Democrat gun-control sit in, and why it's bullshit.

So for the past day or so, a cabal of Democrats have been sitting in on the House floor demanding that the Republicans go along with their gun-control proposal. Most controversial being using the terrorist watch list to ban those persons from purchasing firearms.

This is purely an election year publicity stunt, that uses the rights of American citizens and legal residents here as a board game piece. Here is why what they are doing is pure bullshit.

First point.
Semi-automatic firearms (only one shot per trigger pull), the technology that Democrats refer to as "assault weapons" have been in existence since the 1890s. One of the earliest being the Remington Model 8, which debuted in 1906 as the Remington Automatic Rifle. The AR-15 was a spin-off of the AR-10 which was designed in 1955, with the AR-15 being available to civilians in 1963. While the mechanism is different, the AR-15 and the Model 8 share the same function, one pull of the trigger gets you one shot. In fact, even the internal working mechanism, the gas-system used by the AR-15 is decades old. The operating principal being that some of the gas used to propel the bullet is siphoned off to "automatically" eject the spent cartridge and load the next fresh one. The first firearm to use such a system was invented in 1884, with the first rifle (Mondragon) going into service in 1908. Despite the 79 year gap, the AR-15 mechanics is nothing more than a refinement of the same operating principals.

If we look at this list from CNN we see a gradual uptick of shootings starting in the '80s. Admittedly it is only the top deadliest and not a comprehensive list, it still proves the point I will be making. Prior to the '80s we only see two incidents, one in 1949 and another in 1966. None in the '50s, and none in the '70s. There were 4 incidents in the '80s (I omitted the 5th one as the killings were done as part of an armed robbery and not standalone actions). Then 6 in the '90s with the first major school shooting happening at Columbine in '99. The '00s saw 5 shootings, and the '10s saw 10 incidents. Yet since 1963 the mechanical workings of the AR-15 did not change.

The first incident that happened in the '80s when we start to see this increase was in 1982, 19 years since the commercial debut of the AR-15, and 76 years after the introduction of the Model 8. In short the gun didn't change, people and society did. So the question that needs to be asked, that no one, not Democrats not Republicans, is asking, is what changed in society?

Second point.
Most shootings that happen aren't the rampage mass shootings and acts of terrorism that get media attention, but rather gang and other crime related, not these highly publicized rampage shootings.

Gun-related homicide is most prevalent among gangs and during the commission of felony crimes. - National Institute of Justice

Looking at the data here if we take the total number of deaths and subtract police related incidents, accidents and defensive use to narrow down the number to murders, we get 3993 deaths. Of those deaths 150, or .037 percent are mass shootings. That leaves 99.963 percent of these deaths being some form of murder, be it premeditated 1st degree, 2nd degree, or felony murder committed during the commission of another felony.

Though things aren't entirely doom and gloom, the rate of violent crime is actually on a downward trend. 

Compared with 1993, the peak of U.S. gun homicides, the firearm homicide rate was 49% lower in 2010, and there were fewer deaths, even though the nation’s population grew. The victimization rate for other violent crimes with a firearm—assaults, robberies and sex crimes—was 75% lower in 2011 than in 1993. - Pew Research Center

If we look at the graph here, we'll see that gun related homicides peaked in 1993, and have been on the decrease other than a slight increase in 2005, that has since continued to decrease. Some might point to the '94 Clinton "assault weapon" ban, but that expired in 2004, and all we saw was a slight increase, that may or may not be related, and by 2010 rates were at an all time low.

So the other question that needs to be asked, of equal importance, is what can be done about this crime problem? Why do we see the downward trend in crime and what can be done to continue the trend.

Yet hardly anyone is asking these questions. The Democrats sitting in aren't asking them, all they're capable of saying is repeating the chant "gun-control, gun-control, gun-control..." as if it was some voodoo incantation that would cast a spell and prevent these incidents. The only reasonable conclusion one can draw from this is that the Democrats are not serious about addressing the issue of guns and acts of murder.

Do questions need to be asked? Yes. Does something need to be done? Yes. But it's not the same tried and failed emotionally driven gun-control that does not address the root issues. Places like Oakland, East LA, Chicago and Washington DC all have Democrat crafted gun-control and those cities are notorious for their murder rates. California has some of the strictest gun-control in the country and it did nothing to stop a sexually frustrated looser from shooting up a college town because no one would have sex with him, nor did they do anything to stop two jihadists from shooting part of a city up. Let alone doing anything to stop the gang related violence.

Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. - Albert Einstein

Perhaps what the Democrats want isn't bullshit, but rather insanity.

Though one more point needs to be made.

No person shall be... deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law... - 5th Amendment

...nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law... - 14th Amendment

Due Process is NOT a suggestion. It is not an option that can simply be turned off to make a certain segment of the population feel safer. Using an arbitrary terror watchlist to deprive an individual of personal liberties without letting have their day in court deprive them of due process. The burden of proof is on the state to prove that a person is a threat, the burden of proof is NOT on the individual to prove that they are not a threat.

By demanding arbitrary power to deny civil liberties the Democrats want nothing less than bringing back the reviled Star Chamber, known for it's abuses of judicial power and use as a tool of oppression.

DOOMed to Hell: DOOM (2016) Review

Back from Hell

The Doomguy came back from 1995 to Glory Kill Captain Price. He warped in from Hell via a portal, shot Price a few times, then grabbed him, ripped out his arm and caved in his skull with it and took all his ammo and proceeded to gib Soap McTavish with a point blank shot from the Super Shotgun.

10/10 (single player)

I'll focus on single player for this review. 

Holy shit, this is easily one of, if not the best game of the 8th generation that I've played so far. Fears that this game was only going to be Call of Doom have been put to rest. This is a return to form, a return to FPS's roots and about the farthest away from the Call of Duty formula you can get and remain an FPS. 

