ebola cola

It doesn’t come much more boring than British reality television, mainly due to the fact that our ‘contestants’ are normally idiotic racists who would much rather eat their own shit than socialise with other contestants. Big Brother appears to be one of the most popular and most entertaining reality TV shows here in Britain and with good reason.

The entire show (which attempts to depict Orwell’s novel, 1984) features citizens of the UK under constant surveillance carrying out various tasks and generally trying to get along. However, Big Brother’s tasks are very simple and only require some time (which is abundant) and basic teamwork.

I have compiled a small list of tasks I (and I’m sure everyone else in the UK) would love to see Big Brother housemates undertake.

Task #1 - Disease Roulette

In the task-room lies a table, on the surface is an assortment of various syringes. Housemates have to pick a syringe using their own gut instinct and inject themselves with it. Should the syringe contain a non-lethal concoction, they are allowed to continue living in the Big Brother house. Should the housemate accidentally inject bleach or the Hepatitis C virus into their veins, then I guess from that point on, their experience in the house might not be the greatest they’ve ever had.

Task #2 - See you at Guantanamo!

In this task, housemates must endure a real Guantanamo lifestyle, complete with orange jumpsuits, cages and regular beatings from American soldiers. A luxury food budget is awarded to those who can shit into their toilet-bucket without hitting the cage floor. If at any point the housemates want to give up and leave, they’ll be stripped naked and forced into strange but humorous positions.

Task #3 - Goodbye Liver

Housemates must drink their entire weight in strong hooch. Vomiting and emergency stomach-pumps are cheating and will force housemates to be disqualified.

Task #4 - Acid Bath

Several baths are filled with clear liquid, one contains water and the others are filled with acid, the housemate with skin remaining on their body at the end of the task wins a luxury food budget and the ability to wear clothes.

Task #5 - Battle Royale

The Battle Royale task would suit as the very final task between housemates as only one housemate should be left standing when it concludes.

The Battle Royale task follows the basic principles of Battle Royale, which are rather easy to understand.

Housemates would be given various weapons, some useful and others plain bizarre. They would then be expected to fight to the death.

The winner would then receive an interview with Heat magazine.

One of the main reasons for using an operating system such as Linux, is the ability to customise almost everything.

With this in mind, I’m glad that users have the ability to alter the theme on Ubuntu Linux as the default is not exactly revolutionary or exceptionally pretty.

However, the community can play a huge role in the final appearance of Ubuntu and by the looks of things, they’re all geared up for the next release, dubbed “Intrepid Ibex”. I have been trawling the concept themes on the Ubuntu website and have decided to pull out and pimp my favourite ones.

Wall-light

We only have a selection of three screenshots when it comes to Wall-light, though what we do have is fascinating. I’m especially impressed by the log in screen, which you can find a screenshot of below.

The colours are vivid, it makes good use of the colours available and it’s just a very beautiful piece of eye-candy.

The desktop concept travels along the same route.

I’m not a huge fan of widgets, such as the need for a large analogue clock, this reminds me too much of Windows Vista and there’s a digital clock in the task-bar anyway. What I am a fan of, is how excellent this theme actually looks, especially when you consider the ugly ‘burnt orange’ and ‘turd brown’ gradients and colours that normally accompany Ubuntu.

Gimmie-Human

Gimmie-Human is one of those themes that really does tell you that the developer was thinking outside the box.

Gimmie-Human steers away from the norm and brings a concept which is complex yet surprisingly simplistic. At a first glance, the theme seems to be childish and chunky, but the more you look, the more you’ll find. There are a lot of small tweaks which make life a lot easier for the Linux user, such as the close button on windows being seperated from the maximise/minimize buttons.

Maybe not something I’d use personally but a refreshing break from the norm nonetheless.

Peachy

Peachy is a basic theme, it sticks with the regular Ubuntu formula but substitutes murky browns and oranges with a pale orange, or a ‘peachy’ colour.

Peachy doesn’t try hard to be different or revolutionary, it’s just a brighter and much more elegant Ubuntu theme and although it doesn’t take my breathe away, I think the author definitely deserves credit for the outcome.

If you have any concept art that you would like to share with us, then please feel free to leave a comment to this post.

