Let me start this off with a story:
I have been buying Pokemon games since the Red and Blue versions came out in 1998. As such, I am a part of that special generation that dragged their unsuspecting parents to the Pokemon movies (just the first two, though). Since I bought my first Pokemon game, Blue Version, I have since bought and/or acquired: Yellow, Silver, crystal, Pearl, and Platinum. Apparently, I have a pattern where I'm fooled into buying a new Pokemon game and then I just HAVE to get the third one for each set.
Now, by the time Pearl Version came out, Pokemon had taken something of a dive in its former popularity. I don't know if this is true with most peoples' experience, but after a while, people got tired of hearing that there were more and more Pokemon. Basically, it felt like we were buying the same game with more and more Pokemon, not all of which were particularly likable.
So after defending my purchase, I bought Pearl Version. I was all about Giratina; I thought it was easily one of the coolest legendary Pokemon to come out of the series. So then they said they were going to release Pokemon Platinum, where Giratina was the game's mascot. So I stated that my new purpose in life was to buy Platinum. After being mocked about me being "addicted" to Pokemon, I again defended myself. I said, "Well, this is the last Pokemon game I am going to buy."
Nope.
I too was filled with the skepticism of my friends, but when I heard that Black and White were in development and that they were going to have new features, it popped on my radar. Then I read about the new features and saw that very few of the new features were not the same things that would get changed from game to game all the damn time.
I am generally a man of my word, so I needed something really new to happen in Pokemon Black or White. What sold it to me was that there were only new Pokemon for the first part of the game. ONLY new Pokemon. Know what that means?
In caves, I would run into NO GEODUDES AND NO ZUBATS. That was my prompt to get signed the heck up for Generation V of Pokemon (Jeez, five!?)
Where an I going with all of this? Well, as I assert in the title, I feel like this is exactly what a Pokemon sequel should be. Adding animations to the normally-still sprites was a great touch for presentation, as was adding a map that doesn't look like crap. And while certain Pokemon may not seem particularly well-designed (http://www.hejibits.com/comics/gray-matter/ is pretty accurate), I found a bunch I really like. Adding Triple Battles was pretty fun, too, though it can get a little frustrating when some moves don't reach other Pokemon.
If you are on the fence about buying Pokemon Black or White, I'd suggest edging over to the side of buying the game. It's not going to change your mind if you're a loyalist to the first generation of Pokemon, but I had a blast discovering the new Pokemon and exploring a new game world. Pokemon was growing a little gray around the edges, even for a loyalist like me, but this one felt fresh enough that I didn't at all regret my purchase.
Saturday, May 21, 2011
Tuesday, May 17, 2011
God of War as Played By Someone Several Years Too Late to the Party (Part Two)
So God of War one had me convinced that I was playing one of the Great New Franchises before I had even made it halfway through the game. But I had yet to face the terror that is Pandora's Temple.
The temple itself was impressive, and held my interest as I completed challenge after challenge. I could remember thinking, "I wonder if this is the only temple in the game, because this doesn't seen like it would be that big of a place. Oh ho ho, foolish me. I made it through that first elevator waiting for Pandora's Box, and then... new enemy type. 'Damn,' thought I,' this place isn't going to end for a good long while, it it?'
It was about here that I figured just how much I had underestimated God of War. I figured that the rest of the game would be along the lines of: Pandora's Temple, then maybe some other obstacle, then fighting Ares. And I suppose I was correct, but not in the sheer scope of what was about to happen. Pandora's Temple was eight kinds of epic, the obstacle on the way to Ares was crazy (There's a reason that saying "The Blades of Hades" can make some gamers cringe), and then I got to Ares. Ares too does everything that had been done with video game boss fights and added more, and I greatly appreciated that they took, "This is my TRUE FORM" (death-metal spider legs) and moved that to the beginning of the fight.
