Astromancer

Dark Souls. It's awesome.

Spoilers:

 

A good game overall. Did not thrill me. The entire art style from characters to music to the amazing skyboxes and environments in general makes it worth playing. The first hour or so of this game is absolutely amazing. The lighthouse and the rocket, going through the chapel and exploring the town, all top-notch. More atmospheric than anything in the first Bioshock, and good enough to outclass anything and everything contemporary with it. After that it all went downhill. I won't get into the changes the game went through in development, from the relentless character re-do's to the fact that Ken Levine rewrote the entire thing in the final six months (it was ready to ship in 2011...), but the game suffered. It suffered a lot.

 

The game goes full retard after you pick ball 77. The violence in this game is ridiculously overplayed. It goes from well-paced exploration and storytelling to an all-out derpfest in a few short seconds. all sense of realism and care for the narrative goes out the window. You must murder at least a dozen cops every half-mile. Blew me right out of the scenario. So you do a lot of fighting to get to Elizabeth, who in pre-production was an unsure-of-herself, meek, sheltered heroine who's slowly discovering how to use her Godlike powers. In the final product she's little more than a pretty face. Elizabeth, who's supposedly never interacted with anybody but the Songbird (except by travelling through her tears, of course, which makes little sense considering that she says she always returned to her cage for her "family", when it was only the Songbird the entire time), is not the least bit shocked by gunfire or violence. Sure, they play it up when she commits her little act of killing later in the campaign, but she does little else besides ducking when the bullets fly. And she's a social butterfly everywhere you go. The caged girl. Not screaming, not scrambling for a corner, not crying (things I, a 19 year old male might very well do if there's 20 people firing guns over my head and corpses everywhere), just getting down and hunting for items to help you along.

 

The point is that the violence was entirely out of place in this game, and served to murder the story. Levine had a good product in the unreleased version, and decided last minute to do something entirely different. You don't try to lay low, or find an easy way off the city, you run around slaughtering hundreds of police officers until the Vox start up, then you start killing them too. The story isn't bad, really, but it's spread out in between long sections of mindless death. Don't tell me that it was intentional, trying to contrast the beauty of the city against Booker's violent nature, that's bullshit. It was purely a "shit, we really don't have a good way to stress character development here, so lets just have Elizabeth say a couple more things to the player after every encounter" thing.

 

Personally, the whole plot behind the multiple realities, Comstock, and Elizabeth's origins felt very last-minute-written...because it was. It's a game with a brilliant opening sequence, a fantastic soundtrack, amazing art and environment direction, and very, very forced, rushed everything else. They recycled plasmids from the first two games, as well as Voxophones (elements they said they didn't want to repeat in pre-production), did very little to make the gunplay stand-out, and butchered what could have been great.

 

If you love the game, I'm not trying to rain on your parade, but hot damn this game is getting critical praise that it just does not deserve. Elizabeth is about as deep as a puddle. The fan wanking about her being a brilliant character can be shut down with the question "Would you like her if she was ugly?", because the answer is a realistic and overwhelming no. She's pretty. She looks like Zooey Deschanel. That's why they love her. The scene from the E3 demonstration of her trying to bring the horse back to life against Booker's warnings had everyone hopeful for the next great AI companion, but she's pretty useless throughout the missions (she has godlike powers, and she's hunting for random shit to hand you...the way the tears were implemented in combat was pitiful). It's sad that Half Life 2's Alyx Vance is several years old, and still outclasses her in terms of personality and use in game.

 

The ending...I wanted to like it, but the way it's delivered made zero sense. You go through all that fighting, all that harrowing shit, and suddenly Elizabeth is aware of the multiverse, the multiple Bookers, the "constants and variables". There was no inkling of her being aware of these things up until that moment. That is a forced twist. The best parts of the entire game for me were the opening sequence and when you free Elizabeth from the torture machine and she brings forth the tornado. That's the kind of shit I was wanting to see throughout the entire thing (and she was doing all sorts of massive shit with her powers in the unreleased version of the game).

