ShreddieMercury

This was really disappointing. I thought the script for the first half was very strong and it was a genuinely clever way to continue the story, but outside of that, it feels and look like a direct-to-SyFy channel movie in comparison to the originals. I appreciate the middle finger approach to making a sequel, but this is just a sad shadow. The VFX weren't necessarily bad, but they have the same digital weightless, sloppy feeling that most modern movies suffer from. The original also has phenomenal cinematography, and really striking camerawork. Just compare the first scene with Trinity and this movie's opening recreation, it's brutal. It has a different visual style, and that's fine, but I couldn't feel any energy behind anything happening in Resurrections. The original movie, and even the less well-received sequels, had a wild creative charge that is completely absent here.

Considering how homogeneous the majority of hollywood movies are these days, there is practically zero chance that I won't enjoy something that's taking huge swings like this. There is nothing that the Wachowski's have done that I haven't at the very least really appreciated if not outright loved, and The Matrix is probably a top five all time favorite of mine. It's also easily the most exciting theater experience I've ever had. That said, what the fuck is up with these twitter "reactions" for every movie? "OMG you guys I LAUGHED and I also CRIED so hard and I have a totally new perspective on existence now". The hyperbole is just hilarious, and it's particularly dialed up with anything Marvel related. I can't believe we're getting a new Matrix movie in two days, and we somehow also got four hours of MacGruber already. 2021 is redeemed at the last minute.

Is this a joke? I honestly can't tell.

The New Yorker published a pretty fun list as well. It's not in any order. The Best Video Games of 2021 | The New Yorker WWW.NEWYORKER.COM As the industry confronts its cultural failings, smaller, more independent games have stepped into the breach.

Happy Thanksgiving all!

I doubt sales will turn around dramatically enough to match or exceed Sony this generation, but it's pretty clear to me at this point that MS has the winning strategy for the immediate future, and that the Xbox ecosystem is easily the best among the competition. We're still a ways away from seeing the fruits of their acquisitions, but in the next couple of years, I'm guessing we'll start getting marquee first party games so frequently on Game Pass that it will become an even more absurdly fantastic value proposition than it already is. The legwork that they've been doing for several years is going to pay off handsomely, and will be tough to match. The much touted SSD stuff on both machines is minimally impactful at best, and since games are becoming more and more homogeneous, it's likely going to be about the quantity and quality of content rather than any specific "next-gen" feature. Add to the fact that you don't have to be spending $70 and it'll be a no-brainer to a lot of non-enthusiasts about which box to choose. The backwards compatibility stuff is also maybe my favorite thing that I've seen from Xbox. I know it's finished now, but they really went all out on this last batch of games, and the effort to preserve and improve incredible experiences from the past three generations is admirable and much appreciated. I was stunned to be able to put F.E.A.R. into my Xbox and play it at 4k/60fps with HDR. Playing Sonic Generations with the same enhancements turns it into the best Sonic game and something that could come out today. The list goes on.

It isn't quite what you're describing, but I miss the wild, bizarre, big creative swings of the Dreamcast library. The creative free reign that Sega gave its developers during that time was both what cemented that system as a classic, and part of what ensured its eventual commercial failure. It's my favorite video game console and I doubt anything can even begin to come close. Games have been largely homogeneous since the 360/PS3 generation, and we're seeing more and more of a split between micro-budget indies and the AAA, focus-grouped games that the big studios put out. It's hard to imagine anybody funding something like Seaman ever again, and games are worse for their lack of wild imagination and no-holds-barred creativity that we frequently saw in that era.

Overall I liked it, and the comical and bizarre tone feels much closer to David Gordon Green's work than Halloween 2018. I loved Jim Cummings as one of the police officers at the beginning, and if you haven't seen his other movies (Thunder Road and Wolf of Snow Hollow), definitely seek them out. He's extremely talented. I found this to be more interesting than anything in the franchise outside of Halloween III, mostly because it went a completely different direction than I expected. It wasn't amazing, but I was pleasantly surprised.

People are scrambling to play all those next gen games!

After a year-long delay, Dusk is finally hitting the Nintendo Switch this month. For those that haven't played it, it's probably the strongest of all of these retro inspired shooters, and is perfect for the season! DUSK for Nintendo Switch - Nintendo Game Details WWW.NINTENDO.COM Don't trust your eyes.

If you have Ico, you should also get Shadow of the Colossus. In terms of interesting games that I don't think ever left the platform, I would recommend the insane and very enjoyable Raw Danger, which is part of the Disaster Report series:

Welcome! I joined when this was splintered off of the old IGN forums and used to be called badcartridge.com. It's really the only gaming forum I've ever felt was worth my time. It's a small but thoughtful, interesting, and very fun community.

True crime stuff fucking sucks and I fully approve of this topic. Just do yourself a favor and watch Memories of Murder and Zodiac, which are artful, non-exploitative films that have more salient things to say about crime, violence, and law enforcement than thousands of hours of these shitty podcasts and shows could ever hope to.

