I just played it solo with two controllers plugged in. Kinda annoying that the people behind the demo force you to do that. I mean, they must know that most people aren't going to have a buddy sitting right next to em conveniently. So all it does is force everyone to play it using two controllers. Really retarded, if you think about.
On normal, it seemed really easy. I was just killing all the enemies by myself. Never felt much of a need for a second player. Weapons loadout menu is pretty interesting, there are a fuckton of options available for customization.
Graphics looked really nice. Seems like it'll be a good purchase even without the co-op.
Monday, May 10, 2010
Avatar the MMO
If you think about it, it's pretty funny how the whole movie kinda played out like an MMO of sorts. First Jake has to grind until he can earn his mount, the banshee. Then later, he gets his epic mount, the... big red flying thing.
First Neytiri uses her regular mount, then later she gets to upgrade to an epic mount, the black jungle panther alien thingy.
Stephen Lang was sorta like a raid boss. Phase 1 has him up in his giant gunship lobbing missiles for major long range DPS. Then, once you get his health down enough, he goes into phase 2 and comes out in his AMP walker suit. Phase 3 starts when he loses his gauss cannon and starts meleeing you with his giant combat knife.
First Neytiri uses her regular mount, then later she gets to upgrade to an epic mount, the black jungle panther alien thingy.
Stephen Lang was sorta like a raid boss. Phase 1 has him up in his giant gunship lobbing missiles for major long range DPS. Then, once you get his health down enough, he goes into phase 2 and comes out in his AMP walker suit. Phase 3 starts when he loses his gauss cannon and starts meleeing you with his giant combat knife.
Avatar 3D the film review (spoilers)
James Cameron has succeeded where George Lucas failed.
That was the one phrase that went through my head on the drive back from the theater. What I mean is, the promise of the CGI technology that Lucas sought in the prequels and failed to achieve, Cameron has gone and fulfilled it. The visuals are a hair away from being photorealistic. It never felt terrible to look at. The 3D is the best I've ever seen and really added to the experience. Absolutely worthwhile for the extra 5 dollars on the ticket, I thought.
Story and dialogue... there's some issues. It's not quite up to par with the visual technology. I'm not gonna go and say it's my favorite Cameron film, Aliens is still there. But it's not so far from that level of quality. Certainly closer then Titanic ever was. As a pure cinematic experience, it delivers.
That was the general overview. Now for the in depth stuff:
Ya know, what's most impressive might just be how Cameron's subverted his entire legacy. What do I mean by that? Well, let's see... in Aliens, he made us root for the space marines as they desperately fought against getting eaten and horribly mutilated by giant aliens. In Avatar, he's actually made us root for the giant aliens as they desperately fought to eat and horribly mutilate the space marines. A much greater feat, I think. (In case you were wondering, I was referring to the scene of the Banshees biting marines and throwing em out of the helos.)
The delivery of the story is pretty damn close to the Cameron we've all known and love. The final huge battle scene... just beautiful action setpieces and payoff. It all clicks together. We don't quite have to suffer all summer under a bunch of hacks and one guy named Michael Bay. You could call this whole December tale The Return of the King. Cameron's returned and god bless him, he's still the king of action. I know my action, Aliens is one of my 5 favorite films of all time, and he has not let us down.
That was the delivery of the story. The actual story itself... ugh. This is problematic for me. Maybe it would have helped if I'd been some sorta tree hugging hippie liberal, but despite living in San Francisco, I am not. So the story really uh... didn't work that well for me. I've never watched Dances with Wolves, but I can completely understand what they mean when they say this film is Dances with Wolves in Space. It basically is just this tale about the white man moving in and trying to take the land of the poor Indians. And how we have to fight back. Jake's whole speech before the battle there kinda nailed it. Though I found it funny how he said "They will not take our land!" Our land, Jake? Last time I checked, you were a human. You're not a native. It's not quite your land. But uh... yea, this whole story was just so cliched and predictable and the overall themes were so bluntly put... it did begin to nag at me. It was bothersome. The Naavi themselves seem to be a hybrid of Indians and Africans. When it's about taking their land, it's obviously an Indian reference. But they also have dreadlocks and they do the weird chanting and the music gives us these shrieks and moans... those remind me more of African influences. But yea, the story's about the white man being greedy and taking the land of Indian/Africans. And they have to fight back while riding horses and using bows and arrows. It's just so heavy handed and obvious.
And the fucking lame Bush references... oh my god. It's just Cameron hitting us over the fucking head over and over again. It's just not good. Lines like "We will fight terror with terror" and "Jake, they're planning some sort of shock and awe campaign." I mean, jesus christ. What were you thinking? Aliens was clearly about Vietnam in some manner, but it wasn't that obnoxious about it, was it? Those lines just killed the scenes for me. You could hear the snarky laughter in the audience. Just... ugh, cut it out. We get it dude, you didn't like Bush. We also know you don't like destroying the environment. Thanks for the hints. We should probably also save the whales, right? That's what you're about too, right? Subtlety... more subtlety please.
