#i love when videos are released and none of the players look like they’d rather kill themselves than be there

[sincerelymarner]

the W in WHL stands for winners

[queenofthemindynasty]

Even If You Say ‘No’ - pt 8

Pairing: Hoseok x Fem!Reader

Summary: {Y/n}, a brilliant, young producer at BigHit Entertainment, tends to be overly self-critical of her work and scarcely gives herself credit when it’s due. Hoseok, A.K.A. J-Hope of BTS, puts so much effort into keeping up the spirits of the other members, he hardly has time to worry about his own well being. What will happen when the two cross paths?

Genre: Angst, Fluff, Idol Universe

Warnings: explicit language, implied self-harm

Word Count: 2143

{Y/n} posted on Twitter about the mixtape’s release when she arrived home. The next morning, she checked her notifications. What she saw was a blast of freezing cold water to the face. 

A thousand likes, three hundred retweets, and twenty seven comments. 

She checked the other platforms. Since she was a new artist on Spotify and had only recently made an account to release Mirrors on, so she wasn’t sure how to find the number of streams on the album. But on SoundCloud, she could see that it was just short of a thousand likes and only twelve hundred streams. And on BigHit’s YouTube channel, the music video didn’t even have one million views. 

It was fine. It had only just dropped eight hours ago, and most people had probably been asleep at the time. It just needed a bit more time. It always took a while to get the notification out to everyone anyway. 

But by the next day, not much had changed. She saw that @bts_twt had liked her Tweet, and Hoseok had posted a screenshot of the title track on the Spotify player, which had gotten quite a bit of attention. But what else was to be expected? The comments on his Tweet were mostly just things directed to him and the boys anyway, like, “I love you, Oppa!” and, “When is BTS releasing their next album?” The same went for the posts from BigHit. Hoseok’s post had only caused hers to about double in likes, but still very few people had commented. The stats on YouTube and SoundCloud hadn’t gone up by much either. Maybe people were still working on translating everything. That had to be it. 

Now it had been a week since Mirrors’ release. {Y/n} had been counting the days as they passed by along with the numbers. She was beginning to lose hope. For the most part, things had remained stagnant since the second day. It was looking like she’d gone completely off the radar by now. 

Today, {Y/n} decided to try and look into the number of Spotify streams, and she eventually managed to figure it out. However once she saw it, she wished she hadn’t. 

Six thousand. 

Not six million. Six thousand. 

A deathly feeling washed over her. This was what the years of anxiety, hardships, failures, improvements, sacrifices, and sleepless nights amounted to. What was she doing? Why was she sitting at this desk in this studio? Why was she here? What had made her think it had been a good idea to follow this path? She wanted to cry, enough so that this little room would fill up with tears and drown her. If this was what chasing after her own naïve fantasies got her, she would have preferred to just die. No one would have missed her anyway. 

It had been weeks since the negligent mistake she’d made. Since she had allowed Seokjin to walk in on her and Hoseok in her studio. Since then, the two of them had had barely any chances to spend time together. They’d say ‘Hi’ to each other every once in a while in the hallways, but that was the most face-to-face interaction they’d get outside of work-related matters. Of course, that wasn’t the end of the world. They still had the ability to talk via keyboard. That was what she would have thought. And yet, it rarely ever happened. They no longer shared late-night conversations over text, and he never called her anymore. The most she would get from him these days was the occasional quick check-in like, “Have you eaten today?” or “Don’t stay up all night!” She’d always answer as soon as she got the notification, but receiving a reply to that would usually take at least five minutes given that she did get one. He’d always been busy, but not for every single waking hour. Even during days off. She was sure he was just trying to be cautious. He and the boys rarely had much privacy while they were around each other, which practically was every single waking hour. She appreciated his efforts, but despite that, a dark feeling still clung to her insides. Hoseok’s silence could almost be called excessive. Wouldn’t he at least be able to chat with her at night, with the rest of the world oblivious to any words the two of them might exchange? She wasn’t expecting him to drive over to her apartment in the middle of the night or anything. Maybe just a few words about how his day went or what his schedule had been like lately. Maybe even one or two pictures of himself that he’d taken during the day. Anything as long as it went past three messages between them both. But there was nothing like that. 

Her fingers thrashed around, tangled up in the cheap pair of earbuds she carried around. This couldn’t go on for any longer. It was like she was incomplete not having him as a permanent factor of her daily life anymore. She missed seeing his smile, hearing his laugh, feeling his touch. He couldn’t be blamed for not reaching out to her; it probably wasn’t his fault. But they’d seen each other too infrequently as things had been before this whole disaster had started. Now it was even worse, all because of the silly agreement he’d been forced into along with the other six boys. They had to escape this somehow. 

“So what do you think?”

She clenched her teeth as she waited for Hoseok’s answer. His hands were clasped together on his lap, and he sat with a relaxed posture across from her. “{Y/n}, I know our relationship is important, but I just don’t see that happening.”

“Why not?” she countered, her words gaining a biting inflection. “There are plenty of other idols who have public relationships.” 

“Yes, but most of them are retired. Plus, we’ve already signed the contract, and everyone knows that—”

“Who gives a damn about that stupid contract? We never did.” A voice was telling her—urging her—to stop herself from going down this path, to turn back before it was too late. But she disregarded it. “The company’s rules are outdated and just—just messed up. Why should we have to follow them?”

He shook his head. “Don’t you think you’re being a bit unreasonable?”

“Unreasonable?! Is that what our relationship is to you then?” She glared at him. What was his problem? Why was he acting so superior all of a sudden?

Hoseok’s shoulders rose, and he sat up straighter. “No. I’m just saying I don’t think this is a good idea.”

“So you’d really rather us not see each other at all than try to fix this?”

“What? No!” His brows twisted. “What the hell gave you that idea?!”

“Well, what else can be done about it?!” she shot back in an accusing tone. “We’ll only be free to do what we want if people accept us, or else we just continue on like we have been.”

An irritated sigh left his lips. “Listen, you’re not—”

“Shut up!” 

His eyes widened. 

“Don’t tell me I’m not worth it. I already know that.”

“Why are you acting like this? Why won’t you listen to a single thing I say?!”

“Because! I already know what you’re about to tell me.” His nose upturned and brows creased, he shook his head, speechless. “You don’t want to go through with this because you’re ashamed to be seen with a worthless piece of shit. Am I wrong?”

He tossed up an arm in disbelief. “That’s—” he half-scoffed, half-laughed, “—not true at all! Why would you—”

“Admit it.” She swallowed hard, spiting her own weakness. “I was never good enough, was I?”

“Babe, please. You’re—”

“Don’t call me that. I don’t want to hear it.” It was impossible to look at his face for a fraction of a second longer. “Just…leave.”

“What the—for fuck’s sake, you can’t even listen to a word I say, can you?!” he accused, standing abruptly, the desk chair reeling backwards at the sudden movement. Hoseok’s figure towered over her. “I can’t do this anymore. Shit, none of this would’ve happened if I’d never met you!”

Whatever she’d been preparing to spit back at him in defence lodged in her throat, taking the form of a rock. She choked back her tears, too angry at him to be sad. “You know what?” she stood up to confront him. “I just wanted us to be able to spend more time together, but with the way you’re acting now, forget it!” She was using every ounce of willpower in her to keep her voice from shaking. “Just go! And don’t ever come back! I don’t ever want to see you again!”

Hoseok’s tone lowered. “Fine then, you won’t.”

Wait, that wasn’t right. 

