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Off Topic / Re: What Was The Last Movie/Anime You Watched?

« on: December 27, 2025, 01:03:48 am »

Home Alone 2: Lost in New York - Bigger, busier, and all around way more messy than the first film, but still a lot of fun. I think you could refocus the movie with hotel staff as the main antagonists and end up with a better overall story, but then you'd lose the utterly demented Looney Tunes-esque finale.

Holiday Inn - Well this is fun little concept, with songs for the YIKES OH NO BLACKFACE JESUS different holidays and such.

Die Hard - Basically a perfect action screenplay. Immaculate structure, great and memorable lines, terrific foreshadowing. Just an absolute all-timer.

Die Hard 2 - Yeah, it's structured like the first movie, and it also takes place on Christmas, but a lot of the moving parts are different enough for me. Lots of recognizable faces with the bad guys, although they don't get as much personality as the original crew. Plays like a Cannon film with a huge budget.

Die Hard with a Vengeance - It's not the original, but it's close. Arguably the best action movie of the 90s. Top 5 for sure.

Red One - Total waste of potential. There's a lot of stuff here I like conceptually, but the execution is a total drag, and it looks like garbage considering it cost around $250 million. Kiernan Shipka and JK Simmons doing their best. Krampus sequence was fun.

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Off Topic / Re: What Was The Last Movie/Anime You Watched?

« on: December 19, 2025, 08:49:10 pm »

It's a Wonderful Life - What really makes this work is how totally justified George's crash out is. Uncle Billy has just basically screwed over George's entire life, so everything that we've been watching him make all those sacrifices over the previous 70 minutes completely pointless. In fact, I think the weakest stuff in the movie is all the fantastical Christmas magic stuff. It's been a phenomenal slice of life and coming of age drama, and I just think it sticks out, tonally.

And of course, Jimmy Stewart is phenomenal.

In Old Arizona - It's not that bad, but it is boring and definitely has the growing pains of an early talkie. Product of its time, and all that.

A Few Good Men - Coming at the tail end of Rob Reiner's nearly unparalleled 80s-90s directorial run, A Few Good Men, is probably the oddest man out of his entire filmography, but it is still an absolute masterclass of it's genre. A huge cast of current and future stars, with everyone delivering great performances. Wish we still got high profile courtroom dramas like this.

Totally Killer - Had a ton of fun with this! Fun time travel stuff, decent slasher action. A couple of issues - some rough CG effects, gets a bit too hand-wavy with the time travel logic, some tonal issues, and it is shot like a sitcom. Mostly a blast, though.

The Lion King - Gonna be completely honest here, Timon and Pumba don't really do it for me. I don't hate them or anything, they are just what keep it from the full 5.

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Off Topic / Re: What TV/Netflix show are you currently watching? (Megathread)

« on: December 18, 2025, 07:27:05 am »

Just finished the first season of Derry Girls, which was incredibly funny and filled with terrific performances.   Reminded me a lot of Pen15, just Irish.

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General / Re: A Year in Review - 2025

« on: December 17, 2025, 08:38:37 pm »

Favorite 2025 Release: Hollow Knight: Silksong

Least Favorite 2025 Release: The only other 2025 release I played Ball x Pitt, which isn't bad, just has to be here by default.

Favorite Game Played in 2025: Silksong again!

Least Favorite Game Played in 2025: Crysis Remastered.  Incredibly meh.

Sleeper Hit of 2025: Ball x Pitt again.  Terrific indie title.

Favorite Gaming Moment in 2025: There are a couple of really great boss fights in Silksong.  First Sinner, Grandmother Silk, and the final boss were terrific.

Proudest Collection Accomplishment of 2025: Uh... I managed to find all my Secret Santa gifts for telly in about 5 minutes at a media shop?  His wish list just matched right up.

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General / Re: VGCollect 2025 Secret Santa!

« on: December 14, 2025, 08:40:05 am »

My package arrived yesterday.  It had a couple of extra pins and some perler art as well as several title from my wish list (newest Assassin's Creed, Nier Automata, and a DBZ game I wanted) and Metal Arms for the PS2 (a game I aware has a positive reputation, but no much else about it, so I'm excited to try it out!).

Thanks, Santa!

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Off Topic / Re: What Was The Last Movie/Anime You Watched?

« on: December 12, 2025, 09:15:43 pm »

Wake Up Dead Man - Far and away the most thematically rich of these, with the most compelling non-Daniel Craig protagonist, but also makes the least use of it's deep bench of characters.  Has probably my favorite scene from them, as well (the phone call), but the mystery never drew me in as thoroughly.

Comanche Station - Excellent finish to this Ranown box set from Criterion.  Beautiful CinemaScope cinematography.  Terrific morality tale with an ironic twist.

Lady Snowblood 2: Love Song of Vengeance - Very different from the first for better and for worse. Feels more like a side quest than an actual sequel.

Titanic - Just a towering motion picture achievement.

The Transporter - Probably the closest the West ever came to having our own Hong Kong action franchise, in no small part to Corey Yuen, I'm sure. When I was 20 o thought the oil fight was stupid as hell and made the movie worse. Now, I'm convinced it is indicative of why the movie works at all.

Transporter 2 - Campier than the first, feeling more European than Hong Kong inspired. The action is generally worse, but not bad (except the CGI), and the plot is definitely more interesting. I liked it a hair more than the original.

