I’ve always wanted an extremely good marksman/sharpshooter/sniper game. One that takes in account your entire surroundings. One with a Battlefield 2 type feel, but more of an assassination twist. One that makes you take in account wind speed, direction, where enemies are positioned, your recoil, your breathing everything… boy was I hoping for too much. Marine Sharpshooter might as well been a shooter on rails with a completely linear environment, and invulnerable player, and about 10 different guns with scopes that in the end all operate the same.

A video I didn’t take

Which brings me to my first point. When developing a sniper game one would think there would be an excellent selection of sniper rifles. I was surprised to see that there actually was; unfortunately as I got deeper and deeper into the game I realized the only difference between them was the scope sprite and the sound they made… At least make some more powerful than others, or larger clip size!

Someone might as well write a book at how bad the A.I. in this game was. Enemies would spawn with their backs facing towards you begging to be shot in the head. If you missed or shot them without a kill they would continue to stand there motionless like a paralyzed special ed student. When they did move they often ran backwards while their legs were doing a forward running motion. If their buddies got shot they also would stand still. You could practically run directly up to them, hump their leg and still have time to scope in for a head shot. However if they saw you and you were “caught” so to speak watch out! Because these little fuckers can see through everything… EVEN GROUND! Hiding behind a tree? forget it! If you can’t see them doesn’t mean they can’t see you. Hiding behind a mountain? Fuck that; they have mountain piercing bullets… oh and to top it all off the enemy sniper can probably shoot off a million rounds a second and still not have to reload.

Fortunately there are so many medpacks around that you never have to worry about dying. Auto healing medpacks in fact. No need to hit a button to heal yourself… if you loose the slightest bit of health the medpacks kick in. They might as well modeled a little R2 unit to follow you around and prod you with a needle the entire time.

The friendly A.I. was also one to be desired. I’m not even sure why I had an ally; most of the time he was stuck behind some tree or jacking off in a corner. I don’t think I ever saw him shoot his gun once in the entire game… I shot him a couple of times and yes hes invincible. Instead of programming a useless friendly A.I. they should of spent some time into programming grenades so I could blow some ganstas up… that would have been much more enjoyable. Or they should have remodeled the friendly A.I. into Jar-Jar Binks because he was equally as annoying and useless. Rag dolls are horrendous; I’m not sure what physics engine this game is using, but I do not ever want to encounter it again. It’s almost like your bullets have a billion kilo-whatevers of electricity in them and when they pierce skin they force the unfortunate being to enter convulsions.

So lets talk about visuals. The environmental textures look pretty nice when you get up close; unfortunately the mountains/hills look like they are made of play-dough and the trees look like a four year olds cotton ball creation. Not much else to say about visuals except every level is exactly the same only with a different linear path. One thing that boggled my mind was the boxes… sure every game HAS boxes, but these boxes seemed to be out of place. Obviously the first level you are placed somewhere in the Middle east so the boxes have Arabic writing on them. Then you are shipped to Korea… same boxes; seems like there was a sale on Arabic storage units. Shipped to Russia… same boxes; wow the Arabs seem to have a crazy monopoly on the box market. Then finally the U.S… yup, same boxes; U.S. customs won’t allow a single middle east citizen in their country but sure as fuck will they allow boxes. Oh and on the topic of culture aparently every person in the world has the same accent, voice and catch-phrases. Doesn’t matter if you are in Russia, Korea or fucken Mars everyone talks like an American from California; in fact I think there was only one voice actor for all the enemy npcs.

I can’t complain too much about the gameplay because I did finish the game. It was short (around 3-4 hours) and after a while got pretty repetitive. The game is extremely easy, I can’t communicate how easy it was, but I will sure as hell try. First off I didn’t die through the whole game and when I did want to die I had to wait an extremely long time for my medpacks to finally fuck off. It doesn’t help that you are super invulnerable, but your rifle is 100 bajillion times more powerful than the enemy weapons. It was like God came down and blessed all my weapons turning them into a one hit killing machine. Once and a while you will enter a sort of Max Payne bullet time. In fact it looks exactly like Max Payne bullet time, but you can’t toggle it; it will just happen randomly. It’s like the game is programmed to enter bullet time when you are getting shot by a million fucken enemies; or when a chopper is landing. Doesn’t matter too much anyway because my automated medkit system will surely keep me alive.

