I'm sick

Yeah, the title pretty much says it all. If you're not connected with me on either Facebook or Twitter than you probably haven't heard, but that's the reason why there hasn't been any videos. I've been a little sick more than recently. Just some sort of stomach flu, but I tell ya it sucks. Made me lose over 8 hours at work :( That's not good at all. Bye bye money... but anyway. I'm doing alright for now and I'm hoping that tomorrow I'll be 100% better. For now though I'll just chill, watch some youtube videos and rest. So until next time guys.

- Locke Downe

Saw VI Review (2009)

Blood and Gore are often two words that are highly associated with the Saw franchise, and while I'm not a fan of either of those things I definitely AM a fan of the Saw franchise. Now some may say my opinions here are bias and I promise I'll try my best to give you the most critical and harsh review possible. However, I won't change my own opinion. So here we go. This is my review of Saw VI (Saw 6).

Alright so I'm going to start off with the highlight of the movie, which is the story. Now for some reason the Saw movies for me always had this huge presence within the story. Almost as if it was originally a book turned into a movie, and that's not the case which is somewhat of a down point. The original saw movie was directed by James Wan who then got followed up by Darren Lynn Bousman. After Bousman it was David Hackl and Kevin Greutert. Now while they all did a fantastic job with directing and stuff I feel like the absence of the original writers, directors and producers may have somehow altered the storyline from what "it could have been." or at least "What was originally envisioned." Now Saw still has an amazing storyline provided you followed all the movies and the absence of storyline is NOT something you'll have to worry about in Saw VI. The story still remains and continues into Saw VII. However this time around there's not really any twists or anything that blow your mind like before, but none the less it's solid and can provide a decent amount of entertainment and enjoyment.


Moving onto Graphics, or in Saw's case, Blood and Gore. Saw is known for blood and gore and if that's your thing, you'll be more than happy with this installment. The intro sequence is one of the more graphic scenes in the franchise and had even myself looking away at moments as a rather large man cut out his own stomach in an attempt to place his fat on a scale and free himself. Now sorry if that was considered spoiler to any of you, I consider it for-warning. Now presentation was done well however I felt like a lot of the originality was lost in some of the traps this time around. Sure, it's not like we seen these traps before, it's just that they lost a lot of their WOW factor and while it was a good attempt it didn't fully succeed. Matter of fact, I don't even think the trap displayed on the cover of the movie box is even in it, but maybe that's just me.

On a musical stand point. What can I say really? I love how the all the pieces were original and not some Rob Zombie knock off. The quality in sound-effects is actually quite outstanding now that I think of it, a few scenes come to mind where I got chills at the realism but I won't go in detail as to ruin anything.


Overall I feel like with this installment it lost a little of it's Oumph! but not enough to damage the series in anyway. Saw withstood the test of time so far and even with this installment down-toning the original wow factor a tad bit, I'm still excited as ever for Saw VII this October!

SCORES:
Locke Downe : 8.5 out of 10
Nigel Barnes (TheGamerz01) : 8.5 out of 10
Stephanie Saunders : 8.5 out of 10

OVERALL: 8.5 out of 10

- Locke Downe

BECK (Live Action Movie)

So a couple days ago a fan of mine informed me that there will be a live action BECK movie. The second I heard this I absolutely flipped and started jumping for joy! However, I did find it a little hard to believe at first, but it turns out it's TRUE!!! 2010 Roadshow. Beck will have a live action movie based off the anime.

Now I've seen a lot of animes including such favorites as Evangelion, Golden boy, Ghost in the Shell, Deathnote, Cardcaptors and Dragonball Z, but out of everything I've seen BECK: Mongolian Chop Squad has been my favorite anime. So this news absolutely blew my mind. I can't wait to see exactly how much of the anime they cover and how good of a job the actors will do. I'm hoping that if it gets dubbed in English that the voice actors for the anime will do the voices, cause that would be awesome. Anyways. I'm filled with delight at this story, but unfortunately I don't have much more to say about it. I just hope that it will be awesome. Here's some quick screens:



Also below, I managed to put a link to the movies main page. It's all in Japanese though so good luck reading it! If there's anymore news anyone finds out make sure to let me know okay?

Link: Beck Official Movie Site

- Locke Downe

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LockeTalks is live!

