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Dumpshock Forums _ General Gaming _ Cyber Wars/Avatar

Posted by: underaneonhalo Oct 9 2006, 10:49 PM

Renting direct to video movies is kind of like playing russian roulette with only one chamber unloaded, most of the time your brains are gonna end up as jelly on the wall.

Cyber Wars (AKA: Avatar in some countries) was that blessed empty chamber, while it's no bladerunner it's at least as good as Strange Days. I'm not gonna bother writing a review because http://www.amazon.com/Cyber-Wars-Jian-Hong-Kuo/dp/B000EBGFRM already has some pretty good ones up, I am however going to point out some stuff that really captures the Shadowrun feel.

Everyone in the city has an implanted ID that functions nearly identical to a SIN and they're all kept track of through the "interlink" which is basically the wireless matrix.

The main character is a freelancer (runner) who hunts down people with illegal simplants (faked SINs) for megacorps.

The police and the corps both use surveilance drones, the police ones being about motorcycle sized while one of the corps uses a tiny robotic dragonfly.

The main plot involves massive scale megacorp manipulation and some all around runner screwing.

A crappy hotel uses augmented reality to make the place look spiffy.

A boy has a cybereye and his father mentions he's saving up to get him a real replacement, also the members of an anarchist group all have visible headware and talk about PANs and such.

Deckers, shoot outs, paranoia, drones, cyberware, and some awesome old school cyberpunk fashion make this a definate watch. I'm going to add it to my "you wanna play in my game watch these movies" list.

Posted by: nezumi Oct 10 2006, 12:36 AM

Thanks for the head's up. It's going to the top of my netflix queue. I'll tell people how I liked it in a few days

Posted by: eidolon Oct 10 2006, 04:56 AM

Cool, thanks dude.

Posted by: Mr. Man Oct 10 2006, 07:58 AM

I was pretty skeptical, but I have to admit that this is a nice catch! I can't say much for the acting (uneven) or script (weak plotting and tacked-on happy ending); However despite its flaws the movie is watchable and does a good job of illustrating some common situations and concepts that are found in Shadowrun.

Just about every shot contains at least one Blade Runner or Matrix reference. There's even a small role for the guy who played J.F. Sebastian.