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samasmith23 · 1 year

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Evangelion: You Can (Not) Marathon — (Prologue)

I’ve made it no secret on this Tumblr blog that one of my personal favorite anime franchises of all-time is Hideaki Anno’s magnum opus, Neon Genesis Evangelion. Comprised of 26 TV Episodes, 2 follow-up movies, and a 4-part reboot/sequel film teatrology, Evangelion has certainly made a lasting impression among both Japanese and American anime audiences. What started out as a simple deconstruction of the mecha genre ended up rapidly evolving into one of the most psychologically complex and multi-layered stories I’ve ever encountered in any medium, reflecting Anno’s own personal experiences with depression while also exploring themes of personhood, loneliness, self-worth, self-destruction, relationships, sexuality, love, death, and psychoanalysis in an incredibly earnest and thoughtful manner. I was personally first introduced to EVA through my best friend at university, who told me it was one of her personal favorite anime series, and subsequently marathoned the entire original series plus the Death & Rebirth and The End of Evangelion movies. For the longest time I’ve avoided the Rebuild teatrology since I’ve heard incredibly divisive opinions from long-time EVA fans who have argued that the newer films are vastly inferior to the original and miss the point. But following the release of the final Rebuild film, Evangelion 3.0 + 1.0: Thrice Upon A Time, I’ve heard many former detractors of the Rebuilds come around on the new films and argue that they actually expand upon the themes of the original series + movies in a thematically rich manner, further reflecting Anno’s personal experiences and growth.

And seeing that I own the original out-of-print ADV Films’ “Perfect Collection” DVDs for NGE and the Manga Entertainment DVDs for Death & Rebirth & The End of Evangelion, recently bought the GKids Limited “Collector’s Edition” Blu-Ray boxset collecting the both the original series + movies in high-definition (and includes both the original ADV/Manga Entertainment Dubs & the modern Netflix Dub), and Amazon Prime includes all 4 Rebuild movies for free, I’ve decided to do a complete marathon revisiting both the original Neon Genesis Evangelion series + movies, as well as watching all 4 Evangelion Rebuild movies for the first time ever!

This marathon will serve as a reaction/watch-through thread, as well as an in-depth analysis of the various themes & nuances of each episode & film! Plus, I’ll also frequently inject some lighthearted humor & references in these posts since in the immortal words of my favorite internet reviewer, Lewis “Linkara” Lovhaug, “I’m a snarky bastard!”

A couple of ground rules for this marathon, however:

First, I’m going to be watching the original English dubs since they’re the versions that I’m personally most familiar with and am incredibly fond of the main cast (i.e. Spike Spencer as Shinji, Amanda Winn Lee as Rei, Tiffany Grant as Asuka, and Allison Keith as Misato). I personally have not watched all of Netflix’s new dub, from what little I’ve seen of it I feel that it’s vastly inferior to the original ADV & Manga Entertainment dubs. While the new dub does include a talented cast of voice actors (especially non-binary VA Casey Mongillo in the lead role of Shinji…), the new translation provided by Studio Khara suffers heavily from hyper-literal translations of the original Japanese script which sound incredibly awkward and unnatural when spoken in English, lacking the same level of emotional weight that the ADV and Manga translations allowed for. While the original dubs have their fair share of flaws did take some creative liberties, they were mostly faithful IMO and possessed a greater sense of energy and passion behind them.

Second, I’m going to be basing my analysis of each episode & movie based off the aforementioned DVD and Blu-Ray collections that I own, and will note key differences between the two versions. This will especially pertain to the ending credits theme song, a karaoke rendition of Bart Howard’s iconic “Fly Me To the Moon” which was completely removed from all international versions of NGE when Netflix acquired the licensing rights for the original series + movies in 2019, replacing the ending theme with an alternate version of Shiro Saigsu’s “Rei I.” So while my original DVD copies keep “Fly Me To the Moon” intact, the iconic song is sadly absent from my new Blu-Ray boxset.

