This August was perhaps the craziest month ever in my life. Between taking care of two kids, preparing for the school year, and taking the family out to Chicago and back, I had little time for my usual nerdy endeavors. I did fit a few things in, though, and I'll sum them up here.
TV
I cannot remember the last time the little lady and I watched Avengers, but the last episode we saw was from the aftermath of the Skull invasion. It was a really fun episode in which we are introduced to Spiderman and the "web" of lies concocted by J. Jonah Jameson at his expense. Spiderman and Captain America were able to relate for most of the episode, since most of the world has no idea that Captain America was being impersonated by a Skull and did not actually want the entire population of the Earth to bow down to them. The headline for The Daily Bugle at the end of the episode, though, as read by Spiderman, really put the episode over the top: "Captain America defeats Spiderman and the Serpent Society!?!?" Comic gold.
I have continued to watch Dexter, but I am still on season 2. Getting in Dexter is tough because there are two young 'uns that cannot watch it, or even walk through the same room while I watch it. So, I need to tuck myself into our breakfast nook in the kitchen with my headphones and laptop while they are playing outside or off doing something else. I had forgotten how great the relationship between Dexter and Doakes is in that season - the writers really did a great job of building up that tension throughout the entire season. I am about to watch the episode in which (spoiler alert!) Doakes ends up discovering Dexter for what he really is, and the episode that follows that is, if I remember correctly, one of the best. I am looking forward to it, but not looking forward to seeing more of Lila at the end of the season.
Season 2 is not my favorite season, but seasons 3 through 5 mark what I believe is the best ark in the entire series, and I bet I'll get some writing in on that.
Video Games
Remember last time, when I said I would play more Legend of Zelda, and more Mario, and more games in general? Yeah, no.
The only game I play regularly is Candy Crush Saga because it's the only game I have time to play, in between being a dad. It's a fun game, and only recently have I found that there is actually a little bit of skill required to get the three star rank for which I always aim. I mean, you don't need much skill - it's still mostly luck - but I have started to develop strategy for levels instead of just mindlessly playing it and hoping for some of the good pieces.
I did sit down and play a depressingly bad game called Chicken Shoot. Seriously, it's bad, and racist, and not well tested, and racist. I would say it's so bad it's good, but it's also racist. Like, really racist, and pointless. I think I might start a series of posts titled "Game You Never Knew Existed," and Chicken Shoot will face my wrath in a much more extended entry, perhaps with some video!
Movies
I spent a rather lengthy blog post on it, so I won't elaborate here, but we did watch Return of the Jedi with the little lady. Please reference my incredibly long rant about the movie from the previous blog post if you are curious as to how I feel about the experience.
We have also been watching the Marvel movies with the little lady, making sure to have good conversations about the violence in them so that we continue to be good parents as well. We watched Iron Man, which continues to age better than I thought it might. Robert Downey Jr. has the role down so well from the get-go that I can't help but feel like it was written for him in the first place. I also constantly forget that Terrence Howard played Rhodes in the first movie. I always get annoyed at switched like that in the middle of a franchise, but really, Don Cheadle has way more fun being a superhero than Howard would have had.
We also watched The Incredible Hulk, the forgotten Marvel movie that, as far as I know, remains canon even though most people pretend like it never happened. I believe there is a Marvel One-Shot that takes care of the loose ends (the fate of Abomination, the tease about The Leader), but I haven't read much because I want to see it, but I also haven't gotten a chance to see it. They should just put them all out on one DVD, or put them on Netflix.
Anyway, that movie isn't great, but it isn't bad. The humor seems ill-placed in it for some reason that I cannot quite identify, even though I feel like each moment succeeds in and of itself. I am glad Edward Norton was recast - Mark Ruffalo plays The Hulk perfectly, with his mannerisms and attitude. I am looking forward to the return of General Ross in Captain America: Civil War - he seemed like such a caricature in this movie that it wasted William Hurt's talents. I hope he's got some good things to work with in the new film.
Books
Reading is tough, since it takes me considerable mental energy to do it and do it well. I enjoy reading, though, and have managed to work my way through The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and am almost done (I think) with The Restaurant at the End of the Universe. I really hate that there is hardly any narrative thread - I like stories that are clever, not clever (and, I will admit, often humorous) little tidbits that are attempted to be thrown together into a story. It's the same sort of problem I had with Stephen King's It - make a collection of short stories and lose the need to connect it all, since the connection kind of sucks. I am enjoying the books, to a certain extent, but after reading It and Faithful and now this, I am really longing for a story.
(Hopefully) Coming Up in September...
Well, there will be more Dexter, damn it. I will have to wait until at least the little one goes to bed, and even then still sit somewhere all on my own to get through it without interruption, but it will happen. I think getting all of the way through season 3 is an overly-ambitious goal, but getting into season 3 should be doable.
The little lady and I should also continue getting through Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes. She'll want to do it - I just need to remember to remind her.
I will read more - I have consistently read every night before going to sleep for about a week and it will continue. I hope to start Stephen King's Joyland by the end of the month.
Video games? Look for a post that describes a regular Twitch playing time, hopefully every Saturday morning (since it's the only uninterrupted time I can get the TV). Also, as I mentioned, I want to start the new series of posts called Games You Never Knew Existed. I hope I can make it happen, at least once a month, as well as continue going through My Collection of Unfinished Games.
Showing posts with label Avengers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Avengers. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 2, 2015
Saturday, August 1, 2015
Nerdy Month in Review: July 2015
On the first of every month, I will recap my nerdy endeavors over the course of the previous month.