Here’s my suggestion to you Groove Media Inc… if that is your real name. Since you are already on the fourth reincarnation of this game it looks as if you don’t plan to drop the series so why not try to do something intelligent with it. You have a good concept… your a sharpshooter with a partner. Why not spend some time looking into what real snipers have to do on a mission, what they have to take into account for when they are looking down range. On the topic of game play you should really have some extra game-play modes. Maybe something like: Play through the whole level without getting shot or… Attempt to have your friendly A.I. completely follow you through a whole mission. Also add some stats; you know at the end of the mission it would be nice to see how many head shots I got because I am sadistic and like to know those things. Lastly make some fucken variety! Unfortunately I will probably play Marine Sharpshooter 5 when it comes out… and boy do I dread that day.

Marine Sharpshooter 4… I give you a: 4/11

One thing that sets it aside all over games of its time is that the environment is fully 3D. Christ, even Final Fantasy didn’t have a fully 3D environment until much later on in its history. It’s impressive to see how Konami achieved this; through the use of fog. I read somewhere that Konami used the fog in the environment as an excuse not to draw the environment very far off-you can see this when you port it to PC because the distant environment tends to drop off.

The gameplay is instense; much scarier than its PSX counterpart Resident Evil 1. It’s scary in its own special way… Silent Hill doesn’t rely itself on cheap pop-out scare tactics. You often find yourself saying “What… the… F*&#” when entering a new area; truely the developers of this game have some pretty sick minds. Silent Hill 1 isn’t your normal run of the mill survival horror, it’s CREATIVE! One moment you will find yourself in an abandoned hospital, then suddenly you will be transported to an alternate scarier clone of that same hospital. Sure its a prime example of my much hated “reduce, reuse, recycle” method of creating video games, but Konami actually used this technique properly!

One thing I noticed off the bat was the sound. Your speakers/headphones are constantly doing something. Whether its the static from the radio picking up monsters, creaking floor boards or the distant groans of an enemy. Everything seems to be where it belongs. I became obsessed with my headphones since the equalizer is used amazingly.

It’s also interesting to see how much this game represents the sandbox genre without even knowing its doing it. Sometimes you are stuck within a certain building, but when you are outside running about you are free to explore; free to do whatever you want within limits. This brings me to my next point-multiple endings!! Everyone loves multiple endings and Silent Hill 1 is full of them… 4 to be exact (plus the bonus UFO ending). I usually don’t have the ambition to play through a game again, but I am really tempted to play through it and try to get the UFO ending.

The graphics are well beyond excellent for its time. In fact the graphics (on the PC port), are pretty decent even with todays standards. With most games of its genre graphics really aren’t everything, but you can tell Konami worked extra to polish this game to a golden shine. There isn’t much more to say about Silent Hill, but to say “GET IT! and PLAY IT!” if you haven’t already. Silent Hill isn’t as populair as say Resident Evil, but maybe it should be.

First thing I should mention is that if you own a PSX and a copy of Silent Hill this is perfectly legal.

Software needed:

• A Playstation and a copy of Silent Hill so this entire process remains legal.
• (Optional) an iso file version of Silent Hill. This is basically a CD Image copied to your computer so you don’t need to constantly insert the CD.
• WinRAR - website - If you are unfamiliar with RAR files they are similair to zip files. You needed a RAR extractor for the plugin files I host.
• ePSXe (Enhanced Playstation Emulator) - website - Download the newest edition and save it somewhere on your computer.
• PSX Bios file. Unfortunately I cannot supply you with a link to this file; because that would be illegal. You can only own this file if you own a PSX. Simply search google for a file named “scph1001.bin” and you should find it fairly easily. If you don’t know how to use google you don’t diserve to play Silent Hill. This file is fairly small should be exactly 512KBs.
• Petes D3D Driver - download - This is the video driver plugin. The link I am supplying is version 1.74 and worked flawlessly with Silent Hill 1. You could get a more recent file, but the setup may be different.
• Eternal SPU Plugin - download - This is the audio driver plugin. The link I am supplying is version 1.41 and worked flawlessly with Silent Hill 1. You could get a more recent file, but the setup may be different.

