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Why I fell out of favor as a Marvel fan.

snowflake_safespace  While Marvel reigns supreme at the box office, may have had it with there latest comic debacle in there attempt to prove how inclusive they are. Enter Snowflake and Safespace, two of Marvel’s latest new heroes as part of a new team of teen heroes and while none of the other heroes sound much better, these two are supposed to be non-binary twins. While I believe everyone deserves a hero and their are should be more varied, original heroes to break the barriers, I couldn’t take any of this seriously. The names alone are mockeries of the people they are trying to represent. I finally felt my last bubble of hope in Marvel comics deflate after the past few years. Before I begin, I just want to say there maybe a hot button topic or two here and while I applaud Marvel’s push for inclusion, I can’t say I approve how they go about it which is part of the few reasons they fell out of my favor.

Years ago, around the time Marvel’s popularity was skyrocketing because of the first phase of the MCU, they started transplanting many of there iconic characters like making Falcon the new Captain America, making Jane Foster Lady Thor, or Kamela Khan becoming the new Ms. Marvel after Carol Danvers assumed the persona of Captain Marvell. While a lot of these changes didn’t bother me, things like 2 factions of X men existing in the same universe and Kitty Pryde, Agent Venom, and the Thing joining Guardians of the Galaxy was a bit hard to swallow; Kitty becoming Starlord makes no sense to me. Some complained about the change of beloved characters but for the most part I was was able to see it making sense.

Around the same time, reading multiple series, I couldn’t help getting irked at the lack of solo stories, meaning there was a overabundance of Events going on. I recall them dropping one after another and it becoming too much of a hassle to follow. Something I give DC, there recent comics still include a huge catalog of solo stories for it’s characters. What also didn’t help was how Marvel’s multiverses ended up colliding in two many versions of the same character existing on the same plane; good luck being a casual and trying to talk about Spider-man and not knowing which Spidey you are following. now I know what you may be thinking, ‘ Torsten, why not wait til you can get the graphic novel and read it all at once’. Well, that would be a good point if not for the price tags. Since the MCU took off, the size of most solo Marvel graphic novels have shrunk as the prizes rise, especially for the Event books which declined in quality. Civil War II was not well received; Secret Empire angered many at it’s plot twist of Captain America being a Hydra agent all along. By the time Snowflake and Safespace came into play, my enthusiasm was far from healthy and I just shook my head, remembering the once amazing work from Marvel, which inspired myself as well as countless others. Someday I hope to call myself a current Marvel fan and call myself a true believer once more, but for now the present is bleak as the $ overrides creative wealth. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

Cabin in the Woods

cabin in the woods

If you caught our Halloween special this past year, you would’ve caught my entry Our favorites, Day 23: Cabin in the Woods . Hell, I’ll go as far as to call this one of my favorite horror movies and it’s certainly something you sure as hell don’t see everyday. Essentially we begin with a tale as old as time: a group of college friends head out to a cabin in the woods for a weekend, only to discover a basement of random relics and it just so happens they waken the undead family that previously owned it. Sounds cliche as hell, right? I’m not going to spoil anything because there is a serious joy to watching this movie’s clever plot unfold and I highly recommend going in blind if you possibly can. While clever and full of some pretty sweet kills and a collection of awesome horrors, the movie is equally funny and quotable. The actors are great and the friends have good chemistry. Honestly, there’s a lot I can say and while I know the movie is getting up there in years, it’s best to just dive in and see what you find. May the gaming gods bring you glory…and please don’t press the big red button.

American Horror Story: Apocalypse

ahs 8

We have a penchant for dark humor here at Saviorgaming and while being cooped up at home during the Corona Pandemic, I figured it’s as good as time as any to catch up on my American Horror Story, and of course I left off on Apocalypse, the 8th season. While the show has been pretty divisive over the years, pretty much everyone I talked to hates this season; how can a horror show botch the end of days?