Transporter 3 - Was obvious within 5 minutes it was the worse than the first two.  Decent action complete cut up by horrible editing.  Knepper is the best villain in the franchise at least.  Olivier Megaton may be the worst director to have financial hits in multiple franchises.

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Modern Video Games / Re: The Game Awards (TGA) 2025 predictions, hype, and general discussion thread

« on: December 12, 2025, 12:00:41 pm »

Very excited for new Divinity and new Control.

Cautiously optimistic about Star Wars Galactic Racer, while very much in "I'll believe it when I see it" mode for Fate of the Old Republic.

New Mega Man is cool, but all excitement completely drained by a 2027 release date.

Bradley the Badger looks like it could be promising.

Orbitals looks incredible, but doesn't seem like a game I'd be really interested in playing.

I'm sure RE9 will be totally fine.

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General / Re: 52 Games Challenge 2025!!!

« on: December 09, 2025, 09:36:33 pm »

I beat Crysis Remastered having never played the original version, and if it weren't for all the talk about how you needed a beast of a computer to run it at the time... I don't think anyone would really remember it. Its such a generic shooter.

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General / Re: VGCollect 2025 Secret Santa!

« on: December 08, 2025, 05:31:59 pm »

I'm still down, regardless if my package is here or not.

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Off Topic / Re: What Was The Last Movie/Anime You Watched?

« on: December 05, 2025, 08:16:51 am »

Needful Things - Terrific cast with a fun premise. If this had a better director it could have really been something.

Hot Frosty - The only reason this works in any real capacity is the 100% committed performance from Dustin Milligan as the hot snowman. Couple that with genuinely talented comedians as the heels and you've got an actually watchable cheesy Christmas romance.

The Lone Ranger - Not nearly as bad as its reputation.  Terrific action, great score, amazing production design, and a deep bench cast are all hobbled by the absolutely idiotic casting of Johnny Depp as Tonto.  Framing device is totally unnecessary and makes the already long runtime to too long.

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe - One of the best (if not the best) of the slew of YA and fantasy adaptations that came in the wake of Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings, while also being one of the most artistic, despite being a huge Disney production. Effects mostly hold up, but it definitely has some pretty shaky green screen in a few spots. Kids are mostly fine, but its also not surprising they didn't do much after. Pleasantly surprising rewatch.

Vertigo - Well it turns out that everything I knew about this movie is only from the last 25 minutes or so, and far less important to the overall story than I had thought.  Terrific story of the type of obsession that can drive you crazy.  Felt a bit rushed in the last act, and ends incredibly abruptly, which is what keeps it from being my new favorite Hitchcock.

The Chronicles of Narnia: Price Caspian - Better than I remembered. Ben Barnes is acting circles around the Pevensie kids.  They traded the somber winter vibes for bright summer ones, and while effects look great, the feelings are just not the same, and the movie is worse off for it.

The Chronicles of Narnia: Voyage of the Dawn Treader - Losing Adamson as a director was a huge blow. Caspian and especially Wardrobe feel like genuine epics. This feels like a generic YA adventure.  And I understand the budget is lower, but it shouldn't look this much worse than a movie from 5 years earlier.

Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair - Finally saw it after all this time, and... I think I like the theatrical versions more.  It is the most I've ever enjoyed the back half, but, and this surprises me, I think the 88 fight works better in B&W and the new anime sequence throws the immaculately paced Vol. 1 off-balance.

Still, a practically perfect film and a mostly great film still average out to damned good.

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General / Re: VGCollect 2025 Secret Santa!

« on: December 01, 2025, 11:57:00 am »

Everything so far works for me, I just haven't received my package yet.

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Off Topic / Re: What Was The Last Movie/Anime You Watched?

« on: November 29, 2025, 10:00:17 am »

Taken 2 - Hot Taken take: better than the first.

Predator: Badlands - I liked this for the most part, but I don't know that the "power of friendship" belongs in Predator.

Taken 3 - Absolutely epileptic editing.  Theres good potential here, in pitting Neeson up against Forest Whitaker, but they don't do anything with it.

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General / Re: 52 Games Challenge 2025!!!

« on: November 27, 2025, 10:32:52 pm »

Made myself power through the last few stages of the Demon's Souls remake today.  Definitely my least favorite FromSoft Souls title.  The difficulty curve is super steep on this one, especially if you already have Souls experience. Its just so hard to consistently have healing items, or even to farm for them,because the enemies in the first couple of stages just are not giving you enough XP.  Not enough to buy healing items, and not enough to level up to make difference.  Once you do start getting enough to level up you kind of outstrip the endgame, pacing and level-wise.

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Off Topic / Re: What TV/Netflix show are you currently watching? (Megathread)

« on: November 26, 2025, 07:17:28 am »

Masters of the Universe: Revelation - This show captured the feeling of just mashing action figures together better than maybe anything else ive ever seen.  I understand why some of the story beats were controversial, but I have no big nostalgia for the He-Man lore, so it didn't bother me at all.  It maybe could have been structured or paced a little better, but as a whole I thought this was great.

Enjoyed the first batch of Stranger Things S5 episodes.  Its never been as good as S1, but I'm enjoying the journey to the end well-enough.

Masters of the Universe: Revolution - Not quite as good as Revelation, but still a fun time!  Really enjoy what these series have been doing in the MotU playground.

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General / Re: VGCollect 2025 Secret Santa!

« on: November 24, 2025, 10:18:30 pm »

Let me know when and i will try to make it to a live opening.