Video Game Reviews
Ordered by date of release, newest to oldest.
See the condensed list.
Torchlight II (Runic Games) 
Release Date: 2012-09-20
Platform: PC
Genre: Action RPG, hack-and-slash
Torchlight II boasts a large portion of the team that worked on the Diablo games, so for starters, it has pretty similar and cool music and sound effects. The controls are very intuitive, much more so than those of Diablo III; playing Diablo III and Torchlight II one after the other makes me appreciate the latter's controls all the more. However, this game feels pretty mindless. I don't like many spells on the skill tree and seem to be able to blow through everything with one skill for the most part. The quests do at least seem to be a lot more original than those of Torchlight. The Act 2 area also reminds me of the desert from Fable 3; good memories there. The terrain is confusing: though it's wonderfully mapped for collisions, it can be hard to tell when you don't have a straight shot at an enemy and I have wasted a lot of mana trying to hit things that I thought I'd be able to. A minor irritant is that the gems take up as much space as every other inventory item and thus inundate my stash very quickly, but altogether, this game is enjoyable enough to play through once. I wouldn't make more than my one character, though; the replay value isn't very high.
Also, whether it be in Diablo or Torchlight, Act 2 is always a desert.
Continent of the Ninth Seal (WEBZEN Games)
Release Date: 2012-07-01
Platform: PC
Genre: Action, fighting, MMORPG
Let's start out with the three negatives I've found: the text can be really hard to read, so it can be tough to tell what's going on. The story is even more difficult to follow since there's no voice acting whatsoever besides NPC greetings (which I don't mind so much) to accompany the small text. Quests can be annoying to read the descriptions for and items on the ground can be hard to find for the same reason, but the game has so far been fun to play even without knowing for sure what I have to do at each step. Occasionally the text on some screens doesn't even show. The quests are also sometimes given to you after you've already completed a stage and gain a new level, so you have to go back and complete the stage again, but this is far more fun to do in C9 than it is in other games I've played, especially other MMOs, even despite the fact that the enemies aren't very varied.
The screen looks cluttered and overwhelming a lot of the time, partially due to how many colors are used simultaneously, but it's not game-breaking; just takes a bit to get used to.
Sadly, last but not least of the negative things about this game, spambots are in tremendous number all over the servers, messaging easily a few times per second. This is tied with the small text as the biggest problem about C9.
Here's a neutral: the way your character starts off seems a little too advantageous, as you can wear one of three widely different costumes - each one increasingly conservative with the last one being a full suit of armor - from the very beginning. I started off with the most revealing outfit because it didn't feel right to be so armored-looking at the very beginning. Some of the clothing options include extremely impractical things like angel or schoolgirl miniskirts and lace stockings, but I don't always mind being a doll fighting monsters.
Now onto the good things: the customization seems pretty awesome; female faces are characterized by whether they're "alluring", "hardhearted", or "enchanting", which is a nice small addition. The tattoos are numerous and, though the available colors are a bit too saturated, they're still a cool feature. The choices of hair color seemed very dull and the hair meshes don't seem completely polished, but the different hairstyles look really nice and fairly original, surprisingly. This is an extra plus to me since I love being able to customize my character.
The music in the tutorial is an interesting metal/rock combination, which I haven't heard before in an MMO, so kudos to them for originality. After that, it's a happy, magical ballad, very dreamy and fitting for such a game. When you're in a busy area, there's even the sound of idle chatter.
Attacking is very fluid and makes me wonder why this game is free-to-play: things like this seem fairly polished in this game, so I'm impressed. The combat is extremely fast-paced and reminds me of a fighting game with tons of different moves and hotkeys. The bounding boxes aren't ridiculously small nor far too large on the enemies, either.
Ultimately, Continent of the Ninth Seal feels like a mixture of the fighting game Dead or Alive (for the attack features), Fable (for the previews of skills and the arrows on the ground to your destination), and D&D games and is pretty fun so far, even though my girl runs like an anime schoolgirl/ninny with her arms cast out to the side. :P
Divina (Gamania) 
Release Date: 2012-06-25
Platform: PC
Genre: Fantasy, MMORPG
Free-to-play games, especially MMO's, tend to have extremely annoying and terribly-programmed services that go with them. Take Divina for example. I still don't know whether my Divina account is also my beanfun! (the service Divina uses) account. Beanfun! also has a habit of putting a shortcut to itself on my desktop every single time it's closed, which is extremely manipulative and intolerable. And in order to play, instead of opening the game itself (which, if you try to play this way, the game will ask you for an account and password which you do not have as it's not your beanfun! account at all), you must open beanfun! and then click Play on the Divina tab there. Basically, I had to look up online how to start the game (on a thread where others were having the same problem), which didn't bode well for the rest of my gaming experience.
However, the rest of the experience wasn't terrible at least. The attacking is very automated and requires little skill; I do like how your character moves in range automatically to attack the enemies when you want her to, but even if the enemy changes position, your character will compensate for that without you having to move your mouse at all, so it's childishly simple and is pretty much 3-3-3-tab, 3-3-3-tab where 3 is a special attack and tab switches to the next nearest enemy. There's no point in killing enemies besides to complete quests, since you get the vast majority of your experience from quests. While the latter is fine, the former is not; it feels like a pointless quest grind much of the time instead of being enjoyable to fight enemies and go off and explore on your own. Moving in this game looks awkward, mostly due to the animations seeming to be very thrown together, and jumping is more like hovering and is very slow and odd. I'm a sucker for bright colors and cartoony graphics, which is part of why I downloaded this game, but while the colors are very vibrant, they're almost too much so. Every player character looks like a crazy mess of unnatural hair and eye colors (natural colors aren't even available in the character creation screen). The saccharine voices can be annoying, and there's a super panty shot on my assassin, so this game definitely has some fan service. The servers also seem very empty; I assume this game was decent in its prime and since has lost almost all of its following. It's nifty that you have the ability to marry like in Perfect World, but since I could barely find other players, I doubt I'll be able to check that part out much further.
For some reason, free MMO's really like to give you text that is nearly impossible to read due to its tiny size. Thus, I read very little of what people wanted me to do and just started killing things - not uncommon for an MMO, but still a shame that getting yourself involved with the story requires straining your eyes. It's also not very clear how much health you have at any given time since your health bar is so small; it should be quite a bit larger and in a more central location. The quests themselves are pretty generic: talk to this person, kill these, gather these, return to this person. There's a lot of walking aimlessly across town to pick up and return quests; you'll often gain two levels in a row just from trading in quests to people across the city, only to be given more quests to turn into other people on the side you just came from. Many NPCs also give you quests that entail you killing the same enemies you killed for a previous quest. The areas in the game are also very symmetric and not very creative, but at least they're pretty.
The atmospheric effects of this game are a positive, though; for one thing, the calm, slow, dreamy music really fits the setting (even though there are very few music tracks per area, a definite negative), and I like some small things like the chirp of crickets at night getting really loud when you go near trees or waterfalls roaring louder when you get close. Your character also sighs and gets impatient when you sit around for too long (though that happens a tad too often, the wait should be a bit longer before the sound is triggered). For some reason, the sharks have a northern accent, snails speak in ebonics, and turtles speak like knights (and make shell puns), which is really amusing. And one of the best things about the game is you don't have to pick up loot. I don't like the trend MMO's have where you have to manually pick up everything an enemy drops (which even takes longer to code than simply putting it into your inventory), especially when what they drop is just gold. This game takes the Chrono Trigger route where it goes straight to your inventory upon the end of the battle, and there aren't that many useless items unlike in other MMO's. Your players should be decently excited to get new loot, and games like World of Warcraft minimize this by having mobs drop a lot of useless items that don't even sell for much, which just takes up time as you clear them from your inventory. The lack of this time suck is one of my favorite characteristics of Divina.
You can get a bunny or mouse sidekick with whom you gain favor if you talk to them about their favorite subject, causing them to have more loyalty to you, which is a cool little feature. I really like that you can choose their class by allocating their stat points instead of having them come with a preset class. The map is also nifty in that you can click on an area and automatic pathfinding will bring your character there instead of making you click your way to your destination. This is really useful when you need to cross an entire map but don't want to have to spend a full minute doing it; you can even have the game running in the background and have your character move to a new location while you do something else on your computer, saving a lot of mindless mousework. The combat itself is pretty mindless, though, as touched upon earlier.
Despite all the quirks, Divina is fairly entertaining, but it's a shame more people don't play it. They even got Laura Bailey, the anime voice actress for Kayko from Yu Yu Hakusho and Tohru from Fruits Basket, to be an optional voice for your character, which is pretty cool.
Diablo III (Blizzard Entertainment)
Release Date: 2012-05-15
Platform: PC
Genre: Action RPG, dungeon crawler, hack-and-slash
A great standalone game, Diablo III is extremely fun and addicting, but not worth the title of the Diablo series in my eyes, for it has abandoned a lot of what made the past two games unique in favor of mass marketing and money-making. Three biggest complaints? The graphics are no longer gothic, the chat system encourages you to not talk to people, and the skill tree got a complete overhaul, making the game require much less skill and desire for originality.
Large issues with Diablo III:
Gameplay
- "200 hours of gameplay!" Yes, because you play the same game four times on different difficulty settings, unlike most reasonable games which allow you to pick the difficulty matching your skill level in the first place. Normal is a complete joke, but you have to spend hours going through it to get the game to start becoming even a mite challenging. Yes, Inferno is hard, but what about all that time I wasted getting to it when I know I'm a capable action RPG player that could've started at late Nightmare or Hell? Not an option, too bad, go waste some time guzzling our semen now.- Very stupid things that show Blizzard doesn't have any clue how to mix casual gamers with more involved ones. There's even an option called "elective mode" left on by default for some absolutely insane reason that only allows you to have one spell of each category hotkeyed at any time. Blizzard claims its "casual gamers have thanked them for implementing this useful feature." What? Forcibly restricting your skill selection is helpful? I could understand if skill selecting was confusing, but if clicking an arrow is too hard for them...then Blizzard is not marketing its game to the right people. Stopping trying to please both parties is what a lot of AAA game developers need to do. But since you're adamant that these kind of gamers need to be pleased too, how will your casual gamers fare in Hell or Inferno, Blizzard? No, don't change Hell or Inferno, change your target audience.
- Every class gets every skill available to that class. There is no more specializing. If that didn't remove the last traces of originality enough for you, consider:
- You can no longer allocate your own stats. Only items separate you from others your same class and level now. Why? Because then you're more likely to use the auction house, including the Real Money auction house, where 15% of the sale goes straight to Blizzard's greedy paws.
Graphics
- Needs more darkness. The graphics of Diablo and Diablo II made it feel like the world hated you, and it did. Why switch that out for generic action RPG graphics that a handful of other games in the past few years have taken on? (With studios dramatically less funded than your own, I might add, what with this being $60 and having the most pre-orders of any game to date.)Online only
- The forced online mode is an absolute travesty, especially for people who like to solo (who, believe it or not, make up a huge percentage of the gaming community at almost half the population, including me). If their server has a problem or needs to update, I can't play my single-player game. If my Internet connection goes out, I can't play my single-player game. And if your player is hardcore and permadies due to a lag spike on their end? "Oh well!" -Blizzard- I can never fully own the game. This alone would make me want my money back if I had bought the game, but thankfully a friend bought it for me. If Blizzard takes their servers offline, I can't legitimately play. If I do find a way to play, it'd be illegal. Here's to terrible customer service!
- The max number of players per game has been reduced from 8 to 4. Why? Server load. Patch the game so it can be offline and, with half of your users leaving the online mode, this problem is fixed, Blizzard.
- Where's the decent-sized text I see when others talk to me? Before it was instantly recognizable that someone is talking to you because there was a large but non-interfering message at the top of your screen. Now it's tucked away in the bottom left a la World of Warcraft and is only distinguishable if it's a whisper to you. I understand that with 99 people in each general chat, there could be a lot of distracting text on your screen, but this wouldn't be the case if there were a max of 8 people who could talk to you like this like there used to be. Once again, the simple solution is to have a lobbying system with whispering compatibilities, just as they always used to have.
- I enjoy talking to my friends while playing, but why not just make connecting to the server so you can chat while still playing alone in a game an option instead of a requirement? Also, there's no invisible mode among your friends. Don't want someone to know you're online? "Too bad!" -Blizzard
- The matchmaking service is embarrassingly badly executed. It regularly matches me with a single other player who half the time is either idle or rushes through everything while I want to check every nook and cranny. There is no way to name your game like "Trist runs" or anything of the sort, forcing you to find a friend who hopefully is at the exact same point in the game as you and that they want to do the same quest. Especially since I travel so much, it's extremely difficult to find people who fit this bill on my friends list at any given time since my characters are on the US server. Better matchmaking or actual game names would fix this, but Blizzard often doesn't want to pair you with more than one or two people because of server load (which could be quickly mitigated by not forcing everyone to be online to play the game). The most offensive thing about this is that Blizzard North had all of these problems sorted out and fixed with the original Battle.net and its lobbying system, but Blizzard Entertainment scrapped their work and took it upon themselves to cash the cow, milking the series of a lot of its goodness. Which brings me to:
Spam
- The spam problem is outRAGEous. Literally at least ten spammers in every general chat (which they force you into every time upon opening the game [edit: they have now made the General chat thankfully optional]). All of these spammers activate at the same time to compete with one another, which leaves you with a wall of text you can barely scroll back through. And if someone has said something before they started spamming? Forget it: their message is lost because Blizzard forces the chat down by however many new lines are typed, meaning that you have to wait for the spammers to stop before you can start scrolling back up and have a chance of finding what was said before (already very difficult in itself). The worst part is that there is an extremely simple solution to this problem: stripping chats of URLs (including alternatives like "[dot]" and commas instead of periods). Blizzard simply doesn't care enough to do this. Spammers are too difficult for their incompetence to handle, and this was a problem even with Diablo II.Story
- Why did you have to kill the characters you did?!- The story is haphazard and quickly put together, with two of the Lesser Evils telling you exactly what they're going to do before they do it. Diablo is also the lamest and sorest loser on the planet.
