Savior Gaming

Green Lantern: Secret Origin

gl2 If you caught my previous review of the live action Green Lantern movie, you’ll realize I sorely don’t recommend it. This book, Secret origin, is a much more cohesive , better told story of Hal Jordan’s coming of age into being one of the most powerful Green Lanterns of all time. The story begins much like the movie with the story of young Hal Jordan; a young boy who dreams of growing up to be a pilot like his father. After he dies in a tragic plane explosion, his life begins a slow, lonely spiral of trouble making, straying further from his living family until he joined the air force at 18 at which point his mom disowns him until the day she dies because of his choice to follow this father’s footsteps. Hal is a natural flyer but his smart mouth and rebellious nature cause him to hang onto his job for dear life…Light years away, the great Abin Sur- greatest of all Green Lanterns- is transporting the savage Atrcitous of the five Aversions across the galaxy to interrogate him. Abin has been uneasy and paranoid unto the clasps of utter madness over a prophecy the Guardians of the universe and creators of the Green Lantern Corps may have been hiding. He fears the coming of the Blackest Night. Atrcitious breaks free and because of Abin’s fear, he’s weak to the attack and becomes mortally wounded, and there ship crashes to earth. Atrcitous escapes. Abin commands his ring to find a suitable replacement- Hal Jordan. The story after stays fairly close plot-wise with the exception of Parallax. Inside a rookie Jordan and now dubbed greatest Green Lantern Sinestro must put there differences aside to defeat Atrcitous, whose armed with a weapon fueled by the power of their rings, before he murders young William Hand who he believes is the key to Blackest Night.

Between the live action movie and Secret Origin, I’d would say the general plot is 65% similar. The difference comes with Geoff Johns’s fantastic writing. The story is fast paced but were able to get attached and sympathize with Jordan, get to see the beginnings of his stormy but true love for Carol Ferris- his childhood friend, old boss, and future Star Sapphire (pink lantern) and well as his tragic relationship with Thal Sinestro- mentor, partner, and rival that would one day turn his back on willpower’s green light and embrace fear’s golden light as the Corp’s greatest threat. The world is more flushed out and what I enjoy about much of John’s writing is it’s a extremely easy book to follow, even if you never knew anything about Lantern lore or even comics in general.

Final score: 9/ 10

May the gaming gods be with you all and til next time, I’m Torsten V and I’ll be back in a few days with my review for Green Lantern: The Sinestro Corps War.

Grand Ages:Medieval Review

Grand Ages

Grand Ages Medieval is a world simulation game by Kalypso that seems to fit a nice niche that PS4 is missing. The game has a campaign mode as well as a sandbox mode with the campaign largely acting as the tutorial. The game takes place in a beautiful work that represents Europe and the basic idea is to reach the rank of emperor through the use of war, diplomacy and most importantly trade routes that you can either use to trade between your own towns, rival towns or like me, a combination of both. The controls work pretty nice on console, which is no surprise since Kalypso has plenty of experience bringing these types of games to console having done so with both Port Royal 3 and the Tropico series. Speaking of Port Royal, if you enjoyed that game, this game s basically that without all the boats. As always thanks for joining me, and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Digital vs Disk

disk

This has been a debate for years in gaming, and just to be honest at some point the question will be moot and companies will simply require digital downloads and disk wont be an option. However for me i still prefer the disk whenever possible. Part of the reason for that is honestly its rarely cheaper for the digital version. Another issue is its usually quicker to install off disk for me than it is download an entire game. On the flip side digital is pretty convenient, I don’t have to wait in line at the store, which on midnight releases is pretty much a blessing. I also don’t have to worry about my disk getting scratched by the kids or my cat ( yes that happened once) Now it sounds like digital is the way to go, but here is another issue for me. With suck limited space I spend more time uninstalling and reinstalling than I would like, and on rare occasion companies remove games from the stores, which means i can’t reinstall said game. All that being said the question really has many ways of looking at it, and as i said at the start eventually it will be the only way to buy games. Once again thanks for joining me, and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Elite Dangerous, day 1

So I started playing this morning for a bit, and quickly got sick of my starting Sidewinder. So I did a few boom missions for enough cash to buy an Eagle. Figured I’d upgrade it a bit and fo bounty hunting.