Third, Episodes 21-24 of NGE are unique in that they later received “Director’s Cut” versions following the conclusion of the TV broadcasting of EVA, reanimating key frames and including entirely new scenes which were developed for the Death & Rebirth recap movie. My DVD copies included both the original “On-Air” and “Director’s Cut” versions of these episodes, whereas the Blu-Ray solely includes the Director’s Cuts. While I personally feel that the Director’s Cuts are the far superior versions of these episodes, I’m going to analyze both versions of these episodes back-to-back to highlight key-differences between them.

Lastly, I’ll be watching the infamous TV ending in the form of Episodes 25 & 26 before I watch the redone movie ending in the form of The End of Evangelion, which stands as not only one of my all-time favorite anime movies, but one of my Top 5 favorite movies period. Additionally, in-between the TV ending and The End of Evangelion film I’ll be watch the Death & Rebirth film which is simply a condensed recap of Episodes 1-24 of the TV series. It’s also worth noting that there are two different versions of the film, with the “Death” portion of the film covering the recap, while the “Rebirth” portion is the unfinished first 30-minutes of The End of Evangelion (it ends immediately before Asuka’s doomed fight against SEELE’s Mass-Production Evangelions). The version of the film on my Blu-Ray release is Death (True)², which completely omits the “Rebirth” portion of the film, while the original DVD includes the “Rebirth” portion. So I’ll be watching the “Death” portion on the Blu-Ray, and the “Rebirth” portion on the DVD.

And with all of that out of the way, let’s us officially begin the launch sequence for the "Evangelion: You Can (Not) Marathon” saga!

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richardsphere · 1 year

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still catching up on things i missed. Am now at the point where Taurus is killed. So its time for the obligatory paragraph of text and disection. So i guess I’ll be honest up front and say that I dont like it.

So credit where its due: i respect the fact that the showrunners acknowledged they didnt handle the racism and civil rights movements well, and wanted to end that arc before they could somehow do more damage then their “You must always and exclusively employ peacefull protest against your violent opressors even if peacefull methods have been repeatedly proven to be innefective”-message already did.

But in the way they decided to “end it ASAP” they verry much left it in a state where, to the best of my recollection, Weiss didnt even get to meet the character embodying her family sins coming back to haunt them.

They had a character physically branded by the SDC, and Weiss, whose core motivation since S1 has been the desire to “redeem her family of its crimes” doesnt even get to see the scars her father has inflicted.

Which combined that with my knowledge through osmosis that Jaques will only ever end up facing punishment for crimes against other members of the political class, and it sends this verry “the fight for civil rights is futile” message, and that crimes against the disenfranchised will never see any comeuppance at all because only the wealthy can hold eachother accountable.

Which, is just plain not a nice or satisfying point to end that story its a message that all hope is inevitably a lie. and serves as a significant part of the reason i look at anyone calling RWBY as a “hopepunk”-franchise with a sceptical eye.

This moment is also probably the reason why S9 Weiss and Blake both feel like hollow shells of characters to me. Their core characterisiation from the start based on this topic the series has now nuked from orbit by the production crew and has had a big warning sticker not to touch or ever adress anything related to it again. So now all that is left is Blake’s relationship with Yang, and Weiss has nothing left but “I guess i have friends and can serve as a comic-relief straightman”.

Im not saying Weiss should’ve dealt the finishing blow against Adam (that would’ve been problematic for a bunch of different reasons), but it feels like since the inception of the Whitefang Storyline, that fight was meant to be a Monochrome struggle, and she should at least have been present to see the scars her family inflicted on the once-innocent.

Im left seriously wondering, if there is actually a single episode where Mr. Brand Recognition and Weiss share any scene at all.

#rwby #Rwby discourse #Rwby discussion

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krueger4eva · 1 year

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Top 12 LGBT Horror Characters

9. Jake Wheeler (played by Zackary Arthur) from Chucky

TW: mentions of homophobia, bullying, child abuse, death, murder

*spoilers for Chucky TV Series*

Moving on to another television series based on a popular horror franchise, we are now discussing “Chucky”, which premiered on Syfy and USA Network in 2021, created by Don Manicini, who originated the entire franchise.

