E3 2010: Additional Game Impressions

Here's My quick thoughts on some additional games that were on display at E3 but not shown off during the conferences.

Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (3DS): The N64 classic and self proclaimed best game in the universe will be released on Nintendo's new handheld system. I never played the original game as I didn't get into the Zelda series until Wind Waker. All I've heard about this game is that its really good and the water temple is bitch, which apparently is going to be made a tad easier in this version.

Kingdom Hearts 3D: Really..another Kingdom Hearts game? I love the series but they're really just stalling with the third game. We've already got a prequel coming on the PSP and two handheld titles that take place between the first and second games. Its unknown where in the timeline the game will take place in, but I'll probably play and at least the 3DS's analog nub will make the game more playable than the DS iteration of the series that came out last year.

Sonic Colors (Wii and DS): This looks like it takes what worked about the sonic levels in the Wii version of Sonic Unleashed and made them into their own game. Sonic has some power-ups to use that don't seem to impede the gameplay so is shaping up to be a pretty good title...lets just hope that Sega doesn't predictably mess this up...

Marvel vs Capcom 3 (PS3, Xbox 360): I guess this is the Vs. Capcom's series answer to Street Fighter IV. I don't play Marvel vs Capcom 2 that much but I might give this a shot when my fighting game friends get a hold of this.

Star Wars: The Force Unleashed 2 (Multiple Platforms): This is just further devaluing of the Star Wars series. The purpose of the first game's plot was to bridge the gap from the prequel series to the original movies so making a sequel to that seems kinda pointless...I did kinda like that game, so I'll check this one out in spite of my bitching...

Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode 1 (Multiple Platforms): seems to play more like the DS games than an actual continuation of the original series, but I'm intrigued by the episodic content and my fondness for the series pretty much forces me to want to download this. If I had a choice between Sonic Colors or this, I'd guess I'd go with this one.

Okamiden (DS): I still need to finish the Wii version of Okami before I can even try this, but I like what played in that game and I hope this handheld version doesn't disappoint.

Mario Vs Donkey Kong: Miniland Mayhem (DS): Sadly, this game continues the Mini Mario gameplay that second game used...I want them to go back to the Donkey Kong Arcade style gameplay from the first game.

Star Fox 64 3D (3DS): WooHoo! I love Star Fox 64 and having a portable version of it is a dream come true. I don't know what will be added to the game other than 3d effects but I hope it doesn't mess up with what made the original game.

And so E3 2010 comes to a close...

My Weekend at AWA 2009

This past weekend I unexpectedly went off with a large group of friends to Amine Weekend Atlanta (AWA) in... well Atlanta. AWA is some kind of 3 day anime, video game, pop culture convention that one of my friends go to every year and this year I was invited to go with him and his friends at the cost of 70 bucks. So I figured "what the hell", I've never been to anything like this before and it's been years since I've been on anything even remotely resembling a vacation. What followed may as well have been the most fun I've have all year.

("Part of my motley crew")

There were 12 of us on this trip, a few I've met before (most of them only a week ago) and we plowed into 2 vans and spent about 5 hours on the road heading to Atlanta. The hotel we spent our weekend at was ritzy, but cheap, charging five dollars for some stupid bottle of water and fifteen bucks a night for an internet connection. While in our conjoining rooms, I slowly but surely started bonding with these people. We all had similar interest and attitudes and just had a blast screwing around with each other. The day before leaving I bought the new Mario & Luigi game with intention of playing it when there was dull down-time between events, but I barely touched the thing as I was spending all my time laughing and messing around with my new friends in the room and during the convention itself. ("Various Kingdom Hearts Characters" )
("Angry Video Game Nerd Vs. Nostalgia Critic" )

The main attraction to this convention is seeing a bunch of people cos-play as bunch of different characters. Over the course of the weekend I saw a lot people dressed as my favorite characters: Mario Bros, Zelda, Pokemon, The Joker, and even The Angry Video Game Nerd and The Nostalgia Critic. The thing I learned from all of this is that cos-play is less about people actually wanting to be these characters and more about people just wanting to show off some cool stuff that they made. One of the only things my friends complained about that I noticed more towards the end of the convention is that the cos-players showed an over reliance on certain franchises. Well over 80% of the people dressed up as characters from Bleach, Naurto, or Kingdom Hearts. It would have been nice if there had been more variety of franchise representation.