To prepare for this experience, I played though the Inferno chapter of the original Doom, so I'd have a fresh reference point in my mind while I played though Doom '16. 

Meet New Doom, same as Old Doom, and that's a damn good thing. 

Once again we go back to having a health and armor meter, no longer does your health regenerate on it's own. No more do enemies take cover and try to pick you off. The result is fast and furious gameplay. Monster will now rush you, Imps are very fond of jumping and climbing walls to get to your positions, Knights of Hell are always charging at you to bash you, and if you stay put too long the huge new Baron of Hell with pound you into the ground. Hit, run, and serpentine is the key to survival, duck and cover is the fastest way to get killed. Given the prevalence of the CoD formula in today's FPS genre, this return to old school Doom/Quake/Duke Nukem style is a breath of fresh air. 

Also returning, and further refined thanks to modern gaming technology, is that combat now has a 3D element. By that I mean, no longer are enemies confined to the ground. Sure in modern and sci-fi shooters you get the occasional flying unit that either comes in every once in awhile to dump a bunch of guys on you and leave, or serves as a boss. In Doom '16 you will run into flying monsters that are every bit as aggressive and dangerous as the ones that come at you from the ground. The further hammers the point that you need to keep moving. Stay in one spot and focus on one monster for too long, thinking your back is safe because you're by a cliff, NOPE, a flying monster like the Cacodemon might come in and literally bite you in the ass and take off a big chunk of life. 

Not to go into Battlefield 1 territory, but around the era of WWI, there was a line of thought in naval design that resulted in the battlecruiser. A medium cruiser type vessel with battleship caliber armament. The design philosophy was "speed is armor". And that perfectly sums up the gameplay of Doom '16. Yes you do have armor pick ups that absorb light damage and mitigate mid to high damage, but you cannot just tank your way though this game. The tactic of shoot, shoot, duck for 8 seconds, shoot, shoot, duck for 8 seconds, rinse and repeat will not work in Doom'16. Just like in the original, you have to keep on the move and you have to be able to dodge what the monsters will throw at you. 

Funny enough, if you are an experience Call of Duty Zombie player, getting into Doom '16 will not be too much of a jump. Just imagine the zombies with guns who move around more than just run at you in a straight line. 

To facility this mad run and gun style of play, level designs have a lot of wide open spaces in which you can run around loose in with little obstruction. Very rarely did I get killed because I got stuck on an obstacle while pack peddling or circle-strafing. Even indoor locations, the hallways are wide and there are much of the combat takes place is big hangar like areas. The other "speed bump" in the road of running and gunning that the developers removed was the reload feature. While ammo pickups remain, the player essentially has bottomless magazines on all the guns. No longer do you have to take a 3 second break in your slaughter party to reload, except with the Super Shotgun, that just like with Doom 2, must be manually reloaded after each shot (until you max out it's upgrades, then you get two shots). Id has more or less taken out most of not all obstacles that would put a pause or slow down in pace. 

There were some concerns that the Glory Kills would slow down the gameplay, but that turned out to not be the case. In fact it adds a layer of strategy to your rampage. The Glory Kill animations are fast and smooth, and Glory Killing will result in health, armor (with suit upgrades) and occasionally ammo pick ups. It doesn't break the flow of your unleashed rage, nor does it result in cheap deaths where you are killed mid animation. There are a variety of Glory Kill animations, for each monster, Pinky for instance, you can get behind him and rip him apart with your bare hands, or you can get him from the front, rip out one of his horns and stab him in the face with it. On a sidenote this was clearly influenced by the Brutal Doom mod, where executions will net you a 5pt health boost, even beyond the 200pt cap. 

Because the game just craps monsters all over you, situational awareness is a must. As you are a running around you need to keep track of where multiple monsters are at once. While this doesn't seem too different from you standard CoD style fare, there's the added factor of the monsters, rather than taking cover, are coming at you. This makes you have to make snap decisions such has which monsters to engage first. Do you engage the long distance Hell Raiser, or the Hell Knight who's been chasing you around for the past 5 min? Should you use the chainsaw to insta-kill that Baron of Hell and use up all your fuel... wait, where did he go, shit did he get behind me?! 

Doom '16 also throws in some light platformer elements, which adds another level of strategy to many areas. Jumping and climbing ledges is smooth and fast. Do you want stay on the lower level and circle-strafe the monsters, or do you want to keep to the high ground and jump around the area? 

Now I know I started off with describing the Doomguy coming in and murdering two major characters from Modern Warfare as a creative way of saying that Doom '16 murders Call of Duty, and while Doom '16 does completely and utterly blow away CoD in terms of single player experience, they're both different enough experiences to stand side by side. 

Ok, so with a nonstop, Hell-coke fueled, demon slayer rampage (on that note the original Devil May Cry soundtrack really works for this game), you need to have a control scheme that facilitates that. While Doom '16 lacks a custom control set up, like many games do today, the settings they have are very intuitive and and leave nothing of want. No more of this 2 gun shit, you now carry an arsenal of 7 guns, accessed via a Resistance style weapon wheel by holding down Triangle. Tapping Triangle will return you to your most previously equipped weapon. Accessing the map on the PS4 is via the touchpad button (which acesses the menu in general, though the map is the default) and you can use the touchpad or the sticks to navigate the map. The super weapons like the chainsaw and the BFG 9000 get their own button so when things are going side-ways you can quickly shift to either one and either chainsaw insta-kill the biggest threat in the room, or BFG everyone in the room. 

Behold! The PC of the future, as big as PC of the past. 