That’s a random planet I found while t traveling to find some action in my eagle, which about 4 seconds after i found it i’m running away back to a station so I wouldn’t die. (I didn’t)

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That last one was just another planet i found, was pretty far away sadly. Eventually I worked my way up to a Cobra Mach 3 which in my xbox play was basically my standard ship. Hoping to work my way up to an exploration ship and get some good pictures. Oh, and one last thing. That big blue star? Don’t go near them, they will blow you up pretty quickly. As always thanks for joining me, and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Final Fantasy 7 retro review

So lately I have been getting into some older games, and that of course led me to Final Fantasy 7. This review was actually quite hard for me to write since I want to be honest, but many times nostalgia gets in the way. For example, one of my favorite scenes from FF7 was Sepheroth walking through the fire.

But hey as long as we are being honest, by today’s standards, the scene, like many from FF7, doesn’t exactly hold up very well. Honestly, the story itself holds up pretty badly. Sure, 20 years ago, I didn’t notice that the whole story with Zack was so far out of the way without a strategy guide, you could easily miss it. Recently going to the temple after Wutai ( rocket town if you don’t recruit Yuffie) I noticed the game never actually told me I needed the keystone at the gold saucer unless you happen to stop at the weapons dealer in the random cabin that also isn’t mentioned. Stuff like that aside, all these years later the materia system is still quite deep and engaging, while chocobo breeding and racing is still one of my favorite parts of the game.

The battle graphics also do not hold up very well, and looking back, I’m not sure they were ever as good as most of us thought.

That being said, the battles themselves are still fun and many still pose a pretty good challenge. If somehow you managed to not play this game, I would still recommend picking it up on PlayStation 4 since it is pretty cheap, tho I would advise you to avoid the cheats that are enabled. They d,o however, make that grind for limit breaks so much easier, and that was always the part I hated the most. All that being said, thank you for joining me, and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

What I hope FF7 Remake keeps

Final Fantasy 7

This is just a list of things I hope the remake of Final Fantasy 7 keeps. Hopefully you will add to it some at the bottom.

First and foremost i REALLY would like them to keep the chocobo breeding/racing portion. Not that it was all that in depth or hard by todays standards, but 1997 me couldn’t get enough of it. The feeling of finally getting the gold chocobo is a feeling i will never forget.

It goes without saying i’d love the materia system to stick around. It was simple yet complicated in all the right ways. Figuring out that the counter materia would counter with a command materia like deathblow was great.

The enemy skill materia was another one that as a kid maybe I under utilized a little to much but playing through again later I thought was way more fun than it should be.

The last thing I hope stays is the hidden characters. I know, it seems like a weird thing to have to say but with the extended FF7 universe I legitimately feel like Vincent and Yuffie will become standard recruited people as opposed to people you had to earn. Not that either was exactly overly powerful or anything of the sort, but it was still getting Vincent out of his coffin and yuffie to actually join you. I’m sure i will update this at some point, but until then thank for joining me and may the gaming gods grant you glory.

Elite Advice For A Dangerous Launch

ED Galexy

With the launch of Elite Dangerous tomorrow ( June 27th) I figured a lot of people may need some advice. So as I sit here sipping on some vodka and orange soda watching how I met your mother let me help you get started. Full disclosure, i have played the X box one version and will be playing the PS4 version.

First, big Rule number one, after you buy a new ship or upgrade your first ship called the Sidewinder, pay close attention to the ship rebuy cost. Rebuy is basically insurance. I’m pretty sure its equal to 5% of your ship total cost, which is a lot better than buying a new ship with upgrades. Last think you want to do is blow up a 20 million dollar ship by slamming into the mail slot of a station and having to restart from the beginning, and yes that has happened to people.

This next piece of advice sounds like common sense, but do the tutorial stuff before you start the game. The controls can be quite complicated and the game has one of the steepest learning curves I have ever encountered in a game.

Don’y be ashamed to check YouTube or google for help with making money, exploring or whatever it is you choose to do. The below video i from one of the bigger names within the Elite Dangerous community and has tons of advice to give a well as various videos about the lore within the game. The video is long but you may not need the whole thing.

While we are on the subject of figuring stuff out, when you first get your Sidewinder is the perfect time to experiment. Play with the boost, shoot random ship try landing on a planet or whatever. Until you start upgrading it the rebuy cost is actually free, so no harm no foul.

While money is important, some would say the most important, aspect of the game i tend to side with the idea that you should play the game however you choose. Whether its exploring, mining, killing random stuff whatever happens to tickle your fancy the money will come. Sure there are ways to make it come faster and its fine to do that as well. My personal plan i to kill ton of stuff until i can get a proper exploration ship, but that doesn’t make it right, simply makes it right for me.

