Over the Edge + November 12, 2009

Warhammer: Mark of Chaos

HAAKON SULLIVAN
PRODUCTION COORDINATOR

Being a fan of Warhammer for
years, I was excited when I saw
Mark of Chaos on the store shelf.
The box hinted at the game hav-
ing a large dramatic story and
an in depth battle system so my
excitement only heightened. I
quickly went to the checkout and
hurried home to install what I
thought what was going to be an
epic RTS and a game that uses
the Warhammer license to the
fullest.

I was wrong, but not that far
off.

First of all, the story really isn't
as epic as the designers made it
out to be. The Empire campaign
is your very typical “evil invades
the land” kind of scenario and it
will take a general with a cursed
past to drive them off in conjunc-
tion with reluctant allies. They
tell this story using either dialog
boxes combined with voice ac-
tors or ugly grainy animations
with uninformative narrative
subtitles. Mark of Chaos still has
some awesome non-grainy CGI
opening animations, but they

“To succ

rd
WADHA

xEMAED

BARE! SLVRL Yapope >,

Meee 10S r

initiate a counter charge. With
the sheer number of units you
can have in this game it might
not be humanly possible to react
to everything that's happening
around you, especially when
the AI can do everything nearly
simultaneously. At times, you
might have to fight off a Dark
Elf Hydra, a charge of Cold One
Knights, and deal with a barrage
of enemy crossbow fire. During
all this, your general is also fight-
ing in a duel against an enemy
hero. To succeed requires some

marched into mediocrity

their own unique ability tree to
choose special abilities from.
Special abilities increase the
fighting ability of a connected
unit, increase the hero’s personal
fighting ability, or increase the
hero's dueling abilities. The hero
gets one skill point per level
(max 40) to throw into these
abilities. Items are also another
way to increase power. The hero
is a major powerhouse of the
army, and can take on one or
two units on his own. Even the
spell casting heroes can do this
in close combat, which is a bit
hard to swallow after playing the
tabletop game.

Then again, it’s not like the
similarities between the table-
top game and Mark of Chaos
are that numerous anyway. To
name a few, your army is limited
to what you started out with,
morale is still an issue in com-
bat, when you attack or shoot
at a unit the hit isnt guaranteed,
and some of the special qualities
of units (such as “Unbreakable”)
are still around. Since this game
is a real time strategy game and
not a turn based one some things

eed requires some godlike micromanagement as the game's

inter face i is in no way accommodating”

seem completely unrelated to
the story so it's just pointless eye
candy.

In fact, the game in general is
a nice sight for sore eyes after
those grainy briefings. All of the
character models are finely de-
tailed with not every model in a
fighting unit looking like a clone
of each other and the battlefields
are well polished with many fea-
tures to the terrain. Fireballs and
cannons go off with satisfying
effects: fire, debris, and soldiers
flying everywhere. When all hell
breaks loose on the field, it really
is a sight to see.

However, that’s a major prob-
lem here: when all hell breaks
loose it can end in a blink of the
eye with you winning or losing.
Basic troops seem like paper
for pretty much any army and
can be cut down in seconds by
an artillery barrage or a cavalry
charge. In order to prevent that
from happening, you need to be
quick on your toes and activate
your unit's special abilities or

godlike micromanagement as
the game's interface is in no way
accommodating.

The dueling system is a bit
strange if not pointless, When
two opposing heroes come
within a certain distance of each
other, one can issue a challenge
to the other, Then they get even
closer and a ring of fire encircles
both of them and they then
stand a few feet away from each
other and duke it out mono E
mono. Here, your hero gets some
extra special abilities and tactics
to utilize to defeat the opponent.
It looks kind of stupid when the
two heroes stand a few feet apart
and just swing a weapon in dif-
ferent ways. I'm not really sure
why youd want to do this since
in most cases it’s easier to kill the
enemy hero by surrounding him
with your army and give him a
gang beating.