But before {Y/n} had the chance to object, the door had already slammed shut behind him. Hoseok was supposed to refuse to leave until he’d made her realise how much he truly loved and cared about her. Not this. Something in her, having been chipped and fractured over the duration of whatever this had turned out to be, finally shattered and vanished. Maybe it was the tiny sliver of hope that she’d had left: that everything would resolve itself in the end no matter what she did. But that thought had gone out the door along with him. She’d been helpless to stop it. Just like she was now helpless to stop the tears from falling to the floor. 

All {Y/n} could do after what had happened was cry. It was all she could think about day and night. Even when she tried distracting herself with work as Map of the Soul: Persona would be coming out in two months, she couldn’t tear her mind away from the constant thoughts of overwhelming regret. Now more than ever, it felt like she was being drowned to death. If only she had wings and could fly to Fukuoka so she could apologise to him, free herself from this emotional prison. But of course, even if she could, would she even have the courage to face him? It was clear enough to anyone that he’d seen her face enough to last the rest of his life. There probably wasn’t much anyone could do to change that at this point. They shouldn’t have even gotten into a relationship to begin with. If only she could just forget everything. 

When her phone dinged at 11:54 at night with a notification from V Live, signaling to her that Hoseok was starting his birthday countdown broadcast, she considered ignoring it at first, knowing it would only worsen her mood and keep her awake longer. But it was obvious that she wouldn’t be getting any sleep either way, and she’d be an even more despicable person than she already was if she did ignore it. 

As she watched silently, fingers still and removed from the comments section, not much of what he was saying got processed. She could only focus on his precious little chuckle and nervous fumbling and radiant grin and how much she loved and adored every part of him. But these things only served as reminders that he didn’t need her love or adoration. It was without a doubt that he wasn’t wondering if she was watching right now. She could tell just by the joy in his smile that she was the last thing on his mind. Every time he addressed the Army and told them how much he loved and appreciated them for their birthday wishes, he wasn’t including her. The Twitter fandom had posted messages with such unparalleled thoughtfulness in their hashtags, #OurPieceOfPeace and #LightOfHopeDay, for example. She hadn’t even been able to bring herself to Tweet anything. She and he hadn’t been together for a year before it all ended, and she’d always assumed that they would be celebrating this birthday as a couple. She’d even bought him something as a gift before everything went to ruin, but it was impossible to give it to him now. 

Before her mind could process what was happening, Hoseok was wishing his viewers good night after struggling to figure out how to end the broadcast, and her screen was plunged into darkness with a message saying, “Broadcast has ended. Uploading for replay. Please wait.” 

Then to her surprise, the message went blurry. 

Tears were once again springing to her eyes. Hobi was gone, lost to her. And he was never coming back. All she could ever do was cry. 

After so many months without seeing it, she once again found herself picking up the familiar, stainless-steel blade out of the drawer of her nightstand, a weak smile creeping its way onto her face. 

[talenlee]

Here’s a one-part diary, one-part itinerary, one-part aspirational documentation of what I did this past year as best I can explain it and we’ll see how well we go as we go with it. This wrapup is at least in part to look at what I did, but also to try and get a handle on my own feeling of yawning lack of accomplishment. If you didn’t do a lot this year and you get overwhelmed by lists, please don’t read this because it might make you upset. On the other hand if you want a wrapup of the kind of things I do and try to do… well, hey, checkit out.

Writing

I got back into writing daily in July, and did so consistantly throughout the year. Part of what let me get onto that schedule better was the use of a Bullet Journal, a tool I found very handy for tracking my progress as I blogged and recorded my mental health and wellbeing. A material object is very satisfying to handle, so I recommend it to anyone struggling with frantic feelings of impermanence.

Of the things I wrote, it seems the things people were most interested in were the articles on Jace, and my Amerimanga covers, with a late-year run-in for Perry’s Lock story.

Study!

I finished my honours thesis, and did well enough to get an almost-but-not-quite top rating mark. The research was considered interesting enough to serve as the basis of my PhD, which I then applied for, and my application was approved. This was a really harrowing experience – I thought writing and applying would take a few weeks at most, but it took almost two full months of work.

My Honours thesis is listed under my government name so I’m reluctant to share it as is, but the basic gist was to try and tackle the idea that when critically engaging with games, play is a paratext, rather than text. That is, there is no true textual analysis that can be done of play without recognising the input of the player, but, you can examine the play the player brings if you recognise what the player means to the reading. This wound up forming the basis of my Making Fun videos.

Reading!

I don’t read enough, I tell myself, so I did my best to read more. When I found myself reading, I made sure to share it and indulge in it, which helped me focus on reading more. Interestingly when you share reading you’re necessarily framing it, which means you’re sort of explaining it, a thing that made approaching some books a lot easier. I’d wind up at the end of a book realising I’d explained it and understood it, without noticing that’s what I was doing.

The Grasshopper: Life, Games and Utopia, by Bernard Suits

Alien Phenomenology: What It’s Like To Be A Thing, by Ian Bogost

Paratexts: Threshold of Interpretation, by Gerard Geanette

Game Play: Paratextuality in Contemporary Board Games, by Paul Booth

Understanding Media, by Marshall McLuahn (SUPER dense)

I also read some manga and comics, and some of those I’d recommend are:

Sense Art Online

Lumberjanes

Irredeemable

Top 10

I also reread Nation, by Terry Pratchett, which isn’t at all interesting because this is merely one of my favourite books and just one of the best things he ever wrote. Also, one final note to Blades in the Dark, a game book I really liked and makes me very excited.

Robots!

I made a bunch of twitter robots, which are basically an automated way of playing with text. They seem like they’d be harder than they are – and you’d be surprised once you get past a certain threshold how well they do things you forgot you told them they could do, or never realised. You can look at all of them here.

Media!

This year I made a protracted point, as well, to actually watch some TV! That may sound like a really minor thing, but TV these days is such a vast thing that there is some cool stuff there. What’s more, TV you can’t interact with and you can’t be expected to get wrong – which can make it good for relaxation and trying to diminish anxiety. I know I watched all of the first two seasons of American Horror Story back to back while in the grip of The Worries, and you would think that would be distressing but it was kind of the opposite.

This also broadened my palate and gave me more ideas for stories. As a nearly non-stop Youtube watcher as well, I’m already in the market for short, informative videomaking, which I also got into, so longer-form, higher-production stuff – even stuff like just Bob Ross was good to watch.

I also took this chance to catch up on some TV series and movies that are part of ‘the zeitgeist’ that for some reason or another I never really watched. I tried watching more anime, too, which is like TV but you can’t multitask during it, unless you watch it dubbed. And on that note, I watched Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood, dubbed, and didn’t hate it. In fact, my thesis and FMA Brotherhood, as well as the work of Sideways, is what convinced me to try making Youtube videos on the subjects that interest me.

What I’m saying is I have a FMA Brotherhood video in me, but we’ll see how I go with this new editing software. Anyway.

Shirts!

I made at least 36 different t-shirt designs this year – holy nerts, that’s a lot more than I expected. My original goal was something like 1 shirt design per month – and thanks to the practice doing graphic design, I wound up making three a month.

In case you were curious, yes, these don’t really sell.

Playing Games!

I did a lot of work on my backlog of games. At the last accounting, I have 559 games in my Steam Library, and of them I have marked 229 as Completed. Note that to me, a game is completed when I’m done with it – I don’t need to slog through a game that bored me in the first hour.

Making Games!

And here we have an absolute bumper. Partly because my thesis required a lot of game design and partly because I cannot resist the joy of merely making, I spent a lot of time this year creating card and board games, including our first proper release of a board game.

I planned to make a game a month for 2017, based on 2016, and that arc follows here, but.

