The Download Munkey : Tracking the Treasure Down …

What better way to introduce a yet unfeatured artist here at The Download Munkey than to overload your senses with lots of delicious eye candy Let’s just say all this is a brillant masterstroke by artist Steve Argyle to win the hearts of new minions (as he affectionately refers to the subscribers of his mailing list like me).

With his recent release of 65 wallpapers featuring 55+ different pieces of Steve’s awesome work for the likes of Legend of the Five Rings, Magic : The Gathering and Dungeons & Dragons, I’m pretty sure hordes of new minions will be eagerly flocking to his website and mailing list

A preview of some of my favourite wallpapers.

© Steve Argyle

Chuda Ruri of the Snake Clan from the Legend of the Five Rings.

© Steve Argyle

A gigantic samurai gets his moustache cleaned in Return of the Shogun.

© Steve Argyle

The Kaiu Wall which guards the Crab Clan from the beasts beyond.

© Steve Argyle

Nightlife in Scorpion City.

Don’t like samurai? How about some Star Wars instead? Perhaps Darth Vader suits your taste better

© Steve Argyle

There’s more in the Star Wars section including an awesome Rohlan Dyre commissioned for the Knights of the Old Republic Campaign Guide, a Star Wars RPG supplement.

© Steve Argyle

Maybe, sci-fi’s not your cup of tea? Good old fantasy should do the trick then, like this lithe Naya Battlemage from the Shards of Alara expansion set for Magic : The Gathering.

© Steve Argyle

Age of Tyranny (above) and Dwarf Barbarian from Dungeons & Dragons.

© Steve Argyle

This small selection of artwork is just the tip of the iceberg – there’s plenty more eye candy at Steve Argyle’s official site. And if 1600×1200 wallpapers are not enough, you always have the option to purchase prints of your favourite artworks

Check out Steve Argyle’s official website or head down right to the wallpaper collection.

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Mini Ninjas Demo Impressions
Urban War Wallpapers : Cyber Samurai!
Afro Samurai Wallpapers
The Art of Phil Wohr – Halo Wars & More!
Pablo Vicentin’s Concepts for Lone Wolf : Flight from the Dark

Everytime when Games Workshop (or one of its licensees like Fantasy Flight Games or THQ) puts out a new edition / expansion or even a totally brand new game, there’s always bound to be a glorious selection of artwork for the eyes to feast upon. The recent re-release of Space Hulk is no exception despite the fact that it is no new game – the first edition came out 20 years ago in 1989. Nonetheless, it’s bloody nice of Game Workshop to commission fresh new artwork by the likes of Adrian Smith (yum!), Alex Boyd, Dave Gallagher and Paul Dainton specially for this third edition of Space Hulk which is up on the Games Workshop website for your viewing pleasure

Since my favourite artist when it comes to Games Workshop is none other than the mighty Adrian Smith, no prizes for guessing which piece I prefer the most

© Games Workshop

Above is the box art featuring three Terminators from the Blood Angels Space Marines Chapter purging a space hulk of Genestealers with stormbolter, power sword and thunder hammer. The trio aren’t just any random Space Marine Terminators though – they’re artistic impressions of three actual Terminator miniatures from the Space Hulk boxed set.

© Games Workshop

From left : Brother Goriel with Stormbolter and a Genestealer trophy in the other hand, Sergeant Lorenzo with power sword – the Blood Angel’s most experienced 1st Company Sergeant and Sergeant Gideon with thunder hammer and storm shield. Click the links to see 360° views of the miniatures as painted by Games Workshop’s in-house ‘Eavy Metal team.

© Games Workshop

Alex Boyd’s artwork graces the cover of the Rulebook and Mission Book.

© Games Workshop

Being a rather recent convert to the wartorn Warhammer 40,000 universe, I find those old-school Space Marine Terminators in the last two artworks a bit weird – I can almost imagine the agony of the Space Marine being hunched up in one of those uncomfortable-looking Tactical Dreadnought suits while fighting against vicious Genestealers – see the Deathwing Terminators on the far left of the piece above by Christopher Baker.

