Finishing Moves Def Jam Icon Missed

It's simple enough to look at a game and see what's good about it, but on a recent gaming session with Def Jam: Icon, I found myself wondering what was missing, and why.

• Why can't I pull my opponents jewelry right off his neck? I mean, if you're giving your adversary a major whoop-ass, shouldn't you be able to diss a bitch by ripping off his tin?
• Why can't I pull my shirt off and flex? I should be able to lift my arms and flaunt my armpit deodorant, ala LL Cool J on MTV's Unplugged.
• Why can't a hard punch knock somebody's grill straight out they mouf?
• Shouldn't I have a dance of victory after I'm done rollin' somebody?
• No homies to have my back? Even my boo ain't there to cheer me on?
  
• If you can beat me to a bloody pulp, why doesn't that ruin my fly gear? Why don't that shit spill on the floor? Cuz I'm bad-ass, that's why.
  
• If I can attack somebody with the sound coming out the stereo speakers, why can't I cause them to have a burst eardrum, or something novel like making them pee or puke themselves?
• No weapons?
• Rap without gunfights is like Disneyland without Goofy.
• What, no nappy-headed hos or stripper sluts to cheer me on after I lay the smackdown?
  

Isn't it a little bizarre that a fighting game can be made so sanitized and just plain boring? I mean, I can beat somebody until they're literally black and blue, but I can't have my character smoke a blizzle with my adversary after we're done with our fisticuffs? Talk about boring. I'm surprised the cops didn't show up to break up all these stupid confrontations. Clearly, that's what's needed in Def Jam: Icon II. Puhleeze.

Don't hate. Just keepin' it real.

Game Review: Tony Hawk: Project 8 (PS2)

First off, they should have titled this game:

Usability Disaster Skating: Punishment 8

I haven't really been into the Tony Hawk franchise of games since, oh, ... college; (I won't date myself by telling you how long ago that was--or the versions of the games I played, for that matter).

Suffice it to say, Neversoft has finally ridden this franchise into an ugly nosedive, ala skateboarding on gravel. It's difficult to say why. Some might say the original audience for the game has mostly outgrown skateboarding. Others could say there are better games being produced these days. Still others would say the franchise has become too difficult to enjoy. I would agree with all those assessments. And to those I would add that the development of this game must have been done without players in mind.

I picked this game up, thinking I would be skateboarding again soon, with a low re-education or re-training time. After all, I had been a decent video game skater back in the day. I should be able to pick it up fairly quickly, ... right?

Thank god I only rented it.

The goal here is to raise your ranking from #200 and get into the top eight. You will, of course, need to hunt down secret tokens, grind many pools, and perform mini-missions to climb the rankings. If you finish enough challenges, you'll be placed in the elite Project 8. If you can get there without smashing your controllers against a wall first, good luck.

Gameplay
The main failure of Tony Hawk is that gameplay has eroded to the size of Nicole Richie's wrists. I haven't skateboarded in years, so I decided to go through the Tutorial portion of the game. Certain elements were simple and straightforward enough. For instance, if you press the X Button, you go forward. Now stay with me. If you release the X button, you "Ollie", or jump. Okay. Simple enough.

Soon I realize I need to press a number of other buttons in various sequences to perform a certain trick while in the air. Not just one button press, mind you, but several, in very quick succession.

Very quickly, Tony Hawk's tutoring becomes a form of very sadistic finger torture.

I was taught I could do a "Manual" trick, that is, a trick on the board while standing relatively still. And this is where the game starts losing all of its charm for me. I finally realize I'm going to be punished, oh so horribly, from here on out. Damn you, Tony Hawk ... damn you.

See, when you perform a "Manual" trick, you go into some weird mode where you need to use the left thumbstick with really quick and subtle movements to maintain your balance. That's not a big deal. But then I'm told I need to press certain buttons AT THE SAME TIME. I'm sorry, I only have two thumbs. Apparently I can't move them fast enough.

The biggest problem with gameplay in Tony Hawk is usability. You will need to learn an entirely new finger language to play this game well. This is challenging, for most people, me included. And I'm fairly dexterous, considering my age. Frankly, I'm not ready to commit to an entirely new pattern set just to ride a video game Skateboard.