Okay, let's talk about that one scene... ya know, the uh, the iffy scene. I was totally with the story, going with it up to that point quite well... it was working on me, and I was along for the ride but man... that SCENE. You know the one. Where Jake and the blue cat princess finally... bump uglies. Now, I'd been going along with Cameron but that scene made me feel very very uncomfortable. Like I was watching something a furry would be getting off on. And yea, I know the Naavi don't have any fur. But still... it felt very wrong and disturbing. One of those times where you just manage to let out some nervous laughter.
Sigourney Weaver in this film was fantastic. She shows exactly why we loved her as Ripley and why Cameron brought her back. It was like having an old friend back for a new journey and that's exactly why she was brought back and it worked perfectly. Weaver gave just the right tone to her part and really sold me. When her character left us, it was sad. We didn't want to lose her, we didn't want to lose what she brought to the film.
Michelle Rodriguez obviously plays the Vasquez archetype, though I will say, she's much more likable in this film then she usually is. Michelle Rodriguez usually plays a macho bitch who nobody likes. Ya know, Ana Lucia. Much more sympathetic and understandable this time. A pleasant surprise.
Any great film needs a great villain. Stephen Lang delivers on this old movie axiom. He's the bad guy, but you can't help but enjoy how determined and just... fucking badass he is about being evil. You actually believe a guy like him, with military efficiency, could jump out of an airlock and fire off an entire assault rifle and a pistol clip while holding his breath in a poisonous atmosphere. The look of intensity in his eyes sells the character, and when we get to the final battle between him and Jake, we care about the outcome. We want to see Jake triumph over this military hardass. Again, Cameron succeeds where Lucas failed. Nobody cared about Anakin fighting Dooku or Grievous or whatever. But Stephen Lang is up to the task. Cameron's last film had a giant frozen iceberg for an antagonist. This time, we get something much better, a great menacing actor.
HEY, JAKE SULLY RAPED HIS BANSHEE:
You're probably wondering what I'm talking about. Well, it's quite clear. Jake raped his banshee. When he first tamed it. Yes, you heard me right. That was an act of rape. It's all quite clear to me. You see, Jake was on top of the poor creature, trying to assert his dominance over it. He had it bound with that rope or grass strap thingy and it was all gagged. Then he bent its neck so it was almost choking. You could see the fear and pain in its eyes. It was fighting back. It even knocked Jake off its back. It was trying to get away from Jake's domination over its form. But Jake just wouldn't take no for an answer. He got back and again mounted the banshee. Got right back on top and quickly thrust his ponytail appendage tentacles into the banshee's oozing orifice. Immediately, you could see a change as Jake telepathically took over the banshee's mind with his own through that ponytail appendage connection. The struggle ceased, Jake had conquered the weakened winged victim. That was rape right there, ladies and gentlemen. Jake Sully raped his banshee. It was even worse then Spock's mind meld rape of Valeris in Star Trek VI The Undiscovered Country.
Jake didn't rape his horse, because the horse didn't put up a struggle when he tried to stick his ponytail appendage into its quivering orifice. That wasn't rape. But the banshee was different. The banshee didn't want his appendage. That's the difference, people. Jake Sully is a rapist. Does it count as bestiality? Or is it bestiality twice over, since Jake is actually a human acting through his Naavi avatar raping the Banshee? I dunno, but it was terrible. Not a movie for kids.
Now, the ending. The ending is ridiculous. Preposterous. How can anyone buy that ending? I'm not talking about Jake Sully getting transferred into his avatar, that was just expected and whatever. I'm talking about the humans getting forced offworld by the Naavi resistance with their proverbial tails between their legs. That is in no way a believable ending. Because guess what, even though Stephen Lang and his space marines got defeated, there's still the rest of Earth's military industrial complex. And they're just gonna send in a bigger spaceship, or multiple spaceships. And they're gonna be packing nukes. That's right, what's gonna happen is that the Naavi are all gonna get nuked. Think about it... we humans have learned how to travel interstellar distances, you think all we have are armed humanoid walkers with large gauss cannons and napalm missiles? Hell no, we're gonna have much better equipment. (I was about to say power armor but walkers seems more accurate, they were driven more then actually worn) So the happy ending with the humans just leaving and the Naavi living happily ever after, that's not realistic at all. The Naavi and Jake and all the trees are going to get nuked to kingdom come.
PS: Oh yea... unobtainium? WTF? They actually called it that in the film. Cmon, copying from The Core isn't something you should do.
That was the one phrase that went through my head on the drive back from the theater. What I mean is, the promise of the CGI technology that Lucas sought in the prequels and failed to achieve, Cameron has gone and fulfilled it. The visuals are a hair away from being photorealistic. It never felt terrible to look at. The 3D is the best I've ever seen and really added to the experience. Absolutely worthwhile for the extra 5 dollars on the ticket, I thought.