That left God of War II to follow some pretty impressive video-gamery. That's why, when it started off with Kratos being stupidly-overpowered, I was giddy. It was time to kill hapless soldiers once more. Then he loses his powers (as is the sad case with sequels) and has to regain them. So how do you out-do having the god of war as your final adversary? How about having Zeus, King of Gods and famous father-killer, take the reins as your villain?
God of War II was everything that it should have been. Sequels are tricky, and being able to generalize about what they ought to be is foolish in the varied world of video games. But God of War II needed to be bigger, badder, and possibly more epic than God of War. Somehow, it pulled it off, and the GoW dev team really needs a pat on the back for that, if nothing else.
Now then, as I said in my last post, mine was a Nintendo household, and my exposure to Sony systems was rare. It's amazing what holding a completely new controller can do to you when it comes to quick-time events, which the fights with Ares and Zeus were made of. This may seem like an odd complaint, seeing how the game is littered with them, even with non-boss characters. But imagine that the shapes that you are so used to on controllers were suddenly replaced by a banana, a phone, a squiggly line, and an X (since that seems to be the only common denominator between controllers). I got away with some of the other boss fights because I had time to glance down at the controller, look back up and press it. Not so much with Ares and Zeus. Imagine that a banana icon jumped on the screen and that meant you had .5 seconds to press the banana button. "Which one was ba--" is about as far as you could think before Zeus would plant a sword in your skull.
That was me. For an hour.
The temple itself was impressive, and held my interest as I completed challenge after challenge. I could remember thinking, "I wonder if this is the only temple in the game, because this doesn't seen like it would be that big of a place. Oh ho ho, foolish me. I made it through that first elevator waiting for Pandora's Box, and then... new enemy type. 'Damn,' thought I,' this place isn't going to end for a good long while, it it?'
It was about here that I figured just how much I had underestimated God of War. I figured that the rest of the game would be along the lines of: Pandora's Temple, then maybe some other obstacle, then fighting Ares. And I suppose I was correct, but not in the sheer scope of what was about to happen. Pandora's Temple was eight kinds of epic, the obstacle on the way to Ares was crazy (There's a reason that saying "The Blades of Hades" can make some gamers cringe), and then I got to Ares. Ares too does everything that had been done with video game boss fights and added more, and I greatly appreciated that they took, "This is my TRUE FORM" (death-metal spider legs) and moved that to the beginning of the fight.
That left God of War II to follow some pretty impressive video-gamery. That's why, when it started off with Kratos being stupidly-overpowered, I was giddy. It was time to kill hapless soldiers once more. Then he loses his powers (as is the sad case with sequels) and has to regain them. So how do you out-do having the god of war as your final adversary? How about having Zeus, King of Gods and famous father-killer, take the reins as your villain?
God of War II was everything that it should have been. Sequels are tricky, and being able to generalize about what they ought to be is foolish in the varied world of video games. But God of War II needed to be bigger, badder, and possibly more epic than God of War. Somehow, it pulled it off, and the GoW dev team really needs a pat on the back for that, if nothing else.
Now then, as I said in my last post, mine was a Nintendo household, and my exposure to Sony systems was rare. It's amazing what holding a completely new controller can do to you when it comes to quick-time events, which the fights with Ares and Zeus were made of. This may seem like an odd complaint, seeing how the game is littered with them, even with non-boss characters. But imagine that the shapes that you are so used to on controllers were suddenly replaced by a banana, a phone, a squiggly line, and an X (since that seems to be the only common denominator between controllers). I got away with some of the other boss fights because I had time to glance down at the controller, look back up and press it. Not so much with Ares and Zeus. Imagine that a banana icon jumped on the screen and that meant you had .5 seconds to press the banana button. "Which one was ba--" is about as far as you could think before Zeus would plant a sword in your skull.
That was me. For an hour.