Now on to the technical aspect. On the PS4 Doom '16 runs at a nice, smooth, constant 60fps. I never noticed any drops in frame rate, even with a dozen monsters running around loose in a large arena like area with shooting, flying and shit blowing up. Very rarely have I seen any visual glitches. I had one glitch that happened only once where I climbed a ledge and the view was blurry (like when they model distance) but it went away after pressing the touch pad and going into the menu and leaving. 

As with visual glitches very rarely did I have any glitches that caused me to get stuck somewhere and have to reload a checkpoint. Though I did have a crash that kicked me out of the game and I had to reload the game. Not sure if that was because of the game or because I was using the media player in the background to play remixes of classic Doom tracks (personally I didn't much care for the game's music). But fortunately the game isn't stingy on the check points so I didn't have to retrace too much of my steps. Certainly not enough to get pissed off over it. 

Aside from that crash the game ran flawlessly. 

Welcome to Hell. Please don't feed the Cacodemons and direct any concerns to the local Baron. If you encounter an angry green armored human with a big gun, DO NOT approach him, he is extremely dangerous and promptly notify the nearest Knight. 

Visually the game is very appealing with the art style going from Alien style industrial sci-fi with the UAC Argent Facility on Mars, to a kind of medieval fire and brimstone/fantasy style for Hell. While the the UAC has a kind of "hard" look to it, Hell has a slight sepia filter that gives it a very slight hazy look, like a kind of a fire-got-put-out-and-the-ash-is-floating-around-a-little kind of look. It doesn't look like everything is on fire, but it does look like a very desolate and unpleasant place to be in. 

Personally I really loved the art style. Especially with Hell's art style, with it's medieval/fantasy look, making it very distinct from the sci-fi facility on Mars. Naturally with a game that features Hell as a location, a lot of the demonic imagery from classic Doom returns, you'll find blood runs scrawled on some of the walls in the UAC base and in Hell you'll find the return of the skull switches. 

Meet New Doomguy, same as Old Doomguy...

The Doomguy himself looks like a revamped version of the classic Doomguy. This time around his armor is full body rather than just upper body armor and helmet over a sleeveless BDU. While updated, you can look at him and right away tell he's the guy from Doom. Just like the original his character development is very limited since he's supposed to be the player. But we do see some aspects of his personality. He has a tendency to break stuff, for instance after upgrading your gun at a service droid he punches the droid hard enough to seemingly knock it out of commission. He'll also smash terminals that get used to communicate with him. When you pick up the little bonus action figures, when you find the one that looks like him, he swivels the figure's hand out and gives him a little fist bump, then shakes his hand like the figure bumped him too hard. 

The monsters are for the most part instantly recognizable and close counterparts to their classic Doom originals. In terms of design, even more so than their Doom 3 incarnations. Personally I prefer the monster designs here to Doom 3's. A lot of them actually attack the same way as they did before, since there are quite a bit, I'll just go over the guys that got a big overhaul. 

Imps now like to scurry and jump around, but they still like to throw fireballs at you, but they now travel along a ballistic arc, and I have noticed that they will lead you to an extent when they fire their charged fireball at you. 

The Demon/Pinky is back, but now he acts like this kind of raging bull enemy that charges at you rather than run up to you and bite you repeatedly. His face is armored so now you have to side step him and shoot him in the flanks and back to to efficiently kill him. 

Hell Knights got a complete revamp, now instead of just a pallet swap of the Baron of Hell, they're these big hulking brutes that charge at you and engage you in melee combat. Gone is their green fireball. 

The Mancubus now comes in two varieties but they're not too terribly different from each other, not enough to require different tactics. They both behave the same way as the classic incarnations, only now they also have this close range continuous flamethrower attack that will sap you health and armor if you stay too close to him. 

The Cyberdemon now has a sword that he can sling these energy waves at you along with his rocket launcher. He also has an attack where he raises rows of stone spikes at you and traps you in a shooting gallery for him, where you have to dodge his attacks, but it works the same way for you and he doesn't bother dodging your attacks, opening him up for guaranteed BFG hit. 

The Spider Mastermind now has a fully organic look, rather than being a giant Krang sitting on a quad-legged wheelchair. It now looks something between the Widowmaker from Resistance 3 and Phantom from Devil May Cry. Now it does more than just standing there holding down the fire button on it's chaingun. It still has the chaingun but now it also has a laser attack that the player must jump over and duck under. The other attack it also has is an area electrical attack that must be evaded by standing on pillars that the Spider forces up from the ground, however stay on these pillars too long and spikes extended from it damaging the player. You need to jump off at the right time. Lastly, after you damaged it enough, the Spider will also start throwing said pillars at you. 

From top to bottom: BFG-9000, Chainsaw, Plasma Rifle, Chaingun, Pistol, Super Shotgun, Combat Shotgun, Rocket Launcher, Heavy Assault Rifle, Siphon Grenade, Gauss Cannon

Now, I can't talk about your victims without talking about the tools of the trade. To tell you the truth, I'm not super fond of the designs of the guns, but they don't feel out of place with the rest of the game's art style, and in terms of function they are damn fun to use. They pretty much threw out all pretenses of realism when they designed your tools of carnage, that's both in terms of art and in function. 

The BFG-9000, as previously stated gets it own dedicated button (L1 for the PS4) and it functions largely the same way as the classic BFG-9000. Fires a big green blast that hits everyone. 

The Chainsaw got a complete overhaul. No longer is it an infinite use weapon, you now need fuel to use it, but there's a catch. It is now an insta-kill weapon and will kill just about all non-boss monsters in one gory Glory Kill style attack (against a Baron of Hell, you'll saw off his right leg and while he's lying on the ground you'll saw off the top of his head from the jaw up), so long as you have enough fuel. The bigger the monster the more fuel you'll need. 

That's it for the super weapons. Each of the normal weapons are accessed on the weapon wheel and have multiple attachments that you can switch out (except for the pistol and Super Shotgun) for different secondary fire abilities. 

