AJ and Jason Discuss: Avengers Age of Ultron

SPOILER ALERT:  I'm pretty sure anybody who would read a discussion of Avengers Age of Ultron has already seen the movie, but here is your spoiler warning just in case.

AJ

Okay, Jason. We've both seen Avengers 2 and we both have things we want to say about it. So let's start easy. Give me a score, 1-10 with 10 being the greatest movie ever created in the history of humanity, and give me 3 basic thoughts about the movie. 

Jason

Ranking a movie 1-10 is not easy my friend, so I'll go with a solid 7, the safest of all rankings.  I think Dr. Strangelove is the best movie ever made and a 10+, while Back to the Future is my favorite movie of all time, but probably an 8 because I'm weird like that.  7 is safe for Avengers: Age of Zingertron because I liked it, but I was also annoyed by a few things.  

I thought the direction was really, really good.  Joss Whedon can really frame a shot to look like a comic book panel, especially during action scenes.  The opening scene shot of the whole team attacking Hydra in the woods was great.  The final fight with the whole team in a circle fighting legions of robots was great as well.  Whedon also really shines during the quiet moments too like the scene where everyone was having drinks and taking turns trying to lift Thor's hammer.  However, I thought it was unfortunate that SO MUCH was packed into this movie that more of these great quiet moments had to be left out for non-stop action, although I realize how nitpicky that is and I should apply for a job with CinemaSins.

Two gripes I legitimately have are with the pacing and SickBurnBroTron, but I'll hold off on him for now.  The pacing is really odd.  Everything seems to happen way too fast, partly because of "I have more one-liners than Terminator Tron's" stupid plan, but also because of the 18 settings for the movie.  They're in New York! Now Africa!  Korea!  Eastern Europe!  It's hard to get a sense of where and when.  I'm confused on the timeframe.  Did these events occur over a few days, a week, several weeks?

What did you think of the movie overall and I'm curious if you have any thoughts on the pacing.  (I am aware I gave you two thoughts and went more in depth than "basic".  You can't tell me what to do!).

AJ

I liked the movie overall. I think a 7 is completely appropriate for it. It was a complicated film that had a lot of things to try to accomplish. They had to build off not only the first Avengers movie but keep in line as each of the main stars also had another movie of their own to develop their characters. It's a lot of balls to juggle at once and I think they did an admirable job of it overall.

My biggest gripe with the film was probably that they spent too little time on THIS film and too much time making call backs to previous films or setting characters up for what they're going to be doing in the future. The most glaring example of this was the Thor flashback, which we saw several times and was 100% about Ragnarok and not Age of Ultron. I understand the need to move characters along because they all have solo films to get to after this but the Avengers movies are about the Avengers being together. Devoting significant chunks of time to splitting them up only serves to defeat the purpose of the entire Avengers concept - they all have solo films, let them do their solo shit there.

A big to do has been made about the decisions regarding Hawkeye, his big reveal, and how it was handled. For me, I enjoyed it, appreciated it, and thought almost nothing of it beyond that. It was nice to see him get serious screen time and finally provide some layer of depth to a character making like his 5th appearance. The end.

The shit with Nick Fury, however, was pure nonsense. The guy randomly shows up at Hawkeye's hideout, NO EXPLANATION WHATSOEVER, and proceeds to drop random motivational bombs, including his whole "no fancy SHIELD toys this time, bros", only to randomly show up again later in the movie....with a fucking helicarrier. So...about that lack of SHIELD toys....

And yes, I absolutely have thoughts about the pacing. I completely agree with everything you said. You know they handled it poorly when nerds have been arguing on the internet for a week that they were in Wakanda for the vibranium or not. When people who are devoted to the movies aren't 100% where the movie is even taking place, you've made some mistakes along the way. It was very peculiar.

All of that said, there were things I definitely loved about the film. Scarlet Witch was excellent. Quicksilver, despite not being given much to do, was enjoyable to watch in action. The tiny moments always make big differences to nerds like me. I loved the small touches scattered throughout. Meeting Ultron for the first time and he was wearing the crimson cape was awesome, as it was a nod to the Crimson Cowl in the comics. I loved seeing Vision and Scarlet Witch interact, knowing they have a big future together. I loved more explanation of the stones and their importance and probably my favorite moment in the entire movie was during the credits when Thanos put on the Infinity Gauntlet. I remember being excited when they were making the first Thor movie and teased the Infinity Gauntlet. A million years and a complete Marvel explosion later, WE'RE FINALLY ABOUT TO SEE IT PAY OFF. YES.

Take that, two thoughts. 

Jason

Oh man, I forgot about the magical helicarrier.  That was some plot convenience if I've ever seen it.

