Reviews – Page 55 – Savior Gaming

Blockers (2018)

Sorry, I couldn’t properly name the movie in the title, I didn’t have a picture of a rooster and I didn’t want to type out Cock Blockers in the title. You all know the movie tho, it features Leslie Mann and John Cena amongst many others trying to ruin their kids attempt at having an amazing night at prom.

Seriously, that is what this movie is. Julie, Kayla, and Sam are about to graduate high school and go to college but first is prom night. They decide to lose their virginity in one night. After their parents see their text messages tho, they decide to follow them around town and try to stop them.

As you could imagine the movie was quite commercially successful tho it did get some rather varied reviews from both fans and critics. Personally, while I recognize the movie wasn’t great it had its moments, and it did an admirable job of being an R rated adult comedy yet still having a nice message of family and friendship behind it. There was also a car explosion so I always enjoy that as well. This comedy won’t be for everyone and if you don’t like John Cena this won’t really change your mind tho it is a far cry from his wrestling persona. This is one of those times tho where there are no surprises, the trailers are what you are getting in the film. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Annabelle: Creation (2017)

Annabelle: Creation is a great example of a solid movie that is a horrible origin story that was never needed that I don’t think anyone asked for. The movie itself is perfectly fine. It involves a group of girls and their caretaker who happens to be a nun, being taken in by a doll maker, Sam Mullins and his wife Esther, as orphans. Years earlier they lost their 7-year-old daughter and they felt now is the time to open their home.

The movie starts off much like most, girls being girls running around the big house, picking on the little one, getting used to the place, being told not to go into a room and of course going into the room and unleashing a ghost. So maybe not so much girls being girls or even kids being kids but a movie being a movie.

From here it is a steady trip of things slowly escalating from bad to wore. The movie is rather newer so I don’t want to spoil things too much. The movie does a pretty excellent job of making things tense and suspenseful while not relying too much on cheesy jump scares and the little girl getting hit by a car is disturbing not for what it shows or does, but for what it doesn’t show and how it does it.

My issue comes when it comes time to explaining how Annabelle came to be in a doll. See this whole explanation takes place in about a 3-6 minute time period in the movie. After the explanation is done there is no real touching on it again either. There is also a twist ending that makes no real sense in the capacity of the franchise in my opinion. They just seemed to try to sneak an origin story and twist ending into a movie that didn’t need both and to me hurt the movie. Regardless it was a fun movie, best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Anno 1800 Open Beta Review

It has truly been a long time since I played an Anno game. I am talking early 2000’s long time. I didn’t really know what to expect coming into this, but it was free and I will always check out a free game or beta when I have the time.

The beta starts off with you needing some money to get home to your sister so you use dynamite to blow up some fish. This will teach you how to use items and move the ship around, and it made me chuckle so that was fun. After this, it is a quick sail home to shock your friend and servant whose life you saved at some point with the fact that you are rich which will admittedly annoy him since you were just blowing up fish for cash and sleeping in barns while you and your family own an island and hundreds if not thousands of buildings.

Turns out dear old dad died in prison after being accused of treason and your sister needs your help to not only clear his name, but build a new empire and deal with your jackass uncle. I won’t go further into the story they shared because it does go along with the game they will be releasing but you will be attempting to unravel a pretty in-depth conspiracy it seems, and it did have me quite interested and I was a little disappointed to see it end.

As for the gameplay and graphics, both were smooth and offered me no problems even on my laptop even on medium settings. Building your town feels fluid and offered no problems and I never really felt like I didn’t know what was going on. Each building is explained pretty well and I didn’t really have to ask how they worked which I appreciated. The full release is looking like it will be worth buying. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Rim World

oh Rim World, how the hell do I describe you. Well here is what Steam says.

A sci-fi colony sim driven by an intelligent AI storyteller. Inspired by Dwarf Fortress and Firefly. Generates stories by simulating psychology, ecology, gunplay, melee combat, climate, biomes, diplomacy, interpersonal relationships, art, medicine, trade, and more.

That is copy and pasted directly from Steam. It kind of tells you what the game is, but it really doesn’t tell you anything. My game started with three people crashed on a planet, it can be three random or customized people. You will start by gathering some resources and then building yourself a home. This is around the time a crazed rabbit attacked my startup colony and killed my dog. That isn’t a joke, I skipped the tutorial because I figured how hard can it be? Well, I didn’t know how to do anything and the damn bunny killed my dog before I figured it out.

