Dragon's Crown

Over the past few weeks I have been playing Dragon's Crown on the PS-Vita. I really enjoy this game, the hand drawn graphics are amazing, as is the music. I have almost tried every character class, and my favorite two so far are the Wizard and the Elf Archer. The Wizard gives you some great visuals with the different spells he learns. Though not very strong in terms of close up combat, he works best in the back casting, as a Wizard should. The Elf is a great mix of martial combat and ranged, with a small amount of magic at her disposal. I haven't played with her as much, but I hope to level her up as much as my Wizard. Today I unlocked the online play and hope to play with some people. If you would like to play, send a friend request my way, Vicfalcon4.

Geek-tastic months

Oh boy my head is still spinning from all that has been going on. I have been busy folks, I do apologize for my hiatus. I was going to post about the Xbox one, but decided to wait for E3 to pass. Then I got distracted by awesome movies coming out, and I am finally once again employed which has taken a bit of my time.

First off my opinions of the Xbox One. I was impressed by its specs, less so by the functions they displayed initially. Then they tried to impose DRM and a mandatory online check-in every twenty-four hours. Since E3 they have taken those features away, not before trying to defend it though and practically calling the consumer stupid. First impressions are important in sales, they obviously forgot that.
 
Sony made some great announcements on how their system will be able to play used PS4 games, and that you will not need an internet connection or check in everyday. They also threw out some awesome games, and now I am even more excited. Destiny, Beyond, Transistor, so many I can hardly stand the wait, I want this system now.
 
Nintendo, though Wii U sales are not as high as they would like, is not out of the race. They have some great looking games coming, Super Smash Bros. I am excited to play as Mega Man. A game from the creators of Xenoblade, simply called "X" for now. I really need to get a 3DS too, I am most excited for the new Pokemon X and Y. I have played every single Pokemon game since the beginning, and I have loved all of them. I can not wait for the new generation to come, neither can my fiancee, we have been keeping up with all of the news.

And now movies, Pacific Rim is out and I think it is a lot of fun. Giant monsters and robot battles, how could I say no? I enjoyed the music, the action scenes were great, though the acting was sub-par that was not what I went to watch it for. I went for giant monsters fighting giant robots, and it delivered.

I also went to see Man of Steel. It was a good movie, though it had some inconsistencies and changes to story. One thing bothered me most though. When taken aboard the Kryptonian ship, he began having trouble breathing, and his powers went away. They said it was because the ships atmosphere. NO. Superman gets his powers from the rays of the yellow sun, not from the atmosphere he is in. He does not even have to breathe, which they even show in the movie a few times. Once while he was underwater for an undetermined amount of time, and he even went into the vacuum of space, twice. Things like that really stick with me, and make the experience less enjoyable.

Once again I apologize for not posting in a while, I will do my best to continue to geek out with you. Until next time folks.

Iron Man 3

Warning this post may contain a few spoilers, just so you know.

I was able to make it to opening night of Iron Man 3, and I had a great time. Iron Man is not really my favorite of superheroes, but I have a passion for any heroes or heroins. The first Iron Man did an excellent job of introducing the characters and establishing their backgrounds. The second had a lot going on, and seemed too cramped. What with Tony being taken to court for his armor, Tony slowly dying from his battery poisoning his blood, and mixing in some S.H.I.E.L.D activity to make way for the Avengers. It was just a lot of different stories going on for one movie.

Three takes place after the events in The Avengers, and Tony is apparently having anxiety attacks when ever someone talks to him about what happened in the portal. Then in comes The Mandarin seeming to antagonize Tony, not directly, with attacks across America. Tony then threatens him, telling him he is dead and goes as far as to mock him by giving him his address. This is followed by Tony's mansion being blown up and he goes on the run.

I found the movie to be entertaining, Robert Downey Jr. continues to play the snarky Tony Stark perfectly. There are scenes where he is interacting with a young boy, and the dialog is priceless. I do not want to ruin that for anyone, you have to see it for yourself. There is not much with the film I was not happy with, it had action, plot twists, and a lot more comedy than the other films. Some people might have a problem with that, but if I am laughing, even through an action film, I am enjoying myself. I say the movie was great, go see the beginning of Marvel's phase two of superhero films. And remember to stay for the end of the credits, I know they are long, but you will be happy.