Good points on much of the movie acting as a set up for future solo films.  I thought those scenes came across as padding in a movie that really didn't need it.  So much was already going on.  That said, I did like the decision to give characters who don't have solo movies, mainly Hawkeye and Black Widow, more screen time for character depth.  Hawkeye's scenes were handled well and I particularly like the line near the end of the movie where Hawkeye acknowledges how ridiculous it is that he is fighting robots with a bow and arrow. It was fun to see him have a sense of humor being on a team with overpowered weirdos. Family man Hawkeye was also less weird than I thought it would be and basically turns him into something like the "every man" of the group.  Someone to relate too....kinda.   

Black Widow's scenes, however, were more problematic.  Previous movies hint at Black Widow having a dark past in which she did things she is not so proud of.  Loki has a conversation with her in the first Avengers where she talks about having "red in her ledger" and Loki responds by questioning if she can truly make up for the terrible things she did in her past.  This is a classic redemption arc....which was thrown away in favor of being a sterile "monster"?  While much of the internet thought this was worthy of driving Whedon off of Twitter for, I hated it more for its continuity rather than some sexist statement (although it is a little sexist still since the whole wanting babies thing seems to come out of left field).  It's also small potatoes when the monster she is trying to relate too is a giant green rage ogre.  Not all monsters are equal.  

Side note:  Some people on the internet thought Whedon was being sexist with her being a damsel in distress but I thought it was okay.  Her kidnapping isn't the main focus of the movie, she's the reason the rest of the team finds out where Ultron is, and she basically saves herself so, whatever.  It's more a product of lazy writing than anything.  

I thought that most of the new characters were okay.  I agree with you on Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver,  even if Scarlet Witch's powers were vaguely explained.  Quicksilver is overpowered as hell so it was probably a good thing they killed him off.  Vision is okay but divorced from the comics, I bet many people think Vision IS Jarvis.  He also is a good way to help explain what the hell the infinity gems are while also keeping them purposely mysterious.  

But....there is one other new character who I thought was a huge disappointment.  Ultron was nothing what I expected and the biggest flaw in this movie for me.  Before I tackle this, do you have any thoughts on the villain?  I'm afraid of turning this reply into a 2,000 word essay.  

AJ

I guess it's hard for me say that Ultron was a disappointment. I never liked the Ultron comic book story line and was pretty comfortable with the fact that I wasn't going to enjoy this, either. His humorous little quips were classic Whedon and didn't really bother me much. Because this movie was going to be so self-contained, I wish they would have just gone straight ahead and made Hulk the villain. It would've skipped the waste of time Ultron story line, the GOD AWFUL Hulk-Black Widow romance, and would have set Hulk up PERFECTLY for the Planet Hulk movie...which is where he's going to end up anyway.

This movie was all about getting the main characters to Civil War, Ragnarok, and Infinity War in one piece. I understood why they had Ultron be the villain. It was a popular story line, it fit with Tony's maniacal obsession with protecting the Earth on his own, and it was easily contained to one movie. What happened instead was they ended up wasting a perfectly fine villain and turned him into more of a cartoon than he ever was in the comics. It's basically a repeat of what Iron Man 2 did to Whiplash.

One last point I wanted to touch on was you mentioning them keeping the infinity gems purposely mysterious. I hate this. We are not 3 Iron Man, 2 Cap, 2 Thor, 2 Avengers, and 1 Guardian of the Galaxy movies into the MCU, which has spent the ENTIRE TIME  building towards the Infinity War. When those movies start, I do not want to spend ANY time fucking explaining them. They've been dancing around them for TEN god damn movies by now and all we REALLY have is the scene with The Collector in Guardians explaining them. UNLESS EVERYONE WAS PAYING CLOSE ATTENTION, we're going to have to re-visit this shit in what will be WELL COVERED TERRITORY by the time Infinity War rolls around! I'M CLEARLY NOT PLEASED WITH THIS. Of all the AMAZING things they've done to setup this universe and these movies, this is BY FAR my longest-standing gripe with the plan as a whole.

Now I know you have lots to say about Ultron. So hit me, dawg. 

Jason

Now that I think about it, I agree with what you said about the Infinity Gems.  I'm sick of origin stories as it is and I have a suspicion that Infinity War Part 1 is going to be the origin story of magic rocks.

I've been of the opinion that the MCU has had difficulty establishing any interesting villains.  They never seem to be that much of a threat to the heroes, their motives range from generic evil to revenge against the hero, and most of them exist due to the heroes incompetence.   Iron Man mostly fights other Iron Men instead of Whiplash or The Mandarin who was turned into a joke.  Red Skull is a Nazi.  Hydra just wants power.  Loki?  I have NEVER understood why this guy is so popular.  He's a whiny baby who is angry that his dad loves his brother more.  And...Loki is the best villain to date, which says more than I ever could.

