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thathomestar · 10 months

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The 3 main things wrong with Destiny 2 right now

I've been enjoying my return to Destiny 2, but this has mostly been carried by the sublime gameplay. Most other aspects of the game are in desperate need of refinement, but these three are the major problems that are truly keeping the game bogged down in mediocrity.

Complete lack of narrative cohesion

It's no secret that "sunsetting" was one of the worst possible decisions Bungie could have made for Destiny 2. Removing whole swaths of the game that people paid real cash money is obviously awful, but the knock-on effects of this have been somewhat dire, primarily the fact that you can no longer experience a fairly important chunk of Destiny 2's story within the game itself.

New players starting Destiny 2 for the first time right now have no real entry point to the story. They get the New Light tutorial quests, which are terrible at introducing the world compared to how it was done in Destiny 1. If they bought the DLC, the earliest campaign they can play is Shadowkeep, one of the weakest stories in the game's history and one that makes no sense to new players. Not to mention that the seasonal story model, where you buy a battle pass every three months to access the new story content, locks out the story after the season is over. If you missed the big story moment from a past season, it's fucking gone forever! Fuck you!

There's not even an in-game cutscene viewer or a bare-bones written summary of the events that have transpired. There's an in-game timeline, sure, but it only gives you a sentence or two about the general events of a given DLC's story. It's basically nothing. Do you seriously expect people trying to understand the basic story of the game to go watch hours of Youtube videos to catch up? That's complete horseshit.

Confusing and aggravating pricing model

Some Destiny Youtubers have been stirring the pot recently about microtransactions, and this is not really about that. I'm talking about straight up purchasing the game. A recent change Bungie has made is a Legacy Collection, which bundles all the previous available campaigns together in a single pack. This is good! Why are they still available to purchase separately from the bundle? Like seriously, look at this store page:

This is a whole bunch of redundancy, and it only serves muddy the waters. "This is so people who have some of the DLC don't have to rebuy the ones they already own when they buy the bundle" that's stupid. There's two solutions to this: either A) have the bundle recognize which DLCs you own and offer a discount based on that (this is possible to do on Steam already), or B) just lower the price of the whole bundle to the price of the latest included expansion (which is Witch Queen, so $30) so people won't feel that bad about rebuying something they own. The latter is what FFXIV does. Buying the latest expansion gets you all the ones that came before it bundled in for $40. Easy. Makes sense.

Then we have the Forsaken Pack and 30th Pack. The Forsaken Pack should just be included in the free to play portion of the game. The fact that they culled Forsaken from the game but still charge money for that content is insulting, though the 30th Pack is arguably worse. $25 for a single dungeon and a single exotic weapon. For the record, dungeon keys, which give you access to two dungeons, is $20. A complete slap in the nuts ripoff.

Speaking of dungeon keys, the fact that dungeon keys have to be bought separately from its corresponding expansion is moronic. Regardless of the reasons Bungie does what it does with dungeon keys (or excuses people come up with for it), it ends up feeling like squeezing people for every dollar they have.

I know at the end of the day, Bungie is a business, and they need money to pay their staff and survive as a studio, but they really need to give some thought into how people actually purchase their game, the process they go through, what they see and encounter along the way, because for a lot of people it's really, really off-putting.

Lack of meaningful player interaction

So Destiny's whole thing is that it's an MMO, right? At the very least, it takes a lot of elements from more traditional MMO games. Something it does not do very well is get people to actually mingle with each other in a meaningful way.

When I play FFXIV, I can strike up a conversation with people hanging out in the main cities if I so desire. There will be people willing to engage in some small talk at the very least. You might tell someone you think their character looks cool, you emote at each other, maybe even add each other to your friends list. You basically cannot do this in Destiny. Text chat might as well not exist with how little I see people use it, and almost nobody opts in to voice chat during activities. People occasionally emote at each other in the Tower or in the field, and that's about it. I've made friends with random people playing FFXIV. I have not made friends with anyone playing Destiny.

Destiny also lacks a proper Group Finder feature common in most other MMO games. They've toyed around with adding matchmaking to raids, but that feature has been in Beta™ for roughly 7 years, so it's safe to say it's never going to properly get off the ground anytime soon. People trying to find pick-up groups for harder content have to use external sites (or know a guy who knows a guy, which is how I've gotten through most of D2's raids).

They have taken a small step in the right direction with player commendations, where you can rate whether people on your fireteam were fun to play with, were a stout ally, or fashionably dressed. This is good! But they really need to make it easier to communicate and form groups outside of matchmaking from within the game to truly take a big step forward.

just about the most interaction i ever managed to get in the tower

To summarize, you can't experience a large portion of Destiny 2's story within the game, trying to buy the game itself is convoluted and the pricing structure is all over the place (and kind of high in my opinion), and for an always-online MMO-style game, it's challenging to find groups or even make friends with other players. Destiny 2 feels like a game that is in desperate need of some true backend maintenance and development, but that kind of work doesn't translate into profit, so it is heavily minimized.

A player starting for the first time right now is not going to know who Cayde-6 is outside of a couple of references. He has been effectively excised from the game. Why should they care about his return in The Final Shape?

#destiny #destiny 2 #destiny the game #bungie #long post #ths writeups #this game is a mess but i'll keep playing it for now #and continue to complain about it because it could be so much better goddammit

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ultrahpfan5blog · 11 months

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Transformers - Rise of the Beasts thoughts...

I have a pretty mixed history with the Transformers movies. I really enjoyed the first one. Even when I have rewatched it, the first Michael Bay film holds up. It has far less annoying adults and created a pretty good layer of mystery behind the Autobots and the Decepticons. The Bayverse fell apart after that. Revenge of the Fallen was pretty terrible outside of a memorable action scene in the forest. Dark of the Moon was acceptable, mainly due to a phenomenal last hour of mayhem. Age of Extinction was an interminable slog, and The Last Knight was so bad that it was hard to follow. Bumblebee was nice, though it openly was an ET ripoff of sorts. Rise of the Beasts, in context, is probably the second or third best Transformers film. Which isn't saying much but it was surprisingly decent. The one thing I liked was that the film moved away from the Bumblebee and Optimus Prime focus. Optimus is still very much front and center, but we have Mirage as the Transformer who is the one who connects with the human characters. On top of that, the human characters are pretty likable. There are only 2-3 human characters of note and they are used effectively enough. Another thing I enjoyed was Optimus was a much more flawed character than he has been in the past. In all the Bayverse films, he was a noble leader with no flaws and endless compassion for humans. For a lack of a better term, he felt a bit more human in this film, because we see the character nursing guilt over what has happened with his fellow Transformers, having an initial disregard for humans and Earth's safety for the sake of the Transformers he leads. Not to mention, he is less invincible as a fighter. The Maximals are also pretty cool though only Primal and Airazor have substantial roles. But they are at least used better than how Dinobots were used in Age of Extinction. The Terrocons were pretty formidable villains, particularly Scourge. His entry scene is pretty well done. Unicron also looks quite awesome.

The story is nothing to really speak of. Its another Mcguffin leading to Transformers teaming up with humans, in order to stop a world ending event. The action is good. It doesn't quite have the style of Bayverse but its much more coherent. The Optimus Prime vs Scourge fights are a highlight. The performances are solid. Anthony Ramos and Dominique Fishback are solid and likable. Obviously, Peter Cullen as Optimus Prime is awesome as always. Pete Davidson as Mirage is pretty good. Ron Perlman as Optimus Primal, Peter Dinklage as Scourge, and Michelle Yeoh as Airazor are the other highlights in the voice cast. The film's pacing is a little slow at times, but overall Steven Caple Jr. made a pretty decent Transformers movie. The action is good and the film doesn't overstay its welcome. I would say its about a 7/10.

#transformers: rise of the beasts #transformers rise of the beasts #transformers: rotb #rise of the beasts #optimus prime #bumblebee #mirage #scourge #optimus primal #airazor #anthony ramos #dominique fishback #peter cullen #peter dinklage #pete davidson #ron perlman #michelle yeoh #unicron #steven caple jr.