Every so often (maybe too often) a game is released into the world that does nothing but embarrass the gaming industry.

Since Ebola Cola is mostly made up of avid gamers with personality problems, where unfair levels of criticism, hate, cruelty and being sheer bastards run rife, it seemed cricket to let us open up and go all out on something in life that truly deserved a good verbal beating: Bad video games. We’re still nice to girls though, and our grandparents.

So, ”It should have been suffocated at birth” is a short post series dedicated to identifying the worst console games in all history. Got that? I hope so.

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What is it?: A pack of top trumps on a disc, and lots, lots more, apparently.

What format?: Playstation 2, Nintendo DS and the PC.

What do you do?: You press ‘x’.

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Top Trumps: Doctor Who. A game so pointless that finding a metaphor to express this fact is a metaphor not worth doing.

Essentially, this is a pack of top trumps on a games console. Except to buy this pack you have to pay an upwards of £12, when the actual pack (which you can probably get more fun out of) costs about £3. With an actual genuine pack of top trumps you can have fun bluffing, giving your opponent silly mind games and play it in the car with family and friends or whilst travelling. The video game is the same, except without the fun or any of what I just mentioned. What it does have though, is the Doctor Who theme playing repetitively in the background again, and again, and again.

As for gameplay, as long as you know where ‘x’ is you should be set to go. This is because all you do is press ‘x’. I mean it. Unlike the card version, instead of having your competitive friends and annoying little brother to play against, the game gives you the immense challenge of playing a random computer. I mean, it’s not like chess on the computer, where you can plan a cunning strategy for a challenging, and if it floats your logical boat, fun game. No, just keep pressing ‘x’, start foaming absent-mindedly at the mouth and hope for the best. Until now, I never actually thought you could die of boredom. Not even Autistics could be entertained with this rubbish for long.

Seriously, It’s a completely random game. Children’s game or no children’s game, no logic or cunning is involved, it’s an insult to children. It’s the epitome of the crap-game-from-parents-at-Xmas-when-you-really-wanted-GTA nightmare. I can’t stress how awful it actually is. You may as well flip a coin and see what side it lands on, except for forever, and with the Doctor Who theme playing unrelentlessly in the background. I guess there are other minigames, but frankly who cares to be honest?

Of all the possibilities they could of had with a Doctor Who game and they came up with Top Trumps on the PC. Christ, they could have made a Doctor Who go-kart racing game and it’d still be better. Shove on a Crash Bash style of minigames on a disc, like ‘Punch John Barrowman’, or ‘Pop the wart on Catherine Tate’s chin’ and I guarantee it would sell millions of copies. Personally, what I’d like to see though, would be an entire game of Billie Piper and Freema Agyeman having passionate lesbian sex, completely naked. I’m no Who fanboy, but it’d be just what the Doctor ordered. (What a fantastic finishing line that is, wow. See how I incorporated Who and Doctor?… Oh, never mind).

As a very big Neil Gaiman fan, I had to enter a competition being held by Fashionista Piranha, who appears to be a very intelligent LiveJournal blogger and avid reader.

The giveaway entry with details, prizes and other information can be found here!

What’s more, prizes are being added after every fiftieth entry into the competition, which leaves the prize list standing at:

“- an ARC copy of Gaiman’s newest book, The Graveyard Book, due to be released September 30th, 2008.
- Coraline, one of Gaiman’s newest graphic novels
- Gaiman’s Bath Surprise: one Stardust bath bomb and one Comforter bubble bath, which Gaiman has written about in his blog
- $25 to the charity of your choice!
- 8/5/08 - added a paperback copy of American Gods to the prize pool to mark the first 50 entries!
- 8/11/08 - added a hardcover copy of Anansi Boys to mark the 100th entry!
- 8/13/08 - added another ‘$25 to the charity of your choice’ to mark the 150th entry!
- 8/14/08 - added Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab’s limited edition Snow, Glass, Apples perfume blend and accompanying chapbook to mark 200!
- 8/14/08 - added Sandman: Season of Mists to mark the 250th entry!
- 8/14/08 - added a 2nd hardcover copy of Anansi Boys to mark the 300th entry!
- 8/14/08 - added Eternals, all seven single issues of the series, to mark the 350th entry!”

This blog post happens to be my entry into the competition, so good luck to you guys that enter!

