Headhunters

          

So as with End of Watch, I saw this shit pop up on Netflix and decided to try it out. For those of you who have never heard of this movie, I'm not surprised. It's actually a Norwegian film. The whole thing isn't even in English, which means I had to read subtitles, and if you chose to watch it you will as well, unless of course you can understand the language used.

Plot
Main character is a man named Roger Brown, winner of the least interesting name ever competition for five years running, though I hear Blandy McBlanderson is giving him a run for his money this year. Anyway, Roger is living the high life with Diana, the epitome of a trophy wife. Roger is spoiling her rotten with his wealth, only problem is, he isn't rich. He claims to live from an inheritance, but in truth he lives his lifestyle by being an art thief. Things go off the rails for him when he steals art from the wrong person. This wrong before being Clas Greve. Clas is some sort of strange ex-military/tracker/hitman individual and you may have guessed he doesn't take kindly to his priceless painting being taken from him. He decides the only proper thing to do would be to find Brown, and fucking murder him.

Alright, so unlike my last couple movie talks, I don't actually have anything major to complain about here. Now don't take that the wrong way, I'm not saying this movie is flawless or it's the greatest thing ever. All I meant to say by that was, I don't see any big fuck ups from the team behind the film. The only complaint I have I mentioned at the beginning; I don't like reading subtitles. Aside from this, I don't have any real criticism. However the issue is I don't really have all that much praise to give to the movie either. Nothing all that good nothing all that bad.

The film ranks for me as okay. Certainly not bad, but not great or particularly note worthy in any meaningful way. I do like how the film ends. It's predictable (fucking spoilers the "good" guy wins) but still plays out in a way I found to be enjoyable with the main character demonstrating his true talent of playing people. But yeah, it's alright, if you've got nothing better to do you might give it a go.

6.5 priceless works of art out of 10

End of Watch

So recently I've been on Netflix (great fucking service btw) and I kept seeing this shit pop up. Netflix kept telling me I would totally love it. So I said fuck it and sat down to watch it.

Plot
So the movie centers around the two guys pictured above. The white guy on the left is named Taylor and the Mexican on the right is named Zavala, typically refereed to as Z. At the start of the movie these two get into a shoot out with some criminals. The event is deemed reasonable and the pair gets reinstated and gets back to fighting criminals on the streets of L.A. The criminals of note are mostly a new gang of Mexican cartels into drugs, murder, human trafficking, and basically all manner of bad things. Zavala and Taylor get wrapped up fighting the new thugs.

So on the whole I thought this movie was pretty decent. I do have one major gripe with the movie though. If you take a look at the picture up there you'll notice a small black object on both of their shirts by their name plates. These small objects are cameras. My gripe with this movie is that something close to half of the movie is done with handheld shaky cameras, or ones like those on their shirts, and the cop car dashboard. This means a few things. The video footage is often not great quality, the angles for shots aren't what you'd really want, and the cameras shakes... all... the... damn... time.

They do have a reason for this, Taylor is doing some video project for a class. They mention this once, for about three seconds, then never mention it again. And to compound things, around about halfway through the film they kinda give up on the whole idea. I'm not saying this idea can't be done. I'm of the mind that damn near anything can be done in a movie, it's all about doing it right. The camera work is still done with care. they need to make sure the viewers see the appropriate things at the appropriate times to get the effect right. But just because you can do something doesn't mean you should. This movie didn't need to be filmed this way. I can't even really wrap my head around why the decision was made to film it like this. Was it supposed to be a neat trick to differentiate itself from the billion other buddy cop films? I don't know but on the whole it seemed like it added nothing to the film. Doing a bit is fine, but do it right. And to use a phrase I'm sure you're all familiar with "You're doin it wrong." So it's a needless bit with a shit justification that they don't even follow through on. That's just dumb and the movie suffers for it.

Another small gripe is that the movie is a bit of a slow burn. The first 45-50 minutes of the movie don't have too much going on. It's not needless time filler, there are things happening but nothing really all that exciting. It's just a lot of set up. In fairness the payoff is quite good, but some people might get bored and give up before they get there.