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charismat1c-megafauna · 1 year

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Tbh i think the appeal of goncharov and why it had such a hold on tumblr is that, 1, it was a collaborative storytelling experience but in such a bare bones way. The only constant casting choice i saw was de niro as goncharov. Everybody else? Completely up for debate and nobody is wrong. Does katya die in the boat scene? Depends on who you're asking. Leading to 2, everybody was generally pretty nice about it, and any arguments over "canon" were just people doing a bit. In fact, most people were pretty good about tagging it, and the joke never seemed to be "you dont know this is a fake movie that we're talking about," but rather "we are doing in depth analysis of a fake movie we made up based on a misprint on a bootleg pair of shoes." It was never meant to be "ha ha, you arent in on the joke!" It was just... approaching something silly with an intensity typically reserved for serious films.

3, and this is pure speculation, it was an avenue for people to make up their own mafia story without any accusation of being a godfather ripoff. Im serious. The gangster genre tends to get a bit gatekept in the sense that if you arent coppola or scorcese, most entries in the genre tend to be looked down on as 'derivative' simply because shit like the godfather and goodfellas codified most of the mafia tropes in a post-hayes code era and if you try to tell a mafia story, it will be stacked up against these films by default. This isnt the fault of coppola or scorcese, and its not the fault of their films, but its just a weird thing that tends to happen, and goncharov let people experiment with these kinds of stories without the pressure of stacking up next to classic films that defined the genre because, ostensibly, goncharov is already a classic film.

But idk man im just sayin stuff.

#goncharov 1973 #goncharov

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elendsessor · 11 months

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decided to give my thoughts on yw3 so far since the more i 3 the more i realize two things:

all entries hold up so well it’s understandable how it took off in the first place. seriously the amount of love and care that’s gone into each especially with the writing and the world itself. it really goes wild with the concept while also making sense and i have yet to see any kid friendly franchise get as creative with world building. also love the attention to detail in a lot of places. i get it’s, in a sense, the real world, but there’s so much even in the first game and the whole reasoning behind why yokai could technically coexist with people is believable.

though this only makes the reality of yw3 harder. it underperformed through no fault of its own and nearly killed level 5 altogether. the localization effort didn’t seem to pay off since it wasn’t completely westernized, which is why a lot of japanese rpgs now feel like pandering to a western audience and things that embrace the japanese influence tend to get made fun of or passed off as cringy/remain niche in far too many markets. you can’t talk about the history/some of the legacy of yw without mentioning pokemon. love both franchises but there was a noticeable difference between the quality of the 3ds titles. this is what 6th gen onwards pokemon should’ve been and knowing that the way pokemon fucking massacred this series was not through improving but by pumping out entries to drown out the competition/make other games seem like they’re copying (i was guilty of this little me thought yokai watch was a ripoff of pokemon). if you wanna even play yw3 you’ll either have to shell out a ton of cash or emulate it.

i’ve been having so much fun it’s absurd and i’m not even close to done. i really wish i could go back and get into it sooner. genuinely might turn into my favorite (semi-)turn based rpg monster collector and i’m genuinely surprised how, unlike a lot of games aimed at kids, it doesn’t cut down on quality because “kids won’t notice.” it doesn’t solely depend on nostalgia or excessive pandering to be unironically enjoyed. the modern game industry has that issue altogether. (oh also the trans media actually does stuff with the game??? like they have scannable codes n shit on toys and you can use them???? not many things do that often?????)

this series deserves better, man.

#shantien rambles #i’m actually most addicted to blasters t-#i don’t like randomized dungeon crawlers much but i think the fact that it’s a side mode benefits it massively

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deep-hearts-core · 2 years

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2013 - semifinal 2

originally posted 5/31/20

Latvia This here, this, is my true guilty pleasure of the 2013 contest. Like I know it's a pair of Latvian dudes in sparkly clothes rapping and beatboxing and being not overwhelmingly great at either of those things, but it's really lighthearted and pure. It endears itself to me through its sheer enthusiasm. In short: it's fun. San Marino Okay, I can actually see how this one didn't qualify. It's really slow at the beginning, and I had forgotten how it really went before the tempo and meter change that kicks the song into the high gear that it's actually known for. Staging was pretty good, though. I don't actually like this as much as I used to, it might not be a qualifier for me anymore (of course, who knows) because of how little happens for the first 2/3 of the song.

North Macedonia This sure was something. I always feel obligated to like entries performed by a minority group, but this song was kind of a mess. There were two totally different songs going on here - Esma's and Lozano's - and while they're both pretty decent on their own, together they just don't mix. (Also, Lozano's parts are lowkey a Love Is Blind ripoff. There. I said it.) Azerbaijan Excellent staging here, by which I mean both the man in the box and the literal actual stage. That first verse had such amazing staging, and you know what, I'm not even as put off by the comphet girl in the red dress as I used to be. This is a firmly good song, but if I'm honest it doesn't really hold up for me when compared to the sheer amount of girl power going on here, between Denmark, Israel, Norway, Ukraine, Russia, etc etc. While the staging is impressive the song is only just good. Finland When I was younger, I specifically remember calling Krista's aesthetic here "trashy Vegas bride". I still think that's true. Finland went all out on the camp here, and it's deliciously good. It's active, and while the song is really cheesy the staging leans right into it and Krista sells it entirely. Marry Me is pure, good fun. Malta This is a really sweet song. Don't get why everyone's so crazy about it, but it's definitely cute and fun. It just really has a family vibe going to it, with the general sunshine-ness of Gianluca and everyone onstage with him - either they all really genuinely like each other and are glad to be there, or they're really good at acting.

Bulgaria There's a lot that's all over the place about this one, in the staging and the songwriting, but it's a refreshing song that's entirely different from the other songs in the semi. While I think this could have been done quite well, the stage here didn't quite lend to the success that Elitsa and Stoyan's previous entry had had. I really like the song though - I love super rhythmic stuff so this was fun to watch and to bop around to. Iceland The staging for this entry is pretty boring, but there's some good composition going on here. When I was younger, I used to make a cappella covers of Eurovision songs, and so as we get into the years where I know the songs well sometimes my judgement of the composition will come from how nice that arrangement was to make. Let me say that I hated this entry, until I covered it, and through doing that I realized that the composition here has a lot of room to be moving and beautiful. It's redeemed the song a lot for me.

Greece I seriously don't think this song would have worked without both the old guy and the band. In prior watches I know I thought the song would be better off without the folksy section at the beginning, but now I acknowledge that it serves a purpose, and it's actually kinda nice to listen to. This is another of those wild, fun ones that, while it's difficult to take seriously, is so lighthearted that I can't help liking it. It's not trying to be performance art or overly campy, it's just... fun. Israel This really was robbed. As a song, it's fantastic, and Moran has a great voice and amazing control over it. Sadly, though, these types of songs work best with something interesting happening in the background, and here there was nothing, so while I really, truly love this song, I understand why it didn't get through. Armenia Everyone always hates on this song, and for why? Like guys it's a soft rock song about climate change. It is in no way bad. I mean, it's nothing polarizing, but it's definitely enjoyable. I really like this style of music and I think that Gor, the lead singer here, is really dynamic and fun to watch. Hungary Firstly I just want to call attention to the fact that Hungary, apparently, only has one female backup singer, because I swear this exact same woman was backup for the 2012 entry. Anyway, Kedvesem is a song that polarizes a lot of people; I think it's just okay. Like, it's nice to listen to, Eurovision goes indie, whatever, but it's not a standout, especially in this year, and if I'm honest the dolls in the background were kinda creepy.

Norway [frantically googles to see if Frozen came out before this performance] Yeah, so this is clearly the success Norway was trying to emanate when they sent Agnete three years later. This song is really weird, but also really good. Lyrically, this song is absolutely fucking hilarious, it goes in so many different directions, but the instrumental is really really good and Margaret has a great voice for this song in particular that really distracts from the absurdity of the lyrics and lets you just watch and listen without thinking too hard. Albania Oh this one goes so fucking hard. The melodic themes in this are just SO GOOD and the main singer here has an awesome voice. Why everyone is jumping around onstage I don't know, but what I do know is that this song totally deserved to qualify. Everyone always complains about the FiK revamps every year but they forget that in years like this and 2011 when Albania didn't revamp their song they still didn't qualify, so like, forgive them for trying something new. Thankfully they've kept their songs the same and have had success with their 2018 and 2019 entries, but Identitet definitely merited that same qualification.

