Colossal Titan vs Greymon

Posted on by
Reply


unnamed
The Colossal Titan is pretty powerful figure that scared the entire planet, but the heroes didn’t have an Omnimon to help them. Omnimon has a powerful blade and it would work pretty well against a titan. A single strike should be enough to take the Colossal Titan out of the fight and Omnimon also has enough speed to dodge any possible counters. No amount of regeneration can save the Colossal Titan! Greymon wins.

Link to the original image by Vizar-Aizen can be found below.

http://vitor-aizen.deviantart.com/art/Omegamon-vs-Titans-371830635

The Amityville Horror Review

Posted on by
2

Disclaimer: This review is of the edited TV 14 version of the film. All thoughts written below should be addressed accordingly as a review of the unedited version would likely be even more negative.
bgCWTcP48I0KRJD58evwWbfK1x8
The Amityville Horror is a film that you could probably judge from the title and know what to expect. I came into the film with reasonably low expectations and it still managed to crash way below them. This title is filled with red herrings and uninteresting characters to distract you from the fact that not much really happens in this film. If you haven’t seen it, now’s your chance to quickly back away to spare yourself some time.

The plot involves George and Kathy as they decide to move to a new house. They are pretty strapped for cash, but they really want a new house. Unfortunately, that’s just how it is in the modern world. The house is really beat up and the previous occupants were participants in a gruesome act, but the new owners don’t mind. They quickly pay up and the real estate agent was probably thrilled that someone finally fell for her tricks. The heroes settle in with their 3 kids and things seem to be going smoothly. Then, mysterious things start to happen and the heroes realize that the house may be tougher than it looks.

Well, there are many placed to start with this film. Let’s talk about the characters first. George is a pretty terrible lead and his “strength of character” is nonexistent. All it takes is an artificial chill that the spirit produces to start corrupting him. He loses his temper constantly and yells at the dog just to provide him with some amount of “toughness” for his character. It really just makes him look petty and even worse. I wasn’t rooting for him almost from the second that he appeared. He is distracted by romance, but not enough so that he can resist the influence of the dark spirits. Feeling cold isn’t fun, but his mind deteriorates way too quickly through this feeling. He continues to crack as the film goes on. He gets a heroic scene towards the end to try and redeem his character, but that was basically impossible by that point. It helps his character to be sure, but it’s simply too late for him.

Kathy is the main heroine and she doesn’t really look much better. SHe keeps on telling George that they shouldn’t get the house, but then she relents and they move in. From then on, she basically just has to watch as George goes crazy and she can’t really do anything about it. In the climax, she decides to fight, but it’s one of the worst attempts of all time. She gives up after a few seconds and she really showed no combat experience. That’s all right, but anyone can throw a punch and I would expect a much better fight out of someone who’s fighting for several lives. That was pretty poor form and she never became likable as the film went on.

The film plays out as a reverse slasher in the sense that the spirit picks off everyone one by one, but it doesn’t typically finish them off. It just gives them a scare so they will leave the house. Failure to comply with it will result in a car crash or permanent paralysis. Sometimes both. It’s a unique approach I suppose, but you do have to wonder what the point of it all is. The spirit gets some character development towards the end, but it’s very slight.

The film also really wanted to push the “Even God can’t save you now” angle. I suppose that it can be seen as the ultimate scare since you would really be doomed. Ignoring that this scenario would never even be possible, it just goes very far to show this. The heroes put up a mini statue of the cross and the spirit makes sure to burn it. Later on, the Father at one of the churches comes over to bless the house and the spirit overwhelms him with a powerful curse. We see him try to leave a Bible, but the spirit forces him to pick it back up and run away. Later on, he tries to go back, but the spirit just takes out his car and essentially ends his life since he’s almost brain dead at this point. Most Hollywood/mainstream films like to point out that demons and spirits can be alive while the same isn’t true for Angels and God. It’s a film so they can always mess with the rules that way, but it makes the whole thing pretty lopsided. The film is also trying to claim that it’s from a true story although I suppose that we all knew better about 15 minutes into the film. Demons are real so some horror stories are probably real, but this is one of the tales that was probably just made up for a quick buck and their 5 minutes of fame.

