#saw vii review

[hannahwatcheshorror]

SAW 3D (2010)

This one is a bit of fun because it brings back some of the survivors from the previous movies but otherwise is a pretty uninspired piece of film. You can tell where they really went out of their way for the 3D effects that would have been a big gimmick when this was first in theaters in 2010. A stepping stone to get to JIGSAW.

⭐⭐.5

So this SAW is all about a lie made true, a man who made a killing (ha) off of pretending to be a Jigsaw Survivor is now facing the reality of trying to actually survive a JIGSAW Game. (Taking life by the horns, the Gary way) He first tries to save his publicist but that just wasn't going to happen in the time set out for him. Also the entire time his wife is chained up and has to watch her lying husband go through his trials which is pretty brutal for her (though she doesn’t know he is a liar until the very end). 

FLASHBACK JOHN WITH THE BACKWARDS HAT to make him look like a young man is one of the best things in this entire movie universe. I honestly cannot even believe that Tobin Bell's entire costume for John Kramer is usually just a zip up hoodie but this backwards ball cap has me FLOORED. Next our main man isn’t strong enough to help out his lawyer so she gets the Halloween Jack-o-lantern special. Then the floor is lava (or it just isn’t there) and he needs to get himself and his blindfolded friend across in less than a minute which doesn’t happen either. There seems to be a pattern with Hoffman's games, they are very hard to win.

In fact, the guy playing the game doesn’t win a single challenge he is set up against other than pulling a couple of his teeth out to open a door. By the time he does the thing he wrote the book about (hooks in his chest meat, barf) he falls down and isn’t even able to save his wife and she dies in a modern Brazen Bull. It was really rough because she was very innocent in the whole thing, she had no idea her husband was a big dumb liar, she thought he was a victim! 

While the game is dying down (ha) Hoffman is hunting down Jill which is so not what John would have wanted (but I guess Hoffman is off his nut now). This whole movie is just Hoffman being an Off-man. If John Kramer were here he would say something about not liking killers and pout. Good thing Hot Doc who actually did survive the first SAW movie is back to tell Hoffman to chill the fuck out and sit the hell down (after Jill is murdered via facial bear trap, which I thought was also pretty messed up, because all she did was love a man and try to follow through with his final wishes).

All and all this didn’t feel like a true SAW film, it felt like more of a crazy slasher because they wanted to capitalize on the 3D aspect of things and that is all well and good for the theater but it doesn’t keep over the years. You kind of have to watch it to get to JIGSAW so… Worth it.

-----------------------HANNAH WATCHES HORROR--------------------

[pricelessreviews]

[emeto-film-critic]

Saw VI: The Final Chapter - 2010

SAFE/Caution - A,V•

Approx. 7:45 - 7:55 •A,V• Dina gets her abdomen cut and blood comes out of her mouth as she hangs above the contraption.

Approx. 41:30 - 42:20 •A,V• Nina g* as the hook comes out and then she spits blood.

Approx 49:50 •AV• A woman gets impaled in the eyes and mouth and blood pours out.

Approx. 1:01:50 •A,V• Bobby pulls his teeth out and blood can be seen on his face and coming out of his mouth.

Approx. 1:10:10 •V• Gibson gets shot many times and collapses. Blood comes from his mouth

***Exessive gore, coughing, gurgling, spitting, and blood on and around mouth can be seen and heard throughout movie.***

[james-stark-the-writer]

and so the original run of the Saw series goes out on a fucking whimper. yeah i get why they didn't make any more for another 7 years after this 7th movie. parts of this hit some kind of camp/kitsch nerve and that is the only reason why this is remotely watchable. tonally confused, aesthetically confused, three different movies, none of whom want to be here. the final twist is so bad it retroactively ruins every other Saw movie. good job. it's been a while since i've seen one of those. you thought Saw V was visually uninteresting? this looks so fucking cheap you could literally put this on cable TV and it would not look out of place, it honestly looks a little too cheap for cable TV as well.

My ★ review of Saw 3D on Letterboxd

[astonmartinii]

you and me got a whole lotta history | charles leclerc social media au

pairing: charles leclerc x historian!reader

y/n is a historian and it’s not her fault her bf’s job takes him all around the world…

yourusername

liked by charles_leclerc, danielricciardo and 102,561 others

location: melbourne 📍

yourusername: so it’s the australian grand prix and i’ve spent the start of the week exploring this old city. one of my stops was the historic old melbourne gaol. this now museum was once a prison that housed some of the most feared criminals in australian history. constructed in 1839, the old melbourne gaol saw 133 hanged for their crimes between 1845 and 1924. it was briefly used during world war two but ceased operation as a prison in 1924 and was renovated to be part of the RMIT university and the museum it is today. a definite must if you’re visiting melbourne !!

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user1: my fave part of the race week is y/n’s museum recommendations tbf

user2: i can vision charles being dragged around this place hating his life

charles_leclerc: the things we do for love

yourusername: you said you enjoyed it :(

charles_leclerc: I DID

user2: oops

yourusername: i’ll leave you at the hotel next time

charles_leclerc: it was scary but i enjoyed it because i was with you

yourusername: okay that’s better

danielricciardo: so my farm isn’t good enough for you

yourusername: noooooo danny i thought we were going after the race?

danielricciardo: oof my bad

user3: petition for there to be a teds notebook but it’s y/n giving us a historical guide to the city the race is in

f1: we’re listening @skysportsf1

charles_leclerc

liked by yourusername, scuderica ferrari and 788,341 others

tagged: yourusername

charles_leclerc: tough race in melbourne but a beautiful city regardless

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user4: HE served, we don’t talk about the race

yourusername: i don’t mean to say i told you so but i did say our day trip would be the best part

user5: girl you’re gonna get banned from the ferrari garage

yourusername: they deserve far worse than what i’m saying let’s be real

user5: true

user6: i love how charles didn’t reply ferrari has his ass ON LOCK

carlossainz55: we'll come back stronger

danielricciardo: we can all commiserate at my farm bro

charles_leclerc: your farm better be as good as you're saying now

danielricciardo: nervously awaiting the y/n review

yourusername

liked by charles_leclerc, maxverstappen1 and 104,561 others

location: miami 📍

yourusername: though miami may be known for it's partying (it's all about the U), charles and i took our monday to take a stroll around st bernard de clairvaux church, one of miami's hidden gems. the church was originally built in spain all the way back in 1141 to the style of cistercian romanesque architecture for alfonso vii. the monastry's cloister was illegally purchased by american william randolph hearst in 1926 and in order for the church to be transported it was dismantled to 11,000 pieces and sent to the us where it was rebuilt and still stands to this day.

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user7: i'm never gonna be able to afford to go to miami so why did i read this whole thing like i'll visit some day?

yourusername: history is important and interesting, always good to read even if you never visit !!

user8: she's like the older sister i never had

user9: did charles enjoy this one more?

yourusername: "at least i'll get a tan here"

charles_leclerc: i feel like anyone who reads about me in your comments will think i'm an asshole, i have fun every time i just don't understand most of it

yourusername: i know you have fun baby (and i love you for driving us to all of these places)

user10: have you considered our super historic frat house this saturday night?

user11: imagine thinking you have a chance when her literal boyf is CHARLES LECLERC

user10: every goal has a goalkeeper doesn't mean you can't score

charles_leclerc: i will run you over

user12: omg ferrari's pr is quaking

yourusername

liked by charles_leclerc, lancestroll and 112,677 others

yourusername: it is my biggest honour to announce my position as a history lecturer here at oxford!! i always dreamed of studying here and to get to pass on my knowledge to those looking to follow in my footsteps is a huge pleasure and responsibility.

p.s. no worries, it is not full time so race week explorations will continue.

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user13: so it was true :(((((( wait i just read the whole post my bad

user14: so i guess i now need to turn my Cs into As if i wanna attend a y/n lecture

charles_leclerc: unbelievably proud of you my love - don't miss me too much

yourusername: you sure i can't persuade you to move to england with me :(

charles_leclerc: i'll be there as much as i can be but monaco is still our home

yourusername: always

landonorris: proud of you smarty pants

yourusername: thank you landito

landonorris: so you'll now root for the brits?

charles_leclerc: over my dead body

yourusername: what charlie said

charles_leclerc

liked by pierregasly, yourusername and 1,209,778 others

tagged: yourusername

charles_leclerc: super happy for another win for the season but we keep pushing for the real prize at the end of the season - thank you for your continued support tifosi and my love y/n who stayed up all the way in oxford ❤️

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user20: i don't wanna jinx it but like the season is going well

user21: too well....

yourusername: winning looks good on you

charles_leclerc: you look better on me

pierregasly: oh god you've been apart for a triple header and now you're being horny on main

yourusername: says mr. doggy emoji

pierregasly: touche

user22: so charles can mathematically win in either austin or brazil FUCK THEM KIDS I NEED Y/N AT THESE RACES

user23: if she's not there for charles wdc i am personally going to have a sleepover on the train tracks

yourusername added to their story

yourusername

liked by charles_leclerc, lewishamilton and 503,786 others

tagged: charles_leclerc

yourusername: the autodromo jose carlos pace is the crown jewel of the interlagos neighbourhood. the circuit opened 83 years ago and has hosted the f1 since 1972. the circuit was originally meant to be a housing area but due to the 1929 stock market crash the owners decided to construct a racing track instead. interlagos is often a season decider with fernando alonso winning both his 2005 and 2006 titles here, kimi raikkonen winning the 2007 championship here, lewis hamilton won the 2008 championship here, jenson button clinched the 2009 title here and CHARLES LECLERC WON HIS FIRST TITLE HERE IN INTERLAGOS FOR THE 2023 SEASON

on a real note i am so proud of you charles, i have seen the sacrifices you have made and the unbelievable amount of effort you pour into every facet of your racing NO ONE deserves this more than you. i am so grateful to have shared this moment with you, here's to many more xxx

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user26: i am unwell this is so fucking cute

user27: bro this is so fucking crazy

charles_leclerc: couldn't have done it without you, so glad you could be there for me xx

yourusername: always charlie xx

yourstudent: miss y/n you can cancel all of our lectures if charles wins the championship again FORZA FERRARI

charles_leclerc: the people have spoken

user28: insane butterfly effect of the wall street crash to charles leclerc 2023 wdc

user29: they make me believe in love

note: this was super random but popped into my head while at work and i knew i had to write it !! hope you enjoyed xx

[allthingsfern]

About my new camera

Yes, I bought a new camera, but it was not a last minute decision. Well, the camera purchase was pretty much last minute after I saw a video about the camera I chose and did some research on the Web & Youtube.

