Movies: Amazing

Guess what, I’m not dead! I’m surprised too, but I’ve been on vacation, and immediately following that vacation I got right back, and started playing Team Fortress 2. Then, a friend suggested I try a new PSU on my Xbox, and lo and behold, it works again; so now I’m getting back into L.A. Noire, all of which has been keeping me away from the computer (except TF2, which has been pulling me away from Blogger.) So, I think this post is one that’s long over-due that occurred around the 4^th, I’m planning on a double post today, one on this topic, and another with updates. Don’t worry children; I’m never leaving you again. Probably. 

So, unlike most Americans, my 4^th of July was spent doing what I like most—doing nothing. However, a few people somehow convinced me to get off my ass to see the new Spiderman movie, which I was personally skeptical about. I only read 2 comics: Deadpool & Iron Man, Spiderman just isn’t my normal cup of tea. Don’t take this as I don’t understand the normal concept of the character, but after the 2003’s venture of Spiderman (which I only credit with opening up the movie market to comic movies, which has given us so many fantastic movies) which by the 3^rd entry they finally gave up on, I was figuring it was a closed issue. I tend to think re-vamps happen 10-15 years AFTER the last movie, and not so quickly afterwards. But, after Spiderman failed to show up in the Avengers, I wasn’t surprised to hear about the new, upcoming title.

So going into the movie, I was cautious. I wasn’t getting my hopes up. I was hoping this one would be more of a direct translation of Spiderman. Spiderman, for me, is a two part hero. It’s kind of like Tony Stark/Iron Man, certain parts cannot be missing. In the original boot of Spiderman, I felt that what made Spiderman just wasn’t there. Saying this, I refer to Spiderman’s personality, his trademark humor, which in ways was another of his weapons, the overall look of Spiderman (which I just don’t feel the original did quite right) and of course, how he is when he’s just Peter Parker.

They started this Spiderman out young, younger than the normal Spiderman is. However, I hold that the actor chosen for this boot of Spiderman is quite near perfect for the role, after seeing his performance. The cast is held together wonderfully, but its missing a few things that I feel should normally happen in a Spiderman plot. Martin Sheen (Uncle Ben) never says “With great power comes great responsibility” although he comes so close to it with a phrase similar to that. There is no Mary Jane. There os no asking for pictures, pictures of Spidermen. Peter Parker is a little more of a dick than I normally think of him, but this is all just minor complaints in the end. I hold this up to the same degree that I look at the current “Dark Knight” series of Batman—the director is making his own version of the comic, which makes perfect sense, especially with the whole Marvel Universe theory.

Overall, I gave The Amazing Spiderman an 8/10. A great movie, but lacking in some areas, and missing some things that I feel an introduction shouldn’t miss. However, if you are a Spiderman fan, and for whatever reason have waited for my opinion, go out and see it. It’s a fun movie.

--Santa

In Bravery We Trust

So, I didn't make that post for day 3 of Meet the Pyro, I'll be honest, I think everyone was too busy trying to be that lucky guy crafting that new hat, and it wasn’t me. I did make a last breath, and some other cool goodies though, which almost mate up for the huge amount of money I spent crafting. I even crafter together genuine hats. That’s how bad it got. In any case, I have decided to give up crafting… until the next major update. However, this did not stop me from unboxing, and ended up getting the Bird Man, the Ushanka and, an Infernal Orchestrinal. So, it hasn’t been too bad, but I still have to sell all of these items, and to make it all better, I found a Killer Exclusive yesterday; I guess things are starting to turn around.

But enough about TF2 for now, let’s talk about movies! I’m pretty cheap so I don’t tend to go to movies I don’t think I’ll like, but I always have one major exception for Pixar movies—I haven’t missed one in theatres since Toy Story 2. I don’t know why it is, but I love Pixar, I still hold that Up and Toy Story 3 are probably some of the best movies of all time, and this means I went to see Brave.

This isn’t to say that I was automatically thinking Brave was going to be bad, I thought Up would possibly be bad, and I had to go flail myself for thinking such things of Pixar. However, I was wary. I hold that Pixar has never made a bad movie, but Cars 2 came close. Cars 2, I feel was a Disney ploy to make more money off of the Cars franchise, since for whatever reason, Cars toys sell so well to kids. I thought that Brave was giving off the same Disney Princess vibe, and I have to say, it scared me to think Pixar may have been selling out to their evil corporate overlords.