While you’re there enjoying the artwork, don’t forget to click the tiny green Next button to grab two awesome Space Hulk wallpapers. Naturally, I prefer the one featuring the three Blood Angels Terminator heroes – I never ever pass up a opportunity to collect the artwork of Adrian Smith

Check out Art of Space Hulk and the Space Hulk wallpapers.

MORE @ THE DOWNLOAD MUNKEY:
Favourite Illustrators of Warhammer 40,000 (I) – Adrian Smith
Warhammer 40,000 Wallpapers from Firebase Magazine
Favourite Illustrators of Warhammer 40,000 (VI) – Kevin Chin (King Mong)
Favourite Illustrators of Warhammer 40,000 (IV) – Andrea Uderzo
Lord Solar Macharius & The Macharian Crusade

Just completed reading all the freely downloadable issue #1s (and assorted sample issues) for the comics / graphic novels published under DC Comics’s Vertigo imprint. I’m not a comics person and I don’t understand what gets categorized under graphic novels when both appear to be the same to me, so for simplicity’s sake, I’ll just refer to everything as comics here

Do note that Vertigo caters to adults so graphically violent and/or sexual images are to be expected together in these comics together with usually generous helpings of coarse language. Then again, given the nature of today’s movies and pop culture, it doesn’t really mean a big difference, does it?

Below I feature some of the comics that I particulary enjoyed.

© Vertigo Comics

My absolute favourite has to be The Losers : Ante Up written by Andy Diggle – a gang of ex-Special Forces personnel pull off some of the most outrageous heists I’ve ever seen in comics (or books … or even movies ).

© Vertigo Comics

V for Vendetta written by Alan Moore – the first comic / graphic novel that sparked my interest in Vertigo’s stuff after watching the movie adaptation. Only a four-page preview of the first issue is available though.

© Vertigo Comics

The Sandman : Precludes Nocturnes written by Neil Gaiman – Volume 1 of the Sandman series in which Roderick Burgess, a self-appointed Lord Magus and his cult attempt to summon and bind Death to their whims but captures Death’s younger brother Dream instead. Without Dream, people around the world sleep and never wake up and eventually the tables are turned on his captors themselves as they become increasingly fearful and tormented from lack of sleep. Meanwhile their captive bides his time waiting for the perfect opportunity to exact his vengeance…

© Vertigo Comics

DMZ Volume 1 : On the Ground written by Brian Wood – Intern Matthew Roth accompanies award-winning journalist Viktor Ferguson into the dangerous Manhattan DMZ where a ceasefire is being arranged between American troops and Free Army rebels, and gets into the thick of the action on his first day at work.

© Vertigo Comics

Northlanders Volume 1 : Sven the Returned written by Brian Wood – bloodthirsty Vikings make bloody good comic material

© Vertigo Comics

The Books Of Magic written by Neil Gaiman – Tim Hunter, a bespectacled boy who looks quite a bit like Harry Potter, is shown the ways of magic by characters from the Vertigo universe. Note the distinctive, almost photorealistic art style by John Bolton.

© DC Comics

Watchmen written by Alan Moore – I like this mainly for Rorschach, a masked vigilante equipped with good old fashioned brawling and zero superpowers,. I had absolutely no idea how closely the Watchmen movie matched the comic, cell for cell until I read this first issue.

Check out the above comics / graphics novels (click on the titles for the download pages) and others at Vertigo Comics (those indicated with #1 have the first issue free for download).

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Watchmen Wallpapers (Movie, Comics & Game)
Watchmen : The End is Nigh Demo Impressions
Marvel Official Wallpapers
Marvelous Papercraft – Boxpunx by Harlancore + Friends
The Darkness & Other Top Cow Comics Wallpapers

© Ben Stokes

A look at some of Ben Stokes’ creative outputs, who’s probably better known as Dimensional Holofonic Sound or D.H.S to techno fans. His track House of God or one of its many remixes has been played by DJs for two decades now, check out its music video at Youtube, also directed and animated by Ben Stokes himself. Or listen to the track itself at Junodownload.

