The Download Munkey : Tracking the Treasure Down …

Received an email a few days back from one of my favourite military history publishers, Osprey Publishing, about a 25% (!) discount code for purchases made at their online store. Since Osprey Publishing have already announceed it on their official blog, I think it should be OK to spread the good news here

Some of the general military titles are really value for money even without discount as they combine material from several previously published books and with the current discount code which lasts until 8 Feb 2008, it just serves to make new purchases much sweeter. If you haven’t read an Osprey Publishing book before, you can browse the selection available at Borders, Page One (Vivocity) and especially Kinokuniya (Ngee Ann City).

I’ve finally narrowed my shortlist to the following books from the 10+ books that I was orginally interested in. I mainly opt for the paperback editions over the hardback versions where available in order to purchase as many books within an approx £50 budget but that’s just my personal preference

© Osprey Publishing

1. Warriors of Medieval Japan by Stephen Turnbull – Paperback, 288 pages, £12.99 before discount.

A book on samurai, ninja, Buddhist warrior monks and ashigaru (common spearmen/arquebusiers/archers). Being a avid enthusiast of samurai and ninjas, picking this book was a no-brainer. Comprises content from previously pubblished books – Warrior 29: Ashigaru, Warrior 64: Ninja and Warrior 70: Japanese Warrior Monks which retail around 34-38 SGD individually so it’s pretty value for money.

© Osprey Publishing

2. Out of Nowhere – A History of the Military Sniper by Martin Pegler – Paperback, 352 pages, £12.99 before discount.

Tracing the origins of the military marksman from medieval times to the present day snipers, this should be a good read for anyone interested in the field of sniping as well as the personnel, weaponry and tactics involved.

As an example of the savings involved as opposed to purchasing these books from local (in this case, Singaporean) bookstores which are selling Out of Nowhere at ~41 SGD (~£14), buying this book from the online store after discount costs less than £10. Do note that shipping to Singapore is a flat rate of £5 so you do need to purchase several paperbacks or at least a hardback before the savings are substantial enough to warrant an online purchase.

© Osprey Publishing

3. Airborne – World War II Paratroopers in Combat by Julie Guard – Hardback, 304 pages, £20.00 before discount.

A book on the German, US and British paratroopers of WWII as well as the tactics and airborne campaigns of WWII (Crete, Operation Market Garden (Arnhem) and Utah Beach).

© Osprey Publishing

4. War on the Western Front – In the Trenches of World War I by Gary Sheffield – Hardback, 272 pages, £20.00 before discount.

Describes the troops of WWI as well as the tactics formulated for trench warfare of that war.

Other interesting titles include Rome and her Enemies (only hardback available, waiting for the paperback edition ), Aztecs and Conquistadores and God’s Warriors (The Crusades)

Buy Osprey books at the official Osprey Publishing site. (remember to enter your discount code 8JAN before checkout)

MORE @ THE DOWNLOAD MUNKEY:
Osprey Publishing’s Military Art “Advent Calendar
Armada International’s Complete Guides
Free Military History Books @ Focal Point Publications

Back in February, I wrote about the cool concept art I found at the official site for Nuclear Dawn, an anime-influenced sci-fi mod for Half-Life 2. I finally found the illustrator for some of those artworks and he happens to be a local artist from Singapore

Known as ukitakumuki on deviantArt, Kai was one of the artists (together with Daniel “Arcipello” Conway) who did the concept art for Nuclear Dawn. Unfortunately the concepts are no longer available on the Nuclear Dawn site, but you can still see some of them in his deviantArt gallery. Below are Twin Moons (top) and Twin Suns (bottom).

© Kai

There’s more concept art done for Nuclear Dawn such as Hell Divers, To Be Free and Wonderful Days among others.

Other than the fantastic Nuclear Dawn pieces, there’s a lot of great artwork in his deviantArt gallery too, of mecha like the amazing 100 Years of Force (top) and Air in Kyoto (bottom), which was done for Half-Life 2 mod Hull Breach …

© Kai

And of warriors both past For My Pride (top) and future Black Trinary (bottom).

© Kai

Some of the other subjects that he illustrates happen to be things that I like a lot, such as the Death Guard Legion of Chaos Space Marines in the Warhammer 40,000 universe. See We Are Legion below …

© Kai

Gundam, like the lone Zaku II in the Zaku Heat of The Night below …

© Kai

Transformers (mainly Starscream) in Like Nothing on Earth (same as the tagline for the RSAF recruitment ad, only that it’s for the Royal Decepticon Air Force this time round …

© Kai

And grim fantasy stuff like Nation of Sol – Urchin Down (below).