July was a hectic month from a non-nerdy standpoint, helping our little lady get through having her tonsils out and adjusting to another foster child in the house. We've also had some pesky visitors in the form of lice and mice, so I have been busy and will continue to be busy. Here is what I did manage to get in, though:
TV
The Little Lady and I have been working through Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes. As of today, we have gotten about 10 episodes into season 2. We've witnessed the Avengers tackle Loki and his invasion of Asgard, the Kree, and right now, the Skrull invasion. The cartoon is epic, far more than the movies ever will be, so for anyone that wants to get into the Marvel universe, this is an excellent place to start (others might suggest the comics, naturally, but if you are like me and comics aren't your thing, then check out the cartoon). I wish they worked harder to get more female superheroes into the mix - we've recently been introduced to Ms. Marvel, a strong female superhero, and Wasp has been there since the beginning, but she fits too many ditzy female stereotypes to really count as a solid female superhero. The comic relief is consistently good, and the series does a good job of recalling intertwining storylines that began at the beginning of the series. Despite the complexity of the storylines, The Little Lady has had no problems getting what's going on until recently, when she got thoroughly confused on who was a Skrull and who was not.
In other TV nerdiness, Umberto MacJay and I are attempting to watch every season of Dexter and rank each and every episode. We spent one glorious afternoon discussing our rating mechanisms and how we are going to rank each episode and present it to all of you wonderful readers. The entire list will probably be available on this blog sometime in the Fall, but don't hold us too closely to that - this is a significant undertaking, and I myself am only about halfway through season 2. I have seen every season except for the final season, which fans were not crazy about, but I am going to withhold judgement until I see it for myself.
Video Games
Where to begin here? I have been playing a wide variety of games over the course of the month, mainly because whenever I finally get time to sit down and play one, it's been so long since I have actually played anything. As a result, I've done mostly gaming without any semblance of a story - Super Mario 3D World, Mario Kart 8 and Super Smash Bros. for Wii U. I already wrote at length about Super Mario 3D World and will spare you anymore details here (no, I have not yet beaten that STUPID OBNOXIOUS RIDICULOUS final level). Mario Kart 8 continues to be a challenge with the addition of 200cc, a ridiculously fast romp through the levels that forces you to change your entire racing strategy. It's like playing a brand new game after being so accustomed to 150cc and the Mirror tracks. I am still missing a 3-star, gold trophy on one of the Mirror tracks, and got 2 stars on one of them (I HATE not getting 3 stars - I usually quit as soon as I don't get first in a race as a result). But, I have enjoyed trying 200cc and silently cursing Nintendo for forcing me to change the strategy that I used over the course of an entire 8-game series.
Super Smash Bros. for Wii U is out and about again in my house because I purchased all of the DLC. Ryu has been a fun addition, and I have enjoyed whipping out all of my old Street Fighter moves when I use him (although really, I usually fall back on using the B button to use all of the special moves to ensure my victory). I wish they had added more locations in the new DLC - I miss the stages in Brawl and Melee so much, the newer versions haven't quite lived up to those - but overall, the game is still a blast to play in a living room full of people.
I spent a lot of the beginning of the month playing The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds. It's easily one of the strongest entries in the Zelda franchise, and perhaps, at the moment at least, is my favorite of the overhead, 2D Zelda titles (not that it is really 2D, with its gorgeous 3D visuals). I am super glad they ditched the requirement of using the touch screen to control Link. I never finished Phantom Hourglass as a result - my hand would get cramped up eventually, and I always ended up doing things I didn't want to do eventually, because of the odd controls. A Link Between Worlds, while I am not even halfway through, has proven to be a phenomenally deep game. I just hope I have more time over the next month to play it.
The Little Lady has taken over LEGO Marvel Superheroes, although I got pretty far before she decided she was going to play it all of the time. Again, I wrote at length about this earlier, so I will spare the details now, but the depth of the game continues to amaze me. I could wander around LEGO New York City for HOURS and still not find everything, and that's a good thing. The Little Lady has also taken over Animal Crossing: New Leaf, and thankfully, she is no longer leaving all of her stuff lying around town. As the mayor of Koholint, my town in Animal Crossing, I want my village looking immaculately clean. She probably wouldn't have cleaned up the town except I pointed out that, if you go to the Mayor's Office, my secretary points out how absolutely annoyed all of the villagers are about it. Thanks, Nintendo, for making a game that encourages me to obsessively organize things - that almost makes up for changing my Mario Kart strategy.
Movies
Nothing much going on here. We have been having The Little Lady watch the original Star Wars trilogy, and yes, we'll probably show her the prequel trilogy because it is, after all, canon. Then we can take her to see the new one, whether she's still living with us or not. I continue to love how interested she is in virtually everything - it was so easy to get her into Star Wars and keep her interested. She still asks me sometimes why Obi-Wan didn't tell Luke the truth about Darth Vader. She seems very annoyed about that.
We went and saw Inside-Out and both my wife and I bawled while the girls were simply non-plussed by (spoiler alert) the realization that yes, some important memories can be sad and our emotions get more complicated as we enter our teenage years. Pixar's slogan should be "let us entertain your kids while you bawl your eyes out." That damn Lava short-movie didn't help - I honestly thought they would give us a sad ending to that volcano's tale for a few seconds, and thought, "Geez, Pixar, I thought you wouldn't stoop this low after the first ten minutes of Up." Don't worry, guys - it's Pixar, it ends happily, although you still might cry.