While I would prefer a Universal Finger Pattern that could be applied to all games, I also support a call to game developers to provide players with open-ended, configurable control schemes. Let us choose which buttons to push to perform certain tricks. That allows for infinitely more interesting gameplay and even personal styles of skating between players. Clearly, Tony Hawk needs to implement better Role Playing Game elements. I mean, if you're going to make a player choose his skater, and clothes, why not give him the option to choose his skating style as well?

Which brings us to graphics.

Graphics (or 3 Ugly Mugs)

What year is this? 2007, you say? Coulda fooled me with this game. From the start of the Career, we're asked to choose between three skaters. A Skinny White Boy Punk, a pudgy Kid, or a Black dude in baggy clothes. I didn't see any Asians, Hispanic, or female faces. Maybe they don't skate?

Choosing one of those 3 archetypal figures, I'm then allowed to choose between three additional faces. In other words, I can be black (with one of three available faces--oh, apparently one of them is lighter complected, maybe Puerto Rican), a child (with 3 other faces), or a white dude (with three more faces). Why they didn't just give me 9 characters to choose from at the start is perplexing, but maybe there's some hidden mystery here?

Nah, it's just plain stupid design.

There doesn't seem to be any skill difference between any of these characters. No visible advantage to picking one skater over another. I pick one. Simple enough. I deck him out in some typical skater gear and I'm off to Training.

Once I got out of training, having abandoned the notion of ever learning how to properly "Grind, Wally, Grind, Sticker Slap," I started the Career. From the start, you're placed in a very confined gaming space, where you're expected to perform a succession of tricks, all while travelling very fast. This was just too much of a test for me. I'm afraid I'm not commited to learning "Tony Hawkian" on my controller.

There's not much to be said about the AI. You're not really racing opponents in this game, so much as performing tricks and "ollies" over obstacles. See, the multiplayer is nowhere to be found on this version. Sure, you can play split-screen with a buddy, but don't even think about getting some online action going.

Physics are somewhat baffling. I found it more difficult to balance my player in the game than I would have on an actual skateboard! When your player loses his balance, he falls, HARD. So hard he spurts out blood. Unfortunately, this results in having to wait about two seconds while some off screen phantom hurls you a new skateboard so you can re-crack your noggin.

Audio
Sound is adequate. The music is appropriate, but somewhat lame. It's not a racing game, so I don't expect hardcore techno or hip-hop, but I do expect something more upbeat. Maybe some good punk music to go with your punk skater dude. But I specifically recall the music delving a bit into the late-night, after-hours, chill-out room ambiance. Definitely boring for boarding.
Sound effects were okay, but there didn't seem to be much background noise, just the sound of your board screeching over pavement. Kinda boring.

Utilities
Menus were simple to understand. There wasn't much commotion involved with getting around in the game itself.

Problems

• A failure in the gameplay usability department. Too many technical requirements to have an enjoyable skating experience. High learning curve without much payoff.
• Lame level design that will leave you asking why you've been locked in a large skatepark that looks like the suburbs.
  
• What's the point? Whoopee, I pulled a Goofy 180, Vert Ollie, Manual Grind, Wallie, Sticker Slap!
• Fleecing America's youth one last time? For shame, Tony, for shame.

Conclusion
This game sucks. I hope you didn't spend your Christmas money on it. If you enjoy a certain amount of punishment, rent it and flog away.

Sifted: 5/10

Game: Need For Speed: Carbon (PS2)

EA's latest release in the Need For Speed franchise is an improvement over it's last, befuddled attempt to further its position in the smothered field of Arcade Racing games. The market is glutted with Arcade racers right now, thereby causing the studios to release games that aren't quite ready for prime time. Fortunately, the gameplay in Carbon is adequate enough to make the experience worthwhile.

Gameplay - Just like EA's last release, Need For Speed: Most Wanted, Carbon continues the old routine of trying to make racing mean something. I don't know why they've decided racing games require all the drama of vindication and revenge, but so long as it doesn't hurt the gameplay, I can live with the cheesy plot devices.

Drift racing is back this time around, but it's a real disaster and ruins this game's chances of achieving gaming perfection. The cars are difficult to control and ultimately, this seems like a tacky add-on that should have been scrapped to retain the game's integrity.