That's right guys, after months of waiting, finally LockeTalks goes live with it's first episode "For England James? No, For World of Warcraft." I hope you all enjoy it. For any of you trying to find access to the LockeTalks page I will paste a link below for easy access. Make sure to subscribe and thank you for reading.

LOCKETALKS

I also plan on posting a link in the sidebar to the right in the near future.

- Locke Downe

Goldeneye Source

Alright guys, so today while I was browsing Gametrailers.com I managed to stumble across this video...

CLICK HERE TO SEE VIDEO

Now after watching this video, I could help but feel nostalgic at all the fond memories of Goldeneye I used to have as a kid. However, it kind of got me thinking. If Goldeneye was re-released today with fully updated graphics and everything what are some of the things they would need to change to make it marketable? Well first off I think they would need online support. Up to at least 8 players online. They should have all the same game modes as before with just as many single players levels and just as many challenges and secrets. They should also incorporate trophies and achievements if they put it on PS3 and 360, but aside for that I think almost everything else should be exactly the same. They don't need to change what we already know is awesome. Now I for one think a remake is highly possible simply because of the Conker Live and Reloaded Remake, but then again, since Rare joined Microsoft their games haven't been all too fantastic. I just hope Rare doesn't go out of business.

So tell me, if they ever did release Goldeneye completely re-vamped what would you like to see changed?

White Knight Chronicles: Impressions

RPG's are something that I've been playing for a long time. All the way back to the days of Final Fantasy IV (FF2 in NA) straight through to Rogue Galaxy and beyond. They've always been such an important part of my life and even though I often times find the gameplay of something like Grand Theft Auto or Zelda a little more appealing they still manage to capture me with their diverse stories and amazingly detailed characters.

White Knight Chronicles is one of the few JRPG's that was designed exclusively for the Playstation 3 and I have to say I'm a lot more impressed then I thought I was going to be. Almost 2 years ago when I first heard of the game, I didn't think much of it. It looked like another amazing Level 5 for sure, but I didn't see it blowing me away. However, more recently I've been looking into it and playing some Level 5 classics like Dark Cloud and Rogue Galaxy and I have to say this game here looks amazing. This week I featured a video demonstrating the online functionality and customization options that will be implemented in the game and I have to say I really can't wait to get my hands on this game! A lot of the customization from Dark Cloud seems to be present along with a Monster Hunter style online play. Not to mention how amazing the main story looks. This game seems to have it all but will it be as easily playable as it is to watch? The battle system (the game's original selling point) has now got me skeptical, but I suppose we'll have to see.


White Knight Chronicles hits stores on my birthday, February 2nd (North America) and I hope every single one of you PS3 owners out there will pick it up. Let me know what your impressions are in the comments section below.

- Locke Downe

Re-vamped and Reloaded.

Finally after about a week of maintenance The Audience of One is up and running. Make sure to check out all the new features we added up to date. Now, at the moment this site is just a beta and could end up changing again in the near future, so as my Youtube page continues to evolve so will the blog. Make sure to leave a comment below and tell me what you think. You don't have to be signed in to leave a comment on a particular blog so feel free. Tell me things you'd like to see added and even a little about yourself. Post anything and enjoy!

- Locke Downe

Evolution

In the past few days I've been spending a lot of time determining what is the best way to go about creating this blog, and I've decided to keep it clean, simple, informative, easy to get around and interactive. The following is a list of upgrades either already made or planning to be added to the site.

- More Original Visual Presentation
- New Color Scheme (Black, Green and White)
- A Monthly User Poll
- A Weekly Featured Video
- Easily Accessible Links
- Hits Counter
- Shout-Box
- Additional Pages (Including Meet The Cast and Shout-Out Page)
- And Many More

I've been experimenting with all sorts of different layouts and designs and hope to find one that can keep us up and running for at least the next year. So Thank you all for your patience and new blogs will be up soon.

Blogger Hiatus

Alright guys, so the new years here and I've been talking to a lot of new and familliar faces on Youtube. I'm going to be taking the next little while (About two weeks) to decide what should posted as videos and what should be posted as blogs and I'm also going to be taking some time to re-design my Youtube page and figure out what kind of videos I want to post on the LockeTalks channel. There's so much to decide and figure out that I'm not sure if I would be able to keep up the Blog while figuring this all out. So please excuse me but I need about two weeks to get everything organized and the blog will be back up on my Birthday (February 2nd). Thank you all.