Books
After finishing Stephen King's It, I read the not-so-nerdy Faithful, the story about the 2004 Boston Red Sox in which Stephen King was a co-writer. The Red Sox are my one truly non-nerdy interest, although I needed to read Faithful to remind myself that I am still a Red Sox fan after such a horrible season up until now.
It is a good book if you think about it like a short story collection, but overall, it's a mess of missed opportunities and silly storytelling shortcuts, all in an effort to force out some sort of epic story even though there really isn't any need for it. Characters like Henry Bowers (a truly amazing King villain) and Beverly's father (King knows exactly how to take abusive, horrible people and make them somehow more disgusting) are far more terrifying than It, and the backstories and the little vignettes King tells are often far more fascinating than the main story. I want to like this book, but it's such a mess that I have to consider it one of the worst King outings I've read, probably the first one I have read that disappointed me (I haven't even come close to reading them all, and if it matters, my favorites so far are The Stand, The Shining and The Dead Zone).
I am now reading The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, something I am told I should have read long ago. As a nerd, it's probably criminal that I haven't read it yet, and so far, I am pretty impressed. Some of the comedy within it feels twinged with arrogance on the part of the author, a sort of "oh wow, look at how clever I am" sort of feeling, but enough of it is quite entertaining that I am continuing to read it each night before going to sleep. It's part of an anthology with three other books by Adams, so I'll probably read those too.
Coming Up in August...
My wife and I will see Ant-Man at some point, and I am sure I will just throw all of my wonderful feelings about the Marvel cinematic universe down in a blog entry at some point afterwards. I will continue to read The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy as well, hopefully getting through it by the end of the month, and I want desperately to work harder on The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds, in the hopes that I can write a Game Profile about it. More Dexter is on tap as well, perhaps allowing me to write an entry about how well it humanizes such a dark character, and adds darkness to characters that are otherwise good. I have also been thinking a lot about online gaming and what it has done to the social aspect of gaming. I have an opinion that is probably in the minority of opinions on online gaming, but hey, I'm going to throw it out there anyway.
July was a hectic month from a non-nerdy standpoint, helping our little lady get through having her tonsils out and adjusting to another foster child in the house. We've also had some pesky visitors in the form of lice and mice, so I have been busy and will continue to be busy. Here is what I did manage to get in, though:
TV
The Little Lady and I have been working through Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes. As of today, we have gotten about 10 episodes into season 2. We've witnessed the Avengers tackle Loki and his invasion of Asgard, the Kree, and right now, the Skrull invasion. The cartoon is epic, far more than the movies ever will be, so for anyone that wants to get into the Marvel universe, this is an excellent place to start (others might suggest the comics, naturally, but if you are like me and comics aren't your thing, then check out the cartoon). I wish they worked harder to get more female superheroes into the mix - we've recently been introduced to Ms. Marvel, a strong female superhero, and Wasp has been there since the beginning, but she fits too many ditzy female stereotypes to really count as a solid female superhero. The comic relief is consistently good, and the series does a good job of recalling intertwining storylines that began at the beginning of the series. Despite the complexity of the storylines, The Little Lady has had no problems getting what's going on until recently, when she got thoroughly confused on who was a Skrull and who was not.
In other TV nerdiness, Umberto MacJay and I are attempting to watch every season of Dexter and rank each and every episode. We spent one glorious afternoon discussing our rating mechanisms and how we are going to rank each episode and present it to all of you wonderful readers. The entire list will probably be available on this blog sometime in the Fall, but don't hold us too closely to that - this is a significant undertaking, and I myself am only about halfway through season 2. I have seen every season except for the final season, which fans were not crazy about, but I am going to withhold judgement until I see it for myself.
Video Games
Where to begin here? I have been playing a wide variety of games over the course of the month, mainly because whenever I finally get time to sit down and play one, it's been so long since I have actually played anything. As a result, I've done mostly gaming without any semblance of a story - Super Mario 3D World, Mario Kart 8 and Super Smash Bros. for Wii U. I already wrote at length about Super Mario 3D World and will spare you anymore details here (no, I have not yet beaten that STUPID OBNOXIOUS RIDICULOUS final level). Mario Kart 8 continues to be a challenge with the addition of 200cc, a ridiculously fast romp through the levels that forces you to change your entire racing strategy. It's like playing a brand new game after being so accustomed to 150cc and the Mirror tracks. I am still missing a 3-star, gold trophy on one of the Mirror tracks, and got 2 stars on one of them (I HATE not getting 3 stars - I usually quit as soon as I don't get first in a race as a result). But, I have enjoyed trying 200cc and silently cursing Nintendo for forcing me to change the strategy that I used over the course of an entire 8-game series.
Super Smash Bros. for Wii U is out and about again in my house because I purchased all of the DLC. Ryu has been a fun addition, and I have enjoyed whipping out all of my old Street Fighter moves when I use him (although really, I usually fall back on using the B button to use all of the special moves to ensure my victory). I wish they had added more locations in the new DLC - I miss the stages in Brawl and Melee so much, the newer versions haven't quite lived up to those - but overall, the game is still a blast to play in a living room full of people.
I spent a lot of the beginning of the month playing The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds. It's easily one of the strongest entries in the Zelda franchise, and perhaps, at the moment at least, is my favorite of the overhead, 2D Zelda titles (not that it is really 2D, with its gorgeous 3D visuals). I am super glad they ditched the requirement of using the touch screen to control Link. I never finished Phantom Hourglass as a result - my hand would get cramped up eventually, and I always ended up doing things I didn't want to do eventually, because of the odd controls. A Link Between Worlds, while I am not even halfway through, has proven to be a phenomenally deep game. I just hope I have more time over the next month to play it.