Georgia This song is totally jury bait, but I really like it. Those harmonies. It's not a super standout, but I think Nodi and Sophie's voices go great together and that the staging was inoffensive, dare I even say pretty. Like, it's typical G:son, but it's alright. Switzerland Not totally sure what Switzerland is trying to achieve here. This song sure is catchy, but a better performance certainly was possible, and I don't know how I feel about their matching Salvation Army polos. I mean, it's like sending the Mormons to Eurovision, and not the ones from the musical either. Romania Um, so this is not what I like to see at Eurovision. It drives the camp factor way up and that's not my thing, and neither is falsetto dubstep. Those dancers were also lowkey horrifying. Like they did not need to contort their bodies like that and they did not need to be mostly naked either. I do find it funny, though, that Moldova and Romania used the same "elevate the stage during the bridge" trick in the same year. Heh.

My personal qualifiers Norway Albania Azerbaijan Israel Georgia Armenia Greece Iceland Latvia Finland Miscellaneous thoughts One of the difficult things about this year is that there are a lot of songs that are really campy or otherwise just fun (the Babushki's influence, no doubt). While very wholesome, it does make it difficult to separate songs out from each other.

#esc reviews

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kerbrobro · 8 months

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The closer I get to the end of Medabots/Medarot 2 Core, the more I think I definitely prefer the first game. There's a LOT of improvements and refinement to the mechanics, but there's SOOOOOO much padding. The encounter rate isn't TOO bad, and you get a thing that lets you avoid it entirely halfway through the game, but the game keeps throwing story scenes where I have to fight the EXACT SAME TEAM like 3-5 times in a row. I don't remember if the first game did that or not, but it was only about 10 hours long so it wouldn't really matter either way. This game is about 60.

There's also some issues with the general feeling of cheapness, which I think comes from a less than perfect localization (a lot of weirdly written dialogue and some obviously incorrect translations/text placement here and there) and the fact that this is just a remake of a Game Boy game. It might actually feel weirder BECAUSE the graphics are so much more detailed; if it still looked like a flagrant gen 1 Pokemon ripoff like Medarot 1, the lack of detail in the world wouldn't stand out as much. Also would've helped if they tried to add a bit more, and make it FEEL like a newer, more detailed game.

I'm still mostly enjoying it, but I really hope the rest of the series isn't as padded as the 2nd entry. Every game after the first one is apparently around this length, but at the rate they get translated I guess I'd have pretty big breaks between them anyway lol.

#medarot #medabots

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koishua · 2 years

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is that a bird? it that a plane? no! it's yet another koishua event! this time, it's not me doing the work however </3 from this day (21.04.22) till 01.05.22, you lot will be filling up our truth jar! you can reblog this post to widen the game's reach on this site too haha even if you're not a follower, you're more than welcome to submit a confession in the truth jar!!

what is this truth jar, you ask?

the answer is quite simple! in this completely anonymous google form, containing only a single text box to fill and answer, you can spill the one thing that you think fits the bill for a juicy confession: scandalous events you've witnessed? your most hidden secret that not even a single soul knows about? something you've been thinking about that you believe most people will find utterly controversial?

anything goes! just fill the box with a juicy confession and i will proceed to tier rank the confessions at the end of the given time (01.05.22)! you may give multiple entries! the more, the merrier!

what are the tiers i will be ranking them as, you may wonder?

the list of tiers goes as follows: "we share the same braincell, i'd have done the same too" ; "wait a damn minute, did i just read this right?" ; "very questionable. i am worried, let's talk about this" ; "ummm im afraid to tall ya this, but..." ; "we need to get you a good therapist" ; "no. just no. immediate jail card."

don't hold back, my friends or else this might be a tad bit boring </3

how are YOU gonna be playing the game?

listen, my job here is to rank your confessions and rank them only with some side commentary. i'll read through them and transfer each one of them as single posts, where we can all discuss where we could rank them in under that post's (confession) replies </3

hopefully by the end of the day, our judges will come to a conclusion for all of them and that's that to the game </3 hope it's not too confusing y'all im expecting some whack stuff in the form, ngl

note that this game is actually a complete ripoff from youtube user debsmikle, the darling sweetheart sexy hilarious woman that we all love and cherish </3

#event: truth jar!#im stoked for this game bahaha hopefully there'll be lots of entries!!#also posted this at one am which is a very wonky and odd time for me so dnxnxn #i dont think anyone's awake rn damn #also does this make me the gossip girl of this corner of wwwdottumblrdotcom?? 😔😔#it's not gossip if idk who its coming from and who the subjects are ☝️☝️#this is me channeling my inner kim sunoo #if this flops oh well i liked making the header so that's time well used 😔😔

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popculturebuffet · 3 years

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Tex Avery Birthday Spectacular!

Hello all you happy people! And welcome to a celebration of the only cartoon director I knew as a kid and one of the finest whose ever lived, Mr. Tex Avery.

Avery is a legend in the animation industry and rightly so. Starting out at a few other studios, and loosing sight in one of his eyes due to some tomfoolery at one, Tex was annoyed with the restrctive enviorment and eventually found his way to Termite Terrace, the animated shorts wing of Leon Schislenger Productions, aka the future Warner Brothers Studios and the makers of Looney Tunes. And his impact on the franchise is vast, cannot be overstated and I only learned about just how much recently: The man created Daffy Duck and Bugs Bunny, created the prototype for Elmer Fudd, and created the design for Porky we’re all far more familiar with.

Eventually though while he was happy there, his career when ended when he eventually got into a squabble with Leon schsinger over the ending of “The Heckling Hare” and left soon after. Given he got a four week unpaid suspension for it , a bit extreme given all he’d given the studio, I can’t blame him. He instead went over to MGM who badly needed his wacky energy, and thus got to go as nuts as he wanted, with creative control a better budget and the result was his peak and classic characters like Red and my personal faviorite and personal boy: Droopy. I will try and do a birthday thing for him next month, we’ll see if my rather packed schedule will allow for it. Point is I watched the guys cartoons a lot as a kid between looney tunes and his shorts being repacked for the Tex Avery show in the late 90′s, and until recently I had no idea the depth and scope of his career: The guy gave looney tunes it’s standard fourth walll breaking and made it a huge part of the industry, and he was the one to hlep htem break out of being a Disney knockoff and into what we know today. The guy has my utmost respect so today I honor him as the first animator to get one of my birthday specials: As is my standard ten shorts, my patreons get to pick one each (I now have two but she start’s next month so her benefits will too) if they so choose (Kev opted out of the porky pig one next week) and I went to my friend blah for a recomendation as he’s an avid fan of the golden age of animation and thus usually has a really good choice up his sleeve. Now that’s out of hte way join me under the cut for some shenanigans as old tex would want it that way.

1. The Gold Diggers of 49 (1935)

This was Tex Avery’s first short with warner and the first of his I could find, not ot mention his first time working with Chuck Jones and Bob Clampett, who he’d mentor and go on to be the heart and soul of Looney Tunes and define the characters Tex created. And since this is more significant than his earlier work i’m coutning it as his first. And as a start it’s.. ehhhhhhh.

I don’t blame him for it though. Most don’t hit it out of hte park their first time up to bat, and frankly the deck was stacked against him. He was saddled with Beans the Cat...

No one brak no one. He was part of an attempt by warner to create a new star as part of a Little Rascals/Our Gang style group of kids debuting in the short “I Haven’t Got a Hat”. This short is notable not for Beans, who no one cares about, but for the debut of Looney Tunes first star: Porky Pig. Porky was just one of the various characters but the only one audiences really liked. It took some time for Warner to get the hint though, hence Beans starring here and Porky playing his girlfriend’s father.. and also now being much older than him for some reason.

