Picks Of The Month February 2013

Welcome to another edition of my entertainment picks of the month! Keep reading to find out how I passed the time in February and maybe I'll give you some ideas on how to entertain yourself in March.

Movie:

Safety Not Guaranteed

In this film a team of journalists head to the countryside to investigate a mysterious wanted ad that seeks a partner to embark on a mission through time. The ad (pictured above) instructs you to bring your own weapons and that your safety is not guaranteed. Awesome!

The movie, while funny, is not as absurd as the ad itself reads. What you'll find here is a heartfelt journey of self discovery for the characters while you simultaneously try to determine if the guy that placed this guy is insane or can legitimately time travel. The film doesn't ask you to suspend any disbelief and is more focused on the development of the characters rather than forcing a sci fi time travel storyline on the viewer.

I had a great time watching this one.  The story keeps its momentum and follows through all the way to the very (positive) end unlike other independent films I've watched lately.

Television:

Lie to Me:

This show has been running for a few years but I was only recently introduced to it via Netflix. It follows the stories of Dr. Cal Lightman, the world's leading expert in detecting lies via micro expressions. Through his discovery of micro expressions, which are supposedly universal to everyone on earth, he can read a person's intent and almost always determine if they're lieing. By mastering this science he has found great success in the creation of the Lightman Group, which is a firm that specializes specifically in the science of lie detection. Basically if you need to see through someone's possible deception, these are the guys to hire.

The stories vary from police investigations, to missing persons, to analyzing political agendas. The science behind their lie detection is presented with enough examples to credit its believability. I especially enjoy when they show photos of celebrities and other famous figures giving further credibility to the science through their own expressions.

Handheld games:

Mega Man 2 was released on the Virtual Console of the Nintendo 3DS early this month. It's like my favorite game ever, so of course I've been dropping lots of time on it now that I have a perfect portable port. Find out why I like Mega Man 2 so much in my blog post here.

Gunman Clive: Another highly addictive platformer in the vein of Mega Man.  It's cheap price point and easy pick up and play controls make this one a no brainer for any 2D platformer fan.  Find out why I liked Gunman Clive so much by clicking my review here.

Gadgets:

Thanks to a sweet coupon from Gamestop Power Up rewards and a spare Xbox 360 I had (don't worry, I still have my main 360 and am very much a fan) I was able to score one of the new slim white 500gb PS3's cheap, along with a year plus 3 months of Playstation Plus for free.

The purchase was worth it for the Playstation Plus alone, because it gives you free games! Thanks to this service I've been able to try out a ton of titles that I just didn't have the money for last year.  I've also found that used PS3 games seem to be quite a bit cheaper than 360 games at Gamestop. For example, I was able to score Soul Calibur 5, Mass Effect 2, and Batman Arkham City for a little more than 20 dollars.

If you have a PS3 and don't already have the Playstation Plus service I highly recommend it for all the free games, discounts, exclusive trials and free avatars and themes.

Console Games:

As I said above I was able to grab a copy of Mass Effect 2 quite cheap for PS3. I'm loving this game and it makes me wish I'd gotten into the series sooner.  On the other hand, I don't have to wait long before playing through part 3 and then enjoying the new DLC that just released for it. Good things come to those who wait so they say.

I'm always a sucker for a good sci-fi flick or story and this game has all the good stuff: space travel, alien races, epic gun battles, relationships with said alien races. On top of that is an epic tale that puts the fate of the galaxy in the hands of you and your crew. 

In case anyone's wondering, I'm a sucker for a strong female lead so of course I went with fem Shepard for this adventure.

Interesting/Funny Artwork:

I got a good laugh out of this while I was looking for Mass Effect artwork the other day.  It's from the board game Girl Talk Secret Diary.  Garrus is the ultimate hunky guy card in the game obviously.  Every gal's dream guy!