Road to Oz #1 Review

If there’s something as synonymous with The Wizard of Oz as Dorothy, Toto, and the Wicked Witch of the West, it most assuredly is the yellow brick road. In Road to Oz, Dorothy wanders away from her Kansas farm with a shaggy old man and gets lost when the road inexplicably splits into 16 different paths. The fabled yellow bricks don’t show up, but once the duo set out on one road at random, you can be sure it will lead to another wonderful adventure in the land of Oz.

Eric Shanower adapts the classic L. Frank Baum book with the same grace and care he put into the past four Oz adaptations. The narrative delivery is clear and light, and while certainly geared towards younger readers, anyone would be hard pressed to not enjoy the telling. There are times when the story moves onward without considering the consequence of the characters’ actions, but that could be attributed to the carefree nature of the protagonist, the ever-kindly Dorothy. Shanower uses different dialects for Dorothy, the shaggy man, and another new character named Button-Bright, instantly making them feel unique and full of life. Even Toto’s got some attitude.

Giving this story its fantastical signature look is Skottie Young. His settings are as simple as they are breathtaking. He has mastered the idea of “less is more” and uses it to great effect throughout the book. Just as masterful are his beautifully rendered characters, who laugh and look sad and get angry in the most captivating way. Young’s Dorothy could give any Pixar character a run for most endearing cartoon character ever.

Joshua is a writer for IGN. Follow him on Twitter or IGN, where he is hell-bent on making sure you know his opinion about comic books.

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Ubisoft officially drops always-on DRM. Won't strictly admit it was a mistake, but drops it anyway

In a turn of events akin to the Munchkins' realisation that the Wicked Witch of the East had taken up a new career as a building foundation, long-protesting PC Gamers can today celebrate the official death of Ubisoft's never-popular always-on DRM policy.

A new interview over at the ever-lovely Rock, Paper, Shotgun with Ubi's worldwide director for online games Stephanie Perotti (in conjunction with the company's corporate communications manager Michael Burk) reveals that no longer will PC players of Ubisoft's games be required to maintain a constant internet connection to the company's servers in order to play, nor will they suffer the kind of limits previously seen on the number of possible installations of any given game.

"We have listened to feedback, and since June last year our policy for all of PC games is that we only require a one-time online activation when you first install the game, and from then you are free to play the game offline."

Perotti stops short of admitting any regret or mistake, however, stating instead when questioned, 

"We’ve listened to feedback, we will continue to listen to feedback, we will continue to make sure that we deliver great games and great services, and are now operating under this policy."

Head over to RPS for the rest of the interview, which also discusses Ubisoft's often staggered console and PC game release schedule, as well as the mysterious never-revealed numbers which backed its previous anti-piracy policy. And don't forget to drop a line in the comments on whether this admission will change your attitude towards Ubisoft's PC games in the future.

Source : gamesradar[dot]com