Thursday, March 10, 2011
God of War as Played By Someone Several Years Too Late to the Party
So, for everyone who doesn't know, when I grew up, mine was a Nintendo household. I grew up playing an NES, an SNES, and a Gameboy (followed by the Gameboy Pocket and Gameboy Color). Then the great divide came; Sega Saturn was flailing about like the dying fish it turned out to be, and there was a choice to be made (in poor poor one-console households anyways): Do we jump ship and go to these shiny newcomers, Sony; or do we stick with our guns and stay with Nintendo?
At least that's how I viewed it. I knew that the system I wanted was the Nintendo 64, though, and that I wanted to skip out on the Playstation 2.
Fast forward to the generation of Gamecube, PS2, and Xbox, where I stayed true to my Nintendonian leanings. I know that I missed out on a lot of extremely important games from the other consoles, notably (bonus points for reading the title) God of War and God of War II. I knew that these were good games according to the critics and all my friends, but I also knew I had no access to it. I could only judge the game by second-hand re-tellings of how awesome it was. The most memorable thing I read about the series comes from Tycho of Penny Arcade:
"Imagine that there is a Harpy swooping overhead, and that you have become perplexed by said harpy. Let me break it down for you:
Other games: Hit harpy with weapon.
God of War: Grab each leathery wingtip, yanking the creature out of the sky. Place your boot on the back of the neck and pull off the Goddamn wings with a strong upward motion."
After reading that, how could you not be sad that your only exposure to the game has been secondhand? I later played the game over a period of several visits to my cousin's house. I got to see how awesome it was, and I made it about halfway-ish through the game, to the point where I saw Kronos in the desert. I was hooked, but I couldn't play the game any more after that.
Now fast forward to today. I am lucky enough to have a roommate with a Playstation 3 and several great games from the PS2 era, including (who could guess?) God of War and God of War II. I have a lot to say about them, so it would be pertinent to end this post here and leave another more edible chunk later.
(Spoiler Alert: I really liked them)
At least that's how I viewed it. I knew that the system I wanted was the Nintendo 64, though, and that I wanted to skip out on the Playstation 2.
Fast forward to the generation of Gamecube, PS2, and Xbox, where I stayed true to my Nintendonian leanings. I know that I missed out on a lot of extremely important games from the other consoles, notably (bonus points for reading the title) God of War and God of War II. I knew that these were good games according to the critics and all my friends, but I also knew I had no access to it. I could only judge the game by second-hand re-tellings of how awesome it was. The most memorable thing I read about the series comes from Tycho of Penny Arcade:
"Imagine that there is a Harpy swooping overhead, and that you have become perplexed by said harpy. Let me break it down for you:
Other games: Hit harpy with weapon.
God of War: Grab each leathery wingtip, yanking the creature out of the sky. Place your boot on the back of the neck and pull off the Goddamn wings with a strong upward motion."
After reading that, how could you not be sad that your only exposure to the game has been secondhand? I later played the game over a period of several visits to my cousin's house. I got to see how awesome it was, and I made it about halfway-ish through the game, to the point where I saw Kronos in the desert. I was hooked, but I couldn't play the game any more after that.
Now fast forward to today. I am lucky enough to have a roommate with a Playstation 3 and several great games from the PS2 era, including (who could guess?) God of War and God of War II. I have a lot to say about them, so it would be pertinent to end this post here and leave another more edible chunk later.
(Spoiler Alert: I really liked them)
Friday, December 24, 2010
The Humble Indie Bundle
Just adding another blog into the sea of blogs talking about how awesome the Humble Indie Bundle is. It's just pretty darn awesome for both consumers and developers, and naming your own price is about the coolest thing in the world for broke college students. It's really cool for two reasons: 1)I would never have played these games if they weren't all set up in the same package, and 2) I got 5 games for 6 bucks. The fact that some of the money went to Child's Play, a charity I have been a big fan of for a long time, is pretty cool as well; now I can say I supported the charity, however weak my contribution may have been.