Bumping this to talk about Hydro Thunder Hurricane. Not sure if everyone forgot about it necessarily, but I rediscovered it via Xbox backwards compatibility and it's really, really good. I remember buying it during the summer of arcade promotion in 2010, but don't think I ever got too far or played it too much. My knocks against it are the extremely generic and forgettable soundtrack, and the fact that the game doesn't really rev up until you unlock the expert boats and the later courses. I wouldn't fault somebody for thinking it's bland or forgettable early on, because the novice and intermediate boats don't give you a great sense of what the game really is. When you unlock the expert boats, and start doing the expert challenges (gauntlet and ring events in addition to racing) the game reveals itself as a phenomenal arcade racer with a great hook: the amazing water physics. The game has a dynamic water system and it's far and away the best that I've encountered in a game. The varying hulls of the boats react differently to the waves, giving each craft a distinct feel, and each race feels a bit different because of the procedural and dynamic water system. Drafting behind boats becomes essential as you ride their wake, and the races and events play out quite differently depending on how you navigate the water. If you have an Xbox and like arcade racing, give it a go. If you like Hydro Thunder or Wave Race, then it's an essential experience.

Quick, everyone post a lot of stuff to impress the new member with our furious activity.

Ohhhh this is rich! Schadenfreude commencing.

In order to evolve the L4D formula, they'd have to first at least get the basics right. The one big thing about L4D is the procedural zombie hordes and the AI "director", and so far B4B doesn't have a hook like that. Maybe it gets better with more playtime or within other campaigns, but the hordes I've encountered are minimal, bland, and slow, and the special zombies are generic and ever present in a way that saps any tension or sense of team strategy. On its own, it's fine. It's another generic co-op service game. But in comparison to L4D (a comparison which it's desperate to achieve) it's lacking in fundamental and baffling ways.

Played this for several hours and though I wouldn't call it straight up terrible, it's pretty close. It's Left 4 Dead, except much slower, with dumber infected/director AI, bizarrely boring levels, and seemingly every negative GAAS element you could think of jammed into every crevice of the game. And the shooting lacks anywhere near the same punch. What makes L4D such a transcendent game is its simplicity. No ADS, no unlocks or phony progression, no cosmetics, limited weapons and equipment. I still consider it one of the most fun and most replayable games of all time. B4B so far seems like a flat, inert, and joyless retread without any of the spark. It's a bummer.

Astral Chain is a top 5 Switch game if you haven't played that.

Awesome. I have the current Criterion blu-ray so I'm not sure I need to jump on this, but I'm all for continuing to preserve Lynch's astonishing body of work. I still maintain that Mulholland Drive is the most unnerved that I've ever been watching a movie. A friend of mine let me borrow his copy in high school, and watching alone in my basement one night, I was so drawn in and then startled that I had to turn it off. I eventually finished it, and I still think it's Lynch's crowning achievement.

Played through a big chunk of this last night, and it retains everything that made the game such a wondrous and unbelievable experience while focusing and improving several aspects of it at the same time. This is the only game I can ever remember playing that elicits intense feelings of awe, wonder, surprise, and fear. There is so much imagination here that it's hard for me to understand how such a small team could create something with this much insight and this many big ideas. It's phenomenal, and cements Outer Wilds as one of the all-time greats. It's a singular experience in games that I can't imagine will be topped for me for some time.

I love the Bond movies, and consider Casino Royale my favorite in the whole series. It's fun to reflect on 15 years of having Daniel Craig playing James Bond, because it's long enough to attach certain eras of my life and memories to the different movies. So it is touching in a way that No Time to Die is so focused on endings and goodbyes. That said, what I've seen in previews and what I've read just makes this seem aggressively uninteresting, and my feeling is that we'll be forever robbed of Danny Boyle (or any filmmaker really) doing something legitimately compelling with this character and particular story. Casino Royale set up expectations and possibilities for what this Bond could potentially deliver that the franchise custodians are simply too terrified to explore. This isn't only a goodbye to Craig though. I expect the franchise to be completely Marvel-fied moving forward, so I'll likely step off this train and hope that new fans find just as much enjoyment with the next era as I had with this one.

I also never had problems with the controller, but I also never played Mario Party. My N64 was basically a Perfect Dark party machine. If this is what's happening, I'll 100% be signing up for NSO.

Even with the effusive praise, you guys still actually undersold this. It's phenomenal. Every element of this game is designed to make sure you're having fun, and it's insanely fun. It paints a pretty depressing picture of the modern games landscape when something this genuinely enjoyable feels like a complete shock to the system. It's like a lost Dreamcast game with modern graphical touches. It runs really well, and there is a ton of content, so I'm not understanding the problem with the price. $40 is a steal for this.

Impressions? Arcade racing throwback means I'm hovering over the buy button.