Mass Effect 3 Leviathan DLC dated

A couple weeks back, BioWare revealed a new piece of Mass Effect 3 DLC called Leviathan. This new DLC will be expanding the single player camapign and just generally sounds great, but at the time, BioWare didn’t part with any details on the release date. We now have that release date, with BioWare announcing today that Leviathan will be available on Xbox 360, PS3, and PC on August 28.

That’s the date for the US release – European gamers have to wait a day longer, as their version isn’t arriving until August 29. In the DLC, players will be tasked with finding the titular Leviathan and using it in their war against the Reapers. The Reapers know you’re looking for Leviathan though, so not only do you have to find this thing, but you’ll have the Reapers on your tail while you do.

If this is the same Leviathan we hear about in Mass Effect 3‘s story, then not only is Leviathan a Reaper, but he’s one of the oldest ones around. When it initially detailed this DLC, BioWare said that players will be learn more about the origins of the Reapers as they search for Leviathan, so if the you found that the Star Child’s explanation of Reaper beginnings left something to be desired, this DLC should serve to fill in a few of the holes.

Indeed, we’ve heard whispers that this DLC changes Mass Effect 3‘s ending yet again, so it sounds like there’s quite a bit of story-driven content to be enjoyed in Leviathan. It’ll also be nice to have some single player DLC that isn’t a response to fan outrage. The DLC will be $9.99 or 1200 Microsoft Points when it arrives here in a couple of weeks, so be sure to keep an eye out for it on PSN, XBLA, and Origin.

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Total Recall’s Bryan Cranston discusses the Breaking Bad effect

This past week we had the opportunity to have a chat with Bryan Cranston on his role in the 2012 science fiction action thriller Total Recall and how his role in the hit TV series Breaking Bad has all but skyrocketed him into the public eye. So well liked is the TV series that it ended up being spoken about at the press junket for Total Recall with the actor as much as the film was – but Cranston, ever the gentlemen, made no qualms about speaking on whatever the press had on their minds. How did the “goofy, silly, fun-loving dad” from Malcolm in the Middle transform himself into a science fiction villain with a methamphetamine dealer/science teacher in-between? Have a peek!

[Q] Len Wiseman [director of Total Recall 2012] brought up that he’d seen Breaking Bad [see the rest of that interview here] and said, ‘I want to work with this guy.’ Is that the common thing for you now, has that show changed your image in the business from the comedy guy only?

[Bryan Cranston] Yeah, I have ridden the hard work and sweat of Vince Gilligan all the way to another level. The best thing a director can do is to identify good actors and fit them in the right parts, and if you can do that in your pre-production, once you get to production you can let them fly, and let them feel safe to be able to experiment and try things. You’ll find happy accidents.

Above: Cranson (right) taking on a very different role in the television series Breaking Bad in which he plays a chemistry teacher with terminal cancer and a meth-cooking business

[BC] For an actor what I try to teach young actors – the best thing they can learn is to identify well-written material. The writing in our industry, in a story, is the most important element, bar none. It is always about the writing first.

So what I’ve been able to do – the thing I’m good at, really, is to identify well written material. Now that doesn’t mean the product is going to end up that way. It’s a recipe – and sometimes it doesn’t work – and you’re thinking, ‘oh well, wait a minute, I had all the ingredients, how did this happen?’ That’s going to happen.

But if you start with something that has good writing, you at least have a shot. If you start with something that is not well written, you have no shot of making something good. The best actor in the world can make “C” level material “C+” level material. Maybe “B-”, that’s it.

Above: Cranston poses with co-stars Jessica Biel and Colin Farrell at the Los Angeles press junket for Total Recall

[Q] You had this in you all the time, even before Breaking Bad, but people’s perceptions of you have changed. Have you thought about that since – Drive, and this, you’re given harder-edged characters and just a straight jacket perception of what your previous roles would be?