January – D-73C7, a hidden movement game on cards

February – Chin Music, a memory game of punching

March – Pie Crimes, the prisoner’s dilemma, with cake

April – Dragon’s Favour, a voting game of hidden roles

May – Queer Coding, a cooperative communication game

June – Fabricators, an economy game of 3d printing futuristic factories

July – You Can’t Win, an impossible trick taking game

August – Cafe Romantica, a handsome boys builder game

September – Good Cop, Bear Cop, a hidden identity accuse-em-up

October – Sector 86, a space station builder

November – Escape Code, a bluffing conversation game

December – C-QNS, a pattern matching number game

In addition to this, there were some extra games we released, Push Pins, Nobeard’s Treasure, Skulk, Camp Osum (Alpha) and Yes Chef. In my thesis I had to complete preliminary design for two more games, Mystery Machine and The Coins Of Tarim, and I did prospective work for Kinksame and pushed through stage one of The Comissioner’s Game. I also put out a prototype concept for a VHS-style wrestling game. So far none of these games have proven to be world-beaters, but I’m happy with all of them, in no small part because I love the process of making them. There are stories about each one, stories about how they improved or changed and that may wind up going up over on the main Invincible Ink website.

I also collaborated more and made more games solo. I made D-73C7 entirely on my own (and incidentally, that number is 881,607, in decimal), and continued this with some of our games – Fabricators and You Can’t Win, for example, were entirely solo projects. Yet at the same time, this year featured Skulk, which has art by Alex Zandra, Sector 86 uses some of our first paid stock art, and Cafe Romantica is a game whose entire visual aesthetic is made by Fox.

In addition to this, games that were complete in 2017, but not released include LFG (releasing Cancon 2018), Black Jack’s Dungeon, Bag O Pipes, Domains of Meh, and Winston’s Archive. There were also revisions and second editions for Crowdfund This, Murder Most Fowl and Chin Music. As I write this, in another window, I have a document open for what I’m hoping might be yet another complete game, which I’m super excited to get my hands on.

Anything Else?

I attended six conventions this year – Cancon, Comic-Gong, SMASH, MOAB, GaymerX and LFG, with varying degrees of success. Cancon was an absolute corker, as was Comic-Gong, with GaymerX surprising us with their interest in our ares, and MOAB and LFG a bit more low-key. Still, contact was made with vendors and FLGS, so here’s hoping going forwards there will be more.

I tweeted a lot, and had a handful of tweets go viral, including a new Most Viral tweet of mine, about Vincent Price. This year that was less annoying – the new twitter feature ‘mute this conversation’ does its job.

Emotionality!

This year featured a few big changes for me. One of them is that I spent some time this year making the conscious decision to minimise my interaction with people who actively make me feel bad, and to instead focus my emotional energy on improving the lives of people I really care about. Something in my family life has come up that I simply cannot deprioritise – it’s too important – and that means that I’ve had to ask myself if the emotional distress of a stranger is really my business, even if I do want to live in a world where people will randomly be kind to you. I acknowledged that there are some people, even queer people, who are just jerks, and I don’t need to spend my time listening to and ceding to them, because they are not immune to basic social consequences. I still take the hit when I can, as my privilege armours me pretty well.

I’ve taken to offering random instances of kindness to people, as best I can, to simply tell people hey, here’s a reminder the world doesn’t suck so bad, and being okay when they drop it.

I admitted to some of my trauma. I opened up and shared with some people about my stress. I watched as my parents recognised that their best intentions have had problems in both my life and my sister’s life and started to learn how to forgive them. And I started to face things about myself that make me miserable and sad and feel inadequate, and start to try and develop a framework for them.

Here’s the big thing: A member of my family is getting divorced. It is not a nice divorce. There are kids involved. Abuse is involved. This sucks. This straight up sucks on toast. There is no cutesy way around it.

What’s next?

Tune in tomorrow.

The 2017 Self-Examination Roundup Here's a one-part diary, one-part itinerary, one-part aspirational documentation of what I did this past year as best I can explain it and we'll see how well we go as we go with it.

[themanformallyknownaswelshy]

Jigsaw Thoughts

HEAVY SPOILERS

Hello there.

So yeah, a new Saw film has just recently been released and I’ve been to see it … twice. I’ll admit to being very touched and slightly scared (in the best way possible) at the amount of requests I’ve been getting from people asking for my thoughts on the film. It’d been … what, 4 years since my last proper video on Saw and that people are still interested in my opinion about the series … that’s pretty awesome. Sadly, this can’t be released in video format at the moment (which isn’t saying it never will be) because I currently have a camera without a battery, a computer that no longer connects to the internet, a laptop that randomly shuts down and no audio equipment. Oh and we’re also saving for a wedding and a house. Priorities people!!!

So anyway, before I address my thoughts on Jigsaw, I want to say something about Saw as it means to me. Keep in mind, this is going to be long as I have many thoughts and if this were a video, it’d probably clock in around the 30 minute mark. Now, it should be noted that I’m not blind to what Saw is and as I’ve previously said, I don’t view it as a masterpiece of cinema and for the people who don’t like it, I’d never be able to change their minds about it. My issue steams from reviews I’ve seen that label Saw (specifically the original) as torture porn and I simply do not agree with this statement. In fact, I informed one person of this once and this person accused me of being sexist and of attacking them for simply disagreeing with their claim, a disagreement I backed up but then I’m the same guy who managed to violate the … what was it, the second amendment with Dark Side of The Internet, so make of that what you will. For me, the Saw Series exists in a heightened reality with everything played at just that over the top level, from the scenarios all the way down to the acting. It’s a very fine line to walk and one Saw, from original to 3D managed to walk almost perfectly. The first 2 films in the series also didn’t have the budget to show the all out gore explosions that the later films became known for so to class the first 2 as torture porn is, to me, simply wrong. A comparison would be a film like Hostel or the Zombie Halloween films, especially the sequel. These films don’t walk the line, they have a very real, raw edge to them, the effects of the torture (blow torches to the face, heels being sliced, women beaten to bloody pulps) are shot very raw and very real and this moves both films beyond snuff (ala Texas Chainsaw) and is why I would class films like Hostel and Halloween Zombie as torture porn and a film like Saw as more a twisted morality tail and it’s sequel, part horror, part psychological thriller because the 2nd film IS essentially a game of chess between 2 players, Jigsaw and Detective Matthews. While the argument could be raised about the later sequels falling more into the realms of torture porn, all films still contained that heightened sense but more so than any of that, I believe it wasn’t the traps that kept bringing fans back into the theatres year after year but it was more so the story because, as convoluted as it was, and BELIEVE me, it was, there was a story that built and teased and, ultimately, provided the answers to many fan theories and questions.

Why have I mentioned this? Read on.

So, my thoughts on Jigsaw?

I liked it. It certainly was better than it had any right to be. The story moved along at a great pace, the traps as they were designed and shot were pure Saw and very Jigsaw in nature. By this I mean, the traps were all survivable, but the subjects were expected to sacrifice something of themselves in order to get out alive. It also played into something Jigsaw says to Hoffman in Saw V about anticipating the human mind, something Jigsaw was always very good at. As Jill Tuck said herself, with John everything was planned, nothing was left to chance. I obviously enjoyed Tobin Bell back in his iconic role like he’d never missed a beat, I loved seeing Billy with glowing red eyes (and I did BILLY when I saw him), the Jigsaw house of horrors barn and separate work shop was a delight and the score felt like a natural evolution with sweet call backs to previous themes. It also benefited from a bigger budget, the opening car chase being a prime example and the money shot that was the culmination of the final trap was a site to behold and I’ll now never be able to here the phrase “It looks like a tropical plant” the same way again.

