10 IF RYAN=NERD THEN PRINT "get out more often"

Take a look at that face. Are you sick of it yet? I know I am - in every newspaper, on the television and all over the internet, Susan Boyle's visage has become the most ubiquitous picture of the year so far.

Now before a horde of angry net dwellers start flaming me with hate filled messages, allow me to clarify something: I have nothing against Susan Boyle herself; she's a perfectly competent singer, and deserves to make some cash from her warbling - others have made millions with less talent, after all.

What irritates me about the past week's Boylemania is the absurd reaction of the media. 'She's plain - and yet she excels at something!' the editors of Britain's Got Talent appeared to say. The ridiculous notion that only those gifted with youth, beauty and perfect teeth are good at anything has been preached by programme makers for so long that they've clearly taken it as gospel truth - hence the gaping faces of Britain's Got Talent Judges (who are, ironically, three of the least talented human beings in the whole country) when Ms Boyle opened her mouth to sing.

Irritation number two: whether she makes any money or not, Susan Boyle is almost certainly doomed to a Jade Goody-esque life of media subservience; one can imagine the glee the producers of BGT felt when she turned up for her audition. The salt-and-pepper hair, the plain features, the Last of the Summer Wine wardrobe - almost too good to be true. Even the name is perfect - like a skin complaint or an old-fashioned sweet that nobody eats anymore. Boyle's explosive popularity on the internet means she's now a commodity; media types and publicists love simple working-class folk, who they can lead around by the nose and photograph, gossip about, prod and cajole.

No wonder she's been 'advised' to retain her dowdy image - it's now part of the brand.

And this really is the saddest part of the Boyle phenomenon: whether her fame lasts for years - as was the case with Jade Goody, who lived and died under studio lights - or fizzles out in a few months, like Mo from Driving School, that bloke from Airport or any one of a thousand reality television-created celebrities, Susan Boyle has become another money-making tool to be exploited by the greedy and manipulative.

It's highly unusual for me to buy a book just because I liked its television/film adaptation, but that's precisely what I did after watching Channel 4's excellent trio of Red Riding dramas.

Before 1974, the first instalment, I'd barely heard of its author David Peace - I knew he'd written something about football (The Damned United), a sport that holds no interest for me whatsoever, but little more.

The Red Riding television series managed to recreate the nicotine and beer infused world of seventies/eighties Yorkshire with a surprising ease when you consider the comparative lack of finances (Peace's second book, 1977 wasn't even filmed due to budget constraints), and depicted a murky world of police corruption, secrecy and brutality.

Peace's original books are even better. Featuring a tangled web of characters, plot lines and hidden links that six hours of television could not hope to replicate, the Red Riding quartet (1974, 1977, 1980, 1983) is shot through with a mesmerising style of writing that, once experienced, is hard to shake - it's a repetitive, mantra-like prose that emerges fully formed in 1974 (which was, it should be pointed out, Peace's debut novel) and simply gets better.

By the final book, there are so many interweaving characters, so many events unfolding past and present, that the whole narrative begins to groan under the weight of it all. Allow your concentration to slip, even for a sentence or two, and you're suddenly lost in a sea of grim events.

Indeed, Red Riding's events are so unrelentingly grim that putting one of these books down feels like coming up for air - the constant descriptions of police-sanctioned torture, killings, beatings and brutality are horribly oppressive.

There are explicit references to Orwell's Nineteen-Eighty-Four everywhere, and the dreadful occurences in 'the belly', where suspects are tortured into giving statements in the most disturbing ways imaginable, have obvious parallels with Winston Smith's encounter with Room 101. The phrase 'put your hands flat on the table' isn't one I'll forget in a hurry.

Real life events, like the Yorkshire Ripper enquiry, are worked into Peace's fiction so effortlessly that it becomes difficult to tell where the fiction begins and reality ends - a conjuring trick the writer uses to narcotic effect.