- And every time you get to a new difficulty setting, your character and followers act like everything you just spent hours going through is completely new to them. My character is still baffled by the mysteriousness of Act I when she just beat Diablo's ass in Act IV five minutes prior. A little bit of story progression in each new difficulty would be absolute boatloads better, Blizzard. I'm sure they know that and just don't care.
tl;dr:
This game IS a fun standalone game, but is the worst edition in the Diablo series by far due to extremely solvable problems that Blizzard Entertainment and their even less respectable partner in crime Activision don't care about. I don't blame the Blizzard North team for leaving them.
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (Bethesda Game Studios)
Release Date: 2011-11-11
Platform: PC
Genre: Action RPG
First off, Skyrim is really fun:
Pros
- NPCs have their own lives and waltz around more like actual humans instead of being unrealistically confined to their stores or homes 24 hours a day.
- The world is massive and there's tons to explore.
- The quests are surprisingly quite creative, something I normally don't expect from modern RPGs. On top of that, you can beat the game fairly quickly, but there's simultaneously enough content to have you playing for hundreds of hours. This is one of the most impressive things about Skyrim to me.
- There are many different choices and roads open to you throughout Skyrim. You can join one of the two factions or ignore them equally. You can be really nice, really mean, and anything in-between. Murdering a whole town will affect whether you can get quests from that town, and little yet detail-oriented things like that feel pretty unique in video games. It's pretty rad.
- Your relationships with people and towns actually improve rather than having people forget you immediately after you've done a quest for them.
- There's a good amount of difficulty levels to choose from (which can also be changed at anytime in-game). Master is a fairly comfortable level for me; definitely not easy, but not impossible, either.
- The setting is very Scandinavian, something I like as a frequent traveler to Scandinavia. Heck, one of the main races are even called the Nords, and you can see many viking ships throughout the game.
- The customization gives you a fair amount of choices for hair, eye color, face shape, etc.
- Fus-ro-dah. And dragons.
That said, as an indie developer myself, the programming in this game is unbelievably frustrating on quite a few counts:
Cons
- I get the appeal of sandbox games, but in a game where creatures don't always level up with you, and certain areas are clearly supposed to be harder than others, more direction than what is given is needed to keep the player sane through getting oneshotted half a dozen times after being given a quest that's way above their current abilities. There's no way to tell whether the area your next quest is in is something you can reasonably do at your level until you go there and see how often you die. It seems very few quests have a level cap, but more than that, there's not even an indication next to the area's name on the map that lets you know how hard the dungeon will be. This is simply a huge oversight.
- Any follower is often a complete moron and stands in your way all the time (especially Lydia). It's not impossible, or even hard, to make people able to be walked through, and if that wasn't coded in in order to make things more "realistic", then why can't you at least push them out of the way, especially since dog followers can push you? (I'm looking at you, Barbas.) This makes absolutely no sense.
- More on followers: I took a liking to Faendal, but most of the available followers have their level set upon the first time you meet them, and thus Faendal became fairly weak after awhile instead of leveling with me. This is irritating because you can't even get close to one specific follower (because they might be next to useless after awhile) unless you edit the game using the console, and I try to do that as little as possible the first run through so I can enjoy the vanilla game.
- Continuing even more with followers, the dog companions, esPECially Barbas, are maddening. For some nonsensical reason, Skyrim's developers thought it smart to have Barbas try to be on the exact same tile you are, causing the dog to push you at every chance he gets and often causing you to fall off cliffs or miss perfect shots. He also barks too much, but that part isn't as bad as I thought it would be. The pathfinding for both dog and human companions is also pretty bad sometimes.
- Your followers often disappear, and sometimes fast-traveling or entering a new area does not fix this problem. This can be fixed in the console by using your followers' reference IDs, but it's not fun to have this happen multiple times per hour of gameplay. The pathfinding for followers can also occasionally be pretty bad.
- You often have to be pointing at exactly the right few pixels to pick up items, and combined with your followers sometimes pushing you, this becomes very frustrating very fast.
- Saving takes a fair amount of time, but you're immediately thrown back into the action after a save, even though the amount of time required for the game to save is variable.
Other cons
- When it gets dark at night, it gets really dark. This is fine if you're always in caves, but moving between areas gets to be quite irritating. Having to recast Candlelight every 60 seconds to be able to see where I'm going is the major issue; if the game's trying to tell me I need to sleep during this time, I can only say that my werewolf blood disagrees.
- It'd be nice to have hotkeys instead of needing to go into your Favorites menu to change spells, weapons, and the like.
- There are only a handful of voice actors, and a fair amount of NPCs (especially shopkeepers and guards) say the exact same things, leading to an annoying degree of monotony at times. Even the NPCs that you can marry often flirt with you using the exact same line; ugh! A lot of the faces, and especially hairstyles, of NPCs also are very similar and ununique.
- Your marriage choices tend to be very bland-looking characters, or uninteresting ones. Some of the most attractive people I found in the game were the ones who weren't courtable.
- There's no real tutorial for the game.
Overall, Skyrim as a whole is pretty fun, and has many, many hours worth of content to keep players entertained for a long while. The extremely common follower bugs definitely make this game frustrating, though.
Age of Empires Online (Robot Entertainment, Gas Powered Games)
Release Date: 2011-08-16
Platform: PC
Genre: MMORTS
I consider this game to be one of my favorite games that I've happened upon by chance. I've always enjoyed Greek and Roman history, so I stumbled upon AoEO in my search for Greek-related games. I quite like the graphics, despite them being a bit cartoony (I never did mind that, really). My favorite civilization to play is the Persians (because of their strong cavalry), but sadly, their civilization is premium content, and I was only able to play them in a demo. I ended up settling with playing the Celts since I didn't like the Greeks or Egyptians as much.
I like AoEO mainly because I love RPG's. That may sound silly and irrelevant since this is an RTS, but you can actually build an empire and buy upgrades over time to improve your units, instead of starting every game over with absolutely nothing like in most other RTS's like Starcraft (a game I also love, however). Part of what hooks me to the RPG genre is the leveling up bit, and I like seeing that mixed in with other genres.
The game is overall very entertaining, but make sure you're connected to a stable Internet connection, because it likes to kick you off the game if you disconnect for literally even a second (which is horrible if you play via a laptop and makes the game utterly unplayable, since your current quest's progress is not saved). Another annoying bit is how some of the quests don't allow you to access the proper quest areas for some reason, which is why I stopped playing. The project was started by Robot Entertainment but was then turned over to Gas Powered Games, which is known for its popular game Total Annihilation. I don't like Microsoft's tie to this title, though (I have a very strong dislike for Games for Windows Live), but I can tolerate it, just as I did with Fable III.
Realm of the Mad God (Wild Shadow Studios, Spry Fox)
Release Date: 2011-06-20
Platform: PC
Genre: MMORPG, shooter
I'm not sure what to think about this game. It does seem pretty well-made, and starting off as only one class - the wizard (you have to unlock all of the others) - isn't so bad, but you have to pay to do anything useful. Not reasonable amounts, either; a beginner's package with stuff that should be available from the get-go costs $20 and a second character slot costs $3. What the heck? So I have to delete my character each time I want to play one of the classes I unlocked? At the very least it's an okay, playable demo, but these prices are outrageous. There are a couple of reasons I wouldn't pay for this game:
- The atmosphere isn't anything special.
- The quests are too similar: "Kill this guy, now this guy, then him." I did like the nonlinearity of the game (there seems to be no linear way to play at all), but I just didn't find it entertaining because of the next reason:
- You press and hold the left mouse button and do long-range attacks with the wizard, occasionally throwing in some actual magic. The mechanics really seem to be as simple as that. I couldn't really get myself to play longer than half an hour and reach level 8 because I knew I'd have to delete my character or pay in order to make another one. That immediately makes all fun drain from the game for me. What's the point of leveling up any character if I have to delete him to explore the game further?
- The inventory system is actually pretty cumbersome. There's no "loot all" button and barely any variation in the buttons you press during the whole game, in fact.
- Charging players astronomical amounts for things like weapons and pets which ultimately amount to a few extra pixels does not sit well with me since, as a game developer myself, I know just how much effort it takes to add these features (read: not much, especially for an 8-bit-looking game). It just seems like a huge, manipulative money grab.
- Spammers. This game has TONS of them. I don't pay for games made by developers who can't get rid of most of their spammers.
So it wasn't terrible, so I don't not recommend it, but I wouldn't play it again and am uninstalling it. The main reason? I have to delete any character I make to start a new one.
Allods Online (Astrum Nival)
Release Date: 2011-04-26
Platform: PC
Genre: Fantasy, MMORPG
This game is extremely polished for being free-to-play. It truly reminds me of World of Warcraft. Many MMO's try to be like WoW, of course, but Allods actually succeeds quite well, with most of the negative aspects of WoW (aggressive and rude player base, endless raid-gear-raid loop) yet to be seen. I can also vouch that gPotato, the playing service this game comes with, is a much better alternative to beanfun!, which is what games like Divina use. No annoying shortcuts or popups or anything, and the site is far easier to navigate.
Allods comes with a quick built-in tutorial at the beginning to let you get the hang of things, but it's a fairly standard MMO when it comes to controls. Combat is fluid and isn't simply point-to-click. Quest descriptions are long, so if you want to get absorbed in the world, there's the option to. I usually just scroll to the bottom and see what I have to do, though, with the occasional full reading of my quest log. So far the quests seem pretty standard; nothing you haven't seen here in terms of talking to people, killing creatures, collecting items, and going to places.
Onto aesthetics: this game is pretty beautiful. The colors are wonderful without being overpowering and the environment is very immersive. Like I said, for being F2P, I'm impressed at the stunning visuals, and quite enjoy the lighthearted fantasy setting of the League, though the Empire's areas are cooler. The animations are very well-done, as are the various faces and bodies of NPCs. For some reason, my elf is a fairy, but hey, I've never played a fairy character before, so it could be fun (also the NPC names are Russian-sounding and there are Russian signs in towns, likely because the makers are Russian). The map system is very similar to WoW's (the maps look almost identical in style) and even includes a feature called Automove (similar to that of Divina) so you can make a straight-shot for your next quest location without having to waste time paying attention to where your character is walking; enemy aggro is even reduced when you use Automove. Customization isn't too involved, but there are enough options to keep my character from looking like everyone else's. Even the log-out screen is nice. I really like some of the effects; for example, when I shoot an arrow, the arrow gets lodged into whatever I shot, including enemies. The voice acting is a bit robotic and the combat a tiny bit awkward by default what with both the basic attacks and special attacks crammed together on the hotbar (you can change this, of course), but it's not too shabby. I especially like how you can "plan an attack" e.g. hold an attack for the next enemy you target if the first targeted enemy was killed while you were casting.
One of the most irritating things about most MMO's is the endless running around to turn in quests. There don't seem to be many straightaway paths to anywhere you need to go, mindlessly increasing the amount of time it takes you to do anything without being any fun. Luckily, Allods implements a teleportation feature that gets you from place to place relatively quickly, though the quest placement is still odd. The quests are also very hard to do in order since they don't seem to follow a logical progression; some quests will require you to stay in the same area, and then one of them will make you go to the other side of town. Are you supposed to continue questing where you end up, or go back to the start area? Both? Seems like a waste of time to go so far to begin with, then. The music also fades in and out at seemingly random times (and also gets old quickly), so I prefer listening to my own music while playing. It's not cool that you have to get what's called a megaphone in order to talk to other people in the world chat, though, and the mandatory group/instance quests for the Empire are an annoyance since you can't progress if you can't find anyone to do the instance with you. The League has no such thing required, though.
So far I enjoy this game a lot, though it remains to be seen if it'll become one of my definitive favorites. The Elf Oracle is pretty boring, but I like playing the Kanian Ranger, Xadaganian Specialist, and Kanian Druid. I'll definitely be playing it again.
Cities in Motion (Colossal Order)
Release Date: 2011-02-23
Platform: PC
Genre: Business simulation
I'm amazed at how companies focus so much effort on graphics nowadays when all you need is something like this to make a lot of people have fun. Heck, all I was doing in this game was building bus and metro lines and I enjoyed myself.
One extreme positive about this game is there's no DRM. That means those who buy it don't have to jump through hoops (like staying online all the time or other nonsense ideas); this is a fantastic draw to any game. More developers should go this route!
This game is fun, but it's difficult to turn a profit. You lose money all the time seemingly no matter what you do, and it becomes very frustrating trying to pass the same scenario for the fourth time in a row, and failing. Mind you, this is the beginning scenario. So I might play it again, but ultimately, after a few hours of play and still not passing the first scenario, I may not.
Secret of the Magic Crystals (Artwaregames) 
Release Date: 2010-02-03
Platform: PC
Genre: Casual, indie
I was given this game as a gag gift, but I figured I'd write an honest review anyway! At the beginning you're just given a horse, and you can't even name it or pick its appearance. You brush and groom it a little and it magically grows up in one game day. You train your horse and make money by taking it on errands, which all consist of either waiting at a screen while the horse goes off and delivers a letter or something, or occasionally pressing the arrow keys when a spinning arrow appears above the horse's head on obstacle courses that all look exactly the same as one another. It's pretty annoying that the game only gives me a 99% at the beginning and not a 100% on the obstacle courses, even though I got 12 out of 12 perfects, giving me a telltale sign that the math used in the game's code is a bit wonky. In addition, the fact that you must breed your horses to level up is not intuitive at all, and means that you have to keep using different horses instead of specializing in your favorites, especially at the beginning of the game, so you can't even really get attached to them. There are also a lot of things that don't make any sense in this game; for example, to get more space for horses, you don't upgrade the stable, but instead you upgrade the well (Huh?). Also, when you upgrade your buildings, they barely look any different, with some of them only changing their color scheme; that as well as not being able to choose your horse's name and appearance are major letdowns since I love customization.