Ultron was intriging because AI is usually depicted as cold, humorless, amoral, and logical to a zero-sum fault in movies.  It also didn't help that the trailers made him look intimidating as hell, like, "YES.  This guy is gonna give the ludicrously overpowered Avengers a real fight."  Instead, he was a wise-cracking, strangely under powered, hypocritical robot who monologued about evolution while simultaneously wanting to build himself a body.  Shouldn't the coldly logical robot, who has a coldly logical motive to end all war by killing everybody (Oh my Cthulhu, he HAS REAPER LOGIC), realize he's better off just jumping from robot to robot?  How can he claim to be a superior evolved being when he wants to make himself more human, while also wanting to kill all humans?

Also, I'm not trying to say a zinger-flinging villain can't be good, but with Ultron it went too far.  When the Hulk jumps onto the jet and Ultron says, "Oh god, what now", I couldn't help but roll my eyes.  I half expected him to raise his hands, look directly into the camera and say, "Can this day GET any worse", followed by a laugh track.  I get that he took on some of Stark's personality since he created him but...I think I would have prefered the stereotype AI character.  Ultron seems closer to Bender from Futurama rather than Skynet from Terminator.  

Oh, and Ultron got trounced by the Avengers.  Just like the aliens in the first movie, I never felt like he COULD win.  Obviously, we all know the heroes in a PG-13 comic book movie are going to win, but I want them to have to work for it a little.  Ultron is just another villain who doesn't pose a threat.  Hell, he gets his ass kicked during his reveal when The Avengers didn't have their gear, were completely taken by surprise, and FUCKING DRUNK.  If Ultron can't put up a fight then, what the hell is he going to do for the rest of the movie?  The Avengers are too powerful.  Thanos sure is taking his sweet time.  

I feel like I could write a novel about Ultron but I'll stop here.  Speaking of things getting long, we should probably wrap this up.  Any lingering thoughts?  Counter-points to my Ultron hate?  Reasons why Civil War is a sub-title to a Captain America movie despite having half the Avengers in it? 

AJ

I gave you the floor for Ultron. I don't have any particularly strong disagreements about what you said. A lot of nodding and "yeah, you tell em" went on while reading all of it. I will say Civil War is my favorite comic book story line ever and they had better not fuck it up but that's a rant for another day.

My last thought on Avengers 2 is that walking out of the theater, I liked it. It wasn't a slam dunk like the first one in my eyes but it accomplished a lot of its goals and as the second movie of a series it turned out okay. It was a good, solid, flawed comic book movie. I'm ready to close the book on this sucker so we can gear up for Mad Max next week!!

Jason

Agreed.  Ultron aside, I actually did like this movie despite spending so much time complaining about it.  It was fun.  Not as good as the first but not as bad as a few others in the MCU.  

And yeah, I am SO stoked for Mad Max Fury Road.  Till next time!

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Atari: Game Over Review

BEE DOO.....BE do BE do BEE DOOO

On a whim, I decided to watch the documentary Atari:Game Over last night.  It's a film covering the 2014 excavation of the Alamogordo landfill that Atari supposedly buried millions of cartridges of the ET Atari 2600 game.  The film questions why Atari (a company) threw away millions of copies of "the worst video game of all time" (an unwanted product) as if this is a mystery or something.  Unfortunately, while getting to the MOST OBVIOUS ANSWER EVER, most of the movie comes off as a love letter to Atari and since this movie is barely over an hour long, it's not like they didn't have time for more depth.

The history lesson about the rise and fall of Atari is pretty good for the first 2/3rds.  The movie does a good job of storytelling the humble origins of Atari with Pong and other coin-op arcade games.  It gets to the point about Atari being the fastest growing company in America after the release of the 2600 and making some blockbuster games like Yar's Revenge and even Raiders of the Lost Ark before ET decided all movie licensed games must suck.  And I mean, Edmonton Oilers suck here.  It lasts for years.

Sometimes decades.

It was important to bring up those games though as the guy who programmed them, Howard Warshaw, programmed ET.  At this point, the documentary goes almost out of it's way to say how much Steven Speilberg liked the game and how Warshaw only had 5 weeks to make it.  That's fine.  He's forgiven.  Warshaw even gets a bit emotional when he is invited to the excavation and is overwhelmed by the amount of people who showed up.  This includes the author of Ready Player One, Ernie Cline, who went to the excavation after picking up his Delorean from George RR Martin because this is a factual sentence I get to write.  I'm not kidding.  This happened.