Paranormal Activity Review (2007/2009)

So rare is it that a movie releases that can actually succeed in what it set out to do. Paranormal Activity was a movie that wanted to do two things. Put you right there in the middle of everything and scare the sh!t outta you! ..and it succeeded.

I myself am a horror movie fan. I laugh at the bad ones, feel chills at the utterly horrifying ones and enjoy the ones that put story beyond gore. Paranormal activity relies rarely on cheap scares and focuses more on a "this could actually happen" kind of fear that dwells upon those who watch it. With a camera that feels more like a home movie than an actual film from Hollywood the film does an amazing job at drawing you in and feeling like you're actually watching footage of some family in San Diego. There's almost no use of special effects or over-dramatizing actors. Everything looks and feels legit, and that's what makes it creepy.

The storyline is simple. A small couple living in San Diego decide to buy a camera so they can film what they believe is paranormal activity occurring in their household. The storyline continues there following Micah, a day trainer, and his girlfriend Katie, a student. Katie's been plagued with these demonic visions since she was eight and though they disappeared for a while they suddenly return and this time they're worse then ever before. That's about as much as I can say without destroying any more of the plot for you. While the plot is not revolutionary it's exactly what this kind of movie needs to be scary. It's kind of like the cheese on a baloney sandwich. Nothing too special but without it it just wouldn't be as tantalizingly enjoyable as it would otherwise.

The sound was handled miraculously, giving a new depth of realism and fear to the movie. As far as soundtrack goes. Well, there wasn't really one so prepare to be on edge listening to every sound out there.


Now I know tons of reviewers have given this movie mixed reviews, but if you ask me it's my all time favorite horror movie cause it actually did scare me. Something no other horror movie has been able to do. When I watched it with a friend of mine ( two of them to be exact ) they actually came out of it crying, I sh!t you not! This movie has the potential to be that scary at times, but like I said it's not a "didn't see that coming" kind of scared, it's a "this could actually happen" kind of scared. For me, my recommendation's a go. Watch it! Watch it right now and make sure to add it to your collection. Paranormal Activity is a wonderful movie made by some small time actors that DESERVES to be watched. So go out there and watch it!!!

Reviewed by:
- Locke Downe

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Locke: 5.0 out of 5.0
Jeremy: 4.5 out of 5.0
Steph: 4.5 out of 5.0
Josh: 5.0 out of 5.0

OVERALL: 19/20

Birthday Shoutout!

I'd like to give a very special shout-out to one of my longest and best-est friends. Shawn Dorey. Known to many on Youtube as Talcon, unfortunately Shawn has been away from us down in Fredericton making his future a success, but none the less I hope his birthday is very very special one and really REALLY hope to hear from him soon. My grandmother would also like to send a shout-out to Shawn as well as our friends Josh, Stephanie and Becky. So Shawn, from all of us down here in NB. Happy Birthday and we all hope to hear from you very soon!


Photo Courtesy of African-IndianBirthdayPhotostoremember.com (Just kidding btw)

Coming This Month

Things Coming to my blog this month. I hope you all check back frequently because I plan on doing these ones soon. There's some you are not going to want to miss.
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Blog Review: Paranormal Activity




















Make sure to check out my review on the chilling but yet still amazing Paranormal Activity. Definitely a different approach to horror films, but is it worth your money to watch? Make sure to check out the full written review coming later on this week. Receive opinions from not only myself but Stephanie Saunders, Rebecca Saunders and Joshua Alexander as well. Make sure to check this out.

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My History with Final Fantasy











My history with the famed Final Fantasy series. You asked for it so I'm going to give you a fully detailed look at what and how I came to love Final Fantasy, which ones are my favorites and which ones I couldn't even touch. So make sure to check that one out.

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Thumbs up of the week!

That's right, I definitely have not forgot about this. There are plenty of events occurring right now that truly deserve recognition. So I'm going to give them the credit they deserve! Every week I'll try and bring to you something I believe that deserves your attention.

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Gamer Spotlight

Who is this month's gamer? Well here's a clue. He's bright, he's got an accent and an obsession with Weet Bix. That's right, he's not from around here but he's definitely someone who deserves to be known. So make sure to check out this gamer spotlight.