On the whole, as I said, the movie was pretty decent. But there are a couple issues. Totally ok movie, could have been better.

7.5 extremely aggressive, trigger-happy cops out of 10

YouTube Meoldy - Edition Two - August 14 2013

#1  Rock: Fall Out Boy – My Songs Know What You Did In The Dark (Light Em Up)

God I love this fucking song. Fall Out Boy may not be my favorite band ever, though if I really thought about it they’d probably be in the running; damn they’re good. Fall Out Boy is one of those rare bands that’s been around for a while, and still doesn’t suck. That doesn’t happen very often. Generally when a group has been around for a while they try something different and tend to lose their audience. Based on the 22 million views on this video, I think FOB still has plenty of an audience. My Song know is off their new album, and if you haven’t heard both this and Phoenix….. go do that. Now. I’m serious. Don’t continue reading this post go listen to these fucking songs.

On a side note, this video had one of my favorite comments ever. Something along the lines of, “Why is 2 chainz wearing only one chain?”

#2 Pop: P!nk – Just Give Me A Reason ft. Nate Ruess

I’ve heard some things from P!nk before and she’s generally at least alright, and I have genuinely enjoyed a couple of her songs. One I don’t recall the name of and Blow Me (One Last Kiss). This song….. isn’t like those songs. The songs I’ve heard from pink that I like are her aggressive songs; I mean, one of them is literally called Blow Me. This song, it’s not aggressive. It’s a love song…. Or well a song about really wanting to love. It’s not terrible, and I do really like Nate Ruess’ voice (Btw for those of you who don’t know Nate Ruess is the singer from fun.). Like I said, not terrible, just not really my cup of tea.

#3 Rap and Hip-Hop: 2 Chainz, Wiz Khalifa – We Own It (Fast and Furious)

I find this song in the same vein as most of the very select group of this genre I can enjoy. I only like the chorus. There are a few Rap/Hip-Hop songs I like the entirety of, but this isn’t one of them. I don’t have anything more to say about the song but I’d like to make a short comment about the movies.

I’ve seen all 6 of these movies and I have no qualms about saying this; I like them. I said it come get me. Or, stop and take a second to think before you say there stupid and shallow and the plot sucks. Fucking Duh. Complaining that these movies aren’t thoughtful would be like watching porn and then being upset that it’s that whole time it’s just people fucking. It’s not meant to be thoughtful. Fast cars, pretty women, guns, and Vin Diesel; that’s the summary of every F&F movie. Don’t wanna see those things? Don’t fucking watch F&F.

#4 Electronic: Swedish House Mafia – Don’t You Worry Child ft. John Martin

I'd heard of SHM before, and may have even heard some of their work while trying to listen to knife party but I'm not particularly well versed in their stuff. Electronic music is actually one of my favorite genres and often when I want some nice chill music I'll look up hour long mixes people make and YouTube and let those play. I enjoyed this song quite a bit, though as is the case with 99.999% of live music, it would have been better with a studio version in my opinion.

#5 Top Tracks: Avicii – Wake Me Up

So, Avicii is not the type of music for me. I don’t really have anything all that negative to say about it. I don’t find it bad in any meaningful way. I would certainly take this over a lot of other things but I don’t really find anything all that positive to say about it either. So yeah, totally okay, not at all remarkable.

One the whole, not a great batch this time. Though not really all that bad either. Mostly I just found myself thinking I’d rather be talking about songs that YouTube would recommend after I listened to these. Like Burn from Ellie Goulding. That chick is talented as fuck and if you don’t know about her go fix that. But no those songs aren’t on the front page of YouTube’s music so it breaks the rule I set for myself about this series. Eh oh well I guess. At least I got Fall Out Boy.

Crysis 3

Crysis 3
Release Date: 2/19/2013
Publisher: Electronic Arts

 


It's decent.

Fine. It'll get a real review. 

Normally I say that all EA does correct is their sports games, this is a moderate exception so it will get an honest review. Of how bland it really is and probably ruin my perception of it. 