The hero system isn’t that bad.
Your heroes usually come in
two basic types for every army:

spell caster and fighter. Each has

PHOTO COURTESY OF HAZARD PHOTOGRAPHY

had to change, of course, and
the differences are too many to
name. This creates an experience
that seems very similar to War-
hammer, but Mark of Chaos just
doesnt match up to the tabletop
game's entertainment value.

Overall, this game didn’t meet
my expectations. It would have
been great if they tried harder to
stick with the formula that the
tabletop game had but instead
they went the RTS route and
created an average strategy game.
I would recommend it to any-
one who likes the Warhammer
universe or real time strategies
in general, but don't expect to be
blown away by it.

Story/Premise: 12/20
Game play: 26/40
Presentation: 17/20
Re-playability: 7/20
Total: 62/100

SAMANTHA FARROW
ARTS EDITOR

Did you know that
being too nice can kill
you? This is the gist of
Dr. Gabor Mate’s book
When the Body Says
No. How, you may ask,
is that possible? Mate explains the dif-
ferent personalities in this innovative
book; there are cancer personalities,
ALS personalities, and other debili-
tating afflictions that can be contrib-
uted to by our personalities.

Dr. Mate, a fellow Canadian, from
Vancouver, B.C, was the head of the
Palliative Care Unit at the Vancouver
General Hospital. Currently, he is staff
physician at a clinic in East Vancouver
where his patients are the marginal-
ized of Vancouver's streets who suf-
fer from addictions, HIV, and other
related problems. He is an effective
and powerful seminar leader and has
even presented in Prince George. In
fact, the write up in The Citizen last
year about his seminar here was what
drew my attention to Mate. I have
long believed that our emotions affect
our health, Seeing as I am in the social
work profession, I am always on the
look-out for relevant books to add to
my personal library.

Mate'’s book takes a look at what
can happen when we dont express
our emotions:

“As Dr. Mate wrote in The Globe
and Mail: “When we have been pre-
vented from learning how to say no,
our bodies may end up saying it for
us.’ When emotions are repressed,
this inhibition disarms the body's
defences against illness. And, in some
people, these defences go awry, de-
stroying the body rather than pro-
tecting it. Despite a rapidly accumu-
lating body of evidence attesting to
the mind-body unity, most physicians
continue to treat physical symptoms
rather than persons. When The Body
Says No argues persuasively that we
must begin to understand the mind-
body link in order to learn more
about ourselves and take as active a
role as possible in our overall health.”
(hetp://www.whenthebodysaysno.
ca/)

When we try to do more than we
should, we compromise: we lose sleep,
and feel stressed or overwhelmed.
While not all stress is deadly, and in
fact it can be helpful, chronic undue
stress can have deadly consequences.
This does not mean that the stress of
crunch time during exams, or pulling
the occasional all-nighter will kill us.

Artsand Culture 5
When the Body Says No:

Gabor Mate

The
Cost of
HIDDEN
STRESS

NATIONAL
BESTSELLER

What it means is if we're constantly in
that state, it will very likely have some
damaging effects on our health. How
many people do you know who have
a full class schedule, work, belong to
groups and committees, still go out
with friends and never seem to sleep?
‘This is never a good thing, no matter
what society tries to tell us.

One of the most horrible commer-
cials on right now is the Dannon yo-
ghurt commercial, the one where the
two women are talking in the kitchen
and the one woman is listing all the
other things the other woman does;
take the kids to hockey, work, go to
the gym, keep the house perfect. The
super-woman holds up the Dannon
like it's the reason she can take all of
this on, Guess what? In real life, es-
pecially if we're going by Mate's book,
she wont be able to keep that up for
long. She will burn out and get sick.
It’s the media with commercials like
this that encourage this behaviour.
You do NOT have to be a super-
human and do it all for people to like
you. If people don't like you because
you won't do what they want, screw
them, they're not really your friends.
How do you measure your success?
Is getting that A on every paper and
ever exam worth your health in the
long run?