The turmoil caused by GTA IV’s simulated violence is close to dying, so let’s bring up another evil-ish game. This time it’s a tabletop role-playing game, the genre made famous by Dungeons&Dragons and its variations. Only, this time it’s not a fantasy RPG. It’s titled “kill puppies for satan”, and the title pretty much says it all.

“kill puppies for satan” is an “unfunny roleplaying game” in the words of his creator. The characters go around doing evil, possibly in style, anyway with some rules, and certainly not without a goal: getting evil points to spend - I really have no idea how you’d spend evil points.

Thanks to a fellow CA‘er, you can watch, and maybe join, an online game of this… thing. Just go here and we’ll all see what this game is like. You have to register in order to post and to play.

Is “evil” turning into a marketing tool? Is it enough to turn it into a comedic sort of evil to make it acceptable? Let us know your opinion on the matter.

As part of the new Ebola Cola upgrades, which you may have witnessed, a forum has been opened in order to attract discussion and a sense of community.

The forum will also be a meeting place for contributors and myself, as we currently have no means of communication.

Since I have been busy tweaking the board and ensuring everything’s in order. I won’t go into any great detail, mainly because there is no great detail to go into. It’s a forum. Instead I will copy-paste my greeting message from my welcome thread within the forums.

“Good evening members.

I would like to personally welcome you all to the birth of Ebola Cola’s forum, which comes as part of the new website upgrade.

Moving onto business however, drunken coding causes errors. If you stumble upon dead links on the main website or experience issues with any part of Ebola Cola, then please deliver an error report through the forums to a member of staff or get in touch with us using an appropriate method.

We appreciate suggestions and issue reports.

Also, contributors, please send me a private message to have your status upgraded and thus giving you access to the uber-secret VIP forum.

Thank you!”

The forums can be located here and will be added to the navigation bar.

So, what’re you waiting for? Register now!

Whilst walking around town at 4AM a couple of nights ago (sober) with an old friend of mine, I began to muse over the existence of life out there in the vast, most likely infinite quantity of space, human evolution and the existence of god. It’s a classic isn’t it? The moment when it suddenly hits you how vast the universe is, with all the large numbers and intricate theories that go along with it; When you look up and your entire vision is filled by a sheet of darkness, with only little specks of light to keep you company. It’s beautiful to look at, but I’m not going to discuss this over-used cliche of how the human race is insignificant and getting all Emo. No, a couple of nights ago I remembered my absolutely kick-ass alien/time-machine theory.

Now, you might believe this is absolutely bulls***. You’re right, it is - but that’s not going to stop you reading this article is it? and neither is it going to stop me writing it. In fact, at the end of the day this probably has more credibility than Scientology, but you never know, so slap yourself and read on.

Over the past few millions of years the brain capacity of humans has increased quite dramatically. In fact, compared to modern day apes the human brain is three times larger. That’s to do with all the juicy information crammed inside, like speech and reading. Technology has advanced a heck of a lot over a rather short timeline of about 100 years and doesn’t look anywhere near slowing down. Add an extended period of time and we have, lets see, people with fat heads and spaceships.

Send these spaceships up into space with us in it and we no longer get much exposure to the Sun, hence making our skins pale, and dare I say it, grey. In space no one gets a tan. And what with all the computer technology, it’ll be no wonder people’s eyes will begin to look retarded, with all the screens and, holy hell - could you imagine all the porn crammed in the internet by that time?

Add lack of gravity and their muscles begin to weaken and their bodies begin to lengthen. Conclusion? Classic Grey Alien. So get that up you.

Oh, and that’s not all.

Time-Machines. You’d believe if a Time-Machine was ever going to be invented then we’d know about it by now, because they’d come back and tell us all about it. Probably over a cup of tea and biscuits. Well maybe they did.

All the alien is, in this stupid idea, is an evolved form of the human race going back in time. Christ knows what for. Abducting humans for kicks? A free Wi-fi connection? Maybe they don’t do Oreo’s anymore or maybe 21st century collector’s items are worth a lot of money. Who knows. And what if, in a bizarre twist of fate, they went back in time to catch out the bastards that made the crop circles, and actually realise it was actually them? And also what if, for the record, all these skinned-alive sheep were used to make wooly jumpers? Everyone knows It’s f***ing cold in space.