The Plasma Rifle comes with a secondary heat blast, that works by building up heat as you fire and releasing it as an attack. The other secondary fire a stun blast that'll put monsters in the stun state and open for Glory Killing. 

The Chaingun can have either an faster spin up time, or can deploy TWO chainguns, almost like KOS-MOS's triple chaingun from Xenosaga. 

The Pistol comes with a charge shot that lets you power it up for a stronger attack. It is also the only gun in the game that has infinite ammo. 

The Super Shotgun can be upgraded blast though monsters and to allow for two consecutive shots before reload. 

The Combat Shotgun can be upgraded with a three shot burst, or an explosive shell attachment. 

The Rocket Launcher gets a remote detonated drone and lock on feature, so now your rockets can do the same thing the Revenant's can. 

The Heavy Assault Rifle, which is really more like a belt-fed general purpose machine gun, gets a sniper scope, and a mini-rocket launcher. In sniper mode not only do you move at almost the same speed while scoped in, but the Rifle remains full auto and there is just about no recoil. 

Lastly the Gauss Cannon. The Gauss Cannon also gets a sniper mode, and has a charged shot secondary. Initially you cannot move while charging the Cannon up, but that can be upgraded to allow movement. 

Now the mechanic behind the upgrades work like this. Most of the guns have two secondary add-ons. Those are unlocked by finding supply drones scattered though out the game at various locations. Then each of those add-ons can be upgraded with weapon upgraded points that are acquired after clearing out rooms of monsters, finding collectibles, and at the end of the level if you killed everyone. 

So... who gets THIS reference?

Now one of the things that sets Doom '16's campaign mode apart from other's in the genre is the replay value. There are a whole host of weapon and armor upgrades scattered through out the game. Armor upgrades come in the form of completing challenges throughout the game. Challenges vary from killing X number of monsters within the time limit using only a certain gun, to running and jumping down a track to reach the end before the timer runs out. Hidden in each level are two collectible figures, there are also rooms in each map that are taken from levels from classic Doom, right down to the old low rez graphics and 2d item and environment sprites. It's unlikely you'll find everything on the first go, not without looking online, so you'll have a reason to come back and replay each level. 

Without getting into plot related stuff, that's pretty much it. It is a fucking awesome game and a return to the frantic pace of classic '90s FPSs. It's a breath of fresh air in today's increasingly stale FPS market. At the same time, those who grew up on the CoD formula may get a bit of "culture shock" in that it is nothing like anything they're used to, and I can see why they wouldn't be so hot for this game. But if you're looking for something old school style, or you're just looking for something different from the tired, played out shoot-shoot-duck for 8 seconds-rinse-and-repeat formula, then get out and get this game. In fact here, now you don't even have to leave the house to get it. 

Final Ruling: 10/10

Yes I give it a perfect score. Id set out with a clear goal in mind when the restarted the Doom 4 project, and short of the multiplayer issues, they executed it perfectly. 

Now onto the plot. 

There really isn't much going on plot wise, it's pretty much something that you would expect out of '90s sci-fi horror film like Aliens. You have an energy crisis happening on Earth so enter the Union Aerospace Corporation, who sets up a research facility on Mars to study some artifacts, lo and behold from these artifacts they find a way into Hell and as it turns out Hell is rich in resources, so they being harvesting energy from Hell and solve the crisis. 

As you'd expect if we can get into Hell, they can get into out dimension, and that's exactly what happens. Now unlike the previous Dooms, this Doomguy isn't just some grunt who was stationed at the wrong place at the wrong time. Instead on one of the UAC's expeditions into Hell they found a chamber with a stone coffin imprisoning the Doomguy and storing his armor. The soldiers brought him back to Mars and the facility boss released him to help fend off the invasion. 

From various tablets you encounter, it turns out that this Doomguy is rather infamous in Hell, the same way someone like Jack the Ripper and Attilla the Hun are infamous in our world. In the past he had slayed legions of demons and went on a rampage across Hell, earning the terror of everyone who lived there, until they were able to seal him away. It's kind of sketchy but he was also associated with an order of knights from another realm that went to war with Hell and lost, and subsequently was absorbed and corrupted by Hell. But there is something interesting about this, while the knights have armor that look both futuristic and medieval, Doomguy's armor looks purely futuristic and military. 

It is mentioned in testament tablets you find in Hell that the Doomguy traveled a great distance and hints that that was across time and dimensions. There is speculation that this Doomguy is indeed one and the same as the Doomguy from the original games. The end of Doom 64, which takes place after Doom 2, has the Doomguy going back into Hell and sealing the portal behind him, opting to stay in Hell to prevent them from invading the human dimension for good. Now being who he is what is he most likely to do? Rampage across Hell of course, and that's exactly what the tablets describe. Now if we take the view of Hell as a sort of nexus dimension that ties all the different dimensions and parallel universes together, it's plausible that the classic Dooms and Doom '16 are parallel universes and the Doomguy traveled across universes via Hell. One tablet states that his armor was made for him by "she who shall not be named", it could have easily been the case that this woman rebuilt his old UN Marines armor into the suit we see him with now, as it does bear a strong resemblance to the classic Doom armor. 

Overall the plot isn't anything all that complicated. It's straight forward and serves only to really move things along and provide an explanation of why you're moving from Point A to Point B, why you go from a industrial sci-fi looking location to barren medieval/fantasy Mordor looking location. Things do get kind of weird, with the addition of a cult element within the UAC. Apparently the branch that was tasked with going into Hell had become a cult with the Division leader having either become possessed or simply corrupted by demonic influences, and it was this cult faction that caused the invasion into the human dimension to happen.  