I have a big soapbox position about video game piracy that I kinda felt like talking about, but the point is moot; if you have an opinion on it, I'm probably not going to change it here. But things like The Humble Indie Bundle are a wonderful way to let the people who have the money barrier for games get some good games for a low price.
The money I paid was supposed to be my thanks, I suppose, but I really wanted to do what little I could to thank them more. SO thanks to all of the people who made the Humble Indie Bundle possible, from the developers to the people who put the bundle together.
I have a big soapbox position about video game piracy that I kinda felt like talking about, but the point is moot; if you have an opinion on it, I'm probably not going to change it here. But things like The Humble Indie Bundle are a wonderful way to let the people who have the money barrier for games get some good games for a low price.
The money I paid was supposed to be my thanks, I suppose, but I really wanted to do what little I could to thank them more. SO thanks to all of the people who made the Humble Indie Bundle possible, from the developers to the people who put the bundle together.
Thursday, September 9, 2010
What Does Scott Pilgrim Mean about Geek Culture in the Mainstream?
The whole phenomenon of Scott Pilgrim vs The World (the movie) is kind of fascinating to me, because as this Cracked article points out, movies that geeks are crazy for do not seem to do well at all. Scott Pilgrim seemed, for a while, to be the great new hope to change that pattern. Spoiler alert: it didn't.
A brief history for those who don't know about the whole thing: the first Scott Pilgrim graphic novel was published in August 2004. Written by Brian Lee O' Malley, the book has received generally positive reviews, and if there is such a thing as the underground comics scene, it is one of the success stories to emerge from it. The next 5 books have a similar story (review-wise, not plot-wise), and the whole series has benefited from the movie. According to BookScan's Top 20 Graphic Novels for August 2010, all six books have jumped to the top sellers list, with Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life (Vol 1) at the number one position, indicating that the movie has fueled a pretty good amount of interest to the series as a whole.
Scott Pilgrim vs The World (the movie) was one of the biggest hype machines that the internet has seen in a while. If you want a physical representation of how excited people were for the movie, look no further than this picture of the Scott Pilgrim Comic-Con panel. The excitement for Scott Pilgrim drew a huge advertising budget from Universal. From billboards to posters on the sides of buses, from commercials to signs on the side of buildings; interested or not, very few people could say they were unaware of the movie. Despite all of this, the movie was poorly received in a numbers standpoint.
Box Office Mojo lists that as of 9/7/10 (the day before this article is being written), Scott Pilgrim has grossed $29,392,215 (Foreign- $9,527,630). This comes after a $60 million budget to make the movie. To put that in perspective, here are two other releases that came out on the same weekend:
The Expendables: Domestic- $94,383,026 Foreign- $90,000,000
Eat Pray Love: Domestic- $70,763,971 (Unreleased outside of the states)
Here's a movie that was released 5 days after Scott Pilgrim:
Vampires Suck: Domestic - $33,367,217 Foreign - $756,000
The Expendables, Eat Pray Love, and Scott Pilgrim all shared similar budgets of 60 million-plus dollars. Vampires Suck was made for about $20 million. I'd like to pepper in some stats for the reviews that these movies have taken. Listing these movies according to Rotten Tomatoes's rating system in order of worst movies to best, we get this result: Vampires Suck (6%), Eat Pray Love (37%), The Expendables(40%), Scott Pilgrim vs The World (81%). The percentages noted are the percentage of positive reviews the movie has received. Metacritic, a similar website, almost mirrors the results of the other search: Vampires Suck (18%), The Expendables(45%), Eat Pray Love (50%), Scott Pilgrim vs The World (69%).
It's difficult to imagine the reasons that the movie did not do as well as people thought it would. Maybe geeks aren't as big an audience that people thought it was. Maybe people are scared of new ideas, and going to the same type of movie that was released last year is comfortable. I'm not really trying to judge here. Eat Pray Love was probably a great movie if it's what you are into, and it certainly doesn't try to hide what it's about. The Expendables's cast is an action movie aficionado's dream, although I'm told it should have been executed better than it turned out. And Vampires Suck... well, you couldn't pay me to spend two hours at at theater watching Vampires Suck. Maybe if it could pay off my college loans, but certainly nothing short of that.
