This barley wine I found in Aarhus airport by complete coincidence. While often barley wine is akin to Imperial Stout, this is more of a belgian quadrupel. Amber in color, with no head (expected) and no sediment (unexpected). The taste is also less sweet than expected, with a bit of bitter aftertaste. For the price, it’s an absolute banger, if only it was exported.
Completed Crimson Skies.
I stopped enjoying the game by Hollywood. First you need to beat a ton of though enemies and pick up a car with time limit. Then you have a mission where you need to fly into a tiny hangar and blow up its doors, while there’s still a chance you will be killed by debris. Then you have a race through the same hangar.
Planes in this game have ridiculous number of guns. In MechWarrior, having many hardpoints made sense, since you could combine weapons into firing groups. But without those, extra guns is just extra ammo, which means there’s no point into putting anything but the highest caliber. Same goes for the turrets, as those have infinite ammo, it seems. Speaking of ammo, explosive ammo is the best ammo type, with no downsides, which makes all the other types of ammo pointless.
Downing a zeppelin with torpedoes sounds cool, until you try. First, the torpedoes fly slower than your plane, you can literally overtake them. And they are armed only after 300m , meaning you can’t use them too close. The real problem? There’s no distance meter in the game, as far as I can tell. So I had to take the heaviest bomber, just to make sure I have spares.
I was sure that the mission in New York where you need to destroy a warehouse is bugged. You need to destroy 6 beams, which are tiny, and I’m not sure if they were made to withstand multiple rockets, or if rockets splash damage isn’t big enough.
The only way I managed to beat the warehouse mission is to create a plane specifically for it, with maximum armor possible, because all enemies focus on you, and multiple guns, because I was literally running out of ammo by the end.
The game has a bug where it sometimes would load key structures at wrong coordinates. The problem with that I discovered that the New York Police Station is basically not in Manhattan, but beyond map limits, half way through a mission where I had to pick up yet another tiny person.
It’s ironic that the final mission is one of the easier in the game, as there are plenty of allies and not that many enemies, and the final boss is just a regular plane, so it’s basically a joke.
What didn’t work out for me in the original game, compared to High Road to Revenge, is how unpredictable some of the mechanics are. I already mentioned that during the firsrt half of the game, most of my deaths were due to my wingman ramming into me. But even during firefights, the hit detection seemed pretty random. Sometimes enemies would destroy me within seconds, sometimes I would finish the same fight unscated. Only to bump into invisible geometry. It’s incredible how many times a game with such an unforgiving collision detection would either make you fly through very narrow spaces, often at 90 degrees, or give you a single try to pick up a tiny moving object.
From the 3rd mission, you already get a Balmoral bomber with two turrets, front and back. And plenty of missiles. Also interesting that you have not just one, but 5 wingmen, although only one is configurable. Unfortunately, it also means more planes to ram you as you about to complete the mission.
Using just the keyboard is suprisingly simpler than I expected. One thing the game loves you to do, though, is pick someone up from a plane/zeppelin/train. Almost every second mission makes you do that. And that requires matching speed. This is pretty annoying to pull.
What’s strange is that you can’t refit your plane. If you want another gun arrangment or armor distribution, you have to sell one plane and buy a new one.
Storywise, first few missions are about hunting after Drake’s treasure. Then we rescue our scientist friend from russians, and his daughter from Americans, alongside an experimental plane.
Maybe I don’t understand some mechanic, but the first Hollywood mission is brutal. You have to hit tiny police cars, then fight off two waves of superior enemies, then pick up a tiny car risking hitting the ground. Not fun.
Original Crimson Skies for PC is a very different beast from its Xbox sequel. The tone is immediately set as a pirate treasure hunt. There are no cutscenes, instead we have radiodrama-like briefings. And the biggest difference is the plane setup. Like in Mechwarrior games, you have weight limit, and you can chose the type of your engine, distribute armour across 4 regions, and most importantly, choose weapon for each of the 6 hardpoints. And for each weapon, you can even pick multiple ammo types.
Bullets have trajectory, indicated by tracers, and aren’t infinite. Missiles are even more finite. I complained that missile stock in High Road to Revenge was much lower than in Ace Combat games, although it could be refilled during mission with pickups. Here, you have 4 missiles, and that’s it. You can also see them on the aircraft belly, which is really cool.
The enemies go down quickly, though, and are few in numbers, so I’m yet to feel need for ammo.
Collisions are quite deadly. I died a few times at the very first seconds of the mission simply because my wingman flew out of the airship right after me, and rammed my plane. And 2nd mission requires you to follow a bomber, which I rammed by mistake as well, downing it and failing the mission.