Another negative would be the George getting corrupted part. It’s so overdone and it’s one of the worst horror plots. Give us a supernatural enemy who can’t be stopped (Which is bad enough) but let’s at least give the main characters some determination and a will to fight back. Seeing him turn on everyone is just not enjoyable and it’s an easy way out of using special effects or good writing. The hit towards the end was basically the cliff that the film went over since he was no longer redeemable although he may have already passed that part earlier.

The film is not the most violent horror film that you’ll encounter. There are only a handful of scenes, but one of them is particularly brutal as one of the main characters has a dream. It’s enough that you could instantly guess that this film was a little stronger than your average summer blockbuster and it didn’t do any wonders for the film. Violence against noncombatants always ends up appearing as a negative compared to fighting violence. See, a fighter getting injured is way different than a pedestrian getting hit since they are prepared for two vastly different roles.

The kids are also pretty bad characters. The girl has an imaginary friend once again who turns out to be the spirit of the house. It explains that it wants them to stay in the house forever so that’s basically why it wants George to destroy them all. Or, so it would seem. The spirit is evidently strong enough to destroy them all on his own, but I guess it wants things to end up just like how they did last time. It mostly seems to have power over the mind, but its abilities have a real impact on the human world so it’s not just simple telepathy. Most likely it has advanced reality warping abilities since that’s a favorite for most horror writers. You don’t have to do any work, just make it able to do literally anything and you can call it a day.

I’d say that the film is actually more grotesque than scary. The film came out decades ago so you can mostly anticipate everything that it’s going to do, which is why it can be tough to be scared. The grotesque part goes back to the flies, which were some of the worst scenes in the film. One thing that I’ve never liked are insect scares since it’s just about insects crawling all over somebody so you can imagine the worst. It was a painfully bad scene as they attack the Father and force him out of the house. The guy takes his time leaving even though an ordinary person would have dashed out. The spirit continues to torment the guy with boils and such since the guy keeps trying to warn the heroes of the imminent danger.

The other scary scene would likely be when the babysitter is trapped in the closet. You’re supposed to be extra worried for her since she already has braces so everything is a little tougher for her. It’s really more unpleasant and sad to watch than it is scary and the lights turn off, but we already know that the spirit refuses to destroy anyone. It just wants to scare them over and over again until George cracks and does the work for him. The Babysitter literally had no point in the story. She was just there to get taken down.

The heroes have a dog and he’s probably the only positive thing that I can say about the whole experience. There is a little dog violence unfortunately as he scratches at a wall so hard that his paws bleed. Luckily, the film redeemed itself by saving the dog at the end so he wouldn’t have to bring the film down even more. It’s a shame that the other characters wanted to leave him (Kathy did anyway) but I would expect no less from her. George went back, which was good since it shows that he could have been a good character if not for the mind control.

The soundtrack was better than your average horror film so I guess that’s another positive. Considering when it came out, it’s surprisingly fast paced at times and it’s decently memorable. A horror film having a soundtrack in the first place is pretty surprising and it being a good one even more so. If only we had some good scenes to go along with it.

The spirit’s true form is only shown twice, but he seems like a decently tough demon. He’s pretty large, but he can probably shape shift at will so he will likely look different each time. He would have been a little cooler if he had fought some more, but the budget probably wasn’t there yet unless they used a suit like in the old Godzilla films. That would have been pretty interesting.

Some plot lines never really get time to develop either since the film didn’t know where it was going. We have the Detective who tries to act tough and sneaks around for clues, but he never ends up doing anything. He just abruptly disappears and ends up playing no role in the story. He was just there for filler, nothing more. Another woman is possessed by the spirits and tells them that the well is a gateway to Hell. Okay…I think we could have guessed that when we saw the endless tar coming out of it. What does that have to do with anything? The heroes never decide to close the well and the info didn’t help anyone out. I’m guessing that the original climax would have had the heroes plug it up, but maybe it was written out due to time constraints and a rapidly falling budget.