Story and dialogue... there's some issues. It's not quite up to par with the visual technology. I'm not gonna go and say it's my favorite Cameron film, Aliens is still there. But it's not so far from that level of quality. Certainly closer then Titanic ever was. As a pure cinematic experience, it delivers.
That was the general overview. Now for the in depth stuff:
Ya know, what's most impressive might just be how Cameron's subverted his entire legacy. What do I mean by that? Well, let's see... in Aliens, he made us root for the space marines as they desperately fought against getting eaten and horribly mutilated by giant aliens. In Avatar, he's actually made us root for the giant aliens as they desperately fought to eat and horribly mutilate the space marines. A much greater feat, I think. (In case you were wondering, I was referring to the scene of the Banshees biting marines and throwing em out of the helos.)
The delivery of the story is pretty damn close to the Cameron we've all known and love. The final huge battle scene... just beautiful action setpieces and payoff. It all clicks together. We don't quite have to suffer all summer under a bunch of hacks and one guy named Michael Bay. You could call this whole December tale The Return of the King. Cameron's returned and god bless him, he's still the king of action. I know my action, Aliens is one of my 5 favorite films of all time, and he has not let us down.
That was the delivery of the story. The actual story itself... ugh. This is problematic for me. Maybe it would have helped if I'd been some sorta tree hugging hippie liberal, but despite living in San Francisco, I am not. So the story really uh... didn't work that well for me. I've never watched Dances with Wolves, but I can completely understand what they mean when they say this film is Dances with Wolves in Space. It basically is just this tale about the white man moving in and trying to take the land of the poor Indians. And how we have to fight back. Jake's whole speech before the battle there kinda nailed it. Though I found it funny how he said "They will not take our land!" Our land, Jake? Last time I checked, you were a human. You're not a native. It's not quite your land. But uh... yea, this whole story was just so cliched and predictable and the overall themes were so bluntly put... it did begin to nag at me. It was bothersome. The Naavi themselves seem to be a hybrid of Indians and Africans. When it's about taking their land, it's obviously an Indian reference. But they also have dreadlocks and they do the weird chanting and the music gives us these shrieks and moans... those remind me more of African influences. But yea, the story's about the white man being greedy and taking the land of Indian/Africans. And they have to fight back while riding horses and using bows and arrows. It's just so heavy handed and obvious.
And the fucking lame Bush references... oh my god. It's just Cameron hitting us over the fucking head over and over again. It's just not good. Lines like "We will fight terror with terror" and "Jake, they're planning some sort of shock and awe campaign." I mean, jesus christ. What were you thinking? Aliens was clearly about Vietnam in some manner, but it wasn't that obnoxious about it, was it? Those lines just killed the scenes for me. You could hear the snarky laughter in the audience. Just... ugh, cut it out. We get it dude, you didn't like Bush. We also know you don't like destroying the environment. Thanks for the hints. We should probably also save the whales, right? That's what you're about too, right? Subtlety... more subtlety please.
Okay, let's talk about that one scene... ya know, the uh, the iffy scene. I was totally with the story, going with it up to that point quite well... it was working on me, and I was along for the ride but man... that SCENE. You know the one. Where Jake and the blue cat princess finally... bump uglies. Now, I'd been going along with Cameron but that scene made me feel very very uncomfortable. Like I was watching something a furry would be getting off on. And yea, I know the Naavi don't have any fur. But still... it felt very wrong and disturbing. One of those times where you just manage to let out some nervous laughter.
Sigourney Weaver in this film was fantastic. She shows exactly why we loved her as Ripley and why Cameron brought her back. It was like having an old friend back for a new journey and that's exactly why she was brought back and it worked perfectly. Weaver gave just the right tone to her part and really sold me. When her character left us, it was sad. We didn't want to lose her, we didn't want to lose what she brought to the film.
Michelle Rodriguez obviously plays the Vasquez archetype, though I will say, she's much more likable in this film then she usually is. Michelle Rodriguez usually plays a macho bitch who nobody likes. Ya know, Ana Lucia. Much more sympathetic and understandable this time. A pleasant surprise.
Any great film needs a great villain. Stephen Lang delivers on this old movie axiom. He's the bad guy, but you can't help but enjoy how determined and just... fucking badass he is about being evil. You actually believe a guy like him, with military efficiency, could jump out of an airlock and fire off an entire assault rifle and a pistol clip while holding his breath in a poisonous atmosphere. The look of intensity in his eyes sells the character, and when we get to the final battle between him and Jake, we care about the outcome. We want to see Jake triumph over this military hardass. Again, Cameron succeeds where Lucas failed. Nobody cared about Anakin fighting Dooku or Grievous or whatever. But Stephen Lang is up to the task. Cameron's last film had a giant frozen iceberg for an antagonist. This time, we get something much better, a great menacing actor.