For about a year I've been wondering if I should sell my Sony a7r3 body and Sony/Zeiss Sonnar T* 55mm f/1.8 lens, which came highly recommended, including by Ken Rockwell, who I also turned to for advice about my new camera. The 55mm f/1.8 lens was highly recommended; it was one of the original set of lenses for the Sony a7 line of mirrorless cameras.

I wondered about getting rid of it because, while I enjoyed using it and got some great photos with it, my 24-105mm f/4 Sony G lens also took great photos, and it covered the 55 mm range. Granted, the 55mm produced super creamy bokeh, but the 24-105 f/4 did too, though maybe not as creamy. Maybe for me, as a vegan, the 24-105mm f/4 bokeh was (is) creamy enough?

Anyway, here is one of my favorites, taken with the 24-105mm f/4 about 6 months after I bought the a7r3. (I've owned an a7r3 for over 6 years now...)

Like butter?

Back to the new camera story. About a year ago, I saw this video about "one camera/one lens."

I also watched a video where he discussed keeping camera gear down to a useful minimum "5 Reasons to Keep Your Equipment Simple feat. Documentary Photography Daniel Milnor." His insights resonated with me because I am not a gear head. I like having one lens on each camera body and not having to fidget. I like to keep it simple.

Then, about 3 weeks ago, I watched this video.

Now, I go make photos in SF often. Every once in a while I also go to Oakland, which has, at least in the 30 years I've been in living in California, a super bad reputation. I've never felt unsafe in either city walking around with my a7r3 with the medium sized 24-105mm f/4 lens on it. Granted, I carry it in the original, small, Peak Design sling bag, which I immediately christened my Audrey Hepburn camera bag because it is so elegant, especially with the little brown leather handle on top.

BTW, I also own the Peak Design messenger bag, but I almost always use this one for my camera and use the messenger bag for when I need to carry my laptop. The 5L sling bag had a bonus: Both my a7r3s with their respective lenses attached fit in this one little bag. Tight, but they fit.

Anyway, that video about feeling safe did set me to thinking, since I am getting older and walk around alone, but it also made go back to wondering if I should carry both cameras, which I rarely do anymore.

Then Adrian Vila posted this video.

And then I found his original video, about 4 years old, about the RX100 vii.

the idea of carrying a smaller camera with a 24-200 zoom intrigued me, I did some research, including visiting Ken Rockwell's site, where he highly recommended this camera (see the review here).

I was convinced, but I knew that the camera is 5 years old (and Sony has no plans of releasing a newer model), so I looked up prices for used, and if I could find them, new cameras. I eventually just opted to get a new one and am going to sell my a7r3 with the 55mm f/1.8 lens. Interesting fact: The Sony RX100 line (7 models) all have a Zeiss Sonnar T* zoom lens. Mine has a 24-200mm f/2.8-4.5 variable lens, so I am still going to have a Zeiss lens, even after I sell my 55mm Zeiss.

Then there was the coincidence that they actually had an RX100 vii in stock at the Sacramento store. I visited the Mike's Camera Website, choosing specifically the Sacramento location (they have several locations in California and Colorado) and saw they had one for sale, so I drove last there Wednesday to buy the camera.

Funny thing is, I learned they don't usually carry the RX100 vii anymore (it is, after all, discontinued) but they happened to get a delivery of one just that day from their warehouse. (I could have ordered it and it would be delivered to the store or to my apartment.) The sales person (Colton) went to check if it was ordered by someone, but no, so the camera was mine.

I explained to Colton how when I went in to buy my first a7r3 on 12-26-17, they did have it, but I wanted the 24-105mm lens, which was just released (and in popular demand) and was told they only had one, which someone pre-ordered. However, the salesperson (Taek) checked and it turned out that person had not gone in to pick up the lens or contacted them about it, and it was sitting in the store for 6 weeks, so Taek opted to let me have it. As Colton said, I have good camera Karma.

So, yes, I am going to be using a smaller camera with a smaller sensor (1 inch) that has only 20 MP as opposed to my a7r3's 42 MP in a larger full frame sensor. However, while thinking the new camera purchase over, I thought about the awesome photos I got from my Nikon D50 with its dinky 28-80mm f/2.5-5.6 lens, and the RX100 is a huge step up.

Finally, here are 2 photos of my new camera.

OMG, my a7r3 is dusty...

Ok. That's all for now.

The adventure continues...

[unpopularly-opinionated]

Beyond Barbie, I’ve watched a fair amount of movies since I last updated y’all against your wills. So many in fact that I’m not going to do a whole ass write up of each because that’s just a complete waste of time. Plus I write reviews on my Letterboxd page, but they’re not entirely fit for public consumption. But I’ll give like a one-sentence review/my thoughts of each, so here we go:

So for context, the last film I posted about in my last list was The First Omen.

Since then I’ve seen:

- The Omen: Keep that woman away from ledges, god dammit.

- Damien: Omen II: I don’t know if this movie came before or after the movie about the crows, but either way this movie did it better.

- Joker: I’d already seen this, but lately I’ve been tossing in some rewatches so I can keep a thorough log/review of them on Letterboxd. P.S. this one is still good.

- The Final Conflict: Omen III: A decent enough ending for its time, to a decent enough franchise for its time.

- Challengers: The single hottest, gayest soft core porno I’ve ever seen, fucking incredible.

- Once Upon a Time… In Hollywood: Went in with zero context, thought it was mid. Read up on the context. Now think it’s pretty OK.

- Idiocracy: Terry Crews as President of the United States, please and thank you.

- Saw I - VII: Progressively got better over time, ashamed to admit one brutal murder scene did kind of turn me on. I need help.

- The entire Pirates of the Caribbean franchise: Obviously a rewatch. First three are literally perfect. Fourth is when we start to see cracks, but it’s OK. Fifth is unwatchable.

- Ready or Not: Went in thinking it was meant to be horror, not a comedy. I was wrong. Pretty funny movie though. Neat premise. Adam Brody is hot.

- Signs: Shamalyan’s God sends aliens to kill hundreds of thousands of people because one man lost faith in him. Shit story. Liked Joaquin Phoenix and a young Kieran Culkin though.

- The Happening: Shamalyan’s God decides to make hundreds of thousands of people kill themselves because the worst romantic pairing in the universe won’t fuck.

- The Sixth Sense: Shamalyan continues to prove that he is a one hit wonder, and this is his hit. That being said, I haven’t cried that hard in a while upon rewatching this.

- Skinamarink: As someone plagued with waking nightmares, this movie spoke to me. It didn’t say much of anything at all, but it certainly spoke to me. Do not recommend.

- Slotherhouse: A dumb bad movie that knows it’s dumb and bad, and is really really good at being both, but in a good way, you know?

- Barbie: An alright cutesie movie so long as you’re willing to accept that it’s not based in reality.

Overall, I’ve been watching a fair amount of movies since my last post, and I plan to watch a whole lot more. Also a lot of rewatches as well I think.

[blacknedsoul-blog]

Random Tought of the day (VII)

So, as I continue to review my notes on rogues and knights (I love you, Lenore), I scratched the potato as to why the Deans would want to keep this pair of lovebirds apart, and came up with a rather specific delusion:

The suspicion that it's possible to escape Nevermore.

But it's the kind of shit that, even if you're someone who's really capable, it would be impossible for you to figure out, let alone pull off on your own. That's why the Deans encourage this aggressively competitive atmosphere: they tell you there's only one life, they pit students against each other in training tests, and there's a scoreboard to give a sense of hierarchy.

In this light, the fact that there are two students who are willing to cooperate because they are a couple is a problem in itself.

But Annabel and Lenore are an even bigger problem, because these two idiots are extraordinarily competent people on their own, who complement each other for a change.

And the icing on the cake: they are natural leaders.