Overall, The Amityville Horror is not a film that you’ll want to check out anytime soon. The monster design is pretty good and the soundtrack is good as well, but everything else about the film really hit rock bottom. There was only 1 or 2 jump scenes and neither of them worked since we weren’t watching the film in super 3D in the dead of night with speakers that make you shiver with loud noises. The gross scenes will just make you back up a little and George’s plot is extremely wince worthy. The film also gives the Father way too cruel of a fate just so it could make a point that wouldn’t help the film anyway. Burning the cross and effectively destroying the Father…we get the point. (We also can’t forget making the Nun so sick that she has to end up leaving the house almost immediately) It’s hard to tell which negatives pushed my buttons the most to deserve a 1 since there were so many of them and they just kept adding up and up and up. Ah well, at least it was a pretty easy decision. I had the rating set before the film had even ended. While you’re steering clear of this film, just play a scary game like Dirge of Cerberus or take the opposite effect and take this time to rent Megaman Battle Network 5. Either way, you’ll be better off as this film goes into Sucker Punch levels of terrible. If you do watch the film, you should try to make a list of plots and characters that ended up not adding anything to the film.

Overall 1/10

Pacific Rim Tales From Year Zero Review

Posted on by
Reply

20141005204304!Pacific_Rim_Tales_from_Year_Zero (1)
Pacific Rim got a lot of hype when it was coming out and I had pretty high hopes for it. It had a pretty epic trailer and the very notion of Kaiju battling robots was epic. It turns out that my hopes were probably a little too high for the film since it ended up underwhelming me, but it was still a solid feature. Checking out the graphic novel was a given. I was ready for some big fights, but unfortunately…they were nowhere to be found. This comic definitely isn’t going to help you become a Pacific Rim fan.

The comic takes place before the film as we get to see a little homage of Gypsy Danger as well as some of the old robots. We see one of the main characters as a child and briefly get to see the original Kaiju attack. After that, some new cadets are brought into the Jaeger program to give the outfit some new life. To pilot one of the mecha, you need a pair of individuals who are really in sync. A moment’s hesitation or distraction can be the difference in battle. Technically, the comic takes place after these events, but we see the story through an interview that a reporter is working on with various people. She actually contributes to the problems that arise though.

Well, the comic was really just a lot of filler. That’s to be expected I suppose, but you wouldn’t really enjoy the comic if you just picked it up at a bookstore. They talk about how dangerous the Kaijus are and how the mechs are being sold, but it’s hard to really care. The Kaiju don’t seem to be an imminent threat at the moment and there’s no sense of urgency here. In the present, the humans just seem down and pretty somber. I guess they are on the losing side, but it feels like the war is already over.

One of the main reasons why the comic is not good is that it resorts to cheap fanservice scenes. Neurolinking inside of the mech apparently means that you have to meet in astral forms that really resemble your normal body. You can at least keep on some sci-fi clothes so that the whole thing is less provocative. It’s pretty unnecessary and there’s no point to this. We also get a one night stand just for kicks and so the two main characters would have something to argue about. (Although, it’s tough to call them the main characters since they barely do anything at all)

The main reporter appears to be a decent character at first, but we see her true colors through flashbacks as the comic goes on. She hints that she’s changed since then, but the comic is too short for real character development so we can’t totally buy into this. The flashback definitely didn’t help matters and she just didn’t feel like a real character. She was there to give the reader some backstory, but that’s about it.

The brothers who are asked to pilot the Jaeger aren’t much better. They’re basically your average mainstream joe. They let romance cloud their judgment immediately and they definitely believe that beauty is only skin deep. Gone are the days when we had noble main characters who would really try to be heroes without any reward. It’s hard to sympathize with them at all during their fight over the girl and you’re just waiting for them to fight a Kaiju.

There’s also a subplot with two researchers who used to be friends, but then work caused them to drift apart among other things. They’re picked to help out in the research division and more romance drama ensues. The comic definitely put too much of an emphasis on romance and that’s certainly not what you want to see in an action comic that features Kaiju and robots. The only decent character would be the general guy who saved the kid in the film. He’s still the only character who can get things done here. It’s a shame that he only gets to appear for a few brief pages.

It should also be noted that the art is pretty bad. I would compare it to a fan comic or the titles that are aimed at older audiences so they try to just this style for effect. (Never works anyway) It’s definitely under average and after reading a lot of solid titles like Mega Man and Sonic, it really stands out. I haven’t seen art that was this bad since some of the random Free Comic Book Day comics from a while back. This certainly didn’t help the comic score either and the fight scenes didn’t look bad, but they were extremely brief. You can barely call a 2-3 page skirmish a fight since it’s over before it’s even begun.