But what's weird about this film, other than nerdy authors owning a nerdy car that he loaned to another far more famous nerdy author, is that Atari seems to take zero flak.  At times, it seems like Atari was just being a "bold, new, innovator that takes risks" rather than a "frat boy with too much money taking stupid risks" which seems more like the truth.  The fact that Atari killed the game market in 1983 due to over saturation is glossed over while simultaneously excusing ET.  I agree that ET didn't single-handedly kill the market, but come on movie, it was a part.  It's like they wanted to make a bumper sticker that read "Atari doesn't kill games, people not buying ET killed games."

The climax of the film is kind of a let down.  They DO find ET cartridges but it ends up being only about 10% of the total Atari games they find.  It's like, this totally mundane urban legend has a totally mundane explanation.  Yeah, Atari threw away a bunch of copies of ET but they also threw away all of their other unwanted product.  Then, the movie ends with a bunch of people talking about how awesome ET actually is and that's it's actually a good game and revisionist history shit.

"So, you see, this is why Atari didn't land on the moon."

Listen, I don't think ET is "The Worst Video Game of All Time".  For one, it actually works.  The game isn't a glitchy mess, something even modern day games have problems with.  It's also one of only a handful of Atari games you can actually finish, which was innovative for the time.  ET isn't even the worst Atari game, nor the worst Atari "thing" since the Atari Jaguar CD exists.

It's a toilet.

That said, it's by no means a good game.  I'm one of the lucky, or, unlucky few to have played this game when I was, like, 5 years old.  My parents had an Atari 2600 and about 10 or so games.  Obviously, my memory is fuzzy and possibly corrupted, but I remember Combat, Space Invaders (obvs), Asteroids, Missile Command for sure (my Dad's favorite), and ET.  I never beat it.  When the point of the game is to collect parts to your spaceship that randomly appear in holes, holes that are difficult to get out of due to shitty controls, enemies that are significantly faster than you and take away the parts you already collected.....AND your health decreases simply by fucking walking, you're not gonna have a good game.  No amount of sunshine and rainbow filled nostalgic thoughts are going to change that.

I have a soft spot for Atari.  It introduced me to games at a young age and it kick started a hobby I've never left...except for one time but eh that's a different blogpost.  But let's not pretend Atari is not without fault here.  It's fine to be nostalgic for the good ole days, but don't gloss over the bad too mmmkay?

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I do wish my parents never sold that Atari 2600.

CounterSpy Review - Gotta Go Back and Kill Em All.

Maybe I'm just really picky when it comes to stealth games but CounterSpy is another one I didn't care for all that much.  I'm of the opinion that level design is possibly THE most important aspect of a good stealth game.  This game, uses randomly generated levels with randomly placed objectives forcing this stealth game to turn into a boring, repetitive, 3rd person shooter.

There are two dominate types of levels.  One is the 2-D platforming stealth sections that are pretty good, and the awful shooting gallery sections that make me wonder how stealth/rail shooter ever came up as an idea in the first place.  

The platforming sections are what everyone thinks this game is.  You can stealthy sneak up on enemies from the front, hang from a ledge and attack them from underneath, or jump up to another platform and come at them from above.  Speed is super important too as once you are spotted, or a dead body is spotted, a guard might attempt to radio in an alert which slowly raises the DEFCON level.  It's imperative to kill these guards as quickly as possible because if the DEFCON level gets too high, a 1 minute long countdown timer starts until nukes are launched at the moon (god this is stupid).  The DEFCON level can also rise from being killed, which is basically saying you have so many lives.  To make matters worse, any alerted guard left behind will ALSO raise the DEFCON level so you gotta go back and kill em all.

Arnold voice: "Hang out"

There are two flaws in these sections that I just can't get over though.  One is the guards better field of view and the seemingly random way they are alerted.  Icons will appear over a guard telling you if they are within alert distance, if they are investigating, or on full alert.  These icons are often on the side of the screen since your character should be able to see them, but you can't.  This kind of weirds me out as I don't know how many times I've killed a guard only to see 8 icons around the screen suddenly jump to full alert despite these guards being in Australia for how close they are.  Other times, I can do the exact same thing without a single person noticing.  Did they see me or not?  And I can't just leave them to maybe find the dead body, so I gotta go back and kill em all.