I wish I could say that, out of everything, at least the graphics are okay, but even they come off as very cheap, despite the 3D, especially since the backgrounds of the obstacle courses obviously just repeat after a few screens. The models of the horses all look the same, with separate horse breeds just being colored differently. My male fire steed (which was randomly named Katelyn for some reason) has the same build as the first horse I was given, and doesn't even react negatively to me washing it with water, which would've been a neat effect to add. When I bred my two level 1 horses Alane, the unicorn, and Katelyn, the fire steed, I got a level 2 unicorn who looks exactly like Alane, not some cool-looking hybrid of the two. Very disappointing. The music is extremely generic: there's only one track that continuously plays throughout the entire game, and it's just low-key happy music, nothing memorable. The tutorials are also extremely annoying since they show up every single time you enter each area, whether you've already read the tutorial or not. They're also terrible; you'd be better advised to get information on how to play this game from threads like this one. The quest notifications are very slow, with each one lasting a few seconds. Problem is, you'll be sitting and waiting on 9+ notifications when you have multiple horses out on quests. And, last but not least, the precision is terribly off, making it very hard to give your horse potions or groom it without it moving around everywhere and forcing you to try every little spot that might trigger the correct action. Thus, altogether, the game is very unpolished, having about 12 hours of gameplay - from what I hear - of doing the same things (waiting at a screen and hitting arrow keys) over and over again. Definitely a funny gag gift to give to your friends as a joke, but, as to be expected, the game itself is not very fun. It does have a charm to it, though, being a cutesy game for young people. I have the most magical horses of the land.
Torchlight (Runic Games)
Release Date: 2010-01-05
Platform: PC
Genre: Action RPG, hack-and-slash
An action RPG so incredibly reminiscent of Diablo II that I got addicted to it insanely quickly; nostalgia for D2 can hook me pretty fast. While playing this game, I even wondered aloud about how the developers haven't gotten sued by Blizzard themselves, a good thing that! That's to be expected, though, since some team members of Blizzard North, the developer of Diablo II, actually worked on Torchlight! This makes Torchlight spectacular, and with the memorable gothic feel and sounds from D2, this game feels more like it's part of the Diablo series than even Diablo III does, which is quite a feat. Even the keys are the same, including the ability to map spells to F1-F12, one of my favorite parts of D2. I'm not a huge fan of the voice acting; it seems pretty shoddily done and rushed, but this game was made in a very short time frame, so I can't be too picky about that. You do get a pet as a companion - something that I've always loved in games - and it can sell items that are in its inventory for you if you fill up while still on the field, which is a pretty nifty feature.
If you like Diablo II but feel Diablo III doesn't hold up to the series, or if you just like the genre in general, and if you don't mind a more cartoony look, Torchlight is definitely a game for you to try. Torchlight 2 is coming out, too, so keep your eyes peeled for that!
Spiral Knights (Three Rings Design)
Release Date: 2009-11-12
Platform: PC
Genre: MMORPG
SK is a pretty fun game, especially to play with your friends (many of my friends absolutely adore this game, long after I stopped playing it). I quite enjoyed going through it alone as well. The graphics are cartoony and nice and the game is definitely worth trying since it's free-to-play: the music is ambient and airy and suitable for the overall techy atmosphere. As for customization, I really like the "main color" feature - where your character stays primarily one color that you choose at the beginning, kind of like a permanent identifier for them - and especially the equip-as-costume feature - where you can keep a piece of equipment as your visible headgear while using the stats of a better item (this way your character doesn't end up looking stupid because of mismatched gear unless you want them to). My biggest disappointment was having to go through endless grinding of the Jelly King in order to get 30 Jelly Tokens to trade for an item I needed. This is when I stopped playing, and I don't plan on picking up the game again, though it was extremely enjoyable while it lasted. Recommended.
Fable II (Lionhead Studios)
Release Date: 2008-10-21
Platform: Xbox 360
Genre: Action RPG
I hate gaming on the Xbox 360 (it's possibly my least favorite console of all time), but I returned to it simply to play Fable II. I wasn't disappointed, but I also wasn't overjoyed, either: the controls are awkward and the female character is ugly as sin (and has a lazy eye), but the combat is fun enough, introducing the usage of guns to vary things a little. I do love the beginning of the story, as well; I quite like my character starting out as a child. Some of the achievements and especially the demon doors are pretty funny, and keeping me laughing is a good way to help mitigate less-than-stellar aspects of any game, like still having to collect all those damned experience orbs yourself (which often get stuck on the terrain and even end up disappearing after awhile).
A good thing about Fable II, though, is that you get experience for the type of attack you used to kill enemies. If you slaughtered some hapless bandits with a sword, you'll get hand-to-hand experience points to spend; guns will give you ranged experience and magic magic experience. I thought that was pretty neat as it customizes your game a bit more. Your stature also changes based on what you often kill people with, so my girl wound up being pretty tall and buff with will designs all over her (I used all three almost equally, with extra concentration on will).
I played Fable III before Fable II (the platform being basically the entire reason why), and I can see that some things from II to III have changed that shouldn't have and others that should've changed didn't. For example, the dog's pathfinding is pretty bad and he'll often sniff out chests after I'm already right in front of them, and then get lost chasing his tail before even trying to sniff out further treasure. This happens at least once every ten minutes or so over the entire course of the game, which is extremely aggravating. This is also just as much of an issue in Fable III, much to my dismay.
Buying property is also a total pain in this game as opposed to Fable III; there is no easy way to see what you own, so you must instead travel everywhere and check house by house, which is very time-consuming, repetitive, and dull (a shame, since one of the most fun aspects of Fable III for me is owning property). The gargoyles (gnomes in Fable III) are one of the best and funniest parts of the game, one that I'll never forget, what with their ridiculous verbal attacks and insults against your mother. The Spire was another interesting bit of the game.
Quick note, by the way? Fable II Reaver > Fable III Reaver. He was so much better-looking, well-developed, and cunning in II than III, though in both games he's probably my favorite character.
I liked this game enough to be okay with my save file being on my roommate's console instead of my own, which is saying something since I will almost never play a game if I can't return to my character later. I'd recommend it if you liked Fable I or III, but I like III much, much more.
SimCity Societies (Tilted Mill Entertainment)
Release Date: 2007-11-13
Platform: PC
Genre: Simulation, strategy
I received this game a few years ago as a Christmas gift, but I never actually played it much until the beginning of 2012. I love it, even though the interface can be a little convoluted, but I can't offer any constructive criticism, so it may just be the nature of a city-building game to have a bulky GUI. In any case, SimCity Societies is very fun, despite having a couple of pathfinding issues and crashing when you're doing a lot on your computer at once.
Tokimeki Memorial Girl's Side: 1st Love (Konami)
Release Date: 2007-02-15
Platform: Nintendo DS
Genre: Dating sim
Man. This game. This game has very confusing controls that aren't intuitive at all, for starters. For example, left scrolls down through text and right scrolls up, which makes sense for a Japanese game, but the up and down buttons are barely used; shouldn't they have taken on this function?
Your stats also randomly go up or down accompanied by either a good or bad sound; however, the game often played the negative sound when my stats went up and the positive one when they went down. A lot of things like this seemed completely arbitrary. Forget that your birthdate made you luckier during certain weeks than others; this feature not only didn't work very well, but it made the game very tedious since you have to keep checking your horoscope and changing your plans if you have bad luck on dates a certain week, for example.
About the actual dating part, I can say I haven't seen worse and more unimaginative dialogue for quite awhile, and the generic dates follow an extremely simplistic formula. You pick clothes the guy likes, say things he likes, and go to places he likes, which, by the way, you have to find out through trial and error unless you look up a walkthrough, but I'm of the opinion that that should never be necessary to do well in any game. And you only get three years in school to not only meet all the guys, but pick the ones you like and try to figure out all their likes and dislikes when you're only allowed to go on dates on your days off from school (because apparently going on a date on even a Friday night is unheard of). Simply put, you don't have enough time to do the majority of what this game thinks it allows you to do. By the time I found the guy I liked best in the 3rd year, there was no time to attract him before the game ended. Why is he even there?
You can try to touch your date using the DS's stylus in certain places, but this feature isn't explained at all. Obviously the little hearts mean he likes it, but what about the little yellow music notes and stars? I assume one of them means you gain friendship points and the other is...something. There is no explanation, and I still have no idea what those images meant even after having finished the game.
The guys themselves are painfully generic, but of course Konami tried to make them unique by simply changing their face shape very slightly and, of course, their hair color (out of 9 or so guys, about 2 of them have the same hair color). So many game developers use this as a copout instead of creating actual unique characters with unique personalities, and it shows very strongly in TMGS:1L.
There is a lot of obsessive-fangirl-service in this game, such as how your guy will "rescue" you from "bad guys" like unwanted salesmen, and your character ends up saying some of the stupidest things I've ever heard once your date comes to "save" you, such as "I don't know what I would've done if you hadn't come." Um, how about ignored the guy? You're in a public place surrounded by tons of people in the bright of day, not in some dark alley at 2 in the morning. Playing a character that is that clueless made me roll my eyes constantly and want to pull my hair out. Combined with her missing out on 100% obvious signals, her terribly underdeveloped personality, and her acting as if she had no idea when a guy was flirting, I felt like my character was in middle school, not high school.
This game goes for a stupidly outrageous $75 on Amazon at the time of this writing. Five words: definitely, absolutely not worth it. I had never played a game like this before, so I played through the entire thing, but it was honestly a chore starting from the 2nd year on, and became tedious even before that. And by the way, there are only about 10 or so [unmoving] backgrounds total that this game regularly uses for its entire duration, and about 20 other very seldomly used scenes. If you choose to play this, you will be seeing the same environments over and over and over again.
Some positives to this game, however, are that it taught me more about how the Japanese school year is laid out, and it was of a genre I've never played before. Thus, it wasn't a total waste of time.
Children of Mana (Square Enix, Nex Entertainment)
Release Date: 2006-10-30
Platform: Nintendo DS
Genre: Action RPG, hack-and-slash
The graphics of this game are absolutely phenomenal. I was hooked for about 10 minutes, being so mesmerized by the visuals. However, as much as it hurts to put down a game this awesome-looking, I must: the plot is terrible (absolutely nothing is explained), and worse, the gameplay is nothing short of horrendous. The magic user is 100% useless, and for the other characters, it's just a boring, frustrating button-masher. Beautiful game, but while marketing itself as an action RPG, it's nothing more than a pointless hack-and-slash. This is the only game I've ever returned to the store, because I felt insulted to own it alongside Secret of Mana.
Sexy Beach 3 (Illusion Soft)
Release Date: 2006-09-29
Platform: PC
Genre: Dating sim, eroge
This game is amazing, for its genre at least. The graphics are completely focused on the girls, of course, where they're moving models on mostly static backgrounds. The gameplay is pretty nonexistent and some of the girls are rather stereotypical, but as this is a dating sim, I didn't expect much else. You play as a male tourist on a paradise island (reminds me of Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball) who tries to get girls to like you. The effort is very minimal, though; all you have to do is take the girl on dates, and there's really nothing you can do wrong that will make you like them less. There's no issue of jealousy or anything between the girls, which is interesting and either lazy or an intended feature. I'd like to see the girls reacting in different ways to different things (and not judging how comfortable they are with you simply based on how many dates you've gone on with them). I'd also really love more areas (or maybe just more ways to explore), because the ones that are currently available get dull fast.
The game does get quite into rated R territory, so watch out for that. You have to like this type of game to get into it, else I can see you hating it due to the lack of actual gameplay.
Esk is my favorite. (Psst, there's even an unlockable Kasumi costume available for the girls.) :)
Dreamfall: The Longest Journey (Funcom)
Release Date: 2006-04-17
Platform: PC
Genre: Adventure
I haven't played the first The Longest Journey, but Dreamfall: The Longest Journey is an awesome game. I haven't played too many adventure games but this is a great introduction to the genre; Zoe, the main character, is fairly interesting, and the various characters with whom you interact feel very natural and realistic, like they're based off of real people. There are lots of places to explore and Zoe's comments on objects and areas are entertaining. I definitely recommend this game both for people who've played the first and those who haven't alike; I'm absolutely enjoying it.
Dungeons & Dragons Online (Turbine)
Release Date: 2006-02-28
Platform: PC
Genre: Fantasy MMORPG
I was introduced to DDO through Neverwinter Nights 2 and I played it for a short while, and while it can be kind of interesting and fun to play by yourself, I ultimately loss interest. Why? Mainly because of a few things that I didn't like about it at all, such as not being a very good soloing game (I am big on soloing) and only receiving experience for killing things after you've fully completed a quest (at least the quests were varied). I'm also not a huge fan of the art style, which is an odd yet unique combination of Eastern influence and realism, but one that I found kind of dull. Also, every other female character had the same face as me; the customization left much to be desired, which is a huge hit for me. However, for this game, the user base is very friendly, very unlike that of other MMORPG's like World of Warcraft, which is a huge plus. Overall, though, this game just didn't suit my tastes, and I dropped it.
Dead or Alive 4 (Team Ninja)
Release Date: 2005-12-29
Platform: Xbox 360
Genre: Versus fighting
Dead or Alive 4 is a great game for playing against friends, but terrible for single-player. The final boss is a cheapskate, able to teleport and frequently taking a third of your health with one hit, and all the game's battles feel like nothing more than a countering competition. DOA4's graphics are lovely, but DOA3 was much more worth the money.
Guild Wars (ArenaNet)
Release Date: 2005-04-28
Platform: PC
Genre: Action RPG, MMORPG
Guild Wars is a competitive online role-playing game, one that I didn't play too long! I was already playing World of Warcraft when I played this game, and I didn't know many people who played, so I left it at the wayside and haven't returned.
EverQuest II (Sony Online Entertainment)
Release Date: 2004-11-08
Platform: PC
Genre: Fantasy MMORPG
The first Everquest game was basically the mother of all MMORPGs. Everquest II has a nice feel to it, especially for having been released in 2004, but I have to comment that the GUI is bulky and the combat is a bit jittery and awkward. One thing I really like in video games is being able to customize the look of my character, and there's a very limited ability to do that in EQ2. My favorite class to play is usually a sorceress type, but the best race for that class (the Erudite) is bald and ugly with both of her possible looks, which was a huge downer.