HEY, JAKE SULLY RAPED HIS BANSHEE:
You're probably wondering what I'm talking about. Well, it's quite clear. Jake raped his banshee. When he first tamed it. Yes, you heard me right. That was an act of rape. It's all quite clear to me. You see, Jake was on top of the poor creature, trying to assert his dominance over it. He had it bound with that rope or grass strap thingy and it was all gagged. Then he bent its neck so it was almost choking. You could see the fear and pain in its eyes. It was fighting back. It even knocked Jake off its back. It was trying to get away from Jake's domination over its form. But Jake just wouldn't take no for an answer. He got back and again mounted the banshee. Got right back on top and quickly thrust his ponytail appendage tentacles into the banshee's oozing orifice. Immediately, you could see a change as Jake telepathically took over the banshee's mind with his own through that ponytail appendage connection. The struggle ceased, Jake had conquered the weakened winged victim. That was rape right there, ladies and gentlemen. Jake Sully raped his banshee. It was even worse then Spock's mind meld rape of Valeris in Star Trek VI The Undiscovered Country.
Jake didn't rape his horse, because the horse didn't put up a struggle when he tried to stick his ponytail appendage into its quivering orifice. That wasn't rape. But the banshee was different. The banshee didn't want his appendage. That's the difference, people. Jake Sully is a rapist. Does it count as bestiality? Or is it bestiality twice over, since Jake is actually a human acting through his Naavi avatar raping the Banshee? I dunno, but it was terrible. Not a movie for kids.
Now, the ending. The ending is ridiculous. Preposterous. How can anyone buy that ending? I'm not talking about Jake Sully getting transferred into his avatar, that was just expected and whatever. I'm talking about the humans getting forced offworld by the Naavi resistance with their proverbial tails between their legs. That is in no way a believable ending. Because guess what, even though Stephen Lang and his space marines got defeated, there's still the rest of Earth's military industrial complex. And they're just gonna send in a bigger spaceship, or multiple spaceships. And they're gonna be packing nukes. That's right, what's gonna happen is that the Naavi are all gonna get nuked. Think about it... we humans have learned how to travel interstellar distances, you think all we have are armed humanoid walkers with large gauss cannons and napalm missiles? Hell no, we're gonna have much better equipment. (I was about to say power armor but walkers seems more accurate, they were driven more then actually worn) So the happy ending with the humans just leaving and the Naavi living happily ever after, that's not realistic at all. The Naavi and Jake and all the trees are going to get nuked to kingdom come.
PS: Oh yea... unobtainium? WTF? They actually called it that in the film. Cmon, copying from The Core isn't something you should do.
My list of issues with Arkham Asylum
1. Boss Fights Sucked.
2. Gargoyles a bit too convenient, grappling mechanic felt too automatic, no finesse involved.
3. Hollow gameplay sections: Courtyard filled with killing dozens and dozens of plant pods (that shoot plasma balls WTF?) by crouching and pressing a button to initiate the canned animation. And hopefully you enjoy that canned animation of him punching into and then ripping open the pod, splattering the fake camera with plant blood, because it's gonna be the same every single fucking time. Which is really boring after the 3rd time. Nevermind the 20th.
4. Gameplay length seems low, if you compare it to some other games released. If you compare it to Modern Warfare 2's length though, it seems pretty great. So that's really hard to say. Coming off of a run of Dragon Age or Borderlands or AC2, it's undoubtedly going to seem a bit short. You really have to judge if the quality of the experience is enough to make up the difference.
There's no real replayability though. It's not linear in the sense that it's a straight line, there are hub areas involved, so you'll have to backtrack and encounter the same areas but with different conditions. But all in all, the campaign's gonna be exactly the same. The only replayability might be in getting higher scores in the Danger Rooms. Wait, Danger Rooms are the rooms in X-Men. What are they called, hazard rooms? Challenge rooms? The challenge is in getting higher scores, but I just played em once each and had enough. It only served to remind me that these sections were taken from the campaign and that there was a lot more to do because you weren't confined inside a room.
5. Other then that, the one big aesthetic detail that I really disliked was what I had been kvetching about for the longest time... before the game, during the game, and now after the game: Batman's walking animation looks retarded. He's just walking like a stiff robot that's maybe a little bit constipated? It just looks bad, man. Seriously, fix that animation. He looks great when he's moving while crouched, but we're all too damn lazy to hold down the crouch button all the time. And when we aren't running, we have to walk. And Batman looks awful doing it. It was a bad jig to begin with, we never should have started this jig. It was a bad jig, a terrible terrible jig.
Arkham Asylum actually didn't have a lot of faults, I enjoyed it quite a bit.
2. Gargoyles a bit too convenient, grappling mechanic felt too automatic, no finesse involved.
3. Hollow gameplay sections: Courtyard filled with killing dozens and dozens of plant pods (that shoot plasma balls WTF?) by crouching and pressing a button to initiate the canned animation. And hopefully you enjoy that canned animation of him punching into and then ripping open the pod, splattering the fake camera with plant blood, because it's gonna be the same every single fucking time. Which is really boring after the 3rd time. Nevermind the 20th.