The day has come and the world has ended in nuclear hellfire as many have predicted. A secret collective of the world’s wealth, brains, and most influential known as the Cooperative have gathered people deemed genetically suitable of repopulating the world at a series of outposts. Outpost 3 is strict and divided between the elite and the workers. A emissary of the Cooperative arrives through the wastes to evaluate the outpost for a sure chance at life; this emissary, Michael Langdon, is not what he appears to be. When the familiar witches of American Horror Story: Coven arrive, we learn the nature of Michael as the Antichrist, but can these powerful ladies stop the devil?

Well, first and foremost I’m going to answer the question I left off with: yes, I would say Apocalypse is the worst AHS. What kills this season is mostly the narrative and how it’s structured. Acting as the Glass of the series, it’s a follow up and sequel season to both Coven and the original American Horror Story that is messily put together for the most part; most of the season is one long backtrack while the opening episodes feel like a edgy YA dystopian knockoff. The show gets better as it goes but it does feel too little, too late by the end. Another thing I have to add is the effects are really crappy and fake at some points and what we get of the wastelands isn’t at all impressive. And the final thing that bugged me was how the same actors were playing so many roles at the same time; Sarah Paulson plays  4 different characters in this season alone. Despite the negatives, it was nice to see the witches from Coven reunite and the music is really solid. Honestly, if you are a die hard fan I’d recommend skipping this season unless you want a meh story and some unintentional laughs. Be safe and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Void Terrarium Gets July 2020 Release date

void tRrLM(); //Void Terrarium will release on PlayStation®4 and Nintendo Switch™ on July 14 for North America, July 10 for Europe, and July 17 for Oceania. The survival of the last human on Earth, Toriko, depends on you. Venture into the toxic wastes to gather resources and provide a suitable environment for her…humanity depends on it!

ARC Review: Call of the Raven by Wilbur Smith, with Corban Addison — Home | One Reading Nurse

Thank you so much to Bookish First and Zaffre Books for the ARC of Call of the Raven in exchange for an honest review! All opinions are my own. This is a prequel book to Smith’s Ballantyne series, that introduces Mungo St. John and gives him a bit of an origin story. While I have […]

via ARC Review: Call of the Raven by Wilbur Smith, with Corban Addison — Home | One Reading Nurse

Resident Evil 3: Nemesis (classic)

nemesis classic

Ok, I try not to do this often, but I have a honest disclaimer here: I never finished this game. In fact, I never even got that far in this game but holy shit did this game have an impact on me as well as the horror community as a whole, giving us the both terrifying and legendary badass named Nemesis.

Jill Valentine thought she saw the pinnacle of horror and macabre after surviving the Spencer Mansion. The terror isn’t over for Jill yet; it wasn’t long after the mansion that the T virus found it’s way into Raccoon City and the city became overrun with monsters and the undead. Trying to escape, she encounters a group of Umbrella soldiers tasked with aiding in evacuations and allies herself with Carlos Olivera to try escaping, while being hunted by a new kind of horror trying to exterminate the old surviving S.T.A.R.S members. Enter: The Nemesis.

From the get go, the intro movie blew me away as a kid. Seeing the silhouette of Nemesis in the firelight after wasting the police with his iconic rocket launcher was simply badass and set the stage. The cut scene graphics  were impressive for the day and besides the intro, the Nemesis reveal was grisly and freaked me out back then. Whether you’re on the streets or in the police station before  the events of Resident Evil 2 ( classic) there is a great sense of claustrophobia and even after encountering Nemesis for the first time, hearing his groans or pounding on the walls adds another layer of dread. It was cool that you were presented with choices and given split seconds to decide and each has consequences. Fighting Nemesis is hard as hell because of the sheer amount of damage the bastard takes and he can dish out just as much. So where’s the downside? Well, the gameplay. The game ran ok in the old days- mainly because it was mainly a norm back then- but now it runs like dogshit and a lot of the game’s graphics are muddy as hell, and this is amplified if you can’t fit it to your screen proportions. In the end, I have to say this game has a lot going for it but holy crap it needs a new coat of paint to it and I can’t wait for the remake. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

Terminator: Resistance

Terminator_Resistance

Terminator, as I’ve said, is the poor franchise that never should have been. The series has plummeted in quality since Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines and most fans wish it completely ended after Terminator 2: Judgement Day . It’s hard to remember the dark, nihilistic tone set by the original film’s visions of the future but this game remembers, and I thank them for all the old school fans out there.