After I went back to the tutorial, which you should play, things got a bit better. Notice I did not say easier. Why? Because the entire game is just trying to kill you. From food to raiders to animals, it can all kill you. In fact, the game is more or less designed to kill you. Yea you can escape the world you crash on but until you get some experience this isn’t likely. For me the fun was just building stuff and trying to survive raids and seeing what happens. Is a bunny going to attack? Are their robots in these ruins? Who knows. There are also some pretty insane mods. I don’t use mods but I saw one that basically let you build in space, one that lets you make prisoners work for you.

The game, in general, is just a lot of fun, even when you lose. If you like building and survival games, this one is worth checking out just know that it isn’t easy. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

The Silence (2019)

The Silence is a 2019 horror movie from Netflix and follows the trend of don’t make noise or you will die. It is actually quite similar to A Quiet Place except The silence is based off a 2015 book by Tim Lebbon. The book goes into more details about certain things but all in all the movie does a pretty good job explaining some things, but we will get there.

The movie starts by showing some miners busting through a wall and unleashing what appears to be some bats. These bats quickly swarm and kill them and thousands are released into Pennsylvania. We are then introduced to the Andrews family, most notably Ally (Kiernan Shipka) who lost her hearing in a car accident and Hugh (Stanley Tucci) which this may be the first time he hasn’t played at least a semi-gay man that I have seen. I mention this because he does that amazingly so I wasn’t sure how I would feel seeing him here as a straight man in a serious role, and he played his part amazingly as did the rest of the Andrews family.

The ancient bats quickly start terrorizing the eastern seaboard and even the military is powerless to do much. Entire cities like Philadelphia and Pittsburgh are quickly overrun and pretty much everyone killed. This isn’t explained great on how this occurs with a few thousand bats escaping a cave but they do show that they reproduce very quickly when they kill, to the point in a few days there are millions of them.

They, of course, can’t see and hunt off the sound everything makes, and there is plenty more going on. The movie isn’t getting great reviews but I can’t see why. The acting and script are solid, the movie does what it wants to do quite well and there are no glaring plot holes or defects with some pretty tense scenes as well. I can only assume people are just tired of the formula which I honestly understand. It is worth a watch, but if you are tired of movies like A Quiet Place and Bird Box, this may not be for you. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Victoria 2 (PC)

Victoria 2 is a grand strategy game from Paradox Interactive and is considered by many to be one of their more difficult games to master due to its complexity. I by no means consider myself a master, or even good at the game, I simply know how to play a bit. I have some experience with their other games such as Stellaris Console Edition (PS4) and Crusader Kings 2 (PC) and I have to admit, it truly is far more complex.

To start you pick a real-world country in the 19th century, and manage it in just about every aspect possible. I will use America as an example since that is where the tutorial takes place and it is my home country. You start just prior to the Texas war for independence from Mexico and is really one of your first major decisions. Do you want to get involved or do you leave them alone to fend for themselves? Well wanting to do the right thing for America, I helped them out and they later became a state, true to life. From here I was setting tax rates, attempting to settle Oklahoma and out west more and moved into what is now Canada. This pissed off the British who at this point still own Canada, they then invaded me. Not know how to really defend myself they took over my new settlements in the north, and the New England states all the way down to New York before I restarted the game.

I decided to not piss off Britan and rush the American Civil war by instantly pissing off the south over slavery, which resulted in hundreds of thousands of rebels and the North getting stomped in the Civil war. After that every 6 months a new civil war would start. Yup, time to restart.

Around the 5th restart I got the hang of the game, most of what is modern America eas under my control, I managed to outlaw slavery while avoiding the American Civil war completely and my tax rate was almost 0 due to my economy being insane with investments all around the world. Until the British, Mexico and for some reason I still don’t understand Haiti invaded me. About 2 months in and Hati quit the war, but fighting in both the north and south was taking its toll on my troops and economy. About 6 years later Mexico asked for peace and gives me Arizona for me to leave them be. The damn Britsh are the bane of my existence tho.

These are the types of scenarios you will come across in Victoria 2, and they get even more insane and weird if you decide to start as a country like Italy or Egypt. You can do things like make Canada never exist, let the Cherokee thrive, have a small African nation take over Asia, your skill level and imagination are the only things stopping you. Well, that and a pretty high learning curve and make no mistake, it is high. That is the only real issue with the Paradox grand strategy games, they take time and dedication to learn, but damn are they worth it. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Depraved (PC)

Depraved is a pretty typical city builder but this one has some survival aspects to it as well. This is a nice change of pace from the usual build stuff, wait awhile build new stuff we usually get. This time in the old west you are not only picking a spot to build that will allow you ample room to build, but also access to supplies such as rock, wood, and food. You will then need to build enough houses for everyone, give them jobs and attract new people.