Their methods are different, but Annabel has the ability to create strong teams that find reasons to cooperate, even if it's out of interest or fear, and she's an excellent long-term thinker. The Misfists, for their part, have a grit, a ferocity, and a loyalty to each other that is enormous; Lenore may not be a long-term player, but she is extremely cunning, opportunistic as they come, and these people would die for her if they saw the need.

Imagine for a moment if you could get Eulalie and Prospero around a table to brainstorm about how the Spectre works. If you could get Duke and Will to spy together. If Montresor and Ada would use their Spectre abilities, not to hurt you, but to help you artificially revise your memories, because after all, Eulalie and Morella are there to help you after such a traumatic experience.

Annabel and Lenore could do that. Annabel's teammates will follow her because she promises results, and the Misfists blindly trust that Lenore knows what she's doing. You'd have all those minds- each highly competent in its own right- actively searching for a way out of this place under the leadership of two people with complementary visions of how to deal with obstacles.

It would be impossible for them not to find something eventually.

And I think that's what the Deans want to avoid. Right now it's working for them, Lenore finds no reason to trust Annabel (with good reason) and Annabel is too conditioned to believe that others will betray her that she would hardly think of it.

But I wonder how this will play out and how the Deans will act when these people get out of hand.

[vinceaddams]

So I know your focus is 18th century menswear, but you're the only person I can think of to ask

Why are you not supposed to button the bottom button on a suit or vest? I thought they were there for a reason? If I'm not supposed to use the bottom button, shouldn't I just cut it off and keep it as a spare in case the top button breaks off and I lose it?

I didn't actually realize that was A Thing until someone asked me about it a few years ago, and I very briefly looked it up and every google search result I saw says that it started with King Edward VII.

I have not looked for primary sources, so don't take this as fact, but apparently he gained some weight and started leaving the bottom button undone in order to be more comfortable, and everyone copied him because people are weird about royalty. This was in the first decade of the 20th century, so that's over 110 years ago now, and I think it's very stupid that it's still the standard! It should stop! This is a silly fad started by a man whose great grandchildren have died of old age, come ON*, it's time to start buttoning your waistcoats all the way down! You have my permission and encouragement as a professional tailor to fasten those bottom buttons!

Though of course, if you actually want to cut it off and use it as a spare, you could do that too.

(It's also annoying when it sneaks into costumes meant to be earlier. One of the things I complained about in my OFMD S1 costume review is that I spotted some unfastened bottom waistcoat buttons. Waistcoats were left largely unbuttoned in the early 18th century, but it was on the top half!!)

*Yes I realize this is an ironic statement coming from someone who wears 18th century style shirts every single day, but 18th century shirts are fun and nice and comfy, and very different from a silly button rule everyone follows just because they think they have to.

[jetstarred]

what i listened to in october 2024!

total albums: 9 top 3 favs: chromakopia (tyler, the creator), lp2 (secret band), no place (a lot like birds) click read more for full reviews :3

VII Magia Infinita (2024) - Zeta (2024)

Fav song: III Sufrir - 2024

This album is short, at 30 minutes long with 7 tracks. But I’ve listened to albums with twice as long of a tracklist that were shorter in length, so for once I’m not bothered by how long this album is. It’s a beautiful post-rock album that does a great job combining the Afro-Caribbean sound into the music. The tracks switch between being full instrumental songs and having some vocals, although the vocals tend to let the instruments take center stage. This might be the first album that I saw performed live before listening to it on my own. During the last song, the entire band played different percussion parts, along with Hail the Sun’s drummer. It’s one of the most unique things I’ve ever seen and made me appreciate very heavily the instrumentation on that song, and this album overall. I’m very excited for Zeta’s upcoming album and hope very desperately I’ll be able to catch them live next year.

Rating: 7/10

LP2 - Secret Band (2019)

Fav song: Black Dolphin

This album might be the closest thing to metal that I listen to and really enjoy. This album sounds like I’m in a grungy edgy video game that’s inspired by Doom but meant to be realistic. Thank you to the members of Dgd for creating this side project because it expands on some of my favorite aspects of that band. Matt’s heavy “machine gun” drums and Jon’s crazy screaming that sounds like he’s gonna throw up are two things I wish I got more of in Dgd so this is perfect for me. All the songs sound really similar so if you enjoy this type of music, this is a great album for you to listen to. I do think there’s enough variety and special moments in each song to make them stand out and make this an enjoyable album for me personally. Overall, I really like this album and I think it’s a fantastic hardcore addition to my music library.

Rating: 8/10

New Hell - Greet Death (2019)

Fav song: Crush

This album is so crazy for me front to back. The beginning song is so intense in a melancholic way and it just stays that emotional the entire time. It feels so reflective and like just stewing in these feelings of longing and sadness that I’m pretty familiar with. The atmosphere doesn't let up, feeling almost like I’m suffocating on stuffy air. I can almost hear the wind rustling through the leaves.

Rating: 7/10

MG Ultra - Machine Girl (2024)

Fav song: Sick!!

This album is a lot of the same from Machine Girl. Which is great because I love their music! It doesn't feel particularly inventive or like they're trying too many new things. That could be a bad thing for some people but honestly I don't mind at all. This album doesn't blow my mind as much as some of their previous albums, which does kinda bring it down for me. But I feel like this is a solid entry in their discography with some songs that could become personal favorites with further listening. I will say I do like the vibe this album has, like grimy futuristic industrial, and how it stays in that zone pretty much the entire time. Overall, I do think it’s a solid album, although it didn’t wow me.

Rating: 6/10

Acceptance Speech - Dance Gavin Dance (2013)

Fav song: Demo Team

This album is insane for opening with Jesus H. Macy.  It’s truly a song that feels like they’re hitting you over the head while simultaneously getting you comfortable with hearing the familiar vocals from Jon, then giving way to Tilian’s singing. This was his first album with the band, and it feels like he came in with something to prove. This album feels like the band building upon what they did on the previous albums, especially Dbm II, but bringing a new polish that makes everything sound grander than it has previously. Every song feels determined, like they’ve come back with a vengeance. Which makes sense when you consider that they thought Dbm II would be their last album before breaking up. Back to the songs themselves, Acceptance Speech has become one of my favorite title tracks that I’ve discovered this year. I really love when a title track matches the overall vibe of the album it’s on, and Acceptance Speech delivers. It carries the exact tone of determination, vengeance, and having something to prove that I’ve already mentioned. I also have to highlight Turn Off the Lights, I’m Watching Back To The Future as a really interesting closer. It carries such a specific energy that is rarely found throughout the album. Overall, this album gives me a similar overwhelming feeling that Conversation Piece gave me, but in a less chaotic way. I quite enjoy it, even if Tilian is my least favorite of all the clean vocalists they’ve had. 

Rating: 7/10

How It Feels To Be Something On - Sunny Day Real Estate (1998)

Fav song: How It Feels To Be Something On

This album's atmosphere is so intriguing to me. It feels warm like a radiator. Definitely reminds me of sitting in the basement during late fall. Overall, I really like the music on this album. It has a groove to it that makes it very enjoyable. The vocals are also kinda unique compared to what I usually listen to in a way that draws me in. I will say that all the songs stay in this very similar sound which makes them blend together a bit for me. So while this album didn’t blow me away, I still thoroughly enjoyed it.

Rating: 7/10

Audible to Animals - Marigold (2005)

Fav song: Into Acceptance

This album is kinda in it’s own space. There’s moments where it reminds me of other bands, mainly Circa Survive. But overall, kinda unique in a way I really appreciate. I love Vadim’s vocals and how light and airy they are while not sounding very high pitched. Feels almost like he's talking in a melodic way. The music is also a little theatrical which can be hit or miss for me, and this time it's a hit. I like the choice to have two fully instrumental tracks sprinkled into the album. It creates a very specific vibe that also makes this album flow nicely. It almost feels like there's a story being told and I really like that.

Rating: 7/10

No Place - A Lot Like Birds (2013)

Fav song: Next to Ungodliness

This album gave me the same sort of overwhelming feeling Conversation Piece gave me on the first listen. It feels more frantic than Conversation Piece, making me feel like I’m panicking over some impending doom. Overall this album builds upon the sound laid out in Conversation Piece, making an effort to experiment a bit more with the structure of the album as well as the individual songs.

Rating: 8/10

Chromakopia - Tyler, the Creator (2024)

Fav song: Rah Tah Tah

This album was a surprise addition to the list of Tyler albums I needed to listen to this year, and I think the fact I went through his discog for the first time this year helped me appreciate this album so much more. It’s such a clear product of Tyler’s continued growth and maturation throughout his musical career. This album feels more artistic and intimate than Call Me If You Get Lost, with a lot of care taken towards every element. It explores a lot more personal topics about Tyler’s life, with each song tackling a different specific topic. The music reflects this also, with a lot of elements taken from traditional African music showing up and mixing with the typical hip-hop sound Tyler has cultivated. The way this album flows is perfect to me, I genuinely have nothing negative to say about it. Spending time listening to this album and really getting familiar with it has made it become my favorite Tyler album, edging out Igor which has held that spot since I started listening to Tyler back in 2019.

