E3 2017: What Didn't Suck

So another E3 has come and gone. We had a ton of stuff to see, but want to know what's good? Want to know what didn't suck Donkey Kong balls? What to spend or save up for this fall or next year? I made a little list that showcases what was really cool. Enjoy.

Assassin's Creed: Origins

The latest game of the Assassin's Creed series looks to be an epic. Set in Egypt the game is set to go all the way back to the beginning, if the tittle doesn't tell you that already. The gameplay is tweaked a bit different this time adding more RPG-esque elements to the classic style we're used to. Gameplay shows that you'll use animals as well as the main character uses a hawk to scout the area.

Shadow of the Colossus

One of the best games of the PS2 is being remade and it is being remade in updated glorious graphics. The first one was a masterpiece so other than the graphics, there is nothing else they need to change. Hopefully it doesn't take 12 years for this to come out like The Last Guardian.

Days Gone

We saw another glimpse of Days Gone this time. Last year we saw just zombies hordes. A massive collection of zombies. This year we get a larger look of the world in this game. Zombies aren't the only bad guys you encounter as you also have to fight off marauders as well. In the gameplay demo, you see just that as they set off a booby trap to try to kill you. Luckily you can craft up traps or even use zombies to set things up and turn the tables around and make yourself the trapper. You can also get work from maurader camps as quests to go further on in the game. What is also unique is that levels change making certain encounters different as you play. There is a lot going on in this game.

Dragonball Fighter Z

I know, a Dragonball Z fighting game that is worth playing? I know they are all basically the same and they grow like weeds each year, bu this game is different. The art style is really impressive as it flows like you're watching the anime. It's 2D but at times it switches to 3D. It looks really stunning. so button mashing or no button mashing to win aside, there's that.

Metro Exodus

The third entry in the series. You've played the other two so what's different? The game has been described as sandbox horror in contrast to the other games meaning that you will have more non-linear levels compared to the linear ones in the past games. Along with this it's in beautiful 4k so kill mutant animals in high definition!

Doom VR

Doom was a pretty awesome game so what would be better? Playing it in not just VR but, VFR. I'm sure the F stands for fun, I think...

Crackdown 3

We finally get another Crackdown game. So, everything you love about the last crackdown game you'll love in this as everything is done on a grander scale. Grander abilities for agents, grander cel-shaded art style, and more explody goodness. Oh, and Terry Crews is in it so that's not bad.

Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus

Wolfenstein is back! Everyone rejoice, except Nazis. This game looks like it will be more fun than blowing up a barrel of Hitlers.

Beyond Good and Evil 2

This game is back from development Hell. All we got was a trailer, but then again a sure sign that this game is not in the scrapheap is all we need.

Destiny 2

We saw a bit more of Destiny 2. It's not going to be identical to the first Destiny. This time around there will be some tweaks. First off is that the newly revamped weapon system. Weapons will be classified as Kinetic, Energy, and Power weapons. This beef up other weapons as the Scout rifle and the grenade launcher so you can not only customize, but experiment using other weapons in the mix. Bungie seems to be very concerned to fixing a lot of issues with the first Destiny and making improvements. We can't wait to see the finish product when it comes out.

Vampyr

We saw Vampyr last E3 and we get to see it again for this one, joy! So for those who don't know, Vampyr is a action role playing game where you are a recently turned vampire doctor in old London. Like all action role-playing games, you have decisions that change the course of gameplay. What sets it apart from the others is how you level up in the game, feeding off of the citizens of London. As which choices and consequences you can kill and gain vampiric powers, but risk vampire hunters and London on your ass along with other vampires. You do have the option to not kill anyone in the game, but this raises the difficulty in the game and fighting off your enemies as well.

Everything Nintendo

Nintendo really came with their A-game this E3. It seems that even before their E3 digest they were giving us great goodies like the Mario and Rabbids game and a peak at the Switch version of Skyrim. When it came for them to finally show what they had in store for us it was worth it. We got a demo of Super Mario Odyssey which looks glorious. Inspired by the exploration and creativity of Super Mario 64 and Sunshine it looks like won't disappoint us. Splatoon 2 looks like it will be better than the first. New Kirby. New Yoshi. Also if that didn't have you excited just yet, not only do we have one Metroid game coming up, but we have TWO with Metroid Prime 4 in the works.

Wonder Woman: Did It Suck?

     One if the most anticipated comic book movies is out right now! All the world was waiting for the movie to come out and see the magic it could possibly do and for good reason. This is the fourth movie in the cinematic DC universe. With Man of Steel, Batman vs Superman, and Suicide Squad failing to wow us compared to Marvel's well oiled universe machine, the universe isn't so very interesting at all so far. Is it time to reboot the whole thing like they do in the comics or will Wonder Woman save the day.