And with the Metropolitan Police's alleged involvement in the death of Ian Tomlinson during the G20 demonstrations last month - and what appeared to be attempts to conceal evidence of that involvement - Peace's cautionary tales of violence and its terrible effects on ordinary people seem all the more timely.

Thanks to the vagaries of geography, Japan Xbox owners were able to download a playable demo of Resident Evil 5 about four days ago - and it doesn't look like Resi fans in Europe or America will be able to get hold of it any time soon. But thanks to a bit of science and cunning, I managed to get my hands on the demo today - and it's incredible.

The essential play mechanics remain unchanged from RE4: the over-the-shoulder perspective's the same, as is the run-aim-shoot control system. The biggest addition comes in the shapely form of Sheva, who follows you around loyally, offing zombies and handing you ammo should you begin to run low. Take a hit, and she'll heal you too. Her AI is pretty good - not Elika from Prince of Persia, but not as annoyingly dim as Natalia from Goldeneye either, which is good news.

Despite the controversial setting (a particularly run-down borough in Africa, it would appear) it's business as usual: fast-moving zombies with a variety of weapons (blunt, sharp and petrol driven), all lusting after your blood. And if you thought the graphics in RE4 were good, wait until you see these - they're incredible, with subtle and disturbing animation throughout. The zombies' reactions as you fire away at them with your revolver is varied and convincing, and the devastating effect of your shotgun genuinely packs a punch - you've never seen heads explode like this.

There are fantastic incidental details too - it's surprising, for example, just how much of the scenery can be shot and destroyed. Obvious things like windows and doors will splinter after a shot or two, but try aiming for the little pyramid of watermelons stacked up in the first room you enter - the effect is unexpected and oddly comical, given the horror that lurks elsewhere.

RE5's setting may be sunny and well-lit (at least in the pair of levels I played), but make no mistake; this is a pant-fillingly tense game, and more than worthy of the 'Black Hawk Down with zombies' allusion drawn by Jun Takeuchi, the game's producer, last year. It's tense, gory, and every bit as fun to play as RE4 ever was.

RE5 may not turn out to be another revolutionary instalment as 4 was, but it's certainly shaping up to be one of the must-have titles of 2009. With any luck, the finished product will hit the shelves some time in March - and I can't wait.

This week, I've been lucky enough to get a review copy of the new Prince of Persia, and I've been playing it incessantly for the last few days. To say any more about it would be very naughty - check out the next issue (or maybe the one after) of Micro Mart for the proper review.

Anyway, Prince of Persia's come a long way since Jordan Mechner's 1989 original - though it's still well worth playing almost twenty years later. The game first appeared on the Apple II, but for my money the best version was the Super Nintendo version - not only did it feature some beautifully redrawn graphics, with more detailed backgrounds and extra curly shoes, it even added a few extra levels. The Japanese version also came in a stunningly illustrated box - it's criminal that this wasn't used in the US or European releases.

Perhaps the most dated aspect of the original PoP is its extreme difficulty; one false move and you were dead - falling from dizzying heights, impaled on spikes, dismembered by the clanging jaws of a man-trap - the result was always the same: back to the start of the level. Add a sadistically tight one-hour time limit to the mix, and you're left with one of the most stultifyingly difficult games you're likely to encounter. I'm a huge fan of the game, but I must admit that I've never completed it.

Of course, PoP harks back to the days when the platform game ruled supreme, and gamers were far more hardened to this kind of difficulty. In these modern, FPS-obsessed times, we're not used to to such harsh assaults on our hand-eye co-ordination.

In fact, the past few years have seen a bit of a decline in the once mighty platform game genre; Nintendo may be flying the flag with the sublime Super Mario Galaxy, but things have been rather quiet elsewhere. That is, until this year, where there's been a bit of a platform game renaissance - we've had the stunning Braid, Lost Winds, Bionic Commando: Rearmed and Tomb Raider Underworld, to name a few.

I for one hope the trend continues - we can't go back to the halcyon days of Manic Miner or the original Super Mario Bros, but that really doesn't matter. This year has seen a clutch of games - Braid in particular - that easily match the best of them.

