Messages

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

« on: May 28, 2023, 09:40:09 pm »

Fast Times at Ridgemont High - Never actually watched this before. Liked it, didn't love it. Like a more unfocused Dazed and Confused.

Captain Ron - Hadn't seen this in like 20 years. Kurt Russell is great, but the rest is kind of a waste.

Hell Comes to Frogtown - Well this was weird as hell.

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

« on: May 27, 2023, 09:51:04 pm »

The Night House - Desperately trying not the let the fact that twist wasn't what I thought it was going pull the score down. Rebecca Hall is incredible here, and the direction is striking, it just whiffs the ending a tad.

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Modern Video Games / Re: One week later: How are you enjoying Tears of the Kingdom?

« on: May 21, 2023, 04:35:46 pm »

As a spectator to someone playing, my initial thoughts were largely in regard to the beginning hours. It seems then that the game heavily focuses on the crafting/fusing system which does not seem all that appealing to me. Perhaps I would enjoy it, but it seems cumbersome, and I generally am not drawn to those kinds of gameplay mechanics. That being said, as I've watched more of the game, it seems less of a focus which is nice to see, personally.

Yeah, I've played quite a bit, and while I have messed around with the building, it's not that required outside of shrines, and even then its nothing that complicated (which is really no different than BotW). It really does give you a lot if freedom in that regard.  Plus once you get far enough you can bookmark and use designs from your history, so you don't have to keep building from scratch.

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Modern Video Games / Re: One week later: How are you enjoying Tears of the Kingdom?

« on: May 21, 2023, 11:14:47 am »

Thanks for the amiibo reminder!  Totally forgot about that functionality.  Better get on it today.

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

« on: May 20, 2023, 07:24:15 am »

Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania - [...]This movie was fine, I've watched worse movies with this phase for sure.  I'm not 100% sure what all the backlash was on this one, the ending was abit "eh", but oh well, it was entertaining enough.

Pretty much where I landed on it.  It's definitely a lower tier MCU film (better than last year's Thor, at least), but did not deserve that absolute trouncing it received from people.

The Remains of the Day - Utterly spectacular as a dramatic period piece, but not completely sold by the romance between Stevens and Kenton. Not the performances, those are great, but it doesn't really find its footing until too late in the film.

Jack Reacher - McQuarrie's Mission: Impossible audition reel. A bit too long, slightly clunky in spots, but it individual sequences are terrific, Tom nails the idea of Reacher (I don't care that he's a behemoth in the books, I've read two of them and outside of the overall intriguing plots they kinda suck), good supporting cast.

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Modern Video Games / Re: One week later: How are you enjoying Tears of the Kingdom?

« on: May 19, 2023, 10:33:22 pm »

All those reviews that said that BotW feels like atrial run compared to this game are right.  It's bigger, more in depth, has more enemy variety, interesting new mechanics while still keeping the great open world exploration,  art design, and combat that made the first game great.  They addressed the sparseness, weapon durabilty issues, and traversal problems (climbing in the rain) with design and feature changes, but they didn't gut any of them.

My biggest complaint is the constant menu-ing that is needed to manage all of the inventory and abilities.

I was actually attempting a no fast travel challenge run, but the game is so massive and my playtime is so limited I had to abandon it.  If I were a streamer, playing 8 hours a day I could do it, but at 1-2 hours a day I'd never finish.

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Video Game Deals, Sales and Promotions / Re: Free Steam/GOG/Humble Bundle Game listings (limited timing)

« on: May 18, 2023, 10:37:12 pm »

Metro: Last Light - Complete Edition is free on Steam until May 25.

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General / Re: Gamer reviews/ rankings page

« on: May 18, 2023, 06:57:41 am »

There is the What are you playing? thread that has been used for this in the past.  It's just been superseded by the 52 Games thread - I know I stopped posting in both because it seemed redundant, unless i was posting about sonething in progress.

https://vgcollect.com/forum/index.php/topic,572.4620.html

It's not exclusively about reviews though, so feel free to use this thread instead, if you'd prefer.

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General / Re: New Low Poly Games?

« on: May 11, 2023, 10:13:49 am »

Yeah, at $7 it's an easy "Why not?" purchase.

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

« on: May 10, 2023, 09:39:01 pm »

Tango & Cash - This is a ton of fun, but it's also extremely stupid.  Monumentally so.  Amazing bench of character actors as well.

The Devil Wears Prada - We as a society have to stop letting movies try and convince us that pre-makeover Anne Hathaway is a troglodyte.

"I'm not skinny or glamorous." Get the hell out of here.

Free Willy - There is the problem of the hypocrisy of the nature of the film, but it's incredibly well-crafted for this type of family fare. Terrific cinematography, great score by Basil Poseldouris, good performances from the whole cast, including a solid child's performance from Richter. It's a good time!

Hustlers - Excellent crime caper. Very stylish, great energy, terrific performance from J Lo.

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General / Re: New Low Poly Games?

« on: May 10, 2023, 07:36:57 pm »

Lunacid isn't a platformer, but it is a lowpoly game like King's Field that I've got on my Steam wishlist.  Looks really good.

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

« on: May 06, 2023, 03:43:54 pm »

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 - Maybe it's just the fact that the MCU has been so stale lately, but this just totally worked for me. Or maybe it's because it is easily the most classic Gunn of the franchise with lots of weird gross monsters and some imagery I am astonished is in a PG-13 movie.

It is a little overstuffed, even at 2.5 hours, and you could excise pretty much all of the Adam Warlock stuff and still have mostly the same picture.

Everybody Wants Some!! - The Jay Niles character feels a bit antithetical to everything else in the film, and I wish there were a tiny bit more plot, but man this is just such a chill watch.

Pirates of the Carribean: Dead Men Tell No Tales - Better than the immensely forgettable fourth film, which isn't saying much.

Minari - Very sweet and quite lovely.  Not really what I was expecting going in, but it's just an absolute delight.

Jumanji: The Next Level - More of the same.  Totally fine.

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News / Re: New DB Mod - Telly

« on: May 06, 2023, 12:03:56 pm »

Gratz, telly!

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

« on: May 03, 2023, 09:25:45 am »

Seasons 4 and 5 of Broad City are both very good.  S4 is a bit better than S3, and S5 is great wrap up to the series.  It's gets far more into the emotional aspect of Ilana and Abbi's relationship, so while it's not as uproariously funny it earns the ending it shoots for.

Second season of Perry Mason isn't quite as good as the first.  It's still really good TV, but the overall conspiracy and investigation, while interesting, isn't as deep or engaging.  The trial is also tough to get invested in.

Watched the first two seasons of Better Call Saul.  The first season is a bit better than the second, as it was obvious they didn't know if the show was gonna work, so it tells a full story that shows you how  these characters could have ended up where they are in Breaking Bad. S2 ends up spinning its wheels a bit, but does provide some good character work and do a good job of putting the characters on an even more direct path for where they are in BB.

What makes it work so well as a prequel is that Saul and Mike were characters that we only ever saw in robot of Walt, so all the people in their personal lives (save only 1 or 2) could easily survive to, and be around in BB.

I put on the first season of The X-Files as a background watch while working.  A bit of a mistake, because it is one hell of a season of television.  Amazing music, stories, cinematography.  Just phenomenal.

Season 3 of Better Call Saul is probably about on par with S2, but with inverted strengths and weaknesses.

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

« on: April 29, 2023, 09:19:30 pm »

Point Break - What was more of a generic and big studio blockbuster chum in 1991 feels like a top tier hyper-specific relic of a bygone era, a'la classic 70s hard-edged potboilers like Dirty Harry or Pelham 123.