In the end, if aliens do exist then there’s no point in getting worked up about them. I mean, If they did exist then they couldn’t possibly be hostile, because if they did they would have f***ed us already.

I’m not one to comment though, because at the end of the day I just find ‘out-there’ interesting. I’m not some whack-job enthusiast, I just let my mind roll sometimes. Although my theory is kick-ass, I don’t really care about it, apart from the fact I’ve just contributed to the internet with my own bulls*** conspiracy theory.

That’s if there isn’t already one like this already.

Rap superstar 50 cent (famous for hit “in da club”, losing an album battle to Kayne West and having a head the shape of a brick) is starring in a brand new, what looks to be extremely bizarre sequel following up his other videogame. Yeah, me too.

I’ll get onto what it’s all about. The game stars 50 cent himself, (millionaire, music artist and successful business man) who is fighting terrorists by himself in the Middle East for absolutely no reason. While doing this he destroys lots of things, crushes people with a big jeep, smokes big cuban cigars, destroys more things and beats people up. He can also hijack helicopters while killing about 15 terrorists, just by using his eyes. He’s that solid. It really is the most ridiculous and retarded setting imaginable. Click the link to the trailer below, unless Shaun figures out how to display a video on the page first. It really does look hilarious.

Watch the trailer.

And by the sound of it, the feedback to the trailer is mainly, if not all, negative.

“OH no man i was a fifty fan i the days but dis boi gone lose his mind wit self lovin I mean dang fifty u just play in one movie and u thank u gang now man sum go shoot dis guy fo real plz.”

“what the f*** is this?”

The really sad thing is, while casting the ridiculous plot and setting aside for a second, it actually looks quite decent. You never know, apart from the fact that it looks utterly retarded, It could actually become quite a fun no-brainer for people with the urge to shoot lots of people and blow s*** up.

Hey, and if I was as rich as ‘Fiddy’, I’d want a game as well (How about Metal Gear Shaun?) regardless if people would want it or not, who cares? I’d be f***ing rich!

“50 Cent: Blood on the sand” will be released in October ( At least act like you care).

So I was asked to write about the Beijing Olympics for a rather minute article in an online magazine. Needless to say I was rather reluctant at first. How can I write about the Beijing Olympics without pressing my own opinions and views on readers? Even then, how am I supposed to write about the Beijing Olympics when the games have not started and a majority of media attention is negative? Heck, China detains most journalists and forbids most things from being broadcast. Nevertheless, I’ve done my research, I’ve watched the live feeds, I’ve written my Goddamn Beijing Olympics article.

When the Olympic torch was lit at a ceremony in Greece, it was surrounded by one thousand police officers. Activists were still able to break through the blue barrier and disrupt the ritual; one protester carried a black flag which depicted the Olympic rings made from handcuffs. As officers bundled them away, all media broadcasting ceased and the ceremony continued with the activists safely locked away from the event. The ceremony continued peacefully and the Olympic torch began its journey around twenty-one countries and passing hands 21,880 times.

So, the preparations for the Beijing Olympics had begun, but it wasn’t without its hiccups.

The Olympic flame was hijacked by Italian demonstrators who were attacking the key sponsor of the Olympics, Coca-Cola, in an attempt to strike a blow against capitalism.

Following several incidents, London decided to tighten their security by mobilising two thousand police officers whose goal was to ensure the safety of the torchbearers. This didn’t stop thousands of pro-Tibet activists from taking to the streets of London in their “Free Tibet” t-shirts, wielding banners with slogans such as “No torch in Tibet, China Stop the Killing and Talk to the Dalai Lama”. Although the torchbearers were joined by a convoy of officers, protesters were seen swooping towards the torch itself and activists brandishing fire extinguishers were arrested for trying to extinguish the flame. Routes were changed, transportation was altered and photo-shoots were disrupted as the torch made its gruelling voyage through London.

A Chinese student who tried to defend China by yelling at pro-Tibet demonstrators in London was also punched in the face and had his Chinese flag thrown to the ground. When British journalists asked a different Chinese student if he would stand up to pro-Tibet demonstrators in China, he admitted that he would not.

The Olympic torch’s voyage has now come to an end with a successful finish in Beijing.