After seven movies, the iconic foul-mouthed killer doll continues his path of bloodshed on the small screen, with his targets sighted on a new generation of kids to terrorize.

One of those kids is middle schooler Jake Wheeler.

Before Chucky came into his life, Jake was already living in a horror story.

After his mother died in a car accident, Jake’s father Lucas became alcoholic, he is bullied mercilessly at school over his sexuality, and his perfectionist cousin Junior wants nothing to do with him.

At home, Lucas’ anger is compounded by the jealousy he felt toward his twin brother Logan’s more successful life he shared with his own wife and son. Plus, he is also not very accepting of Jake’s sexuality once he came out to him. All of this brewing rage led to Lucas punching his young son in the face after a heated argument. 🥺

The only solace he had was building those bizarre, morbid sculptures in his bedroom. (A hobby that he apparently outgrew after season 1, cause it’s never mentioned again.)

Then, Jake crosses paths with the red-headed doll at a chance encounter at a garage sale. After discovering his supernatural secret, Jake becomes slowly influenced by Chucky through after sharing his problems with him. Chucky uses false empathy to sway Jake into believing that he cares about his personal issues and wants to help him out. Thus, Chucky proposes a solution to make Jake’s emotional pain go away: MURDER!

What makes this so fascinating is that we see our lead character contemplating on going through with murdering someone. There are scenes of Jake buying weapons, chasing after someone, and even willingly gives Chucky to his tormentor Lexi, knowing that she would get murdered. Even though he has a change of heart and chooses to stop this plan, part of me actually worried that Jake would’ve succeeded in giving in to Chucky’s psychopathic manipulations, becoming another Charles Lee Ray in the making. It is terrifying, yet heartbreaking to see how easy it is for a child from a broken home could be influenced to do horrific acts by a stranger.

Yet, the damage was already done. Jake’s actions have still led to many deaths around him, including classmates and family members.

Now, Jake has to take responsibility and make things right. Now, everyday him and his friends have to spend their teen years facing danger at every turn.

Evil therapists. Psychotic nuns. Sociopathic children.

And to top it off, Chucky can be anywhere…and ANYONE!!

I can’t tell you if Jake will survive Chucky once more, because season 3 hasn’t premiered yet by the time this post has been published.

#zackary arthur #jake wheeler #chucky #child’s play #lgbt characters #fictional gay characters #don mancini #top 12 lgbt horror characters #horror characters #lgbt horror #syfy #usa network

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ticktockmyclockworkhart · 6 months

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I'm perhaps one of the most easy to please Pokemon fans ever. I wouldn't identify myself as a nintendo fanboy or anything even though I love a lot of their IPs (largely because the number one prerequisite to being a "nintendo fanboy" is hating Nintendo more than anything on earth it seems), but I will be the first to admit my standards are much lower than they should be. I eat up everything Pokemon related like the blindly eager little consumer I am, I've beaten every main series game and damn near every spin-off.

All this to say I think it says something when even I haven't beaten BDSP yet, and not for lack of trying. But the game bored me to tears. I've reset my saves on that game more than any other I have in the hopes that "well, maybe the next file I'll be more attached to". I can eat my way through new Pokemon games when they first come out in a few days and never put them down, but whenever I'd put BDSP down I'd have to reset my file again when I picked it back up because I no longer cared about whatever I had going on.

I've been grappling with this for a long time, trying to figure out what it is about this remake that makes it the one Pokemon game someone as easy to please as me couldn't care enough to finish. I'll be fully honest when I say I'll happily take whatever table scraps Game Freak cares to toss me and I'm not proud of that fact lol. I love Gen 4, it's one of my favorite Gens, and I actually like the BDSP artstyle too, I think it's a fun way to keep the spirit of the original games, though it really would have been cool to see Sinnoh at full scale and free to explore in 3D.

But today after another attempted replay I think I figured it out. It's the dumb. Fucking. Experience Share.

