In 1986 Frank Miller changed Batman forever with Batman: The Dark Knight Returns.  In this book Batman is old and has retired.  Gotham has just gotten worse and worse without Batman to protect it. Finally Batman can take no more and returns darker and more violent that we have ever seen him before.

After Batman: The Dark Knight Returns success Frank Miller retells Batman’s origin in Batman: Year One.  In this re-telling, a darker and more violent Batman is born as we learn about Bruce Wayne’s childhood, the brutal slaying of his parents and how Bruce Wayne became Batman.

Batman: The Killing Joke is not one of the stories that comes up a lot when talking about Alan Moore, but is another example of the great adventures Alan Moore takes readers on. Originally published in 1988, the book came in a deluxe format that had a very strange color pallet in side it. After recently reading the hardback version I was surprised to find out that artist Brian Bolland just didn’t have time to color the book and someone else was brought in to color it. In the hardback version Brian Bolland has gone back and re-colored the whole the whole thing. Batman: The Killing Joke reboots the Joker just as Batman: The Dark Knight Returns rebooted Batman two years earlier. Throughout the book Batman and the Joker are locked in a psychological battle, though some scenes are quiet brutal like the kidnapping of Commissioner Gorden and the shooting of Barbara Gorden. Just like all good Alan Moore stories readers are led through twist and turns that come neatly together at the end leaving readers with a darker Joker to go along with our now darker Batman.

These three book completely updated Batman to the modern character we see today. Though many long time readers of Batman hated the changes, many more new readers started reading the series from this point on.  Both of the last two Batman Movies (Batman Begins and The Dark Knight) seem to based on this modern version of the character.

I love playing my X-Box and I love all the digital content available on it. Several month ago Microsoft started selling games on demand through the X-Box Marketplace. Games on demand allows members to buy games and download them straight to your X-Box hard drive without going out to the store. Most of these games are older X-Box 360 games or original X-Box games that retail for $19.99 or less, and even cheaper if you buy them used . The whole games on demand system is flawed because many of the X-Box 360 titles cost $29.99 to download. It is understood you get some convenience from buying from games on demand, but $29.99 is as bad as renting a movie in a hotel room for $15 when you can buy it for that much. You also lose the the ability to sell the game after you finish it or give it to a friend to play. Considering all the manufacturing, shipping, and environmental cost that games on demand is eliminating why not drop the price to $14.99 or something close to the cost of a used copy of the game. This direct competition with stores like Gamestop would entice gamers to buy more games on demand and increase the total copies of each game sold instead of reselling the same game over and over again.

Retro games are starting to make a comeback by showing up as iTunes applications and the newest one to hit the App store is Bust-A-Move

Bust-A-Move was first released in 1993 as a coin operated arcade game.  In short Bust-A-Move is a puzzle game where you must connect three or more of the same colored bubbles together to make them pop and disappear before they cross the line.  The iPhone/iPod Touch version is not that much different except there are fewer bubbles to pop on each level as there is just not enough screen space.

There are 3 modes to play in the iPhone/iPod Touch version: Story mode where you control Bub in a puzzle solving adventure, Vs. Mode where you can play head to head via blue-tooth and Challenge mode where the level never ends it just keeps getting harder and harder.

Bust-A-Move is fun but not very hard to beat making the replay value not very high and along with a $4.99 price tag not for everyone.  Unless you absolutely love the Bust-A-Move games I suggest waiting for this game to go on sale for $0.99 before buying it.

So many old games are popping up on the iTunes App Store that it is refreshing to see and old game re-invented for the iPhone/iPod Touch.  Wolfenstein RPG looks and sounds exactly like the original Wolfenstein 3D that we all remember and love except this version is turn based and you work on building your character Sergeant B.J. Blazkowicz instead of just killing everything you see.

Wolfenstein RPG contains 9 levels and 16 different weapons for you to collect and use.  There are 32 different enemies including some from the original game.  The controls are easy to learn and use taking full advantage of the touch screen.  The levels themselves are challenging and well layed out.  You don’t get easily lost yet there is little repetitiveness to the levels.  If you do get lost there is a map system to help you find your way back when you get off track.  If you are looking for a game that is nostalgic, fun, and still new Wolfenstein RPG surely fits the bill.

Wolfenstein RPG Official Web Site

Wolfenstein RPG on  iTunes App Store

Tron Legacy: This looks great but I’m on the fence as to if Disney is just cashing in on Tron fans or if this is going to be a good sequel. One of the best parts of Tron was the incredible effects it offered. We will have to see what the new Tron has to offer besides Disney 3D.

Astro Boy: What can I say besides it’s about time. Astro Boy came out in the 1960s as a cartoon and in the 1980’s as a comic book. Always fun, enjoyable and kid friendly!

Most of the apps I have for my iPod Touch do updates off and on to fix bugs or to make small changes to how the app works.  I was pleasantly surprised when Grocery IQ updated and added a whole bunch of new and useful features.  My favorite being you can now type in a barcode from any item and it goes out on the internet and finds what the item is.  I have yet to stump it even with store brand items.  You can also now create several lists instead of just one as when I bought Grocery IQ several months ago.  You can also email a copy of your shopping list making it easier to share the shopping duties with others.  Kudos to the makers of Grocery IQ for including such great new features in the latest update!

