Kagome Higurashi vs Talim (Soul Calibur)

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Suggested by iKnowledge This is definitely a pretty close bout. Both of these fighters are skilled at mid range combat. While Kagome Higurashi can’t really do hand to hand, Talim would be able to fall back on her martial arts. As such, this fight will come down to whether or not Talim’s wind can help shield her from Kagome’s arrows. I don’t think they will be able to which would give Kagome the slight edge here. Her energy bolts just won’t be stopped and a single good hit could decide the match. Kagome Higurashi wins.

Wonder Girl vs Talim (Soul Calibur)

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Suggested by iKnowledge Wonder Girl may not be quite as powerful as the iconic Wonder Woman, but she can certainly put up a really good fight. Her super strength will allow her to completely overwhelm Talim in close quarters combat. Furthermore, Wonder Girl also has the edge in speed. As a result, I don’t really see what Talim can do to turn the tides here. She’s simply outmatched and her wind won’t really deal any actual damage to Wonder Girl. Wonder Girl wins.

Nui Harime vs Ghost Rider

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Suggested by iKnowledge Ghost Rider is definitely a very powerful Marvel character. He’s gone up against Hulk in his World War form as well as Galactus. That being said, he will be utterly powerless against Nui’s speed and destructive capabilities. Ghost Rider’s healing factor and durability will certainly keep him in the fight for a little while, but ultimately he will just be delaying the inevitable here. Nui Harime wins.

Days of Wine and Roses Review

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It’s time to look at a film about drinking addiction. I can’t say that I had high hopes for the film going in and it looks like that feeling was certainly well warranted by the end. While it’s a concept that isn’t particularly fun as it is, the film manages to use some poor writing to make the film harder to get through than necessary. What do I mean? Stick around and you’ll find out!

The film starts off with Joe heading back to the office to get some work done. He hasn’t been sleeping too well but at least he’s been drinking so he’s ready for the day. He wants to be a PR agent but instead he’s a coordinator for some dicey activities. He wants to complain to his boss, but doesn’t have the heart to do so. That’s when he runs into a secretary named Kirsten. He immediately falls for her and shows his affection by asking her out. When she denies him, Joe begins making faces at her and throws around a lot of insults. He suggests that her skills aren’t what got her the job and makes a lot of mean remarks which Kirsten takes offense at. She runs off, but of course Joe stops her and gives a very fake apology. Immediately the two decide to get married.

Thing is, they got married so quickly that they don’t really know each other. Hoping to avoid ever having to do so, they fall into the land of liquor. Eventually they are drunk 24/7 all days of the week. This problem continues to snowball until Joe is out of a job and Kirsten starts burning the house down. Joe decides that he’ll stop drinking but Kirsten refuses. As a result Joe keeps falling back into the vice due to peer pressure. He’s going to have to choose what is more important, his marriage or staying sober. It’s going to be a tough struggle either way.

I think you can see where the dicey writing can in to play here. The romance makes absolutely no sense. There’s no reason why the two would have been paired after you see their opening scene. It’s just him being mean to her in petty retaliation for being declined until she does a 180 and accepts him. Then getting married a few days later is a bit much. There’s no real reason to root for these characters. Even before the drinks they don’t seem like particularly good people. Take a look at the scene where they visit Kirsten’s dad. They just drop the bomb on him that they’re married. It’s almost like they’re taunting him because he never even got to give his input. It’s a pretty mean thing to do.

So we already don’t like either character and they’re not even drunk yet. Throw in their drunk episodes and things get worse. You’d think they were taking hard drugs with how crazy they were acting. Of course, everyone has different effects when drunk, but man do both of them take it really poorly. Joe tries to get out at least, but he does manage to relapse a bunch of times. At least in the end he stayed strong. Then you have Kirsten who doesn’t even try and doesn’t get a particularly happy ending here. It is a shame since she used to not drunk and Joe got her into it, but even so she should have stuck away from the drinks. The first time she at least halfheartedly tried to say no, but then Joe brought some in after working in the forest at night. He’s such a bad character but she’s also pretty bad by the end.

