myself doing this at all. The expansion itself is fairly short at only 25 hours, but it’s filled with twists and puzzles and all sorts of things that will bring ESO back to life if it’s perhaps getting a bit repetitive for you. Although the map may be too similar for players of the original game, it’s a wonderful landscape for new players to explore.

Unlike previous DLC for the game such as ‘Thieves Guild’ and ‘Orsinium’, it’s a little harder to know how to actually start playing the expansion – there’s no obvious quest that comes up in your journal or character that you need to speak to, and so you have to do a bit of exploration. It’s nice that it’s different, but it did confuse me a bit. It’s also starting to show its age a bit, with the graphics starting to look dated compared to other games coming out. It’s still beautiful to look at, but it’s not exceptional anymore. Some changes have also been made that you’ll either really like or really not like – one example is how the skill line menu is set out. Before we were able to view all skill lines in one go, yet now it only features skill lines that are relevant to your character (i.e. a weapon type skill line will only show when you have used that weapon type). Although this makes it more focused, I found it slightly annoying as I couldn’t compare the different skill lines without first trying each weapon, armour, and crafting method out individually. Not an issue for those of us that have played the game before I’m sure, but it could potentially cause problems for the new player.

There’s also been two completely new additions to ESO with the ‘Morrowind’ expansion, one being the new Warden character class. There’s now five classes in total, and this one makes for a great all-rounder. It’s a particularly great class for healers, with one skill line providing some awesome healing effects, but the real excitement is the ability to summon animals to help with fights. The bear Ultimate is cool at first, but after a few uses you realise that actually it’s pretty similar to the Storm Atronach within the Sorcerer class. I love the idea of fighting alongside nature, but there’s still not enough control to coordinate your attacks efficiently.

The other addition is the eagerly-awaited PvP aspect. We’ve already got Cyrodiil of course, but Battlegrounds add a whole new element, featuring Capture the Flag, Domination, and Deathmatch, which are arranged the same way as any other PvP elements in the game. They’re typical games that seasoned PvP players will no doubt have experience of already, but the lack of instruction and direction is really confusing for players new to the PvP scene. It’s also very difficult to play if you’re not a high PvP level despite the Champion Points not being taken into account, as armour and weapon bonuses still exist. I rarely came across any players under the max level, and so frequent deaths became frustrating after quite a short space of time. I did like the idea of a questline alongside the PvP which helped make it relevant to the main game, but again this would be hard to complete unless you were onto PvP from day one.

‘Morrowind’ is a great new expansion for ESO, and it’s certainly got me back into it all again. It’s not without its flaws (one major one being that you can’t share it over Gold if you’re on Xbox), but with a great storyline and exciting new features, it’s certainly one to add to your collection of ever-expanding ESO titles. 

★★★★☆

Hannah Read

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Snapchat Spectacles ★★★☆☆

Wearable technology is becoming more commonplace in our world nowadays, what with the ever-expanding presence of Fitbits at the gym and the more niche VR headsets you can now use to play games. Snap (the company that created the app Snapchat) are the latest to join in with the movement, bringing us Snap Spectacles – tech glasses reminiscent of the now discontinued Google Glass that allow the wearer to take snaps straight from their eyes that automatically upload to their Snapchat Story. 

Snap Spectacles in black featured in their charging case with USB cable – not the sort of glasses case that you’ll lose easily! 

The Spectacles come in a pretty cool case – it’s bright yellow, sturdy, and offers an interesting way to charge them. You simply put your glasses on and off you go. Remember to remove the thin plastic sticker from the charging port before attempting this, or you may end up confused as to why your glasses aren’t working (totally not something that happened to me… honest). Once you have worked that bit out though, the glasses show that they’re charging by lighting up on one side, and you can have the case open or closed while they charge. A full charge takes about 90 minutes (the case will hold up to four full charges before it needs to be replaced), and will give you about 100 Snaps… It sounds a lot, but it’s not as much as you’d hope for considering each Snap is only 10 seconds long.