Step 1 - Installing ePSXe/Setting up ePSXe

Before we begin to configure ePSXe we must first get everything in the right directories. Simply extract the zip file you downloaded from the ePSXe site to a directory called ePSXe somewhere on your computer. I just put mine on my external drive. Next take the PSX bios file you downloaded and put it in the bios subdirectory within your ePSXe folder.

Now its time to install those two plugins you downloaded from cvirtuoso.com. Extract both Petes Video Driver and the Eternal SPU driver into the plugins subdirectory within your ePSXe folder. You should now have two files called: gpuPeteD3D.dll and spuEternal.dll in your plugins folder.

Step 2 - Configure ePSXe

Now it’s time to actually configure the ePSXe application. Run ePSXe.exe in your ePSXe folder. Click Config -> Wizard Guide and follow the instructions below:

1. Click Config >>
2. Make sure scph1001 - USA (Recommended) is highlighted and click Next >>. If you do not see this file or got an earlier warning about a bios file missing it means you did not install the bios correctly or have an invalid copy.
3. Make sure Pete’s D3D Driver 1.74 is highlighted and click Config. If Pete’s D3D Driver is not listed it means you installed it wrong or its missing/corrupted.
4. Take a look at this screenshot and make sure your settings match mine. You can obviously change the screen resolution, but changing anything else may impare Silent Hill 1. Be sure to select your video device at the very top.
5. Hit OK to close the Config and click Test. You should receive a message saying “Plugin working correctly”. If you did not redo the steps. Click Next >>
6. Make sure Eternal SPU Plugin 1.41 is selected and click Config
7. Take a look at this screenshot and make sure your settings match mine. Once again you can play around with some of them, but you may impare Silent Hill 1.
8. Hit OK to close the Config and click Next >>. The Test button didn’t do anything for me, but the sound works ingame.
9. If you are running XP/2000 make sure the WNT/W2K CD Driver is selected, if you are running 9X/ME select the other option. Once again Test/Config didn’t do anything for me so click Next >>
10. Ignore configuring the controller for now and click Next >>
11. Your ePSXe is properly configured so click done and go onto the next step.

Step 3 - Configuring controls

You could skip this step and launch Silent Hill 1, but the controls for a keyboard may be a little awkward so I have found an awesome control scheme that might make your gaming experience a bit better! From the ePSXe application click Config at the top and go down to Game Pad -> Port 1 -> Pad 1. Check out this screenshot to see how I have setup my controls. To remap a key click in the space and hit the key you wish to use. A little bug here is when you map the TAB key to Circle. You actually have to select the Triangle slot and hit the TAB key. Windows will skip to the next data input area then assign TAB to O. With those controls selected the controls for Silent Hill 1 are as follows:

Up Arrow - Walk Forward
Down Arrow - Walk Backward
Left Arrow  - Turn Left
Right Arrow - Turn Right
Spacebar - Action \ Fire Weapon \ Use
Backspace - View Map \ Exit Menu Screens
I - Access Inventory
TAB - Turn On or Off Flashlight \ Exit Menu Screens
Left Shift - Run (hold down to run, release to walk)
Left CTRL - Hold Down to Raise Weapon (then press Action to fire)
Q - Sidestep Left
E - Sidestep Right
Z - Look Around
P - Pause Game \ Skip Movie Scenes
F1 - Quick Save
F3 - Quick Load

Step 4 - Launch Silent Hill 1

You are now ready to play Silent Hill 1!!! From the ePSXe application click File -> Run CDROM, or File -> Run ISO if you have copied the CD to your computer. The game should start up and you are good to go. There is a great walkthru here if you get stuck.