The only good character here is Jim. Jim is the chairman for alcoholics anonymous and he does help out quite a bit. Without him it’s fair to say that Joe would have been doomed. Of course, it is true that with willpower you can do a whole lot, but you gotta know your limits. Groups and places like this exist to help those who know they can’t stop on their own. Things are always easier when you have people to support you and getting out of this addiction is no exception. Once Joe finally accepts this he is able to move forward. Him is very patient and supportive throughout. He’s probably seen this situation many times before, but he never makes Joe feel like he’s just another cog in the engine. He makes sure to help him every step of the way and that’s why Jim is the MVP here.

Overall, This still isn’t a good film though. The writing has major problems with the biggest one being the fact that the characters aren’t all that good even before they’re drunk. As a result it only gets worse once they do start drinking. The film is pretty long and it’s mainly the characters going in circles for quite a while before the situation finally changes. It’s definitely not my kind of movie but if you want a hard hitting movie with unlikable characters who try to be better than they were then maybe you’ll enjoy this film. I’d sooner recommend watching something like Man of Steel though. There we get a beacon of hope who doesn’t make these mistakes.

Overall 2/10

Kingdom Hearts III Review

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It’s time to look at a game that fans has kept fans waiting over 10 years. There have been a lot of spinoffs and such after KH2 which were all pretty solid but everyone was ready for 3. After all, this one was going to end the arc and wrap up the organization plot. It’s definitely a fantastic game and an excellent end to the trilogy.

Following the events of KH2 Sora and Riku took the mark of mastery exam so that they would be strong enough to stop the mastermind Xehanort now that he has returned from the grave. Unfortunately Sora failed and lost all of his powers. To reclaim them he must go to a bunch of Disney worlds and reaffirm his reason for fighting. Riku and King Mickey head to the world of shadows to save Aqua and to begin gathering the 7 Keyblade masters. Will that be enough to stop the newly resurrected Organization XIII?

As always the gameplay here is a blast. I always enjoy a good 3D action game and the combat is very well done here. There are a bunch of different mechanics to learn and utilize as well so you always feel like you have a lot of options. It’s all very fast paced and one big change is instead of forms like Master, Final, you have temporary super attacks or weapon changes. It’s effectively pretty similar although I liked the outfit changes that the forms had. The super moves range from things like boats to cars, tanks, etc. They’re all pretty handy although their damage output never seems to get any better so towards the end of the game I’d like to have turned them off as the would take up space in my combat zone. (I’m sure there’s a way to select a different super attack when you have more than one option but I was not able to find that out.

To make the worlds a little more special in this game, each of them have their own unique gameplay element. In Toy Story you can control a robot, in pirates a ship, etc. It’s pretty cool that they developed so many game modes for this title. It does help to make the whole experience feel even more polished. While playing through the game everything is really sharp. I don’t think you’ll have any gameplay complaints. It’s pretty much perfect and all that you could expect here.

Naturally the graphics are quite good as well. The opening is extremely sharp (Although 0.2’s intro is probably still the best animated one) and the graphics in game are also still very impressive. Square is always at the forefront when it comes to graphics and this game does not disappoint. It’s all very detailed and bright throughout. Then we’ve got the soundtrack which is also very solid. The new intro may not be quite as good as the older ones but it’s almost impossible to top those. We still get quite a few solid battle themes here and the final boss theme is pretty intense.

The story mode lasted a little over 20 hours, but typically is seems like it usually lasts around 30. III does feel shorter than the first two games and was one of our least played KH titles, but I have to factor in the fact that I was dashing through the game for the most part. I haven’t gone back and done all of the bonus content. Once you do that the game will definitely get very long. The Platinum trophy could take as long as 60-90 hours which is crazy. There’s no shortage of content here, that’s for sure. You’ll also want to make sure that you unlock the secret ending or at least watch it on Youtube since there’s more to the story than meets the eye.

While III is a near perfect game, it still does have some issues which keep it from beating KH 2. I’d also say that in terms of the plot it’s the third strongest behind Chain of Memories as well although as a complete package I would put it as the second best KH title. As I mentioned, the game does feel a bit short. This isn’t really a complaint because once a game is 20+ hours it is certainly long enough. I just feel that given how long this game took to come out it could have been longer. If anything it feels like they probably just had this game on hold for most of that time because development wise it doesn’t feel like it should have taken much longer than the usual 3 years for a new game. It took so long that I wouldn’t be surprised if some of the code got outdated for the older gen and they had to restart development at times.