4. Gameplay length seems low, if you compare it to some other games released. If you compare it to Modern Warfare 2's length though, it seems pretty great. So that's really hard to say. Coming off of a run of Dragon Age or Borderlands or AC2, it's undoubtedly going to seem a bit short. You really have to judge if the quality of the experience is enough to make up the difference.
There's no real replayability though. It's not linear in the sense that it's a straight line, there are hub areas involved, so you'll have to backtrack and encounter the same areas but with different conditions. But all in all, the campaign's gonna be exactly the same. The only replayability might be in getting higher scores in the Danger Rooms. Wait, Danger Rooms are the rooms in X-Men. What are they called, hazard rooms? Challenge rooms? The challenge is in getting higher scores, but I just played em once each and had enough. It only served to remind me that these sections were taken from the campaign and that there was a lot more to do because you weren't confined inside a room.
5. Other then that, the one big aesthetic detail that I really disliked was what I had been kvetching about for the longest time... before the game, during the game, and now after the game: Batman's walking animation looks retarded. He's just walking like a stiff robot that's maybe a little bit constipated? It just looks bad, man. Seriously, fix that animation. He looks great when he's moving while crouched, but we're all too damn lazy to hold down the crouch button all the time. And when we aren't running, we have to walk. And Batman looks awful doing it. It was a bad jig to begin with, we never should have started this jig. It was a bad jig, a terrible terrible jig.
Arkham Asylum actually didn't have a lot of faults, I enjoyed it quite a bit.
Batman's got issues
What Batman does seems slightly unfeasible.
Think about it. He goes out night after night and fights criminals in Gotham City. But how does he do this? He waits until it's night. Night time will generally be from 7:00 pm to maybe... what, 5:00 am? That's not bad, that's a solid 10 hours of crimefighting. But what happens when the sun comes up? No more Batman. And that's exactly when the criminals and supervillains are going to strike, right? Cause after a while, even the cowardly and superstitious lot are bound to notice that Batman seems to arrive at 7:00 pm every night, like clockwork. They'll just sleep during the night and do their dastardly schemes during the day. Kinda like how normal people operate. Batman isn't able to do anything, he's gotta wait till night. Unless he got some sort of WayneTech device to block out the Sun. That'd be silly, though.
But you might be saying... well, he'll just go out as Bruce Wayne during the day and stop them with his Lamborghini Murcielago. Like in that Chris Nolan film, The Dark Knight. Which sounds good, except that he actually risks blowing his cover. He's not wearing his mask as Bruce Wayne. And Bruce Wayne doesn't have the protection of the Batsuit, or any handy gadgets. That's quite risky. So what he did in TDK seems like a pretty rare occurrence. Generally, he's not gonna risk it.
And of course, he'd probably be sleeping during the day. Like a vampire, which is appropriate. After fighting crime for 10 hours and grappling from building to building, beating thugs, saving hostages... Bruce has got to be beat and in need of some rest. I don't believe any comics have ever had him copying Kramer and trying that DaVinci sleep method where you only sleep for 20 minutes every few hours or something. The man's reserves are down, he'll have to go to sleep during the day. You know what happens when he doesn't get sleep? He gets his fucking back broken, that's what. It's a bad scene.
Now, on to Batman actually fighting crime. His batsuit protects him from bullets. And he'll generally hide in the darkness. But what about his no killing rule? Is that really an actual rule that a guy fighting crime night after night can keep? You'd think that eventually he'd do something like punch a guy, have the guy go unconscious, fall down, hit his head on a toilet bowl or something, and die from inadequate medical attention later on. Or maybe he punches some big dude in the chest, which causes a freak heart attack and death? Ya know, stuff that's a little unlikely, but becomes more and more likely as his crimefighter career continues. Batman doesn't have detailed medical dossiers on every two bit crook and thug in Gotham, right? That seems like a stretch.
In law, we have something called the eggshell skull rule. Basically, if you punch someone in the head and they turn out to have a rare condition which makes their skull as weak and brittle as an eggshell, you'll be punished for the actual outcome, not your intent to merely inflict a punch that would have slightly injured a man with a normal skull. So you're basically screwed if you just happen to punch someone with an eggshell skull. Now, this could happen to Batman. He might not know if a new criminal mastermind has an eggshell skull. So he goes for the one punch knockout and... ends up killing the guy. Gordon and the GCPD suddenly have a warrant out for his ass. He's done for. Or, the criminal supervillains like Joker or Two Face could just hire someone with an eggshell skull to be their thug for a heist. Batman shows up and falls right into their trap. It's terrible, breaking your one rule to never kill because you ran into a thug with an eggshell skull. That would just feel terrible.