Kyoryu Sentai Zyuranger VS. Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers

I was recently lucky to find all fifty episodes of Kyoryu Sentai Zyuranger, the series that started America's Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers. I have always been told that the Japanese version had a better story than the American. So I embarked on a 6 month quest to find to either a DVD set or a steaming community.

When it came to America we of course took our scissors and cut the heck out of the series. We also added a bunch of new stuff such as Zordon, Alpha and teenagers with attitude. When I was younger I of course had no problem with how corny it was, how the picture quality would change when they 'morphed', or how they would be in one place and then be somewhere completely different a second later. The story was very simple too, a witch named Rita escaped her prison after ten thousand years and begins trying to destroy planet earth. And all that stands in her way is a group of teenage superheroes. When Rita's monsters seemed to be defeated, she would cast down her staff and make it grow. Then the Rangers would have to call on their powerful Zords, large dinosaur themed robotic beasts, to help and form the Megazord to banish the monster for good.


However, the original story was deeper and had more plot twists. Five young warriors from an ancient civilization of Dinosaur-evolved Humans are awakened during the present day after 170 million years of suspended animation. This is in reaction to their sworn enemy, Bandora the Witch, being inadvertently released from her magical container on Planet Nemesis by two astronauts. The five warriors, the Zyurangers, must summon the power of deities known as Guardian Beasts, each modeled after a different prehistoric beast, and form Daizyujin in order to protect mankind from Bandora's evil forces. A sixth warrior, Burai the Dragon Ranger, later becomes involved with the conflict between the Zyurangers and Bandora.

It is revealed that Burai followed the Zyurangers into suspended animation to seek revenge on Geki, the red ranger and his younger brother. He believed that Geki was responsible for the death of his family. This is because they had been separated when Geki was a baby. Though he was raised by the King and Queen of the Yamato Tribe, he was adopted by them after his birth father rebelled against the Yamato King and was forced to give Geki up for adoption as punishment for his insubordination. His birth father used this as an opportunity to challenge the King and reclaim Geki, only to be killed by the King. But the two resolve their differences and eventually fight along side one another. Later in the series the Zyurangers discover that Burai actually died while he was frozen and was brought back to life at the request of Daizyujin. Burai only has a short amount of time before he must return to the land of the dead, and has to stay in a magical room void of time. But every time he leaves it burns down a candle that measures his time left. Eventually Burai runs out of time, but before he leaves he passes his powers onto Geki.

Wow, what a difference, and I think I still left some things out. To close, I am truly happy I was able to watch this series, it was so much better then what I was subjected to as a child. I feel as though I was cheated, I would have gladly watched this much story and thought put into my programming. Though as my Fiancee and I watched we could not help but recall the different scenes that we remember from our younger days. And could not help but insert the hilariously bad dubbing.

Gatchaman goes Live!!

For those who do not know Gatchaman is a Japanese anime from 1972, inspired by the rise of popularity in henshin (transformation) series' like Kamen Rider. Gatchaman features five young heroes trained in the art of the science ninja technique. They fight for the conservation of nature, environmentalism, and responsible use of technology for progress and advancement. The main antagonist is a group of global terrorist known as Galactor, who use giant mechanoids to try and take control of Earth's natural resources. As you could guess, I am a huge fan of this series. I can remember getting up at four or five in the morning to catch the block of anime shows the local channels had running at the time. There were several, Ronin Warriors, Voltron, to name a few and of course Gatchaman. Though that is not what it was called when it came on TV here in America. It came over to America in several forms, from Battle of the Planets, to Eagle Riders. It was heavily cut for the violence, and they added sequences that were clearly of different quality. By doing so it was made even more into a kid show, cause we all know adults do not watch cartoons right? But I was young then and I did not know what I know now.

