Avatar (Movie Review)

I know that this is a blog about games, but right near the word games is the word and, and behind that is stuff. So today I have to talk about stuff. While I typing I might as well start something, like Movie Reviews by Me! Anyway, around late 2009, I was laughing at all the jokes making fun of that horrible movie, Avatar. It's going to be horrible...blah, blah, blah...

So then it actually comes out and people are dancing around in a flower meadow, cancer has been cured, Cuba is free, scientists find life on the moon, there are aliens in the sea. Now that we're on the topic of James Cameron, let me thing of something to rant about. While I was watching Avatar, I realized that half of James Cameron's movies are pretty predictable. This guy falls in love...major disaster...someone important dies. The thing it's more stretched. The reason why Avatar and Titanic are so long is because Cameron realized, if people have time to get really attached to the characters, they will cry a river to the oscars. It worked for Titanic, but instead the main charcter lived in Avatar...so where is he going with this?

It's been a few months, and I have convinced myself not to see Avatar. Cameron is counting the money...but non of it is mine. Finally I decided to see it...in the old fashion theatre, no Imax for me. The story is this guy dies so they go to his brother, at the funeral, and offer him a job...more specifically his brother's old job. He connects to his avatar...or something like that...

Blah, blah, blah, blah...everyone hates the humans because we're destroying everything randomly...blah, blah, blah...this guy falls in love with one of the aliens...the military is going to destroy the aliens, but this guy is all like, 'we can do it,' which is strange because they are about 2,000 aliens with bows and arrows, against 500-3000 advanced soldiers with advanced weapondry. The main charcter escapes with his buddies, stealing some of the avatar gizmos to their secret lairer. For some reason the colonel rallies his troops, who strangely all look like truck drivers, to bomb the aliens, but instead of sending modern F-22s to just get the job done, he sends these weak and slow helicopters that have to manually drop a crate full of C4. I thought this was supposed to be the future? Anyway, when the aliens were shooting at th planes nothing happened, but in the big attack when an arrow hits the plane everything breaks and the plane crashes. There were even some times where a single alien took down 3-5 armed soldiers with his bare hands. For some reason it takes like 10 minutes worth of dramatic effect before they can drop the bomb, so by then a group of 1 or 2 aliens have alreay took down have the fleet. The human forces on the ground don't really know what to do they start burning everything. Meanwhile, the main character has been single handedly taking down the big planes with a hand grenade or two, flying from plane to plane. The colonel sees this, so he starts shooting the glass, killing the pilots and such. In the end the humans loose somehow and are shooed away.

People keep saying this movie was awesome. I hated it! It was horrible! I goes it was OK...but it doesn't deserve the credit it has gotten. The 3D was probably just a thin layer of coolness to shield the plot from critics like me.

New Super Mario Bros Wii

It this game good?
Short answer: No
Long answer: Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
It seems like every year Nintendo fails yet again. Almost every Mario game to date is about a short sterotype itailian who saves a princess/relative from a evil castle, usually in control of a mini dragon who became emo in his teen years. Occasionally he gets unneeded and annoying help from his brother, but then Mario just kind of forgets him and runs away. You run around on a yellowish stone road to the castle, avoiding minor enemies and scary looking flowers.
Nintendo recently took that game, slightly tuned up the characters to look almost 3D, made it so there is four charcters, and then slammed the word New in front of it. Take a look for yourself. As you may have noticed, the only new aspect of the game is multiplayer. Actually now that I think about it, all Wii games are just you and 3 others beating each other up on a tiny map, complete with cartoon violence. Welcome to the club, new super mario bros Wii. Meanwhile, the Xbox 360 allows you to do this on a open map, with more compeling story, plot, characters, and everything else.
The characters in this new game, are Mario, Luigi, and two different color toads. That's like a super hero game with, superman, batman, and two recently hatched ducklings. Not that it matters though, because all the characters are exactly the same when it comes to ability. The plot is pretty much non-existant, and the concept got old about 20 years ago. The power ups are even designed so that only one person gets them too.
Even bad games have a place in history, sometimes even as teaching purposes, but this game doesn't deserve to exist. This doesn't even top previous mario games, at their standards, what so ever.
On the plus side, now you and three friends can all commit suicide at the same time...yay!