Apple released version 3.0 of the iPhone/iPod Touch software today.  Included are updates that everyone has been asking for such as cut/copy and past, search, landscape keyboard, Safari improvments, Youtube login, stereo Blue-tooth, peer-to-peer gaming, push notifications, and shake to shuffle.  I’ll be testing it out and posting what I find later.

Just another quick list of iPhone/iPod Touch apps I have found to be fun or useful!

WiFiTrack – A great app for finding open WiFi spots that works flawlessly.  WiFiTrack also will auto-connect to WiFi spots you have used before and allow you to block ones you never want to use again.

Peggle – Yes the very addictive game that is on PC, Mac, the web, and X-Box is also now availible on the iPhone/iPod Touch.  Even after being adapted for so many platforms Peggle still remains to be fun and enjoyable.

Grocery IQ – Make shopping list and check off the items as you pick them up in the store.  You can even sort the items you use the most by what aisle they are on.  Grocery IQ has proved to be very handy and useful to me every week because I can create a shopping list throughout the week and have it ready to go when I get to the store.  Grocery IQ comes with over 130000 items already in its database and you can add more as you are making your list.

Last year I recieved an iPod Touch 2nd Generation for my birthday.  My 40gig iPod photo had died and I wanted a new one.  What makes the Touch and iPhone so good is all the apps you can run on them.  Here are four of my favorite apps:

Chess With Friends is a fun and free chess game.  Whats really nice is you and your opponent do not need to be online at the same time to play.  Games within the app get updated when you or your opponent make a move.  If anyone feels like challenging me my user name is Shack70.

Tweetie is a clean, easy and simple to use Twitter application.  Even though it cost $2.99 it is worth every penny to a Twitter user.  Everything you can do from the website you can do with Tweetie and more.  Some of the extra stuff included with Tweetie are: find other Twitter users near you, follow Twitter trends and a good search.  Follow me on Twitter.

ComicZeal is a free digital comic reader.  There are several digital comic readers in the iTunes store but ComicZeal is about the best one.  Comic Zeal allows you to add your own digital comics and read them on the iPhone/Touch.  ComicZeal Sync is a stand alone application that will allow you to covert digital comics you have on your PC or Mac and transfer them to the iPhone/Touch for viewing within ComicZeal created by the makers of ComicZeal.  Comics look really good in ComicZeal and can viewed in portrait or landscape.  Zoom is also availible for thos hard to read word bubbles.

Stanza is a free ebook reader for the iPhone/Touch.  With the use of a desktop app provided by the makers of Stanza you can port you ebooks over to the iPhone/Touch and carry a small library with you.  Stanza is very customizable allowing you to adjust things such as font, font size, text color and background color.  There is no support for PDF files at this point.

I’ll post more iPhone/iPod Touch apps later.

I usually post about this earlier but I’ve been kind of busy.  Saturday May 2nd is Free Comic Day this year.  Free Comic Day is a good chance for anyone who is interested in comics to try some for free.  How it works is comic publishers supply your local comic shop with free comics to give away to anyone who enters the store.  The idea is to get people into comic shops and to introduce readers to something they may not have tried reading.  It’s also great to take kids to Free Comic Day and let them pick a few comics.  It gets them to read and they have a good time as well, but make sure you screen what they pick since some of the titles offered at Free Comic Day aren’t completely kid friendly.

This years list of free comics and stuff:

Comic Books

• Aliens/Predator
• APE Cartoonapalooza #2
• Arcana Studio Presents
• Atomic Robo And Friends
• Attack Of The Alterna-Zombies!
• Avengers
• Blackest Night #0
• Bongo Comics Free-For-All!
• Comics Festival! 2009 Volume 3
• Contract #1
• Cyberforce/Hunter-Killer Preview
• Dabel Bros. Showcase
• DC Kids Mega Sampler
• Disney/Pixar’s Cars #1
• FCHS
• Fist Of Justice #1
• Gold Digger #101/Prince Of Heroes
• IMPACT University Volume 5
• Love & Capes
• Love & Rockets Sampler
• Mercy Sparx: Under New Management
• Nancy & Melvin Monster
• NASCAR Heroes: Origins #1
• Owly And Friends
• Radical 2009 Preview
• Resurrection #0
• Savage Dragon #148
• Shonen Jump Presents: Ultimo
• Sonic The Hedgehog: Evolution Of A Hero*
• Star Wars: The Clone Wars
• Studio 407 Sampler
• The Mighty Archie Art Players
• The Stuff of Legend
• The Wizard Hot List
• TMNT #1 25th Anniversary Reprint
• Transformers Animated/G.I. Joe
• Warhammer Fantasy
• William Shatner Presents #1
• Wolverine: Origin Og An X-Man
• Worlds Of Aspen #4

Additional Items

• FCBD 2009 Minimate
• Magic The Gathering: Agents Of Artifice Sampler