I won’t lie, when I first saw the trailers for Jigsaw I was slightly concerned about how glossy and clean everything looked. The Barn appeared to take place almost entirely in day light and a lot of the film seemed to be taking place out doors. If there was one thing Saw excelled at was the rustic, run down, abandoned factory, enclosed and claustrophobic feeling and with Jigsaw, I never really got that feeling. I never felt like I was suffocating along with the characters in the environments they were finding themselves in and this seems to stem more from the way it was shot rather than the script. It’s also seemed to be setting up future sequels because a number of events occur in said film that raise greater questions. The film managed to keep the Saw style of walking the fine line of maintaining its heightened reality and felt like it easily slotted into the world as it had been previously established in previous films. It’ll certainly please fans to the series but won’t win or convert people who have never seen the Saw films before. It’s also a film that, while trying to restart the series, suffers if you’ve never watched the series before.

One of the big problems Saw encountered in it’s later life is it was essentially becoming a movie serial. You’d have needed to have watched the previous episode in order to understand what was going on. For someone like me, someone who had watched and re watched the films so many times I could quote them in my sleep,  this wasn’t a problem and watching the newest entry always felt like a reward but for someone jumping in as a first time watcher, they wouldn’t have had a clue about what was going on. Leigh Whannell references this during his Saw 3 commentary in that he would get people coming up to him and saying they didn’t understand Saw 3 because they’d not seen Saws 1 and 2. Leighs reaction to this was simple, “Who goes to see a film with a 3 in the title without seeing the first 2 films first” and I agree with that. Jigsaw ultimately duffers from this because, while it is an attempt to perform a form of series restart, the people who will get the most out of this film ARE Saw fans. The biggest hook to the series is and always will be Tobin Bell and without him, you simply don’t have a series so while I can appreciate what they were trying to do with the film and there were many directions they could have gone, their solution I found to be very predictable, very uninspired and more specifically, and this is why I have a bigger problem with the film than maybe I should, very damaging to the Saw mythology.

So here we go … my problem with Jigsaw. From here on out there will be heavy spoilers from not only Jigsaw, but nearly every single Saw film, give or take. You have been warned, tread carefully, follow your heart, follow the white rabbit (oh wait, that was the Matrix) … whatever ... spoilers ahead.

Right off the bat, when I heard there was going to be a new Saw many ideas went through my head about what they were going to do. Was it going to be a total reboot, a soft reboot, were they going to retcon some of the story? Were they going to introduce a long lost family member? I’ll be honest, at one point in the film, Jigsaw refers to his late nephew and in my head I immediately pictured either Jigsaw having an identical twin brother or a sister that we’d never heard of and then we’d have had a female Jigsaw taking over the reigns of the franchise. None of these appealed to me and NO, it’s NOT because I don’t think a woman can be scary, bla bla bla bla. My concern was I didn’t want would I deemed to be a cop out, long lost relative ending. Sarah, my fiancée, had other ideas though, as you can see below…

John Kramer has an identical twin brother who has been jealous of his brother’s successes all those years ago. He felt John’s moral crusade pointless and would rather just kill people he wanted to torture. This brother first made an appearance in Saw 1 where he was skulking around Jigsaw’s hideout but was caught by Tapp - it was not John Kramer to slashed Tapp’s throat but his evil twin brother. He now has long flowing hair and a curly moustache.

As he proceeds to murder his next victim through torture he plays Cascada’s “”What Hurts the Most” and reveals that he is going to take control of Jigsaw’s legacy and unleash his new name on the world: The Sudoku Killer.

However during this revelation the doors fly open and John Kramer appears, cloak billowing. He announces that he is still alive and not happy about the whole Sudoku game his brother has planned. To his brother’s horror, John reveals that when they were born , there was another brother, so they were actually identical triplets. The third brother was adopted due to financial limitations but John had found him years ago. He had worked with his secret brother to set his vision in motion, but then his brother had cancer and another game was created in which Jigsaw could create a legacy even after death. His brother took John Kramer’s identity and died of cancer, whilst John Kramer lived in the shadows like Batman. It seemed his work had left a lasting impression as his death created more followers to his cause. However his evil brother’s foray into his own murderous games caused Jigsaw to come out of retirement and put an end to his dastardly plans.

Grumpily, Jigsaw reveals that he now has to start his work up again to eradicate all the wrongdoing his brother has done. He admits ta he doesn’t really understand Sudoku puzzles. He leaves his brother in the room to die, while lay his brother twirls his moustache worriedly.

Thank you Sar she is very proud of her theory and it’s one of the many reasons I love her.

So anyway, we didn’t get the secret family member ending, although there is nothing to say this still won’t happen seeing as Logan clearly had help through the film but what we did get was the reveal of another secret apprentice is this is what I have a problem with. Firstly, it just feels lazy because it’s something we’ve seen twice before but also, there has been literally no build to this reveal. With Amanda, she was set up in Saw as a survivor so the revelation of her being an apprentice made some form of sense. With Hoffman, he was introduced in Saw 3, pocketing a piece of evidence and then in Saw 4, placed himself into the game so again, the revelation had a form of surprise but felt natural and given that Jigsaw had access to so many criminal files, it seemed like a natural fit that he would have a cop helping him. Here, they have to effectively screw with the entire lore of the Saw Universe by implying Logan was helping John from the beginning and this is where I have my biggest problem because, as I’ve said, it was the story that kept me coming back to Saw and it was the handling of the series from Saw 1 onwards that made me truly fall in love with said story. When they wrote the first Saw, James Wan and Leigh Whannell had no concept of a larger story of multiple sequels. They were just 2 guys trying to crack into the movie business. With the success of Saw, Saw 2 was immediately green lit and to get a jump on the production, they adapted a script from Darren Lynn Bousman with Leigh (and Tobin) adding in the Saw story. Saw 3 was green lit even before Saw 2 was released and with the release of Saw 3, the studio announced a Saw 4,5 and 6. This allowed the storytellers to plan their story long term and to sprinkle in teases that would build through the (as I originally called it) Hoffman trilogy with everything due to culminate in Saw 6. The backstory of John Kramer and his death and rebirth into Jigsaw is told through Saw 2 thorugh 6 and makes sense in the context of these films.

People have often asked why I love Saw 6 so much and it is for this very reason. Saw 6 pays off many of the long term threads that had been teased since Saw 3. This long term planning of these films allowed the film makers to take their time with the integration of Hoffman into the world. He was shown briefly in Saw 3, he is revealed in Saw 4 as the apprentice, Saw 5 then allows us to see the meeting of Jigsaw and Hoffman and Saw 6 is the ultimate fan reward as we see Jigsaw, Amanda and Hoffman all share the screen together. While this is undoubtedly fan service, it makes sense in the context of the story because now we, as an audience, have accepted Hoffman working with Jigsaw, it would be more than logical, given his physical size, strength and position within the police force, that he would have worked with and assisted both Jigsaw and Amanda. If the scene between Jigsaw, Amanda and Hoffman had been shown in Saw 4 it wouldn’t have had half the impact nor would it have meant as much because it would have felt like a complete shoe in with the creators dancing around with a board saying “Look Hoffman was involved”. By taking the time to establish Hoffman and his relationship with Jigsaw, we see the contrast between himself and Amanda. The Jigsaw/Amanda relationship was very much like a father and daughter, The Jigsaw/Hoffman relationship is very much built on business with Hoffman clearly suppressing his true inner psychopath until after Jigsaw has passed. With Jigsaw they basically fast track Logan into the series as a secret apprentice and immediately show him working alongside Jigsaw which ultimately hurts the story as it has been established since the original Saw. Now they do try to cover themselves by claiming Logan was a prisoner of war for 10 years but Logan also says Jigsaw gave him purpose after the war, so I’m at a loss here as to whether Logan (in this new series) was absent during the original series of events (as a POW) or if he was present because if he was, where the hell was he because the original series has covered the time line from John Kramer, budding father, to cancer patient, attempted suicide, rebirth as Jigsaw, his start as Jigsaw, every single game played during that series from Cecil trap right up to Saw 3D trap, from his death right up to Hoffmans imprisonment in the bathroom and it handled this about as perfectly as could be expected given how insane the timeline can seem.