Pokemon is a turn based RPG, battling is literally the main gameplay loop and I found that I kept putting the game down because I would get so incredibly bored by the battles. None of them felt necessary and all of them felt way too damn easy. Pokemon Scarlet/Violet had this problem too, I noticed, but what got me to finish those games was I'd never experienced the story before and I wanted to see it finished. But with BDSP I know the story, so why should I finish it if the battles are such a drag? In the original Gen 4 I'd make a point of battling every trainer on every route. I'm very meticulous about my leveling and my Pokemon all need to be within one level of each other, lol. So my incentive for fighting every trainer was to keep my team at a high enough level and also to keep my levels rounded out. But with that EXP share they're always rounded, or god forbid they have different growth rates and I have to keep putting Pokemon away to prevent overleveling which just bothers my OCD more than anything lmao.

It also makes me care so much less about my Pokemon. I cared about my team because I took time to individually raise and train each Pokemon, and if I don't care about my Pokemon then frankly I barely care about the game. In Scarlet/Violet where trainer battles have become entirely optional for the most part I barely did any of them! And in BDSP all I am is annoyed by the trainer battles. There's next to no new content to keep the game interesting and give me a reason to keep playing, and when the main gameplay loop isn't even fun anymore, why would I play at all?

I was worriedly thinking that maybe I'm just getting old and it's hampering my enjoyment of the games (Terrifying thought) but I have just as much fun with ROM hacks that I did with older games. Most notably, there's no broken EXP share. Can't we at least get the option to turn it off? I get trying to find a solution to make grinding less of a miserable drag, because grinding is always the worst part of playing Pokemon, but the broken exp share hasn't made grinding less tedious, it's just made battling as a whole feel hollow and boring.

I still want to beat you some day, BDSP, I really do. Nothing makes me feel sadder than being bored by a franchise I love and I know can do better.

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scruffyplayssonic · 1 year

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Are the ArchieSonic comics actually an 80's/90's syndicated cartoon? Episode 44: Hero suddenly becomes six-to-eleven years old

Welcome back to my look at the ArchieSonic comic series, and how it shared a lot of the same story tropes as a typical ‘80s or ‘90s syndicated cartoon! Last time we had a look at the horrors of age, so this time we’re going to talk about the horrors of youth:

Episode 44: Hero suddenly becomes six-to-eleven years old

I don’t think this actually happened in the comics, however we did see the rapid de-aging of characters in both Sonic X and Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog!

That AoStH episode is one of my least favourites, in large part because baby Tails’ new catch phrase was, “Goo-goo poo-poo.” Ick. 😛

But since I can’t think of any cases of de-aging in ArchieSonic, now seems as good a time as any to talk about the two Sonic Kids super specials. After all, it wouldn’t be an 80’s/90’s franchise if there wasn’t a kiddified version of the characters, would it? Muppet Babies, Flintstones Kids, Tom & Jerry Kids, A Pup Named Scooby Doo, James Bond Jr, The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, Sabrina: The Animated Series, the list goes on and on. Heck, Archie Comics even did this with the Archie cast!

So, the Sonic Kids specials featured previously untold stories that took place when the cast were a lot younger. Super Special #5’s first story, “When You and I Were Young, Sally,” featured Sonic, Sally, Antoine, “Boomer” (Rotor’s childhood nickname), and Tails discovering the caverns beneath Knothole where they initially set up base in the early issues of the series, as well as Tails learning to fly for the first time.

The second story, “Stop… Sonic Time!” (which I am only now realising is an MC Hammer reference, dammit Tom Rolston and Karl Bollers why?!) featured present day Sonic telling a story to a bunch of kids about how the younger Tails got his sneakers.

They turned out to be a gift from his uncle Merlin Prower, who was still in hiding at the time. This story also involved Sonic foiling Robotnik's latest plan, which involved using a ray that froze time.

The third story was not about the Freedom Fighters as kids at all, but instead was about Sonic, Sally and Antoine each telling Uncle Chuck contradicting stories of how they destroyed a Combot that attacked them.

I’ll get back to this story in a later episode.