(It's Over 9000!!!!)

(The Comedian(Justin) and Rorschach)
(The Mario Sisters)

There was quite a full list of events planned at this convention from watching various anime to pokemon trivia contest to cos-play 101, but I didn't attend most of them. Usually the lines to these things were too long for me to tolerate, so I usually spent most of time with one of my friends in the dealer's room where you can buy rare Japanese merchandise. There were action figures, DVDs, video games, dolls, and swords. I managed to walk out there with a Dragonball Z and Sonic the Hedgehog figure, a Kirby doll, and a couple of Mario Galaxy cards. The downside was that everything was overpriced, a side effect of most of the items being imported I suppose.

(Rikki Simons: the voice of GIR)

(Set phasers to stunning)

The place I spent a huge chunk of time at towards the end of the convention was the artist room where people can go and view and buy fan art. Nathan and I spent too much time and money here, but all of the drawings were just too good to pass up. The coolest thing we managed to do in this room was meet Rosearik Rikki Simons who did the voice of GIR from Invader Zim. We got pictures with him and he autographed some pictures and it was just too cool for words. I really wished I had job so I could buy some more stuff. (I think I just rediscovered my love of Pokemon)
(A yeti eating chris's head, a flamer, and Nathan)

Come Sunday afternoon it was time for us to depart this wonderful locale and head back to our dull reality. Overall I had a blast and have come to find the friends I roomed with as people I can't wait to see again. Nathan and I made plans to go another convention in November, but I seriously doubt that would actually come to be. I'll definitely go back to AWA next year if these people go as well.

Spiderman 3 (Review)

I like Spiderman for pretty much for the same reasons everyone else likes him: He's very easy to relate to and he makes mistakes. I enjoyed the first two Spiderman movies. They were fun, exciting, well-written movies that served as grade A examples of how superhero movies can be done. The third film is almost as good but it misses its mark by being a little too...busy. Part of the problem comes from the film featuring three antagonists instead of just one or two. The Sandman is pretty cool or at least the special effects used for him are cool. I never really found him to be a memorable foe in the comics and I must be one of the few people who wasn't bothered by the film making him Uncle Ben's killer. He was just a normal criminal when he killed Ben so it's not like Peter still couldn't have done anything stop him. Harry Osborn taking up the mantle of Green Goblin is fun even though it happens a bit too soon in the series for my tastes. At least it gives actor James Franco more to do this time. Finally the big fish in this villain buffet is Venom, who was pretty much guaranteed to appear when it was revealed that the symbiote would be play a role in the plot. I would have preferred that they held off on Venom for the inevitable sequel as he's just too cool and popular to share the spotlight with another baddie.

The other thing that makes the storyline here overstuffed is the continued and completely unneeded romantic drama between Peter and Mary Jane. Spiderman 2 pretty much had the two where they needed to be as they were together and M.J. knew Peter was Spiderman. In other continuities Mary Jane and Peter get together and M.J. acts as strong supporter for Peter and his problems. They had a strong relationship and pretty much only had minor typical rough patches. It's confusing to me why they felt this movie needed more drama when there's already so much stuff going on.

Even though the movie packs in a bit too much, it's still executed extremely well. Peter wearing the symbiote suit fuels some of the humor as we see him become a huge twat and the situation only becomes irritating during the kinda funny but completely retarded dance sequence. The fight scenes are wonderfully choreographed, one of my favorites being the Sandman fight in the sewer/train track tunnel. The final battle is the highlight as brings together all aspects of the story and wraps them up in a satisfying way. I enjoyed Spiderman 3, not as much as the other two but I believe it does a great job of concluding the over-arching storyline. There's a fourth movie coming, but I'm not really looking forward to it as superhero series don't really do so well after three movies... oh well at least these first three films were good.