The text in the small window on the lower left has so many colors as to be extremely confusing and unreadable, which made me not want to read it and means that I caught almost none of the story. I also found it annoying how I had to click on the lower left EQ2 button every time I wanted to go into the menu; I wasn't able to just press "Esc" like in most games, which is idiotic; that key doesn't serve any worthwhile purpose in EQ2. You also really don't have enough inventory space to do much at all unless you buy extra features, despite the game being free-to-play. In fact, the game feels like it's missing quite a decent bit with all the things it wants you to buy (e.g. out of 16 character races, only 4 of them are actually available without purchasing anything, and the same thing with the classes). A better alternative would be just having creative and fun DLC. This makes me not want to play the game anymore (I got to level 9), and thus I've stopped. I will say that I had to make a conscious decision to stop, though, for the game was a little fun while it lasted.
Zoo Tycoon 2 (Blue Fang Games, MacSoft, Rapan)
Release Date: 2004-11-01
Platform: PC
Genre: Business simulation
I played the first Zoo Tycoon and found that ZT, along with RollerCoaster Tycoon, are the only two Tycoon games I ever really fell in love with. ZT2, unlike its predecessor, lets you play with your animals in 3D, even letting you teach certain species tricks and allowing you to walk around your own zoo in Guest Mode (something I liked in Sim Theme Park). I like being able to see the faces of my guests, and one guest even turned to face me RPG-style and stared when I was staring at her, which I found pretty cool. I was skeptical of the graphics at first since they didn't seem to be a style I would like, but for a 2004 game, they're really not bad at all. Your selection of buildings and objects isn't great, even with the expansions, but there is enough to work with to keep the game going; the main focus is instead on the animals and their food and toys.
There are a few annoyances; for example, some things get auto-placed (like some statues) without notifying you and end up blocking off areas (which you often won't notice until there's a complaint), and you're only able to build things after you've manually removed the trees and rocks that are in the way. Your selection of buildings and scenery is very limited, and since one of my favorite parts of the Tycoon series is the interaction with guests, this is a downer. The game also doesn't seem to be extremely thoroughly tested since the tutorials got stuck for me once and your zookeepers do relatively little, which ends up making you pick up after the animals yourself for the most part. All in all, though, I was impressed by how fun and engaging this game is, and how long I played it in my first few sittings.
RollerCoaster Tycoon 3 (Frontier Developments)
Release Date: 2004-10-26
Platform: PC
Genre: Construction and management simulation
This was not made by Chris Sawyer (who made the first two RCT games) and that is blatantly obvious as soon as you start up the game. It's a mess. Here are a few reasons why:
Building
Building paths is a chore in this game. Instead of using the old, very intuitive method of picking a starting point and then building from there, they obfuscated the process: now you have a starting point, but the path will try to move in weird directions and you have to interact with the bulky interface way too much; sometimes the correct menu won't even be toggled. And you can't right-click to deselect, so you have to fully close out of more than one menu to select a person after building, for instance. And there's no Ctrl+Z undo anymore, which makes construction even more frustrating.Music
Waaaayyyy toooo muchhh oofff ittt. You have multiple tracks blaring at you depending on your zoom level (yes, what?), and the noises your customers make are equally annoying and gaudy.Staff
You can hire as many janitors as you want to patrol your park, but the park still stays incredibly messy unless you want to screw with one of the least fun parts of the game. They've introduced a "laziness" and "discipline" aspect that should be completely optional, but isn't. That means that, even if you have 10+ staff members, you have to check on all of them regularly and make sure they're not getting lazy or that they're paid too little. It takes a LOT away from the game to have to do something as boring as focus on your staff members every ten minutes, because that laziness percentage shoots up fast, even when you don't have your staff members assigned to large areas of your park. Unless you want to deal with this, though, vandalism is rampant and there's puke and trash everywhere (despite there being trash cans everywhere too). And what's the point of benches in this game? The customers hardly use them at all, even when they're eating or sick.User Interface
This is by far the worst part of the game. The buttons are extremely tiny, and you have to hover over everything to see what things do. The problem is that a lot of the buttons' icons aren't very descriptive, so you end up having to relearn the interface every couple of minutes. It's a disaster; I've never spent so much time trying to navigate through menus inside of menus. Frontier Developments apparently wanted to do everything in a circular pattern to make things pretty, but it's a huge inconvenience; the rectangular menus that RCT1 and RCT2 used were perfect. The window for a ride doesn't even show you the ride's name, and for some reason, in order to pick a person up with the grabber tool, you have to be under the "General" tab. Not intuitive at all.The sad part of all this is that I was really enjoying the game (being able to create your own guests and ride your own coasters is pretty fun) until these issues added up in a matter of minutes. The biggest one by far? The user interface's size. I have 20/20 vision and I don't even want to bother with it.
If another RCT is made, I dearly hope it's not by Frontier Games.
The Sims 2 (Maxis) 
Release Date: 2004-09-14
Platform: PC
Genre: Life simulation
I had forgotten how truly enjoyable the Sims was until going back to this game. Compared to the Sims 3, this game's response is instantaneous. As soon as I want it to zoom, it zooms; when I want to save, it does so quickly and efficiently, and it doesn't bog down the rest of my computer, either. This is one of the most optimized games I've played in comparison to the Sims 3, which wasn't made by the same company that made the first two; surprise! (Deja vu via RollerCoaster Tycoon's situation?) I like the graphics a lot better in this game than in TS3 as well; the sims look and feel more expressive and their interactions are far more exaggerated and interesting. Maxis's humor seeps through this game thoroughly.
The Sims 2 also happens to be one of the most heavily modded games I've ever seen. Countless sites are dedicated to messing with meshes and objects that you can use in your game to modify your characters and houses, a feature that was largely ripped away in the Sims 3 (it's still possible to edit TS3 quite a lot, but the abilities given to the modders are nowhere near as advanced as TS2's).
If there was only one feature I could take from TS3 and put in TS2, it'd be the ability to walk around the neighborhood as if it's one seamless unit. As such, I will be playing both TS2 and 3, with a heavy preference for the former but a subtle appreciation for the latter.
SimCity 4 (Maxis)
Release Date: 2003-01-14
Platform: PC
Genre: Simulation, strategy
SimCity 4 is an awesome addition to the line of SimCity games, even though I prefer SimCity Societies' building-by-building construction (in SC4, you just designate areas as residential, commercial, or industrial, and the buildings build themselves). This game is addicting and has a very loyal online following that has made many cool mods for it.
Dead or Alive 3 (Team Ninja)
Release Date: 2001-11-15
Platform: Xbox
Genre: Versus fighting
Dead or Alive 3 and Dead or Alive 2: Hardcore are my two favorites in the DoA series, as well as my favorite fighting games. These games are very easy to pick up and play, dissimilar to many other fighting games.
Empire Earth (Stainless Steel Studios)
Release Date: 2001-11-12
Platform: PC
Genre: Real-time strategy
I really like the idea of this game. Choosing your own civilization and advancing through the ages is pretty fun, and I knew I'd enjoy that kind of thing as soon as I heard about it. I love hiring a canine at the beginning and scouting the map, finding animals and such to hunt and gather. The campaign is something I have problems with, however, because it seems to drop you in the middle of a scenario without giving you proper instruction on how to play. Not only that, but in the Pacific campaign, for example, it starts you off in a rather advanced age instead of letting you build up to it with slowly increasing difficulty.
The big con about this game is the controls. For example, it is extremely easy to accidentally select something you didn't want to, such as a building when trying to select the units around it. Also, the pathfinding in this game is pretty terrible, some of the worst I've ever seen in a game. My units will regularly not go the quickest route to where I tell them to. What's worse, if you're trying to attack something with a lot of units (sometimes "a lot" in this game means "four"), and especially if they can't fit properly around what they're attacking because the unit/building is too small in diameter, your units will go all over the map in some ridiculous maze. This will aggro the other enemy units and will get your army slaughtered almost every time. It's really best to attack in relatively small numbers, because this happens extremely often. There should be a better indication of when a unit is finished building, as well, because the sound that plays is often confusing and they quickly run together if you're making many things at once. Hitting spacebar like one would in Starcraft doesn't always work. This means you have to manually look around your base to see if your units have been built yet, which takes a lot away from your speed. The animation is also a bit wonky, but that's to be expected of an old game.
However, playing with your friends is very fun. If you want to play online and the LAN doesn't work, download GameRanger, a great program for playing old games that no longer have properly working multiplayer with your friends.
Overall, this game is very fun, but the unit issues are taxing and take away greatly from the replayability of Empire Earth.
Dead or Alive 2: Hardcore (Team Ninja)
Release Date: 2000-10-25
Platform: PlayStation 2
Genre: Versus fighting
This game properly introduced me to fighting games and I recount playing it a ton in my younger years. Addictive play, but with an admittedly weak story, DOA is about the only series of fighting games I know anything about.
Diablo II (Blizzard North)
Release Date: 2000-06-29
Platform: PC
Genre: Action RPG, hack-and-slash
I grew up on Diablo II's chat service, Battle.net, and together with Starcraft, I have easily played the two games combined for 10,000 hours (a lot of idle time on Battle.net!).
Cruis'n World (Midway Games)
Release Date: 1998-09-26
Platform: Nintendo 64
Genre: Racing
Cruis'n World was originally released as an arcade game, but I've only played it on the N64. Regardless, it's a very fun game that I used to play with my sister a lot, despite it not being the hardest racing game in the world (especially not compared to its predecessor, Cruis'n USA). You can do stunts and get speed boosts like in a lot of other racing games, but this was the racer (together with Super Mario Kart) that characterized my childhood.
Starcraft (Blizzard Entertainment)
Release Date: 1998-03-31
Platform: PC
Genre: Real-time strategy
I grew up on the chat service for Blizzard games, Battle.net, and I have played this timeless RTS combined with Diablo II for an estimated 10,000 hours (that's almost 417 days, a lot of which was me logged in idling on Battle.net).
Bomberman 64 (Hudson Soft)
Release Date: 1997-12-01
Platform: Nintendo 64
Genre: Action-adventure
The story mode possesses some huge, fatal drawbacks, but its saving grace is its multiplayer. This is a very fun and cool game to play with your friends.
Diablo (Blizzard North)
Release Date: 1996-12-31
Platform: PC
Genre: Action RPG, dungeon crawler, hack-and-slash, horror
Diablo is an extremely classic dark fantasy dungeon crawling game. Creating a genre that was like no other, it is one of the fathers of modern games, and especially of hack-and-slash dungeon crawlers.
Furcadia (Dragon's Eye Productions, Inc.)
Release Date: 1996-12-16
Platform: PC
Genre: MMOSG, MMORPG
I'm not one for socializing as an animal, but I figured I'd try this game out since I've been wanting to catch up on older games, specifically ones that came out when I was little. First off, not being able to full-screen the game is distracting (since I keep trying to because of how small everything is). But being able to customize a bit of how your character looks is pretty cool, and I've never really played a game before where your character is an animal. I may try other games like that since it seems like an interesting concept. The window in the bottom left which shows you which emote actions you can do is pretty cool too, though the pictures on it could be smaller. However, things like walking are really awkward in general, way more so if using the keyboard to do it, and the amount of time it takes for the game to process where you want to move is very annoying. I feel like the isometric view hurts this game more than helps it or makes it unique. Your character also gets stuck in between its walking animations, but this is just a cosmetic issue. I wasn't really able to find anyone to play with, likely because the game is so old, so I never really got to the playing part. Despite all this, and because I didn't play much, I can't be too hard on it since this is an old game, and for its time, I'm sure it was pretty decent.
Cruis'n USA (Midway Games)
Release Date: 1996-12-03
Platform: Nintendo 64
Genre: Racing
Originally an arcade game, Cruis'n USA is a hard but fun racing game. Cruis'n USA is the father of Cruis'n World, and its AI has always kicked my butt without fail. There are a couple of cool cars, and you can even unlock a police car to play as well. Enjoyable, but difficult.
Secret of Evermore (Squaresoft)
Release Date: 1995-10-01
Platform: Super Nintendo
Genre: Action RPG
Made by the American branch of Squaresoft, Secret of Evermore is a severely underrated and overlooked action RPG from the SNES era. Like Chrono Trigger, it deals with traveling in time, but also combines many elements from Secret of Mana like flying around the world map in mode 7.
It's definitely worth mentioning that this game has one of the best ambient soundtracks I've ever heard, if not the best. Composed by Jeremy Soule, the music does a fantastic job of complementing whichever part of the game you're in. I'm particularly fond of the music in Antiqua and Gothica.
Chrono Trigger (Square)
Release Date: 1995-08-22
Platform: Super Nintendo
Genre: RPG
With its time travel, memorable characters, and extremely fun gameplay, Chrono Trigger holds the title of my favorite game of all time, though Diablo II, Secret of Mana, and Starcraft come extremely close.
Super Bomberman 2 (Hudson Soft)
Release Date: 1994-12-12
Platform: Super Nintendo
Genre: Action
Super Bomberman 2 is a game with incredible single-player and multiplayer modes, a feat that many games even today can't accomplish. Tons of fun and tons of blowing your friends (or the computer) up.
Secret of Mana (Square)
Release Date: 1993-08-06
Platform: Super Nintendo
Genre: Action RPG
With one of the most beautiful soundtracks of all time, Secret of Mana is a timeless classic that I grew up with. I love this game, and I always come back to it every half year or so. The funny sprite especially has a place in my heart. The only thing I'd call even remotely annoying about this game is your teammates getting stuck behind objects sometimes, making you backtrack a second or so to retrieve them.
Super Mario Kart (Nintendo EAD)
Release Date: 1992-09-01
Platform: Super Nintendo
Genre: Racing
An absolute classic, Super Mario Kart is one of the fathers of the majority of cooperative racing games to come after it. Incredibly fun to play with your friends, the game established an important, powerup-centered precedent for future Mario Kart games to follow.