The story also doesn’t always go in the direction I’d have wanted it to go. I think adding the dolls was maybe not a good move although this technically started a few games back. By creating a life like doll, a soul can go into it and the character is effectively reborn. As such, you’ll see a bunch of old characters in this game. For the villains it can feel a little redundant because we already dealt with these guys a while back. Do we really need to deal with all of them again? Even more than that though, the villains all seem way too strong. The heroes never seem to even stand a chance against them.

You know that things are getting dicey when one enemy is able to take out all 7 Keyblade masters. How can they beat 13 Organization members then? The power levels definitely seem more than a bit wonky here. Going back to the plot, I also thought Aqua’s plot was a little off. It seems to me like she could and should have left the dark realm a long time ago. There wasn’t much of a reason for her to stay and doing so almost backfired. Finally, I didn’t care for the ending. Granted, the after credits scene certainly saves it, but otherwise the normal ending will definitely be very unfulfilling when you see it. It makes the whole journey less satisfying because try as he might, one character couldn’t outrun his destiny which sort of proves the villains right from the start.

That’s enough of that though. This is still the climax of the arc so we’ve got a bunch of hype moments throughout. If anything you’ll be blasting through the Disney worlds extra fast here because you just want to get to the plot stuff. Typically something plot related happens whenever you leave a world. Naturally the climax is pretty intense as it’s fight after fight. We finally get to see Roxas again which is one of the best scenes in the game. Dark Aqua was also cool and Riku gets his moments even if he does get wrecked quite a bit here. You’ll quickly see why the Heartless tornado is probably the strongest character in the franchise. You’ll be engaged from start to finish during this game. The Frozen section was also impressive as we got the full Let It Go song. I wasn’t expecting that.

Lets talk about some of the characters. Sora’s come a long way from the old days and is mostly past his shaken confidence. Still, he has lost most of his powers and has to train up once again. He does begin to lose his way towards the end of the game, but stays strong when it counts. I do think he was right to suggest trying to save Aqua sooner. Without him the others were definitely doomed. Goofy gets a lot of hype in this game as he’s constantly making the most sense. I think the writers were going for some irony here as Goofy appears to be the smartest of the heroes despite the character not usually having that rep. Then we have Donald who is a good ally as always. He gets slightly less to do but his flare spell near the end was definitely hype.

King Mickey is solid as usual but he has been heavily nerfed. Roxas is a scene stealer and whenever he shows up you can feel the hype. The guy can dual wield Keyblades so you know that he is serious. If anything it’s too bad that he couldn’t appear more, but I do like the possibilities of him being more of a main character in future games. Axel gets quite a bit of screen time here, but at the same time he doesn’t really do anything. He sort of gets hit by the hero curse where now that he is a hero it seems like he can’t really fight all that well. I think he should go back to using his twin discs instead of a Keyblade.

Kairi fans will probably be pretty disappointed with her role. She doesn’t do much of anything and is mainly just a liability. Meanwhile it is nice to see Aqua and the gang also showing up. Aqua definitely looks solid here and Terra has his key moment. Ventus doesn’t do quite as much but he’s always eager to help out, even if everyone tries to stop him. For the villains, most of them don’t get to do a whole lot. They basically just follow orders or pay the price. Two of them start talking about possibly betraying Xemnas, but they never get around to it. Ansem from game 1 doesn’t do much but he’s always a cool villain regardless. Just showing up is neat. Xemnas’ voice feels even deeper than usual and he always makes for an epic boss. Then we have Xehanort who may not be as cool as the first two Ansem versions but he makes for a good final boss as well. I do think there is some plot hax with Sora being able to take him on, but maybe Xehanort underestimated the kid’s potential.

Either way, with the organization gone now that means that new villains will be showing up. The game’s ending does give us a glimpse at who these guys will be. I think the heroes can probably school them if it’s a fair fight, but this is Kingdom Hearts so that is unlikely. There will probably be a bunch of mental battles as well as emotional ones. I also get the feeling that we won’t see the 7 Keyblade masters teaming up for quite a while. The villains will probably separate the team and without Sora they’ll all be lost. Sora, Roxas, and Aqua are probably the 3 strongest Keyblade masters at the moment so the rest could all be in danger.