Much better-looking than I’d thought, and easy to pull off as real sunglasses.

As for the design, these glasses actually look pretty awesome. They’re designed to be sunglasses as well as a camera, featuring UV protection and rubber nose pads to prevent those annoying dents you get in your face from some glasses. They’re light and comfy to wear, and are the closest to actual glasses that we’ve had in technology so far. They also come in three colours – black, teal, or coral – so you can be as vibrant as you’d like. 

The camera is located on the right-hand side of the glasses, with the recording button on the left. A simple double-tap to the side will show you how much charge you have left, and the lights will stay on when you’re recording to make other people aware. This is a good idea, although this also depends on other people understanding that they are recording specs in the first place – I spoke to a lot of different people and not one had actually heard of them before. It brings the whole privacy debate into focus again, but at least Snap are trying to prevent the ‘creepy stalker filming people unawares’ scenario that could so easily happen with this type of technology.

To use the Spectacles you just need to press the button once to film a 10 second Snap. This can be extended up to 30 seconds long by pressing the button again before the end. Each time a Snap is recorded it is stored on the Spectacles and uploaded onto the app, either by WiFi for iPhones or Bluetooth for Android. Using WiFi deletes the battery more quickly, and so it’s advisable to take the charging case with you if you’re going to be using them a lot. You don’t need to upload them there and then though – you can also sync up your Snaps later on through the app.

The Snaps are easy to access via the Snapchat app and allow you to browse through and edit them as you please.

Once the Snaps are on your app they’ll be added to your Story, and you can add the usual emojis and text as you see fit. They can also be deleted if they didn’t turn out so well (such as a whole minute of recording I did that had my hair over the camera – long-haired users beware!), but remember to delete them off the Spectacle storage as well if you’re planning on handing them over to anyone else.

The photo quality isn’t too bad considering that they’re glasses, with a 115 degree field of view to mimic the human eye. It’s similar to a fisheye lens and is best viewed in the app. Videos become grainy in low light but do the job when filmed during the day. While they won’t capture stunning visuals they will get across your everyday videos, which is what Snapchat really focuses on as an app anyway. They also remove that handheld shakiness you often get when filming, and a proper view from what you’re seeing, rather than your phone.

As a gimmick the glasses are pretty cool, but at the price point I’m assuming they’re supposed to be seen as more than that. They’re fun to use and also incredibly simple, but I felt that they needed more control – sure, you can take videos, but in the future it’d be great to have the uploading and the editing side as a feature of the wearable product. If you’re a big Snapchat user and you’re into filming every day moments then these may add something to brighten up your life, but if you’re looking for wearable tech that is more suited to events and ‘wow’ moments then I’d invest your money into something that has more features and better quality. 

★★★☆☆

Hannah Read

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The Fate Of The Furious ★★★☆☆

I really wanted to try and be nice...

The Fast and the Furious franchise is set in an alternate universe -  just before everybody evolves into Pixar's Cars, where all the people of Cuba party in the streets all day, dressed for an MTV music video. Dominic Toretto, played by Vin Diesel, a fairly well built dude with a baby's head and a teenager's mumble, is the best driver around. He can drive a burning heap of scrap, backwards, faster than a muscle car can go at full speed forwards.

Which is why a hacker group (apparently “hacking” consists of saying mainframe a lot and screens with shiny, spinning graphics. It takes every step Mr Robot took to make theirs seem mostly legit and just goes 'nope... flashy things'), headed by Cipher, played by Charlize Theron; who's apparently a badass, because she has blond dreads and wears a Metallica t-shirt, blackmails him by kidnapping an old girlfriend and their baby, into stealing an EMP.

The FBI recruit the rest of Dom's team of criminals to track him and Cipher down, because apparently being an illegal street racer is criteria for being hired by the Bureau. The movie is held together by Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson and Jason 'Olympic diver' Statham whose on-screen chemistry is great and they have all the best scenes. It was good to see them go full bromosexual.

