futoncast-blog - Tumblr blog

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I'm very busy these days. Here's something old.

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Fuck drawing!

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I told you not to kill the firekeeper.

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March 15 2012

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Jack's Obscure Comic Reviews!

This week:

Batman:  The return of Bruce Wayne!

In the long series of “he have an awesome concept now make a story for it” that all comic companies have used at some point or another, we have Batman: return of Bruce Wayne.  For those who really want the back story, once upon a time in another comics event Batman was killed in by Darkside.  Since Batman is kind of a popular character a crazy bring him back to life story is construed  which has batman traveling through time with no memory of who he is.  Thus we get Caveman-batman, pirate-batman, noir-batman, cowboy-batman, and the kinda lame Pilgrim-batman.  Each story is just batman becoming batman in a different era, all while trying to get back to his rightful time.  There’s also some side plot about him being bobby trapped by darkside and doomed to blow everything up if he gets back to current era, but be honest, that’s not why anyone came to read this book.

I will give the authors a lot of credit, however, this is a book that they could have easily just thrown the plot to the wind, yet they did a reasonably good effort to give the novel some depth.  There are some interesting implications with batman being in different eras, as each new period builds upon the actions he made in previous ones.  Caveman batman starts a new tribe of people, and those people are the ancestors of witches that Pilgrim batman is searching for.  But the era that interested my the most of this novel was noir batman.

Noir batman has a special place in my heart because he had to investigate the murder of Thomas and Martha Wayne, his own parents.  Course having no memory about who he is makes it just a regular case for him, but it still gives me chills to think that Batman was more involved with his parents death than we ever thought possible.  It was a nice reveal that didn’t alter the DC time line, just revealed something hidden about it, and that is always a classy move in my opinion.  I always hate when a one shot ends up to be rewritten out of the canon, or placed in a parallel universe, but in this novel DC was sure to establish that all these events were indeed happening and held real weight.  That kind of dedication to the bigger picture really impressed me, and was the main reason this novel appealed so much to me.

Plot:9/10  Action:6/10  Romance:4/10 Overall Rating 8/10

Jack Approves, THROUGH TIME!

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BONUS

My girlfriend told me I was "like a fish in his little puddle."

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Originally wasn't gonna do a comic this week. Have some donuts though.

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Today we talk about games, games, and more games.

And games. 

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Jack’s Obscure Comic Review!

This week!

Marvel: 1602

This comic is exactly what you would call a throwback, a throw all the way back.  No longer content to reminisce about the golden age of their superheroes, in this graphic novel Marvel throws it’s impressive roster of characters into Elizabethan England!  This is not too big of a stretch for Marvel however, considering the ultimate, noir, and zombie universes they have created for readers to enjoy, it seemed only natural for their to be a Victorian one as well.  I was honestly surprised they didn’t capitalize on the obvious chance to turn the series into a steam-punk marvel!  Perhaps the reason things were not blown out into ridiculous territories would be the head author on the project, a Mr. Neil Gaiman. 

The plot of this novel is an interesting mix of superhero origins.  A mysterious golden sphere is discovered, and thought to hold great cosmic power.  As such, a quest for the sphere between several parties arises.  Whether it is Secret Agent Nick Fury, the blind bard Matt Murdock, or the notorious Count von Doom, all the sphere truly does is provide momentum for the book to retell the origins of all the famous marvel heroes in victorian fashion.  Along the quest we hear the tale of the fantastic voyagers; four shipmates who were cursed by strange magics.  We also run into the grand inquisitor Magnus and the catholic church and their hunt for witches at Xaviers school for gifted youngsters.  I could go on and on with the heroes that get made over in ye fancy old style, but the idea is easily understood.  The only character that steps out of the remake formula in the slightest is Captain America, but as that is a big reveal of the book I’ll leave you to find it out.  Needless to say, it is a nice twist in what was otherwise becoming a slightly repetitive book.

In conclusion, 1602 is just the marvel origin formula all over again, but theirs nothing wrong with that.  One may not find much enjoyment out of the novel if they don’t know the characters that well, but it wasn’t meant for someone like that (all two of them), it was meant for the die hard fans.  The whole story is just an imaginative retelling, and done in the perfect way.  It has enough of the old to keep the nostalgic feeling, but enough new to make it make the readers feel like they are actually going through a new story, not just rehashing through old work.  So although it might not get any gold medals for breaking the mold, 1602 get’s Jack’s very offical seal of approval for being able to retell our favorite marvel hero’s with an entertaining twist.  Marvel you sly dogs you, how many times are you going to get away with this trick?  Still holding out for that steam-punk marvel universe by the way, anytime you’re ready…..

