Batman: Arkham City

arkham city

The follow up to Arkham Asylum royally kicked the notches up when it came to scope and gameplay, but it ain’t perfect. I would say Asylum was a 10/10, Knight a 9.5/10, and City a 9/10. By no means horrendous, but still my least favorite of the three.

The begins with a bang, Bruce Wayne is arrested during a press conference protesting the formation of Arkham City: a huge, contained part of Gotham acting as a massive prison for all of Gotham’s criminals from the common thugs to the Super villains. The head of Arkham City, Hugo Strange, knows Wayne’s true identity as he tells him how he will make Gotham a better, safer place without Batman with the mysterious Protocol 10. So it’s up to Batman to face off against a city in the clutches of a three way gang between Two-Face, Penguin, and a dying Joker who requires Bats help, injecting him with his own tainted blood to ensure Batman’s help. It’s a race against time to save the good, the bad, and the insane from Strange and his dark benefactor lurking behind the scene.

I love the story as it first stood. Arkham City the best rogues gallery of any batman game I’ve ever played facing off against Two-Face, Penguin, Mr Freeze, Clayface, Rhas al Ghul, Solomon Grundy, and Deadshot to name a few. Mark Hamil and Kevin Conroy are amazing as always as Joker and Batman, with all around great voice acting. The combat is much more fluid this time around and being able to add gadgets into my combos was friggin sweet; I loved the gliding mechanics for getting around Arkham City. Then we come into some issues with the Riddler and Catwoman. shit. The Catwoman sections on there own aren’t bad but I hate how they were integrated into the game after the Game of the Year edition came out which kinda kills the flow of the game for me. And the Riddler stuff ranges from cool to flat out, blood boiling annoying and oh there is a shit ton of it. So if you don’t like collecting shit- oh well. Another pet peeve is that find things to complete the side missions are a major pain at times. You either have to wait a lot or randomly find things along to continue them, which thank god they fixed the mission for Hush because that drove me crazy. Overall Arkham City is a really sweet game with some drawbacks but a lot of fun. May the gaming gods bring you glory and best wishes.

Elite Dangerous Federation Ranks?

Lately I have been playing some Elite Dangerous and I decided I needed to see the Sol system. I knew the money grind was real and heard rumors the rank grind was pretty bad, but had no clue how bad it was. Also here is a pic of a random planet.

So I am in the Sothis system bouncing between there and Ceos. Its quite popular since its a short jump and they feed each other data delivery missions. It is pretty easy to stack 20 missions, many times without even board hopping. It is just so damn boring and it takes so many missions to reach a new rank. Also here is another photo.

Someone did the math and it takes around 1000 missions to reach the max rank and even if it goes perfectly it would take around 8-9 hours. Realistically tho it would take closer to 20. And of course that still leaves the empire which doubles that.

Granted you are in no way required to do both or even do either. You aren’t even required to do anything really. But it can be a huge pain in the ass. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Justice League: Flashpoint Paradox

flashpoint paradox

Another great comic I wanted to read and one of Flash’s greatest stories that inspired much of season 3 of the show as well as rumor has it is looking up to being the focus of DCEU’s solo Flash movie.

We join Flash, Barry Allen, as he goes about his normal life as the Scarlet Speedster. Fastest man alive. Life is ok, but could be better. Barry’s driving force is the death of his mom Nora, the death that put his dad away for a murder he never committed. A conflict with Flash’s greatest nemesis, Eobard Thawne- Reverse Flash, brings Barry the oppertunity to have his dreams comes true: Thawne gives Barry the chance to travel back and save his mom. He takes the chance and saves her, causing one huge bitch of a paradox. Barry wakes up one day and discovers himself powerless but happy, but the world around him a dark mirror of itself on the brink of WW3 between Themyscira and Atlantis, where Bruce Wayne was shot dead in Crime Alley as a kid and Thomas Wayne became a malevolent, cruel Batman, and Superman was found by the US government instead of the Kents and experimented and locked away. Barry is powerless and alone, realizing his dream meant the suffering of millions.

I have to say this was my favorite DC animated movie so far. Batman was my favorite part, twisted and sad. If you love Flash or are one of those people who think comic books or superheroes can’t tell great stories, I urge you to check this animated movie out on Netflix. May the gaming gods bring you glory and best wishes.

Guess Who (2005)

I picked this movie on a whim honestly and I must say, I forgot how much I missed Bernie Mac. The man played the perfect combination of funny and serious. And this movie has two very powerful messages to me. 1. That even in today’s world interracial couples face adversity from all sides (and they should not) and 2. Even a serious topic can be covered in a manner that can entertain and inform, and Ashton and Bernie knock this out of the park.