Fittingly, the movie is also a bit of a love letter to the late Paul Walker (Running Scared, Hustlers) with his character, Bryan Turner, getting more than a few passing mentions. Which was nice as he was a good actor (Go watch Running Scared). My attention span is pretty bad, a GIF is sometimes too long and I can just about get through an episode of The Regular Show. Fate of the Furious is 2 hours and 20 minutes long. For a movie about speed, it's not in any hurry to get anywhere, some basic exposition scenes get dragged out far longer than necessary.

For the most part, the movie looks very nice, not sure if that's down to the cinematographer, Stephen Windon, who has worked on most of the F&F films or the Director F. Gary Gray. (Friday, which is a classic and Straight Outta Compton. Which was a decent movie, but about as accurate as a Stormtrooper). The Fate of the Furious is high fantasy, for boy racers. If you hang out at your local drive-through Maccy D's and then line up to show off your mums Clio 1.6, this movie is probably for you.

There's no logic here and nothing makes sense... There are inconsistencies everywhere... But for all that, it's fairly well shot and edited. At times it feels like a hyperactive, live action, anime.

"Go fast or go home".

★★★☆☆

Bry Wyatt

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HTC U11 ★★★★☆

HTC has launched the U11, its flagship for 2017 just 4 months after launching a very similar looking U Ultra famed for its Edge/Dual Screen. The U Ultra now already looks outdated and feels more like a “hey, don’t forget us!” device from HTC. The U11 changes everything with it’s “best camera on a phone ever” statement. Let’s find out if HTC manages to get back in the game…

Right out of the box, the HTC U11 looks very similar to the ultra glossy, highly reflective U Ultra but with a more ergonomic design.The back is basically bonded glass in a twisted form to look metallic and throw different colors in different viewing angles. So you really don’t know what colour your phone is! HTC calls the 2 variants Brilliant Black and Amazing Silver, though and both of them are fingerprint magnets. Thankfully, on the front it’s a lot more “normal” with a 2.5D curved edge glass on the 5.5” SUPER LCD 5 with a great 1440 x 2560 resolution. The capacitive home button cum fingerprint scanner is at the bottom flanked by the Back and Overview buttons which light up on touch.

Nothing on the left edge, while power and volume buttons on the right. No 3.5mm jack here, so your old earphones are of no use since HTC wants to move forward to Type C charging and earphones. The Noise cancelling Usound earphones thankfully come bundled with the U11.The earpiece doubles up as a woofer in addition to the speaker grill at the bottom. It’s got IP67 certification i.e. water and dust resistant. The U11 supports Hybrid Dual SIM, Bluetooth 4.2, NFC and VoLTE.

Under the hood , you’ll find the latests Snapdragon 835 processor with 4GB/6GB RAM and 64GB/128GB memory respectively. It’s the latest hardware available on all flagships now and you don’t need to worry for at least a couple of years. 

HTC Sense runs atop the Android 7.1 OS and similar to the U Ultra. They did announce the Sense Companion UI but it’s nowhere near the Google Assistant or Siri yet, not even close to what Bixby can do at this moment. Overall the UI is smooth and lag free with a few customisations but HTC can do better. The Edge Sense is the most innovative feature to come out of HTC’s stable yet that allows you to trigger apps or shortcuts by squeezing the sides of the phone .You can launch the camera or voice recorder or text to speech etc and even click photos once in the camera app. The advanced mode allows for multiple triggers based on pressure sensitivities. I’m not sure though, if you will ever be able to use a hard case/cover on the U11 ;).

Coming to the most talked about camera ever on a phone, the U11 scores a 90 in the DXO Mark camera test, which was being ruled by Google Pixel with a score of 89 until now .Samsung S8 & iPhone 7 Plus are just below 89. And true to the numbers, the U11 does not disappoint.It’s a cracker of a camera at just 12MP F/1.7, showing people that neither an additional camera nor the MegaPixel count matters, what really does are the pixels, ability to capture light and sensors on it .I’d definitely rate it slightly over the Pixel and the best shooter in low light / night mode. Even the front 16MP camera takes realistic and crisp selfies.Video can be recorded with up-to 4K resolution. The only thing missing is Optical Zoom on an otherwise impressive setup.