As I was writing this article, I could hear the live stream of the opening ceremony from Beijing’s bird’s nest stadium. Needless to say, I could not avoid staring at the spectacular events taking place. Thousands of Chinese drummers lined up and preformed various rituals, bright, sparkling lights lit the stadium and the crowd cheered. Two years of preparation appeared to pay off as the countdown began with large, floor-lights displaying the numbers from sixty to zero. It was certainly an epic ceremonial display. China, being the fireworks capital of the world, managed to broadcast a superiorly colourful pyrotechnic display of streaming fire and light from 35,000 fireworks.

The entire performance was complete with the Olympic rings made of various lights, floating and tilting in the air. Really giving off a sense of harmony and peace, certainly everything the Olympic rings and the Olympics itself represents.

China had obviously put in a lot of work for the events as each one symbolised a different ritual and had great meaning. For instance, fireworks explosions marked twenty-nine immense footprints in the sky, each perfectly co-ordinated along Beijing’s central axis towards the stadium.

An abnormally large scroll began to open in the stadium, revealing a bulky canvas which was dotted with dancers who were etching symbols into the paper. This was just one of the 23 key events of the night. And so, with the opening ceremony ending without incident, the sports can finally begin.

There are 302 gold medals to be awarded to athletes, of which there are 10,708 competing in 471 events ranging from archery, basketball and boxing to sailing, shooting and Taekwondo.

Let’s hope that the Olympics go without a hitch, each country brings home a golden medal and the Olympic rings and the harmony which the Olympics represent stays true.

It’s not often a games company releases a box of perfectly polished games for the price of one. Valve released “The Orange Box” in late 2007, containing five games. Among this treasure trove was a game known as Team Fortress 2, Team Fortress 2 was released in April of this year for PC gamers and to my amazement, is one of the best games I’ve played.

I began playing Team Fortress 2 on the Xbox 360 console, needless to say, many problems existed. The game relied on players to actually “create” a server which would just piggyback on the player’s connection. No “ranked” matches actually exist on the console’s version as most of the players seem to enjoy the quick unranked matches and the unranked matches that exist are unbearably filled with lag and connection problems. This ultimately left the servers lonely and vacant. It was a shame because the game was packed with so much fun.

After selling my Xbox 360 version of The Orange Box, I was able to buy Team Fortress 2 for Windows and after a month or two of playing; I’ve finally reached a rather superior conclusion.

Unlike other class-based games, TF2’s classes spread across a wide range of abilities and they mean wide! TF2 contains the following classes: Spy, Pyro, Soldier, Heavy, Medic, Sniper, Demoman, Scout and Engineer. Two of my favourite classes being Spy and Engineer. The mere ability to choose from nine different classes means less repetitiveness and a fresher gaming experience. To give an example of two very different classes, I have outlined the skills and tasks of both the Spy and the Engineer.

Spies have the ability to “cloak” themselves, appearing as members of the opposing team in order to infiltrate the team’s base. Spies also have the ability to “sap” engineer structures and even come equipped with a knife and revolver.

Engineers can construct sentry guns, dispensers and teleportation devices. These structures can be demolished, upgraded and have to be maintained by the engineers in order for them to survive. Structure survival is difficult as enemy demomen and spies love to destroy sentries and dispensers and upon doing so, leaving the fortress unprotected and this opens the floodgates to enemy Soldiers, Pyros and of course, other Engineers who can also build structures anywhere in the map.

Moving onwards, away from character classes, Team Fortress 2 has an artistic style of its own. Unlike Valve’s previous games and in fact, any game, the visual style of TF2 is smooth and takes on a cartoon flavour. Something one wouldn’t expect from a first person shooter, though the art style works perfectly for Team Fortress even if die-hard Team Fortress fans might claim it to be childish.

When it comes to maps TF2 has a handful to choose from and being a Steam game, is blessed with a community of professionals fanboys who are constantly developing new maps which again, keeps the game fresh and stops things from becoming stagnant. Even if this doesn’t stop me from playing ctf_2fort twenty-four hours a day.

With this said, I highly recommend Team Fortress 2 just for the crazy, exaggerated parts of the game. With the ability to taunt other players and jeer at your team. What’s not to like?