F-Zero (Nintendo EAD)
Release Date: 1991-08-23
Platform: Super Nintendo
Genre: Racing
One of the first games to use Mode 7, F-Zero is a timeless and fast single-player racing game. Shortly after its release, the more powerup-centered Super Mario Kart (by the same creator) showed up and began dominating the market.
Anime/TV Show Reviews
Ordered by date watched, newest to oldest.
Hagure Yuusha no Estetica
Other Titles: Aesthetica of a Rogue Hero (English)
Genre: Action, comedy, fantasy, romance
Number of Episodes: 12
Watched: Sub
Not too much to say about this anime. The expressions are pretty well-drawn, but this anime is your fairly standard fantasy magic show.
Pros
- Pretty nice visuals.
- Kazuha and Chikage are pretty cool. A genius yet quiet kid and an entertaining, lesbian girl is not a character team I was expecting to see.
Neutral
- The green-haired Haruka's voice actress, Marina Inoue, is good at playing her role of snappy side character.
- Lots of fan service.
Cons
- A lot of stuff isn't explained and it feels like a total cop out. For instance, where or whom did Akatsuki learn his Chi powers from? He's had them from the start of the anime, but their origin is never touched upon. And why did we learn in the first episode that the demon king, the man Akatsuki just killed, tells his daughter to stay with Akatsuki, his murderer, when he dies? That doesn't make sense at all. Akatsuki also never got to fight whom he wanted to during all twelve episodes.
- I don't feel like I connected with any of the characters, really. This is both due to the anime only having 12 episodes, but also because the show seemed slightly more interested in showing bare breasts than making me care about the characters. Granted, there's still a decent plot, but the fanservice is a bit too loud.
- The sound used for magic was always the same, and always irritating. It was even jarring when it was triggered in some quiet settings.
- Very typical school setting, with the class and vice presidents and the like. Fairly trite and overdone.
Rating: 6
Code Geass
Other Titles: Kodo Giasu (Japanese)
Genre: Action, drama, mecha
Number of Episodes: 25
Watched: Sub
Wow. This anime blows me away with how wonderful the character development and interactions are, and then takes a turn for the even-more-intensely-emotional. Power, friendship, love, loyalty, abandonment, sacrifice, justice, right and wrong. What are all of these things, and what do they mean to you? These questions are explored constantly in Code Geass. Episode 22 especially makes my jaw just drop, and after that is equally climactic, though none of the earlier episodes lack excitement, either. Quite the powerhouse of entwined fates and twists, it is, and I am looking forward to watching the next season. The art, character design, and graphics are also absolutely incredible and to my liking with the anime having many varied looks for characters instead of simply employing hairstyle swaps. Similar to Evangelion in how powerful and emotional the last couple of episodes are as well as how they touch upon the nature of the entire human experience. Bravo, Code Geass.
Rating: 8
Love Hina
Other Titles: N/A
Genre: Comedy, harem, romance
Number of Episodes: 24
Watched: Sub
This anime is predictably very generic, but it was one of the most popular of its genre during its time. Thus, even though it has fairly forgettable characters, they're made slightly more memorable simply because Love Hina helped pave how Japanese comedy animes are today. I love some of the little things that were added, such as Naru Narusegawa's antenna-hair and how Seta keeps getting into life-threatening car crashes, but the gimmicky nature of this genre of anime still irritates me. Keitaro Urashima himself, while he has a little bit more depth than the main character from Tokimeki Memorial: Only Love, still doesn't give off a very developed air; his character seems lacking in many departments, as do most of the others. It's always hard to have developed characters in harem-type animes, however, because there are simply too many things to find out about each one in such a short amount of time. The ending is very weak, which takes its toll on the rating. Also, as an aside, Naru Narusegawa has a similar voice to Hitomi from the fighting game Dead or Alive, which was entertaining.
So, while this anime is fun-loving and cute, it doesn't strike a chord in my heart or anything, and comes to a solid 6/10.
Rating: 6
Spice and Wolf II
Other Titles: Ookami to Koushinryou II (Japanese)
Genre: Adventure, comedy, romance
Number of Episodes: 12
Watched: Sub
Not quite as good as Spice and Wolf but more centered on economics, Spice and Wolf II is a lovely addition to the original, mostly in that it fleshes out the romance aspect a bit more (though SaW2 ends kind of abruptly). Everything in this anime is about supply and demand and character interactions while chasing Kraft Lawrence's dream of owning his own shop. The deeper, emotional conversations of this anime are particular of note, and the futility of money is discussed despite money being one of the core subjects through each episode. A nice blend of adventure, comedy, and romance, Spice and Wolf and Spice and Wolf II are, and both Kraft Lawrence and Horo are memorable characters (especially Horo!). Recommended for anyone who likes adventure shows or economics!
Rating: 7
Spice and Wolf
Other Titles: Ookami to Koushinryou (Japanese)
Genre: Adventure, comedy, romance
Number of Episodes: 13
Watched: Sub
Spice and Wolf is one of the most unique animes I've seen due to it taking place in a medieval European setting, something I haven't seen before. Horo, the wolf girl, is very entertaining throughout the series, and I find her companion Kraft Lawrence to be likeable as well; the two bounce very well off of one another. I'm normally not interested in any kind of show that deals too much with trading, but I was captivated by the character interactions, setting, and the simplistic atmosphere of this anime. Horo is definitely my favorite character, and I must say that both the subbed and the dubbed versions are nice, despite me mostly watching the subbed one. Glad I saw this, and I'd recommend it to anyone who likes foxy (or, in this case, wolfy), sassy girls and entertaining character relations.
Rating: 7
Cowboy Bebop
Other Titles: N/A
Genre: Action, comedy, space, western
Number of Episodes: 26
Watched: Dub
A beginning that got me interested rather early and an ending I didn't entirely expect. Not bad. A quick rundown of some of my favorite episodes of the series: episode 17 (Mushroom Samba), where Ed pursues mushrooms, is amazing. Episode 18 (Speak Like a Child) is very emotional for me as it shows the earth in the future and Faye Valentine as a 10-year-old. Episode 19 (Wild Horses)'s reference to the Columbia Space Shuttle was funny; tons of American pop culture references in this anime! Episode 20 (Pierrot le Fou) is just...a trip. Rather creepy. Best quote from episode 21 (Boogie Woogie Feng Shui) is "Open foot, insert mouth" from Jet, haha! Episode 22 (Cowboy Funk) pits Spike against an eerily similar adversary, and makes direct reference to the YMCA and Christians. I'm surprised any of this show ever aired on American television, what with the US's obsession with censoring. Episode 23 (Brain Scratch) has a pretty interesting idea behind it, that humans are now obsessed with television. Episode 24 (Hard Luck Woman) is very emotional. The whole series reminds me of the stream-of-consciousness movie Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas with Johnny Depp; disconnected, a parody of society, and full of random thoughts and imagery. It's quite unique, and none of the episodes really relate to each other, or even have to be watched in order. Ein's my favorite character, then Ed, then Spike. They're all a great bunch, though, especially when put together in the same ship. This genre still isn't my cup of tea, but I definitely recommend this anime to anyone who's a fan of western-ish shows, or to anyone who is rather carefree and enjoys this kind of thing.
Rating: 6
Trigun
Other Titles: N/A
Genre: Action, adventure, comedy, drama, romance, sci-fi, western
Number of Episodes: 26
Watched: Sub
I'll start off by saying that I don't like most things dealing with the western genre. Trigun takes places on a desert planet, a setting I wouldn't normally take kindly to, but it works surprisingly well for the many different genres this anime crosses into. Character interaction is the big boon here, with Vash the Stampede being one of the most original yet likeable characters I've seen in awhile. This anime, like most, has a lesson-to-the-story thing going on, but unlike many, it doesn't come off as corny or too happy-go-lucky. The emotions running through Vash's head at any time are fantastic to analyze, and the series even wraps up nicely. It took me going through about a third of the episodes until I became truly interested at about episode 10. Not bad at all, and I'll remember Vash for a long time!
Rating: 7
Neon Genesis Evangelion
Other Titles: N/A
Genre: Action, comedy, drama, mecha
Number of Episodes: 26
Watched: Sub
Wow. This anime is quite a trip. I'm not a big fan of the mecha part and the fighting, as it gets tedious, but the real core to this anime doesn't start until about episode 18, where it takes a complete turn. Controversial ideas surface, and the anime doesn't spell things out for you; you have to think for yourself on this one, and the last episode doesn't disappoint. I congratulate NGE for having one of the best last episodes I've ever seen in any anime, an episode that delves to the root of human suffering and brings us back out again. Too much time was spent on the Eva vs. Angel bit to give this too high of a rating, but episodes 18 - 26 are truly worth watching. Bravo. And for some reason, this anime is great to watch with subtitles to learn Japanese. Plenty of repetition of core sentences and different constructions to help you understand what they're saying.
Rating: 6
Tokimeki Memorial: Only Love
Other Titles: N/A
Genre: Comedy, romance
Number of Episodes: 25
Watched: Sub
The only character I like in this anime is the chick everyone is ga-ga over. Everyone else is terribly generic, and I predicted every next step. The "entire school is head over heels for one girl" and "girl who blushes for absolutely no reason" and "main character is attacked by absolutely everyone" tropes are really overdone, and I couldn't push myself past half of episode 7 of 25 before stopping. Won't remember any of the characters, but that's okay.
Rating: 4
Zettai Kareshi
Other Titles: Absolute Boyfriend (English)
Genre: Romantic comedy, exotic boyfriend, science fiction, tragedy
Number of Episodes: 11
Watched: Sub
The protagonist is a bit too bubbleheaded for my tastes, but this is a nonetheless very entertaining drama about choosing between a perfect robot boyfriend (who sometimes seems very human) and a real one.
Rating: 8
Movie Reviews
Ordered by date watched, newest to oldest.
Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl 
Date Watched: 2013-06-09
Genre: Action, adventure, fantasy
Year: 2003
I watched the first Pirates movie about a decade ago at a friend's birthday party, but I didn't pay too much attention to it because we were preoccupied with food and friends and the like. I decided to give it a second chance, and I'm glad I did: Johnny Depp is a very versatile actor, and pretty hilarious in eccentric Captain Jack Sparrow's role. I see how there could've been such a dichotomy over Johnny Depp vs. Orlando Bloom: there are a lot of good-looking actors (and actresses; looking at you, Keira Knightley) in this movie. I used to think the Black Pearl referred to a literally black pearl, but after I learned it was instead a ship, I became a lot more interested in watching the film. It's not too gory nor perverted for people to show it to their kids, but also not too childish or naive. Great balance, great use of humor, and it didn't feel dragged out, either. 8/10.
The Great Gatsby 
Date Watched: 2013-05-29
Genre: Drama, romance
Year: 2013
I'm one of those "ridiculous" people. You know, the ones who want to give a movie a standing ovation at the end even though the director isn't there. But then again, what's so ridiculous about that? A good movie's a good movie, and The Great Gatsby is definitely one of them. Not only was the movie incredibly true to the book through and through (a rare compliment for films based off of books, for sure), but the drama was so captivating and intense that the 2-and-a-half hour length didn't seem too long at all. No, quite to the contrary, actually: it felt like nothing was rushed, nothing at all, and yet nothing was dragged on for too long, either. I was initially wary of Tobey Maguire playing Nick Carraway, but he ended up blowing my expectations out of the water, as did the entire movie - including, of course, Leonardo DiCaprio, an actor I've always found effective and versatile in many different roles. The most important lines from the book were kept in their entirety, and this made me so happy as a literature nerd. It didn't seem forced, either; the lines were worked in eloquently, beautifully, and they fit their corresponding scene so very well.
Really, there's little I can say that irked me about this movie, barring one exception: the lines, especially Jordan Baker's (and especially her facial expressions), sometimes felt a little overexaggerated. That didn't bother me enough to knock down the rating by even one full point, though. I would almost say the movie was better than the book, which is something I don't recall having said about any film before. The incredible details, such as those surrounding Gatsby's very extravagant parties, fit the themes of the book so perfectly: needless consumerism and entirely unnecessary displays of wealth. Baz Luhrman really went all out on Gatsby's estate, and I absolutely love how relevant that is to his character. There were a few quotations taken directly from the book - one in particular when reflecting on Gatsby's past - that struck me to the core far more when they were shown accompanied with DiCaprio's brilliant performance onscreen, and I know they'll stick in my head for a long time. Gatsby is the epitome of something that is quite important in life, despite his flaws, and this movie absolutely brought all of that out. The only reason The Great Gatsby, now one of my favorite movies of all time, does not get a 10 is because the atmosphere of the book was never something I found as pleasant; it's rather eerie, but in a way that mars my enjoyment of the story just a tiny bit. The one lost point in the rating has nothing to do with the movie itself, but rather the book it is based on.
Fantastic, fantastic. I would definitely watch this again.
The Cabin in the Woods 
Date Watched: 2013-05-22
Genre: Horror, mystery, thriller
Year: 2011
The Cabin in the Woods is a parody of most horror films: a group of teenagers go traveling somewhere, get stuck, get taken down one by one, and usually each one conforms to some kind of high school stereotype like "the jock" or "the scholar". There are some interesting twists on the story, of course, being a parody, such as the kids must die to save humanity (as is sometimes seen in horror films)...but they're being watched. And bet on. And even when a little bit of sympathy starts to circle the ranks of those watching the teens die, it melts again at the mention of tequila. Good premise and good movie, but I don't like gory films in general; though I can watch them, I don't usually care to because I don't like sudden, loud noises. The Cabin in the Woods gets a very reluctant 7, only reluctant because of the gore content.