Performance and multimedia wise, there won’t be any troubles if you have multiple apps and games open simultaneously or running in the background. There was no lag on Asphalt 8 & Fifa 17 when abruptly switching between them and 2K videos look great on YouTube. Sound from the speakers is loud and clear while listening to music or gaming . With the battery at 3000 mAh you feel hard done by, considering the potential heavy usage you’d have regularly. I got just over 10 hours on a single charge but on moderate usage you can stretch it up to 15 hours which isn’t bad. If price isn’t a concern and you don’t want the Samsung S8, go for this one . Otherwise you have the Pixel XL at a lower price now and the One Plus 5 or even LG G6 to consider. 

★★★★☆

Pritesh Khilnani

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The Walking Dead: Season 7 ★★★★☆

Another year, another season of everyone’s favourite horror soap opera. In recent years, the show has decreased in quality as filler episodes have become the norm and stretched out, meandering plotlines are the modus operandi. Is Season 7 a return to the show’s early form, or does it merely continue this trend? Of course, it goes without saying that spoilers lurk in the review below. If you’re not up to date on the show, I’d suggest you steer clear.

The Good

Firstly, and perhaps controversially in the eyes of many of the show’s watchers if social media comments are anything to go by, Jeffrey Dean Morgan’s Negan is the finest thing to happen to The Walking Dead in years. Charmingly terrifying and darkly hilarious, Negan is like a breath of fresh air for the show – not since David Morrissey’s Governor have we had such an intensely watchable villain, posing a genuine threat to our heroes and giving the series high stakes again. The zombies are just background noise now. The Walking Dead has always been at its best when a strong human villain was in charge. Other new characters – such as Khary Payton’s King Ezekiel – also bring some new life to the show but it is the baseball bat wielding leather-clad psycho who makes this season his own. And incidentally, the payoff from Season 6’s cliffhanger is handled remarkably well, with the deaths of our beloved Abraham and the long-foretold violent end of Glenn. I was one of the very few people who thought that cliffhanger in question was incredible, too…Fight me.

And the main bulk of our heroes are on good form, too. Rick (Andrew Lincoln) spends most of the season in rather submissive and cowardly role, but when his balls grow back, we cheer for our bearded leader. Daryl is a little broken for the first chunk of the season too, held prisoner by Negan – but his escape and reunion with the gang is both intense and emotional. This season itself could be considered one long trailer for the next one, with all of the pieces getting put in place for the All Out War plotline. And yet, the majority of it (with some exceptions) does not feel like filler. This is a slow-burner, but the payoff next season could just be the best of The Walking Dead yet.

In summary, all of the positives of The Walking Dead’s 7th season are really down to Negan. When the plot is moving slowly, the presence of Negan – even when he’s off screen – is felt and feared, making the show far more intense than it’s been recently. We fear for the safety of our survivors once again, and this “new world order” makes the world of The Walking Dead a dangerous place to be. But that being said, if all of the survivors were to meet their grisly end at the end of Negan’s beloved Lucille, I wouldn’t be too bothered. Negan could lead this show, easily.

The Bad 

But, of course, this is The Walking Dead. Even with Negan’s presence, the plot does often come to a complete standstill –  for multiple episodes at a time. Some subplots are utterly tedious, with an entire episode dedicated to Tara’s brief time at an all-female camp by the ocean, a particular low-point. But, this comes with the territory of The Walking Dead. It always has. We know to expect this filler, and we know it’s worth enduring because the good episodes can be incredible. We all know that bold statements by our characters like “we’re going to war” often mean “we’re going to war in 20 episodes’ time”, but that’s okay. The fans who’ve stuck around know that the show can dip wildly in quality even during a season, but when it grows back up to the heights it’s capable of, it is incredible television.

