Up late talking games & writing? You're...

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Film: The wife and I scored a pair of free tickets to go check out Alien Trespass, a brand-new retro-ish sci-fi movie done up in classic 50’s style. (A hearty thanks to @EMPSFM for the score. Much appreciated!)
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Being shown inside a small theater within the Experience Music Project downtown, an unexpected bonus was that the film's director, R.W. (Bob) Goodwin was on hand to answer questions and share anecdotes. Goodwin has quite a storied history in films and TV, having worked on things like the X-Files, Trinity, and others.
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Starring Eric McCormack (Will & Grace) along with smaller roles turned in by Robert Patrick (Terminator 2) and Dan Lauria (best known as the father from the Wonder Years), the film is about an alien saucer that crash-lands on earth. Upon impact, a rubbery penis-shaped monster escapes, and an intergalactic peacekeeper must recapture it before Earth is lost.
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The film will be an immediate trip down memory lane for anyone who's seen the seminal sci-fi that became so popular in the shadow of nuclear fear. Careful attention was paid to the clothes and small details of the time period, including the preposterousness of the special effects. It's obvious that the people involved with making this film had a great love of the subject matter.
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In terms of the film's actual quality… I hate to say it, but I feel like the film is way off target.
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Goodwin stated that some of those old classics seem so hokey in modern times that viewers can only laugh at them, so he wanted to emulate that unintentionally-comedic style. However, the actual film is extremely earnest in its presentation and pays homage to its inspiration to a fault. Rather than taking a satirical edge or even presenting itself as a tongue-in-cheek farce, Alien Trespass is literally a 50’s film made today. Like an extremely drawn-out joke with no punchline, I kept waiting for the actors or even the director to wink at the audience and let me know that they knew how absurd some of those films were, yet it never happened. I admit that I chuckled a few times, but the film was neither clever enough nor self-aware enough to be able to present itself with any relevance to modern audiences.
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Scenes drag on, some dialogue has no purpose, and the actors do their best to deliver material that doesn't connect. There’s no teeth, no bite, no outrageous parody of the genre or time… it's completely straight-faced, and I have no idea who the audience is supposed to be. It wasn't funny enough to play off the source material for those who will remember it, it's not interesting or engaging enough to stand on its own, and it seems more like a love letter to bygone days from someone who always wanted to make one of those movies, but never did.
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Although neither I nor the wife found the film to be our cup of tea, I did think it was quite interesting that the director was able to shoot the film in fifteen days and under budget of four million dollars… the very fact that he was able to complete the project under these parameters was impressive, regardless of how I felt about the final product.
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If you're still curious, the film hits nationwide on April 3.
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Games: A couple of days ago I finally located a copy of Alone in the Dark: Inferno for the PS3. I'm not a huge AITD fan in general, but prior to the game's release for the 360, there had been quite a lot of talk from the developers about different ideas they were trying out, and their approach to making something they saw as fairly revolutionary.
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…Of course, it ended up accumulating countless negative reviews and extremely poor word-of-mouth. Last time I checked Metacritic, the 360 had an average score of 58. Basically, pretty much everyone who played it hated it, and it crashed and burned spectacularly.
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After this potent feedback, the development team at Eden Studios gave the game a radical makeover and fixed many of the things that sunk the first release. This new and improved version (PS3 only) was subtitled Inferno, and despite addressing the concerns, this release also went nowhere. Currently, a brand-new copy can be had for $20 or less, and last I heard, any hope of a sequel has been utterly destroyed.
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It's deeply, deeply unfortunate that Eden released the flawed 360 version first, because Inferno is completely fucking brilliant.
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Without meaning to sound intentionally hyperbolic, I can certainly say that it's been the best experience I've had on the PS3, bar none. The development team and director were thinking so far ahead and so far outside the box that I've basically been totally impressed with everything I've seen.
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It's dynamically cinematic. The set pieces are fantastic, pacing has been great, and the overall tone and setting are extremely cohesive. In a nutshell, Lucifer’s going to make his grand entrance in Central Park and everyone else is along for the ride. Honestly, Metal Gear Solid 4 could take quite a few cues from what's going on here.
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The physics dominate. Within every aspect of the game, the developers have implemented a physics engine. While most games using physics employ them to a limited degree, Eden has created a world where everything fits and works together, especially with regard to the puzzles and challenges that main character Edward Carnby must overcome. Rope, electricity, fire… all these things are included in a way that's so straightforward and natural, you'll be surprised no one has really attempted it before.
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The design is unique. From the main character’s inventory (pockets inside his jacket), to the combination and manipulation of items, to the extremely bold DVD-style chapter system that allows players to rewind or fast-forward to any segment of the game, it's pretty easy to see that Eden was not afraid to try something that wasn't common-consensus game design.
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Although I haven't finished the game yet (in the home stretch right now) Alone in the Dark: Inferno is easily one of the most impressive experiences I've had this generation, and is certainly a title that deserves to be studied by anyone interested in game design or games criticism. It's not a perfect project by any means, but its bumps and rough edges are absolutely forgivable in comparison to how much it gets unequivocally right.
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Original, visionary, and with an exceptionally unified approach towards creating the game's world from the ground-up, I'd strongly recommend Inferno to anyone with a PS3 and a desire to partake of something that breaks out on its own and succeeds where it counts.
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