The Little Lady has taken over LEGO Marvel Superheroes, although I got pretty far before she decided she was going to play it all of the time. Again, I wrote at length about this earlier, so I will spare the details now, but the depth of the game continues to amaze me. I could wander around LEGO New York City for HOURS and still not find everything, and that's a good thing. The Little Lady has also taken over Animal Crossing: New Leaf, and thankfully, she is no longer leaving all of her stuff lying around town. As the mayor of Koholint, my town in Animal Crossing, I want my village looking immaculately clean. She probably wouldn't have cleaned up the town except I pointed out that, if you go to the Mayor's Office, my secretary points out how absolutely annoyed all of the villagers are about it. Thanks, Nintendo, for making a game that encourages me to obsessively organize things - that almost makes up for changing my Mario Kart strategy.
Movies
Nothing much going on here. We have been having The Little Lady watch the original Star Wars trilogy, and yes, we'll probably show her the prequel trilogy because it is, after all, canon. Then we can take her to see the new one, whether she's still living with us or not. I continue to love how interested she is in virtually everything - it was so easy to get her into Star Wars and keep her interested. She still asks me sometimes why Obi-Wan didn't tell Luke the truth about Darth Vader. She seems very annoyed about that.
We went and saw Inside-Out and both my wife and I bawled while the girls were simply non-plussed by (spoiler alert) the realization that yes, some important memories can be sad and our emotions get more complicated as we enter our teenage years. Pixar's slogan should be "let us entertain your kids while you bawl your eyes out." That damn Lava short-movie didn't help - I honestly thought they would give us a sad ending to that volcano's tale for a few seconds, and thought, "Geez, Pixar, I thought you wouldn't stoop this low after the first ten minutes of Up." Don't worry, guys - it's Pixar, it ends happily, although you still might cry.
Books
After finishing Stephen King's It, I read the not-so-nerdy Faithful, the story about the 2004 Boston Red Sox in which Stephen King was a co-writer. The Red Sox are my one truly non-nerdy interest, although I needed to read Faithful to remind myself that I am still a Red Sox fan after such a horrible season up until now.
It is a good book if you think about it like a short story collection, but overall, it's a mess of missed opportunities and silly storytelling shortcuts, all in an effort to force out some sort of epic story even though there really isn't any need for it. Characters like Henry Bowers (a truly amazing King villain) and Beverly's father (King knows exactly how to take abusive, horrible people and make them somehow more disgusting) are far more terrifying than It, and the backstories and the little vignettes King tells are often far more fascinating than the main story. I want to like this book, but it's such a mess that I have to consider it one of the worst King outings I've read, probably the first one I have read that disappointed me (I haven't even come close to reading them all, and if it matters, my favorites so far are The Stand, The Shining and The Dead Zone).
I am now reading The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, something I am told I should have read long ago. As a nerd, it's probably criminal that I haven't read it yet, and so far, I am pretty impressed. Some of the comedy within it feels twinged with arrogance on the part of the author, a sort of "oh wow, look at how clever I am" sort of feeling, but enough of it is quite entertaining that I am continuing to read it each night before going to sleep. It's part of an anthology with three other books by Adams, so I'll probably read those too.
Coming Up in August...
My wife and I will see Ant-Man at some point, and I am sure I will just throw all of my wonderful feelings about the Marvel cinematic universe down in a blog entry at some point afterwards. I will continue to read The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy as well, hopefully getting through it by the end of the month, and I want desperately to work harder on The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds, in the hopes that I can write a Game Profile about it. More Dexter is on tap as well, perhaps allowing me to write an entry about how well it humanizes such a dark character, and adds darkness to characters that are otherwise good. I have also been thinking a lot about online gaming and what it has done to the social aspect of gaming. I have an opinion that is probably in the minority of opinions on online gaming, but hey, I'm going to throw it out there anyway.
Sunday, July 26, 2015
Somebody Make This: Cooperative, Multiplayer Avengers Game
Imagine this: both HYDRA and AIM, evil organizations from the Marvel universe, are fighting each other in New York City, with SHIELD jumping in not only to fight off these two, but to keep the Avengers from interfering. The Avengers are scattered throughout the city, some tackling HYDRA, some tailing AIM, and some fending off SHIELD. They each have their own tasks but must come to the aid of others when they can. It's a crazy, hectic situation, the Avengers needing to stay coordinated and communicate.
Well, if you can't imagine it, you can simply watch Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes episode titled "Hail, HYDRA!" That's the premise, and it's a doozy - a fun episode that shows just how entertaining the show can be and the kind of mayhem it can present. The movies cannot touch this kind of character collision - too many actors, too many contracts, too full for even a 3-hour movie. And do you know what else would be able to handle an epic battle of this magnitude?
A video game.
I know - there's LEGO Marvel Super Heroes, but it doesn't have the cooperative aspect or the multiplayer aspect. As much as I have talked up that game in a previous post, the thing I have in my head is much, much more than what that game manages to accomplish. There's also this Avengers: Battle for Earth game, but it's a fighting game, not the type of large-scale treatment the Avengers really deserve. These guys need something big, something epic ... something Hulk-sized.