Top 10

Hooray! It's been one month and 2 days since my first post. Apparently I actually took time to rant about my life for more then 12 seconds. Today I thought I'd take this into another direction, since this is the fifth week anniversary...give or take some. Welcome to the Anniversary Top 10 Thingie!

Top Ten best games of 2009:
1. I Dunno
2. I Dunno 2: Escape from Lakeville
3. I Dunno: Streets of Liberty
4. McDonald Donalds and the Last Knight
5. NUk3D P3r50N's L1f3
6. 1 Vs. 100
7. 5432...7Zombie_game
8. DarkDoc: Arena
9. Roast Beef Expansion Pack for the game, FoodKIll
10. Over taxed

Most Memorable Video Game Characters Ever:
1. Duke Nuke'm
2. That guy that was in I Dunno...oh yeah, Jack Jackson
3. Master Chef
The rest is sucked into a vortex because of the awesomeness of Duke!

My Summer Disaster: MoH

Over the summer of 2009 my XBOX360 was getting fixed after someone accidentally kicked it. Of course, I was forced to my worst nightmare. A year or two ago my family asked me if I wanted a Wii at all. I politely replied, F***en s*** No! On christmas I got one anyway. When I asked why, they replied that my aunt(whom I despise) said it was so much fun, so they gave it to me anyway. For the next few years it sat on the shelf. I had to play the Wii while my XBOX360 was repaired. Those days sucked. If you haven't already, read my post about why I hate Wiis, here.

Anyway, during that time I bought some new games for the wii such as Medal of Honor. Since I like WW2 shooters I was expecting this to be remotely, in some way, kind of fun. Wrong. I started the game off on the first level, parachuting on to the battlefield. Immediately I couldn't shoot because the Wii pointer is flying around just from my breathing. I get shoot from a guy I can't see of the screen, because guess what? You can't look up! Ok...restart. I'm lunging my arm at my feet like a manic trting to control the pointer. Then I realize I'm crawling all of a sudden because the gun is controled by the same movements as going prone. I'm unable to get up now...die...restart. After another 1-2 attempts I actually was able to follow the NPCs to the objective. Of course, most of the time I was lost because everything is so dark, even if there is a light right next to you. After several really boring attempts I just ran past everything and some how glitched to the next objective. Apparently they didn't think of that when they were making this thing.I was lunging my hands around my head just to walk correctly. Finally I some how got a hold of the gun and was able to actually do something. After the mission ended, I started up the next one and realized that it's basically the same. No multiplay, co-op, or extras...just 4 of these levels. That is why I rate this a 3 out of 10.

Reviews: Modern Warfare 2

Being a big fan of the Call of Duty series, I picked up a copy of Modern Warfare 2 as soon as it came out. Right away the campaign started unique and fresh. One of the things that really made the game more fun was the fact that the character dies several times through out the game. In most shooters the goal is to stay alive as you blow up building randomly, but in this game it changes into a 'finish the mission' mental state. Another thing that was unique was the fact that the missions weren't all 'shoot em' up' type objectives. For example, in the mission, 'Cliff Hanger' you have to complete the challenge of climbing up the mountain.

There were some points in the middle where I felt like this mission was just trying to increase the level amount. Other times things just didn't add up. There was this one mission where I died almost foot from the objective. (*Spoiler*) Next time I tried it I got the objective and General Shepard killed me. Basically if you die here you're a loser, and if you die a few inches forward you're a winner. There were also a few loose ends. For starters, why did General Shepard betray his country? It's a little unclear, and then all of a sudden he has his own branch of the army that's all betraying their country. What ever happened to Makarov anyway? Toward to end of the game they just forget him and focus on General Shepard. This either guarantees a sequel, or makes Infinity Ward really unobservant. I'm going to put my money on the answer number one.