All this and more later on this month!

An Update: From The Inside

First thing is I wanted to apologize for not posting any new blogs recently like I said I would and secondly I wanted to apologize for not responding to any questions you've guys had over the last few weeks. Things have been rather crazy lately and I just haven't really had a chance. With all the things that were happening on Youtube and stuff, I just had a lot to deal with, not to mention I've been getting more and more into guitar lately too so that's taken a lot of my time.

Things in my life are starting to change again and this time it's not for the better or the worse, it's just changing. I'm starting to save money now so I can move out in probably September. Not to mention now I have to pay rent to live with my parents (I know, it's crap aye? :( but oh well that's life. ). I'm starting to focus more on the band in my spare time. I have a wonderful lead singer (Steph) and a really good drummer for someone who has never taken lessons (Scorch) and all we're looking for now is bassist. We've even got a name picked out. Check it out, we call ourselves Weathervein. Here's the CD cover...


We decided to go with something different. Weathervein was the name of a street and we took it and changed it into our own thing. So I've been practicing a lot for the band, at least 3 hours everyday and I guess when I get caught up in that I sometimes forget about the blog and things like that, so I really wanted to apologize and know that I plan to maintain both this site and Youtube regularly. I just kind of got behind a little considering all the stuff that happened with me and Viacom, so once again I'm sorry.

* * *

Recently I've been talking to some Youtubers on MSN and Facebook and they're really great people that I think you should all check out.

The First person is JerichoX13. I'm pretty sure he used to be known as Real Deal Dan, anyways, dude's been around for a long time. He knows what the original Youtube community was like and I suggest checking out his Youtube page:

Jericho's Youtube Page



The second and third person needs no introduction. Probably two of the coolest people on Youtube and honestly two of the coolest people I've ever met. Sarynthra (Cory Ellis) and Uberpwner930. These two guys here have been around since the beginning and deserve your views and subs. So go check them out if you haven't already.

Sarynthra's Youtube Page
Uber's Youtube Page



...and last but most certainly not least. TheGamerz01. Also known as Nigel. Nigel is one of my best friends and one of the greatest people I've ever met from Youtube. He's funny, knows his games and has a lot of respect for everything that goes on in the gaming community. Up to now he only has about 60 subs but deserves to be at like 400 by this point. He puts out a video at least once a week and does a great job with it. So if you haven't heard of him go check him out cause he's awesome.

Nigel's Youtube Page

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Now as you know I've been having some problems with Youtube lately uploading my videos so I might have to start posting Sunday Morning Reviews on Facebook, but don't worry I'll still post a video on Youtube giving you guys the link and the news that it's there. I also managed to reduce my security on Facebook so don't worry, everyone should be able to see it now whether or not you're on my friends list.

* * *

So Aside from that I hope you're all having a good week and I really hope to see you all again soon. Thank you for all your questions and I'll try to get them as soon as possible. Thank you.

- Locke Downe

New Blogs Coming Soon

The next few days I swear I'm going to be over-whelmed with free time so I'll be surfing the net a lot, might make a video or two if you guys want to see it. So, just expect more than a few blog posts over the next few days. Sorry for the wait.

- Locke Downe.

Happy New Years

I just wanted to tell everyone: Happy New Years. So many things happened last year that it's almost unbelievable we're in 2010 already. Last year was an alright year for my Youtube career but I hope that this year will simply blow people away. So just as a quick post here's a list of games from 2009 you should check out if you haven't already:

- Blazblue (PS3/360)
- Resident Evil 5 (Wait for the Gold Edition) (PS3/360) (Gold Edt: PS3 only)
- Uncharted 2: Among Theives (PS3)
- Infamous (PS3)
- Assassin's Creed II (PS3/360)
- New Super Mario Bros. Wii (Wii)
- Silent Hill: Shattered Memories (Wii)
- Zelda: Spirit Tracks (DS)
- Dissidia: Final Fantasy (PSP)
- Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days (DS)
- COD: Modern Warfare 2 (PS3/360)
- Batman: Arkham Asylum (PS3/360)

...and no doubt there's more, but that's just a few I can recall. So I hope everyone had a safe and happy holiday. I'm really looking forward to all the questions you have for The Audience of One (in other words, me) and I can't wait to hear from you all in the many weeks to come. Have a great year.

- Locke Downe