For example, there is a random hallway section I've ran into with three guards.  I'm at one end, 2 guards are standing next to each in the middle, and the 3rd is at the other end,  I pop out of cover and headshot one of the guards in the middle with a silenced pistol thinking the guard next to him will investigate but no.  He is oblivious, but the OTHER guard down the hall investigates instead.  He walks up to the body and begins to radio in the alert so I pop out again to kill him quickly, THEN the other guard goes on full alert allowing me to kill em all without having to go back.  Later on, I run into the same hallway section again but this time decide to kill the guard at the end of the hall first.  I headshot him, with the silenced pistol, and EVERY guard is on full alert now despite those other two guards not looking at me or the other guard.  What the hell?  These examples are in a relatively simple area too.  It's even worse and more head scratching when you're in a larger area with dozens of guards. Need to be extra thorough in those sections so I don't gotta go back and kill em all.

I wasn't thorough

The other problem with these platforming sections are the aforementioned randomly placed objectives.  The computers you need to raid could be anywhere, forcing you to explore everything and fight everyone.  Great stealth games usually provide ways where you can avoid combat entirely and some of these platforming sections actually have passageways that bypass guards.  Too bad you might also be bypassing your objective so...gotta go back and kill em all.

The other major level concept is the shooting gallery sections which are awful.  Get into cover.  Stay there.  Pop out to shoot baddies.  Move on when they are all dead.  Yes, there are explosive barrels and panels that you can shoot to help out but they are the explosions to this Micheal Bay of a level concept.  The guards rarely switch cover too.  Sometimes there is a rocket guy who shoots a slow moving rocket that can be shot for more BOOMS.  Also, they sometimes throw grenades which you can throw back in the VERY unlikely chance it lands next to you.  I mean, you remember that kid on your little league team who would always throw a baseball into the dirt 20 feet in front of you or 20 feet over your head?  All of these guards were that kid.  I kinda feel bad about going back and killing them all.

Sometimes these shooting gallery sections have a 3-D perspective and look like they can be avoided but I was NEVER able to do so.  Many of these room have like 8 dudes and you can try to wait 10 minutes for them to all have their back turned so you can sneak by.  It will never happen.  Sometimes you can go around it in the 2-D area but there is usually guards there too and if you alert one you alert all 8 of those FUCKERS in the shooting gallery.  SO I GOTTA GO BACK AND KILL EM ALL.

Every time I saw this room there were 8 dudes in there.

In case my point hasn't been made clear yet, a good stealth game should never force you to have to slaughter everybody.  A good stealth game gives you the opportunity to go unseen/undetected and gives you the chance to go back to that state without having to kill everything.  CounterSpy offers neither.  I'm not gonna complain that it isn't like most AAA stealth games since this is a low budget indie title, but you'd think "stealth game BASICS" would have been adhered too.  And it's sad too that the basics of good stealth games would go ignored because this game has a lot of good stuff going for it.  

The story is cheeky and lighthearted for a game about nuclear annhilation (Again, they want to nuke the moon).  The controls are really good, snappy and fluid, but there is strangely no crouch button (another stealth game staple ignored).  Shooting mechanics are basic but fine.  There are several enemy varieties with normal dude, armored dude, machine gun dude, rocket dude, and officers who can be taken alive to lower the DEFCON level (which I suck at. Not a game flaw here, I just suck at this).  There is even different security camera types making some harder to destroy than others.

But...still...I gotta ignore stealth game basics and go back and kill em all.  The LARGEST reason for this flaw is level design, which is exponentially worse due to the randomly generated levels and computer locations.  I've never been a big fan of randomly generated levels in games (MAN, I'm just killing it with the future blogpost teasers), but it seems impossible to have a good stealth game with this concept.  I don't need to know exactly where my objective is, but I need at least a little idea.  Otherwise I'm wondering if I already passed my objective, and I gotta go back and kill em all.

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I reviewed a AAA stealth game that is worse than CounterSpy.  Read it here.

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Papo & Yo Review

Is this THE LAST GUARDIAN?!?!?

When I downloaded Papo and Yo off of Playstation Plus, I was expecting a lighthearted puzzle-platformer that would leave me thinking, "that was a thing."  I was also thinking it might be a game I don't finish as I find puzzle-platformers pretty hit or miss.  This one, however, is all Hit and it dished out the emotion in a thoughtful way.

From the opening dedication and the opening cutscene, you know this game is going to be about a boy dealing with an abusive father.  (Look at the picture posted above again....subtle isn't it?)  Instead of being presented as some realistic, deep, drama, the game takes place in a dream like world that seems to be the boy's escapist fantasy.

You take control of the boy named Quico.  You quickly meet a mysterious girl named Alejandra who seems scared of you at first but later acts as a best friend/guide role.  There is also Lula, Quico's toy robot with a jet pack, who is animate and can talk.  Then, there's monster....