Controls have improved since the last release, with 10 options for controller layout. Cars are more responsive and actually drive with the physics one would expect. There are additions to the gameplay that hint at something much grander coming down the pipe with this genre. Something called "Crew" racing seems to be on the minds of the developers at EA, and I think they're really onto something. In Career mode, you now race with a "Wing man" who can assist you in three different styles: by Colliding with competing racers, by Scouting ahead for secret pathways, or by giving you speed boost via Drafting. The Wingman concept is really strong and would allow for some incredible racing via XBox Live, but this is PlayStation 2 I'm reviewing because my Xbox is, sadly, down with the flu, so I don't even know if it's an option for Xbox players.

Career Mode also requires you to choose your favorite style of car from the start, so you can expect to be behind the wheel of a Tuner, an Exotic, or a Muscle Car from the beginning. Not sure if that's such a good idea, since some racers like multiple car types and being locked into one may seem confining. In addition to all these new concepts, racing now involves capturing and defending territories against rival racing teams (racers who also race with a wingman). This requires more strategy than one is accustomed to in a standard racing game, which is very interesting.

As always, you can customize your car to your heart's content, and the new Autosculpt feature gives you even greater control over your artistic bent, allowing you to customize your car in millions of different ways.

Interface & Graphics - The Interface of Carbon is really not too different from the last release. There has been a marked improvement in the ability to jump directly to races via the WorldMap. This saves a lot of time and releases the player from having to deal with the tedium of avoiding cops all the time, as we did in Most Wanted. Graphics seem the same, but for some reason the cars look more realistic, less cartoony. The backgrounds are quite an improvement from Most Wanted. The cut scenes are similar to Most Wanted, with live action which has been altered to resemble animation. However, there are some serious frame rate issues this time around that were not present in the last release. Not sure if the developers were rushed to get this out the door before Christmas, but gameplay can get choppy/glitchy at times. Not sure if this is merely a PS2 problem or if it affects all consoles similarly.

Artificial Intelligence - The AI in Carbon is leaps and bounds ahead of what was presented in Most Wanted. Cop chases are remarkably realistic from the start and their chase patterns seem much better coordinated and challenging, bordering on belligerent. Rival racers are also more apt to cause frustration early on in the game, which is actually a welcome addition for a racing game of this type.

Sound - As always, the soundtrack in this Need For Speed release is superior to what you will find in most racing games. Whoever is in charge of licensing the music for this deserves a raise. You can always count on a Need For Speed game to have some of the freshest music out there. My only complaint is that I wish there was more than 30 or so songs here. Why not include all that older music you have licensed from earlier releases of the game? After a while, hearing the same collection of songs can get tedious, even when they are great songs. The Sound Effects are first rate, as always. The cars seem to have their own distinctive engine sounds, although, I did not notice much change in sound when changing muffler tips. The voice acting is good, but the new Crew racers can get a bit grating, as they are somewhat repetitive (but also entertaining at times).

Utilities - The mechanics of the game are almost identical to Most Wanted. Being able to jump to races eliminates the tedious need to free roam through the city and that's a good thing, since most of the city is empty until you defeat bosses from recently conquered districts. There is a new card collecting feature, but it's a bit of a mystery that doesn't immediately present itself.

Problems -

• Glitchy frame rate problems.
• Cops are very persistent from the start, bordering on relentless.
• Drift Racing is back, but it's a complete and total disaster. Controlling your car on a sheet of ice would be more fun.
  
• This is not a racing game for beginners or the faint of heart. If you have not played a racing game before, you would be better off starting somewhere else. If you are a fan of the Need For Speed franchise, this is an excellent title to add to your library. Much better than the annoyance that was Most Wanted.
  
• Licensed cars for this release seem really scattered. On the one hand, you have licenses for Porsche and Ferrari, but old staples of the Need For Speed franchise, like the Dodge Neon, are nowhere to be found. There are no SUVs or Pickup Trucks. Want to race your own whip? It's unlikely you'll find it among the roughly 50 cars licensed in this release.

Sifted: 8/10

Game: Need For Speed: Most Wanted (PS2)

I have a love of racing games that could best be described as obsessive compulsive. I have favorites in each category of racing. Yes, there are more than one.

There are the simulation racing games, which try to make the driving experience as close to the real thing as possible (think Gran Turismo, or Forza Motorsports); then, there are arcade racers, which are far more interested in creating the illusion of speed (Midnight Club); there are rally racers (Colin McRae) and Sport Racers (Nascar, Grand Prix Challenge) the genre I like to call the Crash racer (Burnout, or Flatout), where your goal is actually to demolish your car or other objects; there are even the futuristic racers, or anti-grav racers (a personal favorite).