As a change of pace to my usual writing nonsense and video game geekery, I've been playing with my paint set for the first time in.. ooh, ages. It's shown here at roughly life size (the original's a dinky four inches square); painting tiny pictures means I can get one finished in a few minutes or so, and I don't make too much of a mess in the process.

Anyway, I thought I might use this here blog as a gallery for my daubs just to break up the obscure nineties shoot-em-up coverage.. if you have an opinion, let me know what it is!

Here's a genuine Megadrive rarity - perhaps not the most rare game on the MD, but not far off - Musha Aleste. I managed to get it from eBay for a surprisingly reasonable price (particularly when compared to the extortionate 100-170GBP some sellers are asking for), and it was worth every penny. Not only does it feature some spanking manga box art (superior, as always, to the woeful Western effort), but the game itself is an absolute corker.

It's a slightly surreal mix of giant mecha and feudal japan; your robot flies over a landscape of farms and temples, blasting away at some brilliantly realised enemies, including the wacky Noh theatre mask depicted on the back of the box. Perhaps Musha's biggest draw is its absurd level of fire-power; at full power you can fire a primary weapon, a dual laser and a pair of drones that spray lead everywhere too.

Aleste received some relatively lukewarm reviews back in 1990 - I seem to recall Mean Machines only gave it 70%, or thereabouts - which is a pity, and probably a sign that reviewers were becoming jaded with the number of shooters that flooded the market. Admittedly, Musha Aleste won't present a huge challenge for more skilled players, but the feeling of empowerment and glee the weaponry provides is unique - for once, the aliens are the ones who are outgunned.

Musha Aleste is a true classic, and well worth adding to any shoot-em-up fanatic's collection.

The Japanese churn out some amazing videogames - and in their spare time they make some wacky commercials too. I stumbled upon the site sega-16.com while wandering the internet, and most importantly THIS PAGE, which features a selection of Sega Megadrive adverts from the days of yore. Scroll down to the bottom and you'll find the Japanese ones - and some of them have to be seen to be believed.

While some are just tacky products of their (early nineties) time, others are grade-A comedy classics; check out the promo for the 'Sushi Tetris' puzzler Puyo Puyo (pictured above) - why is there a chef peering in through their living room window? Be sure to have a look at the Columns ad too, which features a man skydiving from a plane in his underpants. What this has to do with a 'match the crystals' puzzle game is a complete and utter mystery...

Enjoy.

* STOP PRESS *
I've just watched the advert for the Sega Megadrive, where the then cutting-edge console is introduced to the unsuspecting public by a Spock-haired man floating above the surface of the moon. Visual Shock! Speed Shock! Sound Shock!

Hardly the most riveting of news, but these fantastic Alien Hominid toys are heading my way from America. They're made by the game's developers, The Behemoth, and they're available from their online shop here.

They've also got a new game coming out this August - Castle Crashers is a four player beat-em-up with the same anarchic art style as Alien Hominid. It'll be available to download from XBLA from the 27th, and I can't wait.

In the meantime, you can visit the Castle Crashers webpage, and here's a bit of in-game violence:

Crikey, has it really been over eight weeks since my last post? Regrettably, it's true - but I have an excuse. I've been abroad, called away unexpectedly to Myanmar where I had to rescue a group of christian missionaries from a prison camp... Oh, hang on - that was the plot of Rambo, which I saw last week.

So what have I really been doing? Writing a lot, elsewhere of course; my usual video game musings for Den of Geek, as well as various reviews and a very long article on independent game developers for Micro Mart magazine.

In other news, I've managed to sneak a fabulous Xbox 360 into the house, along with copies of Halo 3, GTAIV and Forza II, which are all marvelous. Oh, and a copy of Viva Pinata as well, which my better half thinks is great (I like the paper critters, but can't see the appeal - looks like a lot of hard work to me). You can read more on the subject here, if you're interested.

Now, I must away - a group of freedom fighters need some help over in Afghanistan...