Hope you enjoy the game as much as I do!!!

On the games front I’ve completed a few more: Vikings battle for Asgard, Turning Point Fall of Liberty, Dark Sektor, GTA4, Iron Man, Alone in the Dark 4, Mario Kart Wii, Lego Indiana Jones.  Well I guess thats more than a few. I’m not at home right now so I can’t check the full list, but those are ones I can throw out off the top of my head. I have also discovered Age of Conan. A great MMO, unfortunately my external drive failed and I have to reinstall all 30gigs of it. Save that for another post.

What I really want to share with everyone (or no-one) is my rejouvinated obsession with Star-Wars. A couple weeks ago Escapist Magaizine ran a whole bunch of Star-Wars articles. I happened to be bored at work that day and read through all of them. Found out that the writer of both Mass Effect and KOTOR had his own series of Star-Wars novels based on Darth Bane and the Old Republic. I read both books in a matter of a week and instantly became upsessed. I’m not talking a healthy obsession, I’m talking full blown lets get all the old republic comics obsession… yea I did. I read those too. So I’ve read/played/obsessed over everything Old Republic and now I want to dabble in a bit of the abandoned-ware LucasArts has been leaving lying around. I’ve heard awesome things of games such as the X-Wing series and the Dark Forces series, but I have never played them. Well expect some posts about those games because I’m currently getting my hands on them.

Other than that not much else to say except I’m trying real hard in math.. which is a first since grade 9.

One of the biggest projects I have due is my independent film entitled “Prelude to Life”. Simply put it’s a zombie film without zombies. It questions how people interact with each other in survival situations.  Staring Mike McMahon as Matt this short story follows the lives of five survivors as their routine quickly gets disrupted as an injured new comer shows his face.

I’ve uploaded it to youtube:

PRELUDE TO LIFE VIA YOUTUBE 

Let me know what you think.

infinity/11 

From what I can tell DMC4 takes place after the events of DMC1 so its not another prequel like DMC3. However, with all that said, DMC4 plays much like a standalone game. There isn’t much reference to the other games, except some returning characters (Lady, Trish and Dante). In DMC4 you play as a new character Nero, he is a naive character who starts out believing Dante is the “bad guy” since he killed off Sanctus, the Order leader. Your girlfriend, Kyrie, is captured and as you progress through the game you begin to understand your true power and the true motives behind the Order.

The Review

Let’s get on with the review shall we? It took me roughly 9-10 hours to beat this game on the XBOX 360; apparently that makes a difference because there is 30 min install time on the PS3. For the first 3-4 hours you play as Nero making your way to save Kyrie. You fight your way through beautiful environments and fight against some really cool enemies. You battle some bosses until you finally reach the end of Nero’s story. I won’t ruin the storyline for you so I will simply leave you with the mystery. However after the end of Nero’s story you play as Dante and you must fight through everything Nero just went through only backwards. The enemies are a bit harder, the bosses are a bit harder but EVERYTHING IS THE SAME!!! Thats right you are playing the same game only with a whole new character that in this reviewers opinion SUCKS. I’m not sure why they did this to the player, but as soon as you start to master Nero’s abilities you can’t play him anymore and are stuck with boring old Dante. Regardless after you fight through the same environments you make it right back to the beginning of the game. You fight the secondary final boss as Dante, then you are able to switch back to Nero.

At this point in the game I was already pretty annoyed at the same shit different pile crap that CAPCOM threw at me. However when I was able to control Nero again I gave the game a second chance. Too bad CAPCOM ruined it… AGAIN! Not only did I just fight every single boss a second time, but now I have to fight EVERY SINGLE BOSS A THIRD TIME WITH NERO!!! At the end of the game you play through this board game type game play and as you progress towards the end you have to fight every boss again as Nero, even the secondary final boss. Once you defeat the secondary final boss you are confronted with the primary final boss and then the game ends.