Let's start with the plot. Oh boy. So basically after Crysis 2 Alcatraz's body is basically taken over by Prophet and he has his memories still. Yeah, I'm not explaining this well but I really don't know what is really going on. Anyways, he is picked up by his old friend/teammate Psycho and they go outside the base where Prophet was being held. Little does Prophet know, New York (and more?) has been taken over by CELL because well..... they're assholes. Why else would you monopolize an energy source for your own personal benefit whilst fucking up the planet?... Nevermind.

Prophet wishes to help Psycho and the resistance against CELL but all this time Prophet is having visions about the aliens (CEPH) coming back, but the leader of the resistance isn't going along with it because she fucking hates him FOR NO REAL REASON. I was helping her all the damn time and all she did was cry that I was part robot... Bitch. In any case, you do what she wants you to and she yells at you for causing more mayhem then she told you to and you would think everything would be good. WRONG! The aliens come back. Oh look, someone named PROPHET predicted something and it came true. Anyways, shit happens and you end up saving the world. Go figure. 

Yeah, if you're wondering why that was explained so shittily, it's because I had absolutely NO idea what was happening about a quarter of the way through the game. I was listening to a mission debrief and had no fucking clue what the person was talking about.... However, despite it's ineptitude in being able to draw in the gamer, it does have a lot of things that are working for it. The obvious one is something that has been consistent throughout the series, and that is the graphics. This game on PC, PS3, and 360 is BEAUTIFUL. This is something that EA did correct with the first and have kept it moderately consistent. Again, even with the lack of engagement with the player I kind of enjoyed it.... The two sessions I actually played it. Even though it only took two days to beat it, it seemed to be about the right length. Nothing too drawn out. The little customization with the weapons was also really good. It was cool being able to use different ammos to make shit explode. And the upgrade system was actually well developed. This brings me to the bad though...

 I loved being able to upgrade my suit of armor, but I never saw the result of those upgrades. Also, the ability to have different sets of upgrades active would have been useful IF I ever needed it. EA literally threw in great features to the gameplay but dumbed the game down to the point where I could have been playing Call of Duty (insert name here). The upgrades were not necessary and I stopped using them. I was playing the game on Hard and they still seemed pointless. Also, I could not play the game for very long. Yes, I finished it in about 2 4.5 hour sessions, but they were spaced about a week and a half apart. It was too repetitive for me to keep going that first time. I had no desire to finish it after the first session, and only finsihed it because I do not return unfinished games to Gamefly. And the bigest thing I have beef with, is the lack of really any new features; there weren't many. Sooo I guess you could say my experience was seriously mixed.... Rating time!!!

With this game, we roll out a new rating system... here we go....

Gameplay: 3 of 10  
Story: 2 of 10
Visuals: 10 of 10
Audio: 7 of 10
Overall: 4.5 perfect landscapes out of 10

And yeah, I didn't mention the bow. Sure, it was fun to shoot people and get my arrows back but I mean, c'mon, don't pimp it out like it's the best thing ever.... Maybe put something really new in your game.

The Lone Ranger

Okay, I just sat down to right this and I already feel the rage building. Let me quickly get through the plot rundown so I can butcher this shit apart and point out all the things it does wrong.

Plot
The guy up there on the right, along with with his brother and a handful of other Texas rangers ride out in search of a big bad criminal. Well, things go tits up and they all die. But then the guy on the left shows up and pulls the ranger out of his grave and waits for him to wake up. Tanto tells him he's now some sort of god damn superhero and he can't die. So superhero and Indian decide to go after the fuck bags who killed him.