[BC] Well, the only thing that an actor really yearns for in a career is opportunity. We don’t ask to be given roles – [if you don't] just give me a chance to get in the room, we have no shot. How I got Malcolm in the Middle – everything – what I try to teach young actors is that, ‘please know, that without a healthy dose of luck, you will not have a career.’ How do you do that? I don’t know. Just keep working, keep working hard, have faith, and this is your life!

"Without a healthy dose of luck, you will not have a career."

Don’t give yourself some arbitrary number – ‘I’m going to give it a year – I’ll give it a good year’ – it’s like ‘stop now, go back to Idaho.’ You know? ‘Make some really nice potatoes. People will appreciate that.’ But it’s a joke – people, you’re either in this or you’re not in this. So that’s the first thing I say. But I was lucky to get Malcolm in the Middle. I was lucky to get Breaking Bad. And I have stories for those – but I don’t want to go in and monopolize that. But I know – the stars were aligning.

After you are able to get some level of success, like Malcolm in the Middle – seven years of doing a comedy – I got offers to do a goofy, silly, fun-loving dad. And had I taken those, I would have helped pigeon-hole myself as that guy.

You better – you better – if you’re on a hit show? You better save your money. You better, because you need to say no to those tempting offers of dollar bills to do the same thing you just did. To me it was no temptation. I just said no, I just did that. But you don’t know what’s going to happen next. I was very fortunate.

This is but one of several segments of the ongoing set of talks we had with the stars and director of Total Recall – stick around in our [Rekall portal] to see the future and past of the film as it rolls out in theaters this weekend! And of course don’t forget to check out our full movie review of Total Recall (2012) as well!

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The Domino’s effect: The pizza giant refuses to phase out inhumane pork

By Twilight Greenaway

Animal behaviorist Temple Grandin has describes raising pigs in gestation crates as “asking a sow to live in an airline seat.” (Photo by Farm Sanctuary.)

Domino’s wants to be different. The company — once known for crap-tastic pizza and mediocre ad campaigns — has struggled in recent years to remake its image with an ironic campaign that admitted to poor quality followed by an effort to incorporate so-called “artisan toppings.”

Domino’s has been doing so much to reach out to food-conscious customers, says Kristie Middleton, outreach manager at the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), that she’s surprised by its latest move — a decision to continue serving pork from pigs raised in gestation crates. “It seems like it would only make sense to include an animal welfare tenet as part of their rebranding,” she says.

Instead, it looks like Domino’s has other allies, including the American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF), an organization known for its staunch support of industrial agriculture and factory farming. In fact, this week AFBF came right out and endorsed Domino’s decision, complete with a photo of a sausage-covered pizza on the front page of its national website.

Domino’s is getting the royal treatment from AFBF because it’s one of very few holdouts, as the last six months have seen an avalanche of announcements by businesses including Burger King, McDonald’s, Wendy’s, Denny’s, Carl’s Jr., Safeway, and Hormel (the maker of Spam), which have all expressed the intention to move away from gestation crates. Even Smithfield Foods — the nation’s largest pork producer — has agreed to phase out the crates by 2017. Eight states have also banned the practice, including Michigan, home to the Domino’s headquarters. (The chain’s top supplier is Tyson Foods, a company that has shown no interest in following the trend away from crates — and has even recently been in the news for continuing to embrace the practice.)

The crates, or cages, are used to confine between 60 and 70 percent of breeding sows in this country, and animal behavior expert Temple Grandin describes them as the equivalent of “asking a sow to live in an airline seat” (without lavatory privileges, mind you).

Earlier this month, despite this shifting tide, Domino’s shareholders decided to swim upstream and reject a resolution suggested by the HSUS for a ban. Not only did the Texas Farm Bureau applaud the move (Texas Farm Bureau’s Mike Barnett praised Domino’s for “showing some backbone to the animal rights activist group”), but AFBF has also embraced it on a national level. In fact, the AFBF site features a blog post by a farmer who describes not only buying a pizza from Domino’s in celebration, but leaving a thank-you note.