Roots of American Gun Culture

So I was scrolling though my Facebook wall when I came across an article that posed the question of where the gun culture in the US came from. Thinking about it I'd say there are two significant factors where it arose from. First was the frontier nature of the country for much of not most of it's existence. Second the fact that the gun was already invented by the time the colonies they would someday become the US were founded.

From Day 0, the people that settled the North American east coast had to fend for themselves to some degree. The Crown was an ocean away, so if something situation arose for the most part they were on their own. Same goes for sustenance. The marketplaces of Europe hadn't been established there. Hungry? Had to hunt or trap your food. You wanted a jacket, had to hunt or trap for your leather and fur.

Just the undeveloped nature of where they lived necessitated that the colonists become self-sufficient, it fostered a sense individualism. Everyone has their hands full handling their affairs, you need to pull your own weight in the colony. And so, what is the most efficient hunting implement? The long arm, and so enter the gun. From there the gun became an important tool for survival, not just an important tool, but a respected tool that was passed from generation to generation. And so history went.

The colonial period gave way to independence and the Louisiana Purchase which more than doubled the territory of the US. Again, the Louisiana Territory wasn't developed, it was the first generation of settlers moving in along with hunters and trappers. Like the era before them, local authorities were far and in between. You had trouble with bandits and other ruffians, you had to take care of them. That rifle on the wall that you use to get game, you're also pointing it at people seeking to do you harm for their own gain. Same goes for the marketplaces of New York and Boston. Like the marketplaces of London and Paris which were far and away from the original colonists, New York and Boston were far and away from these settlers. If you were hungry, had to go and hunt or trap your dinner. You were cold and wanted a jacket? Had to go out and shoot or trap for your leather and fur. And so history went.

Flintlocks worked by the user pouring and ramming powder and ball down the barrel and pouring a charge in the pan. A metal lid with a lip would be closed over the pan. When the trigger was pulled the cock holding the flint, slammed down and scraped against the lip, dropping sparks into the charge in the pan, igniting the charge which then ignited the power behind the barrel and launched the ball, firing the gun. 

As Louisiana was more settled and began to develop, people kept on moving west. The farther west you went, the farther away from the authority of government, and easy access to a variety of goods diminished. As the people moved west, the gun moved with them. The gun remained an important and respected tool. Even the Native Americans came to respect the gun for it's utility, the top item of trade they wanted, were rifles. The only thing that really changed was the technology of the gun. The flintlock mechanism gave way to the percussion cap mechanism which granted far more reliable method of ignition. History marched on.


As time went on, settlers continued to push west, and still with them, came the gun. The only difference was the gun was now changed by Civil War advances in technology made by the Union. Muzzle-loaders (front loaders) gave way to breach-loading trap door designs (you load from the back of the rifle) and repeating designs like the Spencer and Henry rifles (aka the Winchester rifle of Old West fame) as well as their pistol counterparts giving way to the revolver. Technology might have changed the gun, but the gun continued to be an important and respected tool of frontier life.

The percussion mechanism was an improvement over the flintlock in that it replaced the flint and loose powder and pan with a hammer and percussion cap. Like the flintlock, powder and ball were rammed down the barrel, but now, the mechanism had a nipple that funneled the charge into the chamber and ignited the powder. The cap was placed on the nipple, the hammer discharged the cap, and the cap ignited the power and fired the gun. This made for faster ignition and more reliable ignition in rain and muggy weather. 

Even as history declared the frontier closed and settled in 1890, things had no means completed development. Outside of the large established cities like San Francisco, you are still largely out on your own to handle your affairs. Which continued to make the gun and important tool for self defense. The United States of America is 240 years old, 114 of those years had a large open frontier to the west, that is nearly half of this country's existence, and that's not including the preceding Colonial Era. That is at least 114 years in which the gun had to integrate itself into the culture of the New World. Not just exist within the culture but because of the role it played in frontier life, for such a long period, it became a part of that culture. One may point to slavery as a part of cultural heritage, however slavery was an institution. An institution set up for the sake of profit, in contrast, the gun became an integral part of the national identity though necessity. A necessity that still continues today given that for practical reasons the modern incarnations of those agents of the state, modern police departments aren't everywhere at once. Furthermore slavery was never fully integrated into American culture, slavery was only accepted in certain circles, where as in any part of the country one could find someone making use of the utility of the gun, be it someone living in a free state or a slave state. This continues today, with gun-ownership crossing multiple divides, rich, poor, Black, White, Asian, Latino, gay, straight, one will continue to find all strip of Americans from all parts of the country owning a gun.

The trapdoor mechanism, which many of the percussion rifles were retrofitted with, operated with a hatch at the rear of the gun. The hatch, or trap-door was flipped upward, a single cartridge inserted into chamber, the door was closed and the hammer cocked, locking the door in place, and the trigger dropped the hammer onto a firing pin which fired the cartridge. This increased a shooters rate of fire almost ten-fold, having no longer needing to load power and bullet separately from the front of the gun. 

The Spencer (top) and Winchester (bottom) rifles were introduced during the Civil War and gave the Union Army a distinct and overwhelming advantage in firepower against the Confederacy.  They were some of the first "repeating rifles" rifles that could be fired multiple times before reloading. Both rifles had an internal magazine holding multiple self-contained cartridges ("bullets") and each shot was chambered by operating a leaver (integrated into the trigger guard on both rifles) that both ejected the spent cartridge and loaded the next one from the magazine. The Winchester in particular built it's fame and reputation during the Old West Era following the Civil War, where it was used by settler, lawman, Native American, and bandit alike for their own purposes.

This was the advancement that made the above rifles possible. The metallic self-contained cartridge, (self-contained paper cartridges existed as early as 1812). This combined the powder, percussion cap and the ball (the bullet) all into one convenient package. No long did the shooter need to perform multiple distinct tasks to operate his firearm, he simply had to load in this one package and he was ready to fire. 