Action: 8/10  Plot:6/10  Romance:N/A  Horror: 5/10:  Overall Rating 7/10

Verily Jack doth approveth!

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Matts Game review: Atom Zombie Smasher

This week is an interesting turn. Atom Zombie Smasher.

Ok, let me just say that I did not expect this game to be so...fun. The game is set as a Risk type map, zombie invasion game where you play as the humans and try to save a many people as you can and save territories as well. This is a simple and yet fantastic game. Let me break it down for yall (western right?)

When you attack a territory, you have your helicopter, which can be used to save the people in the city. Cuz, you know, the more people who get bit by zombies the more zombies and blah blah blah. So you have to save as many people as you can, OR you can defeat all the "Zed's" and take the whole city and gain a new territory. Now after a few missions you get things like snipers, commandos, artillery, all kinds of fun things that go BOOM! So you think that taking city's after a certain point is easy right?

Wrong, because sometimes your units can go on away missions, and that means you cant use some of your units. So this can really fuck you over when you think your going a level 4 city, then you realize all you have is your one artillery and 3 barricades (not joking.) 

But, never fear, because you can always set the mods in it so that you can always pick which units you want and customize it to your play style. 

The game eventually leads up to a point system, where you try to out score the zombies by either more people saved, more territory, the whole dang thing.

Cheap, fun, 2 hour game if you want something new to play. I recommend it.

Overall: 8/10

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My tablet didn't feel like working right and neither does the server.

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This week!

BATWOMAN:  Elegy

Wow….., okay so, batwoman.  Where to begin?  I guess I should try to tell you the plot, but to be honest it’s kind of like explaining a really lucid dream.  There seems to be a natural progression of things, but you just can’t put it all together, and sometimes really random stuff just shows up out of nowhere.  Anyway Batwoman Elegy starts off as your typical origin story.  We begin with the heroine already established and kicking butt, and while we are traveling through a pretty stock “save the day” adventure we get treated to her backstory through various flashbacks and dialogue.

Batwoman is a former soldier turned superhero after she is kicked out of the army because she is gay.  She decides to don the tights after a inspirational moment when Batman saves her from some muggers.  As goes with the having a superhero prefix of bat in your name, she follows the universally understood rules of no killing and having no real powers.  The non origin portion of the plot has to do with a giant coven of occult worshipers meeting up in Gotham city who seem to be obsessed with killing Batwoman, and on a side agenda, generally murdering everyone else as well.  Batwoman goes to stop them, fights their “Alice and Wonderland” themed leader ( That’s her up there on the cover, and I kid you not her name is indeed Alice), and just when things look bleak for our heroine, the animorphs show up to save her.  No you didn’t misread me, just stop and let that soak in for a while.  Here we are in your pretty average story, and out of nowhere a wolfman, and other animal themed people show up.  Not only do they uncomfortably shift the tone of the novel from gritty current-era batman realism to campy 1960’s batman shenanigans, but I swear to god one of them looked just like Squidward and I simply could not get over that for the life of me.

(not pictured:  a fearsome creature of the night)

The animal men pull an unintentionally hilarious, “get to the van!” scene, and then we learn about a secret cult within the cult and blah blah blah.  This was the point that I gave up actually reading the book and just skimmed through the rest.  Let me wrap it up quick, the villain was a long lost sister, the occult group is stopped, and the animal men just kind of keep being animal men.  Satisfied?  Neither was I. 

But besides the plot that went from generic to batshit crazy, there were several other things which rubbed me the wrong way about this novel.  The biggest of which was Batwoman’s portrayal as a lesbian.  Now I want to let it be known right now that this is not an anti-gay thing in the slightest, I am all for equal rights.  But the type of lesbian batwoman is depicted as is stereotypical to the point of insulting.  She wears gothic makeup and tuxedos, flirts with just about every girl she runs into, has a stepmother who just doesn’t understand her, and maintains a balance of between being physically empowered while remaining emotionally unstable.  I will say this for the writers, they have managed to create a character who will simultaneously appeal to both genders of teenagers.  The overly dramatic girls will relate to her, and I don’t need to go into what the hormonally overloaded boys will get out of her.  If we as a society can agree that assuming the gay male stereotype of being extremely effeminate and having a excellent fashion sense is insensitive, then the female counterpart deserves the same amount of respect.

Action 3/10   Story: 1/10  Romance: 1/10   Horror: 5/10  Overall Rating: 3/10

JACK DISAPPROVES

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Matts Game review: Halo Reach.

OK OK I know we have all played halo in our lives and I know I will be probably treading though high water…but I don’t care. Anyway time for one of the most popular games out there right now that is

HALO Reach.