So, the comic didn’t really have any notable positives to it. The comic could have easily risen up to a 6 if they had cut out some of the romance and included an actual Kaiju fight. As it stands, the cover is very misleading. I think it may have also been more engaging if we had experienced the events instead of just finding out about them through flashbacks and stories. That’s never the best way to show what happened in the olden days. A more interesting cast definitely would have helped as well. You’ll walk out of the comic forgetting all of the names because the characters just aren’t memorable enough to be remembered.

Overall, Pacific Rim Tales From Ground Zero was pretty disappointing. There isn’t really anything very good to say about it. The concept of this universe is pretty good and it has the potential to be a pretty great franchise. I’m still looking forward to the upcoming TV show and the film sequel should be pretty good as well. This prequel just didn’t add anything to the series and we really learned nothing here. There were no real action scenes and the main characters were all pretty bad. It’s hard to root for the humans, but the Kaiju don’t get to look very good either. Add in the fanservice and the romance and you have a losing formula. I was pretty close to giving this one a 5. It was neck and neck with the 4 star rating, but sometimes the score becomes clearer as you’re writing the review. This was one of those times and I ended up giving it a 4 since I would not recommend this one. Read a Transformers comic if you want some good mecha action with a superior plot. Tales from Ground Zero could not live up to its cover and I hope that future comics will be better.

Overall 4/10

The Mummy Review

Posted on by
Reply

The_Mummy_1932_film_poster
Looks like it’s time to check out the original Mummy film! This one came out almost a century ago so you shouldn’t expect the effects to look quite as good as Tron’s. That being said, a film can still manage to be pretty good without effects as long as the writing is strong. That’s what helped a lot of the previous retro installments. Alas, it could not last. This film is nowhere near as good as the remake although I applaud the supernatural elements that made things pretty intriguing at points. Let’s see where the film messed up.

The plot involves an Archeologist and his partner as they are pretty sad. Their expedition into the desert turned out to be a waste of time and they are getting ready to rejoin civilization so that they can be mocked for their efforts. At that moment, a suspicious character tells them of a hidden tomb that is nearby and his minions uncover it for the heroes. The courageous fellows quickly inform the press and send their findings to the museum. This has all been too easy…why would this person help them? It makes more sense when you watch the flashback before this scene as the Mummy is uncovered because a man opened the legendary chest that had a curse inside of it. (Don’t worry, the curse isn’t random, we find out who placed it there towards the end of the film) The Mummy awakens and one of the guys goes insane with laughter as his mind breaks at the mere sight of the Mummy. In the present, The Mummy needs the ancient manuscript for his devious plans and he also wants to revive his partner. Time for the heroes to do something about it!

The plot sounds rather deep and convoluted thanks to how I wrote it, but it’s not as bad as it sounds. You are aware of the Mummy and the sinister developments for a good portion of the film. The heroes are just unsure of what they can really do about it, which results in a lot of tense scenes. None of the characters are really likable though, but more on that later. The film was doing all right in these moments, but let’s look at one of the big pitfalls that the film threw itself into.

First up…Animal Violence! I expect animal violence when I watch something like Sucker Punch or Toriko, but I don’t expect it from one of the most famous horror films of last generation. The scene comes out of nowhere, which is pretty sad. The main heroine randomly admits that she has a dog and takes him to the villain’s base. Seeking to impress her with his hypnosis, the Mummy tells his slave to take the dog away…then the slave murders the dog. Why would he do such a thing and why would the Mummy allow it? The whole point is that he is tricking the heroine and that shouldn’t help matters. Unfortunately, she is rather weak willed and her strength of character is not enough to even remember how her dog died. It was a rather depressing moment in an uninteresting film and I quickly slashed a few points off the score. (Although, even without the animal violence this film was destined to fall within this range. Animal Violence or not…this was not going to crack a 5)

I don’t really comment on the acting so I won’t get into how terribly awkward it was for the film. I’ll just point to how they wrecked the characters through the drama scenes. A lot of scenes just have the characters staring at each other or making terrible decisions that lead to their untimely demise. With that set up…it’s time to look at the characters!