Batman often gets wounded in combat. You know, something sharp shreds his costume sometimes. Catwoman's scratched him good in a few encounters. So he gets cut a bit and maybe blood spills out from the wound. Batman doesn't stop to clean up the pavement, he just keeps going with the battle and drives away when it's all over. So you've got Batman's blood on Gotham pavement, or inside a building somewhere. Couldn't someone take that blood and try to find Batman's real identity with it? Just gotta try and match it up with any DNA in a database. Bruce Wayne probably had blood taken from him as a kid for... medical reasons, right? Does a hospital keep really good records of people's blood and DNA? I'm not sure, but even if they don't, the existence of Batman's blood is worrisome evidence. Could you use the DNA in the blood to trace it to the Wayne genealogy? It doesn't seem too far fetched.
It's tough being Batman. I don't know how he does it.
Think about it. He goes out night after night and fights criminals in Gotham City. But how does he do this? He waits until it's night. Night time will generally be from 7:00 pm to maybe... what, 5:00 am? That's not bad, that's a solid 10 hours of crimefighting. But what happens when the sun comes up? No more Batman. And that's exactly when the criminals and supervillains are going to strike, right? Cause after a while, even the cowardly and superstitious lot are bound to notice that Batman seems to arrive at 7:00 pm every night, like clockwork. They'll just sleep during the night and do their dastardly schemes during the day. Kinda like how normal people operate. Batman isn't able to do anything, he's gotta wait till night. Unless he got some sort of WayneTech device to block out the Sun. That'd be silly, though.
But you might be saying... well, he'll just go out as Bruce Wayne during the day and stop them with his Lamborghini Murcielago. Like in that Chris Nolan film, The Dark Knight. Which sounds good, except that he actually risks blowing his cover. He's not wearing his mask as Bruce Wayne. And Bruce Wayne doesn't have the protection of the Batsuit, or any handy gadgets. That's quite risky. So what he did in TDK seems like a pretty rare occurrence. Generally, he's not gonna risk it.
And of course, he'd probably be sleeping during the day. Like a vampire, which is appropriate. After fighting crime for 10 hours and grappling from building to building, beating thugs, saving hostages... Bruce has got to be beat and in need of some rest. I don't believe any comics have ever had him copying Kramer and trying that DaVinci sleep method where you only sleep for 20 minutes every few hours or something. The man's reserves are down, he'll have to go to sleep during the day. You know what happens when he doesn't get sleep? He gets his fucking back broken, that's what. It's a bad scene.
Now, on to Batman actually fighting crime. His batsuit protects him from bullets. And he'll generally hide in the darkness. But what about his no killing rule? Is that really an actual rule that a guy fighting crime night after night can keep? You'd think that eventually he'd do something like punch a guy, have the guy go unconscious, fall down, hit his head on a toilet bowl or something, and die from inadequate medical attention later on. Or maybe he punches some big dude in the chest, which causes a freak heart attack and death? Ya know, stuff that's a little unlikely, but becomes more and more likely as his crimefighter career continues. Batman doesn't have detailed medical dossiers on every two bit crook and thug in Gotham, right? That seems like a stretch.
In law, we have something called the eggshell skull rule. Basically, if you punch someone in the head and they turn out to have a rare condition which makes their skull as weak and brittle as an eggshell, you'll be punished for the actual outcome, not your intent to merely inflict a punch that would have slightly injured a man with a normal skull. So you're basically screwed if you just happen to punch someone with an eggshell skull. Now, this could happen to Batman. He might not know if a new criminal mastermind has an eggshell skull. So he goes for the one punch knockout and... ends up killing the guy. Gordon and the GCPD suddenly have a warrant out for his ass. He's done for. Or, the criminal supervillains like Joker or Two Face could just hire someone with an eggshell skull to be their thug for a heist. Batman shows up and falls right into their trap. It's terrible, breaking your one rule to never kill because you ran into a thug with an eggshell skull. That would just feel terrible.
Batman often gets wounded in combat. You know, something sharp shreds his costume sometimes. Catwoman's scratched him good in a few encounters. So he gets cut a bit and maybe blood spills out from the wound. Batman doesn't stop to clean up the pavement, he just keeps going with the battle and drives away when it's all over. So you've got Batman's blood on Gotham pavement, or inside a building somewhere. Couldn't someone take that blood and try to find Batman's real identity with it? Just gotta try and match it up with any DNA in a database. Bruce Wayne probably had blood taken from him as a kid for... medical reasons, right? Does a hospital keep really good records of people's blood and DNA? I'm not sure, but even if they don't, the existence of Batman's blood is worrisome evidence. Could you use the DNA in the blood to trace it to the Wayne genealogy? It doesn't seem too far fetched.
It's tough being Batman. I don't know how he does it.
Why I Hate Anime Part 2: The Art
What's up with anime? It's just terrible, terrible art. The same identical fucking appearance, all across anime. Weird shaped head, with giant eyes, small nose, small mouth. Fucking ridiculous. Are they greys? Are they supposed to look like grey aliens? Cause grey aliens also have giant eyes, small nose, and small mouth.
And what's up with them having giant teardrops next to their head sometimes? Why is there a giant teardrop hovering near their head? Why? Is it raining? Is something going on? It looks retarded. Absolutely hideous. Along with the giant eyes. And sometimes the faces turn into cat faces for some fucking reason. Again, stupid shit.