Alright let's talk about some of the stupid fucking shit this movie does wrong. First, totally fucking pointless framing mechanism. The whole movie is some old ass Tanto talking to a kid in a fair. But for the most part the movie realizes this is stupid and hopes you forget about it, by them mostly not bringing it up. Next, the main villain, whose name I can't even fucking remember, is cartoonishly evil going so far as to eat a human heart at one point because ya know, shock value.  Next up, and the most glaring issue here, this movies tone is wildly inconsistent. Or let me rephrase, the movie's tone isn't inconsistent, it's just constantly being fucking ruined. Everybody in the movie is playing this straight except one person. Give you one guess who. You're right! Johnny fucking Depp. I'm pretty certain that Depp is incapable of being serious in any role. What has he done recently? Charlie and the chocolate factory,  Alice in wonderland, and of course pirates. In everyone of these movies what has Depp done, be fucking silly. After all that being silly, I think Depp has lost any fucking ability to not be silly. And in being silly Depp constantly fucks the tone of this movie. Everyone is playing it straight with a plot full of back stabbing and trickery and then Depp is prancing around feeding a dead bird saying stupid bullshit like "Something very wrong with that horse."

I recall walking out of the theater thinking this movie was okay, though even then I was thinking it had some issues. But now looking back I can't recall anything I liked about this movie, I can only think of things I hated. In case you didn't realize this, that's not a thing you want someone saying about your movie. At the end of the day this movie is bad. It does so many things wrong and I can not think of anything it does right.

3 stupid fucking quips out of 10

Damn......

Yeah.... I know.... It happened again.... So let's skip the "I'm sorry" 'cause I'm just going to rant for a little while.

 

First off: Fuck you, Microsoft. Fuck you and your damn XBox One. I don't like it and I don't like you anymore. IT'S OVER!!!! Loved the 360, but not looking like I'm going to get the XBox One. It has less capabilities, requires you to connect one a day to the internet (which could cause problems for me), comes out later, and costs 100 dollars extra. So fuck it. PS4 it is. AND WHY THE FUCK CAN IT READ FACIAL EXPRESSIONS?????????? SERIOUSLY, IS THAT A NECESSARY FEATURE???????? (Don't belive me? -- http://www.vg247.com/2013/07/20/xbox-one-microsoft-details-controller-recognition-real-time-facial-expressions/  --read away.) Whew. That felt good.

 

This reminds me: Good job, Sony. You did it, you finally won me over. It took you long enough, but I think we're really going to enjoy this new friendship. Unless you fuck up. Then I might try to switch to Nint--- nevermind. I can't associate myself with a company that has a product called a Wii-U. It's just terrible.  

Random Shit:

 

Final Fantasy XV looks interesting. I want to play it..... Idk if the trailers were actually decent, or if my 12+ years of devotion is kicking in.... Shit..... I should get this checked out.....

 

The Song of Fire and Ice books are well worth the hype. So is the show. I like them both very much. Now all we need is George RR Martin to finish the damn books before he DIES!!!!!!! Seven YEARS???? C'mon man.... That's too long.... That's what she said - Sorry, I'm still torn up over The Office Series Finale..... It's over :(

 

There have been quite a few really good movies that have come out recently. Star Trek: Into Darkness (Even though they reused a lot of plot from an older film), Now You See It, The Man of Steel, Oblivion, and others.

 

Speaking of movies:

 

So help me, Disney if you screw up Star Wars.... Well, I really won't care all THAT much. But there's a looooot of people who will. And if the rumor I heard was true and you're trying to bring in Zac Efron..... You might just be killed on principle. Not by me, again, I don't really care, but hardcore fans will.

 

Sooooooo a Superman Batman movie.... Sounds..... Like they could really end up fucking it up. Sure, some of the cartoons are decent, but a live action movie could turn out baaaaad (Said that like a goat). In any case, they have the superman from Man of Steel returning, Batman is yet to be cast.  

 

Sigh. I think that's it for all. Goodbye.

 

Steve's Journal Days 1-3

Day one
I awoke in a strange place. I’m not sure how I got here, or for that matter even where here is. I'm not even certain of my own name. Steve perhaps? I can't seem to remember. From a quick look at my surroundings, I appear to be in some kind of jungle. Trees, tall grass, and flowers are everywhere. I attempted to scale a rather tall tree, hoping to look around and find… something… someone. I don’t have a phone or a compass or anything. The only thing in my pockets when I awoke was this journal and a single pen. I didn’t manage to get up the tree, I slipped off the vines I had been using to scale the tall thing and fell. I twisted my ankle rather badly after landing on the unforgiving ground. I decided not to try that again.