 

In short, it's alright, but I was let down. Levine did so much touting of his amazing story and brilliant AI companion to have them fall so, so short.

I'm so, so excited for the next season, which will be the second half of A Storm of Swords. All the shit goes down. Hopefully they get the guy who played The Mountain in season 1 back, because the guy they have as him now is just not going to cut it. Nothing against him personally, but he's just a tall guy. He doesn't have that feral animal element that s1 Gregor did.

Vapor Trails for me all the way. I can crank up VT and rock out to the whole thing start to finish, enjoying every second. It's bright, hot, urgent. Love it. I skip through most of Test For Echo, sadly. I like the opening track and Driven kicks ass, but other than that...I don't even think I remember the other tracks.

 

I mean, come on. One Little Victory, Vapor Trails, Earthshine, they just rock so goddamned hard. And even if everything in between isn't as memorable, I don't have any urge to skip songs.

At first I thought I was in for something really, really stupid based on the Krypton opening. It was, like the OP said, way to much like Star Wars, just CGI everywhere...and that flying mount that Jor was riding. What the hell was that? It got better fast, though. Cavill made an awesome Kal, the scenes of young Clark were all badass, Kevin Costner was somehow touching, Lois was a solid character, Zod was a fantastic villain, even if his crew of Kryptonians was a bit silly.

 

I enjoyed the whole film, start to finish, even if it had a few writing issues for me. I thought they should have kept the whole Earth's atmosphere element out of it and just stuck with the Yellow Sun alone...I think that Krypton would have figured it out by then that nitrogen and oxygen give them superpowers. Overall though, hell yes, that was a good Superman film.

Dune by Frank Herbert, easily. I'm a huge fan of King, Moorcock, and Robert E Howard as well, but Herbert just blew my mind.

AFFC was pretty slow in relation to the holy-f***ing-shit thrillride that is A Storm of Swords, but I enjoyed the hell out of it. Jamie's chapters especially, the book actually managed to make me like him. I've yet to read A Dance With Dragons. Waiting on soft-cover or trade paperback.

Ha, the Hall of Bullshit. I didn't keep track of it for a long time because I thought "If Rush isn't in it, how relevant to music can it actually be?", but I about lost my shit when I learned that Deep Purple, among others have been barred access to something called a f***ing "Rock'n Roll Hall of Fame".

 

I mean, the whole thing is just an insult to music. I laughed when I learned to that Pop and Rap stars are in, because that just further proves the point. It doesn't matter. Let them have their crap. Let them have the trendiest popularity contest in the world, because anyone who actually understands or cares about real musical talent will go "Rush and Deep Purple aren't in? What the f**k kind of Hall is that?".

I like the physical build of a lot of Apple products (aluminum feels nice, iPads are just-right, everything has a nice keyboard), but paying for them is idiocy.

 

As someone else mentioned, for the same price as a Macbook Pro, you can have a monster gaming-tower that will outperform any Mac.

Tai Shan is pretty. It makes me feel nice.

The only one I'd consider weak there is Presto, and even it has songs I enjoy present on it.

 

Honestly, I don't see what could bring a person to dislike Power Windows. Did you get raped while it was playing, or what?

I saw him last year and thought he sounded stellar. I've never had a problem with him; I want to hear Geddy, not a "singer". He's technically nothing as far as his voice goes, in all likelihood, but he's what I enjoy hearing and what I expect to hear when I hear Rush.

 

Plus, he's playing bass and synth while he does it, so it would take a person with equal multitasking credentials to oppose him.

QUOTE (tjtull @ Dec 1 2011, 09:21 AM)

I voted for PoW. I've never been a huge fan of CP, though a lot of the songs have grown on me over the years. I still think Nobody's Hero is cringe worthy though.

As much as I enjoy hearing Counter Parts, Power Windows easily wins this for me.

 

It's no contest, really, with PoW having Marathon, The Big Money, The Manhattan Project, Middletown Dreams...I love all of those songs dearly.