My final tidbit of advice for all you fresh new commanders is simple. Have fun, help people where you can, and don’t be afraid to try new things. I thought for sure trading would be for me, turns out I like combat and exploring. As always thanks for joining me and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Green Lantern

gl1 Ugh, this one hurts like getting a snapping turtle shoved up my ass. I’m 98% sure this film is the reason Green Lantern won’t appear in the upcoming Justice League (JLA) movie this November even though he’s been in the Justice League since it’s original inception. Green Lantern- Jon Stewart in particular- is my second favorite DC hero. What I love is that unlike most comic book heroes, Green Lantern does not pertain to one singular person but several diverse characters: Hal Jordan, Jon Stewart, Guy Gardener, Kyle Raynor, Simon Baz, Killowog, Arsya, and hundreds of others in a universe full of rich lore. Ideally, Green Lantern could be an amazing film franchise; Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy films proved that there is a market for cosmic themed superhero films and can be well done. That being said, this movie has bright spots in my opinion both as a critic and a fan of the comics but what’s terrible murders this movie. The film follows the story of Hal Jordan, ace air force pilot and smart ass who is trying to live up to the memories of his father who died in a flight accident when he was a kid. One night, hes sees what he takes to be as a meteor crash or some kind of aircraft crash nearby him so he goes to investigate. He comes upon a mortally wounded purple alien named Abin-Sur, a great warrior of the Green Lantern Corps; he reveals to Hal that his ring guided him to him, so he can take his place. Hal takes the ring and Abin dies, before handing him his ring and a green lantern, instructing him to “speak the oath”. After he does he’s taken to planet Oa and brought into the Green Lantern Corps. The lanterns are intergalactic peacekeepers given rings forged from the concentrated willpower from throughout the universe with the ability to construct there thoughts into reality, fly, have access to knowledge collected from throughout the known universe, with the ability to travel in deep space. Hal discovers an ancient Entity of fear called Parallax was responsible for Abin’s death and has his sights set to destroy the Corps while being signaled by mad, mutated scientist Hector Hammond. So Hal has to face his fears and fight this seemingly unstoppable force and become the green lantern.

First, the positives. Overall, the acting is fairly good. Ryan Reynolds tries his ass off to pull the part of Jordan off. The supporting cast of the late Michael Clarke Duncan as Killowag, Geoffrey Rush as Toma ree, and Mark Strong as none other than Thaal Sinestro- one of DC’s most infamous villains ( which the after-cred scene reveals) are the best part of the movie. Problem is these actors would’ve shined but the script isn’t good. Its condensed to shit, the villain layout is wrong, and it tries way too hard to be other, more popular superhero flicks. The CGI is an atrocity, it’s everywhere and it shows; especially in Jordan’s costume and Parallax…and the race car. Oh the race car scene makes you want to drink. I don’t recommend this movie if you want to learn about Green Lantern. Because of this movie, I rushed to find out more about the character. If you are interested in some epic lantern action I suggest Green Lantern: Secret origin by Geoff Johns or Blackest Night: Green Lantern. I’ll be covering some lantern books soon in the near future so stay tuned and let the gaming gods be with you all

Snes classic

Nintendo has officially confirmed the Super Nintendo Classic is a thing to be launched this year and will include the never released Star Fox 2. More info can be found here.

http://comicbook.com/gaming/2017/06/25/snes-classic-edition-confirmed-closed-door-events-gamespot-managers/

Lets just hope this isn’t as limited as the NES classic, something many of my friends want but only I seem to have. The 30 games are nice and the system and all its parts work just as well as you would hope and i expect nothing less from the SNES Classic. As always thanks for joining me, and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Open World Games

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Open world games are pretty much always full of places to visit, things to do, people to meet and hey usually I try to kill them. But do they need an actual story? Normally I would say yes, but there are exceptions to the rule. Nobody would expect Sim City to have a story attached to it for example. These games are also usually filled with places to visit, many of which most players never take the time to find. I have easily over 200 hours into Skyrim and I know for a fact I haven’t seen most of the world. I can really say the same thing for any Bethesda game. But they have amazing stories with full fledged worlds to explore and a mission to accomplish. But could there be an open world game that just dropped you in and stopped caring what you did? I’m aware of a couple but the only one I ever played was Elite Dangerous and that is a pretty different breed all on its own. As always thanks for joining me and please comment a few games that may fit this,and may the gaming gods bring you glory.