Here's what I've got:
The gameplay covers a map - let's say New York City, but other Marvel locations could work (maybe Wakanda, maybe another city). There is chaos all over this map - maybe HYDRA trying to steal something somewhere, maybe another super villain breaking in somewhere else - and you and a team of Avengers is scattered, trying to handle all of the problems. Whether the multiplayer action occurs online or in your TV room together (I prefer it all happening together - more fun, better communication, better gaming environment), it is up to you and whatever Avenger you have chosen to save the city. You need to coordinate, obviously - you can't all go to the same crisis and ignore the others - but you also need to work together to accomplish every task.
There could be missions to complete, or maybe you get some sort of rating after you have saved the city. You could compete with others to get a better rating. There could be some sort of story mode, but it would need to feel unique somehow - it can't feel tacked-on like the Star Wars Battlefront story modes. It needs to somehow build on the multiplayer mode, but I haven't thought of any good ideas about that yet.
But more on the gameplay, since that is the most important aspect. SHIELD could play an important part in this, and even be playable - how about taking advantage of that wonderful touch-screen controller for the Wii U and letting someone use that to pilot the Helicarrier? They could keep track of where all of the action in the city is, tell the other players where to go and who is there. They could even call in recruits from SHIELD or (and this is where things get crazy), they could even call in Ultron recruits. The Avengers cartoon does a great job of introducing Ultron as an army of robots that help the Avengers fight off an alien invasion, and soon afterwards, Ultron turns on them. What if you had the option of using Ultron in this game, and sometimes, but not all of the time, Ultron turned on you and you had another problem to solve? Oh man, if this game had that kind of depth, it would be epic.
Let's build on that - what if you and your friends were sitting in the living room, playing this game, and online, somewhere else, was another group? One group could be coordinated by HYDRA and the other by SHIELD, and you would fight each other over the internet, not knowing what the other group is planning. That is definitely one of the best multiplayer ideas I have ever heard.
Now, some of this gameplay does sound like Star Wars Battlefront, but those games were always clunky and unrefined. This needs to be almost flawless in its execution or it'll be a let-down. I know it would never, ever happen, but Nintendo could destroy this (in a good way). Shigeru Miyamoto once said he would never put multiplayer in a game unless it was better than Mario Kart (a high standard, to say the least). This could be exactly what he's talking about, and nearly every single Nintendo game I've played does play smoothly, especially in multiplayer mode. This is a game that needs the kind of care and attention Nintendo tends to give games. This is, of course, a dream, but it's nice to dream sometimes.
There would, of course, be a wide variety of heroes to choose from: Hulk, Iron Man, Captain America, Hawkeye, Black Widow, Antman, maybe the Wasp (since I got my inspiration from the cartoon), and definitely Black Panther. You could also play the game from the villain's side and play any number of Marvel villains. I imagine DLC would happen at some point, with more locations and characters available to unlock. This could be a pretty big deal, if it were done well.
And while I am thinking on an incredibly large scale, why not make one of the locations Asgard? The little lady and I, continuing to plow through the Avengers cartoon, just watched the Avengers thoroughly thrash Loki and his army of monsters. How about defending, or taking back, Asgard from Loki? What about somehow incorporating all of the other nine realms? Maybe SHIELD cannot coordinate here and you need to find other ways to coordinate your efforts and prioritize different parts of Asgard as you fight off the enemy threat.
I'm sure I haven't even scratched the surface of all of the possible Marvel locales that could be involved in such an undertaking - I am limited to what I know from the movies and the cartoon. Those who read the comics may have a better handle on how this idea could be broadened or refined, and what sorts of things to include. The game would need some significant development time - it would need to be tested and retested to make sure it all works flawlessly - but I have no doubt that this game would be a pretty big deal if it ever actually happened.
Why no one has managed to try putting something like this together, especially in the wake of continued success of Marvel movies at the box office, is a complete mystery to me. I suppose the idea might be out on the internet somewhere, if I broaden what websites I check regularly, but maybe it isn't, not on this scale. Come on, people - talk this one up. Someone needs to make this happen, because it could easily be one of the biggest games to ever grace our wonderful gaming world.
Well, if you can't imagine it, you can simply watch Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes episode titled "Hail, HYDRA!" That's the premise, and it's a doozy - a fun episode that shows just how entertaining the show can be and the kind of mayhem it can present. The movies cannot touch this kind of character collision - too many actors, too many contracts, too full for even a 3-hour movie. And do you know what else would be able to handle an epic battle of this magnitude?
A video game.
I know - there's LEGO Marvel Super Heroes, but it doesn't have the cooperative aspect or the multiplayer aspect. As much as I have talked up that game in a previous post, the thing I have in my head is much, much more than what that game manages to accomplish. There's also this Avengers: Battle for Earth game, but it's a fighting game, not the type of large-scale treatment the Avengers really deserve. These guys need something big, something epic ... something Hulk-sized.
Here's what I've got:
The gameplay covers a map - let's say New York City, but other Marvel locations could work (maybe Wakanda, maybe another city). There is chaos all over this map - maybe HYDRA trying to steal something somewhere, maybe another super villain breaking in somewhere else - and you and a team of Avengers is scattered, trying to handle all of the problems. Whether the multiplayer action occurs online or in your TV room together (I prefer it all happening together - more fun, better communication, better gaming environment), it is up to you and whatever Avenger you have chosen to save the city. You need to coordinate, obviously - you can't all go to the same crisis and ignore the others - but you also need to work together to accomplish every task.
There could be missions to complete, or maybe you get some sort of rating after you have saved the city. You could compete with others to get a better rating. There could be some sort of story mode, but it would need to feel unique somehow - it can't feel tacked-on like the Star Wars Battlefront story modes. It needs to somehow build on the multiplayer mode, but I haven't thought of any good ideas about that yet.