As my title points out, and as much as it pains me to say this, it might be that geek culture does not translate well to the mainstream. It certainly seems like it has its merits, but of course I think that: I'm a huge nerd. I get all of the little in-jokes and what the SNES sounds are. Joe America does not always get those jokes, and he might feel alienated because of it. It is safer to see a more popular movie because you know what you're in for.
But look at the good the movie has done for geeks: a good percentage of people who didn't know about the comics have been motivated to buy them. The movie itself is sure to be a cult classic, and as director Kevin Smith says, the movie's success isn't about the money, it's about the movie itself. Also, Micheal Cera finally got to fight in a movie instead of being a wimp, so that was nice. I know what little money I have to spare on such things is going to a Special Edition Scott Pilgrim DVD, and maybe the comics if I have extra spare money. Scott Pilgrim vs. the World: The Game is another huge success story. A $10 game that turned out to be anything but shovelware, it has received hugely positive reviews (Metacritic shows a rating of 77 as of 9/8/10). It even gave pixel artist Paul Robertson a job as lead animator for a video game, something which I personally have been waiting for since I saw Kings of Power 4 billion%.
A box office success or not, Scott Pilgrim rocked the world. It could be that geekiness is best left to live in the world of the geek, but I am personally ecstatic that this project had such an impact on the geek world. It might not be everyone's cup of tea, but it's like they say: trying to please everybody is sure to result in a mediocre product that almost no one will enjoy. This one's for the nerds, I guess, and I for one am glad to be a member of that group.
A brief history for those who don't know about the whole thing: the first Scott Pilgrim graphic novel was published in August 2004. Written by Brian Lee O' Malley, the book has received generally positive reviews, and if there is such a thing as the underground comics scene, it is one of the success stories to emerge from it. The next 5 books have a similar story (review-wise, not plot-wise), and the whole series has benefited from the movie. According to BookScan's Top 20 Graphic Novels for August 2010, all six books have jumped to the top sellers list, with Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life (Vol 1) at the number one position, indicating that the movie has fueled a pretty good amount of interest to the series as a whole.
Scott Pilgrim vs The World (the movie) was one of the biggest hype machines that the internet has seen in a while. If you want a physical representation of how excited people were for the movie, look no further than this picture of the Scott Pilgrim Comic-Con panel. The excitement for Scott Pilgrim drew a huge advertising budget from Universal. From billboards to posters on the sides of buses, from commercials to signs on the side of buildings; interested or not, very few people could say they were unaware of the movie. Despite all of this, the movie was poorly received in a numbers standpoint.
Box Office Mojo lists that as of 9/7/10 (the day before this article is being written), Scott Pilgrim has grossed $29,392,215 (Foreign- $9,527,630). This comes after a $60 million budget to make the movie. To put that in perspective, here are two other releases that came out on the same weekend:
The Expendables: Domestic- $94,383,026 Foreign- $90,000,000
Eat Pray Love: Domestic- $70,763,971 (Unreleased outside of the states)
Here's a movie that was released 5 days after Scott Pilgrim:
Vampires Suck: Domestic - $33,367,217 Foreign - $756,000
The Expendables, Eat Pray Love, and Scott Pilgrim all shared similar budgets of 60 million-plus dollars. Vampires Suck was made for about $20 million. I'd like to pepper in some stats for the reviews that these movies have taken. Listing these movies according to Rotten Tomatoes's rating system in order of worst movies to best, we get this result: Vampires Suck (6%), Eat Pray Love (37%), The Expendables(40%), Scott Pilgrim vs The World (81%). The percentages noted are the percentage of positive reviews the movie has received. Metacritic, a similar website, almost mirrors the results of the other search: Vampires Suck (18%), The Expendables(45%), Eat Pray Love (50%), Scott Pilgrim vs The World (69%).