What drew me in the most about Gatchaman is that it was different from most superhero, action packed adventures that were out there. It had an on going theme and message, use technology wisely and protect nature. The plot was also continuous and consistent, something that is rare for a kid show and cartoons even today. They always used caution when using their bigger weapons, such as the bird missiles and the powerful phoenix attack. I really liked that they did not just go firing away, they thought about the consequences and any damage it might cause. I had never seen that before in anything, and I think it really taught a valuable lesson of think before you act. 

Back in 2005 ADV films released several DVD volumes with all of the episodes uncut for the first time ever in America. Both in their original subtitled version, and a new dubbed version. I was so excited that this happened, I was finally able to see Gatchaman as it was meant to be seen. And now the even greater news, Gatchaman is getting its own live action adaptation! When I heard about this I nearly jumped around for joy, okay I did a little. The movie is slated for a Japan release on August 24th of this year. They now have a teaser trailer on the official site, as well as some images.

Ken "The Eagle" Washio

Game of Shows

Sunday marked the end of the third season of The Walking Dead, AMC's hit television drama loosely based on the popular comic of the same name. I was disappointed with how it ended, it was very anticlimactic. The episode started strong with some action and explosions and then took a swan dive into drawn out dialog followed by some more dialog. Then they went to Woodbury to strike back and just ended up with more talking. Oh and the "Governor" went from pretty crazy to just plain insane and shot all the people he took with him to hit the prison, just because they ran and did not want to die. I really like the show but the season ender really did not empress me at all. This season was not as impressive as the last two, and did not boast the same amount of zombies, sorry 'walkers', as the previous seasons. It was more talking then anything else, and grasping to find different ways to shock the audience.


Game of Thrones on the other hand started its third season Sunday, at the same time as the Walking Dead finale. I watched GoT first and then stayed up to watch the re-showing of WD, let me say I partly regret the decision to stay up and should have just gone to bed. GoT season premier was by far more entertaining, I am more of a fantasy geek so yeah my opinion might be slightly biased. The show has so many intertwining stories that I tend to only pay attention to my favorite characters, John Snow, Tyrion Lannister, Daenerys Targaryen and Arya. The show really took off for me during the second season, when they really started to ramp up the fantasy element. And now with Daenerys having her dragons and making a war path, it is really shaping into an exciting season already.

TMNT

I was watching my usual cartoons recently and saw an ad for the new LEGO Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles sets based off of the new Nickelodeon series. As I am a huge fan of TMNT and Legos you could imagine my extreme excitement that the two have finally come together. Here is some great behind the scenes videos of the making of the new toys. I have also been watching the new series on Nickelodeon and I am very happy with it, there are some changes to the story but only to modernize it and make it relevant for today.

I am really happy how the turtles are once again making a come back. It was not long ago that they had another series that aired on 4kids TV, but it did not grab the interest they had hoped, though it did air for six years. It even had a season, or two, where the turtles were thrust into the future, but that did not go so well and I was not a fan of that much change to the story. The new series though reboots our turtles to when they are younger, fighting the Shredder and his Foot clan, and aliens called Kraang from a different dimension. We find out the Kraang are working on an invasion, and that the ooz that caused the turtles to mutate and also change Master Splinter from a human to a giant rat is from the Kraang dimension. I like the small changes to the story and characters, as it really doesn't change who and what they are. Mind you though these cartoons are for kids and are only spin offs of the comics, which are darker and bloodier.

As happy as I am about the turtles coming back, I can't help but worry about the impending movie slated for June 2014. It is going to be live action and is to have a mix of puppetry and CGI, as well it will be based more closely to the comics. That is cool, but as with other things from my childhood that he has tainted, Michael Bay is a producer with this project. I have also heard despairing news that the turtles will be aliens themselves. That is not the turtles I grew up with, they are mutants, four baby turtles that came in contact with a strange substance that they call the ooz. Raised by Master Splinter, who was also mutated, and trained in the art of Ninjutsu. That is what I grew up with, that is what I want, stop messing with our childhood Michael Bay!! I thank God he is not directing it too.