This brings me to the latest in a long line of arcade racing games I have briskly enjoyed and inevitably retired after a few short months of feverish play. Need For Speed: Most Wanted (PS2 - because my XBox is still broken). Now, I love the Need For Speed series. Don't get me wrong. When it comes to furious, arcade-style racing, with an excellent illusion of breakneck speed, it's really difficult to beat. This particular release, however, is nowhere near the masterpieces that were its recent predecessors.

Graphics have taken a step down, it would seem. Buildings look painfully 2-dimensional, even compared to the recent Need For Speed: Underground series. The illusion of speed has been reduced to comic-like draft effects that hang off the back of your car in the form of a few simple lines. And lastly, the views seem to be less effective. When it comes to racing games, being able to see the road and oncoming obstacles is key, but I found myself constantly having my view of the road obscured by the car itself! A shift in camera would have gone a long way to improving this game tenfold. Oh, but the maps have drastically improved, actually making it possible to know where you're going! That's a plus.

Another kudo: the actual video cutscenes are well-done, with decent acting. The marriage between games and films seem to be happening faster in Racing games, for some reason (SRS actually included cutscenes featuring unlockable girls). I don't know why the porn industry hasn't figured this out yet, because merging with a gaming company would revolutionize their product. Imagine a game where your goal would be to seduce different people, culminating in unlockable film clips. Astonishing.

Gameplay is fair. The controls seem more jumpy and the racing seems to have taken on a more arcade feel, ala the Burnout series. The problem here is that crashes have no effect on car performance (even head-on collisions leave nothing but scratches and a few measly dents). I know, it's an arcade racer, but there's simply nothing intriguing about accelerating the entire way through a race without having to worry about the outcome of a wreck. In addition to this peculiar oversight by the developers is the inclusion of cop cars and annoying police chases. It's not enough that they're present, but now they actually have become part of the gameplay! In order to increase your reputation, you have to engage and evade the cops (time and again). This, of course, gets old after the third time, if you're easily entertained, like I can be. Lower levels are way too easy, while the higher levels are too difficult. I could swear the game was cheating when a slight smack against a wall sent my car reeling. The AI is punishingly gamed. You can cause a semi to wreck and lose its payload, yet cars on your trail will not be slowed at all. You can walk away from the game, come back, and still catch up to your competition on the final lap. I'm sorry, but that just sucks.

Sound effects are solid, but the soundtrack is weak. Midnight Club 3: Dub Edition and the Remix version have Need For Speed beat when it comes to music.

What made the Need for Speed franchise stand out from the rest was the ability to customize your car beyond belief. You could trick out your Hyundai until it actually looked fast. Imagine that. Indeed, that was one of the major parts of the fun of this game. But now, every other game out there is doing it too, and some are even doing it just as well (Midnight Club 3: Dub Edition).

Need For Speed: Most Wanted seems like it's trying to straddle the fence between arcade and simulation and doing a poor job at both. Car customization was what made NFS such a good game to begin with. And while cop car chases make for interesting races, they shouldn't be part and parcel to a game of this calibre. It's like a copout on their quest to be innovative. In a world that's now oversaturated with racing games, Need For Speed needs to churn out something better or run the risk of being left behind.

Sifted: 6/10

Game: Dynasty Warriors V: Empires (PS2)

Okay, so I'm a Koei freak. I'll admit it. I'm not ashamed.

I love slashing and hacking through ancient chinese, enemy combatants as I run around with oversized clubs, swords, spears, fans, funny-looking yoyos, and even nunchaku. There's just something poetically cathartic about running around a battle field looking for enemy officers to face off against. And indeed, while the voice acting has gotten a little annoying at times (If I have to hear "Why isn't anybody protecting that base?!?" again, I will pluck out each of my eyebrows with an Epilady), and even though the AI is completely unchallenging, there's an element of fun to the strategy, especially when you play the games on higher difficulty settings.

Dynasty Warriors V: Empires is not a great game, by any means. What it is, is very addictive. You do the typical Dynasty Warriors thang, by hacking your way across the countryside, but there is the new goal of unifying China--easier said than done. Yes, it's difficult, and at times you swear the computer is cheating to defeat you. The Strategy element is perhaps more meaningful than the hack and slash in this game, for once.