OK so where to be begin…at the beginning of course! This is the first game of the series of halo starting with the awesome yet tragic story of the Fall of Reach. Halo setting is future space with mobile armor and aliens but no space lasers (sadly). So this being the first you get to encounter the first huge wave of them and get to have your butt handed to you. The story consist of you and your squad trying to survive the destruction of your planet Reach. Eventually you save a few people from the hoard and as a final act you SPOILER give your life to hold off the wave of aliens. END OF SPOILER SO why is this game so fun? Because its a shooting game. Also it comes with a fantastic multiplayer for everyone. Such modes include editing, matchmaking, firefight, and….custom? I believe so. Halo is a game that us fun to get a group of friends around and just have a blast shooting each other or doing other things (like playing HORSE on it) Overall halo is a great game. Has a stable campaign and a solid multiplayer. I really like it in compare to other shootout games because I see it as one of the most balanced….unless you make it unbalanced…you cheater. Anyway I say get a couple of guys or girls together and just have a fun time playing an Infection map.

Or message me of you are interested in having a game going. Ill include a gamertag when you message us.

Fighting: 8/10 Shooting: 9/10 Story: 8/10 Fun 10/10

Overall: 9/10

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"Enough talk! Have at you!"

I know it's not Thursday but I don't care.

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PODCAST 2/23/2012

New podcast every week!

This week includes obscure jobs in the 1950's, you will never think of dolphins the same.

Link Dump

http://www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/75068  Me and my Pal, the Dolphin

http://som.missouri.edu/SimCenter/default.html  Simulations!!

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Game review: Limbo

Limbo, bimbo. Lots of fun things going on this week. This week I review Limbo, a physiological platformer game. This game involves lots of puzzle and lots of jump'n and missing platforms and falling and dying. So here's the games story: 

Boy wakes up, cant find sister, looks for sister.

Well, that's all I can say, aside from the giant spiders, people with darts, brain slugs, bear traps and things I cant even describe. So, what makes this game unique? This game involves a small child, jumping and climbing and not dying (expect for the times that he does die then its just horrifying.) 

like this death

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q7z60YyuJsk

or all the deaths...

So pretty dark game right? Pretty strange place right?

Then why play it? Because of the first time you see your death and the face expression you have. Other than that, the puzzles are pretty challenging and its an over all fun game. I would recommend this to anyone who enjoys a good puzzle...and a good death. 

Overall rating: 7/10

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Jack's Obscure Comic Reviews!

This Week,

ENDER’S GAME

The Comic!

For those of you who have not read Orson Scott Card’s amazing sci fi novel “Ender’s Game”, stop.  Seriously, save your tabs, go down to your local library, and pick up this book.  It is one of the most ingenuous stories that science fiction has had since the works of Asimov.  The comic is a mostly faithful retelling of that story in graphic novel form.

Without going into deep detail about the plot ( I don’t want to spoil too much for people who haven’t read the novel yet), the story is set in a world recovering from alien invasion.  Mankind won the war, but is still afraid the alien menace will one day return.  In order to prevent more destruction, mankind unites together and decides to take the battle to the enemy.  Thus battle school is born, a space station where the best and brightest children are brought and raised to become soldiers.  The narrative follows the journey of Ender Wiggen as he battles through school and prepares for his roll in the upcoming war for survival.

As far as the comparison between the book and the comic goes, I feel as thought the graphic novel does a pretty decent job in staying true to the original story.  Nothing has been cut down, and no characters have been removed.  In fact, the only thing that bothered me was what was added, which was mainly violence.  Ender’s Game is mainly psychological thriller, and while their are some combat elements, for the most part the journey is taken through dialogue.  I understand that for a comic having the characters stand around and talk isn’t the best way to make sales, but the way they added some pizazz just seemed a bit too force.  There would be an engaging battle of wills argument between to characters, and then the comic would have them coming to blows or one pimp slapping the other.  Good for visual effect, but I felt it was out of place for many of the characters to do so.

The second issue I had with the comic is probably the best one I can think of,  it’s split up into several stories.  I only had the chance to read the first 4 out of 5 novels, and at first I wondered how they were going to wrap the novel up when their was so much left that had to happen.  After doing some online research I realized that the comic creators had decided to split the novel into two different substories, battles school and command school.  In a world where almost everything is condensed for the sake of time, especially comics, it was nice to see the creators giving the story the proper spacing it required.  Yes it means I have to go out and buy the second 5 part series, but for a true to book retelling it’s worth every cent.

Action: 7/10    Horror: 4/10  Romance: N/A  Plot: 10/10  Overall Rating: 8/10

JACK APPROVED!