The Special Operations (Spec Ops) were a lot of fun to play with a buddy if you're bored. The system they used for the stars and achievements worked to my standards. The multiplayer felt like an add-on that people were looking forward too. If your buddy is away then there is always that.

Over all I'd say that Modern Warfare 2 is a great game. It delivers the right amount of suspense before it reaches a climax, but then the ending felt unended. If you get this game you will most likely be happy with your purchase. I rate it a 8.7 for its unique style.

Spinning the Fail-O-Meter

I'm sure that everyone is so delighted at the direction of the gaming industry. Ever since the 'Nintendo Problem', thinking stopped. Ever since the 2009 E3, games have been announcing their new motion control systems. Hooray? No. Noooooooooooooooooooo! Let's be honest...we play video games to relax after a hard day. I don't relax by flailing my arms around. I'm talking of course, to the Wii. Why is Nintendo still in business anyway? All of their games are either things like Wii Sports or games available on other consoles. The thing is that when it's on the Wii it's completely ruined. You're trying to shoot the enemies, but you can't spin your arms at them without missing. The customizable 'Miis' are the same as the avatars on the Xbox 360. The difference is that the Xbox 360 actually has more than 5 options so you can actually express yourself, and tell the difference between your mom's mii and your's. At first Wii apealed to people by saying it was family friendly. They ruined that too by exepting games that were considered too violent. I still don't know why Wiis are the best selling console ever. For starters everyone important and consumers alike hate them. I'm guessing that people in their 40s buy the Wii for their kids blindly. Outdoor people(like football players)are too littlely knowledged about video games that they're so used to the failures of the Nintendo brand. I don't know what they're trying to do here, but now they got all the better gaming consoles following the trend.
Hooray...
Now lets spin the Fail-O-Meter. Oh, look! It's gone from epicly bad to retarded.

The style of Halo

As I ponder my shelf of empty cd cases I'd like to establish something. Fusion Frenzy 2wasn't as good as the first. The first wasn't exactly the good stuff either. Speaking of Microsoft games, Bungie is on the chopping block(metaphorically). Bungie is the creator of the popular Halo series if you did not know already. The series is so popular that people have a hard time noticing the brillant(sarcasism) writing team. The storyboard of the first 3 games are nearly the same.

In Halo- Cool I'm a spartan...blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and now the covenant invades...I kill one of the prophet guys...we got to find the Ark...flood attacks...go to the Pillar Autumn...nearly sacrifice my life to damage rings...w00t!

Halo 2- Cool, I lived...blah, blah,blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah...covenant attack...I kill the second prophet guy...I go to the Pillar Autumn...we still need to find the Ark...flood attacks...nearly sacrifice my life to follow the last prophet guy.

Halo 3- W00t, I jumped off a ship and lived...blah, blah, blah, blah, blah...covenant attack...I kill the last prophet guy...find the ark...flood attack...I go to the Pillar Autumn...sacrifice my life to destroy rings.

As you can see the unique story line in each one sucks everyone in(sarcasism again). In the end they're sitting on a pile of money throwing fake gold down at us. After the multiplayer and custom games experience faded away, I didn't even bother to buy
Halo 3: ODST. In reality ODST was a grab at more money...and was really bad. From all the speculations and sneak-peaks, Halo: Reach is going to be just like ODST only you're a spartan again. Wait a minute, didn't they say that Halo 3 was the last Halo game? Then they made Halo Wars, Halo3: ODST, and now Reach. What's up with that? Not to mention the $25 dollar comic books and t-shirts. Hopefully after 2-3 more sequals people will say, 'hey, this looks familiar'. For me the effect is falling.