The Summation

There is one really good thing about this game and one really bad thing. The good thing is that the environments are beautiful and the graphics are really polished. The bad thing is that its the same game three times over. It’s almost like CAPCOM decided the game was to short and needed to make it three times longer. I understand the concept and the plot structure and I understand that Dante had to make it back to the beginning of the game to confront the evil boss structure, but why take the same path? Why not open special areas that only Dante could go through? You could still use the same environments only with different corridors that were once foreign to Nero. Furthermore why throw every boss at us again in an annoying mini boss battle!

Final Thoughts

I think CAPCOM has to begin to rethink how they deal with the reduce reuse recycle outline of video game development. The point of the R.R.R outline isn’t to recreate the same crap with a different character, its to use the same environments in different ways… its to open up new ways of utilizing that environment to keep it interesting for the player. I really do hope CAPCOM gets their act together before they release Resident Evil 5. As I was playing through this game I kept thinking that DMC4 was a tech demo of the environmental engine of RE5, I could be wrong but it doesn’t feel like they put enough heart into this game to justify it as mainstream worthy. Sadly I think DMC4 will be put to shame much like DMC2 was. Another swing and a miss CAPCOM; DMC5 better be awesome because 3 strikes and your out. My final score is:

6/11

That answers the first question; “How did I like it”, now to move onto the second “Was the ending good”. My cousin is an interesting character, he usually rates games on how interesting the ending is. I find that “reviewing” structure to be quite obscure however in this situation it fits. I am going to ruin the ending for you… I’m not even going to put my usually spoiler tag… because the ENDING SUCKS! Maybe by reading this article I will save you from the disappointment of this game so you can do other things…. like widdle.

So lets get started. At the end of the game you decide it would be stupid to leave an exploding planet so that you can seek revenge on someone who is going to die on it anyway. You head out on a hero mission to kill the antagonist of the plot. Finally you reach him, cue CUT-SCREEN… cue another CUT SCREEN… and hes dead. Yes, you heard me correctly you don’t actually FIGHT to antagonist of the game. You simple watch as Turok does it for you. This has some slight interactivity… you have to push LT and RT when the game tells you too, but all in all its basically a boss on rails; only this time you don’t have a sweet plastic gun in your hand while you shoot zombies. APPARENTLY the developers of Turok thought that boss was boring and as you make your final “forced” stab you are confronted with a familiar T-Rex; called Momma Scarface. If you don’t want to die an annoying death A MILLION FRECKEN TIMES follow this simple strategy. Find the nearest metal crate… grab the shotgun… play about 40 rounds of ring around the rosy blasting the T-Rex in the face; if you run out of ammo repeat this strategy on another nearby crate. The T-Rex dies you throw some C4 in her eye and you jump on the previously disguarded spacecraft. Some idiot on board says some Bruce Willis catch phrase and we roll credits.

That pretty much sums up my experience with Turok. The worst part is still to come, if you do decide to play through the game beware of the insanely annoying battles. These battles will put you on wits end forcing you to hold back to urge to chuck your controller into your nice new HD TV. It’s sad when loads take longer than it takes you to die afterwards. There are some ridiculous quick save slots zones; example: whilst staring down the barrel of a helicopters mini gun. The friendly AI doesn’t make things any easier… this is quite possibly the stupidest AI I have seen in our slew of next-gen games. I vaguely remember the developers of Turok boasting that their AI was “state of the art”, they are so smart they will “flank you”. Why couldn’t you apply this remarkable AI to my allies? Why do my allies have to run in front of EVERY god damn rocket I shoot.

The original game of my childhood now tarnished.