At the heart of the matter, say the critics of these bans, is whether the crates are in fact more harmful to pigs than other industrial practices. On the Texas Farm Bureau site, Barnett pretends to abdicate, but in fact does nothing of the sort. He writes:

The use of the gestation stalls — which confine sows during pregnancy — is at the center of the controversy. I’m not defending nor condemning their use. I truly don’t know enough about pork production to make that judgment.

Lacking knowledge, I’ll turn to the experts — the American Veterinary Medical Association – for their views on animal care. That organization says there are advantages and disadvantages to both cage-free and caged pork production methods.

While it’s true that the American Veterinary Medical Association has merely asked for more research on the issue, the HSUS also has veterinarians on staff who believe that the available research is quite conclusive [PDF]. And the Pew Environmental Group — which funded the respected Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production — says the crates are “among the least humane of industrial farm animal practices.”

Not that all pigs in confinement aren’t still, well, in confinement. Critics of the alternative — something called “group housing” — point out that pigs in close quarters are known to get bored and aggressive (and often have higher rates of injury). And despite the use of terms like “cage-free” in the PR efforts of the companies phasing out the crates, Middleton doesn’t see an end to gestation crates as a silver bullet for factory farming. “We don’t want consumers to think that just because these animals aren’t in cages that they’re being treated humanely.” Even group housing can be very crowded and must be well-managed to be safe for the animals, who are intelligent and get bored easily, she adds. “To ensure the better treatment of pigs in those group housing situations, we’ve seen farms that provide things like bails of hay just to give them something to do.”

HSUS appears to be shifting a very powerful industry with an incremental approach to change, by focusing on what Middleton calls the “most urgent” problems first. “At the very least, by going to gestation-free pork, these companies are helping spare animals from some of the worst abuses that happen in factory farming,” she says.

And it’s hard not to see how taking pigs out of crates the size of their own bodies — and letting them turn around on occasion — is a move in the right direction, even if Domino’s, Tyson Foods, and the AFBF don’t see it that way — yet.

Twilight is the food editor at Grist. Follow her on twitter.

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BioWare slaps four-player multiplayer mode onto Mass Effect 3

Game maker BioWare has added a four-player cooperative multiplayer mode to its Mass Effect 3 game, one of next year’s most anticipated titles, the company said today.

The new multiplayer mode drops you into a game with three other players. The Mass Effect series has traditionally been a single-player experience and the game has relied on compelling storytelling and creating a cinematic experience to draw gamers in. It’s a formula that’s worked exceptionally well so far, with the original Mass Effect game earning a score of 91 out of 100 across 74 reviews and its sequel earning a score of 96 out of 100 across 98 reviews.

Mass Effect puts players in control of Commander Shepherd as he tries to fend off an ancient alien race called the Reapers. In the final installment of the trilogy, the Reapers have taken control of earth and Shepherd has to rally the forces of the galaxy to take back the planet and destroy the reapers. It’s an over-the-shoulder shooting game that features role-playing game elements, such as earning experience for completing objectives and becoming more powerful over time with better skills.

When entering the game, you can choose your race (among others, there are the massive Krogan and the powerful, psychic Asari races) and class, like a Sentinel or a Soldier, each of which has different abilities. You then face off against waves of enemies while trying to defend strategic locations across the galaxy.

Successfully completing those missions contributes to Shepherd’s “war assets” in the main story line — the more assets you have means you get a better and more complete ending. BioWare added multiplayer to the game to make use of its new team in Montreal and to give players an alternative way to build up their war assets in the game, Mass Effect series executive producer Casey Hudson said. Players can still get the best ending by playing through the game in a single-player campaign, but now they have an alternative way to build up their war assets.

“This is really the best place to start playing the Mass Effect series, this is the beginning, middle and end of the whole galactic war,” he said. “You’ll be able to take control of characters you have never been able to play before — you’ll have access to all the different classes and many of the races.”

Hudson said it made the most sense to add multiplayer to this title, which tells the story of an all-out galactic war at a huge scale.

Mass Effect 3 will come out March 6 next year.

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