Now Saw 6 WAS supposed to the culmination of all of these hanging story threads. It was supposed to end with Hoffmans death and close off the franchise but between Saw 5 and 6, the studio decided they wanted 2 more Saw films. This resulted in Hoffman (thankfully because he was now awesome) being spared but when Saw 6 was released it found itself at number 2 at the box office because of the first Paranormal Activity. In a panic, the studio cancelled Saw 8 and Saw 3D became a combination of an attempted Saw 7 and 8 story and was marketed as the Final Chapter which is one of the reasons it is such a convoluted mess. As I said, Saw 6 was due to close off many questions, which it did, with the major remaining question (the fate of Dr Gordon) still being up in the air due to the ongoing lawsuit between Elwes and the studio. During 5 (to my knowledge) the lawsuit between Cary Elwes  and the studio was settled and this allowed the series to bring Cary back to answer the series final question and it really WAS the series final question because Saw 6 had managed to wrap up pretty much everything. Fans went into 7 wondering what had happened to Dr. Gordon and hoping (because let’s face it, we were ALL on Hoffmans side here) Hoffman would get his revenge against Jill. As I’ve said, I’m not a fan of Saw 3D, although I loved the ending reveal that Gordon had been assisting Jigsaw for years, but it ultimately left fans with the biggest bitter pill to swallow in that we were robbed of what we had wanted for years, a movie dedicated to the battle of Hoffman vs Gordon. Face it, Hoffman had been built up as an uber bad ass since Saw V. This was a guy who had broken his own hand and ripped off half his face to escape the bear trap, he was also a man who set up a game involving being taken into a police station in a body bag just to get his hands on Jill Tuck. There was no way in hell he was going to stay in that bathroom. Eric Matthews broke his ankle to escape the shackle, Hoffman would damn near snap his foot off to get out of there.

Jigsaw, as it currently stands, almost seems to remove the entire Hoffman story from the Saw Lore. While Jill Tuck is mentioned, she was shown in Saw 3 so it might not seem as big a departure and when Jigsaw does appear, he is shown to still be wearing his wedding ring. My reason for thinking this is during the half way point of the film when Eleanor takes Logan to her warehouse which houses a number of Jigsaw traps. There’s the chest trap from Saw 3, the glass box trap and gun from Saw 2 and the reverse bear trap from the original Saw. As far as I can see (I may be wrong) there are no traps from the Hoffman series shown in this room. Now this might be the movies attempt to retcon any of the events of Saw 4 through 3D but this still hurts the story established in Saw 1 through 3 and, once again, leaves you questioning, again, what happened to Dr. Gordon. Now granted, what I deem to be the glass box trap from Saw 2 might actually be the water box trap from Saw V and if it is, I’ll be thrilled because it means the Hoffman series is still deemed canon, but it also raises the question as to whether Logan had any form of relationship or interaction with Amanda or Hoffman because, again, lets face it, Hoffman would have ground Logan into dust had they ever crossed paths. The nature of Logans message and whole MO seems to move away from what Jigsaw wanted as it was originally about cherishing your life with Jigsaw targeting people he had deemed to be unworthy of the gift of life. These were people he had either encountered through the clinic his wife worked at or through working with Hoffman and discovering criminals who were abusing the chances they had been gifted. Now, he seems to be speaking for the dead, which isn’t a far cry from what he says to William in Saw 6 “You think it's the living who have ultimate judgement over you, because the dead will have no claim over your soul.” but Logan now seems to have gone full Dexter and seems to be targeting out and out criminals with no real chance of survival. There is also the message of not coming from vengeance and yet, Logan seems to act out his game with vengeance in mind. People could argue about Jigsaw targeting Cecil out of vengeance in Saw 4 but the difference here is once Cecil was in his trap, Jigsaw does not touch him and Cecil has the opportunity to leave after freeing himself. In Jigsaw, after getting his confession, Logan kills Halloran, which is completely against what Jigsaw would want. The elaborate trap in the barn (complete with an electronic Billy with glowing eyes … a first for the series) also clashes with the trap lore because we’re made to believe that the trap in Jigsaw is from 10 years previous and indeed, we see Logan and Jigsaw making the reverse bear trap. The problem here? Saw 4 shows Jigsaw in his workshop, alone, working on his traps and his ideas. He has no one helping him and his first traps were very basic in design and execution. The trap he placed Cecil in was a knife trap, the bathroom trap was 2 people chained to a wall, the razor wire trap, barb wire maze. When exactly does this fit into the time line for Jigsaw to create such an elaborate trap at the start of his career, which Jigsaw leads us to believe was even BEFORE he placed Amanda into the reverse bear trap.

So yes, this is my main problem with Jigsaw. Even if it retcons the Hoffman series from the time line, it still leaves far more questions than it does answers that ultimately hurts the lore as it has been built. Was Logan aware of Amanda, was Amanda aware of Logan?

WHAT HAPPENED TO DR. GORDON...AGAIN!!!!

Now granted, all of these questions may be answered in future sequels as there does seem to be more story to tell so I guess we’ll see. Anyway, this was long and I’ve gone on for long enough and if you’ve reached the end of this then you deserve a cookie so go and grab one.

Night all.

[recentnews18-blog]

New Post has been published on https://shovelnews.com/liev-schrieber-snl-sketches-ranked-dan-crenshaws-sick-pete-davidson-burn-robert-de-niros-epic-return/

Liev Schrieber 'SNL' Sketches Ranked: Dan Crenshaw's Sick Pete Davidson Burn, Robert De Niro's Epic Return

Pete Davidson put his foot in his mouth with a bad joke about Congressional candidate Dan Crenshaw’s eye patch last week on “Saturday Night Live,” so Crenshaw came back this week to get his revenge and did so in epic fashion.

As for the actual host, Liev Schreiber is not known as a funny man, as he readily admitted in his monologue, so most of the jokes were done around him and with him playing it very straight. And to his credit, he does that very well. The same goes for Robert De Niro, who dropped by as Robert Mueller again in a surprise cameo.

And for a guy known for very serious work, like “Ray Donovan,” Liev did manage to bring plenty of laughs to a mostly successful show. One sketch later in the night was so stupidly hilarious that almost no one involved in it could keep a straight face, and Liev lost it with Kate McKinnon in another.

The audience loves it when cast-members break, but these weren’t breaks in a way that derailed either sketch.

Elsewhere and as expected, “SNL” tackled the firing of Jeff Sessions, allowing Kate one more chance to shine, as well as the White House intern who became embroiled in the middle of the Jim Acosta scandal after his credentials were revoked and Sarah Huckabee Sanders released doctored footage of his exchange with the intern as evidence to justify the decision.

As usual, we’re ranking all the sketches from worst to first, including the Cold Open and the regular “Weekend Update” segments. We’ll skip the musical guests, because they’re not usually funny – unless Ashlee Simpson shows up. We wrap up with a look at the cast-member who had the strongest week.