© Kai

Check out Kai’s deviantArt Gallery for even more awesome eye candy.

MORE @ THE DOWNLOAD MUNKEY:
Zaku II Artwork by Tetuya Watanabe
Warren Louw – Illustrator
Keith Thompson – Illustrator
Adrian Smith – Warhammer 40,000 Illustrator
Andrea Uderzo – Warhammer 40,000 Illustrator
StartDrawing.org – Asia’s Drawing Portal

First seen at GameWallpapers.ru, here’s the official wallpapers for the latest installment in the Tenchu series for Xbox 360, Tenchu Z.

© From Software

My favourite wallpaper is the second one which is also the most accurate depiction of historical ninja amongst the four. (Although I doubt ninjas would want to encumbered by a bulky nodachi slung across the back)

Download them from the official Tenchu Z site. A massive 136 MB fansite kit is also available but I don’t really see anything interesting in it. The contents of the fansite kit are listed below in case you do want to download it:

• 36 64×64 and 96×96 weapon icons in TGA format
• 6 3D renders of the main characters (including Rikimaru – the ninja in the first wallpaper) in PSD format
• 26 3D renders of assorted NPCS – civilians, enemies and geisha – in PSD format

    
  © From Software

• 1 concept artwork (somewhat similiar to the second wallpaper) in PSD format
• 1 Convection Regular TrueType font (WTH!)
• 1 logo in PSD format
• 4 screenshots in BMP format

  
  © From Software

• 5 graphics for background and borders in your HTML pages.

MORE @ THE DOWNLOAD MUNKEY:
Ninja Rinseout Game
Dubplate Killaz 2 Ninja Wallpaper
Shinobido Imashime Intro Trailer
The Brothers Brick – Lego Ninjas!

Ninja Rinseout is a very short Flash ninja game comprising 10 single-screen levels where you have to take out enemy guards armed with katanas and naginatas and archers to rescue a damsel-in-distress (the game doesn’t mention who she is though).

All this takes place on a gloomy rainy night where the background scenery are drawn as silhouettes, which IMO is a very nice way to portray level of darkness One gripe is that while the guards with katanas are drawn as ashigaru (spearmen) which historically were rarely equipped with swords – but hey, it’s only a game

At night, really bloody things happen

Although the ninja that you control can dispatch the enemy with a single slash of his blade, he cannot run fast enough to evade the enemy thrust with their longer weapons. You can back away with the D key but the best way to complete the level is to use stealth and time your attacks and approaches carefully.

There’s no penalty for taking your time as the overall score is calculated the number of times you’re spotted instead of the time spent. The guards can only spot you visually and so cannot ‘hear’ your ninja even if he jumps onto the tree above them.

As a ninja, you can scale cliff and tower walls although you have to time your run correctly to avoid being running straight into a katanta or naginata of the patrolling enemy guards above. The nifty thing is that you can always do a backflip and retry again if you mess up your timing.

Up, up and away!!

Not all that replayable after a few games but it’s quite fun for those short three to five minute breaks to try to get a better score at the end of the ten stages.

From the wonderful ninja feature @ jayisgames again The actual game is at www.onelevel.com

The website for the Ultimate Fighting System CCG by Sabertooth Games has been updated with new wallpapers for Street Fighter : The Dark Path (8), Soul Calibur III : Soul Arena (7), King of Fighters 2006 (7) and Samurai Shodown V (5). The update also means the links in my previous post here are broken

The highlights of the new wallpapers are again the Soul Calibur III : Soul Arena ones. The character artwork for Mitsurugi and Taki are excellent but the wallpapers would be nicer with a cleaner design and less gaudy colours.

© Sabertooth Games

The Samurai Shodown V wallpapers take second place. Two of my favourites, Yoshitora (six! swords) and Hanzo the ninja.

© Sabertooth Games

King of Fighters 2006 wallpapers are also available on the same page as the Samurai Shodown V wallpapers, mainly for the major characters like Alba, Kyo Kusanagi and Mai Shiranui.

© Sabertooth Games.

Last but not least, we have the Street Fighter : The Dark Path wallpapers for characters like Evil Ryu and T.Hawk (haven’t seen this character for a long long time)

© Sabertooth Games

If you’re looking for the older wallpapers, they’re still in their respective sections – the original Soul Calibur III’s Mitsurugi wallpaper below is still my favourite – I love samurai characters!

© Sabertooth Games