Apparently the first Sonic Kids special was a hit, because Archie cranked out another one a year later, and this time Knuckles got to be included in the action. The first story, “Zoneward Bound,” featured Sonic and the other kids finding a ring in a well (the same well that Sonic got that same ring from in issue #0) before being flung into separate zones.

Sonic had his first confrontation with Dr Robotnik, Sally was confronted with a terrifying vision of what had happened to her father, and Tails, Antoine and Rotor fell through a void wearing each other’s heads and limbs.

Trippy.

The second story, “My Secret Guardian,” showed young Sally and her father, pre-Robotnik’s coup, taking a trip to the Floating Island where Sally encountered Knuckles for the first time.

This was mostly a rehash of stuff we’d already learned through the main series, but more fleshed out and with some new information revealed. The biggest thing we learned is that the real reason King Max took them to the island was to search for the ship his wife and son had been on which had been shot down during the Great War.

The third story, “Eve of Destruction," is my personal favourite of the Sonic Kids stories. This story showed us that Tails' father became one of the earliest victims of the roboticiser when he discovered Robotnik was planning to overthrow the King.

But while all that was going on, his pregnant wife was busy going into labour. Fortunately Sonic and Sally were able to get her to the hospital in time, carrying her in a wagon that Sonic towed.

I really like this one. There's a lot of cute stuff with Sonic and his friends, but there's also a lot of darkness there and a grim sense of foreboding. We know what's coming.

That’s all from me today. Were there actually any stories about the characters being de-aged that I didn’t think of? What do you think of the Sonic Kids specials? Let me know in the comments! Next time I’ll be tackling episode 45: Boys vs. girls! …did that ever even happen in ArchieSonic?

#archiesonic syndicated

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bartoonist · 1 year

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Oddworld’s Lapis Lazuli: This is my Oddworld Fan Character/Gem OC that I originally created as a nameless Lapis Lazuli variant and one time love interest for Abe the Mudokon about 7 or 8 years ago where I drew that Yellow and Blue Lapis Lazuli and Abraham Lure a.k.a Abe the Mudokon (since I actually learned of his actual full name in the opening credits of Oddworld: Soulstorm) used to have that touching hands moment based on that touching hands scene from that Disney’s Tarzan movie that I took a simple inspiration from that one time long ago too of course, and since most of the main gems share the same names as their variants do since they received nicknames from Steven Universe himself these days like how most variants of the Main Pokémon and Digimon receive nicknames of their own monster tamers/fan players in their video game sourced media franchises already of course, I thought maybe its time I started giving this Oddworld Fan Character/Lapis Lazuli OC a nickname of their own (she/them since Gems in the Steven Universe franchise are an alien race of Genderless beings who mostly refer to each themselves as she/her and sometimes as they/them but never on screen on the Steven Universe TV series except for the Nonbinary Human character: Shep from Steven Universe Future whom Sadie referred to on screen as a they/them with the on screen-words: Oh they’re great etc etc), an epithetic nickname which is Oddworld’s Lapis Lazuli only she’ll/they’ll (whichever pronoun you folks wanna refer to my muscular, feminine, and androgynously feminine Genderless Gem OC as of course) have an Oddworld+Gem OC backstory of their own that refers to OLL as a lost, forgotten, and lucky defect survivor of Oddworld’s Beta Kindergarden since this Lapis Lazuli Variant Fan Character is blue and yellow like how those blue Lapis Lazuli gemstones also happen to have yellow flecks and stripes around them in real life of course, especially when as of these point on: I’ll draw an occasional series of Abe x Oddworld’s Lapis Lazuli fan art drawings/illustrations as a fanfic couple on occasions these days since part of me still loves to envision a beautiful new beginning of what it would be like if Abe the Mudokon got to find a beautiful love interest for once in his life whether it be an interspecies love story of or a same species love story, since I like to think that Abe deserves a chance at finding a hopeful, beautiful, heavenly, and romantic happiness in his life where he could leave behind that horrific life of cannibals hunting preys and miserable war against those upper class racially classist Glukkons who’ve wanted nothing more to make their Mudokon slaves into livestock for their cannibalistic consumers for so many years now, plus I’ve got a special Oddworld fan art piece that I’ll be posting to both Instagram and here on Tumblr later on since Twitter and Tumblr aren’t on Instagram’s sharing app list anymore lately except for Facebook, even I don’t actually use Twitter or Facebook as I don’t really care for those two social networks at all, plus I really do miss cross posting my Instagram posts to here on Tumblr and I hope that after having sent my App Store review to the Instagram developers that they’ll reconsider bringing back the option to cross post my Instagram posts to Tumblr here if they’ve read my App Store review one of Instagram’s missing features already that is? Well I hope you folks like my Oddworld Fan Character/Gem OC sketch of Oddworld’s Lapis Lazuli already of course.