This lazy douchebag.

Monster is the metaphor for the boy's real world father.  (This is not a spoiler.  You'd have to be an idiot to not figure that out in the first FIVE SECONDS of the game).  Most of the game revolves around getting Quico and Monster from point A to point B in an effort to "fix" Monster.  Monster's AI is basically a big dumb id who sleeps and eats and does nothing else.  You can manipulate him with coconuts to get him to go where you need him as he seeks them out automatically.  A lot of the time he is passive and in one instance he saves Quico's life.  Monster ALSO seeks out frogs, which he really likes to eat....but that's where things change.

Once Monster consumes a frog he goes into rage mode and becomes aggressive, constantly attacking you.  What is interesting here is that this is NOT a fail state in the game.  He cannot kill you, but man, does he beat the ever loving shit out of you.  He seems slightly faster than you, gives you little time to recover after tossing you like a rag doll, there is no such thing as a dodge button, and he can cut off a turn like a semi-truck.  I know this is a cliche thing to say but, "I've never been so helpless" in a video game.  The only way to get Monster de-raged is to feed him a rotten coconut, which forces him to vomit out the frog.  Frogs are obviously a metaphor for some sort of substance abuse.  SPOILER (It's alcohol).

"It makes me feel alive, because it is alive man"

These metaphors are the best part of this game and I love games that tie storytelling into gameplay this well.*  Lula is a toy that Quico cherished as protection.  Alejandra is, I THINK, Quico's older sister but I'm not entirely sure (I think this is one of those lost in cultural translation things because at times she comes across as almost a girlfriend despite SPOILER AGAIN ((she has the same father as revealed late in the game.))) (Sooo many parentheses!!!!!))))))).  There is also how Quico deals with Monster.  Lula and Alejandra both caution Quico about trusting Monster too much.  Quico, meanwhile, seems optimistic that Monster can be a good guy.

*Sidebar:  I actually think the indie game scene has the ONLY people experimenting with storytelling through gameplay, which is a shame since video games could tell stories in a very unique way.  Something like Minecraft doesn't count by the way.  I hope to cover this topic more in depth in a future blogpost.  I have opinions and stuff!*

This blogpost is getting long but I feel like I'm forgetting something.....

Blocks?  SQUARES ON THE GROUND? WHAT IS THIS MADNESS?

OH, right!  Gameplay.  The dream-like world is set in a Latin American shantytown with various gears, keys, levers, and handles all outlined in some sort of magic chalk. Activating these moves literal buildings to help you get from place to place.  The puzzles themselves range from obvious to mildly tricky, but I never spent too long being stumped on one.  An early bridge building puzzle looks daunting at first since the camera spins around showing DOZENS of points to interact, but once you start it, you find out that each thing you activate is just a part of a bridge, which you can manipulate to reach new parts, and so on.

What kind of key unlocks a wall?  Ever heard of DOORS?

While the puzzles are pretty easy, there are times that can be frustrating because there are puzzles you can only get past WITH an enraged Monster.  Make one poor jump and you fall to the ground where Monster relentlessly beats on you.  It's difficult getting back up to the platforms, especially if you are thrown into a corner where the beatings from Monster seem worse.

This game does have it's flaws but they seem entirely on the technical side of things. Objects clip through other objects from time to time.  Certain mechanics are introduced once but never used again like throwing frogs against walls and one single platforming section having disappearing platforms. Twice, the frame rate had a severe drop that lead to some choppy chase sequences but those drops only lasted a second or two so I'm not going to be like TotalBiscuit and whine about it for 27 more paragraphs.

Nothing smug about that.

Regardless of some flaws, the gameplay is solid.  If you want a challenge, this is not the game for you.  If you want a unique, interesting, metaphorical, escapist look into a dark past, this game is for you.

I appreciate this game.  I thank the developer for sharing a personal story in such a compelling way.  I don't have an abusive family member but I too have some dark shit that happened to me in the past, just like literally everyone.  This game makes me wonder if I could create something so imaginative to exorcise those demons.

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4 Movies I'm Actually Looking Forward too this Year.

Not gonna lie.  Leading into 2014, I couldn't give two shits about any movie.  I saw exactly 2 movies in the theatres. Ghostbusters Re-Release, because it was awesome and I got drunk and Guardians of the Galaxy, which was okay.

Seriously, why did everyone love GOTG so much? It followed every cliche ever.  It was an okay movie, not great.

1.  Avengers: Age of Ultron

Obviously.  Watch the final trailer if you haven't already.

...This is the Thumbnail?