It's difficult to imagine the reasons that the movie did not do as well as people thought it would. Maybe geeks aren't as big an audience that people thought it was. Maybe people are scared of new ideas, and going to the same type of movie that was released last year is comfortable. I'm not really trying to judge here. Eat Pray Love was probably a great movie if it's what you are into, and it certainly doesn't try to hide what it's about. The Expendables's cast is an action movie aficionado's dream, although I'm told it should have been executed better than it turned out. And Vampires Suck... well, you couldn't pay me to spend two hours at at theater watching Vampires Suck. Maybe if it could pay off my college loans, but certainly nothing short of that.
As my title points out, and as much as it pains me to say this, it might be that geek culture does not translate well to the mainstream. It certainly seems like it has its merits, but of course I think that: I'm a huge nerd. I get all of the little in-jokes and what the SNES sounds are. Joe America does not always get those jokes, and he might feel alienated because of it. It is safer to see a more popular movie because you know what you're in for.
But look at the good the movie has done for geeks: a good percentage of people who didn't know about the comics have been motivated to buy them. The movie itself is sure to be a cult classic, and as director Kevin Smith says, the movie's success isn't about the money, it's about the movie itself. Also, Micheal Cera finally got to fight in a movie instead of being a wimp, so that was nice. I know what little money I have to spare on such things is going to a Special Edition Scott Pilgrim DVD, and maybe the comics if I have extra spare money. Scott Pilgrim vs. the World: The Game is another huge success story. A $10 game that turned out to be anything but shovelware, it has received hugely positive reviews (Metacritic shows a rating of 77 as of 9/8/10). It even gave pixel artist Paul Robertson a job as lead animator for a video game, something which I personally have been waiting for since I saw Kings of Power 4 billion%.
A box office success or not, Scott Pilgrim rocked the world. It could be that geekiness is best left to live in the world of the geek, but I am personally ecstatic that this project had such an impact on the geek world. It might not be everyone's cup of tea, but it's like they say: trying to please everybody is sure to result in a mediocre product that almost no one will enjoy. This one's for the nerds, I guess, and I for one am glad to be a member of that group.
Sunday, September 5, 2010
A Note When You're Designing Video Game Bosses
Just making a short post because I've been nagging myself to post for... what? 5 months now? Well, at least it's a shorter break then some of the webcomics I read (but at least those are enjoyable to its readers).
So here's the thing: games aren't perfect. That's given. But when you have a JRPG boss that can wipe out your team in two hits, you may have slightly overpowered them. If you have a boss that can use the most powerful unblockable magic that attacks all of your team at once, you may want to reconsider attaching that spell. If that boss can use that spell three times in a row and immediately regain full MP before their turn is over, you're just being annoying.
And you know, all of the above complaining is pretty suitable for final bosses. And I'm not saying that I expect a flashing weak point on everything I fight. But I'd expect that when my main character halves every attack (except stupid unblockable magic), he'd live for more than two attacks.
But when walkthroughs say that you should "Null Fire and hope for the best," and getting the skill to Null Fire isn't something you're warned to do ahead of time, it's frustrating.
That's all, though. The rest of the game is friggin great.
So here's the thing: games aren't perfect. That's given. But when you have a JRPG boss that can wipe out your team in two hits, you may have slightly overpowered them. If you have a boss that can use the most powerful unblockable magic that attacks all of your team at once, you may want to reconsider attaching that spell. If that boss can use that spell three times in a row and immediately regain full MP before their turn is over, you're just being annoying.
And you know, all of the above complaining is pretty suitable for final bosses. And I'm not saying that I expect a flashing weak point on everything I fight. But I'd expect that when my main character halves every attack (except stupid unblockable magic), he'd live for more than two attacks.
But when walkthroughs say that you should "Null Fire and hope for the best," and getting the skill to Null Fire isn't something you're warned to do ahead of time, it's frustrating.