And what about the super deformed appearances? Sometimes they turn super deformed. Have they just been in a fucking transporter malfunction, like that scene in Star Trek The Motion Picture? Where the science officer and that chick from the Lost Years novels gets transmogrified and all screwed up by the transporter? Why are things super deformed? Why does anything have to be deformed for no goddamn reason? Why is it super deformed, and not ultra deformed? Super deformed denotes that it has not quite gotten to the stage where it might be ultra deformed? Cause they look pretty deformed, and squished, and all small and ugly and kinda stout and uh... they don't look quite right. Again, really stupid and ugly art.
But it all comes back to the fact that they all look stupid. Giant eyes, really really giant eyes. Who the hell thought up this shit? With small mouths, that sometimes have a little bit of pointy incisor tooth. Just a little bit of incisor, to make em look kinda like cat people. Other times, you don't even see the nose. The nose disappears completely. Just awful. Ridiculous crap.
And of course, because they do all look the same, with the identical faces, the only logical way to differentiate them... the only way to tell em apart, is with wild and different colored hair. So you've got people with green hair. For no goddamn reason. Or they'll have blonde hair, but they're still supposed to be Asian? Really? Asian people with really blonde hair, that doesn't actually look like it was dyed? Purple hair, blue hair... just the gamut of colors. All because they can't be fucked to draw people differently. Noooooo, always gotta continue with the same identical giant eyed faces with small mouths. Unless they open the mouth, then the nose disappears. The mouth opens, nose disappears, and giant teardrop comes WHAM out of fucking nowhere. People make fun of the crazy ass hair in anime, and the defense is "well they wouldn't be able to tell characters apart without the different colored hair." No fucking shit. No fucking shit we wouldn't be able to tell those idiotic characters apart, they're all the same with those giant eyes and small noses and mouths! The answer isn't to give em all ridiculous hair... it's to actually try and draw em differently sometimes a bit mayhaps! Think, you lazy assholes!
Speaking of lazy... anime is so absolutely lazy. Just look at ALL the fucking speedline sequences in anime. I'm talking about those scenes where a character does something really dramatic, like running. What is the background while he's running? It's some crazy hyperspace field with a lot of lines and maybe purple ass stars flying around and it's like... where the fuck did this guy go off to? Or a robot will do something crazy like fly around. Suddenly, he's in this pinkish background with sparkles or some shit. And he's doing some crazy maneuver, but it's not in a location anymore, he's floating around in this magical ethereal world of white lines and stars and uh... nothingness? It's bullshit.
And of course, you'll have plenty of shots of people making punches or cutting with a sword, and the animation shows them all frozen in place, then a giant slash appears, then the thing getting punched or cut suddenly leaps six feet off of where it was, and the shot freezes once again. This is supposed to be dramatic, but just looks lazy, like the animators didn't want to animate more then a few shots. Lots of frozen scenes, depicting stuff happening. It's retarded.
You look at American animation, and yea, some of it looks like crap, but for God's sake, it doesn't all look alike. The Simpsons doesn't look like Batman TAS. Batman TAS doesn't look like X-Men TAS. Rugrats doesn't look like Ren and Stimpy. Kim Possible doesn't look like South Park. (Yes, I watched Kim Possible. It was embarrassing, but I was bored.) But everything anime is the same. Giant eyes, small nose, small mouth... usually a fucking robot in the background.
And what's up with them having giant teardrops next to their head sometimes? Why is there a giant teardrop hovering near their head? Why? Is it raining? Is something going on? It looks retarded. Absolutely hideous. Along with the giant eyes. And sometimes the faces turn into cat faces for some fucking reason. Again, stupid shit.
And what about the super deformed appearances? Sometimes they turn super deformed. Have they just been in a fucking transporter malfunction, like that scene in Star Trek The Motion Picture? Where the science officer and that chick from the Lost Years novels gets transmogrified and all screwed up by the transporter? Why are things super deformed? Why does anything have to be deformed for no goddamn reason? Why is it super deformed, and not ultra deformed? Super deformed denotes that it has not quite gotten to the stage where it might be ultra deformed? Cause they look pretty deformed, and squished, and all small and ugly and kinda stout and uh... they don't look quite right. Again, really stupid and ugly art.
But it all comes back to the fact that they all look stupid. Giant eyes, really really giant eyes. Who the hell thought up this shit? With small mouths, that sometimes have a little bit of pointy incisor tooth. Just a little bit of incisor, to make em look kinda like cat people. Other times, you don't even see the nose. The nose disappears completely. Just awful. Ridiculous crap.