I saw a desert nearby and decided to go over to it. After walking around in the sand for a bit, I noticed a strange sinkhole. It was a perfect rectangle with some odd looking stone visible just over the top of the sand inside. I wanted to look into it further but I didn’t want to be stuck in the pit and the sun was setting. I thought it would be best if I could find some manner of shelter for the night in case some kind of predator showed up. I did see a pig at one point, I’m not sure I want to be around if something comes to eat him. I was going to burrow a slight bit into a large hill and basically bury myself inside but luckily I found a small cave. I walled off the cave with some dirt a little ways in to avoid anything coming from deeper in and saying hello and mostly closed the entrance before beginning to write. I’m still not sure

My god. I… I don’t know what to say. I stopped writing so abruptly because I saw a man walking in the distance. I called out but he didn’t respond. I squirmed out of my small cave entrance and walked over to him. When I got closed he turned to me. It was horrid.


I ran back to my cave and closed the entrance fully. I spent the rest of the night praying that beast would not break through. I’m still not certain where I am, but I’m no longer sure I want to know.

Day two
A very strange thing happened in the morning. The terrifying monster that spent all night trying to get into my cave… it… it burst into flame.


I’m not sure why, but I’m thankful for it. I decided if I am to survive long enough to get myself out of this hell, I would need some tools. I spent the day gathering wood from the nearby trees then returned to my small cave and spent some time doing what I could to fashion a small bench to work at. I created a poor excuse for a pick and wailed at the stone of my cave for hours breaking of bits and pieces till the wood pick shattered in my hands. I took the stone I’d collected and fashioned more tools.  I saw something I hadn’t noticed last night in my terror. One of the walls of the cave had some black stone embedded in it. I tore at the walls and collected the stones only to realize they were in fact coal. That’s lucky, now maybe it won’t be so damn dark in here all the time.


I managed to fashion some torches by putting a small bit of the coal at the end of stick, not ideal for lighting, but better than sitting in the darkness all night. Aside from that beast that came after me last night something else is odd about where I am. I’ve been awake for nearly two full days now, but I don’t feel the need to sleep. As odd as this is, it’s probably for the best. I fear if I were to sleep something might come as I rested and kill me. Damn this place.

Day three
I decided to back to the strange sinkhole I found in the desert. After carefully scaling my way down I cleared away the sand to reveal a strange rectangular room completely empty except for a strange cage in the center. The cage contained a miniature version of the beast that had came after on my first night and fire. Was this where the beast came from? I had no idea. I decided to surround the strange cage in torches after remembering that I had seen the creature burning in the sun’s light. Perhaps then if the thing in the cage freed itself it would burn in light of my torches.



As I was walking back to my cave, I saw an odd creature. It was tall and walked on four legs. It ran right at me and I feared it wanted to hurt me.  I shouted at it trying to scare it away, but it didn’t care and only continued advancing, I quickly reading the weapon I had made, some with the sharper bits of stone I had collected embedded in some wood, rather like a nail bat really.



I smashed the creature and it stumbled back. I expected it to flee after the first strike but it recovered and it advanced again. I smacked it again, and it stumbled back. This happened a few more times before the creature collapsed. It was filthy but I cut into the beast. I can’t really even be sure why I did it. Maybe I was hoping to see some normal looking organs to at least confirm that not everything had changed. Everything has changed. I found what I believe to be gunpowder inside the beast. I’m not sure what for but I can assume I will find a use for this.

My stomach turned over and growled with hunger. In two and half days I had nothing to eat save for one of the few apples I found in a tree. I saw a pig standing nearby. I felt bad to harm the creature but I was so hungry. I bashed it upside the head with my weapon. I carved at its underside to collect some meat. I noticed a couple more pigs, oblivious of their fate. I killed them too. Tonight, I have some pork to eat.