So instead of being a Little Rascals ripoff bean is now a mickey mouse ripoff, as the short gives me mickey mouse vibes.. but without the things that made those shorts actually good and feels mostly built on studios trying to make what they think audiences will like. There’s sparks of waht Tex would become.. but just not enough wiggle room for him to make something special. Also porky looks and sounds weird in this one and Bean’s girlfriend has a REALLY annoying voice. Oh and two horrible Asian stereotypes, because it was acceptable at the time but lord was it never okay. Then again I should be at least mildly greatful none of the shorts had blackface.. because tex apparently REALLY had a problem with that, something I obviously didn’t know as a kid as they edited it out but given most of his MGM shorts have “blackface edited out of x version”, yeahhh.... I may like the guy, quite a bit and feel those gags weren’t done out of malice.. but it dosen’t make them okay, they were never okay and he should’ve done better.

2. I Love to Singa (1936) Thankfully our next entry is 800% better, as we get a classic from my childhood and probably multiple childhoods. Admittedly part of the reason this one stuck in my head is the title song, sung by a young jazz singing owl whose dad doesn’t like that he sings Jazz instead of classical, enters a contest and nearly looses singing classical to please his dad only for his dad to intervene and finally accept his son. It’s a wonderful story of acceptance with some decent gags, beautiful animation and one hell of a title track that will probably never leave my head. The song is really what makes this short and sometimes that’s okay. Also just to note so someone else doesn’t: This short was a parody of the Jazz Singer one of the first talkie’s.. and also a film that uses blackface and whose 80′s remake bafflingly also uses blackface for some reason. Yes really.

3. Tortoise Beats Hare (1941)

One of Tex’s only four Bugs Shorts.. but given 3/4 of them are certified classics, and one of them involving a horrible stereotype.. to the point it’s part of the rightfully infamous “Censored 11″ and the ONLY one involving Bugs Bunny.

So as I said, Tex has a bad history with casual racism, and while it was the style at the time and I don’t THINK he was actively malicious towards black people.. it doesn’t make some of his work any less harmful. The rest of his bugs work though is remembered for the right reasons: his first appearance, and early classic we’ll get to next.. and this standout everyone who saw it as a kid or an adult fondly remembers.

You all know the premise: Bugs finds out, in an utterly brilliant wall shattering bit at the start where he reads off the crew names and then the title, that this picture will have him beaten by a turtle and taking offense to that challenges the guy. This is honestly one of the few Bugs shorts where he’s the out and out villain of the picture. He’s doing this race purely out of ego, yells at Cecil whose perfectly nice in this one, and in general is the bully set up for a fall he’d later be famous for taking on. But it works, both because this si early in bugs career so it’s entirely in character, and because Mel just really sells the obnoxiousness while still being funny.

This short also has one of Tex’s trademark setups as this is essentially a prototypical droopy cartoon: A meek, goofy voiced protagonist whose shorter than his large obnoxious enemy and who torments him by showing up every where he’s going to be and casually doing it. Cecil even does so using an army of fellow turtles with Droopy later using a similar trick in one of his shorts. As a big Droopy fan i’m clearly not complaining and while Droopy would do it better, this short’s still a classic for a reason with tons of great bits and is a fun break from the usual bugs setup, though in full fairness the usual bugs setup is still solid gold so take that how you will.

4. The Heckling Hare (1941)

Originally I was going to have Daffy in Hollywood in this spot as I thought it was on Max, it was not, so I swapped it out with his final bugs cartoon. For the record his first, and Bugs, is being saved for Bugs birthday this summer. And honestly i’m glad I did because this was 7 mintues of pure joy that has another setup that Tex himself and other Looney Tunes animators would resuuse: Bugs being pitted up against a far dumber antagonist. One who often still fully deserves it but allows him to just have fun for several minutes at this dumb bastard’s expense. It works well here, with tons of clever gags, my faviorite being the two doing dumb faces with each other only for bugs to stop and pull out a sign as seen right above.

It’s also an approriate capper to our warner made Tex shorts for the day, as this would be the one that got him fired. He and Schisnger argued over it and he got suspended as I mentioned and I found it again a bit fucking extreme. So did Tex and after a handful of shorts elsewhere, he’d move over to MGM, whose cartoons would ironically be bought up by warner. They needed a shot in the arm to compete with Disney and Warner and Tex was happy to provide hte needle filled with nonsense. And the results.. are pure gold.

5. Dumb Hounded (1943)

I’ll admit as a kid I didn’t know Tex’s MGM shorts were theatrical, or any shorts but somehow I knew they weren’t looney tunes. Besidds obviously having hteir own show they just had their own tone and pacing and style. While the Looney Tunes aren’t bad, at all honestly, Tex’s work here was in a class by itself with MGM gladly giving him a higher budget and even more creative freedom. And the results speak for themselves and one of those results is one of if not my faviorite classic cartoon character. And since I might not be able to get to his birthday with one of these next month, though i’m certainly going to try march is just VERY VERY FULL. Anyways point is our happy hero was introduced here. And given i’m frequently depressed and often withdrawn, not that you could tell from my reviews here, I related to this depressed bulldog who always won anyway despite being an outsider, finding love, sucess and always beating a much larger, much more assholish antagonist. But Droopy is good on his own merits as his shorts are just that funny.

This was true from Day One as dumb hounded is fucking perfect: The Wolf that Avery always used in his cartoons escapes from jail and is hunted by bloodhounds including our boy, who charmingly introduces himself with “You know what, i’m the hero”. From there it’s a simple setup but a great one as Droopy finds the guy.. then chases him from here to enternity with one amazing gag after another. Simple, utterly hilarious and the dawn of a legend, with the ending having Droopy go a bit nuts after getting his reward money before returning to his usual demeanor “You know what? I’m happy” So am I bud, so am I.

6. Red Hot Riding Hood (1943)

Yup same year. Tex hit the ground sprinting. This one is his signature MGM toon and for good reason. Using his usual forth wall breaking style, both the wolf and red riding hood rebel when it opens with a typical telling, so it changes to a 40′s nightlife setting: Grandma lives in a penthouse and is man hungry, Red is a fanservicey night club act and the Wolf is a sexually harassing asshole who chases after here and has some over the top reactions to her that are iconic in some’s mind.

The short is gorgeously animated with Red’s dance sequence and Wolfie’s reactions being the highlight and the short isn’t as bad as it could be as the wolf is treated as a scumbag for hitting on her and generally being a creep. SO the first two thirds aren’t bad with nice touches like the narrator clearly improvising the new story. It’s just badly hampered by the last half where Grandma sexually harasses Wolfie and it just doesn’t work. This double standard stuff annoys me and “haha get it it’s funny when a woman stalks a man” isn’t funny. Wolfie stalking her really isn’t that funny either it’s just not you know an entire third of the film. So a classic for a reason.. but one that really has degraded with time. Still worth analyzing and what not, just not great.

7. Who Killed Who? (1943)

Yes still. It was a good year. This is another one off like Red Hot Riding Hood and as is tradition since the Tom and Jerry one, my patreons each get to pick one and Kev selected this one. And this.. was a great choice.

Seriously I could not stop laughing with a great gag a minute, WAY too many to mention, a classic ending, and just nothing but net the whole time. I don’t have much to say really.. but because this one’s just good. The whodunnit genre hasn’t really gone away, it’s cliches are welll known even today and this is a lovely parody of it that hits the ground running after a live action intro and runs right through the wall across a lake and straight into droopy “You moved.”.

The only real observation I have other than “This is fucking awesome watch it immediately” is that the villian looks exactly like the Phantom Blot. Who knew the Phantom Blot was a live action guy with a weird haircut the whole time huh? Seriously this one is a masterpiece, an instant faviorite, and I highly recommend it.

8. Screwball Squirrel (1944)

As you can probably guess by how I lead it in this one is not very good. It is tex TRYING to make a bugs or daffy type character again and somehow failing at it. He created them, he did plenty of shorts like theirs with other characters and got how the cat and mouse antics of the old theatrical shorts worked.. so I have no idea how this one happened.