Overall, Sora takes the line “My heart’s a battleground” to the next level. Things are constantly happening to him and his friends and their battles aren’t always limited to traditional planets. One of the big bosses is literally fought inside of a heart. It’s definitely refreshing to play a Kingdom Hearts game again and hopefully the wait for 4 isn’t nearly as long this time. I’m ready to continue the saga and hopefully this time we’ll get some actual Final Fantasy representation like Cloud or Lightning to show up and help out.

Overall 9/10

Dr Mario Review

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It’s time to look at the original Dr Mario game. This title was actually pretty iconic back in the day as we got many more Dr Mairo games afterwards. Just look at that mobile title we’re getting soon. Dr Mario is one of those games that is very accessible and just a lot of fun to play. Of course, this one is a lot more limited than the newer ones as there was only so much you could do back then but the concept was sound so I definitely recommend checking this game out.

There is only one mode here of course and that’s the normal destroy all viruses to win mode. There are 20 different levels which determines how fast the board moves and how many viruses are on the screen. I definitely recommend starting with level 1 while you get the hang of the game. I was able to make it to about level 8 and then at that point the viruses overwhelmed me. You can also skip to level 20 to quickly see what it’s like. You’ll certainly feel overwhelmed before long though. It’s just hard to make matches in time before the blocks hit the ceiling. The game is also smart as when you pause the game the screen vanishes so you can’t cheese it out by constantly pausing. It’s one of those things where it seems obvious, but it’s still important that the developers realized this in time.

In the settings you can switch up the speed which is pretty nice. Unlike the Yoshi game you can’t switch the soundtrack though so that part’s a little different. It’s a more complete game than Yoshi, at least as far as content is concerned. The graphics aren’t quite as impressive though. Still, there is less to look at just due to how Dr Mario is set up so in a way this definitely does make sense. It’s not as if it looks bad. The music isn’t quite as good as the Yoshi game either but it is nostalgic to hear the Dr Mario theme.

As for the gameplay, you may already know it, but I’ll mention how it works just in case. You have to clear the board of viruses. Each virus is a specific color like the blocks that are falling onto the screen. To remove a virus you have to match it with 3 other blocks of the same color. Likewise you will do that to get rid of the extra blocks as well. It’s a simple concept, but executing this will get tougher and tougher with each level. By the end of the levels you will need to be doing all of this on instinct without actually thinking about your moves much. If you stop to think about them then you will truly be doomed. You’ll definitely get better at the game the more you play it though. Who knows, play it long enough and these latter levels may even feel easy.

There’s a lot of replay value here. That’s because the levels are quick and fast paced. It’s easy to jump right in and pick up where you left off. The challenge always feels pretty fair without being too lenient. I’d like to see a modern take on this for consoles. I know we have the mobile game coming up, but it’d be fun to see what the game would look like with massive graphics and a cool new soundtrack or something. Maybe someday.

Overall, Dr Mario is a fun game. It’s really got everything you could want in a Connect 4 type game from back in the day. It also reminds you how influential Tetris was as everyone tried to copy it back in the day. Dr. Mario was one of the successful ones and manages to still differentiate itself. He even got himself a playable spot in Super Smash Bros Melee which is no small feat. If you have never tried this game before then you’re missing out and need to change that ASAP.

Overall 6/10

Yog-Sothoth vs Bass

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Suggested by Anonymous Yog-Sothoth is a pretty powerful cosmic being. There is a lot of lore around this guy that suggests he is one of the strongest absolute beings out there. Fortunately for Bass there is only one true King of media and that is himself. Bass has never lost a fight on the blog nor do I expect he ever will. His speed and strength are basically limitless and the guy’s other abilities like “Get Ability” make him even more invincible. Bass wins.

Moguera vs Ebirah

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Suggested by Destroyer It’s time for a battle of Kaiju! It’s fair to call Moguera a kaiju if we’re being honest even though he’s a robot. The guy has been through his share of fights and has such a good offensive arsenal that even Ebirah will go down. He would have the edge if it gets up close and personal, but Moguera will prevent that from happening with his speed and flight. From there, it’s all over. Ebirah just won’t be able to land any good hits. Moguera wins.

Black Manta vs Chunk

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Suggested by Destroyer Black Manta has returned and now he is up against The Chunk. The Chunk is one of those adversaries who is always right around the corner. You can run away, but he’ll catch you eventually. That’s why going for the quick win is always the best approach and that’s how Black Manta is going to win here. He can definitely claim victory with relative ease here. He’s just the more experienced fighter. Black Manta wins.