The main character is Frank. He’s better than his predecessor in the opening who goes insane just by looking at the Mummy, but he’s not much better. (I still can’t get over that though. Do people honestly think that someone would go crazy just by sneaking a glance at a dead guy? That was one of the biggest moments of plot hax that I’ve seen since Colonel actually held his own against Forte in the Program of Light and Dark) Frank is the kind of guy who believes in (fake) love at first sight and he really pushes the point when he meets Helen. She keeps on telling him that she is not interested (For about 5 minutes anyway) but he won’t take no for an answer and she quickly relents. After that, he doesn’t really care about anything except helping her and he can’t do a good job of that either. He knows that the Mummy is playing her like a fiddle, but he still decides to just go to sleep on the couch. It should be noted that his partner tried to help by giving Frank an amulet that stops the Pharaoh’s abilities from working, but Frank decides to hang it on the doorknob as a little keychain. You may admire his courageousness, but you’ll probably just face palm as the Mummy quickly uses the Force Choke to take Frank down for the count. A rather embarrassing end and no amount of main character hax that occurs in the film can take that moment away from us. It was pretty inexcusable.

I can’t say that Helen is much better. Again, she tried to say no to Frank, but then she just agreed that the feelings were mutual. They evidently were not at first so she changed her mind way too quickly. Her mind is also very frail since the Mummy is able to quickly convince her that she must go with him. She always enters a trance and he has complete control over her. She tries to fight it once in a while, but with terrible results. Forgetting about her dog was also pretty inexcusable and she should have been able to fight the mind control. This is definitely a strong example for how you do not write a main heroine. It was a rather poor showing.

There were two old men who tried to help out as well, but they couldn’t get the job done. One of them had the simple task of burning a few papers in the fireplace, but the Force Choke surprises him so much that he drops the papers and starts to backpedal until he bites the big one. (Which is when the slave breaks in through the unlocked door and steals the papers) The other guy just gives advice like “Let Helen go to Imhotep so we can find out where his hideout is” before taping an untimely nap. These guys loves to beat around the bush as seen with their interrogation of the Mummy, but they know that they are outmatched. They actually admit it in front of the Mummy, which is pretty sad.

The actual Mummy isn’t great either. We get a sob story for him about how he did all of this for romance and stuff. Unfortunately, deciding to reincarnate yourself is against the law so he’s quickly destroyed….thereby speeding up the reincarnation. I guess they didn’t have any mages back then to counter the Mummy’s spell. After that, he evidently decided to wait years and years for some archaeologists to come and discover the tomb instead of just going inside of it himself. He would have been able to have gotten the scroll without any objections that way and then he could have searched for his reincarnated partner. Alas, he decided to do things the hard way. He has a strong amount of telepathy and possibly some superhuman strength so I guess it’s okay for him to be confident. Unfortunately, he underestimated the humans or overestimated his Force Choke when push came to shove.

The flashbacks and the ending were intriguing, but they just threw in supernatural elements without any true meaning. I applaud the effort as we actually get a “god” at the end who decides to help out, but just barely. The Mummy still would have gotten away for it if not for a few missteps. I mean, the Mummy Did basically laugh at Isis’ rules by coming back to life so you would expect a little more urgency.

Overall, This was definitely not one of the better retro films. I definitely preferred the newer Mummy film. It was more action packed and while it wasn’t downright amazing, it was a lot more fun. The Mummy just isn’t a fun or engaging villain and his telepathy is the only thing that actually made him a threat. A lot of scenes didn’t seem to have really been thought through either. (The heroes going after the Mummy after the villain had a super long head start and still making it in time.) Strictly speaking from Frank’s perspective, the ending felt like a parody. He’s the big hero, but he never got to be useful from start to finish. I would sooner recommend watching the remake or checking out Speed Racer than this film. This film was lacking in positives while still containing a lot of negatives.