     Heads up Zach Snyder is involved in this, but only as one of the writers and one of the producers. Patty Jenkins who gave us Monster with Charlize Theron is director. For those who read the comics, Wonder Woman's origin story is almost the same. The movie is pretty much set in World War I and the story begins in the same way in the comics. Diana, princess of  Themyscira, saves US spy Steve Trevor who crashes near the island of amazon warriors. Hearing about the war, Diana takes up the duty to help man and journey into Man's world and stop the war, oh and kill Ares because he's influencing the whole thing. No punching Hitler and there's no Amazon competition, we don't have time for that, Diana has to save the world.

Script
     The script was pretty good. They captured the sense of who Wonder Woman was in the comics. Wonder Woman is not just a kickass Amazon in satin tights fighting for our rights. She is a strong woman in strength and on the inside, being just as nurturing just and caring as well. The script did a good job playing with her character who's thrown out not in Mans' world but a world that was in in decay from the war. Jenkins, the director did a great job evoking the emotion of how dire and helpless everything was in the war and how Diana experiencing it all was dealing with situation. You felt along with her seeing what she see and experiencing what she is going through and wanting to help. The best scene from the movie was the No Mans Land scene which was the heart of the movie and where you strongly felt the understanding of Diana and the movie's message. It was more than a superhero movie. More than your generic superhero origin film. It was an origin movie with purpose. Most of the reason Diana fought was more to actually help and you felt that instead of it being like other movies where the action scenes where put in to look cool or the hero learns what it is to be a hero at the end. Everything in the movie (flow, pacing, and writing) worked and was woven incredibly well. Add an emotional script with cool fighting scenes, even though that zoom effect could be kinda annoying at times and wholla: you got a interesting film.

Acting
     We've seen Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman in Batman vs Superman. In that movie we only got a small glimpse of her character, but in in the title film is where Gadot shines. She got the whole innocence and purity and courage of who Diana was. The movie was Diana growing and becoming her own person in the movie in her quest to stop Ares and you got a sense of her seeing how she was learning things outside of Themyscira and Gadot portrayed that feeling beautifully. Chris Pine was surprisingly good in it as well. The chemistry between Galdot and Pine was well done. What I liked about Steve Trevor's portrayal in the film was that he was fighting alongside Diana. It wasn't just her saving the day. He didn't feel like the sidekick at all. He was there to assist in battle and guiding Diana through our world. Pine did a great job.

Final Verdict
    Did Wonder Woman suck? Strangely enough that Zach Snyder had involvement, not at all. It is an epic movie where everything worked well and works well together. The acting, the writing, the pacing. It was done almost effortlessly. DC and Warner Bros. needed this film to be amazing after the bombs of Batman vs. Superman and Suicide Squad. This movie is the mark. This movie needs to be the example of how the future DC movie universe movies need to be made. Sometimes it takes a woman to set things right 4 out of five stars.

How Will Zelda Mobile Play?

For the past year Nintendo has finally decided to make the leap into mobile gaming. And mostly with success. We had Miitomo and Super Mario Run which were both hits which generated millions of downloads. Then we had Fire Emblem Heroes which had a modest success. And let's not forget the reason we all braved the outside last summer, Pokemon Go. Of course with Nintendo doing so well with their mobile titles so far, and also promising to release a few titles each year, it is only plausible that not only would the company would make mobile versions of their other bigger titles.
     According to the Wall Street Journal, Nintendo is working on a Zelda mobile game. Nothing is confirmed yet and these are just so far only rumors. How exactly would a Zelda mobile game work?
Quite well. Zelda would be perfect as the series is known to be one of the best puzzle adventure games ever. But how will it look?
     If you could imagine probably it would work you can go back to the Game and Watch version of the original Zelda. In that version, they pretty much scaled down things by taking away the overworld and mainly focused on the dungeons of the game. But of course, unlike the basic Game and Watch versions Zelda mobile will probably retain the puzzle aspects of the series that we all love. The game could work like Super Mario Run where the dungeons will be level based and have you explore dungeons with different and more difficulties as you progress through the game. Because this is a Zelda games you have to have items to help you on your quest. You could rent or buy certain items like A Link Between Worlds to help you progress through dungeons. There might even be a magic meter like in most games that wears out if you use an item too many times.
     There's the question of how microtransactions will work, because of course this will be a freemium game and Nintendo needs more money. You can earn rupees (money) buy completing certain tasks or paying for them with real money. Gameplay might also depend on the magic meter that if it runs out, it might refill over time. Also like Super Mario you may have to buy certain dungeons to get the full game experience.
    Regardless of how the game will turn out I'm sure that we will love it, and Nintendo will love us throwing money at it. However another question about the game haunts us: Where will it fit in the timeline?

