“So, who else remembers that Rambo III was about Rambo going to Afghanistan to help the Taliban, huh? We do (and apparently the Sun’s Jim Slotek does too). It’s rather a shame that Sylvester Stallone hasn’t seen fit to continue from that point and deal with the consequences of the conflict, instead jumping straight to Burma/Myanmar for, as far as the reviews tell us, an absolute ton of incredibly graphic (and meaningless) violence.’”

I’m slightly obsessed with 1980′s action flicks (specifically Commando, as I’ve mentioned previously) but oddly Rambo doesn’t mean as much to me as Rocky does.

“Films! Films films films films. Sometimes it’s hard to get this column started, so we just sit in front of a blank word document and type the word “films” until it doesn’t make any sense to us any more. But by then, we’ve got started typing, at least, and so we continue.”

Usually I would delete this kind of paragraph. Today, I decided to leave it in, for some reason.

“It’s simply a very lovely film, telling Marjane Satrapi’s story in a pleasant, anecdotal style while a portrait of Iran’s turbulent history reveals itself in the background. It’s well worth going to see, and they’ve kept the excellent original French-language voice acting, so that’s another bonus.”

(I’m talking about Persepolis.)

“It’s nostalgia that binds me to the Contra series. Since I first played ‘Gryzor’ in a caravan park’s amusement arcade in the late ’80s I’ve been a fan of the series, enjoying a great Amstrad CPC port, the brilliant 16-bit Probotector titles and then gritted my teeth through 13 years of terrible Contra games.

Thankfully, Contra 4 has been produced by California-based Wayforward Technologies (developer of Sigma Star Saga and, er, Ping Pals) with an eye on faithfully recreating the feel of the original Contra titles. They’ve succeeded in doing so, but whether that’s truly a good thing or not is debatable.”

I wish I liked Contra 4 more than I do, but once I wrote the review I put it down and haven’t picked it back up again. On normal difficulty it just feels unfairly hard rather than a rewarding challenge, which (for me) is a stark difference from previous Contra titles.

“If you were lucky enough to win tickets to the screening of There Will Be Blood last night you will have already made your mind up about the film (well, we hope), but we’re going to subject you to our opinion of it anyway.”

My opinion: There Will Be Blood is quite good.

“This is really a release made for, and by, Castlevania fans. If you don’t think much of the series, this isn’t going to change your mind. I wouldn’t think much of it either if it only included the remake, but the tip-top ports of the original Rondo of Blood and Symphony of the Night bump the score up a couple of marks easily.”

As I say in the review, I really don’t rate Rondo of Blood. To be completely honest, I don’t even think Symphony of the Night is “all that.” However, if you want (and are willing go to the trouble of unlocking) them, you really couldn’t go wrong with this collection.

“After twenty years in the business, with the decision of Atari to sell Shiny Entertainment in early 2006, founder and Earthworm Jim, MDK, Messiah and Enter The Matrix co-creator David Perry decided to take a year off.

Gamasutra recently talked to Perry after his session about his ‘holiday’, his many projects, and the concept of free-to-play MMOs.”

Happy New Year!