This does not mean that everyone
who is an overachiever will get sick, it
just means that you're setting up pat-
terns now that could affect your health
in the long run, Besides, people don't
love you or like you because you're a
straight A student, they like you or
love you because you are you. If you
are an overachiever, maybe take a look
at why you are. Also, is it worth stif-
ling your emotions to spare someone
else's? I know most of us were raised
to believe that, that we need to be po-
lite all the time and not rock the boat,

but what is it costing us? This does
not mean that I recommend freaking
out anytime someone says something
you dont like; what it means is that if
someone has really offended you then
say something to them, you'll feel bet-
ter for it and be healthier in the long
run,

Another part of the book I found
interesting is Mate’s take on smoking
and cancer. It is widely believed that
smoking causes cancer. Mate states
that if this were the case, everyone
who smokes would get cancer. He
recognizes that yes, it is a large con-
tributor; however, other factors play a
part in which smokers gets cancer and
which ones don't. This does not mean
I am promoting smoking, although I
am a smoker, I just found it interest-
ing that he mentions this. There are
certain personalities that can predict
who gets cancer; in his years as the
head of palliative care, Mate started
recognizing patterns in his patients
depending on what they were dying
from. For instance, most people suf-
fering with lung cancer had a ten-
dency to bottle up their emotions.
‘This was supported by a British chest
surgeon, David Kissen. A number of
studies supported Kissens clinical
impression, reporting that men who
lacked the ability to express emo-
tion were five times more likely to be
diagnosed with lung cancer, The more
severe repression, the less the smoke
damage required to result in cancer
(Mate, 2003).

Although I wouldn't necessarily
classify this book as entertainment, I
believe it’s an important book to read.
I was blown away when I began to
look at the personality of those who
have had cancer in my family and
Mate's personality descriptions; they
were accurate to say the least. This
is not to say that they are to blame
for their condition, Mate states that
very clearly in his book. However, in
reading this book, it gave me hope
in avoiding cancer myself; although
I have never had a problem with the
word no, it is one of my favourites. I
am not superwoman, I can't do it all,
and really, I am okay with this.

If you're interested in purchas-
ing this book, you can find it online
at Amazon, or buy it at Coles in the
Pine Centre mall, or at the Ava Maria

Health Food Store.

of Extreme Metal

Dissecting the Art

R.TURNER
CONTRIBUTOR

G.TURNER, also know as ‘Metal Guitar Extremist’ is a seasoned veter-
an in the world of Heavy Metal and all things guitar. Musician, songwriter,
teacher, and author, this Prince George born artist is no stranger to the
grueling music scene and knows the cost of playing music for passion, not
for money and not for fame.

Emerging from the explosive Vancouver underground Metal scene,
Turner's band, VOLATILE, toured Canada from coast to coast and left a
huge impact on Metal fans nation-wide. The video for the track “Back of a
Rat” from their self titled CD made it to regular rotation on Much Music's
Loud Top 10 and had been one of the highest requested metal videos of
their day.

His influences range from the late greats Chuck Schuldiner and Dime-
bag Darrell, to Malmsteen, Agustin Barrios Mangoré, violinist Itzhak Perl-
man, and his ultimate hero Joe Satriani.

Being a graduate from G.I’T (Guitar Institute of Technology in
California) Turner has not only re invented guitar playing, but has evolved
into one of the greatest guitarists Canada has ever seen. He is, none the
less, a virtuoso on a seven string and eight string guitar. His own personal
collection includes an eight String Ibanez, seven string Schecter and three
custom made Dean Dimebag series.

‘The highly anticipated release of his instructional book and guitar manu-
al entitled Dissecting the Art of Extreme Metal is scheduled to hit the shelves
late next year. He is calling out to local graphic artists to help complete
the final stages of this massive collection of over 1000 guitar examples and
complete guide and literature for playing and being the ultimate metal
guitarist. Nationwide distribtion has been set in place upon its release. If
you are interested in participating in this project please contact G.Turner
at: ps_metal @hotmail.com

For more info and music go to www.myspace.com/gturnermetalguita-
rextremist