In fact, the hack and slash has taken a step back here. Samurai Warriors, another Koei game (and a superior one, when it comes to the hack and slash), has advanced the controls further along than the Dynasty Warriors series can. Picking up this game, I felt like I had taken a step back in Koei's evolution. But Empires is still fun and worth owning, if you can get your hands on a used copy. I wouldn't buy it new. In fact, I wouldn't buy most Koei titles new, considering they're all pretty much the same. And to think, I'm actually a fan.

Sifted: 7/10

Game: Bully (PS2) and a Rockstar Retrospective

First off, $40 is not a bad price to spend for a brand new game. I happened to stalk it run across it at Target. Not sure if it was on sale or not; I snatched it up simply because I am an opportunist.

I have played many, many Rockstar games over the years. I played Grand Theft Auto back in 1998, when it was still 2D, having scored a pirate version in a Singapore tech mall for $5. That was not a good thing. I was turned off to the notion of playing a silly 2D maze game on a laptop. The subject matter was interesting, but it just wasn't that good, really. Grand Theft Auto probably wasn't that intriguing to me because I grew up in the ghetto. The notion of stealing cars and (later) beating up hookers just seemed stereotypical and tired to me. This spoiled my expectations of every release of GTA that followed for several years to come.

In 2000, Bungie released a game called Oni. Inspired by Ghost in the Shell, Oni was a mesmerizing 3rd person shooter that played like a fine piece of anime film and kept me up late for days. I remember seeing the Rockstar logo on the loading credits of the game. Okay, so maybe they deserved a second chance? It was the beginning of a long love affair with their products.

These are the Rockstar games I've played (in somewhat chronological order) and how I rate them:

• GTA - 4/10. Frustrating, ugly, pixelated 2D mess. This game stressed me out and turned me off to the entire series.
  
  
• ONI - 9/10. The only improvement they could have made with this game was to make it multi-player. This was one of the first games to truly entrance me. Now I'm like a junkie, always looking to match that initial fix to satisfy my addiction. This game was before its time. It illustrated what could be done when you merged great cinematography with excellent gameplay. To this day, few games ever reach this level of synergy.
  
  
• Midnight Club: Street Racing - 8/10. Not bad, for a first generation console racing game. Unfortunately, the difficulty level ramped up a bit too fast for me to really get into it, but I chalked it up to my own old age, rather than a flaw in the game. This was one of the first games to showcase street racing and an LA car culture sensibility. Many have imitated it since, but most have humorously failed--think SRS (Street Racing Syndicate), with its semi-pornographic, stripper cutscenes.
  
  
• GTA II - Not memorable. I remember picking this game up and hardly playing it at all. It seemed like just more of the same, stressful nonsense I had played last time, only with better graphics. Okay, so maybe I didn't give it a chance.
  

• GTA III - 9/10. Impressive, but beating up hookers and beating down gangsters with baseball bats left a lot to be desired. Still, the gameplay was a masterpiece.
  

• State of Emergency - 6/10. This felt like GTA, only more clumsy. I never got into it, though I was starting to appreciate the free-roaming elements and I distinctly remember enjoying the run and gun gameplay.

• Midnight Club II - 9/10. This really showed what the PS2 could do. Nothing could compete with this for sheer fun arcade racing ... until Need For Speed Underground, that is.
  

• Manhunt - 10/10. This is truly a masterpiece. I nearly went insane playing this in the dark. And though I could never get into beating up hookers with a baseball bat in GTA, I sure as hell did enjoy beheading racists in a junkyard with the razor wire. Who knew?

• GTA: San Andreas - 8/10. Okay, so this is a great game. Unfortunately, the racial stereotypes really started to grate on me. It became entirely evident that this was a game for which I was not the intended audience (being an educated minority male). Although I was not offended by it (and in retrospect maybe I should have been), it did make me oddly feel like an outsider. I mean, for the first time in a game, I had the opportunity to play a minority character, but at the same time I was being asked to play as if I were a white teenage male who was playing a minority character. Mindblowing.
  