 

CP is awesome, but IMO, it doesn't hold a candle to the magic that was captured by PoW.

QUOTE (Union 5-3992 @ Oct 11 2011, 06:12 PM)

I'm interested in it, despite not liking the Hulk movies and Thor.

I'll have to think about it.

 

Also, I actually enjoyed a lot of the films on this list, especially 2004's The Punisher. It wasn't bad at all, if I remember correctly.

Geddy's opening vocals in The Necromancer are enough for me to love that entire album. The Fountain is an epic journey, Bastille Day is hardcore, Lakeside Park is gorgeous, and ITIGB is an alright song, IMO.

I recently finished watching Ghost in The Shell: Stand Alone Complex 2nd Gig, and can say with certainty that it's my favorite thing. Ever. Finishing Second Gig finalized my consumption of most available video media linked to the franchise; I've seen both feature films, and Solid State Society.

 

I have not once been disappointed in anything I've watched. It's consistently brilliant, gorgeous, and compelling. No series I've seen has ever hit so hard visually, philosophically, or thematically. From the dark, cyberpunk thrill of the first feature film, through the beautiful intricacy of SAC's Laughing Man case and refugee-based political tension, to Solid State Society's disturbing ending, it's kept me thinking and saying "f**k yeah" from start to finish.

 

I think some people are turned off of it by their preconception of what anime is. This series is not f***ing Naruto, or Beyblade, or some other crap. It's an adult-oriented piece of brutally smart artwork that will hammer you with greatness from every direction, and always leave you wishing that it was never-ending.

 

Is anyone else a fan? Or a massive fan?

What is it with people and genres? This is coming from a heavy metal fan: Rush is not heavy metal. It shouldn't be that hard to figure out.

 

They have some heavy elements sometimes, but they aren't metal. Judas Priest is metal. Iron Maiden is metal. There are elements of their sound and feeling that make them so.

 

Rush is something different. I'd say they're prog rock, but apparently there are dozens of sub-categories of each semi-different sound now days. I've heard the terms "hardcore" and "metalcore" described genres. I've been lost and angry ever since, lol. It's just unnecessary.

QUOTE (Boots @ Oct 3 2011, 12:29 PM)

It's no secret that Joe Hill hates Rush.  He's kinda funny about it. Some of his more memorable tweets: "Who needs a deathmatch over it? Listening to RUSH is a li'l death in & of itself. The death of melody. Maybe of hope." "Listening to RUSH is like being having a MENSA grad puke in your ear. Just cos they're smart doesn't mean you want it to happen."

I enjoyed the hell out the movie when I saw it last year in US history. Pretty much a perfect film from every angle.

I want to root very badly. I'm afraid of bricking, though.

 

I'll work up the nerve eventually.

It's entertaining, but really, really stupid. It's a Sci-Fi fan's Jersey Shore.

 

It lost me completely when the kids went to swim in the river. There's no way in hell that they'd ever be able to do that without dying by way of either parasites, bacteria, or the large, hungry things that lived in the water at the time.

 

Realistically, they shouldn't even be able to walk around outside the compound without suits lest they be devoured by huge insects (the mosquitoes alone would have killed people).

 

This show should be "Walking With Dinosaurs" with people trying to survive in it.

Apparently, they tried to implement it too late in development and it was unbalanced and felt weird. But I seriously don't care; they should have built it into the game from the ground-up.

 

It's the biggest WTF about any upcoming release I can think of. It's shaping up to be the "Fable 2" of the series; adding a ton of stuff that doesn't matter while ignoring a key feature that should have been in the last game (Oblivion begged for mounted combat).

 

I don't care about getting married in-game; I want to take heads from the saddle.

GAH!! Hayden Christianson (sp?) is a hack. The original actor as Anakin's ghost was pretty much right on the mark as to what his appearance at that age should look like.

 

Now this shit? He's ruined the f***ing scene! Vader silently looking back and forth between his son and master are the only thing that the audience needs to see. WTF? I need to find a VCR if I ever want to watch those films again...