Overall 3/10

LBX Little Battlers Experience

Posted on by
Reply

LBX-1-kaze
All right, it looks like we have another solid manga series to add to the current lineup. The LBX show is good, but it’s been very slow paced and the animation can be better. The manga improves on just about all of its faults and volume 1 was a pretty great start. It reminds me of Megaman in many ways. Keep it up and this series could go down as one of the big toy based manga. I shall have a review for it when the series finishes.

Overall 7/10

M&M’s Kart Racing Stats and Records

Posted on by
Reply

Stats time!

Coins

Yellow: 404
Everyone Else: 0

Best Lap Times

Chocolate Factory 37s
The Streets 52s
The House 33s
The Farm 38s
Forest 39s
Mountains 1m 16s
Beach 57s
Sea Carrier 1m 6s
Arctic 1m 15s
Alien Space Craft 38s
Alien HQ 57s
Abstract World 48s
Chocolate Volcano 30s
Coliseum 34s
The Stadium 35s

M&M’s Kart Racing Review

Posted on by
Reply

M&M's_Kart_Racing
I’ll admit that this was a title that I have been wanting to buy for some time now. Who here didn’t grow up with the famous M&M candies? They were and still are awesome. I feel like having a bag of them right now. They’re just sooo good. Well, that was one of the reasons why I wanted this game, but I also noticed that the reviews for it were rather negative. I like games that tend to get poor scores (especially on the Wii) and I like the M&M’s so throwing in the racing genre was an added bonus. It was about as good as I had expected although it should have been 4 players.

There’s not really a plot in this game so you’ll probably just jump into the tournament mode. There is only one tournament, but it is over 10 races long so it should last you a good 30-40 minutes. The first stages were pretty dicey, but the backgrounds get more interesting during the later levels. You actually get to go to space as well as a chocolate mountain. That sounds pretty fun right? Most of the levels are around 2-5 minutes so they shouldn’t take you very long to complete. One of the levels was especially funny since it’s basically just a generic circle as you follow the road and there’s no danger of bumping into anything. You can just coast along and chuckle at your brilliance.

There’s not much to say about the gameplay. You accelerate with one of the buttons and then you head for the goal. There is only one item in this game and it takes the form of a cup of tea. (It looks like tea anyway) If you run over it, your character will get a slight boost in speed, but your kart will also start shaking a lot so it’s a gamble. It’s great on the easy stages without many turns, but it’s typically not worth it on the earlier levels.

I liked the final 5 stages much more than the first 5 ones. The main reason is that the camera is pretty bad and you won’t be able to see where you’re going until it’s too late. I crashed quite a few times on those levels, but I still managed to squeak out a first place finish every time….except for one level. It was a boat level and I got stuck for so long that I was firmly in last. I quickly redid the level and nailed it, but it’s nice to know that the computers do have a little fight in them. My recommendation to beat the camera is to put on the brakes a lot and keep your foot off the gas when you see any kind of turn approaching.

Don’t worry folks, this isn’t the next Casper! Once you beat the Tournament there is still one thing to do. You have to keep on racing the levels over and over again until you get enough coins to get every kart with every character. It shouldn’t take too long since 30 races will be enough to get enough coins for one character so you just need to enter the tournament like 20 times. Of course, that’s the long way. The best way is to just find the level with the most coins and keep on playing it until you have them all. I’ll probably attempt this someday……if video games stop coming out. I have too much on my plate to worry about this at the moment so it’s going to have to take a back seat.. (Smash Bros on the 21st, DBZ early next year, Big Naruto game late next year…etc)

I got enough coins to unlock one or two cars for the blue (or yellow) M&M and that’s good enough for me at the moment. You can tell that the game was made rather quickly due to the lack of replay value. There really isn’t anything else to do in single player mode and that’s where the multiplayer mode comes in. This is the kind of game that will only have a lot of replay value if you have someone to play it with. The gameplay definitely pales in comparison to the other racing titles, but it’s not that bad when you’re actually playing it. It’s actually fun and you just don’t want to play it in super large batches. As long as you keep this in mind…you’re set! Of course, one flaw in the multiplayer mode is the fact that it only goes up to 2 players. In this day and age, that’s a little unacceptable. It’s the kind of game that would be perfect for 4 players so I don’t see why they didn’t do that. It would be hard to see where you’re going, but that’s already the case in single player mode.

