Month: April 2018

Enlarge / The towering Ravenii are impressive to look at, less so to fight. (credit: Iron Galaxy Studios)

At my most reductive, I’d call Extinction one long string of escort missions. The game struggles and claws to add more variety, in small ways, but it never shakes up or fleshes out its core rhythm enough to justify a full game. Instead, it feels like a frustrating proof of concept, unworthy of its evocative title.

Backing up a bit, Extinction is an action-platformer clearly influenced by Shadow of the Colossus, Devil May Cry, and especially the anime Attack on Titan. A medieval-fantasy world—of which we only catch shallow glimpses—is under siege by towering, teleporting ogres called “Ravenii” who can topple whole cities with ease. You play as a bland meatbrain who, as we learn through a handful of barely animated 2D cutscenes, is also a magical warrior called a Sentinel. The title grants him enough parkour powers to run up the speechless invaders and lop their heads off.

And lop heads he does. Constantly. Head lopping is pretty much Extinction’s only neat trick, though even that novelty crumbles faster than the settlements you’re meant to protect. It doesn’t take long at all to figure out how sloppy the process really is.

Off with their heads

You can’t just kill one of the Ravenii, for instance. First, you need to charge up a decapitating strike. That means bounding around the city, killing largely meaningless lesser monsters by mashing the square button, or standing next to large crystals long enough to teleport handfuls of civilians to safety. This is where the “escort” elements kick in. Besides needing to complete a given objective before the ogres destroy too much of each city, you want to protect civilians from the man-sized goblins. That way you can bank them for killing blows later on.

Enlarge / Mature Carolina Reaper. (credit: Magnolia677)

Extremely hot peppers don’t just blister your mouth and bum—they can also spark fiery havoc in your brain, according to a report published Monday in BMJ Case Reports.

An otherwise healthy 34-year-old man developed a blood-flow disorder in his brain and suffered several debilitating “thunderclap” headaches after entering a hot pepper eating contest, US doctors reported. The man had managed to get down a Carolina Reaper pepper, which in 2013 earned the title of the world’s hottest chili by Guinness World Records.

In 2013, the Carolina Reaper—a cross between Sweet Habanero and Naga Viper chilies—clocked in at 1,569,300 Scoville Heat Units (SHU), a unit of measure for a chili’s spiciness. For comparison, jalapeños fall in the range of 2,500 and 8,000 SHUs, while ghost peppers (Bhut Jolokia) register at just over 800,000. In 2017, the Carolina Reaper took the title again, with a pepper grown in South Carolina that measured 1,641,183 SHUs. (Though there have been reports of a “Pepper X” measuring 3.18 million SHUs, it has yet to be confirmed by Guinness World Records.)

Enlarge / Backpage.com CEO Carl Ferrer, left, former owner James Larkin, former owner Michael Lacey, and COO Andrew Padilla sit in Sacramento Superior Court on Wednesday, Oct. 12, 2016. (credit: Hector Amezcua/Sacramento Bee/TNS via Getty Images)

Federal prosecutors in Arizona unsealed a 61-page, 93-count criminal indictment of seven men accused of running an online prostitution ring through the website Backpage, which was seized and shuttered last week by authorities.

The seven suspects, who have all been arrested, were charged with conspiracy, facilitating prostitution, and money laundering, among other accusations.

"For far too long, Backpage.com existed as the dominant marketplace for illicit commercial sex, a place where sex traffickers frequently advertised children and adults alike," Attorney General Jeff Sessions said in a statement. "But this illegality stops right now."

Enlarge (credit: HBO)

Westworld executive producers and co-creators Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy continued beating the hype drum for the TV series' second season with a Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything) thread on Monday. Ahead of the season's April 22 premiere on HBO, however, Nolan isn't just dropping hints of what to expect. He's suggesting that HBO is fully prepared to spoil the season before a minute of Westworld airs.

Nolan closed the AMA by thanking fans for their questions—and pointing out his ongoing interest in their theories. He also pointed out that fans' theories, once reported by outside parties and news outlets, often function more like full-on content spoilers for what's to come on the show. This sparked internal HBO discussions, Nolan noted, which led him to post what he's calling a "potentially highly controversial" question:

If you guys agree, we're going to post a video that lays out the plot (and twists and turns) of season 2. Everything. The whole sordid thing. Up front. That way, the members of the community here who want the season spoiled for them can watch ahead and then protect the rest of the community and help to distinguish between what's 'theory' and what's spoiler.

How will HBO determine whether this video should be posted? By waiting for the total upvote count attached to Nolan's question to exceed 1,000 points. As of press time, the question has a 173-point score (which adds up its collective upvotes and downvotes) and rising.

Enlarge / Still from a promotional video on The Erotic Review website. (credit: The Erotic Review)

A website that hosts customer reviews of sex workers has started blocking Internet users in the United States because of forthcoming changes in US law.

Congress recently passed the Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act bill (SESTA), and President Trump is expected to sign it into law. SESTA will make it easier to prosecute websites that host third-party content that promotes or facilitates prostitution, even in cases when the sex workers aren't victims of trafficking.

After Congress approved the bill, Craigslist removed its "Personals" section and Reddit removed some sex-related subreddits. The Erotic Review (TER) has followed suit by blocking any user who appears to be visiting the website from the United States.