The Verdict

It’s difficult to summarise a 10 hour-plus season in so few words, but as I look back on this season of The Walking Dead, I honestly can’t remember much other than Negan. While some might think that could be considered a criticism, it isn’t. It’s not to say this season was forgettable – it’s rather to say that Jeffrey Dean Morgan was so utterly incredible in every single scene, he has single-handedly made Season 7 of The Walking Dead one of the finest seasons yet. I, for one, cannot wait to see what he gets up to in the upcoming episodes of the show, and I’m filled with excitement and joy for the future of the series – something I couldn’t have said a couple of years ago. 

Welcome back, The Walking Dead. You were always there, yes – but the lights were on, with nobody home. Now, the lights are on, and you’re having a god-damn house party. Long may it continue.

The Walking Dead is back to near-perfect status. Next season could be a 5-star belter.

★★★★☆

Sam Love

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Dublin Comic Con Photo Competition voting is live!!

So Dublin Comic Con has come to a close after an amazing weekend of CeXy fun!

Got your picture taken with one of our monsters or by one of our team members?
Follow these steps to be in with a chance to win yourself a €250, €150 or €50 CeX voucher:

1. Click HERE to find the gallery.

2. Find your picture, share it and get those votes!

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CeX at Dublin Comic Con!!!

Dublin Comic Con - are you coming this weekend? 

If so make sure to visit the CeX pop up shop wonderland. Help yourself to CeX freebies whilst browsing your favourite games, movies and tech! Have your picture taken with of our crazy creatures to be in with a chance of winning a €250, €150 and €50 CeX voucher! www.webuy.com

Also, the CeX party rolling into town can only mean one thing....
THE RETURN OF THE RECYCLER MEMES!

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DiRT 4 ★★★★★

The DiRT series has a long history dating back to its roots on the PS1, when it went by Colin Mcrae Rally. Colin McRae 2.0 pushed the PS1 to its limits and was a great rally game, for its day, with the gameplay still holding up today. After McRae's death in 2007, the series changed its name to DiRT but stuck to its hardcore rally origin. DiRT and DiRT 2 had some great damage physics affecting your car, the scenery and the terrain. DiRT 3 lost its way a little, while still a good game, its fan base was largely put off by it being too "arcadey". Its 2015 outing, DiRT Rally, was highly praised as a return to roots, with high emphasis on rally simulation. A very solid and fun game.

Taking feedback from all of this, DiRT 4 offers two physics options to pick from. Gamer, which is recommend for a more arcade driven experience - turning on drive assists and some extra help with traction and drifting.For the more hardcore rally fans… Simulation, driving with assists turned off, on a muddy track, in a torrential downpour is a test to your driving skills... and fun.

As you hardly ever see the driver a character creator would be a bit much. Instead you get to pick your driver avatar between 4 gormless males, 4 females... or generic ‘Helmet-Man’. (I went with Helmet-Man). The game will run you through an introductory tutorial track and judge your driving to recommend a difficulty for you to start at. These have various differences including an aggressive driver AI, earning more money at a higher level, there are a surprising amount of game types to play from.

Career Mode, to me, was very reminiscent of Gran Turismo 2. Earn new licences to unlock more races, win money for finishing top and save up for a new car from a dealership or scout the Classified Cars section for a cheaper but used car. Events come with extra target Challenges, such as ‘make a clean race’ or ‘don't make any repairs’, which when met will earn you extra cash after each race.

During an event you can repair your vehicle between races, this uses an interesting game mechanic of giving you a set amount of game time to dedicate towards repairs. Back in the DiRT Academy, you can test drive your cars around an open derelict area with coned out corners to practice or there are empty warehouses to drive through. You can also pick training from here, teaching you more advanced techniques and the differences between front, rear and four wheel driving and driving across various conditions and terrain. 

By far the best feature of DiRT 4 is Freeplay, this mode essentially gives the game endless amounts of tracks to race on. Pick a location and then using a slider bar, you adjust the distance and complexity of a course, then hit generate and test your new personal stage. If you manage to make one you like, you can save them and upload them for friends to play and race against.