The graphics are definitely not that good. They are better than some of the other Wii games from the bottom of the barrel, but they’re definitely not the next Mario Galaxy. I would actually compare the graphics to some of the older DS games like Alex Rider. While you are going through the course, it’s usually still loading. So, you’ll see parts of the wall not be there in one moment and then they’ll suddenly appear. You’re simply going too fast for the actual game to keep up so the animations are a step behind. It’s a pretty bad sign to be honest, but it’s mostly just hilarious. I imagine that there are a ton of glitches here just waiting to be found.

There’s not really much of a soundtrack here. I seriously don’t recall any specific themes during the races. Maybe I was too excited to notice them, but I’m assuming that they were just unmemorable. I quickly turned on the game as I was writing this review so at least get the theme song (And my stats post) ready to go and it’s not bad. It’s just ultimately generic so you will forget it instantly. I should also mention that the loading times can be rather long so you should hope that you don’t dislike the music since you will be listening to it a whole lot. There is no opening or ending cinematic in the game for beating the tournament so there’s no chance for music at those points.

Finally, you can rest assured that this game does provide each character with a few taunts. Feel free to use them while racing since it won’t slow you down and the voice acting may cause your opponent to crash into a wall while they try to cover their ears. The M&M’s are very sure of themselves and you should hear how confidently they insult the others. The character designs did make me pick the blue (or yellow) one by default since they all looked pretty bad, but at least they mean business. It should be noted that while you are driving at over 200mph, the gameplay speed is very slow. You’re basically going through the stage as if you were on a real toy cart. Since some of the stages are only about 2 minutes, this means that the scenery is pretty limited. (30-40 seconds per lap after all) So, that can be interesting, but maybe it just makes the game more strategic.

Overall, M&M’s Kart Racing won’t last for very long, but it’s not an unpleasant experience. I may not actually play it again until around Christmas, (If at all) but I knew what I was getting when I bought it. It was a little over the usual 5 dollars that I’m willing to shell out for a game, but I knew that it was worth it. If you are going to use the multiplayer option then feel free to add an extra number to the score and if you’re by yourself, then you may want to keep it as you see it. I had a tough time deciding whether this game deserved a 5 or a 6, but I went with the latter in the end. After all, the game is still entertaining and there is a little replay value thanks to the coin collecting. I would sooner recommend Mario Kart 8 or F Zero GX, but this is a fun title if you’re looking for a Wii Racing game that you can get for a few bucks. How can you go wrong with eatable main characters? Also, don’t fall for the hype! There are 15 levels, not 10. Everyone reports it as 10 and it’s the most false advertising that I’ve seen in a while. It’s good for the game not to spoil the secret levels, but everyone else should catch on. We don’t want to underscore the game now do we?

Overall 6/10

Madden 2003 Review

Posted on by
Reply

1277815790-00
I managed to find a store that was still selling Gamecube games so you can bet that I dashed to pick up this title! I currently own Madden 2002, 2004, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, and 2013. Now that I have this title, I’m just missing 2005 and 2008. After that I can finally say that I own all of the titles in the series. (Up to 2013 of course, I’ll get Madden 25 and Madden 15 once the price dips a little) This title is nostalgia gold and it may even bring tears to your eyes. I can certainly say that it’s one of the best Madden titles!

Right when you turn the game on, you’re greeted by the great color scheme that was present in Madden 2002. It’s all so retro and impossible to put into words. I grew up with Madden 2002 and played it a lot until I got Madden 2004. (The ultimate Madden) It’s just awesome to see the old menu’s and colors again. It’s easy to pick up and play as you grab your favorite team and you get to face off against any other team. You can play in a season or join the minicamps to have fun with drills. I decided to see how I’d stack up right off the bat in Play Now.

I beat the CPU on Pro, but I lost on All Madden and All Pro. I’m confident that I can win on those levels though and it shouldn’t take many tries. It’s a good feeling since other games practically cheat to make the A.I. better. Madden is guilty of this to an extent as your receivers tend to drop more passes, but it still feels pretty fair. I made some hasty decisions on some throws and the game really got out of hand once I was down by 10. Win or lose, it makes for a fun challenge.