But more on the gameplay, since that is the most important aspect. SHIELD could play an important part in this, and even be playable - how about taking advantage of that wonderful touch-screen controller for the Wii U and letting someone use that to pilot the Helicarrier? They could keep track of where all of the action in the city is, tell the other players where to go and who is there. They could even call in recruits from SHIELD or (and this is where things get crazy), they could even call in Ultron recruits. The Avengers cartoon does a great job of introducing Ultron as an army of robots that help the Avengers fight off an alien invasion, and soon afterwards, Ultron turns on them. What if you had the option of using Ultron in this game, and sometimes, but not all of the time, Ultron turned on you and you had another problem to solve? Oh man, if this game had that kind of depth, it would be epic.
Let's build on that - what if you and your friends were sitting in the living room, playing this game, and online, somewhere else, was another group? One group could be coordinated by HYDRA and the other by SHIELD, and you would fight each other over the internet, not knowing what the other group is planning. That is definitely one of the best multiplayer ideas I have ever heard.
Now, some of this gameplay does sound like Star Wars Battlefront, but those games were always clunky and unrefined. This needs to be almost flawless in its execution or it'll be a let-down. I know it would never, ever happen, but Nintendo could destroy this (in a good way). Shigeru Miyamoto once said he would never put multiplayer in a game unless it was better than Mario Kart (a high standard, to say the least). This could be exactly what he's talking about, and nearly every single Nintendo game I've played does play smoothly, especially in multiplayer mode. This is a game that needs the kind of care and attention Nintendo tends to give games. This is, of course, a dream, but it's nice to dream sometimes.
There would, of course, be a wide variety of heroes to choose from: Hulk, Iron Man, Captain America, Hawkeye, Black Widow, Antman, maybe the Wasp (since I got my inspiration from the cartoon), and definitely Black Panther. You could also play the game from the villain's side and play any number of Marvel villains. I imagine DLC would happen at some point, with more locations and characters available to unlock. This could be a pretty big deal, if it were done well.
And while I am thinking on an incredibly large scale, why not make one of the locations Asgard? The little lady and I, continuing to plow through the Avengers cartoon, just watched the Avengers thoroughly thrash Loki and his army of monsters. How about defending, or taking back, Asgard from Loki? What about somehow incorporating all of the other nine realms? Maybe SHIELD cannot coordinate here and you need to find other ways to coordinate your efforts and prioritize different parts of Asgard as you fight off the enemy threat.
I'm sure I haven't even scratched the surface of all of the possible Marvel locales that could be involved in such an undertaking - I am limited to what I know from the movies and the cartoon. Those who read the comics may have a better handle on how this idea could be broadened or refined, and what sorts of things to include. The game would need some significant development time - it would need to be tested and retested to make sure it all works flawlessly - but I have no doubt that this game would be a pretty big deal if it ever actually happened.
Why no one has managed to try putting something like this together, especially in the wake of continued success of Marvel movies at the box office, is a complete mystery to me. I suppose the idea might be out on the internet somewhere, if I broaden what websites I check regularly, but maybe it isn't, not on this scale. Come on, people - talk this one up. Someone needs to make this happen, because it could easily be one of the biggest games to ever grace our wonderful gaming world.
Sunday, July 19, 2015
Watching Cartoons As An Adult
Many of us know that a great defense of watching cartoons (children's cartoons, mind you) is simply saying, "My child is watching it, so I watch it with them." I imagine that, in any general social situation, I would use the same defense, not that I believe it is necessary, but because making a solid first impression is one of my core philosophies. Most people, after all, are generally suspect of adults that watch cartoons and then go around talking about them. I happen to find such an opinion silly - there are plenty of mature, responsible people that watch cartoons - but I still find myself only able to truly justify watching cartoons when I am watching them with my nine-year-old foster daughter.
Having said that, before the little lady joined our household, I had worked my way through several cartoons from the 90's and early 00's all on my own using the glorious resource known as Netflix, the place to go to seek out those nostalgic shows we watched back when Saturday morning cartoons still existed. Since I have graduated college, I worked through Spiderman (the 90's version off of which many a McDonald's toy were based) and Batman Beyond. Once I had someone with whom to watch, I started making suggestions, all of which the little lady has agreed to watch with much enthusiasm. We made it through all 3 seasons of Beast Wars: Transformers and have recently started watching Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes.
Several of these cartoons have a definite theme, if you have noticed. I do enjoy my superhero cartoons, probably because I lack the patience to work my way through the vast library of comic books and graphic novels from which these heroes gained their fame. As I believe I have mentioned in an earlier post, I am not completely enamored of reading comic books - that's my wife's territory. I have made several good-faith attempts to get into them - The Sandman was pretty amazing, and I have enjoyed the more recent Iron Man comics, since the first movie came out - but overall, it's not an artistic medium that resonates with me. The content, however, is something I have always found attractive. A hero fighting off scores of awesome villains, and sometimes teaming up with other awesome heroes? An entire universe full of these heroes and villains to explore? To me, the opportunities have always seemed limitless, causing me to craft my own world of heroes very early on in my life. Even now in adulthood, I have flirted with trying to bring some of these heroes into being through my writing, although my fiction writing leaves quite a bit to be desired.