I’m really not overselling it: The short is about Screwy, who hyjacks it from a cute widdle bunny clearly parodying bambi.. who he beats the shit out of, then decides to get things going asks a dumb dog to hunt him, then insults him to provoke him to attacking him. He then spends the entire short tormenting the poor dumb bastard who again HE PROVOKED. It feels like a poor imitation of dumb hounded, as while Bugs clearly outclassed the dog there, he’d die if he lost, so while he was punching down, he clearly didn’t have a choice and you can’t honestly blame him. Here, Screwy is fine, he just wants someone’s head to fuck with and spends a whole short torturing him. We don’t even get catarsis as while the dog does catch him at the end via weird gag, they end up deciding to beat up the bunny instead.

His voice is also just the worst, just utterly grating and making me wish an anvil woudl fall on HIM instead. Screwy would return for some other shorts but I have no idea why. This was easily the weakest of these ten shorts and I will probably not return to the guy next year.

9. Bad Luck Blackie (1949)

This is one i’d forgotten till I got a ways in. It’s also weirdly one of the only MGM Tex shorts on HBO Max as this was included in the Tom and Jerry collection for some reason, the dog in it clearly isn’t the tom and Jerry verison of spike... though the dog Droopy fought a lot was indeed called spike. Yes that is confusing, no I don’t know why MGM thought this was a good idea.

As a result though I have been saving giving out about this till now but seirously , put the tex avery shorts on HBO Max. Their on Blu-Ray, their on boomerang, especially Droopys. I do not get why they aren’t on here. I’m tired of them holding things out for the boomerang app when not everyone subscirbes to that. Let me have my morose dog dammit.

That giving out aside i’m glad this one caught my eye via i’ts weird name as it’s another masterpiece. It also does what one Tom and Jerry short I reviewed, the one where tom’s a millionare, earlier this month failed to: properly make it’s antagonist loathsome enough to deserve the parade of abuse he gets. With that one Tom is tourturning jerry for like 30 seconds, but Jerry torments him for most of 5 minutes.

Here we get about two minutes of our lead kitten getting torremnted by a mean bulldog. It’s not only still a bit entertaining to lessen the horror just enough to be watchable but not enough to make the bulldog likeable, but it makes what happens for the rest of the short oh so fucking satsifying. While the previous short today really didn’t get the karmic ballance neded for a good classic screwball comedy short this one overwhelmingly does.

Our kitten gets some help in the form of Blackie, a professional black cat who agrees to turn the tables, sauntring across to a wonderfully catchy tune. any time the little guy whistles. The result from there is 5-6 nonstop minutes of comedy genius, as Tex finds new and creative ways for the cat to come out of nowhere, and even shakes things up to keep it intresting towards the end iwth the dog getting the whistle.. only for it to still not work out, and for our little kitten to get his revenge at last by painting himself black after the bulldog paints blackie white. As should be obvious by now, it’s really good, showing Screwball Squirrel was the exception not the rule. In general Tex was this good during his mgm and when he was at his peak we got gems like this. Truly sensational, watch it if you have max it’s under the tom and jerry section for some reason.

10. T.V. of Tommorow A decent one I remember seeing as a kid. Not much to say though, it’s mostly a bunch of gags about “future” tv’s based on their viewer’s needs. Some good stuff.. not as good as most of what was here today but still better than the worst of it and still very memorable and part of a memorable tetralogy i’ll probably come back to when I do Tex’s birthday again next year. Not a bad note to end on though.

Overall these shorts show just how strong a creator tex was, gleefully taking convention and ripping it to tiny pieces. As i’ve mentioned many times i’ll be coming back to his work next year.. and probably be watching a hell ofa lot more in the time between. Might even do a second special on him in between birthday ones. We’ll see how this does. The Tom and Jerry one sadly wasn’t quite the hit I hoped.

Until then I have many other reviews. And since Today (This review is late) was supposed to be the 90′s tom and jerry movie but that turned out not to be on Max for some reason. I still plan to cover it some day i’ll just have to find it and buy it first. But tommorow if I have the time i’ll be continuing the Lena retrospective with an intresting little side trip. So until then, i’ts been a pleasure and you know what? Thanks for reading.

#tex avery #droopy #bugs bunny #porky pig #the gold diggers of 49 #cecil turtle #tortoise beats hare #the heckling hare #tv of tommorow #dumb hounded #red hot riding hood #who killed who #red #spike #bad luck blackie #screwy squirrel #screwball squirrel #owl jolson #I love to singa

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percysblakeney · 3 years

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List 7 comfort movies and tag 7 people!

I was tagged by @thehighsign , @rememberedkisses , and @glamourofyesteryear to do this! I’m so sorry it’s late. Thank you for tagging me ♥️♥️🥰🥰

1. Dragonwyck (1946)

I've seen Dragonwyck so many times that I could quote it in my sleep. I also read the book religiously. Vincent Price and Gene Tierney are a power couple, and my bisexuality goes crazy for this movie.

2. In The Good Old Summertime (1949)

I like to ignore the fact that this movie is a musical ripoff of The Shop Around the Corner (1940). It's so sweet and Judy is an angel. Buster Keaton being an adorable oaf is just a bonus.

3. The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014)

This movie is visually stunning and so funny. It cheers me up every time. Saoirse Ronan is gorgeous as always and Ralph Fiennes is, obviously, a gem.

4. Pride and Prejudice (2005)

I don't think this needs an explanation.

5. The Scarlet Pimpernel (1934)

That fly on his sleeve is the star. Take this entry as every movie Leslie Howard has ever been in. Yes, including Gone With the Wind. I'm sorry.

6. The Woman in Black (2012)

7. Yes, this is a horror movie. But it is one of my favorites and I'm strangely comforted by it and its perfect aesthetic. I have good memories of seeing it in the theater with my close friends. And the soundtrack is to die for! (pun intended).

7. Westworld (1973)

I love Yul Brynner, and this movie is so fun. Again, I could put quite a few Yul Brynner movies in this list like The King and I and The Magnificent Seven, but I don't have enough space!

I have so many more of these that I could list, but I only had 7 spots, so I put down the first ones I could think of. Thank you all for tagging me!! I don't know who to tag, as I am getting to this so late, so I tag whoever wants to take some time to think of movies that make them happy. I hope you're having a spectacular day! 🥰

#get to know me #tag game #comfort movies #@thehighsign #@rememberedkisses #@glamourofyesteryear

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razeluxe · 4 years

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Razeluxe’s Top Ten Male Characters

So I’ve been thinking about doing a particular list for my favorite characters across anime and games for quite a while and with some advice I decided to break it into my favorite male and favorite female characters. Most people that know me can probably guess at my top three favorites but if you don’t know me... well you ‘bout to learn lol. This was harder than I thought to compile...enjoy my fanboying of the boys lol.

By the by, I’ll do my best to keep spoilers to a minimum.

10) Apollo Justice (Phoenix Wright Series)

I’ve played only two games that this character was in (Apollo Justice and Dual Destinies, slowly working through Spirit of Justice) and this character particularly in Dual Destinies struck me even more than Edgeworth who is another amazing character. Apollo has an amazing spirit and it was only through playing Dual Destinies that I really got to understand Mr. ‘I’m Fine’ and his stupid ‘Here comes Justice’ puns. I feel his original game didn’t allow him to shine (still a great entry in the Ace Attorney series I don’t care what anyone says) and Dual Destinies allows him the development he deserves. He gets hurt during a trial and it allows a deep dive of his character even if his personality shifts for a while. Damn he’s savage. He’s considered the underdog in the Wright Anything Agency but he’s to me the hardest working person there who is also the most factual in court.