What are your thoughts?

Will Nintendo's E3 Plans Deliver?

     Recently we learned that Nintendo has huge plans for this year's E3. As the same old they decided to not do a live presentation and go the direct, literally, route with doing a video presentation and the annual Nintendo Treehouse competition. What they're offering this year is a playable demo of the upcoming Super Mario Odyssey, more info on the upcoming games Splatoon 2 and ARMS as well as tournaments for said games too, and more.

     It's good and also kinda assuming that we finally get a playable demo of Odyssey. It is one of the most anticipated game for the Switch this holiday season as wel as the biggest title as well. We're looking forward to see what it has to offer and how things will be this time around. The same goes for Splatoon 2 and ARMS. People have accepted both games well. 

     Now to the topic, how well will the Dircet will be. That depends on what Nintendo has to offer not only this quarter but the next quarter. The Switch has already done better than the Wii U and that partially has to do with the titles they released so far. It is their fastest selling console with almost one million units sold since its start in March.
     The magic word Nintendo needs to know is consistency. We need Nintendo to have a strong lineup of games. It will be interesting to see how Nintendo does things past launch. So far what they're doing is good. They need to keep the momentum or up the ante. Hopefully they will keep things in the right direction. 

Power Rangers - Did It Suck?

     After 10,000... no wait, a couple of years the Power Rangers reboot is in theaters. If you don't know what Power Rangers is first of all how? Second of all I'll tell you. Power Rangers is a TV franchise where a group of teenagers with attitudes are giving powers by a giant talking head in a tube called Zordon who are tasked to save Earth from evil aliens. It was Japanese footage from the series Super Sentai mixed with American footage and American actors that made 30 minutes of awesome. The series is still running after 30 years, but during the 90s it was a mega hit. I'm talking about HUGE. There were an insane amount of merchendise and toys that drove parents crazy, including my own. Now there the original story is being re-introduced to a new generation retold as an more grittier reboot. I saw it. Did it suck?

Story
You've heard the story before. Zordon recruits a team of teenagers with attitudes to become Power Rangers and save the world? The story is a bit different this time. We were promised that this movie will be a more darker and grittier reboot of the series. It wasn't darker or grittier as the movie gave the original characters from the show: Trini, Zach, Kimberly, Billy and Jason more character and backstory. It's very much teenagers with not only attitudes but with problems. Think Degrassi, with superpowers. You got a lot of character background in this movie. Billy is the nerdy outcast, Kim is the a not so popular popular girl, Jason is a football jock that once had so much promise but fucked things up by getting into trouble with the law, Zach has to care about his ailing mother, and Trini aside of a running gag of everyone getting her name wrong is basically Ally Sheedy. I think the director had the Breakfast Club in mind while making the movie. It's cute and all, but it's obvious that Breakfast Fast club had a better job with character development than Power Rangers. At least the movie in its two hours had better character development than the tv series did the original cast during their run on the show. Action did take a bit of the back burner in order for you to get to know the characters with all the serious stuff happening in the later half of the movie. The movie did have a lot of jokes. They were the saving grace of the movie which made it a lot more entertaining. It took the opportunities to poke fun at certain things not only in the movie, but the show itself, which is not a bad thing as the show itself is now considered to be camp and over the top watching it now.

Acting
Most of the cast except for Zordon, Rita, and Alpha are mostly unknown actors. When it was announced who will be the Power Rangers in the movie, we were a bit skeptical. Will they do a good job, being the characters? A matter of fact they did. The biggest surprise has to go to RJ Cyler who played Billy and Darce Montgomery who played Jason. Both actors were the break away characters in the movie. Most of the cast did a great job, well most meaning everybody except for Elizabeth Banks. Her rendition of Rita seemed off. Not the iconic screechy voice in the Tv series, off but let me using different accents in certain scenes off. This surprised me as Banks is usually good in other roles I've seen her. Brian Cranston was great a Zordon, not a surprise as this is Walter from Breaking Bad. Bill Herter did an alright Alpha that didn't turn out as annoying, like in the show.

Final Verdict
Power Ranger overall seemed to be cute. It was a nice throwback to the series and in most cases it was funny. However with it main focus which was character development, it did a good job, but there are other movies that do it better. It tried to be a superhero version of the Breakfast Club but it didn't do a morphinominal job at that. Despite that it was a good movie, not great. Good. It gets a 3 out of 5.