• The Warriors - 6/10. Adventure Fighting. Excellent movie tie-in, but the fighting was a bit cludgy, and it got really repetitive way too soon. The marketing budget for this game could have probably paid to send every gang member in the country to college on a 4 year scholarship. Ultimately, I was disappointed.
  
  
• Midnight Club 3: Dub Edition Remix - 9/10. Arcade Racing. Fun beyond belief, but it did get a bit too challenging after a while. The soundtrack to this game is astonishing, but even it has limitations when it's trying to be everything to everybody. From Techno to Reggae, Hip-Hop to Punk Rock, this game has a little bit of everything and not enough of anything. Nevertheless, when I picked this up, I had no clue I would lose a month of my life.

And finally, we come to Bully, Rockstar's latest release, which has gotten a ton of bad press even prior to production. It was partially the bad press which has led me to buy this game, in fact.

I do not believe in censorship. Period. I especially don't believe in calls to ban a game before it has been played. My decision to buy this game brand new is almost entirely inspired by my desire to spite those same folks who would like to ban games, or blame any and all of society's ills on gaming. Not only do I find that mindset offensive, but I find it threatening to the fabric of our national identity.

So long as this is a free country, my intention is to give an unbiased opinion of the game based only on my experience with it, having played it through a couple of sittings. Because $40 may not be much money to most people, but it is to me, and I know most teens don't want to spend that money on a game that sucks.

Disclaimer: I haven't played through the entire game. Nor have I ever felt a decent review required a total walk through of a game. In general, you can tell within the first 5 hours if you will enjoy a game or not.

To put it bluntly, this game is good. It is definitely worth the money. I have only gotten through 10% of the game after 5 hours of playing. That translates to high replay value. Graphics are decent (not stunning), precisely what is to be expected from a PS2 title. Controls are nice, though not customizable. Fighting and skateboarding seem fairly intuitive, but I would have liked the ability to change my button configurations. That's just a basic expectation of a game these days, as far as I'm concerned.

Perhaps the strongest part of Bully is the incredible storyline. There are plenty of missions here, but you are always brought back to the schedule of attending classes (with plenty of time for mischief in between).

Unfortunately, there are a few negatives to consider:

1. Load Times - The game has to load every time you enter or leave a building. And the load times are horrendous. This is compounded by being on a PS2. Sad. Load Times (for a perfect game score from Propaganda Sifter) need to be minimal!
   
2. Some funky camera - Rockstar is great at giving us the free-range camera. Unfortunately, there are some minor issues with it this time around. There were several times when the camera became a nuisance in the midst of trying to run away from danger. One moment I'm behind the character, and the next I'm in front of him looking backwards. This, of course, is disastrous to a review score by this Propaganda Sifter.
3. Repetition - Okay, so 5 hours isn't a lot of time to invest into a game, but there are already elements of tedium starting to rise up in the gameplay. When a game becomes too much like a job, it ceases to be fun. This is the main reason why I hate The Sims series. But for people who are into micromanagement and resource re-allocation, this might be entirely their cup of tea.
4. Sub-par Art Design - Okay, so I'm supposed to believe this kid is 15 years old, right? So why does he look like he's 12? At one point, the Principal raises his hand and the poly count is so dreadful that it looks like he's wearing mittens!
   
5. Deja-Vu - Okay, so it's more of a pet-peeve than an actual flaw in the game. But at some point--if you are out of high school, that is--you will most likely start to feel disturbed by this game. There are moments that will seem familiar and maybe even a little uncomfortable.
   

Bully is an exercise in being able to replay your high school years, only this time it's more treacherous. If you are still in high school, you probably won't enjoy this game. The ethical and moral dilemmas the main character has to endure are ultimately more satisfying if you've had to make these decisions in the real world. Congratulations to Rockstar for giving us a game that lets us be who we want to be. If we want to be thugs, we have that choice. If we want to be nerdy, we can pursue that as well. The choice is up to us. And frankly, I'm glad I live in a country where I still have a choice to make those decisions. Ultimately, This might be a good game for teenagers to play. They have a chance to see the outcome of their own decisions, be they ethical or unethical, before they make them.

One thing is certain: this game is tame, compared to some of the other fare Rockstar has produced. Maybe it's time to lay off them and let them do what they do best? Because I'd really enjoy the chance to live out my fantasies of becoming a crooked politician, for once. I have a feeling Rockstar could pull it off, if anyone could.

Sifted: 8/10