9) Gokudera (Katekyo Hitman Reborn)

Or as I like to call him, Scowludera since he’s scowling like 90% of the time. This Ichigo ripoff’s character development is insane. And I think that trend follows most if not all the characters in this list. His relationship with his sister is interesting and he’s pretty explosive in terms of personality and intelligence. His fights are all really interesting too, he has some of my favorite interactions in the series thus far (haven’t read the post anime manga chapters yet sadly, but he’s more than earned this spot on this list). He butts heads with people a lot and he can be ignorant but he grows from his experience and you get to see it bit by bit. This dude is loyal to the bone. RIP if you aren’t Tsuna or Reborn. Also, I’d like to shout out this anime as one of the few to do the shounen genre proper justice. Go watch it. Also his sister Bianchi is <3. Oh wait. Male list. Oops. Can we also talk about his weapon? Not gonna say spoilers but that thing is dope and probably one of the best ever designed weapons. And his kitty Uri <3

8) Joshua Bright (Trails in the Sky)

This will be short as I don’t want to spoil anything, but Joshua is a very easy character for me to connect to personally. His feelings, actions, development probably relates more to me than a lot of characters on this list. He’s got good people around him...I’m very happy for his ship and support it 120%. Also the Trails Series, both Sky and Cold Steel are probably my favorite series of anything period. Go play it. There is more to this character that meets the eye and has broken my heart more than once ;_;

7) Neku Sakuraba (The World Ends With You)

Neku Neku Neku. Another very relatable character for me (see the theme here? lol) He initially shuts out people and over time, through his experience in the Reapers Game, he starts to open up and bring people into his circle. He goes through some crap, like a lot of trauma. When you learn of him it’s no wonder he wound up disliking people and society. He’s extremely creative and that creativity manifests itself in different ways. Kinda like me. It’s worth mentioning I used to roleplay this character back in the day, the very first canon character I used to write for.

6) Shulk (Xenoblade Chronicles)

One of the only blonde’s on this list. Shulk is a character that is driven by revenge but eventually changes. He goes through some pretty traumatic stuff that I absolutely will not spoil. His personality when he encounters a certain characters shifts big time and it’s kind of scary considering how early you see this. Also he gets points for being a notably intelligent character. I mean, the dude has his own lab...and is able to fix and adjust stuff. He’s really a great and well balanced character despite all the crap he goes through. Also I used to make fun of this character and dislike him a little bit, but then I grew up.

The list gets real starting...now. Not that it was fake before. :o

5) Jaden Yuki (Yu-Gi-Oh! GX)

Anyone who has actually watched the entirety of GX might know why he’s here. His character development in the latter seasons so unreal and interesting. I’m not spoiling crap but there is a lot more to the character than meets the eye. Like a lot lot. Over the course of the series he loses his innocent eyes and his personality changes a lot...His character is probably one I can relate to in terms of the reasons for his actions, the way he gets down about himself, the way he acts in the final season...it hits me hard...he’s too dang relatable...just like..

4) Rean Schwarzer (Trails of Cold Steel)

Surprise surprise. Rean is here. -hears crickets- Guess you’re not surprised. I wonder why. I think I relate to this character more than anyone else on this list. Except number one. Number one is in his own league. Rean is a character who generally carries a happy disposition...he has a unique power but you can see he is actively scared of it. It’s something I actively deal with...he’s so scared of himself that he puts distance between family and friends. He never feels he’s good enough. He’s made headway through this, but...

One thing that’s extremely interesting about this character is his selflessness. You may think this is driven to the ground in character stereotypes but for Rean it’s different...his selfless has been described as abnormal by characters in game, and it’s not for positive reasons...Rean deals with some real unhealthy stuff. This is getting long.

As of this post Cold Steel 4 comes out in one month and I’m extremely worried for his character. If you’ve played 3 then you’ll know why. Also if you haven’t played the Trails series, go play it. No buts. Heck I’ll even buy the game(s) for you if I can.

Oh look we’re at the top three. I want to say that while numbers two and three here are pretty interchangeable, these characters have been in my top three for over a decade and a half and I don’t see this changing anytime soon. Rean I love you but you have your work cut out if you ever want to breach the top 3. I wanna post a few honorable mentions here. They didn’t get into Smash but they do get Mii Costumes at least! -shot-

Davis Motomiya (Digimon Adventure 02)

This character was everything I was when I was a kid. The way he tries everything to woo Kari is too cute. Also his unwavering faith in Ken. Also Davis Cries Veemon.

9S (Nier Automata)

Not mentioning any spoilers. Just watch this character and see how his vision of the world changes over time.

Okabe Rintaro (Steins; Gate)

Okabe’s shift from his ‘persona’ as things get real and his efforts to fix everything is too relatable for me ;_;

Yosuke Hanamura (Persona 4)

No, I do not ship him with Yu. They’re great buddies for sure, and he’s pretty cool. Really likable character for me personally save for a few moments in the game...he’s also the main in the Arena games. “Let’s do this, Jiraiya!” He’s so cool lol.

Top 3 time. Fiercely dedicated to these guys.

3) Robin (Teen Titans Go! 2003)

Robin is such a raw character that carries his past and tries so hard to move from it yet it embodies him to his core. He has since gained a softer side from forming a team, and has been doing normal teenager stuff...which is good for him. However at times that Batman side impacts him so hard that he can only concentrate on his mission, and starts shutting out everyone and everything to do things himself. It actively gets in the way of his interactions. He deals a lot with moving on from failure and acknowledging his friends more, which he does get better at over time. He is also represented by the color red. My favorite color. He’s badass and yet carries so much crap. I connect to this character a lot even now. Third canon character I ever wrote for.

2 Lloyd Irving (Tales of Symphonia)

I love Lloyd. I love his voice, I love his attacks, I love his stupid double sword logic. He says wielding two swords makes him twice as powerful lol. I love his development. I love his idealism and how it matures over time. I love everything about Lloyd. It was legit love at first sight. I remember being 15-16 and seeing him on that Gamecube boxart and saying “I wanna play that guy” Most people I feel (guys in particular) probably looked up to certain characters growing up as a child/teen. Lloyd was mine.

1. Zidane Tribal (Final Fantasy IX)

While it was love at first sight for Lloyd, that was not the case for number one on this list. I was 13 when I first played FFIX. Zidane upon encountering him, I always thought he was a cool character, but he was nothing special. Even at Zidane’s lowest point I thought he was an okay character at best. I had not finished the game.

Fast forward a few years and I decide to play FFIX again, this time determined to finish it. I had went through some things, grew up a bit before turning this game on. This damn bandit...I remember writing this bit years ago: “His infamous mantra labeled above describes him well, but under his ability to console others with a smile, to cheer people up and meet them at their point of need with his abundant optimism lies a blonde who masks his pain and keeps his issues to himself. Despite his many friends and buddies he harbors a deep loneliness that, like his problems, he keeps to himself. One would have to look carefully to notice his character flaws for Zidane does an impressive job of hiding these problems. Whether it be through his energy, his theatrics, or focusing on other people, Zidane can cover things up quite well.”

Zidane has an absurd amount of depth to his character that I was never able to comprehend as a kid, beneath his flirting, his playful attitude, he hides a lot of feelings, a lot of anger, a lot of sadness. It used to boggle me how he’s able to uphold his sense of virtue despite what goes on in his life and the end of disc 3 answers this for me. It goes without mentioning that this was the second canon character I’ve ever written for, and I still love writing him. I could and write walls of text about how Zidane is so amazing, a chivalrous thief, a lover and a flirt but I think I can let you go lol. Hit me up if you really want to hear me ramble about any these characters, also play FF9.

...So I wrote all of that and forgot to write about Zidane’s ship...have to give it its own paragraph because I love these two together and she does wonders for Zidane as a whole as does he to her. She’s a princess and he’s a thief, they take their time to show them together through different things, different ordeals...particularly the ordeals. Its interesting seeing them both at their worst moments and the many funny moments..Man, that boat scene gets me every time...If I ever write a top ten couples list this couple would no doubt be in the top two if not number one. And I’d probably write way more than this about them because they’re great. Also they’re canon. A healthy canon. Also Dagger’s hot. Oh wait wrong list.

Okay finally done. Not editing this anymore :P

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breadknight-likes-things · 4 years

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Bread’s Skate (?!) Journal 09/06/20: The Other Ones: A Look Back On The Tony Hawk Imitators Of The Early 2000's....And BMX XXX.

Looking back at Tony Hawk as a series that's pretty solidly in the past can cause someone to easily forget how those games were actually thought of at the time: Hyper popular. As a result of that popularity, it was easy to see a bunch of other games and franchises that wanted a piece of that money, some from Activision themselves, some....very much not. Some of these games were good! Some of these games were so bad that they've become something of a legendary laughing stock in the game landscape as a whole.