If this sounds easy, it is because I haven’t gotten to the part yet where bears will occasionally attack you if you wander too close, the winter will come and attempt to freeze you to death. Bandit attacks will also come and go because what is the wild west without that?

The game does a great job of making you decide what to build and when since it won’t be easy to stockpile materials in the early game. You will constantly be building something to attract more people or keep people alive. For an early access game, I was pleasantly surprised by the amount of content, and I will be checking back in or more. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Young Adult (2012)

Young Adult is the story about a woman trying to get back a man from when she was younger. The one problem is that man is now married, with a daughter. Hey, why let that get in the way tho right?

Mavis Gary (Charlize Theron) decides to go back to her home and win back Buddy Slade (Patrick Wilson) She also has a huge drinking problem, she is technically at some stage of drunk for most of the movie and if she isn’t she is about to be or is just waking up from a night of drinking. Along the way, I would like to say she makes new friends and learns life lessons, but she seriously mostly just drinks a lot and sleeps with people while trying to wreck a marriage. The movie isn’t great but it isn’t bad, and most importantly it is fun.

The aspect of her writing a book is also a pretty nice touch, and I didn’t even mind that there was no real ending because there didn’t need to be. I didn’t get the ending I wanted, I got the ending I needed and that is few and far between in movies these days really. Give this one a watch, best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Alien Warfare (2019)

Alien Warfare is an interesting movie. I don’t always mean that as a compliment either. The story is so stereotypically painful I almost think they did the whole thing on purpose as a joke to see if it could be done. The movie is a navy seal team is sent to investigate a top-secret base that is hiding something. I say that because of the President and CIA not telling them what they were hiding despite the fact that they were supposed to secure, instead just telling them if it is there they will know it when they see it.

Of course, the team has a wild card member that happens to be someone’s brother, and their father was also was a Navy Seal and oh yes, both the brother and father got someone killed on a mission because they are a hothead. Despite the fact that everyone disappeared, one scientist survived and knows a lot of things about, you guessed it the alien artifact that was found, the government messed with, and got everyone killed except for this one that happened to be in the one room that would save her.

Aliens are of course super advanced and can teleport but don’t kill any of these guys, and they are far too stupid to see they aren’t trying to murder anyone they just want their giant black rock looking device back. I won’t spoil the ending for you, but I will say this. Don’t watch this movie. It isn’t very good. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Pet Sematary, 2019 (Savior)

So I feel I should tell you, I am probably going to make some statements that some may feel are a bit controversial. Some may agree, some may not. Feel free to berate me in the comments.

First, let me say this. The 2019 version of Pet Sematary is better than the 1989 version. Second, the 1989 version wasn’t all that good anyway. Third, how did I not realize the movie was spelled with an S?

That really isn’t important, just weird I never noticed. On to the review. If you are reading this, I am sure you read the book or saw the original. In the grand scheme of things, the story hasn’t changed. Doctor Louis moves with his family to the country to slow down and spend more time with the family. His wife, Rachel as a troubled past that will come and go throughout the movie and then the kids Ellie and Gage try their best to adjust to the new life. Gage is young and his one job most of the movie and that is to be cute, and Hugo and Lucas (Yes twins) Lavoie do the job amazingly. Ellie (Jete Lawerence) also does a commendable job and plays her role very well tho I feel John Lithgow steals the show with his role as Jud.

As the movie goes on their cat, Church (sorry guys, no name here, Church was played by multiple cats) dies and Jud introduces Louis to what is beyond the place the locals bury their animals. To a place where the dead doesn’t stay dead. The cat comes back as we all know, but Church isn’t what he used to be. The friendly cat is hissing and scratching and bringing home dead animals and even stops Louis from getting some man and wife time with Rachel. The cat is truly evil.

Now I don’t want to go any further in the story as there are some changes, and you will be happy to know it has been reported a few places that the man Stephen King himself approved of the changes. I enjoyed the changes personally tho I do have to admit while the movie was good enough (but not great) it isn’t a very good book to movie adaptation. It was, however, a good movie. If you are looking for an accurate to the book experience you are not going to get it. If you are looking to simply be entertained, this is worth a watch. Tho before I go, anyone that has seen the movie can you answer a question for me and @torstenvblog? How the hell did they get the cow to the burial place? Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.