Rating: 9/10

[tavolgisvist]

Impressively, the Liverpool scene was big enough to support its own weekly music paper, Bill Harry’s Mersey Beat, which he’d begun at art college after switching allegiance from jazz to rock’n’roll:

‘I was writing to the Daily Mail saying what is happening in Liverpool is amazing, it’s like New Orleans at the turn of the century, but with rock’n’roll bands instead of jazz. No answer, of course. And the Liverpool Echo didn’t do anything on the scene. The advertising column on their front page said ‘Jazz’, and no matter how much the clubs asked them, the Echo would not change it to feature rock’n’roll. And all the Northern media was based in Manchester: though Liverpool had a larger population, all the news was Manchester-biased. Bob Wooler and I made a list of 300 local bands, yet no one knew about anything outside their own immediate neighbourhood.’

Mersey Beat became the grapevine that allowed a coherent scene to develop. ‘I didn’t know what to call it. But I pictured our coverage as like a policeman’s beat. So I thought Mersey Beat. It was purely that: the word beat wasn’t used for the music at the time. The venues were called jive hives and the groups were called rock’n’roll groups. The Beatles’ name was not taken from the beat of the music but from John and Stuart saying they should be an insect name like Buddy Holly’s Crickets. So it became Beetles and John thought of putting the “a” in it.

‘Groups then started calling themselves beat groups. The whole city became aware of the music, with Mersey Beat coming out. Suddenly in the tailors’ shops you had the dummies with guitars. You saw all these groups’ vans in the streets now: they started travelling all over the region.’

Harry took his brainchild to the local venues and shops, including NEMS: ‘In July 1961 Brian Epstein ordered twelve dozen copies of issue number two, an incredible amount for a provincial record shop. The entire front cover was about the Beatles recording in Hamburg. And I got John to write a piece for me which I called “On the Dubious Origins of The Beatles. Translated from the John Lennon.” He was so delighted he gave me everything he’d ever written, about 250 poems, stories, drawings, and I used them as a column called Beatcomber.

‘Epstein got so excited by the paper he asked if he could be my record reviewer, and his reviews appear in issue three. He took advertising, and the only other thing on the NEMS page was a piece by Bob Wooler on the Beatles, saying they were musical revolutionaries. Every time I dropped copies around to NEMS, Brian would call me into his office, offer me a sherry and want to know all about it. He saw something in this scene on his own doorstep. He asked me to arrange for him to go to the Cavern. In his book he comes up with this thing about a guy coming into the shop and asking for “My Bonnie” but he’d been discussing the Beatles with me for months already.

‘I was in the office all the time: I did the wnting, design, advertising, circulation, the lot. At times 1 was working 100 hours a week, collapsing with the blood coming out of my nose. Did an interview with the Swinging Blue Jeans once, they had to get an ambulance and take me to hospital.

‘There was an amazing folk scene, too, and the biggest country music scene in Europe. Add the poetry and the black music scenes, and it was incredible what was happening in that city. I don’t think it ever happened anywhere else. You get books saying, “Oh, as soon as the Beatles happened, everyone was suddenly on the streets with guitars.” But the whole thing happened prior to that.’

(Liverpool - Wondrous Place by Paul Du Noyer, 2002)

Part (I), (II), (III), (IV), (V), (VI), (VII), (VIII), (IX), (X), (XI), (XII), (XIII), (XIV), (XV), (XVI), (XVII), (XVIII), (XIX), (XX), (XXI), (XXII)

[ladyirisreviews]

Final Fantasy 6 (GBA) - Review

This is the Final Fantasy game I was looking forward to the most, besides the near-universal praise VII gets, this is the other one that is considered the best in the series, and while I thought VII was kinda over-rated (more of that on its own review), I was really hoping VI be as good as people claimed it was, and for the time it was released, it probably was true.

There is a lot to talk about when it comes to this game, so I'll try to describe some part of the plot first.

The game opens by offering some exposition, 1000 years ago a war known as "the war of the magi" left the world in complete disarray, eradicating magic from the world completely.

In the present, steam engines and gunpowder run the world, but the Gestahlian empire is trying to revive magic to enslave the world.

We now meet our initial protagonist, Terra, who mysteriously can use magic and is being held captive by the empire thanks to a mind-control mechanism on her head.

She is being taken to a village in the north, where an important objective for the empire is being guarded.

After arriving and finding what they were looking for, a mysterious creature trapped inside ice, Terra reacts to it. Both of the guards disappear in a surge of magic, and Terra is left unconscious.

She wakes up in the house of a resistance member that is fighting the empire, but she has no memories of her life, a side effect of the mind control mechanism.

The resistance member tells her that she won't be able to exit the village normally, as the villagers saw her with the soldiers, and she is now thought of as an enemy, so she will have to use the caves around the village to escape.

He also sends another resistance member to assist her shortly after she leaves, who meets up with her to lead her into the resistance base, and that pretty much sets everything in motion.

This is the game that really steps up the storytelling, the whole first third of the game is still, in my opinion, unrivaled by any other Final Fantasy game.

The game keeps on introducing characters, raising stakes, and even showing you multiple perspectives on the events going on.

There is a point where the group of characters you formed gets separated, and you are able to decide which side of the story you want to see first, and the game doesn't skip on what the rest of the cast does, and when you finish the scenario you picked, you pick the next one.

All the while, characters interact with each other at every step of the way, showcasing their personalities and relationships.

It also goes the extra step and tries to give characterization to the main villain from the very start of the game.

Kefka is, in my opinion, the first truly great villain in Final Fantasy, and is still to this day one of the best the whole franchise has to offer.

The game establishes his personality traits from the moment he enters the screen, and it's always entertaining to watch him do his deeds, despite still being kind of a just evil guy, he had way more personality than any of the villains that came before.

The game also boasts a whopping 14 playable characters, each one with a unique gameplay gimmick, personality, and relationship with multiple characters.

However, as much as I appreciate everything it did with the plot, it isn't completely perfect.

While the first third of the game, as I mentioned, does everything very well, after that you are pretty much free to pick what party you carry for the rest of the game, with the option of multiple points of view not returning.

This is a problem because there are multiple times when the characters get separated and this could have helped to flesh them out and the overall plot more.

But besides this, interactions between characters slow down dramatically, being restricted only to specific plot points, and even then, quite a lot of dialogue after the first third is replaced by generic dialogue that anyone could say, to the point the text boxes don't show the portrait or name of the character talking.

All of this is alleviated a bit in the last part of the game, and even then I have some grievances with that last third too.

For example, for things I won't mention for spoilers, the party gets separated and you get your characters back one by one.

There are situations where you will have a character with an important relationship with another one you are trying to recruit back, but they won't say anything for the whole time you are trying to get them back, it feels like a missed opportunity.

And I know that specific dialogue for every possible party configuration is too much to ask, and situations where character-specific combinations neat more dialogue already exist, but I also have problems with these, if you don't know said combinations you will be missing out on some character development.

I feel like if they restricted the player to specific parties through the second third of the game, like in the first third, the situations could have led to more concise character development and interactions, and even if they didn't, simple but clearly characterized dialogue would have helped a lot too.

I mean, what we get is already way above basically every other game on the SNES by that time, and it's pushing the limits of its original console at every turn, but I am only trying to say that I think it could have been even better in that aspect, but they had limitations.

With the plot review out of the way, it's finally time to talk about the gameplay.

The description of the base combat will be short, it continues what Final Fantasy 4 and 5 started with the ATB, characters wait for their ATB bar to fill before it's their time to act.

A change made from Final Fantasy 5 is that bars keep going even when a character is making an action, making battles take slightly less, but in my opinion, it's at the cost of making turns feel inconsistent, as some animations will take longer, they will fill both the enemies and allies ATB bars, technically reducing waiting, but also making fast-acting characters feel less important, but to be completely fair, this is almost a non-issue on this game, later games are the ones that take it too far, at least in my opinion.

Outside of this extremely small nitpick, the other changes made to the game are mostly how characters work.

Each character has their own special skill, Locke, the thief, is the only character with the stealing skill, Edgar is the only one who can use machines, which lets him do different things, Sabin is the only one who can use martial arts that are inputted by pressing button combinations like in a fighting game, and the list goes on.

This makes every character feel special in their own way, but also, later into the game, the characters can equip items that let them learn magic, which not only lets you personalize characters with any magic you want, but some of these items also give bonus stats on a level up, allowing you to personalize characters even further.

And like the whiny loser I am, I have a problem with this too.

The concept itself is very fun, the problem comes with the fact that you get these items pretty late into the game, and the ones that give better stats boosts are even further into the game, closer to the end.

This creates a limited amount of levels that a character can enjoy getting bonus stats, so if you did any amount of grinding for any reason you will be missing easy bonus stats.

It isn't THAT big of a deal but I wish it worked in a different way, like every character having an independent level for that item, making bonus stats impossible to miss.

Even with that, it's a cool system to mess around with, being free of letting almost any character learn whatever spell you want might make it sound like every character will feel the same at the end of the game, but they still have their unique gimmicks, so they will never really feel the same.

Besides plot and gameplay, I also have to mention the graphics and music.

Visually the game is excellent, the game is able to create some amazing imagery, to the point it's hard to believe they were made for the Super Nintendo, like really, some bosses look stunning, and there are set pieces that are very memorable.