As I said, Activision was no stranger to trying to apply the Tony Hawk formula to other sports in an attempt to cash in on the extreme success of their franchise. Sometimes these cash in's actually made for decent, if unoriginal games. Matt Hoffman's Pro BMX was more or less a carbon copy of the Tony Hawk formula, but with BMX Bikes instead of Skateboards, and it actually worked pretty well once you got used to the inherent differences of the two different styles. Other attempts were not quite as fortunate as Matt Hoffman though, and both of them sort of had the same "downhill" problem. Shaun Palmers Pro Snowboarder was an attempt to put the Tony Hawk formula into a snowboarding game, and while that should reasonably work, the linear and all downhill nature of the levels really didn't lend themselves to a fun time.

Following from Shaun Palmer was "Wakeboarding Unleashed featuring Shaun Murray" which is quite a title! It was originally revealed with the far more descriptive name as "Shaun Murray's Pro Wakeboarder" but I have to assume that was changed to...distance the game from Tony Hawk? It's a confusing move to say the least. The game was actually quite decent, more so than you'd assume from something like a wakeboarding game, and you can tell there was some talent behind it, the games issue was that, by design, it was pretty much always on rails. You were literally pulled through the levels behind a speed boat, and even though there was plenty to trick off, it lent a feeling that you were just being guided to the cool set pieces rather than actually doing any exploration of your own, it deserved better. Hell, it at least deserves it's own Wikipedia page, the only mention of it at all is on Shaun Murray's very small Wikipedia entry, an ignoble end for a game that least tried something new.

I had to find a screenshot for Shaun Murray, which I swear is real, and this is the only one I could easily find online. I swear this game happened!

Of course Activision wasn't the only studio trying to capitalize on the extreme sports craze and the Tony Hawk trick heavy style. EA found what I would consider the greatest success with franchises like SSX, and one entry wonders like Freakstyle (which is a seminal game for me as a kid, but one I feel very few people even know exist), a sort of blend of SSX and racing through the lens of Motocross. Hell, eventually EA would make Skate, which outlived Tony Hawk itself for a few years, and I already wrote about earlier this week, an excellent franchise that was nonetheless heavily inspired by THPS.

Now, there are far more imitators and hanger on's, some good (Splashdown, while closer to Wave Race, definitely stole some of it's vibes from THPS). Some incredibly bad (Gravity Games: Vert, Street, Dirt, an abysmally bad Tony Hawk ripoff from the early 2000's immediately springs to mind) and some downright strange (Four words: Disney's Extreme Skate Adventure). But only one company tried so hard and failed so miserably, and that's Acclaim, and BMX XXX.

This is genuinely what some of the worst impulses of the video game industry look like.

Acclaim had found success early on by getting Dave Mirra Freestyle BMX out only one year after Tony Hawk's Pro Skater, and it certainly wasn't a terrible game. It felt a little clunkier than what came out of Neversoft at the time, but it was definitely playable. Acclaim also went on to put out Aggressive Inline, which, while it might sound insane to say about an inline skating video game, is genuinely one of the best extreme sports games ever made. So Acclaim had real reason to believe they actually could put something out that would rival Tony Hawk! Then they put out BMX XXX.

BMX XXX is one of the most insipidly stupid things that any company has ever produced, certainly one of the worst video games ever made, and was so bad that Dave Mirra forced Acclaim to take his name off of it before release. You really can boil this game down to two things: Dave Mirra's okay BMX game play, and the horn-dog mindset of a 13 year old boy that just found an issue of Hustler in the woods. It's incredibly embarrassing! Full of hookers, pimps, literal strip club videos, dogs fucking and humor that was shitty and mean spirited even by the standards of 2004. It's astounding that anybody thought this game would sell at all, let alone do the impressive numbers they wanted for it. Even the console manufacturers didn't really seem to want this thing on their consoles, Sony out and out censored the nudity even (which yes, the game featured full polygonal breasts, and they are horrifying to look at today), and though the other two allowed the nudity to slide, they made it pretty clear they thought the game was terrible.

BMX XXX is a punchline today, rightfully, but I think it did so much harm to the idea of a competing extreme sports franchise, that any further attempt to really hone in on an Tony Hawk alike just sort of stopped right there. It actually came out pretty early on, in 2002, long before some of the other games I've mentioned on this list even, but the damage it did was impossible to ignore. Activision kept trying, we still got the occasional excellent SSX game, and we got Skate. Hell, we even got Ubisoft making a couple of tries, first with Shaun White doing a snowboarding and Skateboarding game, then with Steep. The concept wasn't killed entirely, a favorite of mine, Amped 3 for Xbox 360, even came out just a few years later, but it felt like the spirit was gone, and it never really came back. Thankfully, these days, we have more independent developers putting out their own vision of what an extreme sports game can be. I hope this new generation of developers can really get us back to the glory days of the extreme sports game, and even if they don't end up making it too far, at least they're going to try.

And things might get a little weird.

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lovelykate94 · 4 years

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Am I the only one who just discovered that $50 Plan B is not the only available morning after pill?!?! Why do I bring this up? Well cuz I live in the U.S. and every grocery store /pharmacy I have ever lived near only sells Plan B at a premium price. It wasn't until I went to Mexico and saw:

This lil guy at the pharmacy for the equivalent of $10 USD. I am outraged. Another way for companies to make boucoups of money off of women during a desperate moment.

I'm not saying this pill should be a go to for contraception, but when a woman needs it, it should not have to cost her the bank. I can't even count how many times in college I didn't purchase Levonorgestrel (aka Plan B) because I couldn't afford it as a struggling student, and lord knows I was not going to ask my parents for the money. Thank goodness I never became pregnant, but I could've been a lot less stressed knowing that I had taken a contraceptive 72hrs or less after having unprotected sex.

I guess what I'm saying is: this is a form of oppression towards women and I'm PISSED. If the tables were turned and men needed this pill, it would come in millions of different brands, have the side effects tested out, and be available conveniently and a reasonable price.

It's not just the abortion debate that is against women. It's contraceptives too! I, as a woman, cannot get the pill, the ring, a shot, an IUD without going to a Dr., paying a copay or paying the whole Dr.'s Bill ( because shocker, I don't have health insurance). I then have to go back and repeat the expensive process every 6 months in order to keep refilling my Birth Control prescription. Oh and on top of the money, I have to be "checked out" by the Dr., or in other words: have a cold metal speculum shoved into my hoo hah in order to be prescribed birth control, even though a pap smear is only necessary every 3 years for a woman in their 20s. Yet another trap to make money off of desperation.

"Buy condoms", they say! Well guess what I can't trust a man to keep one on, so I must protect myself in other ways.

Ladies, there are other options out there besides the premium priced Plan B.

If you read my whole rant, thanks for coming to my TED Talk.

Here's some links: https://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/us_5785562

Side Note: Plan B is run by an organization called Teva Pharmaceuticals

Here's a pic of the CEO (it's is MAN)

DL;DR:

Plan B is a ripoff. There are cheaper options out there now.

#planb #plan b #contraception #contraceptives #womens rights #awareness #birth control #birthcontrol #ladies rights #levonorgestrel

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eurosong · 5 years

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Hey there, folks! I recently saw @serhat2019 posting threads comparing 2019 with 1999 and 1989. I love comparisons going back into the classic contests, though for me, 1989 and 1999 are each the weakest contest of their respective decades. It got me wondering which songs I’d prefer if I included all the decade-ending years. So, here we are! Of course, I removed the countries with just one song, but here’s my comparison of those with 2 or more songs across ESC history. Gold means I think it’s the best for that country over the decades. Silver is like an honourable mention because I like it a fair bit. Red is for when I particularly dislike a song.