The game uses Mechwarrior 3 engine, which is obvious to anyone by it’s quite unique picture-in-picture mode, that’s used to track enemy aircraft. That’s pretty neat, as you don’t only get to see their relative direction, but also which way they’re facing. That’s the only good thing I can say about those visuals, though. The lighting is flat, and so are the textures. There’s 3 years difference between Crimson Skies and High Road to Revenge, but the technological gap is vast.
I didn’t manage to make my Xbox One controller work with Crimson Skies despite multiple guides. And I had to use RivaTuner in order to limit FPS, otherwise the game runs at 4x speed with 240FPS.
I mourn for the day I’ll find a barrel aged stout I don’t like. Today is not that day, though. Despite Spanish name, this Imperial Stout comes from Finland. It has a complex taste, with a warm aftertaste of chillies.
This isn’t what I expected, as most of the movie isn’t actually dedicated to capturing Eichmann or to dramatising the escape. Instead, it’s a dialogue between Oscar Isaac and Ben Kingsley.
Melanie Laurent is best known for Shoshanna in Inglorious Bastards. So seing her play another Jewish lady hero is nice.
But I’m not sure what point this movie was trying to make, unlike “Munich” or even “Golda”.
Which is strange, because Oscar’s character arc is solid: he’s this egoistic, rash and haunted by his past failures agent, not the first to be picked, and not the one expect to handle interrogations. And in the end he fights to keep Eichman alive, and almost sacrifices himself in order to let others escape Argentina.
I think I mostly don’t understand Kingsley’s Eichmann. Is he a calculated and violet wolf hiding among sheep? Is he just a German bueracrat judged for crimes of the entire nation? It feels like instead of being ambigous, he’s just confusing.
The cigarettes are a common motive. Golda smokes all the time, and so is her cabinet.
The meeting of the cabinet is almost comical. No, it actually is comical, as Ariel Sharon steals two pieces of cake on his way out.
This is all filmed within just a few rooms: Golda’s apartment, the cabinet, courtroom and hospital, with Golda’s visit to the frontlines being played alongside real historical footage of her, and all the action replaced by real historical footage as well.
Despite a couple over dramatic cancer scenes, I really liked the dialogue. It does gives an impression of a chess game, where one side not understanding it mahave won if only just.
Lev is too handsome to play such a slug as Kissinger was, but I still liked the “torture by borscht” scene.
All I knew about this movie is that fight scene on a bus. It is amazing, though. In the way it tells a character story without many words, and with “burglary gone south” trope made fun of.
Strangely, it reminded me of Hurtlocker, the same theme of a veteran trying to live a regular 9to5 life.
Of course it turns into RED, although I’m not sure how many people even remember this Bruce Willis movie.
I talked about picture quality over the last year (although it hardly says anything, as I don’t watch movies in the order of their release), but this one surprised me with the audio quality. They really make the point in the veteran tattoo salon, when the sound of the tattoo machine follows the camera, but it’s just great overall.
Completed Crimson Skies High Road to Revenge.
This is the most inspiring game in a long time. Second episode boss is a giant mechanical centipede.
Then 3rd episode starts with a duel of two zeppelins between Chicago skyscrapers.
I like how Brigand plane, the heaviest yet, has a rear gunner that reminiscent of Lancaster bombers.
There are some pacing issues in the 4th episode, like mandatory bet with British tourists (?) who downs more Nazi zeppelins. And I’m not a big fan of flying through corridors, especially Aztec corridors with huge pendulums. But this level is much more forgiving than Ace Combat games.
I also stumbled upon the bug of getting stuck after escorting the first Sun Disc. What helped me was to tackle that mission first, then help the tourists.
The final mission is though, but fair. If only there were checkpoints between blowing different parts of the huge Nazi zeppelin.
But then I guess it would be too easy. That way, the boss does give some trouble, but also plenty of satisfaction once you fly through all the turbines and blow all the cores.
Zeppelin is amazing. It’s there during all the missions, it actually engages enemies by itself, and you can also land on it at any time to shoot enemies using one of its guns. This kind of tackles the problem I have with most arcade sims: they are sims of one particular style: dogfight or foxfight, usually. While my favorite style is actual capital ships, like Rebel Galaxy did. Here, you kind of can pick between dogfights and capital ships. Kind of, because you don’t control the zeppelin.
The attention to small details is astonishing. Like the moving trains that you need to either rob or protect, and you can grab ammo from its open platforms. Later, there’s also a duel between two trains.
I also like how no-hands-holding new planes are. Nobody tells you there’s a plane you can find. You need to look for it, and usually you’ll find a new one in some bandit hideout.