But it isn't only the gun that has journeyed along side us though the American experience. But also the idea of individualism. The government was there, but because it was so far away you had to be able to take care of yourself until the government was able to get there to be the ultimate arbitrator. That sense of independence, of taking care of yourself, never truly went away either, it, and the gun, go hand in hand together. Yes you work together with your community, but you all contribute to the community, the community doesn't contribute to you. With so many people moving west, and setting up new settlements, this resulted in a large portion of the population being armed with guns from early on. Even today that sense of independence plays a role, while we may have police services set up, they still have a response time, and in that regard they are still some distance away.

The AR-15, introduced in 1963 originally designed in 1958, menace to society? No, just an continuation of the gun's legacy in the American cultural experience. It operates on principals developed around the 1880s (the world's first semi-automatic rifle being the Mexican Mondragon going into service in 1908, John Browning's M1895 gas-operated machine gun having gone into service even earlier in 1895 and was designed in 1889). A portion of the gas used to propel the bullet is siphoned off and used to operate mechanism to "automatically" eject the spent casing and load the next cartridge. The direct impingement system used by the AR-15 is nothing more than a refinement of those same principals developed in the late 1800s. The AR-15 operates differently from it's predecessors, but ultimately it's character is no different from the Winchesters that came before, and the Kentucky rifle that came before that, what it will and won't do is wholly dependent on the person holding it. 

This sets the American Experience (I include the Colonial Era, Spanish, British and French, as part of the Experience) apart from the Eurasian Experience in a significant way. There was never a period in the American Experience where the gun did not exist. Alexander's Empire, the Roman Empire and the Mongol Empire all spread their boarders and settled the land with the sword. Battles were fought with the blade, by Spartan Hoplites, by Roman Legionaires, by armored knights. Metropolitan culture had already developed in Europe long before the first matchlock muskets started to appear in the mid-1400s. Over a millenia ago Rome had stood at it's height atop the most developed empire the world had yet seen. A grandeur and splendor that the gun had no part in playing. The Old World was already built when the gun entered the world stage, in contrast the gun was there from the start to help build the New World.

In the New World, it wasn't the sword or the bow that the frontier settler relied on, it was the gun. The New World, wasn't just a new world, it was the ground that a new culture would take root in and grow from. Some may compare Australia to America, as Europeans arrived in Australia around the time as in North America, the Dutch made landfall in 1606, but there are key differences. Inland, North America was very rich and fertile land. Meaning there was a lot of space to be settled, plenty of room for people. In fact, compared to the rest of the country, the middle portion of the United States is not as populated and is derisively refereed to as "flyover country". By contrast central Australia was inhospitable desert. The other differentiating factor was where the American colonies were set up to enrich the British homeland, the First Fleet that arrived in Australia were looking to set up a penal colony. The first free colony wasn't settled until later, well into period of Manifest Destiny in North America that had settlers pushing west. These differing factors set America apart from Australia, America and Australia do not share the same cultural experiences.

Going back to the question of where gun-culture in the US came from, there is my answer. It was always there it was, and continues to be an integral part of the culture of the United States. So what does this ultimately all mean? It means that European solutions, and Australian solutions, and Asian solutions to social issues where guns are involved, will NOT, and likely not EVER work in the United States. The US, while having traditions spun off from the Old World, is a completely different culture. Just as how Christianity is wholly separate from Judaism, despite having spun off from Judaism. Unlike Canada or Australia, the United States literally threw out the Old World. The US kicked out British, and it kicked out the last investigates of the Spanish Empire from Cuba. To find an effective solution, an American solution must be found, not a solution copy-pasted from nations that do not share the same experiences. Guns are every bit a part of American culture as the freedom of speech, the freedom of religion, the freedom to live your life as you see fit.

Charting Uncharted territory: Uncharted 4 Review

Overall score: 9/10

Holy crap! OK if you have a PS4 but not Uncharted 4, then you are doing yourself a massive disservice.

To kind of give this review some organization, I'll review it on several points, visuals, the technical aspects, gameplay, and plot.

From the visual side, the game is beautiful. I don't even know how much time I've spent playing around with the camera mode taking scenery picture style screen shots. But even the most beautiful of virtual landscapes can be completely ruined by choppy frame rate and texture tearing, and other graphical glitches, like an award winning lawn after the neighbor's 200lbs St.Bernard came and took a dump on it. Fortunately, graphical glitches aren't a problem that Uncharted 4 has. The game runs consistently smooth and I witnessed no graphical tearing or stretching. In fact the graphics are almost too nice. In previous Uncharteds the handholds in the climbing segments were pretty obvious, they always slightly stood out in a strange unnatural kind of way. Think the items standing out in Resident Evil or Onimusha's prerendered backgrounds. Here in 4, they look so much like a natural part of the terrain that sometimes it'll take you a moment to realize that there is a handhold there for climbing. Just about everything in the game has a photo-realistic look to it, unless you get the camera super close to a piece of foliage, then it just starts to look like green paste. But the only time you'll experience that is when you are playing around with the camera mode. What also stands out the most is how great the water effects look, especially the waterfalls.

The character modeling certainly lives up to the game's scenery. As with other Uncharted games, you can watch Nate's clothes dry. Nate will also get dirtier if you have him running though mud. I had someone walk by during a cut scene between Nate and Nadine and they literally thought I was watching TV, not playing a game. Even with the weapons, they are modeled accurately to their real world counterparts. The AK-47 has the charging handle in the correct position and even has the side scope mount on the left side. The Mini-30 also is also modeled accurately to Ruger's Ranch Rifle.

I literally have nothing to complain about when it comes to the game's visuals. Perfect score here in that regard.