Albania - 2 decent efforts but I much prefer Ktheju tokës. Keep keeping your songs in your beautiful languages, Shqipëria. Armenia - A real tough choice as these are two of their best ever songs. At the minute, my mind is constantly singing Walking out oooooo, so I give it the edge. Austria - Austria is one of many countries I feel end decades on a lacklustre note. Limits is the best of the bunch for me. Azerbaijan - The second best Azeri song for me (top is Skeletons) versus one of the shriekiest. No contest... Truth. Belarus - Not much of a choice. I go for Like it even though I don’t... like it... much Belgium - 6 decades, 6 songs and none get my heart racing. Door de wind and Like the wind are pleasant enough. This year’s is too. The one with the most character of the bunch for me is Hey nana. Croatia - Slim pickings - 2009. Cyprus - Not a fan of any of their decade-ending songs. The first is the least tragic for me. Czechia - I didn’t hate Aven romale as much as many folk did, but I prefer FoaF. Denmark - I like this year’s song, but even better is the iconic Tommy Seebach. Estonia - Storm is dire sub-Avicii stuff. Diamond of night was one of the few nice songs in a woeful year. But I’m going with Rändajad of course, probably Estonia’s best. Finland - Of course going here with Katri Helena, one of the many often undeservedly forgotten queens of ESC. France - the only one of this bunch I don’t like is this year’s obnoxious ode to self. Je suis l’enfant soleil was a fierce return for AMD. J’ai volé la vie is one of the very few occasions where I’ve been able to stomach a child performing in main ESC. But I have to go with Un jour, un enfant, one of the best winners ever for me.

Germany - Miss Kiss Kiss Bang made me swing, Dschingis Khan made me dance, but I’ve got to pick Heute Abend..., which charms the hell out of me 60 years later! Greece - This year’s is one of my favourite entries from Greece in a while. The cheery Sokrati gets an honourable mention. Hungary - Credible versus cringe. 2019. Iceland - The best Icelandic song ever for me was 1989. Such a strange musical procession, such poëtic lyrics, such an undeserved nil points. Ireland - Sadly my dear Ireland often ended decades on underwhelming notes. 22 is the best of the bunch for me. Israel - Can one not pick Hallelujah here? I hope not. Italy - in most occasions while doing this, if a country had a lot of entries, the lower the probability was that I’d pick this year. Italy is one of the few exceptions. I adore Soldi above the 4 others, though they’re mostly very nice entries. Latvia - Nice, laidback, rainy song versus a pretty dire outing in 2009. 2019. Lithuania - Strazdas is one of the few songs I like from ‘99 and the best of the three. I wish they’d return to their national language! Luxembourg - Statistically, one of my favourite countries ever at the contest, but they didn’t do much justice to themselves in the ends of decades. I prefer the quirky Monsieur. Macedonia - Both decent but not spectacular. Both a bit old-fashioned. I prefer the rocky one. Malta - One of Malta’s best versus 2 of their worst. Chameleon any day of the week. Moldova - Extremely dreary song this year, especially when compared to the dynamic Hora din Moldova! Monaco - 1959. I didn’t like any of the three though Montenegro - You know a song is bad when you prefer Heaven over it, but the Siegel penned Abba-ripoff of 2009 is indeed worse than D mol. Netherlands - Arcade is nice. De troubadour is iconic. But Een beetje is one of the greatest winners evah! Norway - Going for another oft forgotten ESC queen. Anita Skorgan with the groovy Oliver. Poland - Poor choice. Going with this year’s for being the most traditional. Portugal - Adore Telemóveis... but for the minute, it has to take runner-up status to the stunning and equally passionate Desfolhada. Romania - Easy pick for the dark 2019. Russia - Scream is nice enough. Ironically, Scream, despite its scary name, nowhere near scared me as much as Mamo did. Serbia - Serbia doing what they do best in 2019 vs a weird entry in 2009. Taking the former. Slovenia - Easy pick for the divinely introspective, intimate Sebi. Spain - A bunch of decent songs from my country of residence... Su canción was lovely til the wee anklebiters started singing. Nacida para amar is an epic... but I have to prefer a song that I will be singing for the whole day now. Desde que llegaste, ya no vivo llorando EY vivo cantando EY vivo soñando EY <3 Sweden - Judy min vän is great and the lyrical content is very unusual for ESC. I like Too late for love, one of Sweden’s best efforts for years even if it is half-plagiat. But the easy winner here is the song I feel is Sweden’s best winner ever in 1999. Switzerland - Some very beige offerings plus the smugness of 2019 and the oddball earworm annoyingness of 1979. I go for 1969 as the most benign. Turkey - I have to go for 1989, back in the glory days of Turkish différence at the contest. UK - Say it again was probably the most underrated UK song of the 90s. Sing little birdie was really charming. Got to go for Boom bang a bang though, an eternal earworm!

#eurovision #esc 2019 #eurovision song contest #classics #opinion #eurovision 2019

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adamwatchesmovies · 5 years

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Leprechaun 4: In Space (1997)

Pray you never live to see Leprechaun 4: In Space. Yes, the only warning it needed is right there, in the title. It dares you to watch it and once seen, no amount of complaining will ever make you feel any better... but that won’t stop me from trying.

Once again, the plot ignores all previous entries and the rules are about as consistent as a game of Calvin Ball. The Leprechaun (Warwick Davis) has kidnapped space princess Zarina (Rebekah Carlton) and intends to marry her in order to become king of her home planet. Before any vows can be exchanged soldiers rescue her and the Leprechaun is apparently killed, but he won't give her up that easily.

There is absolutely nothing good about Leprechaun 4: In Space. You think I’m trying to be funny or hyperbolic, but I mean it. Let’s begin with the plot, which makes absolutely no sense. It’s like someone found a terrible ripoff of Aliens and did a “find-replace” to take out all instances of “Alien” and insert “Leprechaun” instead. It’s astonishingly, inhumanely poorly written. A character pissing on a corpse is a plot point! How some executive managed to sit through this escapee from hell and green-lit it, I’ll never know. Even if the production was top-notch, It’s so dull you'll struggle to stay awake.

The titular monster isn’t remotely appealing. He never rhymes in the way he kinda did in the previous film and repeats the same “jokes” over and over. The humans are pathetic as well. Most of them are meathead military mercenaries waiting to be killed, with a couple of visual quirks given to some to help the editor remember the order in which the deaths were supposed to happen. Don’t expect anything awesome when it comes to their demises, however. This is a zero-budget picture that can't afford to show anything. As a cherry on top of the toilet fudge sundae are a bunch of developments that come out of nowhere towards the end and a conclusion so abrupt I was certain there was going to be a stinger at the end of the credits.

The film steals liberally (sometimes for would-be comedic effect) from countless better films. Alien and Aliens obviously, but also The Fly, Star Wars and The Wizard of Oz. This horror comedy is never funny, not even in a “so bad it’s good kind of way”. It’s juvenile stuff, like pointless nudity or ample jokes revolving around male anatomy. Warwick Davis embarrasses himself by giving a bunch of bad impressions and we even have some cross-dressing thrown in. At times, it gets so bad you're left confused. Is the fact that we’ve got an evil German Cyborg named Dr. Mittenhand (played by Guy Siner in some shots, by an unconvincing puppet in others) supposed to be comical, or is it a coincidence that his name sounds like it was meant for a kitten?

If I had to single out "the worst thing", It'd be the special effects. It’s not only that they’re bad, but they’re continuously bad in a wide variety of ways. If it isn’t a cave that looks like it was made from the contents of a full kitty litter bin, it’s the same three sets used over and over. It’s shots of asteroids that are just the same CG rock copied and pasted, continuous shots of a space shuttle that looks like it belongs in one of those infamous FMV games, which then cut to sets that are clearly cobbled together from easily available props. There’s a window that is clearly just a black sheet of cloth with some sparkly circles glued to it and the Leprechaun's treasure looks like it came from a dollar store. I counted at least 3 establishing shots that were actually still photos from a set that none of the actors or camera people had any access to. It’s like someone did a web search for “space station” and used the results to fill in some of the missing footage! The composite shots are weak and in more than one instance, characters or objects looked pixilated. Don’t even get me started on that conclusion. I’ve seen more convincing effects on YouTube.

With a title like Leprechaun 4: In Space I hoped for a new “so bad it’s good” classic. It isn't. How could someone have made a film this abysmal and how can it be widely available for everyone to see? Director Brian Trenchard-Smith must either be the bravest or most delusional man on Earth to have allowed his name to be listed in the credits of this cinematic atrocity.

I wouldn’t wish the experience I had watching Leprechaun 4 onto anyone. It's one of the worst films I've ever seen... and there are still more movies in the series to watch! (On DVD, June 23, 2015)

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