I’m mindblown how bold this game is. First episode boss was a zeppeling transforming into mechanical spider.
Completed Cold Fear.
One of the worst design decissions is the C4 episode, where after clearing two rooms, you need to fight an invisible enemy in a room full of explosive barrels. One wrong bullet, and you need to repeat the entire episode again. And if you thought of running away: there are laser mines, which you can avoid, but the enemy can’t.
There is exactly one boss, and it’s a strange one. While Anna plants bombs, you need to distract her mutated father. If he catches her, it’s game over. He can also knock you off the platform, game over. Or, if you get knocked down, he can stomp you. Game over. If you manage to survive, the second phase is waiting for him to grab you to perform a QTE counter three times.
I was expecting some kind of plot twist regarding CIA agent that guides you, but no, nothing. You blow the platform and that’s it.
Completed Ace Combat Assault Horizon Legacy.
I was wrong that they excluded aircraft due to it being old. You do get access to F4 later. Not sure why you’d want to fly an inferior plane, though.
By 21st mission, you get the F15M (doesn’t exists in real life, it’s a tribute to Macros anime). And this mission, which was quite tight in the original is laughably easy. And while I didn’t managed to complete cruise missile chasing Last Resort on the first try, I did it on the 3rd, not 30th like with the original.
First time I see wingman actually completing objectives. In all other games I remember only value was that they would distract some enemies.
Most people don’t understand what “informant” means. This is probably the best depiction, how working with FBI allowed a small time Irish criminal become Boston kingpin, killing tens of people in the process.
I don’t remember why I wanted to watch it, maybe because I watched “Legend” or maybe was impressed by Joel Edgerton from “The King” (here it’s much weaker role).
After doing some reading, the bit that surprised me the most is not Bulger (although going for Johnny Depp was an overkill, he’s nothing special), but how sympathethic Flemmi is depicted. In reality, he strangled not one, but two of his girlfriends, then dismembered them. Also, the fact that Flemmi was an informant before Bulger is completely reversed.
It’s amazing, and obviously very sad. It is funny, the writing is great, and over the top acting fits the atmosphere well.
Scarlett Johanson really surprised me, as I was sure she would be just a prop, but she actually steals the show. How she delivers “you don’t know him, he’s a fanatic” speaking of her 10 years old son is incredible. Or how she plays the missing father. There is so many levels to that single episode.
Everyone always mentions the double shoes scene. But frankly, almost every scene is amazing with it’s asymmetry.
Strangely, or maybe not, the scene that hit me the most was the Russians executing the Nazis, and how that goofy, over the top German soldier sacrifices his life to save JoJo.
And maybe the subtleness of the rabbit in the winter scene. Since we see JoJo scrapping garbage bins for food we expect that the next scene he’d be eating the rabbit. But this isn’t about it. It’s about holding long enough to survive.
And yeah, maybe the movie was about surviving the “Nazi Trump” first term for some. I don’t care. I think that’s what makes a great art, when you can find something for yourself.
There are two main problems with Cold Fear.
First is unintuitive navigation. While Resident Evil is a maze you need to learn, Cold Fear is maze you need to unlearn, because it would constantly block paths behind you, forcing you to find new paths. You can mock Resident Evil for its thematic locks and keys, but remembering which door can now be opened in Cold Fear is far more difficult task.
The second problem is… lack of inspiration. Your weapons are: pistol, AK, shotgun, and a speargun that shoots capsules that distract enemies. The enemies are: zombie with cleaver, mercenary with pistol/AK and spider-like parasite. There isn’t much to go on.
At some point you decide to crash the whaler back into the platform it sailed from. You loose all your weapons and get infected by the parasite, but both resolved in a matter of 10 minutes, I’m not even sure why they bothered.
On the platform, we finally get our first boss fight. And it’s just shooting a russian dude until he dies. Hansen also removes his eye from the corpse for retinal scanner. Those Coastal Guards are sure hardcore.
You find more weapons on the rig: MP5 (why, if we have AK?), M79 grenade launcher, flamethrower (useless, unfortunately). And more enemies: hunter-like enemies that take far too many shotgun blasts to die, and frog-like invisible enemies.
Hansen infected again, in a span of an hour. And Anna is first rescued, then purposefully infected by her now mutated father, which of course reminds of Birkin from Resident Evil 2.
I rarely drink cider. This one we found while visiting Ludlow, and turns out it’s a very local brand, that doesn’t even have a proper website.
Barrel aging makes everything better: whiskey obviously, beer, and even cider. It’s delicious, smooth, with almost no gas and a lot of body. Hits pretty strong too.