Runespell : Overture

So green does a top five games of 2012 and mentions all those games will likely have upcoming reviews then reviews two other games instead. Yeah, that is exactly what I did.

So anyway, most of you are probably wondering what this Runespell game is. Runespell is an indie game I found on steam that really wouldn't be all that worth mentioning for any reason save one. But before I mention why it is worth bringing up I wanna talk about everything else quickly that I feel should be in a review.

Runespell is an rpg. You play the character in the above picture named changeling. The story, so far as I've been able to discern, is that some time back your daddy was a bad dude. Your daddy was some sort of evil king who more or less enslaved a large region or people and routine raped the women there in. Some time along a hero showed up and murdered him. The hero then built a castle way the hell away from where he murdered your daddy. Your fate as one of the changelings is to go and avenge your sick and twisted daddy. I do like the fact that when this is revealed to the character you are allowed to point out that this essentially make you the bad guy.

The art of the game is really nothing impressive. Almost everything in the game is static images, the only moving things I've found are the characters in battle and even then only when they perform an attack. The game seems rather lacking on the content side, enemies are routinely recycled to avoid having to draw new ones. Movement is done through a map screen and no area aside from the camps can be gone into. So most of the game is spent looking at the map and looking a the generic combat screen, only maybe 15% of which varies based upon the area, but then again everywhere I've been has been different areas of a snowy mountain so if that 15% of the screen has changed I cant recall noticing it. There's no voice acting to speak of other than possibly during what I hesitantly call a movie scene. I really can't even recall if there is some sort of narrator or not.

So I seem to be talking about a lot of smack about this game but not really hate filled. So this isn't an angry don't buy this piece of garbage. And it isn't a recommendation, at least not yet. Why am I writing this then? Just to talk about a mediocre game? Well if you don't have brain damage you should remember I mentioned that there was one thing that made this game worth talking about. None of the things I've said have sounded at all worth mentioning you say. I agree. The astute among you might realize I mentioned there was combat but didn't talk about how it works. There's only two reasons I would do that. Reason 1: the combat is extremely simplistic and obviously copy-cating another game and is devoid of any finesse and utterly unworthy of mentioning. Reason 2: The combat is worth mentioning and I was waiting on doing so. This is a case of reason 2.

So the combat in Runespell is done by playing poker. No I didn't mess that up. You play poker to fight. Well you sort of play poker. You play a card game that uses the same card combinations as poker. Each player sets out their cards in a fashion similar to solitaire such that there are eight face up cards stacked on face down cards. Each player is then allowed three action points per turn. Action points are used to attack, use spells, or move cards. Cards must be formed into sets of five before they can be used. The set of five cards becomes an attack with power depending upon how good of a hand it is. Thusly a pair with three garbage cards (Because a hand must always consist of five cards) is the weakest attack that can be used and a royal flush (Which I've never yet manged to pull off) is the most powerful attack. One thing that is really cool is you are in fact allowed to steal cards from your opponents so long as those cards are not yet part of a set.  However the corollary is also true ie. your opponents can steal your cards as well. I do feel like sometimes the game is somewhat unfair as more than once I have started a battle in which the opponent got to go first and in their first turn they created a four of a kind which is a reasonably powerful attack.

So all in all, it's a mediocre game with a really neat way of doing combat that I really would like to be able to recommend more than I feel I really can. I got it at 75% for $2.50. I feel like I've got my money's worth out of it, and I probably will play it at least enough to beat it. However, 75% for $2.50 means the game is normally $10. I think that is somewhat over priced for the content you get here. If it was just five dollars and the gimmick sounded cool to you then I'd feel comfortable saying sure drop five bucks and give it a look. However, it is kind of an old game so it is on sale from time to time and there is a demo so you can try it for free before putting out money to get it.

5.5 stolen cards out of 10

Steve's journal series.

Hey Green here.


I've been thinking about starting up a new series. The series would be a story that would come out probably every other week. The story, for those of you wondering, would be a first person narrative written by Minecraft's Steve. It would be done in the style of a journal as if he sat and wrote in the journal each night about the happenings of the day. I would include screenshots from MC occasional in the posts.