As a result of this life-long interest in superheroes, I am still very interested in what cartoons are out there. One cannot simply get their superhero fix from the movies - TV shows, particularly cartoons, offer so many differing paths for these heroes to follow, often getting things right that I feel the movies have been unable to handle. Watching these cartoons has given me a great glimpse into just what is possible for these heroes, and how big the universe really is. The Spiderman cartoon, at that time in my life, was the only thing I had ever seen that brought so many different heroes and villains into the picture - I was obsessed with gathering toys of them all and playing with that world myself, expanding it as I saw fit and making it something entirely different.
Anyway, enough nostalgia - what about now? I still find myself appreciating how cartoons are presented, and how they tell their own stories. Due to their targeted audience, cartoons keep it simple, something many movies could benefit from doing (here's to you, Avengers: Age of Ultron). They often represent the mantra of "show, don't tell" incredibly well, again mostly due to their audience. Kids don't tune into shows to listen to people talk all of the time - they want to see things unfold, watch how things happen. Yes, there are clunkers out there, but if we look at the medium in general, it's incredibly easy to find a wide variety of cartoons out there that tell their stories incredibly well.
One of my favorite episodes of Batman Beyond is called "The Eggbaby," one of the goofier episodes that actually works. Terry (the boy who is Batman in this particular iteration of the hero) must care for what is essentially one of those fake, robotic babies anyone that's taken a Home Economics class knows about. Of course, he must also fight crime, as Batman is apt to do. What follows is a wonderfully hilarious sequence of events that culminates in Terry actually getting a good grade on the assignment because he succeeded in getting the egg baby the stimulation it needed. It's an example of a "serious" cartoon that does everything well, relying on the visuals to get us through and entertain us, with special emphasis on the egg baby's face and sounds. I actually made my wife watch this episode with me, even though she generally wants nothing to do with my "silly" cartoons, and even my "too mature for cartoons" wife was entertained.
Cartoons are already well-known for making people laugh, though - what about an instance in which it manages to do something else? I tear up every time I watch the Beast Wars: Transformers episode known as "Code of Hero," in which one of the Maximals (the good guys) known as Dino-Bot makes a last-stand effort to protect the future of humanity. It gets a bit over-the-top at times, with Dino-Bot delivering monologues plagued with clichés, but in the end, watching him sacrifice himself to protect the future is quite powerful, given his on-again, off-again relationship with the Maximals, having started out as a Predacon (the bad guys). Beast Wars is a deeply flawed show - it doesn't handle "goofy" quite as gracefully as Batman Beyond - but it does a great job of giving us very well developed characters and putting those characters in interesting situations.
There is, of course, a nostalgic piece to this. A lot of the cartoons I have named are ones I watched growing up. Avengers is the one exception here - that came out within the last five or six years. Even though I am no longer a child, the show still interests me. The little lady is on board with it too - she keeps asking to watch more and more. She's a future Netflix binge-watcher, she is, but she's a child - we expect her to find these things entertaining. I find the show has great comedic timing and gives the characters personalities that are completely independent of their movie counterparts. The cartoon takes the idea that we can craft original stories from already-existing characters and make it solid entertainment. It has its own agenda, its own ideas, and its own identity.
And maybe that's what makes cartoons so fun in general - it is a reliable place to find originality. Are there other sources of it? Of course, but when it comes to a reliable source of original ideas, cartoons are a great resource. This may be due to the nature of animation - if you can think it, you can make it. Other shows and movies are limited by budgets and materials, but animation? If you get the picture in your head, and you have the talent around you, it can appear on page (or, these days, on a computer screen). There are some wonderfully creative minds in the cartoon business, and with a medium that gives a significant amount of freedom in what it can present and how it can present it, why wouldn't there be a plethora of entertaining, original cartoons out there?
So, if imagination is the only limiting factor for a cartoon, then that might explain why they are so attractive. The superhero universe within Spiderman I obsessed over as a child could only be so expansive and varied because of the medium. Even goofy shows like Spongebob Squarepants and Animaniacs are set within a universe that feels huge, where there seem to be limitless possibilities. If someone has a funny idea, then it can be animated, and placed in the context of a universe that is arguably larger than most TV shows and movies can accommodate comfortably and effectively.
So, if you are one of those people that poo-poos the idea of cartoons, do some research and check some out. In order to be an adult and watch cartoons, you don't need to watch things like Family Guy (for the love of God, don't watch Family Guy - watch something that isn't created by a sexist piece of garbage like Seth MacFarlane, like Bob's Burgers or Futurama). Watch some cartoons with your kids and see if you can find something entertaining, or if you don't have kids, watch some with your friends' kids, or your nieces or nephews, or go volunteer somewhere with kids so you can watch cartoons with them. Odds are in your favor that you will find something you will like - it isn't all superheroes and fart jokes. There's a wealth of creativity in the world of cartoons, so even if you don't find any that you like, don't judge those that do watch them. We, like you, just want to be entertained.
Having said that, before the little lady joined our household, I had worked my way through several cartoons from the 90's and early 00's all on my own using the glorious resource known as Netflix, the place to go to seek out those nostalgic shows we watched back when Saturday morning cartoons still existed. Since I have graduated college, I worked through Spiderman (the 90's version off of which many a McDonald's toy were based) and Batman Beyond. Once I had someone with whom to watch, I started making suggestions, all of which the little lady has agreed to watch with much enthusiasm. We made it through all 3 seasons of Beast Wars: Transformers and have recently started watching Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes.