The first movie made the Avengers look invincible by making an invading alien army their bitch.  This is a problem as it makes the heroes hard to root for.  Also, movie LAW says the 2nd movie in a trilogy must be the darkest (except for The Lord of the Rings because Peter Jackson is terrible at pacing), and every Avengers trailer has made Ultron a very intimidating threat.  Who voices him by the way?  JAMES SPADER?!?!  That's so fucking rad!

So what other threat could make The Avengers look like the underdogs? AI of course.  CALL ME A SCI-FI NERD but humanity has been fighting robots for so goddamn long...(in movies)...I think Asimo is ready to file a harassment suit.  

I think it's a toss up between this and #4 on this list for "which movie will make more money". It doesn't really matter who wins though.  Both movies are owned by Disney.

2.  Mad Max: Fury Road.

I love really like the Mad Max series.  Granted, I haven't seen a Mad Max movie in about a decade, but I'm actually excited for this reboot.  It's a funny thing to write too, since I am well known on my previous blog for being really skeptical...of every...reboot...that even gets announced.  Reboots that are better than the original are very rare.  (2012's Dredd is a good example of the exception.  Than again, the Stallone Judge Dredd movie set a very low bar to hurdle).

However, this reboot is being made by the same director and writer of the original.  If anybody can re-work art AND have it be good, it should be the original artist.  Oh, and the movie uses very little CGI. Almost every stunt is done with practical effects which CALL ME A HIPSTER, alwayyyyys looks better on high budget movies.  I mean come on, look at this shit.

Mel Gibson is a fuckhole

Okay.  That storm near the end of the trailer is obviously CGI but the car wrecks and explosions are real.  And they look amazing, since this is shot in the desert, and unlike a comic book movie, doesn't need to destroy a city.

3.  Crimson Peak.

Not gonna lie, I love Guillermo Del Toro.  He makes movies for the fun of it.  The Hellboy movies are stupid but very entertaining and make narrative sense.  Pacific Rim is REALLY stupid, VERY entertaining and DOESN'T make narrative sense (why isn't Mako the main protagonist?).  But there is the hipster in me that wonders why he doesn't make another Pan's Labyrinth only as a full blown horror film.

Luckily, we get his "ultimate masterpiece" that has been in and out of development for 10 years or so.

Spoiler alert:  I bet "Crimson Peak" is a fancy term for "Blood Mountain".

I hope this movie does what people THINK it might do, which is reboot the entire stagnant horror genre.  GDT is also involved in one of the most anticipated horror video games with Silent Hills.  That is a lot to put on one guy and hopefully his vision can make a great movie and great video game.  My senses say it will be a mediocre movie and an awful video game because Hideo Kojima may have been fired from Konami. That's like Microsoft firing Bill Gates or Reese's Peanut Butter Cups firing Mr Peanut.  

If this movie re-invents the horror genre, I will be surprised.  CALL ME A PESSIMIST, but out of any movie on this list, this is the one I'm the most curious about.  It's different.  It's unique.  It's an original goddamn screenplay.  And holy shit, does the horror genre need an entire reset more than any other, except for maybe Rom-Coms.  

4.  Star Wars: The Force Awakens. 

I don't talk about it much but I used to be a HUGE Star Wars nerd.  I still want a Stormtrooper costume (contact me on Twitter if you have a free one).  I had books, comics, toys, and the video games holy shit, the first Star Wars: Dark Forces is one of my favorite games....in like the 30's range (also, Battlefront).  

So it should go as no surprise that I flipped my shit on this trailer.

WHEN THE MILLENNIUM FALCON PEW PEW'S AND I'M ALL LIKE YYYYYEAH PEW PEW BLAMMO.  GET SOME YOU DARK SIDE FUCKS!

I don't even care.

I don't even care about your opinion of me.

I want this movie to be so good my eyes are blown through the back of my skull.  

I don't even care.  I don't even care about your Jar-Jar attitude right now.  I want this movie to blow every other movie out of the water with tactical nuclear strikes.  I don't even care.

Also, George Lucas did such a terrible job with the prequels that this movie might be good just by association alone.  I expect the 2nd Star Wars movie to be dark as shit, just like my favorite Star Wars movie, The Empire Strikes Back.  So...Avengers: Age of Ultron might be the better movie, but fuck it, I wanna see this one more.  

CALL ME A STAR WARS NUTJOB!  I will take it as a compliment.  

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Thief (2014) Review

Writers note:  I did not finish this game.  I played about 15 hours.  I didn't finish because it sucks....hard.

My one sentence review of Thief would be: "It's a shitty Dishonored".  My in depth review of Thief would end: "So basically, this game is a shitty Dishonored".  I loved Dishonored.  This game tries to be Dishonored...only if it was shitty.