For those that somehow don’t know Bernie Mac plays a very successful black man. Great job, big house, beautiful family. His daughter brings home a man she loves dearly to meet the family for the first time. He is also successful, great credit report which Bernie mentions many times. There is one small catch. As we all know Ashton is a white man. While the family is ok with this Bernie seems less than thrilled. While he is never cruel to him he is openly distrustful and even semi hostile towards him.

I won’t spoil to much but there is a very powerful scene where Bernie basically urges Ashton to tell racist jokes at family dinner which they actually find quite funny at first until he takes it one step to far.

Now this is a comedy and of course at one point both of the men end up on the same team when their respective ladies get pissed at them after an argument in the yard where pretty much everyone comes off as an asshole and Ashton makes the mistake of referring to the people in the yard as “you people” and then defends himself by saying he has a black girlfriend.

Absolutely check this movie out, it will go down as one of Ashton and Bernie Macs best movies. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Gotham by Gaslight trailer

gotham by gaslight

So it’s pretty safe to say DC’s first R rated animated film didn’t do so great despite Hamil and Conroy reprising there iconic voice roles as Joker and Batman. I’m seriously optimistic and pumped for Gotham by Gaslight. Gotham by Gaslight is a what if story about steampunk Batman tracking down the infamous Jack the Ripper. Already from the trailer we got, I love the scenery and art style. I always had a fondness and appreciation for Victorian era themes and scenery and to see Batman looking so down to earth and old fashioned is really cool. I’d love to read the graphic novel before the film comes. May the gaming gods bring you glory and best wishes.

Overwatch PS4

Oh Overwatch, possibly the most popular competitive game out there right now. And I have to be honest, if any other company made this i’m pretty sure people wouldn’t care about this game. While hard to master this game is as basic as basic gets.

You pick a character each with unique ability, some are healers others are defense oriented others attack or some variation. Then its time to team up kill each other or go for an objective.

That’s pretty much it. That’s the game. Graphically it looks good and the sound is great but the story is pretty much all online and you must go to different places such as YouTube to find it.

That being said while the game is as basic as basic gets there is one thing that is hard to really describe and get across in a review, if you like multiplayer or competitive games, the game is simply fun. I played by myself a bit and honestly hated the game. A friend however harassed me to play on a team with him and about 4 hours later I didn’t even notice that much time had passed. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Wonder Woman

wonder woman

Ok, so I feel like I’m really repeating myself here, but I’m not really a Wonder Woman fan but I did love the movie. After the movie, I’m willing to jump into her comics, so if anyone has any ideas where to start drop them in the comment box. Seriously, Gal Gadot was fantastic as Diana Prince and badass as hell as Wonder Woman. In what short of screen time she had in BVS, she stole the show from the titular men for me there and I’m glad to say I’d call her movie the best the DCEU has to offer so far.

Diana is an amazonian princess on the island of Themyscira, a paradise island inhabited by amazon women. Diana is not a average amazon however, she was forged from clay and brought to life by Zeus. She grows up a skilled warrior, possessing speed, strength, reflexes, and durability unmatched by any of her fellow amazons. But there is nothing to fight…until Steven Trevor crashes into the sea near the island. Diana races out to save him, in astonishment he is a man. Trevor brings trouble as war follows him and amazons are killed in the fighting. Diana is convinced the war in Trevor’s land is the work of Ares, the god of war. Rescuing him from confinement, taking the things that would be her costume, her and Trevor set off to Europe to fight World War 1 and Diana is off to kill Ares o end this great war to end all war…

Wonder Woman is the most refreshing superhero movie I’ve seen in a long time. Instead of being overly dark, overly bloated with sequel bait and universe building, and needlessly complex, the movie went back to a simple story done right focusing on characters, setting, and story. This is a gorgeous film to behold. The tone is extremely well balanced, knowing how to be serious and tragic when need be, but humorous and light hearted when need be to.  A huge problem I had with the first Captain America movie was that I wished it was a more grounded in reality; Wonder Woman does feel much more grounded in a hard gritty war. The trench scene and her taking back the village is one of the most badass debut scenes I’ve ever seen in a superhero movie. The characters are well flushed out but the villains are kinda weak, especially Ares but nowhere as bad as they could be. Overall, I highly recommend Wonder Woman to fans of the genre or people that just want to see a cool movie. I hope writers in the future take note from this film. May the gaming gods bring you glory and best wishes all.

The Overnight (2015)

Yea..look I don’t even know where to start on this one. Basically couple A moves from Seattle to California and they meet couple B when they meet at the park when they have their kids at the park. This is basically where the normalcy ends. Hold on people this shits about to get real damn weird.