Where Does Breath of the Wild Fit in the Zelda Timeline?

     Breath of the Wild is simply stunning. The game all about exploring an incredibly vast Hyrule as you brave trials and formidable odds in order to save Princess Zelda and Hyrule from Calamity Ganon. You can say fans are extremely satisfied with the game, or almost. While the game is incredible, one question or you can say one quest is left for fans to explore: Where does Breath of the Wild fit on the Zelda timeline? Beware of spoilers down below.

     For those who don't know most of the games in the Legend of Zelda series have been disputed exactly where they fit and relate to each other and theories of where they fit in a timeline have been one of the biggest mysteries in gaming, with few clues given, until Hyrule Historia officially revealed a map of where everything fits. There is a line where a few games are pretty linear like Skyward Sword happening before The Minish Cap. It gets funny when it gets to Ocarina of Time where there are three branches which is no wonder as that game deals largely with time travel. The three branches are a timeline where Link is returned to as a child at the end of the game (The Child timeline), the timeline that takes place after the events of the game (The Adult timeline) and a paradox timeline where Link fails to save Hyrule (The Fallen timeline).
    Like games before, Breath of the Wild gives sorta vague clues. In the game you do experience not only the ruins of the Temple of Time, but ruins of Lon Lon Ranch so this indicates that the game takes place after Ocarina of Time. Narrowing things down? Not really. Most of the games take place after Ocarina of time. Some fans have indicated that maybe the game takes place in the Fallen timeline as Link in this game has failed and has to be put to sleep for hundreds of years and the Master Sword is in the Lost Woods like A Link to the Past which is in the same timeline. While the former might be obvious, the latter could also be just a decision of visual artistry as the image of it resting in the Lost Woods is an iconic moment in the game. You do have things like certain creatures existing like Koroks and Ritos in the game which existed in other timelines, but that doesn't mean much as the series have done thing like put certain characters in other timelines as well.
    One theory is that the game takes place far in the future past the other games and is in a convergence time where the branches are rejoined. An example of this is where it has been stated that the Sacred Beasts in the game have fought Ganon 10,000 years years before and again 100 years and in during the final battle where Zelda has stated that Ganon, in his primal form has been tired of being reincarnated and that his final form in the game is his rage of doing so.
     So, let's get down to the nitty gritty. Does Breath of the Wild fit in the adult timeline? Not really. Even though it references a lot of stuff and creatures in that timeline according to the events in Wind Waker, Hyrule is under attacked by a somehow unsealed Ganon which causes it to flood and later on in the game Hyrule is forever in the bottom of the ocean, where the Temple of Time and Lon Lon Ranch is. It is most likely that it is in the Child timeline or the Fallen timeline, more so the Fallen timeline since what happens in the game seem to have a scenario where Link and Zelda fails and does have to restore Hyrule to its glory. Of course nothing is certain until Nintendo officially reveals where it is and shocks us all once again.

What are your thoughts?

Should Nightwing Be A TV Series?

     Warner Bros, while trying to make sense of not only the entire DC universe but the recent Batman movie fiasco, is apparently making a Nightwing movie in the future. No release date or news or who's on board for the movie has not been revealed other than it is being made by Chris McKay from the Lego Batman movie and it is being written by Bill Dubuque who wrote The Accountant. For those who don't know who Nightwing is he's Dick Grayson, the first Robin, deciding to be the JC Chasez to the Justin Timberlake Batman-led dynamic duo an venture off into a solo super hero. While a movie may be cool and all, there are some things that question Warner Bros' decision to make it a movie and maybe making it a TV show might work better.
     First of is the obvious, we have no fucking idea what is going on in the DC movie universe most importantly the Batman part. Batman vs Superman and Suicide Squad hasn't really established a clear map of when things have taken place. We do know that there was a Robin, but one he's dead and two it's Jason Todd not Dick Greyson. BvS is suppose to be when Batman and pretty much every other hero aside from Superman are brand new and things that we know in the comics haven't happened yet. There's no clear indication when Batman went through already two different Robins before he started fighting crime, especially when we haven't even gotten a full story on Batman yet.
     Maybe a TV series can help explain things by taking place a few years after whatever may come from the upcoming Batman movie? There is a possibility that the Batman movie and maybe even the Justice League movie might give a better story about Jason and Dick, but a show doing that would probably go smoother than anything the movie universe might try. There could even with a Jason Todd/Red Hood storyline that might play out better than it would in the movies.

What are your thoughts?