And then there's the music, which is some of the best the whole Super Nintendo had in its lifetime, there are SO MANY great songs that never get old, some that you only hear once but stay with you for a long time, after experiencing the game I was left with so many songs I will no doubt add to my music list on Youtube. Specifically, the regular boss theme is so catchy to me, despite being only a 1 minute loop, I was legitimately overjoyed every time the song came up.

The music is just excellent, I can't find other words to describe how good it is.

All of this criticism I made to this game come out of love, because I can only imagine how much better both the plot and gameplay could have been, at least to my whiny standards.

It's in cases like this when I wish remakes only consisted of tweaks to the gameplay, and some little rewrites to the plot, and only the visuals would be the thing that is upgraded, instead of a big change to the game in every aspect, when sometimes the initial charm gets completely forgotten.

But I feel hopeful, now that the Dragon Quest 3 remake is finally out, the team has expressed interest in doing the same treatment to Final Fantasy 6, and considering how Dragon Quest 3 turned out, they have the opportunity to not only make a faithful remake of Final Fantasy 6, but make it even better than it already was, without the limitations the Super Nintendo had, I am super excited and I hope Square Enix lets them do it.

But even as it was when it first came out on the Super Nintendo, it's a game I would 100% recommend, not only is it a classic, it's by far one of the best Final Fantasy games, and honestly one of the better games the Super Nintendo saw on its lifetime, if you could only play 1 Final Fantasy game from the ones I reviewed so far, this one is definitely the one you should try out.

[silver-wield]

Final Fantasy VII Rebirth Review Chapter 9!

Okay, this collection of posts will be filled with spoilers, including clips and screenshots, so if you don't wanna see things, then don't look. Some of the things I'm gonna highlight will include references to Remake and other sources to link with the overarching plot. This is a straight path playthrough with no sidequests or extra content.

Tiny amendment, I realised I accidentally combined chapter six with seven because they were both really short narratively speaking, so we're actually up to chapter 9 😁

Anyway...

Me? Gongaga 🤣

Chapter nine is meatier than Junon, and I had to get creative with the images.

So we begin the following day after Barret's showdown with Dyne and the group is driving around the desert hoping to spot a black cloak. Until Yuffie gets sick and they stop. Cait Sith decides to do a reading, which throws up a hint about mushrooms. Tifa tosses the keys to a smug Cloud and we're in the driver's seat from now on.

Destination: Gongaga.

Cloud gets deja vu looking at the local area. What's interesting is this isn't prevented by jenova and he doesn't get a headache. This is because he was in Gongaga while in a coma, so does this mean that while in his coma state jenova and Sephiroth have no influence over him?

Tifa's such a foodie and I love this about her! Also explains why Cloud brings her exotic ingredients to cook with. He really knows what she likes 🥺❤️

And we're meeting Cissnei. Now, she either did what Aerith did and saw the sword first and mistook Cloud for Zack, or she recognised Cloud as the second escaped sample and is covering up her surprise. She does tell him later to rest, so it's definitely sus.

We have convo opportunities in Gongaga too, although the one that furthers the plot and can't be missed is this one at Zack's parents house. After insulting Zack to his parents, Aerith asks if she was selfish, to which I always answer duh.

Cloud asks outright if Aerith still likes Zack, although he can't recall him still at this point. She says he never gave her a reason not to like him, then Tifa comes over and there's a bit with Cloud insulting Zack and the girls getting mad at him.

The conclusion is Cloud doesn't know Zack, but this gives Tifa more misgivings because Cloud knows about events in Nibelheim and Zack was there.

There's something going down at the reactor, so the guys head over to check it out. The more mako Cloud breathes in the less functional he becomes, which leaves them all vulnerable to Scarlet's attacks.

Meanwhile, the girls are heading in to save the day. They take on Scarlet, giving the other team time to get to a safe spot, with Barret carrying the sick Cloud over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.

Tifa becomes separated from the others and tries to stop Scarlet from attacking the weapon inside the reactor. She ends up swinging from her grappling gun, which panics Cloud and gets him moving to save her.

But Sephiroth's not far behind and takes control of Cloud, which results in a bloodbath of Shinra soldiers. Tifa rescues herself and rushes to Cloud's side to save him from himself.

And then comes the series of scenes from the trailers. Sephiroth manipulates Cloud into attacking Tifa in an echo of how she was almost killed in the Nibelheim reactor, only Cloud misses. For someone who was slicing and dicing with frightening accuracy a few minutes before, the fact he missed Tifa at point blank range shows part of Cloud can't be fully controlled by Sephiroth. He missed. Tifa still fell, but she wasn't hurt. Sephiroth failed.

And then weapon pops up to chow down on her. Cloud comes to and wonders where Tifa is. Last thing he recalls is going to help her. He gets a bunch of flashes that jenova tries to get between with some static, but Cloud knows what happened. And we see him break down over it.

Meanwhile, weapon takes Tifa on a tour of the lifestream. She hears her parents and friends and sees some scenes from her childhood. Specifically scenes that are important to Cloud. They're also Tifa's precious memories, and give her some important information she'll need later to save Cloud in the lifestream.

Sephiroth appears and tries to kill her again. Bit more directly this time. His blade just misses her, but it pierces the weapon and she starts drowning. She sees zangan, Dr Sheran, Barret and Aerith, and the first three give her words of encouragement to keep fighting to live. Aerith just says her name and nothing else.

Tifa sees Cloud, but he's leaving her to follow Sephiroth. She becomes distressed as Sephiroth taunts her that her words can't reach Cloud now, but we know those two have always communicated best without words 🤭

The injured weapon reappears in the reactor. Barret slaps some sense into Cloud and tells him Tifa needs him. This gets him out of his stupor to go to Tifa's side and check on her as she loses consciousness.

When Tifa wakes up we see a guilt ridden Cloud about to rush off and let everyone know she's okay, but Tifa stops him and they have a heart to heart about the past and that fateful trip up Mt Nibel. Tifa admits she doesn't remember everything that happened, and Cloud regrets not being able to save her. He finally confides in her that he feels like he's losing it and Tifa promises to save him like he saved her.

They almost kiss, but Yuffie opens her fat mouth and interrupts.

This is a non-optional moment between them. Even if you chose the worst options in convos and ignored Tifa completely, they will almost kiss.

Tifa goes into the living area and there's some chat about the planet and what to do next, which ends in a decision to hit up Cosmo Canyon.

A lot happens in this chapter. Like plot heavy serious things that shouldn't be ignored at all.

Cloud has deja vu about Gongaga.

Tifa learns Cloud doesn't know/remember Zack, and grows more concerned.

Sephiroth forces Cloud to overdose on mako gas in the reactor in an attempt to take control of him.

Cloud doesn't harm Tifa despite being Sephiroth's puppet, meaning he doesn't have total control over him when it comes to Tifa.

Tifa learns about the important memories of her and Cloud's past, and that the planet is currently winning against Sephiroth from her pov

Cloud and Tifa share mutual attraction and chemistry that results in an almost kiss

Cloud and Tifa confide in each other and their relationship deepens.

[theadventurerslog]

King's Quest Wrap Up

Here we are. I've finished King's Quest 1-7, which I would consider the main series as Mask of Eternity is so different and I won't be playing it. It's been a great ride that I wasn't even originally intending to do, but I'm glad I did. Sitting here writing this post is a bit more bittersweet than I expected.

This whole blog idea came about because of King's Quest. I went from just watching them played (Thank you SuchMinutiae!) to thinking it'd be fun to try at least V and VI to wondering about the idea of logging them as a textual let's play, which led to doing them all. And now I've played them all and they get to be the first games and first complete series done here.

I mentioned there were a lot of classics I was missing and that Sierra games were a big hole in my history entirely. Not only did I have that total gap, but it was one that didn't come with the best reputation. Basically my association with Sierra was hard obtuse games in which you die at the drop of a hat. Which, okay, especially in the case of the older games that is true, but it's not the whole picture. I can only speak for King's Quest right now, but that misses the fun adventure of them and the evolution the series went through and that VII dropped the cruelty and had no dead ends and deaths were harmless with instant retries.

It misses what I can only imagine the feeling was back then of setting out into what would have felt like a big world and going on this big adventure. It misses the charm and goofiness that crops up. The portrayal misses the fun (and sometimes frustration) of goofing around with the text parser in the first four games. It misses the evolution of not just the mechanics and graphics, but also the story telling and how they start to connect more with each other into a bigger whole. I'm going on a bit of a rant here, but if I had continued with only that original outlook on them and a couple of stray reviews I one time saw while looking briefly into the games quite some time ago--can't recall exactly why, it may have been when that episodic King's Quest game by another company came out--and those reviews also really highlighted difficulty and not too much else I would have passed on an experience I really enjoyed.

Now, I will freely admit my opinion would probably be a bit different if I had gone in blind, or just with the knowledge to save a lot and keep lots of saves. That last point is a big one and would spare some anguish. I definitely would have gotten more stuck on points far more often and probably dead-ended myself at other points and had to rely on past saves more. But I'm also not too proud to poke at hints or check for bits in guides, so I still could have gotten through, but there would have been some more frustration colouring my views. Not to say there wasn't any frustration because there sure was at points, beanstalks and stairs and dark dark caves with trolls, oh my. Still, my point still stands that I could have so easily been continuing to be swayed away from ever giving these a shot and missed out.

