As Ted notes, the first Watchmen trailer went online today, and it looks fantastic. Every scene looks faithful to the original graphic novel, which is a relief… for now. Pretty much all the major heroes were seen in the trailer, from Rorshach to Ozymandias to Dr. Manhattan to everyone’s favourite, the Comedian.

But will the movie stay true to the graphic novel entirely? Watchmen is an exemplar graphic novel: it showcases all the qualities of a perfect graphic novel. It is a multi-layered, deep narrative that you can read over and over again without ever getting especially tired of it.

The way the rich art blends with the dialogue and narrative is probably what makes the novel so unique. Watchmen is a story that can only be told completely and fulfillingly in the form of a graphic novel. As Alan Moore himself noted, you read a reference in the novel and flip back a few pages to find that reference and you find out something new. You observe the artwork, the backgrounds, the symbolism, and you always learn something new about the complex and beautifully-built world of Watchmen.

The graphic novel is filled with witty juxtapositions, metaphors, hints and other clues. It expertly blends character exploration with a running story that you’ll never guess. Will the movie be able to capture all of this? Can you really make a decent movie while holding all the subliminal qualities of the novel?

Snyder already proved his mettle with 300, but 300 and Watchmen are two completely different ball games. While 300 wasn’t a bad graphic novel, it was a much easier conversion to the film format. And while the movie did introduce a side-plot I do not agree with, the mild change in style only did good. I’d wager to say that for once, in 300’s case, the movie was more likeable than the original.

But you’d need at least 6 hours of screentime to convey all the raw information Watchmen bombards you with. There are several layers here, each conveying a deeper sense, a greater gravity to the story and its characters. To fully express them as they were in the novel would be a truly epic task to do in some two and a half hours of film. Snyder is going to have to outdo his previous work.

Also, like the comic, will the movie have hidden hints in the background? Will the movie encourage viewers to see it again and again? Most importantly of all, will it be in the same spirit? Already, I can make out that very minor shift in style from the trailer. It’s definitely good and I love the 300-style flashback scenes from Vietnam. But it is also definitely different.

Watchmen has a reputation in the world of graphic novels. The problem is, since movies are a much bigger world, will Watchmen achieve a similar status of recognition? The Dark Knight appears to have made its mark with the critics, giving comic book movies a lot of hope, but not everyone is a Christopher Nolan. Well, maybe Zack Snyder is.

While 300 magnified the original and became a success, the comic had been received similarly. Will the Watchmen movie be received with all the appreciation of the graphic novel? If it is, then it will get ratings and reviews no less than what The Dark Knight is bathing in right now. We definitely hope it does, because with better and better comic book movies (Iron Man included), the entire comic book movie industry might be in for a facelift.

This will result in higher bars for Marvel’s upcoming plethora of movies. Perhaps DC’s empty lineup will also receive some entries, such as Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, the Justice League, or of course, the Superman franchise that seems to have gone dead after Brandon Routh donned the red cape.

We shall wait and we shall see. Watchmen comes out on the 6th of March next year. Kick ass, Snyder.

E3’s right around the corner now and in the big show, we’re going to be seeing a lot of awesome games filled with win. EA will be bringing in the biggest lot, from what I can tell. In this post, we check out which games are worth getting excited for. And there is, of course, the entire EA Line-Up right below:

• Dead Space
• FaceBreaker
• Hasbro Family Game Night
• Littlest Pet Shop
• Madden NFL 09
• Mercenaries 2: World in Flames
• Mirror’s Edge
• iPhone/iPod Touch Games from EA Mobile
• The Sims 2 Apartment Pets
• Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 09 for the PSP
• Zubo
• MySims (PC)
• MySims Kingdom (Wii, DS)
• Spore
• Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 09
• Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning
• Command & Conquer Red Alert 3
• Crysis Warhead
• Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
• The Lord of the Rings: Conquest
• SimCity Creator (Wii)
• NBA Live 09
• NCAA® Football 09
• Skate It
• Rock Band™ 2
• Left 4 Dead

Definitely a mouthful. Check out the slightly more detailed looks by hitting the jump!
Full Story

Now, I’ve always thought that the Vikings deserve to be treated better in Hollywood. We have Rome represented over and over again and 300 made Sparta immortal in Hollywood. But for the Vikings, we had to endure the desaturated headache that was Pathfinder. But all that can change in a major way when sci-fi viking epic of pure awesome, Outlander comes your way later this year.

In the classic galactic struggle between man and alien, the ship of a human from a faraway planet crashes into the Nordic coast. Our hero, Kainan thus finds himself in the company of Vikings, but he is not alone. His adversary, an alien creature, the Moorwen also emerges from the wreckage and since he’s the monster-baddy-thing, we have him wanting to destroy everything there is. And well, Kainan and the Vikings must stop him.