MONOLOGUE – Liev Schreiber

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Liev Schreiber came out with a monologue about how he is not particularly known for being funny, which he thinks is great because it’s all about “managing expectations.” He also appeared to be very nervous, stumbling over several lines along the way. Or maybe it’s because, as he pointed out, he said more words in this monologue than in the entire fifth season of “Ray Donovan.” So don’t fault this sketch for sitting at the bottom as it wasn’t supposed to be funny. It was to manage expectations and praise the more than 100 million people who voted in a midterm election.

The Poddys

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So this was a weird premise, a podcast awards show celebrating the most jarring transition into an advertisement and white women who are where they don’t belong. Liev Schreiber had fun as Michael Barbaro, stammering and stuttering his way through the nominees alongside Cecily Strong’s Sarah Koenig before Alex Moffat came out and owned an impression of Marc Maron. And they did nominees, shots to the audience and acceptance speeches, so the commitment to the premise was all in. Oh, and did we mention this was weird. Not even sure if it was funny, but man was it weird.

Outside the Women’s Bathroom

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Another weird sketch, this one featured Liev Schreiber filming a pilot for a talk show outside a women’s bathroom. It was mostly cringe humor, save for when Leslie Jones walked out and stared him down. She didn’t even have to save a word. While Liev messed up his lines a few times, it’s easy enough to pretend it was part of the character … but we know it wasn’t. For the most part, none of this ultimately came together as a successful sketch, but it did have a few memorable moments and funny bits, including Heidi Gardner as his poor date, abandoned at the table so he could film. But yeah, odd stuff.

Paranormal Experience

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We’ve seen this countless times, but it’s always worth seeing what ridiculous things Kate McKinnon’s trashy character had to endure, this time as it relates to ghosts. She compared Cecily Strong and Liev Schreiber’s stories to “Ghost” while hers was more “Beetlejuice.” And it was every bit as stupid and awful as we predicted. Oh, and she totally found a way to harass the guest, grinding her bottom on Liev’s chest as he tried to hide his laughter. At some point, these are going to stop being so funny, but so long as Kate keeps coming up with new rhyming ways to describe her frontside and backside, we’ll be there … a bit uncomfortable, but there.

Unity Song

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In a country divided, the cast came together to unite under all the things they dislike together. Because if there’s one thing modern Americans are good at, it’s bitching and complaining. As for the list, it includes the words “moist” and “crotch,” airplane pilots who say too much when there’s nothing going on and nothing when there’s too much going on and the damned chip reader sound. So yeah, they pretty much nailed this one. And you know what? We do feel better.

Booty Kings

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Future returned for this one, joining Chris Redd and Kenan Thompson as the Booty Kings with Uncle Butt (Pete Davidson) and Lil Wayne. It’s a typical hip-hop song about dat booty, but it’s also about consent and Time’s Up. What a bizarre combination, but with sharp writing it had wit and heart. We love the women in the club (Ego Nwodim and Melissa Villasenor) stunned that the guys are respecting their boundaries. At the same time, it’s sad that this was so funny because it’s so unexpected that guys can be decent in this scenario. We still laughed, though.

COLD OPEN – Jeff Sessions

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It was an inevitable as sunset, but still appropriate that Kate McKinnon got to say farewell to her brilliant take on Jeff Sessions in the cold open. “Goodbye trusty Bible,” she said as packing up her awful. “I justified a lot of bad things with this book.” As he packed, he was visited by Sarah Huckabee Sanders (Aidy Bryant), Mike Pence (Beck Bennett), and even Eric (Alex Moffat) and Don Jr. (Mikey Day). In a closing surprise, Robert Mueller (Robert De Niro) dropped by for a final farewell. The whole thing was more of a bizarrely touching tribute to her performance, with plenty of possum jokes and just brilliance from McKinnon for what’s hopefully not the last time.

Weekend Update

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First up, Colin Jost and Michael Che broke down the midterms, with Jost quickly tempering the left’s enthusiasm by reminding them Trump still control everything except the House, including the media, space, time and our ability to perceive reality. Che gave it up to Stacy Abrams taking on a white man in Georgia in a runoff election where he’s also in charge of the election. “That’d be like taking on LeBron [James] at home where he’s also the ref. It’s an uphill battle to say the least.”

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And then, in a brilliant little parody, Cecily Strong showed up as the White House intern who tried to take Jim Acosta’s mic and she proved just as disruptive here. And then they doubled down on the intern story with their own doctored video in response to the one Sarah Huckabee Sanders showed to justify revoking Acosta’s press credentials. We think this one is more believable.

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The guys then moved on to other topics, with their won funny reason Justice Ginsburg broke three ribs, and calling new acting Attorney General Michael Whitaker a Michael Chiklis (“The Shield”) impersonator.

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Dan Crenshaw dropped by “Weekend Update” to confront Pete Davidson directly after last week’s poorly-received joke comparing Crenshaw to a pirate in a porno. And boy, he didn’t have to say anything to shade Pete in the most epic way possible. It’s all in the ringtone. Damn!

House Hunters

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Liev Schreiber and Leslie Jones were the couple trying to decide between all the houses they’d looked at and if you love how ridiculous this show is but wish it were even more ridiculous, this is the sketch for you. We loved the gas stove in the middle of the bed, and the fenced in backyard for Liev’s sister to run around in. Oh, and did he mention his man cave? He definitely wants his man cave. They absolutely nailed it with this one. Now the actual show will just be a letdown.

Brotherly Love

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Beck Bennett and Kyle Mooney portrayed two grade-school brothers struggling to impress the neighbors. Let’s see, Liev Schrieber was their father who kept a garden hose in the house to hose them down when they got too rowdy and that was always. Beck and Kyle were so into these roles that the rest of the cast couldn’t even keep it together as their antics got more over-the-top and stupid.

Good Day Denver

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Reporter Cecily Strong accidentally referred to Mikey Day and Alex Moffat as the “incest” twins rather than the “invest” twins. That’s the catalyst for this whole thing, but anything that gives us the great comedic chemistry of Day and Moffat together is worth it. Everything they said was double entendres and really creepy with the graphic “Incest Twins” below them in this news segment parody. And they went pretty far down this particular rabbit hole and every bit of it worked. Clever writing, top-notch commitment from everyone equals a disturbingly funny sketch.

PLAYER OF THE WEEK

While Mikey Day, Kyle Mooney and Beck Bennett turned in some amazing work it came down to veterans Kate McKinnon and Cecily Strong this week. McKinnon treated us to another brilliant Jeff Sessions and her ghost story was both terrifying and– well, it was just terrifying.

But we’re going to have to give the edge to Cecily Strong, who pantomimed beautifully as the White House intern, and kept things moving during the “incest” sketch as well as embodying a wholly different vibe with her ghost story, as well as anchoring the “Unity” song and mostly keeping it straight in the brothers sketch.

I will take arguments for Kate, though, as this was easily one of the tightest battles of the season and she had two very strong sketch appearances on a more balanced night across the cast.

“Saturday Night Live” returns next week with host Steve Carell and musical guest Ella Mai at 11:35 p.m. et on NBC.

Got a story or a tip for us? Email TooFab editors at tips@toofab.com.

View Photos Getty All The Barely-There Looks From the 2018 Victoria’s Secret After Party

Source: http://toofab.com/2018/11/11/saturday-night-live-liev-schrieber-snl-dan-crenshaw-davidson-robert-de-niro-sessions-acosta/

[seganerds]

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]he yakuza with a heart of gold is back once again, this time in an updated remake of his very first adventure.

Yakuza 0 was my first experience with the series, and if you haven’t played the game and/or read my review, I encourage you to do so before proceeding. The reason is that even though it isn’t essential to have played 0 before Kiwami, the latter is still nonetheless built off the former, and in many ways, to understand one is to understand the other.