A much better game.

The first problem with this game is its terrible, TERRRRRRRRIBLE, level design.  Many gamers complained that this game is "too linear" and in a vacuum, that is like complaining that GTA is "too open world".  Linear games are fine.  Linear stealth games, however, are a problem.  Stealth games thrive in large environments.  The Last of Us, for example, has a linear progression but a majority of the levels are large enough to give the player options on how to handle a given situation. Thief is more like two virgins having sex.

You can pick the locks on doors, but can't open others.  You can open some windows, but not others.  You can climb a few walls, but most you can't (Some of the walls you can climb switches to a 3rd person Assassins Creed mode for no rational reason).  You can use the rope arrow to reach higher terrain like 2 times...making me question why I even bothered to buy the damn things.  In Dishonored, I almost always took to the rooftops to get around.  In Thief, you are limited to the ground in an insane number of times, except in the prologue which I think exists just to insult the player.  The prologue is almost all rooftop, like, "look at how much fun it is to run along rooftops", only the rest of the game NEVER LETS YOU DO THAT!

Imma touch you!

There is a stupid amount of dead ends in this game.  In a stealth game, that's a huge fucking problem because you need escape routes when you get spotted.  In Thief, whenever I try to escape getting noticed, I run into a dead end alleyway forcing me to use the awful combat system to fight my way through 6 guards and probably die.

Did I mention the combat system sucks?  Because holy shit, press one button to do all combat is worse than an insurance company who might appear when you're having sex.  I played this game on the PS3.  L1 to dodge, R1 to do all melee combat.  You can use a bow, but that only really works when the guards are not alerted (and even then, not always).  Think of the combat system from the Elder Scrolls games but somehow WORSE.

Yeah.  Totally believable fight sequence.  

But just in case this game didn't sound bad enough, the enemy AI is absolutely BROKEN.  Guards will never notice you unless you are 5 feet in front of them in a well lit area.  Apparently Garrett (the main character) is a wizard who is invisible in darkness even when a guard is looking DIRECTLY AT YOU AND STANDING 10 FEET AWAY.  However, if you are noticed, every guard in a 3 state radius bum rushes you and with the previously mentioned shitty combat system, AND inability to escape (I cannot stress how big of a problem that is for a stealth game), you are fucked.  That means you have to run every level absolutely perfectly, not because of purposely difficult design, but because of shitty design.

Before I move on to one last shitty thing about this game, I should mention that this game IS OPEN WORLD, but good fucking luck getting anywhere.  The map, holy hell, is fucking worthless.   I thought Deadly Premonition had the worst map in video game history but no, Thief is somehow worse.  You cannot zoom in, ever.  You cannot scroll.  YOU, CAN, NOT, SCROLL!  It is completely static.  Even then, the map is nothing but rectangles that might be connected but those connections ARE NOT SHOWN.  Holy shit, fuck this game.  It can't get a map right!

WHAT? My map never got this filled in...and THIS map still looks like shit.

This game was also written by Rhianna Pratchett who also wrote the new Tomb Raider with such a nuance, subtlety, and humanity that Lara Croft has never had.  So how did this boring, cliche, Dishonored ripoff of a story happen as well?  A good story could have convinced me to finish this game but even that sucked.

This is the same studio that did one of my favorite games of all time, Deus Ex: Human Revolution.  How?  HOW DOES THIS HAPPEN?   I know layoffs are a big problem in the gaming industry and why I only really trust Bioware and Atlus to be consistent (and I'm not even that confident in Bioware), but this has got to stop.  Square Enix doesn't get enough hate considering all the hate given to EA, Activision, and now Ubisoft (rightfully so).  But Square Enix is the forgotten 4th child.  Not quite as big as those other 3, but still big enough since they will have 15 shitty Final Fantasy games to offset their shitty* decisions elsewhere.

Final Fantasy XV coming soon!

*I've said "shitty" a lot in this post.  This post was brought to you by the AVGN.  Remember him?

Being a big fan of stealth games, this is the first Thief game I've ever played.  I know the previous ones are probably a lot better, I also know that I could probably just replay Dishonored.  Fuck this game.

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Here is my part 1 of my Top 10 Games list with a GOOD stealth game

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Here is a thing.  

3 Story Problems with Dragon Age:Inquisition

A major part of every Bioware game is it's story and narrative.  Dragon Age:Inquisition is no exception with an epic storyline with the fate of the world in your hands.   Of course, I have some thoughts on that, but I can't really talk about it without including some spoilers.  If you want to play the game and not have anything spoiled, skip this post.  If you have played the game, don't plan too, or just don't care if things get spoiled, click below to read.