You're also able to set several stages into a competition event.

RallyCross is typically a circuit track race against other rally cars. While Land Rush is dirt circuits in buggies or trucks. A fun distraction from the career mode with a chance to race the computer's AI opponents. Joyride is full of silly challenges, smashing boxes within a time limit and a bunch of other mini games. A nice touch to all of this (and I hope more games use it) is a signal beep and controller vibration at the end of loading times to alert those of us with short attention spans who have drifted off into the world of our phones during this brief period...

Utilising the same game engine as DiRT Rally (2015), the game targets 1080p and 60FPS (frames per second) using a dynamic resolution scaler, meaning it will drop the games resolution in favour of keeping the framerate at 60FPS. The PlayStation Pro takes advantage of its extra horsepower to keep 60FPS, advance anti aliasing and an increase to shadow and reflection resolution.

DiRT 4 is a must have for any rally or driving game fan.

★★★★★

Bry Wyatt

DiRT 4 at CeX

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Saban's Power Rangers ★★★☆☆

Oh where to start with this one…

In an age where seemingly every popular property from the 80s and 90s is being dragged kicking and screaming from the grave, it's surprising that it's taken this long for the Power Rangers to return to the big screen. But how did the Mighty Morphers perform on their grand return?

The Good

You’ll probably be able to guess the tone of this review when I tell you that Power Rangers wasn’t a complete travesty.

The film’s main feature worth commendation is its inclusion of disabled, LGBT+ and gender fluid characters within the primary ensemble. Although one could argue these issues are handled somewhat clumsily (Jason, the heroic Red Ranger and leader of the group is a straight, white male), the mere fact that movies of this ilk are bringing them to the forefront, without resorting to parody or exploitation is undeniably a step in the right direction.

You’ll also be relieved to know that the Megazord makes an appearance towards the film’s grand finale. The climactic battle is impressive enough (I should think so too given the movie’s reported $100,000,000 budget), however when we’ve had films such as Pacific Rim portray city-levelling mech battles with more gusto, it’s easy for the odd jaded cinephile to feel a tad let down.

It would be remiss not to mention that, yes, THAT theme music does make an appearance in Power Rangers. Despite the film’s many flaws, I could feel those rose-tinted spectacles rise firmly up my nose for this scene.

The Bad

The main criticism of the film is that it suffers from a blatant identity crisis. It’s far too adult for kids, with the implied ‘pleasuring’ of a cow kicking off the film in an exchange that would feel more at home Van Wilder.

Yet astonishingly on the other hand it still manages to be too childish for teens and adults; despite a few nods to the audience, it lacks the nostalgia and charm that maturing fans have been pining for. Played out tropes of teen angst and high school politics feel far too cliché, and it’s criminal how much screen time they take up in place of schlocky fight scenes.

The cherry on the turd sundae that is Power Rangers was the offensively obnoxious product placement. However much money the studio made by shoehorning in a Krispy Kreme advert to the final, climactic battle, it wasn’t enough.

The Verdict

Ultimately expectations for Power Rangers were curbed at best, and in retrospect quite correctly. Although director Dean Israelite must be applauded for presenting a culturally and ethnically diverse group of Rangers, if you peel back the veneer, you’re left with yet another lazy cash-in on a beloved property. Power Rangers felt like a lazy clone of Transformers, but astoundingly even more vapid.

★★★☆☆

Sir Thomas Baker

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CeX is on the Radar! The TechRadar!

The lovely folks at TechRadar have named CeX as a good option to sell you old XBOX in their article "How to sell your Xbox: The best way to sell your Xbox, Xbox 360, or Xbox One".

What's more, they forgot to mention that you can trade in your Xbox for a CeX voucher as well, which you can use to buy anything from their stores and online. And you can rest easy knowing that they give you a whopping 24 month warranty on everything! So why not visit one of our 500+ stores worldwide, or head to webuy.com to see what techy delights you can get at the best prices!

Check out the full article HERE. 

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