I have currently written up the first of this series and I want to say something write now, this series would be a story first and a game second. there are a couple of things in the pictures I took that are not totally consistent with the written text up to that point. I realize this. I'm not trying to lie to your face and notice how many people catch it. The picture are there to supplement the story, not to be scrutinized to ensure they show exactly what's being said in the story. Got it? Good.

Now let me try and preemptively answer a few question I'm sure people will have about the series.

World seed: Colored Media
Structures: On
Difficulty: Normal
Texture pack: Wayukian (Whatever version number it is for the latest edition of Minecraft)
Skin: Star fox

This is not on a server so no I can't play this file with any of you. If you have any other questions feel free to ask them.

Bastion

Today I'd like to talk about Bastion. Now I can pretty well assume that if you've heard anything about Bastion you've heard that it's good. It is good. It's very good. If you've heard two things about Bastion then you've heard that it's good, and that there is a narrator. If you've heard three things, alright I'm done with this bit.

Bastion is an rpg in which you play a character known only as the kid. That's him there facing off against the large blue fellow. Now without the narration Bastion is a completely passable rpg, even I would say a bit above passable. The controls are fine, looks good, love the music, story is decent, not spectacular, but not difficult to follow or stupid.

The narration does however add quite a bit to the game. It's a calm pleasing voice and what I like most about it is that it responds to what is actually happening. If you get slapped around by a boss he'll comment on it. He has comments about each of the weapons that you can bring with you as well as all of the different liqours than you can activate for various other effects. So comments are static comments based upon entering a certain area or killing a certain enemy, picking up a certain item, ect. It's also woven into the story. There isn't a narrator just cause wouldn't that be cool guys, let's put it in and we can sell more. There's actually a legitimate reason for the narration.

Personally I liked the machete and bow myself, and used the two of them for the vast majority of the game. There are however a reasonably large array of weapons. A hammer, a dart gun, a pike, a bow, a machete, a flamethrower, a mortar, a pair of pistols, a shotgun, a rifle, and a rocket launcher. Each of these weapons can be upgraded with an item that corresponds to it and the upgrades are not singular. Each tier of upgrading gives two options. One option might increase damage while the other gives a chance to stun enemies or something like that. There's also a shield the kid always has that can be used for counter attacks. Each weapon has a fun minigame area where you can see just how skilled you are with it, and most of the proving grounds are quite difficult to fully complete.

Another thing I think is worth pointing out is the idol system. Once you get far enough in the game to unlock it you can active various idols to make the game more difficult in a number of ways. It is cool though that the idols increase money and experience gained so there is a draw to use them other than just making the game harder. They're a good risk reward system that is completely optional.

Overall it's a very good game. My only real complaint about it was best said in a youtube comment when I was listening to one of the tracks on the game's soundtrack. The only problem with this game is I can never play it for the first time again.

Now this isn't because of something at the ending of the game that makes everything look stupid. Mainly this is because of the narration. Playing the game again would meaning hearing a lot of it again. But you said it changes! I said some of it changes, and if you got the shit kicked out of you by a boss the first time do you really think you'll have a flawless run the second time? Playing through the game again would yield some new lines of dialogue form the narration, but certainly not all of them new. If you did everything in the game differently the second time you could get, maybe 60% new lines. If you did EVERYTHING different. Playing through it again removes the element the narration adds, which by no means make it a bad game, as I said at the start without the narration it would still be a decent bordering on good game. The problem is that the second time through being compared to the first time is comparing with narration to without, and everything looks worse when compared to something better.

I also want to point out that the new game plus has no difficulty modifier so it's extremely easy since all of your stats and weapons carrier over. Yes, you can use the idols to modify the game and make it more difficult, but it would have been nice to see something like borderlands new game plus in which the enemies are modified to be tougher the second time.

So all in all it's pretty good game bordering on a great game that has an unfairly poor light shed on it after the first time through.

8.5 expertly delivered dialogue lines out of 10