Napoleon Dynamite
Date Watched: 2013-05-21
Genre: Comedy
Year: 2004
This movie is very enjoyable for its originality. I've seen it before, but I was far more entertained this time than the last: this time around, I actually know more people like the ones in the movie, and it's fantastic. Napoleon, the listless teenager, and Pedro, the blank-staring Hispanic new kid, bounce off of each other nicely, and if you like awkward, deadpan, yet still really funny jokes and humor, you'll love this movie. It's likely aimed at middle schoolers and high schoolers, but that made it no less enjoyable for me! :P
Iron Man 3
Date Watched: 2013-05-14
Genre: Action, adventure, sci-fi
Year: 2013
I don't believe I've seen Iron Man 2, but I enjoyed Iron Man and figured I'd agree when my friend wanted to bring me along to see the third. First off, the whole plot bit about the Mandarin is hilariously played out. I love who they got to be the part. Everything involving Guy Pearce in this movie was also pretty well-thought-out. I don't normally see Gwyneth Paltrow in movies, but I liked her part, too, as well as seeing Rebecca Hall for the first time. The action gets pretty entertaining around the middle of the film and only gets better from there on out. Iron Man 3 is supposedly better than the second, and definitely recommended by me even though I'm not really into superhero movies (which is one of the only things bringing IM3's rating down).
Flåklypa Grand Prix 
Date Watched: 2013-05-11
Genre: Animation, children's, comedy
Year: 1975
This Norwegian classic film has a ton of charm. It was made way back in 1975 and has a very unique look to it, but I was surprised to find that the incredibly simple plot entertained me: an inventor's old assistant takes credit for one of his former boss's inventions and they face against each other in a Formula One Grand Prix. I watched the original Norwegian but with English subtitles, and it was fair practice in Norwegian. My favorite character is Solan the magpie, of course: he knows how to get things done! Ludvig is also cute. I can see why this is pretty popular among Norwegians; it seems like one of those movies almost everyone of its generation would have seen and liked. I wouldn't watch it again and it was of course very simple, but quite enjoyable.
Lost in Thailand
Date Watched: 2013-05-09
Genre: Adventure, comedy, drama
Year: 2012
I picked this movie almost as soon as I sat aboard my Lufthansa flight to Frankfurt on my way to Norway. I am usually in the mood for comedies on planes, so I decided to pick one of the only mildly entertaining storylines I could find. I wasn't expecting anything spectacular, and surely this movie was not spectacular, but I love Baobao (Baoqiang Wang) and his sprightly attitude on pretty much everything. The plot was actually somewhat original (two rival businessmen vy to get to their boss first in the interest of furthering their own projects, but due to one of the men bugging the other through hacking, they both get lost in Thailand). Silly movie, but absolutely great, heartfelt moments coming from Baobao.
Zoolander
Date Watched: 2013-05-04
Genre: Comedy
Year: 2001
Zoolander is one of the only movies I've seen twice, largely due to a friend giving me a choice between this and Kung Pow one night (I wasn't wholly in the mood for the latter at the time). Stiller puts on a pretty good, animated performance and is impressive as a complete dunce, though I'm not sure that's such a compliment! I like Stiller and I liked him in this role, and Owen Wilson and Will Ferrell were nice additions, too. Funny, but not knee-snappingly hilarious. 7/10.
Anchorman
Date Watched: 2013-04-24
Genre: Comedy
Year: 2004
I've watched bits and pieces of this movie when younger but I'm not entirely certain I've seen the whole thing through before. I can see why people find it funny, though it doesn't mesh with my humor too-too well. It's still funny enough; this is definitely one of Will Ferrell's best films...though, admittedly, that isn't saying much. I enjoyed it, especially Steve Carell's character. He loves lamp. :)
Life of Pi
Date Watched: 2013-04-07
Genre: Adventure, drama, fantasy
Year: 2012
This movie was wonderful and incredibly creative. I've never watched anything like it. An Indian boy who survives a tragedy involving his whole family at sea becomes friends on a lifeboat with the Bengal tiger from his family's old zoo. I definitely didn't expect that kind of plot from the title, but the guy's nickname is Pi. This movie is really terribly interesting, but it had one rather large drawback: it felt so very long to sit through. There was a lot of unnecessary time spent on the seafaring lives of the boy and the tiger...about 15 whole minutes extra on just that one part. Thus, because of its unwieldy length and despite its intricate, colorful, and elaborate scenes (and intriguing plot twist), I have to rate it as only a 6.
Evil Dead
Date Watched: 2013-04-04
Genre: Horror
Year: 2013
I'm not a fan of horror movies. I went to see this because my friend invited me and I hadn't seen a horror movie in awhile, so I wanted to try it on for size again. I didn't get scared, nor did I expect to too much; what gets me about horror films is sudden, loud noises, and I have a very good sense of hearing, one that does not take kindly to chronic dins, something horror movies tend to be quite fond of. Thankfully, Evil Dead only had a few seconds of film where I had to cover my ears. As far as being scary goes, I don't know. The people in the theater seemed to really enjoy it, and I liked David (Shiloh Fernandez), the male protagonist, but none of the scenes were really that frightening. I felt like each time something really frightening could have happened, the opportunity was relinquished by adding a few more unnecessary seconds of pounding ambience or something. So, my conclusion is that this movie is not scary, but if you like horror films for the creepiness factor, you may like it.
Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo
Date Watched: 2013-04-02
Genre: Comedy
Year: 2005
I've never seen the first Deuce Bigalow, so I'm not sure if it was horrible or something, but I have no idea why this movie received such terrible reviews. Admittedly, its humor is coarse, but what do you really expect from this film and its prequel? I'm not a big fan of Rob Schneider, but I think he plays Deuce, normal guy turned gigolo (again), pretty well. Perverted jokes all around, surprise surprise, but if you don't mind immature humor now and then you might like it. Eddie Griffin and Rob Schneider also bounce well off of each other, and I like Griffin's spunky personality and line delivery. The movie was enjoyable, far more so than its average rating of 4.4 on imdb would lead you to believe!
Warm Bodies
Date Watched: 2013-02-09
Genre: Comedy, horror, romance
Year: 2013
This is one of the most unique movies I've ever seen. Sure, it has zombies; I was even put off by that at first. At the insistence of my friend, we watched it anyway; it's about a zombie, R, who gradually regains human emotions and tendencies, and the humor throughout is of a flavor of its own. The genre "horror" is only even slightly applicable to this film because of the zombies; the actual movie is not scary at all. Kind of an unspecial ending, but the whole movie has an irresistible humor to it that more than evens it out, and even for that alone, I recommend it.
As for my favorite character... I absolutely love the zombie at the airport with the metal detector who looks completely clueless every time somebody walks by.
One for the Money
Date Watched: 2013-01-07
Genre: Action, comedy, crime
Year: 2012
One for the Money is about an unemployed young woman who resorts to the bail-bond business due to being broke; little does she know her ex-boyfriend is one of the first people she's assigned to. I really enjoyed Katherine Heigl's performance as the protagonist Stephanie Plum; this role suits her extremely well. I found her witty and it felt like she wasn't trying too hard or desperate in this role. The action scenes were never too exciting because Heigl's character had barely ever even shot a gun before, but I was sufficiently entertained the entire duration and didn't feel like it was a waste of time. Even the bits involving Stephanie's overbearing family were funny. 7/10.
Aeon Flux
Date Watched: 2013-01-07
Genre: Action, sci-fi
Year: 2005
This movie is too focused on visuals. Really. Whether it be the tons of scenes focusing on the different angles of Charlize Theron in her tight black outfit or the silly action scenes, too much attention was paid to the parts of the movie that added very little to my enjoyment of it. I used to like Charlize Theron as an actress due to loving The Italian Job, but I haven't seen many movies since then with her in them that I've liked. The story behind the movie is actually fairly interesting, but the film is bad at explaining what's going on until the very end. I wish I'd had more time at the beginning to appreciate the story instead of being thrown into an immediate attempted government takedown. This wasn't terrible, but I definitely wouldn't give it another watch.
Painted Skin: The Resurrection
Date Watched: 2013-01-02
Genre: Fantasy, romance
Year: 2012
This is the second of two movies I watched on my international flight back to Florida. I've never seen the first one, but this seemed like yet another movie that would be worth watching on the plane. First off, Mini Yang was adorable as the bird; her voice is so high-pitched and fitting for her role. Her mouth also makes an appropriate pout face, which she does a lot in the movie. The movie itself is about a fox spirit who desires to become human after escaping an icy prison. She must sustain her warmth by tearing out the hearts of human men, but she wishes to find a man who will give her his heart willingly. There's a surprising amount of drama in this film and I quite liked that. Wei Zhao was also gorgeous as the princess, fitting because she's so beautiful outside of movie roles as well. This is a decent tale of romance, though I preferred the interaction between the fox spirit and the princess more than any of the romance scenes.
Tenchi: The Samurai Astronomer
Date Watched: 2013-01-02
Genre: Drama
Year: 2012
I watched this movie on my international flight from Frankfurt to Orlando (returning from Norway). I thought it would be just an okay movie to sit and watch while waiting 10 or so hours, but I actually really liked it. For one, the female actress (Aoi Miyazaki) was cute in her role, and the whole movie was really heartfelt. Junichi Okada played Santetsu Yasui, the puzzle-loving astronomer who desired to change the official calendar Japan used in the 17th century. His playful, upbeat personality was a joy to see in a protagonist, and I wasn't impatiently waiting for this film to end at all. It was much better than I thought it'd be, so 7/10.
The Intouchables
Date Watched: 2012-12-27
Genre: Comedy, drama
Year: 2011
This movie is endearing. A black man from the projects is enlisted as the caretaker for a rich French aristocrat who became disabled after a paragliding accident. François Cluzet (who looks a lot like Dustin Hoffman) plays Philippe the quadriplegic with Omar Sy as the caretaker; these two actors have decent chemistry on-film and Omar Sy is humorous enough as Driss to carry the show most of the time. Quick comment on the setting: Philippe's house is absolutely gorgeous, especially the room in which Driss stays. The baiting and quabbling interaction between Driss and Magalie is genuinely funny and I like the inclusion of real African roots into Driss's background. Cluzet is a bit lackluster as Philippe, I feel, but I know that some of that is intentional given his role as a once-paragliding rich quadriplegic. Slightly heartwrenching but nothing stellar in that department; as such, I give this movie a 7/10.
Love Is All You Need
Date Watched: 2012-12-27
Genre: Comedy, romance
Year: 2012
I really like this movie. First, though, I have to say that both the title in Danish (which translates to "The Bald Hairdresser") and the Norwegian title (which translates to "Summer Wedding in Italy") are far more descriptive, memorable, and fitting for this movie than the English. The English sounds like one of those generic romcom films, and I don't think of this movie that way. For one, it weaves a beautiful masterpiece of Danish and English all throughout, complete with Pierce Brosnan (my favorite Bond) and a lovely Danish actress. I watched this in a Norwegian theater with Norwegian subtitles, and thus the only English present for me to listen to was when they actually spoke it in the film. I understood a good amount of the Danish and Norwegian, but even without the full context of the movie, it was a unique story about a woman with cancer who goes to see her daughter's wedding in Italy. The movie is much more interesting than it sounds, especially if you love languages as much as I do. Very nice, 8/10.
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
Date Watched: 2012-12-14
Genre: Adventure, fantasy
Year: 2012
Compared to the three LotR movies, the Hobbit is very low-key and lighthearted. Ample danger and perils still abound, but this time the focus is Bilbo Baggins and his adventures around the time he first found the One Ring. Just like the other movies, this one is very long, and I found myself being a little anxious for it to be over. It wasn't terrible, but most of my favorite characters aren't in it. It's an interesting take on the dwarves in Middle Earth, especially the beginning scene at Bilbo's house. Mostly entertaining, but couldn't capture my attention the entire time. Also, it's always eagles!
The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King
Date Watched: 2012-12-13
Genre: Action, adventure, fantasy
Year: 2003
This movie is all about fighting and heroism, deception and betrayal. It's a good addition to the series, though I wouldn't say it's as good as the previous two. The developments with Gollum are interesting and climactic, and Sam's role as Frodo's best friend really shines through. Plenty of action and loss of hope, with special focus on the characters' interaction with one another during the battles. If you really want to get to know one of the characters, this is probably the best of the series to get to do that. I enjoyed it, but not as much as the former two.
The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
Date Watched: 2012-12-11
Genre: Action, adventure, fantasy
Year: 2002
Just like the first, LotR: The Two Towers impresses me. The amount of work going into each of these movies is extremely apparent, and the hordes of orcs and actors in real chain mail in this one made me look up how much it took to make ($94 million for those who are curious, though it grossed over $926 million worldwide). Stunning effects and emotions for its time and great character development are also present; I'd be very hard-pressed to name a movie nowadays that had this much work put into it. One hundred percent recommended, especially for the scenes with the trees, Gollum talking to himself, and the massive fight with thousands of orcs.
American Pie
Date Watched: 2012-12-03
Genre: Comedy, romance
Year: 1999
Like all the other teens-simply-wanting-to-get-laid movies, the story here is bland and there's nothing hugely special about this movie. However, since American Pie was one of the first films to use such a plot, it gets some brownie points despite me having watched it 13 years after the fact. I like how there's at least a tiny semblance of a meaning for watching this movie, though, unlike with the others that copy it. Alyson Hannigan was hilarious as Michelle, the airheaded band geek. The acting was decent for being a teen romance-comedy, and the characters worked well together. Not bad.
Killing Them Softly
Date Watched: 2012-11-27
Genre: Crime, drama, thriller
Year: 2012
First off, this movie has a rather large focus on death and politics and the downfall of society, so if you're not into that kind of drab setting, watching it isn't advised. Brad Pitt plays Jackie Cogan, an enforcer hired to restore order after a few dumb guys rob a Mob protected card game, causing the local criminal economy to collapse. Pitt's performance is pretty good, as is that of Richard Jenkins, and they both fit the role of comic relief pretty well. When someone dies, this movie spends an extra few minutes showing extremely slow-motion details of the shooting, which is fascinating and extremely morbid. The whole movie is a parody of American society and politics, as political stations are always on every time anyone is in a car or bar. Obama, still a senator in this movie, speaks loudly about standing together as one and about the power of America during some of the more violent or sinister parts; the same goes for George W. Bush. Not one of my favorites, but definitely not bad.