That's all, though. The rest of the game is friggin great.
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
So this is How I Feel about Avatar
Okay, first off, I want to say that I am proud to be probably the three-millionth person to write about Avatar. On a scale of originality, I am probably between talking about drunk college students and how dumb the iPad is.
But still. I have my opinions, and I wish to sling them out into the world where everyone (read: three people) can read them.
So I was one of the miscreants who didn't see Avatar in mind-boggling 3-D. Ya know, I do wish that I had seen it in 3-D, because everything I did like about the movie would have been made much better. Yes, I said it: I did like some parts of Avatar. Anyone who's been around me in the past 3 weeks will probably be shocked or call me a liar or throw rocks at me or something, but yes, I didn't think the movie was a complete waste of time. The thing about 3-D is that it is like the Wii: it is much easier to make a quick, very gimmicky buck with it than to actually put some decent effort into making it a respectable platform. And from what I understand, the 3-D-ness of the IMAX experience made Avatar what it set out to be. I mean really, did you see those floating mountains! Those were awesome! I WISH those mountains had been floating in front of me, popping off the screen. I would have probably been taken into the world more, which segues me nicely into my thing about Pandora:
Something that has been kinda bothering me about Avatar is the world they live on. Pandora is by all means, a beautiful, wonderfully-rendered, awesome accomplishment in film, and everyone involved with creating it needs to be given a high-five. And based on what I can hear from the positive reviews about Avatar, this is where me and the fans are in agreement. The idea of the planet being connected with the creatures inhabiting it by way of electrical impulses is pretty darn cool. Okay, do I have all of the happy out of the way? Good. The thing about Avatar's super-awesome world and the people on it is that it's nothing I haven't seen before. Giant-overmind-world aside, I felt like the planet was just adding to the preachy-ness of the movie. The overmind aspect of Pandora was just used to make more commentary on how bad man is, and if anything will frustrate me about anything, it is when you are prompted to say, "Yeah! Mankind sucks!"
Look, mankind does kind of drop the ball from time to time. In fact, I'd say mankind has dropped the ball more than the Oakland Raiders have lately. But just like my unfounded loyalty towards the silver and black, I feel that to write mankind off as washed up shells of what we once were is stupid. Which brings me to the way that the cardboard-cutout of a military was portrayed. Where, exactly, was our motivation? On looking for Unobtanium, possibly the least-thought-out name since the iPad (ba-dum-pish). Hey, awesome, so we need something that Pandora has, right? And mankind will fall without it? No? Okay then, we have researched the element and have found it to hold immense energy potential, right? No? It's just worth a lot of money. Yes, that makes sense. Because we would approve of spending a probably unheard of amount of money to build a settlement on a new freaking planet, just to look for a new rock. Did you see the Unobtanium on the executive's desk? It wasn't even shiny!! At least gold and silver, two other ways to invest your money in shiny rocks, have some luster and beauty to them. So why fight the giant cat-people to the death? Because MAN IS GREEDY AND LIKES TO FIGHT.
It's the black knight riding in to destroy all that is good. He lands a good blow on the white knight, who struggles just a little bit before he pulls himself together in time to avenge all that has been destroyed. It's a good story, if a bit (A LOT) overdone. I do have a problem with the fact that I felt like I had seen the movie before. But I have connected to much better fictional worlds than this one. Have you seen what Bioware and 2K Games did in making the Mass Effect universe and Rapture, the underwater world of Bioshock? They are beautiful, wonderful places, and, importantly, filled with atmosphere. When I played Bioshock, I wanted to (and still do) find out everything about Rapture. When I watched Avatar, I didn't care. I didn't care that the big home tree was blown to pieces. By that time, I was so tired of the Na'vi, I was kinda rooting for the humans.
So, to wrap up and hop off of my soap box. Avatar: good movie? Yes. Great world, technologically awesome, and the overmind-world thing was way cool. Movie of the year? Did you see Up? Inglorious Basterds? Those movies earned it so much more. Even if they don't win, just don't let Crapatar win (see what I did there?).
