Objection! Video Games should stay out of my movie, damn it!

*Presses start*

So, I've been moving recently and I hate life. We've bee......

HOLD IT!

There's been a recent announcement that the lawyer with a mission, Phoenix Wright, is getting adapted to the big screen. From the way it sounds, Phoenix, Maya, and Mia, and Edgeworth will all be represented in this long awaited movie.

So....why is it that I have a huge problem with that?

If you think about it and you've gotten past the first case in the first game, you'd know exactly why. I'm not going to spoil anything now, but in a later blog post, I will. Just know that the entire basis of this Phoenix movie lies in the first 30 minutes. I just don't think that they'll do it justice.

And that, Ladies and Gentlemen, is what every gamers nightmare is.

Since 1994, Hollywood has been taking our video games and for the most part, killing the stories and the characters that have made them iconic. Super Mario Bros. Sucked. Double Dragon was terrible. Don't get me started on Street Fighter. Hollywood has a habit of taking well established stories and "ritzing" them up for people who aren't on the same gaming wavelength and getting them to understand the story and to care about their characters. The problem with that is by changing the story, you change a lot about the character, and when people like myself go to enjoy said movie, we end up shouting "THAT'S NOT WHAT HE/SHE/IT WOULD DO! LIES!" at the screen while the other people around us wonder what we've been smoking. They just don't understand that when we get in the theater, we already have a established connection with the lead character/villian and the movie being displayed is nothing like we've played on our game systems.

That's not to say that it's always 100% why VG movies fail, either. Sometimes, we as gamers want the exact same game, line by line, scene by scene, translated to awesome CG effects. Generally good movies get thrown down the tube because of what X director didn't do. I thought (and still do, to this day) that Mortal Kombat was the best video game movie that you could find. It didn't follow what was considered at the time to be canon, but it did a damn good job at getting as close as it could. Resident Evil was the same way. I thought it was a pretty good movie and could have succeeded as being it's own franchise, but I don't think it has a damn thing to do with the game series at all besides sharing a title. Hell, I even kinda enjoyed DOA, but for totally different reasons. :-D

At the time of this writing, David O. Russell just stepped down from the Uncharted movie. This movie was a prime example of taking a video game and changing everything about it. (From being a treasure hunter to a family of art dealers? Really?) Besides, Mark Walburg should never touch another video game movie again. Max Payne is still too fresh in my mind. *shudder*

I think for any director that wants to pick up a game needs to find that happy medium. Make a good movie that stays true to the series, and I'll be happy and you can take my money any day of the week.

I'll leave you with Ken Levine's comment on the BioShock film that was started but then cancelled. All directors, heed this warning. All gamers, listen closely. This is dedicated to you.

“I think we’re in the space now of building properties that are appealing to people, and there’s a version of BioShock that makes a great game and there’s probably a version of BioShock that makes a great movie.”

Continue?

TCPS 11: Rapturecast!

Rapturecast!!! Oh wait.... This is awkward, we're all still here.... Oh well, listen to our podcast! We play some..... Religiously influenced video games. Our last act before the rapture and we're stuck doing crappy podcasts in hell for eternity. *Warning: Listen/Watch with an OPEN MIND. Meant with Much Humour.*

TCPS 10: Carmen gets Random

It's our 10th podcast! We decided to use a Randomizer to play a game, and get some, interesting, results. And then we find pure gold in the form of a V.I.L.E. henchman named after a place in California.

Late Update

So there is a reason there was no podcast yesterday. I was busy. Planning stuff. Sunday was Mother's Day, and with Mother's Day is my own mother's birthday. Today, in fact, is her birthday. So I've been planning two things that really cause such distress because they are so close together, the podcast got neglected. But fear not! As I sit her staring at my cat that has cobwebs all over her face and whiskers (looking much she is an evil villain with a handle bar mustache), planning the delicious dinner that I plan to make my mother, I am also planning to post a podcast tonight, after dinner. It's a video one, and it may or may not involve Carmen Sandiego. Stay tuned Gumshoes!

No More Heroes and the Waggle War

*Presses Start*

Suda 51 is the shit.

For those of you who don't keep up with your game directors, Suda is the wonderful director for games such as Samurai Champloo: Sidetracked, Killer7, Fatal Frame IV and the wonderful No More Heroes. To give you a brief summery, you play as Travis Touchdown, a nerd whose new mission is to defeat the top ranked assassin in his new job of killing everyone in his way. It's rude, it's vulgar and best thing of all time, I love and it's one of the best games on the Wii. Hands down.

PS3 is getting a port of the wonderful part one this summer, so I gave the Japanese version a shot.

But before I get into that, let me give a little bit of info on the waggle war.

Back in 2006, Nintendo launched the Wii, the thing that would soon single handedly destroy their competition for at least 3 years. With it's innovated motion control gaming, it stood on the top of the mountain and laughed at Sony and Microsoft. Both Sony and Microsoft came out and called the Wii's gaming "cute" but none of them could topple the giant. That is, until 2010. Sony released the Playstation Move. It looked just like the Wii, but with wireless nunchuks and a ball on top of the remote. Microsoft released the Kinect the same year touting the tagline "You are the controller." The Kinect sold a lot more then the Move did, but aren't we all forgetting that Both competitors came up with such technology to cut into the Wii's success? And whatever system has the better games is completely to the eye of the beholder because the three consoles have their quality games:

Kinect has Dance Central, a pretty big flagship of a game.

Move has Resident Evil, SOCOM, NBA2K, Killzone, and a few other games that can use the move.

Wii Has your Mario, Zelda, Metroid and other misc games that are just awesome.

At the end of the day, it all depends on what you are into. I, personally, have a Move and a Nintendo Wii. There's nothing that interests me on the Kinect. I don't care for Dance Central and that's just about it as far as "good" games. I have a Move and Killzone was awesome to play on it as well as Resident Evil 5. The Wii gets the most playtime just because I like the quirky games to come out on it. Trauma Center Series. Madworld. TVC. Brawl. Other M. No More Heroes.

*Sigh* No More Heroes.

I love the game, but it doesn't flow as well as it should on a system on the ps3. It struck me as colorful, vibrant, and just as cartoony as the world that it was depicting. On the PS3, The graphics are much better, but it became a darker world in the process and I found myself missing the little things in the game. The Control scheme for this game should have been easy, but it just feels like they were a compiled mess. The game was indeed, made for the motion controls and it should have never been stuffed into a controller. Towards the end of the first boss, I just felt frustrated and mad that half of the moves that I could easily pulled off on the Wii were getting me killed on the PS3. I can see this being playable for US audiences only if you're going to be using the PSMove. If you're looking for getting this one, make sure that you have the move.

Travis Touchdown fumbled on this port. If this is the way that we're going to handle ports from now on, we should have No More Heroes.

Continue?