The Dark Knight Rises
Date Watched: 2012-11-17
Genre: Action, crime, drama
Year: 2012
I loved the Dark Knight. Even though I'm not much into Batman at all, I thought it was the perfect mixture of action and dark comedy and drama and considered it to be one of my favorite movies back when I saw it in theaters. However, the Dark Knight Rises didn't live up to its predecessor in my eyes. Clearly, it's a brilliant movie, but my friend and I literally had to stop the movie and watch it on two separate days in order to finish it because it just didn't capture our full interest during its 2-hour-and-45-minute duration. Anne Hathaway (who you may have heard of from various princess movies) plays Selina, and while her acting is mostly brilliant as both the cutesy, nervous act in the beginning and the go-getter thief soon afterward, she had a tendency to drawl irritatingly when her character was annoyed, and seemed like she had no idea how else to act annoyed, which was a mite distracting in such moments.
The action was fairly good and the film was a bit funny, but one definite positive I will give this movie is that the twist in the end is very intriguing, something I didn't expect at all. The drama also seemed pretty well-thought-out.
Though it was only 13 minutes longer, the Dark Knight Rises just seemed to drag on and on compared to the Dark Knight, and thus it does not garner the previous movie's rating of 9.
The Boondock Saints
Date Watched: 2012-11-07
Genre: Action, crime, thriller
Year: 1999
This is a pretty unique film. Two fraternal twins (played by Sean Patrick Flanery and Norman Reedus) in Boston rid the city of evildoers while being tracked down by an FBI agent (Willem Dafoe). The premise may not be the most interesting, but the way the two brothers defend each other is, what with their extreme toilet-lifting and gun shenanigans. Rocco (played by David Della Rocco, funnily enough) is also a pretty cool and whacked out character, and the FBI agent's homosexuality adds an unnecessary but well-played touch. I remember Norman Reedus from Dark Harbor, another very odd yet enjoyable movie, but I didn't recognize too many of the other actors. Still a pretty good watch, especially if you like swearing and Irish humor.
Skyfall
Date Watched: 2012-10-27
Genre: Action, adventure, crime
Year: 2012
I'm not a big fan of Daniel Craig and I figured that would take away from this movie as it has from past Bond movies, but it didn't this time. That was a good start. The action is present but not overdone and the tension is high, just like I like it in a Bond movie. Javier Bardem is swimmingly excellent as Silva, the flirty villain who has been wronged in M's past and comes back to haunt her. Not much more to say about this movie besides that it's a welcome change from Daniel Craig's past films. It contains a nice introduction to Moneypenny, too. This will also be remembered as M's last movie. :(
American History X
Date Watched: 2012-10-24
Genre: Crime, drama
Year: 1998
Now this is a good movie. Neo-nazi skinhead Edward Norton doesn't want his younger brother going down the same path he did and tries to prevent him from being a racist pig. Very dramatic and heartfelt, with a good cast to boot (Edward Furlong is brilliant as the confused rebel of a little brother, Danny Vinyard). I was kept interested the entire time, all the way to the well-done and climactic ending. Every scene just felt very thorough and polished, especially at the end. Definitely recommended.
Pride and Glory
Date Watched: 2012-10-23
Genre: Crime, drama, thriller
Year: 2008
Bah. This movie had potential, especially with the presence of Edward Norton, but things happened so quickly in the action scenes that it was hard to tell what actually went on. I do like how police honor is questioned and such, and I feel like the setup wasn't that bad, but this movie just feels incomplete. First movie I've seen Jon Voight in in awhile, though.
Shutter Island
Date Watched: 2012-10-20
Genre: Mystery, thriller
Year: 2010
Martin Scorsese's movies are always thrilling in their twists and turns, and Shutter Island is no exception. Leonardo DiCaprio plays Teddy Daniels, a U.S. Marshal sent to investigate the disappearance of a murderess on an island. I liked the atmosphere of this movie, as it was very creepy and dark, and dreamlike in a few ways. The intentional discontinuity in some scenes was interesting, and it all seemed to be very well put together. Extremely interesting ending, with the last line being memorable and thought-provoking. Strong performance for DiCaprio.
Looper
Date Watched: 2012-10-16
Genre: Action, sci-fi, thriller
Year: 2012
This was fantastic. I watched it in a Norwegian cinema and was well impressed with it, given that I wasn't expecting much walking in. Bruce Willis has always been one of my favorite actors, though I'm not entirely sure why; it's likely his part in the Fifth Element that got me to like him. Joseph Gordon-Levitt was pretty good too, and he and Willis made a nice team of protagonists. I quite like everything about Cid and the farm scenes. The ending is also just spectacular, and made me comprehend again why I love stories involving time travel. Very well done, and I might even consider watching it again.
The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
Date Watched: 2012-10-15
Genre: Action, adventure, fantasy
Year: 2001
This movie is incredibly well done. The scenery and atmosphere is incredible all throughout, the characters are memorable, and the dialogue surprisingly isn't half bad. The story is pretty enticing too, and Gandalf is the man. Nothing felt rushed or haphazard, and I was really sucked into the film while watching. It's quite understandable that a lot of movies, games, and more took their inspiration from LotR. It's a rather long movie, but I didn't mind as I enjoyed it so much, and it makes me want to play D&D-related games with dwarves and rangers and wizards.
Pan's Labyrinth
Date Watched: 2012-10-14
Genre: Drama, fantasy, war
Year: 2006
Pan's Labyrinth is based on a quite original premise. The stepdaughter of a sadistic army officer in 1944 fascist Spain escapes into a strange yet fascinating world of her own as the trials and tribulations of the real world she has come to know get worse and worse. The tasks she must complete in order to further herself in her fantasy world don't make a lot of sense, but since it's fantasy, I can give it a pass here. The acting is fairly good and the movie is entirely in Spanish. The faun, specifically, speaks very slowly and is easy to learn some Spanish from. Overall, the main feelings throughout the film are melancholy and wonderment, and it was nice to watch before bed one night. It's not one of my favorites, however.
Chronicle
Date Watched: 2012-10-13
Genre: Drama, sci-fi, thriller
Year: 2012
Another generic movie. Three teenagers get the power of telekinesis randomly through some gemstone thing underground and start using the power to gradually wreak more and more havoc upon everythingness. The main character has something very predictably change in his countenance. Nothing special about this movie; it was okay.
Project X
Date Watched: 2012-10-11
Genre: Comedy
Year: 2012
This movie is very generic, just about a group of young teenagers wanting to get laid and having a huge party with thousands of people attending. There's really not much to say about this, it's just really overdone. At the end, the father's slightly amused reaction to the party is pretty memorable, but that's about it.
Ted
Date Watched: 2012-10-09
Genre: Comedy, fantasy
Year: 2012
Seth MacFarlane is known for his work on the very satirical and pop-culture-lambasting Family Guy, and now he brings us an unrelated movie about a boy who makes a wish that his teddy bear would come to life. Later on, Ted the teddy bear is having a negative influence on the older John Bennett's 4-year relationship with his girlfriend Lori (Mila Kunis). Firstly, the inclusion of Mark Wahlberg as the protagonist John Bennett is already a good move, but I also surprisingly liked Mila Kunis in this. And it was funny to hear the point-blank references to Family Guy and hearing MacFarlane go through his usual repertoire of voices and impressions. The humor can be anywhere from asinine and perverted to kind of thoughtful, so I greatly enjoyed this. This is also the first movie I ever saw in a Norwegian cinema, with Norwegian subtitles.
The Butterfly Effect
Date Watched: 2012-10-07
Genre: Drama, sci-fi, thriller
Year: 2004
Add this one to the list of best movies I've ever seen. This movie also holds a special memory for me as it primed me for feeling all of my emotions thoroughly and confessing something special to someone special. Ashton Kutcher, for the first time that I've ever witnessed him doing so, plays a serious role as Evan, a young man who blacks out when traumatizing events happen, but begins to have fewer blackouts as he gets older. One day, he learns how to remember what happened via reading daily journals he has kept since he was 7, and through them, can supernaturally change the course of his life. A big theme explored in this movie is time and the wish to change the past. Once you edit one thing you thought wouldn't touch the other events of your life, everything changes. I especially like the events centered on Kayleigh (Amy Smart), as they tend to cut to the core of Evan (Kutcher) the most. Fantastic movie; I'd love to watch more of the same genre.
The Descendants
Date Watched: 2012-10-03
Genre: Comedy, drama
Year: 2011
For some reason, I really liked George Clooney in this. The role isn't too serious, nor is it too funny, but he works it well, playing a land baron who wants to find out more about the man with whom his dying wife was cheating on him, while simultaneously trying to get closer to his two daughters after having been a clueless father for so many years. The part I consider rather special about this movie is the way the eldest daughter Alexandra and Matt (Clooney) work together to track the man down. I'd bet that this movie would be especially touching to anyone who has ever lost someone who had to be taken off life support. It deals with the anger, regret, and acceptance of death, as well as the forgiveness of the dying person's actions in life. A good movie that I watched on the flight from Orlando to Toronto before heading over to Norway.
The Avengers
Date Watched: 2012-09-29
Genre: Action, sci-fi
Year: 2012
I don't normally watch superhero movies unless it's with someone else who wanted to see them, and The Avengers is no exception, put on by my brother during today's family gathering. My favorite of the heroes is Iron Man, of course, followed by the Hulk, but Thor is pretty cool too. Nice action scenes and CGI, and, as is usual with superhero movies, the plot is weak, but the character interactions are pretty swell. I really don't like Chris Evans (Captain America) as an actor, and this movie is unbearable with its lines that try to appease American audiences (superior reference to Hitler, as well as some other minor things). Scarlett Johansson is as attractive as ever. Really not much more to say about it: though the dialogue was weak, I was entertained, and was able to pay attention through the eight-or-however-many people who regularly blocked the television, so I'd say that makes it deserve a good rating.
American Beauty
Date Watched: 2012-09-26
Genre: Drama
Year: 1999
Wow. The two movies I've watched in the past week (Minority Report and this) have been some of the best movies I've ever seen. Wes Bentley is quite attractive in this movie, and Kevin Spacey does a good job as the protagonist, Lester Burnham. Mena Suvari (whom I've been told I look like) has very flat line delivery, but I enjoyed seeing her for the first time after hearing about her. American Beauty covers a lot of themes at once: betrayal, comfort, denial, family, homophobia, loneliness, materialism, secrecy, self esteem, self identity, sex, wealth, and still others. There's a pretty good buildup and then events just spill over at about the 80-minute mark, quickly boosting it to one of the best films I've seen. The quote from the last minute of this movie was especially influential, and it literally jumpstarted me into being as calm and appreciative as I used to be before a moving setback occurred a while ago and threw me off balance for a period. I am glad I watched this, and I absolutely recommend it.
Minority Report
Date Watched: 2012-09-18
Genre: Action, mystery, sci-fi
Year: 2002
Wow. Bravo. This is one of the best movies I've ever seen, definitely in the top ten with a rating of 9/10 from me. I'm not a huge fan of Tom Cruise, but his performance was awesome, and the detail in this film is top-notch. It seemed a bit silly in the beginning with all the too-high-tech gadgets and touch screens, but it really fit the setting after I gave it a chance. I like the character Agatha, and the story is a clever whodunit that I wouldn't be entirely opposed to watching again sometime, something I rarely say about any movie. The movie was very enjoyable and filled with just the right amount of action, drama, and mystery. Definitely recommended for anyone who loves action, crime, mystery, or sci-fi films.
Fargo
Date Watched: 2012-09-16
Genre: Crime, drama
Year: 1996
This movie is funny for a few reasons. First, the people speak like this. Second, my extended family sounds like that. It brings back memories to hear people use such weird expressions and unnecessary wording, since I remember past family gatherings where my aunts and cousins would sound just the same as the people in this movie. The film itself is pretty good, with William H. Macy playing a very convincing weak, sheepish, greedy man, and seeing the funny Steve Buscemi was nice. There's definitely a bit of sick drama toward the end, but that's part of what makes it enjoyable. Fargo is nice and simple with some good comedic moments, and the way they talk alone kept me entertained.
The Sixth Sense
Date Watched: 2012-09-14
Genre: Drama, mystery, thriller
Year: 1999
I am in tears right now. I don't cry during most movies, but this one got me in the last ten minutes. A boy who can see and communicate with spirits who don't know they're dead gets help from a child psychologist. Not only was it a brilliant trip down memory lane, but it played out heavy issues, allocating a good amount of time to them; nothing felt rushed or out of place. There's nothing that's necessarily incredibly creative about the plot, yet this is one of the most original movies I've ever seen. It has a way of being scary without needing to resort to blood or violence like a lot of modern films, which takes considerable talent. I love Bruce Willis, and I love the execution. Haley Joel Osment was also spectacular as the little boy, Cole. I'm glad I finally took the time to watch this gem. And for the record, my favorite scene is at the mourning for the random young girl.
Schindler's List
Date Watched: 2012-09-05
Genre: Drama, war
Year: 1993
A very evocative movie and one that I liked much better than other war movies. The usage of color was quite symbolic and well thought out, and each scene was emotional in its own way. Both Liam Neeson and Ralph Fiennes were impressive in their roles, especially Neeson; I recognized him almost immediately and had no idea he was even in this movie before. Shows how much I keep up-to-date with Hollywood. If not for the nudity, I'd expect to see this shown in American classrooms with the other WWII films. Although this is a pretty good movie compared to the others of its same genre, I still am not a fan of the genre, and thus my bias makes the rating suffer automatically.