To be honest, the plot sounds like a video game to me. The concept would totally work, but since there’s a movie coming out, we have to dash all our expectations there. Still, the movie can be equally awesome, because 300 proved last year that a story high on visual effects and action can actually be excused for a shallow story.

Still, who the hell doesn’t want to see freaking Vikings fighting freaking aliens! It’s outstandingly awesome! And to prove it, check out the great trailer they just released. It’s intense and totally works up on the action element. It also doesn’t seem to have the musty old-age feel most period films tend to have. With the sci-fi element, it feels a lot more slick. Check out the trailer below and there’s a great gallery of photos here.

Dragon Age, BioWare’s much-awaited dark fantasy game that will be bringing them back to their classic D&D-style hardcore roleplaying, will be coming at this year’s E3, courtesy EA. In fact, it will be one of their “premier” titles at the big gaming showdown next week. A select press will get the chance to get their hands on the game.

More interestingly, the game has been renamed. Yes sir, you’ll refer to it as Dragon Age: Origins from now on. The name change may not seem like a whole lot, but I honestly like it: it adds more class to what was originally a pretty generic name… (then again, no offence to BioWare, an epic fantasy hardcore D&D roleplaying game does sound a tad generic).

Staying truthful to their promise of “More on July 9th”, the official website has also been updated. Not that it really gives you a whole lot more. I love the logo, which I have graciously pasted above. But an interesting bit of info it gives it that the First Trailer will be coming out on Spike TV and Spike HD this Friday at 1:00 am. Of course, it will be then uploaded to Gametrailers in glorious HD-ness.

The website also gives you two newsletters to subscribe to: one for info on the game in general, and another for “world-builders” (read modders). Hmm, perhaps BioWare is going to put a lot of focus on moddability and customization, like Neverwinter Nights. The more I hear of this game, the more I can’t help believe that it’s a spiritual successor to Neverwinter Nights in some way or another.

Bethesda’s take on the glorious Fallout series, Fallout 3 has been refused classification in Australia! The news has been confirmed by the guys at Internode, the consequences of which are that the game is effectively banned in the land of kangaroos.

Why the banning has taken place is currently unknown, although a pretty good guess will be violence. Screenshots of the game released over the months have pointed to some pretty messy violence (much like the first two games). The game is pretty violent and bloody as it is, but the famed “Bloody Mess” perk in the game makes it bloodier and messier. Bethesda had confirmed recently that it will be returning. Perhaps that is reason for refusing classification?

Sex is definitely played down in the game, as Bethesda had mentioned. The game will have mature themes, but not so much about sex as in Fallout 2. That pretty much leaves violence in…

The game will most probably be sent in for a re-evaluation after some modifications. Fallout 3 is just too big a property to not be released in Australia. Besides, we want Zero Punctuation to be review it!

Brütal Legend, the game prophesied for raw awesomeness, will not be appearing at this year’s E3, according to MTV Multiplayer.

They were sent a mail from Lord Awesome Tim Schafer himself, who informed them that the game will not be appearing at E3 and that there’s nothing to worry about: the game is in fine order. “We’re not going to be showing at E3, but soon after that we hope,” he said. As for when this “soon” comes, he says “As soon as the dust settles from this whole [Activision Blizzard] merger thing we should be able to talk about the game a lot more.”

For those not in the know, this is because the game was originally supposed to be published by Vivendi, which now becomes a subsidiary of Activision along with Blizzard, by the clauses of the Great Activision Blizzard merger.

Brütal Legend will see Jack Black playing the roadie protagonist as he travels across a surreal heavy metal-inspired landscape. The game will feature music and cameos from several Metal Gods, such as Ronnie James Dio, Lemmy Kilmister, Rob Halford, Black Sabbath, Wolfmother and many more. It is going to be one hell of a game! Check out our earlier coverage on it! You’ll love it!

Infinity Ward is about as synonymous with Call of Duty as Valve is with Half-Life or Bungie with Halo. Okay, Treyarch did make Call of Duty 3 and will be alternating with Infinity Ward in making CoD titles now, but nobody seriously cares about them. Sorry, Treyarch.

Now, while Call of Duty is all fun and all, we’d like to see a little something different from Infinity Ward, and things seem to be on the right track. Talking from his blag, Robert Bowling, the Director of Communications at Infinity Ward announced that they have decided to reup their publishing contract with Activision, which kickstarts their future project, “a unique new IP” that they will have “complete control over”.

Since Bowling isn’t very willing to divulge any details on this “unique” new project, we’re guessing it’s going to be a long while before we actually find out what happens of this. I would be surprised if we get an announcement by February next year! Still, it’s great to know that Infinity Ward is up to something creative and not abother war shooter (which they are pretty good at anyways).

On a pretty loose guess, I’m thinking it will be a typical dystopian/space sci-fi shooter that will probably involve either zombies or aliens or alien zombies. What do you think of this? What is Infinity Ward up to?