So, going into the theater for Brave with my brother, I went to get the snacks (since he gets to refill them during the movie since I’m quite lazy) and where does he decide to sit? In between a full row of children, with just one seat left for me. I’m not a small guy, so when they see this 7’24” behemoth coming to sit down, I think I scared some of them. I got those looks from their parents that told me that they thought I was nothing, and what was this big guy doing at a little girls’ movie? But, I have no pride, and don’t care, and I hunkered down for the movie, shoving my mouth with the salty mess we refer to as popcorn.

Brave is a movie that takes place in Medieval Scotland, with the protagonist, Merida, a Scottish princess about to be married off to one of the members of the clan. She doesn’t want this, and of course, with the queen (her mother) behind all of the planning in this case, she has to come up with some way to change her mind. When she stumbles across a witch who gives her a spell to change her mom, the story kicks off in an unexpected adventure. Riveted with a beautiful landscape, wonder character animation, great voice actors and a plot that ties together fairly well, Brave is a good movie. The only thing that lets it down, like almost every other movie, is how it ends. I personally feel that Brave could have had a stronger ending, and that Pixar just… left it there. It works, but I expect more from the animation giant. They make a movie per year, they can do I bit better I feel.

Overall score: 8/10

Brave is not Pixar’s crowning achievement, but it’s still a nice piece of work. If you’re into the whole fairy tale stuff and love pretty, tom boy princesses, then this is the story for you. I think this is one I’ll pass on, it’s just not my normal piece of pie, but Pixar still makes it in a way that everyone from little girls, to their parents, to a big gamer like me can enjoy such a normally niche story.

--Santa

Pyromania II: Hats & Tools

Today has brought us a new, teaser picture of Meet the Pyro,3 new sets, and of course, more speculation.

• The Public Enemy (For Scout): Comes with hat, new pistol which gives more health and negates fall damage (in return for extra fire damage taken and slower firing speed) and a new, more accurate scattergun which will gain a boost that will let you move faster on hit, negatives include less damage, less base speed, and the boost resets upon jumping.
• The Urban Professional (for Sniper): a new hat, snazzy glasses, a new SMG which guarantees crits for 3 seconds upon kill, but has a smaller clip and no random crits, there is also a new sniper that gains "focus on kills and assists" which allows for 25% faster recharge and no zooming out when meter is full, and also decapitates on kill, the minus is that bodyshots do 20% less damage.
• The Dumpster Diver (for Soldier): comes with a new hat and misc, and a new rocket launcher that will allow for the user to hold down "fire" and then release up to 3 rockets at once, however there is a 3 degree random projectile radiation, which makes aiming near impossible.
• The flare gun that was put up on the homepage awhile ago now has a name, the Scorch Shot, and will do 50% less damage but in return will do knockback to the person hit, and will explode into an AoE fireball.

Tomorrow's the day, get ready.

--Santa

Post 100: Meeting New (Old) Friends

Well, here we are. This is post numbro 100 for the old Workshop. We’ve come pretty far, eh? Well, I thought it would only be right to give it a bit of a wait, after all, we’re seeing what could be the biggest, and best update in the history of TF2 since the Mannconomy update: Pyromania.

Yes, the long awaited meet the pyro update is upon us, and with it is coming a giant hat dropping party, the name was originally planned to be called “Safety Dance” but when they realized the band’s horrendous name, they decided it would be better off to use their own creative name, “Pyromania.” We are now in day one of the supposed 3 day updates (and if we remember to the über update, then it could actually be 4 days of updates) and we have been showed a new gametype: Doomsday. The mission is to relay a bomb to famous space chimp, Poopy Joe, only one team can win, etc, etc… Looks interesting, but there were no hats released today, which makes day 2 seems all the more exciting.

Another thing to note is the page found on Adult Swim, saying that they have teamed up with Valve, and for reasons we have yet to learn, that something extremely good will come out of this:

“are teaming up for something that you'll probably enjoy. To learn how their video game peanut butter will be getting in our network's chocolate, come back next week.”

This will of course, probably lead to the Meet the Pyro update being on Adult Swim, but this also raises the question, will this mean that Meet the Pyro will be much longer than previous “Meet the” videos? Looking at both the Medic’s and Spy’s videos, which were the two latest, and have gotten longer each time, it would make sense for there to be a long episode, say 15 or even 30 minutes long, but this could end up being much more than even that.

Talking with some friends, I have come up with the theory that it is completely possible that Valve is going for a TF2 series, and if this at all true, then I will need about 15 pairs of pants every time it comes on. I’m not much of a TV guy anymore, but if there’s one thing I do love, I do enjoy myself a good slice of lore, and the old style, super complex storyline of Team Fortress 2 is without any debate my favorite of all time, we will most likely not know until Wednesday if this is what’s really going down, but I’m excited to see what Valve does next. Expect an update per day on this big update, this is it.

--Santa