I also think it's great to visit or revisit some old games now and then. Not just to see how far things have come, but to experience what things were like. It was still so new as a medium, still is relatively speaking, and devs were still learning and trying stuff and experimenting and there's a very wild west feel to it. And it's just... this is what they knew, this what they had to work with in regards to the tech and it's...cool. And being reminded how much and fast things were changing like the jump from KQ IV to V. It was a lot! I just think it's nice to be reminded sometimes. Games have moved so quickly it can be easy to forget.

It was also nice to have a reminder of my own...outlook I guess? on graphics in a tangible way. I'm not someone who needs or cares about high-end top of the line graphics anyway, but the ability to get into the game and meet it on its level struck me particularly in a couple spots in III and IV where I found myself having the exact same reaction to things I'd have to the same kind of things in a modern game. Those things being a couple waterfalls spots in III ("ooo! waterfall!" Screencap!) and Genesta's island and the path going up the mountain to Lolotte's area in IV. More ooo, pretty, or ooo cool moments. These early four games are older than I am and primitive by today's standards and it's just...nice to know I can still have these little wow moments anyway.

I've gone off on some tangents here, so back to the individual games themselves. As for each game, the obvious thing to do in an end post like this would be to rank them, but I am terrible at ranking things. If you want to send me into a spiral of dithering and second-guessing myself, make me rank things. Instead I will just say that VI is my favourite and I have no idea after that. I am going to give my last thoughts on each and heck maybe some kind of preference or order will emerge. Still not ranking them though.

King's Quest I: Quest for the Crown

The beginning! There's always something exciting about a new start, certainly so when you know it continues into a series. It's very simple: find the three missing treasures of Daventry and become king. Really nothing deep here, but it's a short enjoyable romp through a mishmash of fairy tale things and sometimes there's comfort in simplicity. Less comfort in falling repeatedly off a beanstalk; I might still be bitter.

Not a lot to say about it really, but a solid enough start.

I'm looking forward to revisiting it sometime through the SCI remake.

-

King's Quest II: Romancing the Throne

I looked back at my final notes for the game and while my points are still true I feel like I had a more negative slant on them than I do now. As I've been thinking about these games off and on while playing I've had a growing fondness for II. Yeah, its plot is thin: Graham wants wife, girl trapped in tower by evil witch for some reason, rescue girl, get married. And don't go here for cohesive world building, but it was fun. It did feel like a grab bag of ideas tossed together into a game, but that ended up being what made it entertaining in not knowing what it's gonna throw at you next.

What IS grandma's deal with the wolf and Dracula, and oh yeah, Dracula. Antique shop in the middle of nowhere, the owner of which seems to have some kind of feud with the witch? Why not? Merfolk? Sure! Its stairs weren't as bad yet either.

I've found its ridiculousness is where the fun was for me and my fondness for it has grown.

-

King's Quest III: To Heir is Human

This game was important for setting out foundations for everything to come: introducing Alexander and Rosella, the existence of Manannan which was used for plot with Mordack for V which also included Cassima to get us the plot of VI, etc. It's where the chain of continuity felt like it really began.

That said I said it was a mixed bag and that hasn't changed. The beginning is fun with the spells and all the thing you can have happen with Manannan which I didn't get much of in my playthrough and I regret that. The spells themselves are fun and the game did get more complex than the previous two.

But that second chunk hits on tedium and frustrations and is just plain not as fun or interesting as the first part. If I were to rank the games, and I'm not, but IF I were I'd really struggle with this one and wish I could put one part in one place and the other part in a different lower place.

One other note: now we don't get a ton of Alexander's personality in III really, just by nature of these older games and he's a little older in VI and of course free of Manannan, but I do have a little trouble reconciling them as the same character. Like, for example, there's a point early when you get the fur from Manannan's cat and he snickers about it and calls it a stupid cat and I just cannot picture VI Alexander ever saying that. Of course I doubt they had any inkling of what VI would be like if it were to ever exist, just something I noticed.

-

King's Quest IV: The Perils of Rosella

Like KQ III I still feel this one is a mixed bag but its low points are lower still than the low points of III and it really leaves me conflicted because there are plenty of things I like but so much ugh at some of the bullshit. The whale, the bridle, the dark cave with the troll, some really awful stairs, it got to be a lot sometimes.

But then it was nice to have Rosella as the protagonist and it was nice to have a more present villain and with Edgar it gave them some material to pull from for later. There were still fun moments and some just really nice spots like the exterior of Genesta's home with her gardens. When I wasn't in the really annoying spots I was enjoying myself as much as the previous games but those blemishes cast long shadows.

It also felt a little more sombre overall, which makes sense under the circumstances, but something I noticed.

-

King's Quest V: Absence Makes the Heart Go Yonder

"We're the aaants led by King Antony..." Ahem. V was my originally planned first game then when I realized it was bundled with IV and VI that maaaybe I should start with IV, which oof, glad I didn't, but then I started from the beginning.

That said I was looking forward to getting to V and I quite enjoyed it. That beautiful art. The voice acting is pretty bad, but I find it weirdly endearing. There's some really charming moments.

There's also a ton of bullshit and a long list of ways to softlock yourself, which should annoy me more on principle, but I think the difference between it and IV is that in this one's case the problems come from things that you can miss rather than frustration coming by the actual act of playing through the annoying trial and error parts like the whale and the cave with the added 'joy' of RNG. And since I knew what to look out for I could avoid the problems whereas I was stuck in it in IV.

Anyway, the connectivity really started to come into fruition here too making use of the events of III while building up to VI. ...Still cranky about Graham's attitude about Alexander at the end and everyone ignoring poor dead Cedric at first.

Other than that it's just so cheesily charming to me.

-

King's Quest VI: Heir Today, Gone Tomorrow

Much like my final thoughts in the last post for the game I'm wondering what more I can say. It's my favourite of the series. It's still so pretty. I really like Alexander as a protagonist. He's so earnest. I like Cassima for what we do get of her though I want more.

I love how much there is to interact with and just the sheer amount of descriptive text with some great humour in there. The premise is hinged on some real flimsy love at first sight, but it's wrapped up in such a good package I can't complain much. There are a lot of fun and charming bits and some just cool chunks too like the stuff in the Realm of the Dead. Having two different routes to two endings is neat as well.

Also, "Girl in the toooower!"

--

King's Quest VII: The Princeless Bride

This one's a little harder to talk about again since I did just finish it so it hasn't had the same time to sit in the back of my mind like the others. It was a departure in a lot of ways from the rest of the games but then again, V and VI were a departure in some ways from the first four as well. It was still a fun different flavour without feeling like it was something else entirely I think might be my best way of putting it. And it was a fun change of pace to be alternating between two protagonists.

And despite its differences it still clung to its roots of fairy tales and the Daventry royals and of course made use of the events of IV. It was also still a point and click unlike a certain other unplayed entry of the series.

It was more comedic and exaggerated and there were some points that were running the fine line of grating for me but never enough to be off-putting.

I wasn't quite sure how I'd feel about it before playing, but I did enjoy more it than I initially feared.

-

I kind of think of the series in three phases which further doesn't help with any attempts at ranking either. There's 1-4, 5-6 and 7. Seeing that kind of progression is another fun thing about going through a series from beginning to end though. Does a ranking emerge from the above notes? VI is high and IV is low. 5 and 7 are probably higher than 1-4 but trying to decide between 5 and 7 and trying to order 1-4 I just don't know. I enjoyed my time with all and that's what really matters in the end.

--

Various Stats and Other Rankings

I've got them anyway, so I may as well gather them into one place!

Final Points

King's Quest 1: 154/158

King's Quest II: 185/185

King's Quest III: 202/210

King's Quest IV: 230/230

King's Quest V: 260/260

King's Quest VI: 225/231

King's Quest VII: N/A

I only got max points in the half the applicable games. Clearly another reason to replay some of these.

--

Death/Game over Counts:

King's Quest I: 58

King's Quest II: 17

King's Quest III: 63

King's Quest IV: 86

King's Quest V: 59

King's Quest VI: 29

King's Quest VII: 42

Feeling some KQIV trauma looking at these counts all over again. I wound up with a higher count that I expected in VII too; it started low then Ooga Booga happened...

--

Death Rankings!

I was given the idea to rank deaths so here are some death awards!

Most Deaths: King's Quest IV. Some awful stairs among other things.

Most Maddening: Any stairs or stair-like things. Stair cases in IV and the bean stalk in I drove me nuts. Aside from stairs, the troll in the dark in IV. Once he's there, there's no escape and he's completely random.

Most Expected: Eat these nightshade berries says the golden eyed 'grandma'. What could go wrong. This being hasn't already tried to lead you to your death on more than one occasion before and isn't remotely suspicious now. Alexander, please.

Most Unexpected: This is a bit trickier as I wasn't playing blind. Possibly the rock in KQ I that you push. You have to push it to get a dagger, but if you push it from the wrong side you're squished and there's not really indication of it being on a slope or anything, so... squish. I feel like I'm probably missing some obvious contenders.

Most Tempting: Tree deaths in KQ IV. The tree puns! And failing the spells in III. Gotta see the results. Oh! And not a death but game over, actually this might be the most tempting, but getting turned into a beast in VI. How could you not want to let that run its course and see it? "Whee whee!!!"

Look at him!