Spooky...

Playing though as the normal end user would (instead of playing it in a manner trying to "break the game" as I once did in a previous life), I hardly encountered any glitches. Certainly nothing that would be considered a non-progression (you get stuck and have to restart) though, I did get the rare occasional crash that kicked me back to the PS4's main menu. Fortunately the game is very liberal with the checkpoints and I never got kicked back very far in the game. For the most part there really isn't any techical flaws in terms of bugs and what not that I would say hold the game back. 

If I didn't know any better I think this was a photo taken at Versailles. Yes I have been to Versailles...

In terms of gameplay, I found the game to be generally closer Uncharted 2. Gone is the ability to throw back grenades. and melee combat has been simplified to just the use of the Square button rather than Square and Triangle combos. This would be where I'd have something to complain about. In addition to removing the ability to throw back grenades, the enemy AI also likes to flank you and is also very grenade happy. Expect someone to flush you from cover with a grenade and have 3 of their buddies all gang up on you as you break cover. I've had more than a few cheap deaths in that regard. I can live with the simplified melee since for the most part in the franchise it was more like an after thought, but I did distinctively find combat to be more frustrating because of this. The ability to throw back grenades should have been retained if they're going to make the enemies more grenade happy. 

On the other hand, I did find the shotgun to be much more useful given that it appears to have more range this time around. Certainly not as long as a rifle, but now you can actually kill someone with one blast at more than 5 feet away. I'll be referring to the guns by their real world names, basically because I can't remember all their fictional names. In previous Uncharteds, especially the first one, other than the Pistole, the shotguns were basically nothing more than a till-something-better-comes-along gun. The arsenal has also had a little bit of a overhaul and is a bit more varied. Where as in previous games, you had a 3 shot burst rifle with a scope to bridge the assault rifles like the AK-47 and the sniper rifles like the Dragunov. Now in U4 we have, what appears to be the Israeli Galil with a low power zoom scope and full auto. Though the U2 FAL also makes a return and is largely unchanged. Gone is the scoped revolver from U2 and U3, just as well since that gun was as broken and over powered as the original Halo pistol. In it's place is a scoped Ruger Mini-30. The Mini-30 has low recoil giving it a high rate of semi-auto fire, a mid level scope and high power second only to the sniper rifles. It's also much more common than the scoped revolver in the prior games. For the most part the pistol arsenal has remained largely the same, the Beretta M-93 returns, as does the Pistole. While gone, there is still a .44 magnum revolver, in this case it appears to be a Chiappa Rhino. 

Other additions come in the form of tagging enemies the same manner as Metal Gear Solid 5, a tag is placed on a target. Another is useful stealth mechanic where you are able to hide in tall grass and thick foliage. I didn't use the tag all that much, but I did use the stealth mechanic often and tried to take out as many as I could before the alarm got raise and the shooting started. Though the stealth mechanic isn't really a must, you can always just go in loud.

Personally, I think the combat was better in Uncharted 3. It felt more balanced and I had less cheap deaths. Additionally, I would say that Uncharted 3 had better level designs for the combat zones. The level designs in Uncharted 4 are set up to be very easy for the player to be flanked. The other issue I have with combat, is that unlike the prior games, in 4, you almost always have another character with you, be it Sam, Sully, or Elena, but you can't issue orders to them. A partner command mechanic could have been implemented though the Dual Shock 4's touch pad. Swipe left = Cover me!, Swipe right = Hold position here!, Swipe up = Attack my tag!, Swipe down = Autonomous action.

Combat wasn't the only changes they made to gameplay. Uncharted 4 sees three new things added. First and the biggest is the grappling hook. Other than using it to get place to place and advance game play it can also be used to flank enemies and move quickly around the battlefield. The places where you can hook on to are pretty obvious (you'll see a post or a pole sticking out somewhere) and the grappling hook icon appears, taking out the guess work of where you can and can't hook on to. While it can be used as a bludgeoning weapon in multiplayer, it's not usable as a weapon in singleplayer. Personally I think this is a missed opportunity to use the hook in a manner like Scorpion and used to pull an enemy towards you for a melee beat down. While a new addition it the hook was so seemlessly integrated in that it feels like it was always there. 

The second addition is a terrain addition, now there are slopes that Nate can slide down on. There are segments, you'll be sliding down and have to jump at the end onto a cliff or end up falling into an abyss. There isn't so much to say about this, there aren't really any set pieces where you're sliding into people as a way to attack them. Like the hook, the way it was integrated was done so well it feels like the mechanic was always there. 

Lastly there are now vehicles, mainly jeeps. The controls for th vehicles are very responsive and for the most part you only use them to really get from Point A to Point B. It does allow for much larger environments to explore though, given that you can now move faster and cover more ground. It adds to the exploration element and looking for Treasure pick-ups. Again, like the other two, it doesn't feel forced on you. A few sequences have the player using the winch on the jeep to "climb" and to pull down obstacles, so even the driving gets a bit of the Uncharted treatment. 

To wrap up singleplayer I'll go into replayablity. The singleplayer has decent replayability.  There's lots of unlockables in the form of weapons, rendering modes (like cell shaded, or 8-bit modes) as well as gameplay modifiers such as no gravity, infinite ammo and what I think was a brilliant idea, mirror mode. Playing though mirror mode almost feels like playing the story with new maps. While everything looks familiar everthing is also reversed and it does throw you off and make you feel like you're in a new map at times.

That water looks clean enough to drink, probably safer than Flint water. 