Allow me to explain what I was expecting in Turok… sweet weapons. Does anyone remember the days of old when the Cerebral bore was the coolest weapon since sliced bread? The only reason I played this game through was because I was hoping the Cerebral bore would show itself once again. Instead I got the normal run of the mill shit weapon assortment we see in every other FPS now a days. Lets see we have a pistol, a minigun, a rocket launcher, a plasma rifle which basically acts like your normal machine gun, a shotgun, a flamethrower and this thing that shoots sticky grenades. Of course I can’t forget your classic bow and arrow (which was actually quite fun to use) and your knife (which also had some pretty cool execution style animations), but all in all the weapons were a grave disappointment.

A couple last things before I close up this review. It seemed to me like Turok was trying much to hard to be like the Half-Life series. Allow me to explain my cooky reasoning. First off the simplistic HUD reminded me of Half-Life 2, but the quiet “lacking of dialogue” main character Turok reminded me a lot of the quiet “lack of dialogue” Gordon Freeman. This would have worked quite well if it wasn’t for the abrupt cut-screens removing the player from the protagonist. Propaganda games had a good thing going for them until they screwed it up.

Lastly, there are some good things to say about Turok. Like the voice acting…. and the repetive feature of setting giant scorpions on fire, but all this is out weighed by its downfalls. Overall I give Turok a:

4/11

Thank you propaganda games for taking away a piece of my childhood.

The weekend started off we me on a mission to find the Japanese version of Super Mario Smash Brothers Brawl. In order to feed my unnerving impatience I sent myself out on a mission to fix my overwhelming XBOX 360 issue.

Allow me to explain in a nutshell. If you are a reader of my blog you will remember that a few months ago I bought a knock-off power supply for my XBOX 360. It is pictured below:

     Let me first start by saying I AM NEVER BUYING A DAMN THING FROM DIVINEO AGAIN! This purchase was by far the worst mistake of my life. This simple PC PSU with a XBOX power connector is the closer to Devil spawn than Damien himself. This thing overheated melting/setting on fire a total of 3 times. I’ve went through two of these things and the customer service at DiviNeo stinks to say the least. I was under the impression that my XBOX 360 mod was the cause of this overheating issue. Allow me to explain, when I first modded my XBOX 360 I had the option of either choosing “Fast” or “Quiet”. I choose fast because I don’t really care whether my computer room is quiet. By choosing fast I figured the DVD drive would draw more power from the power supply, therefore I came to the conclusion that my knock-off power supply couldn’t keep up. After an entire day of fixing computers at the Windsor Gaming Centre I was finally able to remod my XBOX 360 with iXtreme 1.4 firmware running at 5x instead of 12x drive speed.

     That night I had plans to watch Groundhog’s day with my girlfriend so as soon as I got home we ordered up some pizza, watched Bill Murry’s greatest performance and had an incredible night of groundhoggy goodness. When the movie was done I was itching to test to see if my 360 mod fixed my power supply issue. I threw in the new Turok for 360 and started the beast up. Instantly it overheated melting the power cord for a fourth time. Only this time the power supply actually crapped out. It just shut off spontaneously, I attempted to disconnect it from the back of my 360 when suddenly it turned back on. With the power cord half out of my 360 the system made a loud POP then both the 360 and power supply turned off. I wasn’t sure whether the 360 or the power supply had died so I immediately headed to the gaming centre to see if my 360 exhaled its last breath.

     Thankfully my 360 booted up with a regular stock Microsoft power supply. So I bit the bullet and bought a power supply from Colin at the price of 50$. I went home and happily played Turok for the rest of the night. I will have a review of Turok once I get a little farther in the game, but I can sum it up by saying it is one of the most annoying games I have played in a long time.

      The next morning I was able to get my hands on a fresh new copy of the Japanese version of Super Mario Smash Brothers Brawl!!!! I was extremely excited. In summation I spent most of Sunday playing brawl by myself and with my cousin then most of this morning playing brawl with my girlfriend. This game is absolutely amazing, I think the Japanese update broke my Wii, but I could care less!

This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 Canada License.

FADE IN:

TRANSPARENT BOTTOM RIGHT CORNER the statement:

February 14th
6:33AM

A GENTLE HUM of ELECTRICAL EQUIPMENT lingers in the background. The sound of a SPARK signifies that a nearby LIGHT BULB is about to live its last moments.