This was the first title to bring in the Mini Camp mode and I loved that feature in 2004. It’s pretty similar here and it’s a fun way to get better in the various aspects of the game. I didn’t really get a chance to do more than check out the feature since I have a lot of games to go through, but I highly recommend giving this mode a spin. It’s pretty cool and it’s probably the best Madden feature that is no longer around.

The graphics are pretty good. It’ll definitely seem pretty different from a title like Madden 13, but that could be in a good way depending on how you look at it. The graphics help for the nostalgia and it’s a top contender amongst the Gamecube titles. (That’s saying a lot) Once you play NFL 2K3, you really appreciate these graphics as well. The soundtrack is pretty fun while you’re getting ready to play if you don’t listen to the lyrics. Once you notice them, they can be a little off putting, but it’s easily remedied through the settings. Also, it won’t really affect you during game time, which is the important part!

The gameplay is a little faster than 2012, but it’s slower than 2004. I’d say that Madden 2004 was probably the fastest Madden that ever came out and even the modern ones aren’t quite as quick. (Especially with the commercials and extra loading times) I’m fine with the speed here since it can also portray the real deal a little more accurately. For the record, the faster the better is my motto, but I can find a lot of positives with both aspects. You’ll be happy to know that quarterback scrambles are still very effective here as I had a tendency to gain more yards on the ground with Quincy Carter than I did with Emmett Smith. I was able to pull off traditional runs no problem, but it is more effective to run with your QB when he’s about as fast as your running back and the defense is not expecting such a play.

EA has gotten a pretty bad reputation in the video game industry and that’s too bad. I still prefer their Sport titles to the competitors despite the fact that many prefer the NFL 2K games. I finally got one of them and I’ll be reviewing it shortly, but I easily prefer Madden. Keep in mind that I grew up with Madden and have been playing it since I was a child, but it’s just more fun for me. NFL 2K can be a little too slow at times and while that’s not necessarily a bad thing, it makes it very difficult to run the ball of pick up big yards on a play. Of course, I’ll get into that in the NFL 2K3 review.

So, where would I rank Madden 2003 among the titles? It’s very difficult since I didn’t play some of the Madden games as much as the others and they can sometimes start to blur in with each other. Roughly, I would say that the rankings go: Madden 2004>Madden 2013>Madden 2006>Madden 2002>Madden 2012>Madden 2003>Madden 2007>Madden 2011>Madden 2010>Madden 2009. Again, note that I barely played Madden 2006-07, I don’t own Madden 2005 or 2008, and that my recollection of Madden 2009 is pretty vague. I’m mostly familiar with Madden 2010 through 2013 and Madden 2002 through 2004. Maybe I’ll pick up some of the others again to review them at some point, but I’ll wait until I’ve gotten through most of my backlog in terms of reviews.

Another aspect of Madden that many fans don’t care for is the commentary. Supposedly it gets very repetitive and annoying. I definitely don’t agree with this either. I think they do a great job calling the game and it makes the experience that much more authentic. By now, you’ve seen that I really like just about every part of the game. Madden is great and I dare say that it is now officially my favorite video game series of all time. Madden 2004 has taken the title of the ultimate game from DBZ Tenkaichi 3 (Which got leap frogged since Brawl also passed it for second) and I don’t think it will be relinquishing that title anytime soon. I have high hopes for Madden 25 and Madden 15, but it would be just about impossible for them to win.

Overall, Madden 2003 is easily one of the best titles in the series. It’s easy to pick up and play and you should be totally ready to take on any level of difficulty so long as you understand the rules. It can be a little annoying to see your kicker randomly kick the ball out of bounds during kickoffs, but you are in complete control for the other situations. The gameplay speed is solid and there are no real negatives in this title. You’re guaranteed to just have a blast when turning the game on and that’s not a feat that just any title accomplish.

Overall 9/10

Scar vs Pain

Posted on by
Reply


x4_Scar_gets_ready
Naruto-Pain1
Scar has a lot of destructive power within him. One touch can be fatal, but he won’t be able to land that hit. Pain is much too fast and his array of ninjutsu is pretty large as well. Pain can just repel Scar away and take him out with a classic speedblitz attack. Scar is a cool character, but he’s physically outmatched here. Pain wins.