And of course, because they do all look the same, with the identical faces, the only logical way to differentiate them... the only way to tell em apart, is with wild and different colored hair. So you've got people with green hair. For no goddamn reason. Or they'll have blonde hair, but they're still supposed to be Asian? Really? Asian people with really blonde hair, that doesn't actually look like it was dyed? Purple hair, blue hair... just the gamut of colors. All because they can't be fucked to draw people differently. Noooooo, always gotta continue with the same identical giant eyed faces with small mouths. Unless they open the mouth, then the nose disappears. The mouth opens, nose disappears, and giant teardrop comes WHAM out of fucking nowhere. People make fun of the crazy ass hair in anime, and the defense is "well they wouldn't be able to tell characters apart without the different colored hair." No fucking shit. No fucking shit we wouldn't be able to tell those idiotic characters apart, they're all the same with those giant eyes and small noses and mouths! The answer isn't to give em all ridiculous hair... it's to actually try and draw em differently sometimes a bit mayhaps! Think, you lazy assholes!
Speaking of lazy... anime is so absolutely lazy. Just look at ALL the fucking speedline sequences in anime. I'm talking about those scenes where a character does something really dramatic, like running. What is the background while he's running? It's some crazy hyperspace field with a lot of lines and maybe purple ass stars flying around and it's like... where the fuck did this guy go off to? Or a robot will do something crazy like fly around. Suddenly, he's in this pinkish background with sparkles or some shit. And he's doing some crazy maneuver, but it's not in a location anymore, he's floating around in this magical ethereal world of white lines and stars and uh... nothingness? It's bullshit.
And of course, you'll have plenty of shots of people making punches or cutting with a sword, and the animation shows them all frozen in place, then a giant slash appears, then the thing getting punched or cut suddenly leaps six feet off of where it was, and the shot freezes once again. This is supposed to be dramatic, but just looks lazy, like the animators didn't want to animate more then a few shots. Lots of frozen scenes, depicting stuff happening. It's retarded.
You look at American animation, and yea, some of it looks like crap, but for God's sake, it doesn't all look alike. The Simpsons doesn't look like Batman TAS. Batman TAS doesn't look like X-Men TAS. Rugrats doesn't look like Ren and Stimpy. Kim Possible doesn't look like South Park. (Yes, I watched Kim Possible. It was embarrassing, but I was bored.) But everything anime is the same. Giant eyes, small nose, small mouth... usually a fucking robot in the background.
Baldur's Gate 2: Not a Fan.
I didn't like Baldur's Gate 2 when I played it. The game practically forces you to pause and micromanage all your party members, and that's just not fun for me. If I want that, I'll go and play a turn-based RTS. That's not what I want from an RPG. I want something like, uh... KOTOR. I'm not gonna say I never paused the game at all in KOTOR, but it was generally in a few key spots, like during a tense boss fight.
The whole pause every two seconds to issue commands to everyone, then unpause to experience one or two seconds of real time combat, then pause again... that shit is just incomprehensible to me. Why would anyone want to do that? That doesn't feel like a game to me. Look, if you like turn based combat like that... then just go all the way and use one of those actual turn-based combat mechanics, like from Persona 4 or the Final Fantasy games. Well, I mean... I've never played a Final Fantasy game, but I figure their turn based combat works like that. Ya know, like Pokemon's combat. It's just all turn based and works fine if that's what you want. But don't give us this bastardized half in, half out schtick. Two seconds of real time combat, followed by a pause and going back to the turn based thing... that's just torture. It doesn't feel good, and if you want real turn based action, it doesn't deliver. Who wants to manually pause every two seconds? It's not what I would consider to be good gameplay, even if it is an old game.
And the isometric view... yuck. Just a terrible choice. Again, something that's fine in an RTS, but feels wrong for an RPG. If I'm some strategic god commanding a hundred different units and mining fucking vespene gas on some outposts... I want that isometric perspective. If I'm role playing as this guy with armor and a sword, talking to people... I don't want that isometric perspective.
Lastly, having a lower armor class is apparently better, which makes no sense.
The whole pause every two seconds to issue commands to everyone, then unpause to experience one or two seconds of real time combat, then pause again... that shit is just incomprehensible to me. Why would anyone want to do that? That doesn't feel like a game to me. Look, if you like turn based combat like that... then just go all the way and use one of those actual turn-based combat mechanics, like from Persona 4 or the Final Fantasy games. Well, I mean... I've never played a Final Fantasy game, but I figure their turn based combat works like that. Ya know, like Pokemon's combat. It's just all turn based and works fine if that's what you want. But don't give us this bastardized half in, half out schtick. Two seconds of real time combat, followed by a pause and going back to the turn based thing... that's just torture. It doesn't feel good, and if you want real turn based action, it doesn't deliver. Who wants to manually pause every two seconds? It's not what I would consider to be good gameplay, even if it is an old game.
And the isometric view... yuck. Just a terrible choice. Again, something that's fine in an RTS, but feels wrong for an RPG. If I'm some strategic god commanding a hundred different units and mining fucking vespene gas on some outposts... I want that isometric perspective. If I'm role playing as this guy with armor and a sword, talking to people... I don't want that isometric perspective.
Lastly, having a lower armor class is apparently better, which makes no sense.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