But still. I have my opinions, and I wish to sling them out into the world where everyone (read: three people) can read them.
So I was one of the miscreants who didn't see Avatar in mind-boggling 3-D. Ya know, I do wish that I had seen it in 3-D, because everything I did like about the movie would have been made much better. Yes, I said it: I did like some parts of Avatar. Anyone who's been around me in the past 3 weeks will probably be shocked or call me a liar or throw rocks at me or something, but yes, I didn't think the movie was a complete waste of time. The thing about 3-D is that it is like the Wii: it is much easier to make a quick, very gimmicky buck with it than to actually put some decent effort into making it a respectable platform. And from what I understand, the 3-D-ness of the IMAX experience made Avatar what it set out to be. I mean really, did you see those floating mountains! Those were awesome! I WISH those mountains had been floating in front of me, popping off the screen. I would have probably been taken into the world more, which segues me nicely into my thing about Pandora:
Something that has been kinda bothering me about Avatar is the world they live on. Pandora is by all means, a beautiful, wonderfully-rendered, awesome accomplishment in film, and everyone involved with creating it needs to be given a high-five. And based on what I can hear from the positive reviews about Avatar, this is where me and the fans are in agreement. The idea of the planet being connected with the creatures inhabiting it by way of electrical impulses is pretty darn cool. Okay, do I have all of the happy out of the way? Good. The thing about Avatar's super-awesome world and the people on it is that it's nothing I haven't seen before. Giant-overmind-world aside, I felt like the planet was just adding to the preachy-ness of the movie. The overmind aspect of Pandora was just used to make more commentary on how bad man is, and if anything will frustrate me about anything, it is when you are prompted to say, "Yeah! Mankind sucks!"
Look, mankind does kind of drop the ball from time to time. In fact, I'd say mankind has dropped the ball more than the Oakland Raiders have lately. But just like my unfounded loyalty towards the silver and black, I feel that to write mankind off as washed up shells of what we once were is stupid. Which brings me to the way that the cardboard-cutout of a military was portrayed. Where, exactly, was our motivation? On looking for Unobtanium, possibly the least-thought-out name since the iPad (ba-dum-pish). Hey, awesome, so we need something that Pandora has, right? And mankind will fall without it? No? Okay then, we have researched the element and have found it to hold immense energy potential, right? No? It's just worth a lot of money. Yes, that makes sense. Because we would approve of spending a probably unheard of amount of money to build a settlement on a new freaking planet, just to look for a new rock. Did you see the Unobtanium on the executive's desk? It wasn't even shiny!! At least gold and silver, two other ways to invest your money in shiny rocks, have some luster and beauty to them. So why fight the giant cat-people to the death? Because MAN IS GREEDY AND LIKES TO FIGHT.
It's the black knight riding in to destroy all that is good. He lands a good blow on the white knight, who struggles just a little bit before he pulls himself together in time to avenge all that has been destroyed. It's a good story, if a bit (A LOT) overdone. I do have a problem with the fact that I felt like I had seen the movie before. But I have connected to much better fictional worlds than this one. Have you seen what Bioware and 2K Games did in making the Mass Effect universe and Rapture, the underwater world of Bioshock? They are beautiful, wonderful places, and, importantly, filled with atmosphere. When I played Bioshock, I wanted to (and still do) find out everything about Rapture. When I watched Avatar, I didn't care. I didn't care that the big home tree was blown to pieces. By that time, I was so tired of the Na'vi, I was kinda rooting for the humans.
So, to wrap up and hop off of my soap box. Avatar: good movie? Yes. Great world, technologically awesome, and the overmind-world thing was way cool. Movie of the year? Did you see Up? Inglorious Basterds? Those movies earned it so much more. Even if they don't win, just don't let Crapatar win (see what I did there?).
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