Jacob Rivers is a Tech Com soldier on the run in the early years of the Resistance. His squad was wiped out by heartless Terminators and Skynet machines and is looking for a outpost so he can get link back up with Conner and the Resistance. He meets a group of survivors he becomes attached to as well as a mysterious stranger who is protecting him from a new kind of Terminator that appears human, the new Infiltrator model. Can Rivers and the Resistance launch there attack on  Skynet’s core or will the Infiltrator terminate Rivers and help seal humanity’s fate?

I’ve played Terminator games in my time, each it’s own bitter disappointment, but I was highly impressed with this game. I give a huge amount of credit to the team for capture the apocalyptic feel of the original 2 movies and respecting how badass and frightening the Terminators really were.  The machines are hard and feel like worthy threats. The gameplay feels like a simplified version of Far Cry and Fallout 4 but it’s more than solid and strangely addictive. The story is pretty good and the characters are pretty flushed out and interesting. Sadly there are some issues. Explosions have some hit detection issues- you’ll be far enough from a explosion and it’ll kill you. On top of that, dying is rather easy and I have experienced more than my fair share of bullshit deaths. Also I don’t like how multiple functions are shared by the same button but different pressures ( ex: hold triangle to use health but tap to use your melee attack). In the end, I had a hell of a lot of fun and I had a lot of fun but this game isn’t perfect. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

 

Infamous: First Light

inf 1st light

With many of us quarantined and the world dialed to the max on crazy, I needed to escape into a good superhero game. I took a dip back into the aged classic Batman: Arkham Asylum and I wasn’t ready to revisit Marvel’s Spider-man (PS4) , I thought it might be a cool opportunity to give First Light a try.

First Light is the story of Abigail Walker, better known as Fetch, and the tragic events leading up to her fighting Delson in Infamous: Second Son . Fetch and her brother, Brent, have been on the run since there parents tried selling out Fetch for her powers. Homeless, desperate, and battling her demons of her neon powers and drug addiction, Fetch is sent on a revenge quest against a aspiring drug lord Shane as she learns to accept her gifts…

Doing a Fetch solo DLC was a smart idea because she continues to be one of the coolest part of Second Son. I loved zipping around at super speed and the amount of abilities you get are pretty impressive and some different than what you get from Second Son. The story is quick but the finale is satisfying and Fetch is a compelling character to follow. I must admit though, in a rare turn of events, I actually had more fun with the side stuff than the main game; the sniper missions got annoying quick and I failed a lot because of the sheer amount of guys on screen. The biggest problem I had was the colorization of the map which is a lot of similar colors that can be a pain in the ass to read. While not perfect, it’s a good quick burst of game if you don’t want to devote days or weeks to. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

The Descent: Part 2

descent 2

Most of the time I see a movie, especially a rare kind of horror movie that’s actually scary, and I get wary. Horror and comedy lend themselves to crappy straight to video sequels and well…(sigh).

So days after Sarah crawled her way out of the caves, bloody and beaten, the cops find her. The trauma of the caves has left her nearly catatonic and suffering from amnesia. The sheriff doesn’t buy it and organizes a search party to find the girls from the first movie, ordering Sarah to come with them. Along the journey, evidence arises towards the grisly end of Sarah’s friends and soon the the Crawlers attack but as the group divides, another survivor emerges…

I try to be as honest when doing these reviews so I have to say Descent 2 outright pissed me off. I wasn’t surprised that the cave is well lighted the whole time and the amount of flashbacks and the reliance on Easter eggs from the first. What pissed me off was that other survivor (I don’t want to spoil it) because after that, the movie starts to crap on what I liked about the first. The plot itself is borderline idiotic and I wasn’t invested in any of the characters; I even laughed my ass off at a poorly done heroic death. The score is decent and there are some decent gore effects but nothing worth mentioning. In the end, I say skip this pointless sequel because it will tarnish the first for you. May the gaming gods bring you glory.