In truth, this comes more from a mechanical perspective than a narrative one, as both titles purportedly use the same engine. This comes through in a variety of ways, as both games largely tend to look, feel, and sound the same on a fundamental level. I don’t personally see this as a bad thing in any way, but at the same time, the fact that this comes from designing both games to run on the PlayStation 3 (in Japan, at least), some minor things like occasional pop-up do spring up from time to time.

Taking control of Kazuma Kiryu tends to feel much the same as well, though I found early on that using his various fighting styles felt slightly different to me than they did in Zero, though that may have simply been my being used to the more leveled-up versions in that game before having to go through the process again in this one. That process is an interesting one in itself, as you do have one of those sorts of “resets” that takes you from a powered-up Kazuma at the start of the game to a point where you have to work your way back up.

In fact, this works against the game at one point early on. I thought the difficulty was uneven as some mooks went down in no time flat, while bosses were like wailing away at a brick wall (though knowing Kiryu, he’d probably do better against the brick wall). It turns out that this is due to a sloppy implementation – or rather, education – of a feature newly added to this release: The Kiwami Heat action.

Basically, during the course of a boss battle, you build up your Heat Climax meter, and when the boss gets winded, they’ll glow with a colored aura that corresponds with one of your fighting styles as they regenerate health. When you’re in that style, you can perform an extra-special damaging move that halts the process and makes the battle a lot easier.

Unfortunately, without getting into too much detail, they decide to introduce this concept before effectively stripping you of it without really telling you. Getting it back is simply a matter of applying experience points to the appropriate leveling-up chart, but you’re not informed of this in any way, thus leading to some confusion (and YouTube videos explaining what to do) I’ve witnessed around online.

Oh, and on the note of leveling up: Since making fat stacks of cash was more of an 80’s theme in the original, it doesn’t play into “buying” moves and levels as it did in Yakuza 0, and enemies don’t have cash flying when beaten. Instead, leveling up is done in an altogether more traditional fashion. It’s understandable, but slightly disappointing after the thrill of mad money flying everywhere.

Speaking of difficulty, another new feature in Yakuza Kiwami is the “Majima Everywhere.” Early on in the game, you meet up with Yakuza 0’s other playable character, Goro Majima, and he pretty much wipes the floor with you, setting up the idea of him attacking you at random to help restore the Dragon of Dojima to his former glory. I was worried that these battles would prove cumbersome to deal with, but relieved to find out that would not be the case.

Instead, Majima Everywhere is a true highlight of the game – you really can’t be sure where he’ll come from, and he goes to some crazily absurd lengths to draw the attention of “Kiryu-chan.” There came one point where his attacks became relentless and were actively preventing me from progressing in the story, but he soon backed off and allowed me some time to do what I needed to do. That brief period aside, Majima is a delight to encounter, save for the occasions you simply run into him while roaming, as he sadly has only one script for every such encounter. Those are still fun, mind, but feels like they’d have been better had Majima been given more to say.

Sadly, one disappointing thing about Majima is that he doesn’t really feel much like the same character we met and played as in Yakuza 0. Maybe there’s room for a “Yakuza 0.5” to tell the rest of his story?

The Kamurocho area feels much like Yakuza 0 as well, but with some 17 years of change applied to it, allowing the map to feel both familiar yet fresh at the same time. Of course, without Sōtenbori to run around in as well, the play area of the game is only about half the size of its prequel. Even so, some different things have been done to freshen things up, such as the locker keys and game cards which now litter the streets, replacing the phone cards from before.

Incidentally, another carryover from Yakuza 0 is that when you come across someone being victimized, it seems the goons and Kazuma’s dialogue is lifted straight from that game.

In terms of story, Yakuza Kiwami comes from a kind of weird place, as it remakes a game that did not have a predecessor behind it. As such, you don’t really have to have played Yakuza 0 to follow along in Kiwami. It’s beneficial, to be sure, as there are indeed various references dropped throughout, and even an entire side-story which calls back to the prequel, but for the most part, you’re given all the context you need to follow along with what’s happening in the here and now without having played the first one.

Even so, I really do recommend playing Yakuza 0 first. For one reason, it’s just a great game, but for another, it will help to enlighten you to some of the main characters, their relationships, and their hardships in this game. In fact, in some ways, Yakuza Kiwami on its own feels less like Kazuma’s story than it does his friend Akira Nishikiyama, which unfolds throughout the course of the game. But playing Yakuza 0 beforehand helps reinforce the bond the two have, helping make Kiryu’s tie to everything feel that much stronger.

Beyond that, a word of warning worth heeding is that the story can be fairly confusing at first, presenting the player with a number of flashbacks (and I think even some flashbacks within flashbacks) that can be a little much to take in. Fortunately, it’s not long before things straighten out a bit and everything makes more sense as it runs smoothly, so I encourage you to stick with it if you’re trying to get a grasp on things and it feels like a bit much.

Yakuza Kiwami is a bit of an odd one, a game that feels as much like a sequel as it is a remake, which makes sense as it is both. In some ways, one could also say it feels like a sort of second episode or expansion to Yakuza 0, as it’s a shorter game that focuses on half the main characters and settings of that title. As a remake of a game that’s 12 years old and had plenty of time to see numerous refinements and growth, there is only so much one can be expected to do to bring it up to modern standards.

Still, just as I loved Yakuza 0, I love Yakuza Kiwami. It has its quirks and foibles, sure, and I might even like its recent prequel just a little more, but damn if I didn’t enjoy every moment I played (and will continue playing, as there are still plenty of sidequests left to handle). I can’t say the game is without faults, but none of them were ever enough to bring me down in the face of all the goodness it has to offer.

Summary

Yakuza 0 set a new standard for the series as the best place to start, but if the lower-price is more of a draw, then you’ll of course still do well by jumping in with Yakuza Kiwami. And if you’ve already played Yakuza 0, then this soft reboot is a great way to keep the good times rolling.

I’d end by saying “Bring on Yakuza Kiwami 2,” but since Yakuza 6 stands between the two releases, I’ll just have to hope it will be as friendly to series newcomers and veterans alike as this was.

Pros:

+ Shorter, single-character narrative makes for a tighter experience + Majima everywhere is a blast, and helps make up for the lack of him as a playable character this time + All fighting styles from Yakuza Zero are available right at the start + Some punks, a dog, a rock, and Kazuma. You’ll know why when you see it

Cons:

– Really could have introduced players to Kiwami Heat actions better – No vintage SEGA games to play at the arcade this time – The number of multiplayer games feels limited compared to the number of mini-games featured in the main campaign itself – No Mark Hamill as Majima. [Note to self: Ask him to squeal “Kiryu-chan!!” for me on Twitter]

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We re-live the original @yakuzagame ‏in our #YakuzaKiwami #review: The yakuza with a heart of gold is back once again, this time in an updated remake of his very first adventure.

[robbiefarlow-sidequestfitne-blog]

New Post has been published on Side Quest Fitness

New Post has been published on http://sidequestfitness.com/kick-ass-games-that-should-have-been-remastered/

Kick Ass Games That Should Have Been Remastered on Xbox One and PS4

11 Kick Ass Games That Should Have Been Remastered on Xbox One and PS4

This article had started with some long winded intro about how fucking disappointed I’ve been with the current console cycle.

But honestly, that’s not why you clicked on this link.

You’re here to read about a list of kick ass games that Sony and Microsoft should have remastered or remade on their four-year-old systems. Because at first, that’s all the Xbox One and PS4 were good for, remastering games that were barely out of diapers.

And besides the obvious reasons for why that pisses me off—chiefly, that game companies already siphoned enormous sums of money out of me for games like Grand Theft Auto 5, Skyrim, The Last of Us, Gears of War, and Uncharted to name a few—now you expect me to get excited to play the same (great) games again but with “updated” graphics?