© Ben Stokes

Also check out the music video for Steel Pulse and Damien Marley’s No More Weapons directed, shot and animated by Ben Stokes. Look for the video labelled Music Videos Part 1 at the Video section of his official website at holofonic.com or at YouTube – you definitely can’t miss the reggae vibes or the animated silhouettes of soldiers moving onscreen (reminds me of the Massive Entertainment animated production logo in the game World at Conflict).

© Massive Entertainment

My favourite work from Ben Stokes is definitely the ultra funky Drum Attack video released in 2003 consisting of multiple video clips of drummers doing their thing and expertly chopped and spliced together into a delicious two and half minute mini-mix, not unlike how hip hop DJs mix in different records at lightning speed like DJ Spinbad (or Aquasky for that matter, who crammed in 150+ records for a 5 minute mini-set for Annie Mac’s show on BBC Radio One in Jan 2006).

© Ben Stokes

Karate chops! Wait, have those got anything to do with drumming?

© Ben Stokes

Ends with a visual of Clyde Stubblefield who played the drums for James Brown’s Funky Drummer.

The quality of the Drum Attack video posted at Youtube is rather crappy so you might want to check out a clearer version at the website for Ben Stokes’ label Tino Corp or the Video section of holofonic.com where a longer 3 minute version of Drum Attack awaits in the Other Works video (fast forward to 2:34 mins).

Enjoy!

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Audiotool – Virtual Music Production Studio
Links to Direct Downloads for Selected Annie Mac 5 Minutes Mixes
Promo Video for Gayle San’s .Network Audiovisual Livemix Compilation
Tony-B Machine – Flash Toy for Creating Early 90’s Techno/Electro
Be Your Own One Man Band

During the recent merger between Gray Solutions and Beige Dynamics, the HR division devised a revolutionary new system to better empower their employees by allowing them to weed out the less capable ones among them, division by division, thus creating a leaner and more efficient corporation as a result.

Welcome to HRmageddon, yet another tongue-in-cheek parody of corporate culture developed by THUP Games and published by the wickedly cool people at Adult Swim. As with any AdultSwim game, there’s bound to be a bit of their trademark mature themes in there but it’s generally all good old tactical squad-based action.

Four different personnel stereotypes are yours to hire : managers provide defensive bonuses to their co-workers but are useless on their own, receptionists are masters in delivering volleys of staples to the faces of the opposition, salesmen zip around dealing massive damage with their equally huge bar charts and IT guys generally mess around with computers and disrupt multiple enemies in the vicinity with abilities like Server Crash.

Pick your six staff wisely and get ready to wipe the opposing division off the new company’s payrolls. Simply take over the required number of cubicles in the office to forcefully retrench the rival division (you can’t work when you don’t have a cubicle to work in, can you) or better still, literally terminate them all (permanently). There’s no limitation to how many employees of each type you can hire in your division, which partially explains why the corporation wants to cut costs – anyone who has ever worked in a place where there were more managers than workers will definitely understand

While it’s obviously just a game, some of the fundamental (and unwritten) rules of work still apply here – pay raises always boost staff morale – but their supposedly positive impact on employee health in real life is still a hotly debated topic Also more coffee = more power (for special attacks) – although I’ll like to readily admit that IT guys like me are more prone to cause server crashes (accidently, of course) from lack of coffee than with more coffee as depicted in-game

The tactical gameplay is surprisingly deep due to the the number of possible division setups – 720 – as the factorial of 6 proves (see, maths is good for you). Understanding how and when to use each special attack for each character for maximum effectiveness as well as how each of your staff complements the others is crucial for victory.

Every cubicle that you control for your division further increases the offensive bonus for your entire division so you have to strike a fine balance in your strategy between a wholescale murder of your rivals and a all-out race for the cubicles.

There’s also several power-ups to be collected, some which will affect your strategy depending on which character picks them up – clone a speedy salesman with the copier to quickly grab more cubicles or a manager for extra healing support for a sustained battle with your foes. For those random effect powerups, you’ll just have to make do with what they confer on your fortunate (or unfortunate) employees and re-adjust your strategy accordingly.

Definitely loads of fun to be had in HRmageddon especially if you like your tactical games sprinkled with a generous dose of irreverent humour.

Play HRmageddon – as recommended by Indie Games

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Warfare 1944
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Modern Tactics 3
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