So we get to couple B’s house for dinner and the kids go to bed. So now they are drinking and discussing work. Guy B sells water filters he invented and chick B is an actress. I thought it was going to be porn but it wasn’t. It was just a demonstration video on how breast pumps work. The logically thing obviously is to give this DVD away to your new friends as a gift…seriously that happens. Now they are smoking some pot, same scene by the way. Now there is some more drinking and dancing and grinding and a game if the floor is lava.

More weird stuff happens and the guys wonder off to see the art work guy B makes…its weird and colorful and its butt holes. No literally. Dude takes pictures of his friends literal assholes and paints colorful pictures of them. I can’t make this up.

Now we all know I hate giving you guys spoilers to the point i rarely give out names. Everything I have told you is in about the first 20 minutes of the movie and isn’t even plot points. Those get even weirder. I won’t discourage you from watching this movie, it isn’t even bad. Its just weird but in a fun way. I don’t regret watching it but it must be noted only certain people will enjoy it. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Man of Steel

man of steel

So I’m not a huge Superman fan but I actually love this rendition of the Man of Steel (haha pun). I’m always more inclined to Darker representations or darker characters but for the first go around, I didn’t necessarily see this as a darker take but in a lot of ways a more human take on Superman.

So we get a pretty detailed, 15-20 minute prologue about the destruction of Krypton. Jor-El discovers his world is going to die, tries to tell the super wise elders and they ignore him because a rogue military leader named General Zod tried playing a coup against there government. In a last ditch effort, Jor-El placed the genetic codex of there world inside his newborn son Ka-El and he and his wife sent him off to Earth, where the sun was still young and strong. Zod murdered Jor-El and was captured, banished with his men to the Phantom Zone. Krypton died soon after. Kal landed in Kansas on the Kent farm in Smallville and yep. Well Clark Kent figured out he wasn’t normal, but he wanted to help people and hated that helping may out him to the world so after Pa Kent died, he searched for his own answers. While this goes on, reporter Lois Lane goes through hell tracking down this mysterious savior. Just when Clark begins to understand his true self, a ghost from his parent’s homeworld tracks him down with his army and a desire to rebuild Krypton anyway possible…

If you’re a Superman purist, you will probably fucking hate this movie. Henry Cavill is not Christopher Reeves, and isn’t the warm smiling, super goodie goodie he always seemed to be. He has understandable darker, human moments. He’s scared shitless as a kid when his senses begin tuning up, he’s pissed because he sees a group of guys try getting fresh with a waitress just trying to do her job, and at the end of the day he sat on his couch in a sweat shirt and jeans with a beer and watched the baseball game. For once, Superman was a regular guy to me. He still had a good heart but he was a regular guy, and I think Cavill did that well. I love Michael Shannon as a actor, I think he was great as Zod and he is my favorite DCEU villain to date. Amy Adams was a good Lois Lane but I didn’t buy some of the romantic stuff. I like the anime influences in the cinematography, like the DBZ feel of the fights and that moment before Superman takes flight; essentially Zod’s plan was the same as Lord Slug’s from DBZ The score is fine but can get annoying after awhile. Ok, so the ending really divides people, but I was fine with it.

Overall I really like the movie as a Superman movie. As for it being a universe movie, it does jack shit to establish a universe at play, adding to why the sequel Batman Vs. Superman was such a clusterfuck. If you enjoyed Man of Steel, I seriously recommend checking out Superman: Earth One volume 1, a lot of the movie came from there and it’s a cool book. May the gaming gods bring you glory and best wishes. It’s good to be back.

I Love You, Man (2009)

Before he was Antman Paul Rudd was awkward as hell. Like painfully awkward. Awkward to the point he was painful to watch. That is ok tho, he was supposed to be. He plays a guy that is about to be married to the woman of his dreams. The problem is he has no friends. And not the way most people have a couple but feel like they don’t have any.

Lets us play a quick game. Imagine you are going to ask the person you love you to marry you. Now think of the person you tell first. Now imagine the person you love says yes. Who do you tell first? Second? Probably would shoot them a text that day or call them right? Yea this guy does not. His best friend may be his mother…maybe.

Antman is now on a quest. A quest to make the bridal party a bit less lopsided and make some friends. This sounds like a boring concept but if you add a mother that accidentally sets him up on a blind date with a gay man, a legitimately gay brother whos type is straight men and we got a fun movie.

He does get a few friend tho. Free spirited Jason Segel for example. They never really specify what his job is, he has a weird obsession with the band Rush and he gets beat up by the Incredible Hulk but that just adds to his charm. By all means check this one out, its a fun movie that many people missed out on. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.