Look, I loved Skyrim. I loved Uncharted and Grand Theft Auto 5. But if I buy a new system, I expect new games, not a bunch of games I played just a couple years ago. That’s not how nostalgia works.

Instead of trying to get gamers dick hard about games that were the best games of 2011 or 2009, you—Sony and Microsoft (even Nintendo)— failed to remaster games that would’ve excited old school gamers (drowning them under a tsunami of nostalgia) and made them want to buy your new-fangled consoles.

Damn it. I said this wasn’t going to be a long intro and here I am 260 some words deep and not to the point. Fine.

Here are the 11 kick ass games Sony and Microsoft should have remastered.

1. Road Rash

Technically, a spiritual successor to Road Rash called Road Redemption has been in development since 2013.

After a Kickstarter campaign, the game was supposed to be released in the summer of 2014. It was not. And as of now, it is still TBA for 2017.

I’m not a developer, and I don’t understand all the tech that goes into making a game happen. So I’m just mouthing off as a fan and gamer.

But what the fuck is taking so long?

We’ve seen four different Call of Duty’s in four years—each one selling less than its predecessors year after year—and remakes of games that were already HD. So why am I not able to drive a motorcycle and bash people in the face with a sledgehammer?

The gameplay footage of Road Redemption below is enough to take me from six to midnight. So, um. Yea, gaming industry. You’re failing. This should have been done years ago.

2. Mutant League Football

This is hands down the greatest—and most fun—football game ever made. So why has this game not been remade in over 25 years?

NFL Blitz was an amazing game, there’s no doubt about that. But MLF allowed you to play in space with aliens, skeletons, robots, and trolls. And to make the game even more awesome, each stadium had its own special hazards that could kill members of your team or the opponents.

And each team had crazy ass audibles that you could call which were far dirtier than deflating a few footballs to beat the Colts. Including the option to bribe the refs, where they’d call a “fake” penalty on your opponent, like a 5-yard penalty for crying.

Here’s what made Mutant League Football the best game ever: you could win the game by killing the opposing team’s players. Yes, you didn’t even need to outscore the other team. You just needed to tackle more of them into landmines, fire pits, off the edge of the field and into space, or call your team’s special audible that killed the QB in one hit.

Below is some video of a pre-alpha build for Mutant Football League—supposedly—due out on PC in 2017 and 2018 for Xbox One and PS4.

25 years after the first game, is far too long to wait. This should have been done ten years ago.

3. Zombies Ate My Neighbors

Back in the day, Lucasarts created some of the best video games on Earth: Secrets of Monkey Island, all the Star Wars games, and Zombies Ate My Neighbors.

Zombie games are one of my favorite genres. Left 4 Dead was amazing. Dead Rising was a lot of fun. But neither of them compare to the ridiculousness of Zombies Ate My Neighbors.

My cousins and I couldn’t stop playing this game. We may have played it more than Mario Kart and Zelda combined. And though you can download the original on Nintendo’s Virtual Console, I still have no idea why this hasn’t been remade?

Oh, right. I know why.

Because Disney shut down the video game development side of Lucasarts. And I doubt The Mouse will want to release any game that involves zombie, werewolf, and vampire murder. Goddamn it Mickey.

4. Battletoads

I don’t have kids. But if I did, I wouldn’t send them to time out for punishment. I’d sit them down in front of Battletoads, with implicit instructions that the only way to get out of timeout is to beat the game.

They’d either stay in timeout forever, or they’d apologize and beg for the torture of this game to stop.

A remastered Battletoads would be huge. And yes, I know Rare released it on their compilation, Rare Replay, for the Xbox One. But the game only took up half the screen; plus, that border is obnoxious. And though the original is fun, in a sadistic kind of way, I’d rather have a remastered Battletoads to play than another broken ass Gears of War.

5. Conkers Bad Fur Day

Since I’m already on the Rare bandwagon, we can’t forget about Conker. This is still, hands down, the most expensive N64 game you can buy on Ebay. Not kidding, I’ve seen this game sell for damn near $200 before.

And yes, Microsoft and Rare did remake the original 64 game in 2005 for the original Xbox, but it deserves to be re-released in HD—with none of the original humor censored.

So I guess this would be a remake of a remake? But who cares. Conkers Bad Fur Day is the most ridiculous game ever made. Not only for its adult humor or smart ass wise cracks that Conker makes to the player as he breaks the fourth wall, but the multiplayer was, next to Goldeneye, the best on the 64.

It deserves to have a modern remake for the Xbox One.

6. X-Wing vs Tie Fighter

I don’t need to say much more here. This is one is pretty much a no-brainer. But it won’t happen. And if it did, EA would probably muck it up. So maybe it’s best left as a fond, but distant memory.

  7. Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem

There were a ton of amazing games that disappeared into the background on the Gamecube. But Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem was a literal mind fuck.

You can read what the story is all about here. But what made this game such a mind fuck is that the game employed what it called, the “sanity meter.” And as you roamed through the game—the hub of the game being your character’s family mansion—if your sanity meter began to get low, the game would do really crazy shit; it was designed to represent a reflection of the main character’s grip on reality.

The lower the meter dipped, the more health you’d lose.

At the same time, you might notice that all of a sudden the camera angle changed. Or that you’d suddenly hear cries, whispers, or unsettling sounds emanating from the speakers.

The game even broke the fourth wall and would give you a “blue screen of death,” making you think the game/system had malfunctioned. It had not. But it was designed to pull you in and mess with your own sense of reality.

Here’re a few more of the crazy things that could randomly happen in this game:

Your character would enter a new room and be walking on the ceiling instead of the floor

Walls and ceilings would bleed

The game would lower its volume and then put a “fake indicator” on your screen, making you think “something” was controlling your TV.

The appearance of large numbers of monsters that weren’t really there and would disappear when attacked

Statues heads would turn and follow your character.

This game was genius. Terrifying. But genius. And a remake by Nintendo, specifically on The Switch, could grant them a ton of opportunities for even crazier mind fucking moments.

8. Earthworm Jim

Do I even need to go any further here? No. I don’t.

Give us Earthworm Jim. The end.

9. Superman 64

Wait, what? How in the hell could I include (arguably) the worst game ever made? Well, for one, it deserves to be remade. Hear me out, though.

Until Rocksteady came along with Arkham Asylum, Batman games kind of sucked. So who’s to say that someone—cough, Rockysteady, cough—couldn’t make a good Superman game?

Plus there are a ton of Easter Eggs in Arkham Knight that allude to the fact that Rocksteady’s next game might include The Man of Steel.

  10. Deer Avenger

I didn’t get a computer until 1999, so I didn’t get to play a lot of PC games. But Deer Avenger was one of a handful of PC games I got to play at my friend Julian’s in the late 90s.

The premise is simple: you assume the role of a deer named Bambo who hunts humans in the same way you’d hunt deer in Deer Hunter. But with a whole hell of a lot more jokes about rednecks.

Five games were made in the series. It was nothing Earth shattering gameplay wise. But it was a whole hell of a lot of fun and one I’d love to see updated, especially, in today’s world.

11. Dr. Mario

Nintendo, why in the name of all things holy have you not remade Dr. Mario?

You probably expected something epic at the end and not Dr. Mario, didn’t you? Well, this is my list after all and I fucking loved some Dr. Mario.

Actually, a remake of Dr. Mario would be a great successor to Mario Run as a mobile game. So, um, Nintendo get on that.

If you had it your way, what games would you want to see remastered or updated for this console generation? Let me know in the comments below.