Funniest: Possibly getting punched out by the bear in V. It's so ridiculous looking and abrupt.

Most Brutal: I've got three here: two deaths in VI and one in VII. The death by spiked ceiling in the catacombs and the death by fire with the druids. They're both drawn out and the way it all plays out is just yikes. They both had me flinching back into my chair. Then in VII we had Rosella and/or Valanice getting dragged in by the skeletons over the Boogeyman's home. And just the sound and the animation, oh the animation. It was another yikes moment for me.

--

Final Final Thoughts

As I try to figure out how to end this ramble. I suppose I will end this with the relatively simple question of would I recommend these?

VI and VII? Yes, particularly VII if someone wants a friendly point and click as VI still has softlocks and the need to save a lot for those deaths

V - with some caveats

I-IV - only to people genuinely interested in exploring the old stuff and willing to tolerate the BS and possible frustrations of a text parser (though I still think the text parser has its own fun)

Was the experience worthwhile for me? Absolutely. Will I replay these games or at least some of them? For sure. I have the SCI remake of I waiting for me and I'll definitely be playing VI again. I think I'll be able to add it to my comfort food rotation. I also, despite my complaining, want to give III another go sometime because I missed too much fun stuff at the start. Honestly I could see doing another run-through of the whole series for myself in the future, maaaybe skipping IV but also maybe doing it too because it's not like I hated it.

For now the Daventry family can live happily ever after until I restart the timeline and force them through all this again.

Once again, thank you for joining me and reading all this.

[kaile-hultner]

THE SPECTACULAR LEVIATHAN

an essay about criticism and culture

ed sheeran doesn't need music critics

Rolling Stone published an article of cut content from a recent Ed Sheeran feature, in which the pop musician said, "Why do you need to read a review? Listen to it. It’s freely available! Make up your own mind. I would never read an album review and go, ‘I’m not gonna listen to that now.'"

And to some degree, Sheeran is right. Streaming services make music readily available and conjure the illusion that it's also freely given to us. We don't "need" cultural gatekeepers - such as, ironically, Rolling Stone - to tell us whether or not the newest song by Ed Sheeran is bad (that's just a deeply felt sense we hold in our bones, which Spotify or Apple Music can help us confirm at our leisure).

But like most criticism-of-criticism in this vein, Sheeran's point misses the forest for the trees. We absolutely don't need critics to tell us whether "thing good" or "thing bad," but that's not necessarily why critics even exist in the first place. In addition to that sort of mere qualitative statement, critics exist to help us understand context, like how financially deleterious the very existence of streaming services is to the artists themselves, for example, or how subscribing to a streaming service means that your music collection is never actually yours and can be revoked by the record companies at any time. Critics can help to place Sheeran in his historical context as a contemporary singer and songwriter, or offer more palatable, lesser-known alternatives to his vapid art. Critics could, if they wanted, try to situate Sheeran's songs in a political context, though I could not tell you how that would shake out to save my life.

Sheeran is not the only person to make that mistake, by any means. The idea that critics are unnecessary today except as objects of derision or agreement is popular, and the idea that criticism is only there to tell you whether "thing good" or "thing bad" is even upheld by people responsible for making sure criticism gets published to a broad audience, like IGN's executive editor of reviews.

Critics ourselves are often pushed into this narrow view of our field whether we like it or not, not necessarily out of malice but out of the harsh realities of business in the media industry. We watch as our friends and colleagues get fired from their "sure thing" jobs regularly, as outlets shutter and downsize to focus only on that which can get the greatest algorithmic return-on-investment.

Even with service journalism, the underpaid and undervalued field where writers put out dozens of how-to guides on everything from "How do I beat this level in Final Fantasy VII Remake" to "Where can I find the latest blockbuster on streaming," writers' jobs are being threatened by the looming mistake of Large Language Model (LLM)-generated content. Why pay someone to write an accurate, carefully considered guide that actually feels like a person wrote them - you know, the appeal of old chestnuts like GameFAQs guides - when you can just get a chatbot (and by extension, forced labor in Kenya) to do the work instead? At a certain level of bullshit jobs-style upper management, what's considered "efficient" is directly antithetical to human life.

But this isn't Ed Sheeran's fault, per se, nor is it really his problem. He's a point on a graph of a much broader trend.

anti-criticism in the age of disney adults

Poet laureate Karl Shapiro identified the concept of "anti-criticism" in a series of lectures delivered from October to December, 1949.1 He saw "[arguments] against criticism [as] related to a wider and more dangerous anti-intellectualism that in poetics leads to the primacy of the second-rate, and in literary politics may lead to official and controlled art." In his ensuing Poetry article, "What is Anti-Criticism?" Shapiro briefly examines the history of 18th and 19th century poetry and how it was analyzed, carefully demonstrating the values such structural and interpretive analysis upheld and how they were incompatible with contemporary 20th century poetry - and indeed, its critical apparatus.

The anti-critic takes for his quarry not only the modern symbolist poets but also the old symbolist poets like Blake; not only the modern metaphysical poets but also the old metaphysical poets; and in addition to these the polylingual poets; those who practice typographical or grammatical experiments, past or present; those who use one rhetorical figure at the expense of the other- those who are too abstract and those who are too concrete. The contemporary poet may not be tolerant of all these kinds of poetry himself, but the anti-critic would like to get rid of the lot. His measure, as I said before, is the prose semantic, and any violation of this central canon he regards as a threat to intelligibility and sanity. To the anti-critic any departure from the immediate area of the paraphrasable meaning is, moreover, a sign of wilful obscurantism. [...] A highly paraphrasable poetry is equivalent to a highly representational art, and both, in a period like ours, are liable to degenerate into escapist art.

Shapiro describes phenomena that would likely be familiar to anyone who has lived through the last decade of critical discourse around any kind of art you can imagine, from the indiscriminate uplifting of mediocre yet broadly popular "cultural products" to the bashing of art that resists easy interpretation and a sneering attitude toward the critics who attempt to analyze said art anyway. Through Shapiro we see anti-critics in those who endlessly repeat "Let People Enjoy Things" at anyone who doesn't like a superhero movie, in the throngs of gamers (and the reviewers who enabled them) who refused to let a little systemic transphobia get in the way of their Hogwarts Legacy run, and in Ed Sheeran's throwaway jab at the critics forced to listen to his pablum for less money than they should be getting for their troubles.

The anti-critic has surely evolved in other important ways away from what Shapiro observed in the first few years after World War II, just as the corporate media/art space has evolved. We see the "enthusiast" subsume more formal critics and critical outlets all the time, coincidentally as a monoculture forms around a few massive entertainment and technology corporations. In one particularly blunt example, critic B.D. McClay notes that a writer for IGN was replaced as the reviewer for the Disney+/Marvel series Loki after a single less-than-glowing review of the show. In a more recent example, replies to longtime film critic Robert Daniels's tweet panning The Super Mario Bros. Movie ranged from indifferent to derisive, with one reply telling him, "I’ll trust the reviews from people who actual [sic] play the game," together with a screenshot of IGN's 8/10 review synopsis.

We might revisit that IGN article that contends the purpose of criticism is to determine whether "thing good" or "thing bad," as it actually contends something worse: that the wide majority of things even worth talking about in IGN's eyes are broadly "good" along a sliding scale of quality from "mediocre" to "superlative." In this case, the criticism isn't even merely qualitative; it's meant to be singularly supportive or at worst ambivalent about a given cultural product. It is itself anti-criticism.

McClay (more charitably than I suspect Shapiro would have been) identifies the tendency for largely positive anti-critical writing about mass media as "a world of appreciation," not necessarily unadulterated fandom, but "essentially, a fan culture." In this dynamic, there is only people who like the thing, and the thing itself. If negativity in this world of appreciation exists, McClay explains, it does so as part of a binary: "the rave and the takedown."

an endless content™ jubilee

I remember when I first got into games criticism I heard everyone joke about the "discourse wheel" and how if you spent enough time in the industry you'd eventually find yourself back at the beginning, older, not necessarily wiser, yet experiencing many of the same arguments about a particular game or design concept yet again. The obvious punchline was someone yelling "LUDONARRATIVE DISSONANCE" and watching everyone in the discord server duck under their desks like an air raid alarm had gone off.

Since then, The Last of Us has gotten a sequel, a PC remaster, a full remake of the first game, and a whole-ass television show with a second season on the way. The discourse around that media franchise has happened in front of me not once, not twice, but like four times at this point. As Autumn Wright wrote, "there’s a new AAA catastrophe that’s weird about trans people and also The Last of Us is relevant again."

This is perhaps not the worst or wildest example of monoculture forming around us in a suffocating cloud, though. That dubious distinction goes to Disney and Microsoft, probably, as the companies attempting to gather up as much culture as they can to homogenize it, with the former going as far as digitizing actors' voices for use long after they retire in new portrayals of characters those actors first performed more than 40 years ago. Hell, it's not even the worst example in the games industry. What iteration number is Call of Duty on? Or Assassin's Creed? Or fucking Mario? Hell, we're already two deep into the reboot of God of War.

It's hardly worth saying at this point that nostalgia fuels so much of the media that we're given to consume. It's increasingly difficult to find new art or ideas in a media landscape that puts so much value on callbacks to old forms. If something isn't another superhero origin story, it's referencing a meme from 12 years ago. And it's nearly impossible to resist the ever-present pull of this strictly iterative culture: I can't lie and say I didn't thoroughly enjoy both of the above examples.