I didn’t know what I expected from this game. Resident Evil 3? Resident Evil 4? Honestly, it’s quite distinct from both. Yes, over the shoulder aiming and laser pointer is very much Resident Evil 4. But there’s much less focus on ammo management. There’s actually an upper limit of how much ammo you can carry for your pistol.
Technologically, it’s very impressive what they tried to achieve here. Dinamic shadows, water phisics, the way your character adjusts his balance according to ship’s sway, raindrops on camera, splashes of water that act as hazard. Speaking of hazards, on the main deck there’s a cargo that swings like a pendulum, and if you get in its way: you’ll get bonked.
Save system is a mix of checkpoints and saves. At key points you are asked if you want to save or not. The only reason you wouldn’t, though, if you are very low on health, I guess. Enemies drop both health and ammo, so for a survival horror, it’s quite aggressive. Sometimes I would finish off a zombie and loot it in the middle of a fight.
Speaking of zombies, they only die permanently after a headshot. And even after a headshot they can edject the parasite, which ironically does even more damage than a zombie with a cleaver. Landing headshots on a swaying ship using a gamepad is not easy. Maybe I should have picked PC version after all.
Storywise, its”The Thing ” all over again. Cartel reopens old russian oil rig, with the help of some exSoviet military and researches. But instead of oil they discover those exocel parasites, that infect dogs, humans and even orcas. Of course they start experimenting on the parasites in order to produce bioweapons. And here we are.
I wasn’t sure what to expect of Crimson Skies High Road to Revenge. Another Ace Combat? As expected from its WW1 aircraft design, it’s much more a dogfight game than a foxfight. Although missiles are still a thing, you don’t get as many of them as in Ace Combat games, and they don’t home as much.
Visually, it’s surprisingly pleasant. It has this softness many Xbox games had, and they really make a point to showcase this with an endless sunset above the ocean.
Since it’s alternative post WW1, they also can immediately show of with huge zeppelins, which is impressive. And there are a few more cool details, like enemy pilots parachuting out of their planes.
There’s an arcade element to the gameplay: sometimes there are health pickups that you need to pick up.
Instead of just replacing your plane with a fancier one, you get upgrade system, albeit very basic and arcady. Basically a plane has three stats: armour, firepower and speed. I’m not a fan of how those upgrades are acquired , though. Instead of getting them by completing missions, you need to search for glinting tokens in the open world, usually performing some flights though tunnels to get them. Which wouldn’t be that bad if they would be marked on the map once you discover them, or if there was at least a count of how many there are in a mission.
Every plane has primary and secondary weapons, but they aren’t the same. First plane is pretty standard, with a machine gun and guided rockets. But the second plane you find has a slower firing cannon and a shotgun.
Instead of a mission, it’s more like a open world game on a smaller scale. You get missions by hailing other planes or stations. The problem though is there are no subtitles in this game, so you need to listen carefully what you ought to do.
Another impressive feature is that you can land into your zeppelin and control one of the three turrets, switching between them.
First time I’m trying beer from Romania. It’s a very solid Barrel Aged Imperial Stout, aged in Palo Cortado (special sherry) barrels for a year.
Zero head, tastes like sour cherry, leaves you energetic. At 12GBP it’s not cheap, but worth it.
Would try some more Barrel Aged from Blackout Brewing when I get the opportunity.
Completed Blood West.
Third episode bumps the stakes again. Enemies are so “meaty” I have to buy the unique revolving buffalo rifle, and gunpowder horn that saves 40% of its very expensive ammo. The whole idea of the episode is that you descend into this “radioactive” canyon (at least you don’t need gas mask filters, but you do need to craft a “gas mask” sort of), towards the huge demon skeleton that carved this canyon.
One episode I didn’t enjoy much is raiding the indian village for one of the totem figurines. It’s swarming with invisible enemies called Broken Screams. Since they are invisible, it’s hard to sneak past them, and I ended up almost running of ammo. Had to use the chain revolver that holds 28, so I don’t need to reload so often.
There are nasty enemies called Boo Hags, skinless women that can only be killed with a instakill or fire. One of them is talkative and asks to bring her skin back. She also mentions that the night is endless, which is never explained.
There’s very little explained in general. We climb the mountain, summon totem of souls (which was previously a ram head on a stick), which is a bubble, that turns into a dragon. The boss fight is fine, but least inventive out of the three bosses: it telegraphs where “mortars” will land, and has a “flamethrower” pattern attack. You shoot it with buffalo rifle until it dies, which doesn’t take long.
Despite story being lackluster, I enjoyed this game immensely. One of the best experiences of 2025.