Now on to multiplayer. I have played too much of the multiplayer, mainly spent my time on the challenges. The biggest disappointment, hands down is the lack of the story based co-op. Uncharted 2 and 3 featured these kind of mini multiplayer co-op campaigns, that were A LOT of fun. These are now gone. But on the other hand, the trial missions serve like a tutorial for multiplayer. So players have a way to ease into multiplayer and get used to the experience. But it isn't just a straight tutorial, it also has a little bit of a bot feature as the maps are also filled with active enemies, it isn't just scripted trial events. 

As with other multiplayer games, you're able to change you skin/character and set up prearraigned weapon loadouts. 

Overall this was a very fun game to play. While I do have some complaints with the combat, it is still a very enjoyable experience. Definitely an A+ experience but not an S rank. 

If I were to rank the games based on game play I would rank them as such, from best to least (though even "least" in the Uncharted series is a damn good game): Uncharted 3, 4, 2, 1.

If you have a PS4, go buy this game!

Now on to the plot. If you don't want any spoilers this is the part where to stop reading. 

The biggest thing that stuck out with the plot was the focus on two people rather than on just Nate. In this regard you could tell that Uncharted 4 was written by a different writer from the previous games. While U4 was in development word got out that the writer of the previous games, had left Naughty Dog and the fear was that the plot wouldn't be up to snuff. Well the writer behind The Last of Us, took up the job, and the story definitely holds up to the previous games. 

Though in terms of plot there were a few things that did disappoint me. While Chole and Charlie were mentioned, I was hoping they would make an appearance, even a minor one. Though they do have renders and voice files in multiplayer, so seeing them appear in DLC is a possibility. In previous games, there was something supernatural, or just wrong, about the treasure at the end. Golden Abyss on Vita, had radioactive gold that poisoned the previous owners. Uncharted 1 had the cursed El Dorado coffin that when opened released this black mist that turned people into these violent mutants. Uncharted 2 had the Tree Of Life with high explosive sap that when consumed gave a person superhuman healing abilities but also seemed to mutate it's eaters into savages. Lastly Uncharted 3 had the lost city in the desert with a tainted water supply that made people have bad acid trips. Here in 4 there wasn't anything supernatural or just out of the ordinary that brought the previous holders down, it was just simple greed. That was a bit disappointing in my opinion. 

The other point of disappointment in the plot was that towards the end it did not become a three way race between Nate, Rayf/Nadine and the Alcazar. There was a lot of potential for a BIG threeway blow out with some really epic set pieces with Alcazar's cartel and Nadine's private army blowing each other up left and right, with Nate and Co. caught in the middle. Instead they wrote it off as Alcazar's involvement being a fabrication. BULLSHIT! I say to that. 

The other big disappointment was how Nadine was handled at the end. She literally just walks away. You have two encounters with her where she's completely unstoppable (unarmed) anyone who's played their share of games knows these scripted encounters are the build up to the big epic boss fight towards the end. But no, she literally says it isn't worth it and exits stage left. No boss fight no nothing. Completely anti-climactic. What I would have liked to see instead is her and her army in a losing battle with Alcazar's cartel after Rayf's been killed, and Nate and Sam helping her get rid of Alcazar to make her owe them one and to rid themselves of the drug lord. Or have Nadine as a boss character in a shoot out in the ruined colony, where just about every weapon in the game is avaiable and the player can fight in any style they want. 

Lastly I can't talk about the plot without talking about Sam. Sam isn't just a tacked on character, but an integral part of the plot. Uncharted 4 is every bit Sam's story as it is Nate's final adventure. The flash back sequences go back further than Uncharted 3's to establish an origin story of how the boys got their name. Their mother was a famed historian who was the originator of the theory that Sir Francis Drake faked his death and had heirs, as well as being in the process of tracking down the pirate treasure that everyone was after before she died. The whole treasure hunter lifestyle and the adoption of the Drake surname was a sort of way to carry on their mom's work. While Sam undoubtedly played a big part in Nate's life before being thought for dead the writer still paid respect to the previous games and did not replace Sully with him, Sully continues to play the surrogate father to Nate. 

The way Sam was introduced into the universe was done very smoothly, he didn't feel just shoe horned in like how a new character would feel in some established TV shows. There's some talk of Sony having another studio do an Uncharted 5 without Nate. At first I was skeptical of that idea, but Sam is likeable enough and the main story of 4 ends with Sam basically asking Sully if he can get him set up with work. I can see an Uncharted 5 featuring Sam, maybe even working with Chloe and Charlie. If Horizon Zero Dawn by that other Sony 1st party dev Guerilla (known for Killzone) turns out awesome, I wouldn't mind letting them have a shot at Uncharted. 

Now for the actual ending. The ending was a beautiful send off to Nathan Drake. We're introduced to Cassie Drake, Nate and Elena's 15(?) daughter. Turns out Nate gets into archalology and makes a name for himself, but he keeps Cassie in the dark about the events of the prior games, till she gets into a wardrobe where stuff from the prior games, like Spanish coin and tree of life sap samples are kept, and Nate and Elena decide to tell her about their past adventures. This was the perfect way to wrap up Nate's story.

Overall the plot was good, but I didn't think it was as strong as Uncharted 3's. Uncharted 3 just had a more polished story. It didn't drop the ball anywhere the way Uncharted 4 dropped the ball with Nadine. U3 also was stronger in the way it showed Nate and Sully's relationship, vs the way Nate and Sam's relations were shown in U4. 

If I give Uncharted 3 a 10 then I'd give Uncharted 4 an 8.5. I would have given the plot an 8, but I gave it that .5 with the way it treated Nate at the end. Nadine was under utilized and I can see several missed opportunities. The plot was great, but it could have definitely be been better. 

Now if I were to rate Uncharted 4 as a total package, then I would rate the overall package a 9.While I think Uncharted 3 is an overall better game that I would score a 10, but that doesn't by any means take away from U4. U4 is still an awesome game, it's still worth getting, and it needs to be in every PS4 owner's game library.