But we still need to try and cut through the overwhelm for a moment. Disney isn't a poison to the culture simply because it owns Marvel Studios or Lucasfilm. The reason for its negative impact is because of the absolute crushing presence it has in the film and television industries at large, having bought out major competitors like 20th Century Fox and nearly completely snowed out smaller film studios at the theaters. It doesn't help that the industry is consolidating in other ways with its move to streaming platforms. As Adam Conover said in a recent video about two different mergers (Live Nation and Ticket Master in the 90s and Warner Media with Discovery late last year), "one man's whims and preferences dictate which stories artists get to tell and what hundreds of millions of people get to watch."

The idea that a few rich dudes are in full control of every piece of media we consume and that the number of rich dudes who do so is actively getting smaller all the timesucks, not just for criticism's purposes but simply as someone who Consumes Content™. To my knowledge, no one has ever been explicitly asked if we want the same shit, year in and year out, only More. Nobody from Game Freak or Ubisoft ever sends out a survey like "hey are y'all tired of Pokémon or Rainbow Six: Siege seasons?" Instead, they just push them out, and let the resulting economic data do the talking: "People want more of this thing because a lot of them bought the thing when it came out." There's such a thing as too much of a good thing, especially when we're less likely (or able) to say no in the first place.

In this light, doesn't it make just too much sense that Ed Sheeran has a whole mini documentary series coming out on Disney Plus?

towards a guerrilla criticism

So what's to be done here? Aside from maybe the 🏴 most 🔥🍾 obvious 💣 (and unlikely) answers with regards to the most egregious monopolies, how can critics - who are, as a reminder, less institutionally supported than ever - or criticism even contend with Content™ backed by the most well-funded mega corps on earth and supported by hegemonically anti-critical fanbases?

Here is where I disagree most heavily with thinkers like Shapiro, who believed in retaining an elevated critical class and poetic movement with remove from the masses, and critics like McClay, who said "Opinions will become both more binary and more homogenous, and about fewer and fewer things. [...] things will get worse, whether or not they ever get better." I don't think our options necessarily have to be "remove ourselves to an academic ivory tower" or "accept that things are the way they are." We don't need to dutifully fall into line along the "rave" or "takedown" axis as McClay described.

The kind of criticism I am imagining is a criticism that is inherently and radically skeptical of (especially corporate-backed) nostalgia; a criticism that is not necessarily hostile to fans but antagonistic toward fandom as a system which undergirds larger structures of power; a criticism that is as transgressive and playful in the forms it takes as it is with the words that fill those forms. I believe we are capable of performing criticism that disappoints everyone in delightful ways.

Criticism as a weapon is not a new idea, of course. Marx is famously quoted as saying "The weapon of criticism cannot, of course, replace criticism of the weapon, material force must be overthrown by material force; but theory also becomes a material force as soon as it has gripped the masses." More modern philosophers and theorists, like the Situationists and Bruno Latour, have written about the decline and possible weaponization of criticism as well. To a degree, that worries me. Talk doesn't just become action because the talker wishes for it real hard. There's a real possibility, no, a near-certainty, that anything that comes out of this will result in next to nothing changing. If everything is part of the cycle of discourse, including conversations on how to break the discourse, what hope do we have?

The alternative to facing the leviathan and losing at the moment seems to be more or less doing nothing, which to me is more unbearable than all the pranks of all the cringe-ass culture jammers of the 90s and 2000s combined. At what point does quiet dissent simply morph into complicity?

***

Shapiro, Karl. “What Is Anti-Criticism?” Poetry, vol. 75, no. 6, 1950, pp. 339–51. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/20591169. Accessed 9 Apr. 2023.

[duhragonball]

Nanwum VII Update: 72,197

I'm starting to run out of gas, which is probably not a big deal since I already cleared 50k, but this bears out my whole strategy of building an early lead. My intention was to pull down 2k per day from the 13th to the end of the month, and I'm still on track, but on the 14th I fell a little behind and only got to 1709. It's not a problem, since I got caught up, but I need to be careful from here if I want to make it to 100k. Not that I need 100k, but I like bragging rights.

To reward myself for the insane wordcounts I put in earlier this month, I decided to watch all of the recent DBZ review videos that TotallyNotMark put up. You know, the ones with the new Team Four Star DBZA clips in them. I'd already watched the "Buu Bits" in a separate compilation video, but now I'm finally checking out the review and...

I don't know, there's a lot of good material in these things. The editing is top notch, and you could play these videos with the sound off and still enjoy it just as an hours-long DBZ highlight reel. And Mark has a lot of salient insights on the series. I particularly liked his analysis of Gohan and Videl's dynamic, and it's also refreshing to see a DBZ fan who, you know, actually likes the show. Like, he's gushing over Vegeta's character arc, or talking about how great the androids and Cell are without a bunch of qualifiers, and it's just refreshing to see that.

That having been said, the writing for these videos often ends up sounding like this:

Like, arguably, you can't do a six-hour review of a cartoon show without being a little pretentious, but there's sentences in these videos where it feels like YouTube is paying Mark by the word.

Also, he tends to make these off-the-cuff style remarks, like he's discussing creative decisions about making the video in the video. I get that too. I write my blog with that same stream-of-consciousness energy, because I really am making this up as I go. It's a blog, there's not gonna be a second draft. But he's doing a YouTube video, and there's a lot of production values involved and the work is pretty polished. I don't think it makes a lot of sense for him to talk about how the sausage is made. Just give me the sausage, which is footage of the cartoon with a guy telling me what he liked about it.

I've sort of had this fascination with the writing style throughout the series, and I think if I had to spoof it, I'd go with something like this:

"Again, as I said before earlier in this video, when I started this review, I wanted to avoid sounding pretentious, an attribute the likes of which can be disastrous for the making of a successful review. But, having established that fact firmly and decisviely, perhaps even conclusively--not withstanding earlier comments made about the length of Piccolo's cape, which is a subject for another day-- I can say with great certainty that Goku and Vegeta do indeed comprise a dramaturgical dyad, not only upon which the series depends upon, but through which we can see the true genius of one of the most influential manga authors of all time."

And while you hear this word salad, there's a cool shot of Vegeta beating up Pui Pui or something.

The weird thing is that I didn't really pick up on this in his GT, Super, or OG Dragon Ball review videos. It's almost like he's purposely writing more stuff so he has room for all the cool footage.

Right now I'm in the tail end of the Buu Saga, and while I give him credit for being diplomatic about it, Mark still falls into the same trap I see with a lot of critiques of the Buu Saga: They keep comparing the existing text with some hypothetical better story that they assumed Toriyama was planning to write instead, before he changed his mind.

I think everyone has run across this before. People saw Gohan take the main-character role after the Cell Games and assumed this was a guarantee. When Gohan gets demoted and Goku takes the lead again, they cry foul and complain about how Toriyama failed to make it work, or he just plain gave up. There's an old fan rumor about how he was "forced" to put Goku back in charge because of backlash from angry fans, but this is absurd on its face.

This leads to critiques of the Buu Saga that operate on the premise that there's some idealized "correct" version of the story, where Gohan trains really hard, beats Buu all by himself, and so on. Whenever the published version of the story deviates from this "correct" version, critics suggest that Toriyama got his wires crossed, and blame everything on the awkward pivot back to Goku.

To me, that doesn't make sense. "Gohan and the Next Generation defeat Buu" is a what-if fan theory. Maybe it's better than what we ended up getting, but it's not fair to review the published work by comparing it to a hypothetical draft that may never have existed. That's like if a food critic gave a steakhouse a bad rating because he thought it was a pizzeria and he's still mad that his sirloin didn't have anchovies on it.

When you look at the Buu Saga as it was actually presented, the throughline is clearly not about passing the torch to the kids, because they all get jobbed out and killed. So it's dumb to review the thing and complain that the Gotenks stuff is pointless, and Gohan's power up is unearned, and his loss to Super Buu really sucks the life out of the story, and gosh, this is a really terrible passing-the-torch story. Well that's because it's not a passing-the-torch story. It's a story about Goku trying to pass the torch, failing, and discovering that he still has a place in the world after all. The "torch" he was trying to pass was his identity and personal responsibility, things he can't just confer on someone else.

You can't just tell someone else they're the new protagonist of your story and now they have to go do your job and feed your pets while you play video games. Everyone talks about Vegeta going Majin as a manifestation of his mid-life crisis, but Goku's mid-life crisis was him dying at age 30 and nope-ing his way out of life to train in Valhalla for the rest of eternity. The Buu Saga forced him to accept that this was a mistake, which is why he doesn't just drink a vial full of heart-virus juice after the story ends. He's back in the world of the living and this time he knows he needs to stay there.

And when you look at it from that perspective, suddenly all the Gotenks/Elder Kai Ritual stuff makes a lot more sense as awkward farce. It's anticlimactic and unsatisfying because none of those plans were ever going to work. Nothing worked until Goku and Vegeta both got their heads out of their asses and worked together. The world didn't need martyrs or torch-passings or a 'next generation', it needed adults to put their personal feelings aside for the greater good.