Several of these cartoons have a definite theme, if you have noticed. I do enjoy my superhero cartoons, probably because I lack the patience to work my way through the vast library of comic books and graphic novels from which these heroes gained their fame. As I believe I have mentioned in an earlier post, I am not completely enamored of reading comic books - that's my wife's territory. I have made several good-faith attempts to get into them - The Sandman was pretty amazing, and I have enjoyed the more recent Iron Man comics, since the first movie came out - but overall, it's not an artistic medium that resonates with me. The content, however, is something I have always found attractive. A hero fighting off scores of awesome villains, and sometimes teaming up with other awesome heroes? An entire universe full of these heroes and villains to explore? To me, the opportunities have always seemed limitless, causing me to craft my own world of heroes very early on in my life. Even now in adulthood, I have flirted with trying to bring some of these heroes into being through my writing, although my fiction writing leaves quite a bit to be desired.
As a result of this life-long interest in superheroes, I am still very interested in what cartoons are out there. One cannot simply get their superhero fix from the movies - TV shows, particularly cartoons, offer so many differing paths for these heroes to follow, often getting things right that I feel the movies have been unable to handle. Watching these cartoons has given me a great glimpse into just what is possible for these heroes, and how big the universe really is. The Spiderman cartoon, at that time in my life, was the only thing I had ever seen that brought so many different heroes and villains into the picture - I was obsessed with gathering toys of them all and playing with that world myself, expanding it as I saw fit and making it something entirely different.
Anyway, enough nostalgia - what about now? I still find myself appreciating how cartoons are presented, and how they tell their own stories. Due to their targeted audience, cartoons keep it simple, something many movies could benefit from doing (here's to you, Avengers: Age of Ultron). They often represent the mantra of "show, don't tell" incredibly well, again mostly due to their audience. Kids don't tune into shows to listen to people talk all of the time - they want to see things unfold, watch how things happen. Yes, there are clunkers out there, but if we look at the medium in general, it's incredibly easy to find a wide variety of cartoons out there that tell their stories incredibly well.
One of my favorite episodes of Batman Beyond is called "The Eggbaby," one of the goofier episodes that actually works. Terry (the boy who is Batman in this particular iteration of the hero) must care for what is essentially one of those fake, robotic babies anyone that's taken a Home Economics class knows about. Of course, he must also fight crime, as Batman is apt to do. What follows is a wonderfully hilarious sequence of events that culminates in Terry actually getting a good grade on the assignment because he succeeded in getting the egg baby the stimulation it needed. It's an example of a "serious" cartoon that does everything well, relying on the visuals to get us through and entertain us, with special emphasis on the egg baby's face and sounds. I actually made my wife watch this episode with me, even though she generally wants nothing to do with my "silly" cartoons, and even my "too mature for cartoons" wife was entertained.
Cartoons are already well-known for making people laugh, though - what about an instance in which it manages to do something else? I tear up every time I watch the Beast Wars: Transformers episode known as "Code of Hero," in which one of the Maximals (the good guys) known as Dino-Bot makes a last-stand effort to protect the future of humanity. It gets a bit over-the-top at times, with Dino-Bot delivering monologues plagued with clichés, but in the end, watching him sacrifice himself to protect the future is quite powerful, given his on-again, off-again relationship with the Maximals, having started out as a Predacon (the bad guys). Beast Wars is a deeply flawed show - it doesn't handle "goofy" quite as gracefully as Batman Beyond - but it does a great job of giving us very well developed characters and putting those characters in interesting situations.
There is, of course, a nostalgic piece to this. A lot of the cartoons I have named are ones I watched growing up. Avengers is the one exception here - that came out within the last five or six years. Even though I am no longer a child, the show still interests me. The little lady is on board with it too - she keeps asking to watch more and more. She's a future Netflix binge-watcher, she is, but she's a child - we expect her to find these things entertaining. I find the show has great comedic timing and gives the characters personalities that are completely independent of their movie counterparts. The cartoon takes the idea that we can craft original stories from already-existing characters and make it solid entertainment. It has its own agenda, its own ideas, and its own identity.
And maybe that's what makes cartoons so fun in general - it is a reliable place to find originality. Are there other sources of it? Of course, but when it comes to a reliable source of original ideas, cartoons are a great resource. This may be due to the nature of animation - if you can think it, you can make it. Other shows and movies are limited by budgets and materials, but animation? If you get the picture in your head, and you have the talent around you, it can appear on page (or, these days, on a computer screen). There are some wonderfully creative minds in the cartoon business, and with a medium that gives a significant amount of freedom in what it can present and how it can present it, why wouldn't there be a plethora of entertaining, original cartoons out there?
So, if imagination is the only limiting factor for a cartoon, then that might explain why they are so attractive. The superhero universe within Spiderman I obsessed over as a child could only be so expansive and varied because of the medium. Even goofy shows like Spongebob Squarepants and Animaniacs are set within a universe that feels huge, where there seem to be limitless possibilities. If someone has a funny idea, then it can be animated, and placed in the context of a universe that is arguably larger than most TV shows and movies can accommodate comfortably and effectively.
So, if you are one of those people that poo-poos the idea of cartoons, do some research and check some out. In order to be an adult and watch cartoons, you don't need to watch things like Family Guy (for the love of God, don't watch Family Guy - watch something that isn't created by a sexist piece of garbage like Seth MacFarlane, like Bob's Burgers or Futurama). Watch some cartoons with your kids and see if you can find something entertaining, or if you don't have kids, watch some with your friends' kids, or your nieces or nephews, or go volunteer somewhere with kids so you can watch cartoons with them. Odds are in your favor that you will find something you will like - it isn't all superheroes and fart jokes. There's a wealth of creativity in the world of cartoons, so even if you don't find any that you like, don't judge those that do watch them. We, like you, just want to be entertained.
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