INT. WINDSOR GAMING CENTRE - NIGHT

Five beings ranging in age from child to senior citizen sit in a haphazard circle in a dim abandoned business interior. Signs of life and presence act as clutter and obstacles in a once active environment.

A YOUNG MALE, DIRTY TEENAGER holds a decorative katana as an older FEMALE YOUNG ADULT glares at him.

CRYSTAL ELBOUN

Would you put that damn sword down? You’re only lookin’ like a fool.

A MALE CHILD looks up from the floor

JUSTIN LAMONT

But what if those things come in here? We won’t have anything to protect ourselves with.

Another YOUNG MALE from behind the remnants of a store counter speaks up.

CHRIS RICHARDSON

Don’t you worry Justin nothings getting in here under my watch; Matt put the katana away you’re scaring the female.

An ELDERLY WOMAN comforts JUSTIN placing her arm around him cuddling him in close.

JACKIE WHITE

OK Chris, I’m going to tell you something. Ever since I’ve been here you have been barking orders at Matt like he was your son instead of your brother. This isn’t the time or the place for false bravado.

JACKIE cuddles towards JUSTIN. Her eyes changing to an attempted motherly softness.

JACKIE WHITE

Don’t worry Justin this place hasn’t been attacked in over three

AN EXTREMELY LOUD BANG startles the entire group. Another BANG follows originating from the front door. Each character scoffs backwards and willows in fear.

CRYSTAL ELBOUN

What the fuck is that?!

CHRIS RICHARDSON quickly grabs the recently disposed katana, jumps the front counter and rushes to the side of the door. Reluctantly he gently moves a nailed piece of wood so that he may see out the front window.

CHRIS RICHARDSON

I think I see Liam Mackenzie

MATT RICHARDSON

Liam?! He’s still alive? What is he doing out there?

CHRIS RICHARDSON

Fuck if I know. It doesn’t matter, if he stays out there he’ll be tomorrows breakfast. Get over here and hold the door while I drag him inside.

MATT RICHARDSON attempts to mimic his brother carefully jumping over the front counter. CHRIS is already fumbling with the array of locks; his hands shaking.

CRYSTAL ELBOUN

If you let any of those bastards in here I am going to castrate you both.

CHRIS RICHARDSON

Crystal shut up for a second. Matt when I say go open the door and I’ll grab Liam; as soon as I get in shut door and lock it fast. Ready GO!

MATT quickly swings open the door as CHRIS, while still half inside the building kneels down and grabs LIAM by the hands. He pulls LIAM so far just to make it inside the building as MATT slams the door behind him.

CHRIS RICHARDSON

Lock it you idiot!

JUSTIN LAMONT

Is he going to die?

JACKIE approaches

JACKIE WHITE

We need to check him for bites.

FADE OUT/IN:

TRANSPARENT BOTTOM RIGHT CORNER the statement:

February 14th
6:40AM

The ELECTRICAL HUM from earlier is louder now.

INT. BATHROOM WINDSOR GAMING CENTRE - NIGHT

CHRIS is rummaging through weathered cabinets in a dingy dirty bathroom as MATT stands observing at the door way.

MATT RICHARDSON

I told you Chris those were painkillers left over from my wisdom teeth.

CHRIS slams the cabinet marches past MATT pushing him aside. He heads towards the front of the building where LIAM, CRYSTAL, JACKIE and JUSTIN sit. MATT follows sluggishly.

CHRIS RICHARDSON

I know we have some antibiotics around here somewhere.

CRYSTAL is now holding LIAM, his head on her lap. She checks his temperature.

CRYSTAL ELBOUN

We don’t have time for spring cleaning. Liam is running a fever and all his wounds are red and infected. If we don’t get him any antibiotics he will die.

JUSTIN LAMONT

What if he turns into one of those things

JACKIE WHITE

We’ve already checked him it doesn’t appear he has any bites on him.