The Hunger Games
Date Watched: 2012-09-04
Genre: Action, adventure, romance, sci-fi
Year: 2012
Ahhhh, Hollywood, why! The book was pretty awesome, but there were a few things I didn't like about it. One is that 1/3 of the book was spent on the time before the actual hunger games part. In the movie, it's a whopping half of the entire film that we have to wait before anything of note happens. They played up the romance aspect as much as they could, though, which I liked. The buildup was spectacular in the book, and while it's understandable that much had to be cut out of the movie, the fact that they changed some of Katniss's lines to make her have more of a heart than she does in the book drives me mad. In the rooftop scene, she doesn't respond positively to Peeta; instead, she says she has no idea what he's talking about. That changes everything in terms of Katniss's personality. But, with a collective sigh at that, the movie was at least tolerable, though Gale should've been darker-skinned and the female protagonist not so striking. Weak delivery of some lines by Katniss and Rue, too, but Jennifer Lawrence was an extremely fitting choice to play Katniss. The most heated part of the movie was good, but the climax directly afterward was mediocre. But hey, nice to see you again, Donald Sutherland! His voice at the end reminds me of the malevolent drawl Alan Rickman speaks in when he plays Severus Snape.
Rain Man
Date Watched: 2012-09-02
Genre: Drama
Year: 1988
Great movie, another one that I've heard of all my life but never watched until now. Dustin Hoffman's acting as Raymond was absolutely brilliant; he was truly convincing in his role as a savant. I'm no huge fan of Tom Cruise, especially nowadays, but I'm glad he was in this movie; I got a chance to see him in his earlier days. The bit of affection that was shown between the two brothers was very moving, and it made up for the ending, which I wasn't a huge fan of. I was in no rush to finish this film, which is a lot more than I can say for others!
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
Date Watched: 2012-09-02
Genre: Drama
Year: 1975
I've heard about this movie since my childhood but had never watched it nor read the book. It's brilliant. Lots of tension, lots of drama, and humor both ludicrous and black. I quite like the Indian guy, "Chief" Bromden, and Jack Nicholson himself was pretty good. A twisted ending and a social commentary are two of the best things about this movie, and I'm glad I finally saw it.
Ocean's Thirteen
Date Watched: 2012-09-01
Genre: Crime, thriller
Year: 2007
Fantastic. I definitely enjoyed Ocean's Thirteen more than Ocean's Twelve. These guys have an awesome sense of humor. The scenes in Mexico were funny as heck, and the atmosphere and feel of the scenes were nice, too. Brilliant job on the part of the actors, just as in the previous ones. This was the best of the three Oceans movies and had the longest heist set-up and execution time of them all. The best line? "Come on man, help me out...my kid just bit the lunch lady again."
Ocean's Twelve
Date Watched: 2012-09-01
Genre: Crime, thriller
Year: 2004
Almost as soon as Ocean's Twelve begins, we're transported to Amsterdam, a city I call home; that was a pretty nice start!
Very creative, this whole film was. Instead of running another American heist, the boys move to Europe to capture their next target. The change of scenery was nice in some ways, and what would a heist movie be without some twists? I enjoyed the beginning and ending, but not so much the middle. Also, cameos of celebrities denying their own cameo are hilarious, and I've never seen any other movie try to do what Ocean's Twelve did in this regard. Not as good as the first one in my opinion, but still a stellar watch. And nice seeing you there, Cherry Jones and Bruce Willis!
Ocean's Eleven
Date Watched: 2012-09-01
Genre: Crime, thriller
Year: 2001
This is a movie I've heard others mention countless times but that I had never actually taken the time to watch. Wasn't a waste of my time at all; brilliant cast and wonderful execution. My former favorite film of this type was the Italian Job, and Ocean's Eleven is quite neck-and-neck with it. I actually felt a connection with the characters (particularly Matt Damon's) and a sinking in my stomach when events began to unfold, which is the mark of a great film. I'll be watching Ocean's Twelve and Thirteen in short order, and I recommend Eleven to anyone who's a fan of George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, or Julia Roberts, or just feels interested in playing voyeur to a diabolical scheme of taking down haughty rich people.
Patrik, Age 1.5
Date Watched: 2012-08-25
Genre: Comedy, drama, romance
Year: 2008
I really liked this movie. It's sweet and doesn't feel the need to censor itself simply because some audiences won't like the homosexual couple. It dedlves into how it feels to be an outcast, but not so much that it becomes too sappy. With a good balance of light comedy and drama, Patrik, Age 1.5 definitely entertained me, and I was in no rush for it to end.
Conan the Barbarian
Date Watched: 2012-08-20
Genre: Action, adventure, fantasy
Year: 1982
This movie was very well done for having been shot in 1982. Incredibly controversial with its inclusion of nudity, a black man, an Austrian man, and a good amount of gore, Conan the Barbarian jumpstarted Arnold Schwarzenegger's career, and I can see why; being cast as the protagonist fit his build and voice, and he's not a terrible actor, either. I liked the women cast in this film; they weren't weak, swooning types, which is a nice departure from the crud shown in other movies. I was interested in what would happen next as opposed to being eager for it to be over. This was nice.
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
Date Watched: 2012-08-07
Genre: Drama, horror, musical
Year: 2007
I normally don't like musicals, but Sweeney Todd is an exception. Grim, dramatic, and satirical. There were of course pretty unbelievable parts to the movie, but that's to be expected. I had no idea the cast of Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter, Alan Rickman, and Sacha Baron Cohen could sing! Not my normal style of movie, but Depp carried Sweeney Todd on his shoulders through his performance. Tons of gore, though.
Edward Scissorhands
Date Watched: 2012-08-07
Genre: Romance, fantasy
Year: 1990
This movie is deceptively simple. There's nothing it tried to do that would make it special, which makes it one of the best and least pretentious films I've ever seen. It wouldn't be so spectacular if Johnny Depp hadn't been the lead, but he was, and he did an incredible job at that. The exaggerated simplicity of the suburban homes, each a different color and with gossip meetings at the corner of the sidewalk, was a welcome parody of people who try too hard to be normal. Growing up in a suburban neighborhood myself made that tidbit even more enjoyable. A very soft romance, Edward Scissorhands is incredibly simple, yet worth my time for its undertones of not fitting in and love.
In Bruges
Date Watched: 2012-08-05
Genre: Black comedy-drama
Year: 2008
Darkly humorous and simplistic, In Bruges is a wonderful black comedy about a hitman whose last job went terribly wrong, a man who is told to go to Bruges, a city he views as no less than a shithole. Brilliant and thought-provoking without causing eye-rolling, I enjoyed watching this when in a slightly melancholy mood.
Prometheus
Date Watched: 2012-06-23
Genre: Horror, sci-fi
Year: 2012
Prometheus felt like a long movie when I was sitting in the Dutch theater; it was barely getting started with the main story when the halfway intermission point interrupted it. It doesn't seem to have much of a climax until about 3/4 of the way through. Mostly interesting characters, and a particularly memorable female lead (Noomi Rapace, not Charlize Theron, even though she was good, too). The robot, David, doing some of the malevolent things he did didn't make a whole lot of sense, being that he's a robot, but I'll let that slide. This movie was pretty good, despite avoiding answering the one question that was asked the entire film, but I can't say I didn't expect that. Perhaps it's never answered out of symbolism.
Iron Sky
Date Watched: 2012-06-09
Genre: Action, comedy, sci-fi
Year: 2012
"The Nazis set up a secret base on the moon in 1945 where they hide out and plan to return to power in 2018."
Funny premise, being both original and unoriginal simultaneously. Someone had to have thought of this before, but here's the movie that made money off of it! I quite like the main characters in this film, including the pretty German girl. The Albert Einstein lookalike is also a funny character. Touches briefly on deeper themes like how humans can never stop warring with each other over things that are relatively unimportant. The best part? The movie Downfall is parodied (aka the Hitler Reacts meme). Especially as a language lover, this movie was entertaining. Definitely recommended for comedic value.
Dark Shadows
Date Watched: 2012-06-07
Genre: Comedy, fantasy
Year: 2012
"An imprisoned vampire, Barnabas Collins, is set free and returns to his ancestral home, where his dysfunctional descendants are in need of his protection. "
Slow to start, but funny once it gets going, Dark Shadows is no blockbuster, but it's not bad, either. The obligatory sex scene wasn't like other obligatory sex scenes at all, but instead humorous and largely clothed. There are a couple of loose ends and things that don't make sense at the conclusion but I'd recommend this to anyone who likes Johnny Depp or vampires. Helena Bonham Carter of Harry Potter fame is in it, too. :)
Book Reviews
Ordered by date read, newest to oldest.
Mockingjay (Suzanne Collins)
Date Completed: 2012-09-28
Genre: Action, adventure, dystopian, sci-fi, young adult
Year: 2010
Aw man. Why? First of all, some of my favorite characters die. That is what it is, happens in other series too, of course. But the manner in which some of them go... I also don't like how the romance played out, and can't even truly consider the third book of the romance genre. A lot of parts of the plot during this book seem pretty half-assed, and as a writer myself, I wouldn't be satisfied with having left it the way it is, especially with so many loose ends untied. The last 2/3s of this book seem very humorless (all three books in the series are pretty tame with humor, but this one seems to have no life at all) and dejected, which is partly understandable for how serious the undertones of this series were from the beginning, but that knowledge doesn't help as I'm reading through a progressively worsening story and wading through one depressing chapter after another after the first 1/3 of the book. As for a numeric rating, I'd give this only a 6/10, whereas the previous two were 8/10. I just can't get behind how one of the three main characters starts in the book, and then how two of the three main characters were at the ending. Some things I will give the Hunger Games trilogy, though, is it has incredible symbolism at every turn, has fantastic, creative, and original writing, and is quite aptly suspenseful.
Catching Fire (Suzanne Collins)
Date Completed: 2012-09-20
Genre: Action, adventure, dystopian, romance, sci-fi, young adult
Year: 2009
Catching Fire is the sequel to the Hunger Games, and I enjoyed it just as much. I have to give Collins credit: three lines in this book made me stop reading and almost want to give applause, they were so unexpected, witty, or thought-provoking. Reading this reminded me of reading Brave New World; a society that is incredibly dystopian, and a sense of black humor to help you swallow it. Brilliant writing and quite an original middle-to-ending. I admit I quite like where the story is heading, and being the sap that I am, the romance bit pleases me, especially about four-fifths of the way through the book. I read all 275 pages of this in less than 30 hours, it was so good. I give this a solid 8/10. Not bad, and I'll certainly soon be reading Mockingjay, the last book in the series.
The Hunger Games (Suzanne Collins)
Date Completed: 2012-06-05
Genre: Action, adventure, dystopian, sci-fi, young adult
Year: 2008
Slow to start, but awesome once the action has begun (around page 50 out of about 250), this novel has become one of my new favorites. The Hunger Games is set in a future where the Capitol selects a boy and girl from the twelve districts to fight to the death on live television. Katniss Everdeen volunteers to take her younger sister's place for the latest match. It's odd because the novel combines the very low-tech society in which Katniss lives with the high-tech society of the Capitol, which led me to be confused as to what era this book took place in at first. I can't connect too deeply with Katniss since she is very dissimilar from me, but I enjoyed the story quite a bit and am excited to read the next two books and read the movie as well.
Restaurant Reviews
Looking for a particular restaurant? Hit Ctrl+F and type in its name to search the page.
Applebee's
Type: Grill & Bar
Expense: moderate
Noise: moderately high
Romance: moderately low
Variety: moderately high
Overall Opinion: decent
Popular, sportsy.
Burger King
Type: Fast Food
Expense: very low
Noise: low
Romance: very low
Variety: very low
Overall Opinion: bad
Very unhealthy.
Chili's
Type: Grill & Bar
Expense: moderate
Noise: moderately high
Romance: moderately low
Variety: moderately high
Overall Opinion: good
Popular, sportsy (less than Applebee's). Home of the best dessert ever.
Denny's
Type: Casual Dining, Family-style, Fast Food
Expense: low
Noise: moderately low
Romance: very low
Variety: moderately low
Overall Opinion: decent
Mainly a breakfast place; the official time for my friends to dine here aka Denny's-o-clock is from 2-4 AM. ;)
Domino's
Type: Pizzeria
Expense: low
Noise: low
Romance: very low
Variety: low
Overall Opinion: good
Honey Baked Ham
Type: Cafe
Expense: moderately high
Noise: low
Romance: low
Variety: low
Overall Opinion: good
Delicious.
IHOP
Type: Casual Dining, Family-style
Expense: low
Noise: moderately low
Romance: very low
Variety: moderately low
Overall Opinion: good
Great breakfast place.
Logan's Roadhouse
Type: Grill, Roadhouse
Expense: moderate
Noise: moderately high
Romance: moderately low
Variety: moderately high
Overall Opinion: good
Free airy bread with butter. Infinite free peanuts, can throw them on the floor.
McDonald's
Type: Fast Food
Expense: very low
Noise: low
Romance: very low
Variety: very low
Overall Opinion: bad
Very unhealthy.
Olive Garden
Type: Italian
Expense: moderately high
Noise: low
Romance: high
Variety: moderately low
Overall Opinion: great
Classy.
Perkins
Type: Bakery, Casual Dining, Family-style
Expense: low
Noise: moderately low
Romance: low
Variety: moderately low
Overall Opinion: good
Mainly a breakfast place.
Pizza Hut
Type: Pizzeria
Expense: low
Noise: low
Romance: very low
Variety: low
Overall Opinion: good
Romano's Macaroni Grill
Type: Italian Grill
Expense: moderate
Noise: low
Romance: high
Variety: moderately low
Overall Opinion: good
Regal, spacious.
Ruby Tuesday
Type: Grill & Bar
Expense: moderate
Noise: moderate
Romance: moderately low
Variety: moderately high
Overall Opinion: good
Popular, sportsy (less than Applebee's).
Sbarro
Type: Fast Food (Italian)
Expense: low
Noise: low
Romance: very low
Variety: low
Overall Opinion: good
Thick pizza.
Subway
Type: Fast Food (subs)
Expense: very low
Noise: low
Romance: very low
Variety: low
Overall Opinion: good
Clean, healthy.
Taco Bell
Type: Fast Food (Mexican)
Expense: very low
Noise: low
Romance: very low
Variety: very low
Overall Opinion: okay
Questionable service, very unhealthy.