CHRIS RICHARDSON

What do you expect me to do Crystal? I don’t have a cauldron… I can’t magically concoct antibiotics.

MATT RICHARDSON

There is a Shoppers Drug Mart across the street I can run over!

CHRIS RICHARDSON

Don’t be stupid

CRYSTAL ELBOUN

Actually thats not a bad idea. They keep amoxicillin or erythromicin behind the counter at Shoppers. If one of you were to go and get it Justin might have a chance to survive.

CHRIS RICHARDSON

I’ll get it! Couldn’t be that hard right? Moxis cillin and eurthmics got it!

JACKIE WHITE

Just be careful. We know that there hasn’t been a sighting in weeks, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t out there.

CHRIS picks up the katana and a baseball bat off the ground. Unlocks the front door and peaks outside. MATT approaches.

CHRIS RICHARDSON

Don’t forget to lock the door this time little brother

CHRIS rushes out the door as MATT watches him from a small crack in the door. From the other side CHRIS pulls the door shut. MATT locks it.

FADE OUT/IN:

TRANSPARENT BOTTOM RIGHT CORNER the statement:

February 14th
7:00AM

SILENCE overwhelms the group.

INT. WINDSOR GAMING CENTRE - NIGHT

MATT sits quietly behind the counter staring blankly at the door. JUSTIN is asleep on JACKIES lap and LIAM is shaking as CRYSTAL places a cold rag on his forehead.

A LOUD BANG from the front door is heard, this time its much more violent. JUSTIN is awoken and cowers into JACKIES arms. MATT rushes to the front door.

MATT RICHARDSON

CHRIS!!!

MATT unlocks the front door

JACKIE WHITE

Matt be careful! You don’t know whats out there

MATT RICHARDSON

I don’t care those things probably have my brother

JACKIE gets up and rushes to MATT. JUSTIN moves towards CRYSTAL and LIAM. MATT swings the door open.

MATT RICHARDSON

Oh fucken shit… CHRIS!

CHRIS RICHARDSON O.S.

Matt don’t get any closer! Stay inside! Take this!

CHRIS’ arm enters the door frame. In his hand are the antibiotics. He drops them inside the building and his arm is quickly dragged away out of view. MATT falls to his knees and tries to grab CHRIS. JACKIE grabs MATT preventing him from going any further. JUSTIN gets up grabs the antibiotics and rushes to CRYSTAL.

MATT now sobs at his feet. JACKIE slams the door and locks it she kneels down to MATTS level. The sounds of pain and horror still occurring from outside. JACKIE puts one hand on MATTS shoulder.

JACKIE WHITE

What Chris did was a remarkable act. He was not a selfish person beneath his hard exterior. He loved you very much. He’s everybody’s hero today.

The horrific sounds from outside begin to fade. CRYSTAL opens LIAMS mouth. Places the antibiotics in it and forces him to swallow some water.

FADE OUT/IN:

TRANSPARENT BOTTOM RIGHT CORNER the statement:

February 14th
7:18AM

SILENCE still overwhelms the group.

INT. WINDSOR GAMING CENTRE - DAWN

CRYSTAL still has LIAMS head on her lap. LIAM isn’t shaking anymore his rag removed from his forehead. JUSTIN and JACKIE are sitting together staring blankly at MATT. MATT sits by the front door. Signs of the sun beat down upon him. MATT stands.

MATT RICHARDSON

I somehow feel free. Like some chain has been released from around my ankles. I feel like I can finally be myself.

MATT unlocks the door for the last time. He opens it turns to JUSTIN and tosses him the keys. The sun light now fully covering MATT as his body juxtaposes the darkness of the room. He smiles and begins to walk out the door. The door shuts behind him.

JUSTIN LAMONT

Is Matt going to be OK?

We now see LIAM his eyes open he looks up at CRYSTAL. CRYSTAL looks down at LIAM they smile.

JACKIE WHITE

Everybody is going to be just fine.

FADE OUT