#cartoonist #illustrator #blake andrew roten #fan character #gem oc #oddworld #steven universe #oc art #tradional sketch

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darkqueenofshadows85 · 11 months

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Sonic Frontiers (2022) Story Review

Disclaimer: I will be judging this game by the plot and writing, not the gameplay.

Introduction

Greetings, mortals! For today's review, we'll be looking at one of the most recent main series installments of the Sonic franchise, Sonic Frontiers (2022).

I can't believe it's already been a year since this game was first released (time flies, doesn't it?), but anyway, I hope you all enjoy my long overdue Sonic Frontiers review... 😅

Though honestly in retrospect, it's actually a good thing I waited this long to finish the review, considering The Final Horizon update had been released earlier this year, which in my opinion, was a major improvement over the base game's third act in a multitude of ways.

This is part of a series of reviews in which I’ll be going into slightly more detail about my thoughts on the main series Sonic game storylines, and why I think they're either well written and engaging, or an absolute trainwreck (or somewhere in-between). I’ll be giving my stance on the character portrayals, visuals, soundtracks, voice actors, and what themes/messages they had to offer. Keep in mind that these are just my own personal thoughts. Whether you agree or disagree, feel free to share your own thoughts and opinions!

(SPOILER WARNING)

Anyway, let us begin! ^^

Plot

Sonic explores the mysterious Starfall Islands to collect the Chaos Emeralds after he and his friends are separated when falling through a wormhole. Sonic struggles to find and save his friends while facing a horde of robotic giants called Titans, and also meets an artificial girl named Sage, created by Dr. Eggman, who cautions Sonic to leave the Starfall Islands.

Characters

For the first time in little over a decade, the characters are written correctly. I love how the characters acknowledge how badly they've been written by Pontaff during the Meta Era and have all been redeemed here.

Sonic has been reverted back to his original personality from the Adventure/Dark Era titles, striking a perfect balance of his cockiness and his heroic nature. His playful and snarky attitude is still present, but done in moderation while also highlighting his empathy and dedication to his friends.

Amy, Knuckles and Tails all receive major character development over the course of the game's story. They all learn to be independent individuals, believe in themselves as heroes rather than Sonic, and go their own separate ways for a while. I also like how they play a more active role in the revamped version of the game's climax shown in The Final Horizon update.

Additionally, Dr. Eggman also has some proper development over the course of the story. At first, he uses Sage and treats her as a normal AI, but later on he shows genuine care for her as if she's his own daughter.

Now let's talk about the newcomer, Sage. Her character arc is learning love and wanting to be Eggman's daughter, which really hit me in the feels by the end. Her story honestly reminds me of Shadow's character arc in SA2, only Sage still has her Maria alive and while Shadow came back in his next game appearance after SA2 due to fan demand, Sage on the other hand was resurrected in a post-credit scene due to the replicable nature of AI, and in The Final Horizon update, she's spared her death entirely. I hope she goes on to become a recurring character in the series just like Shadow did.

Visuals

The in-game cutscenes look good visually for the most part, and I do like the cinematography for some of them.

Soundtrack

As usual for the Sonic series, the music in this game is awesome. I'm Here and Undefeatable are two of my favorite vocal tracks. Vandalize, Break Through It All, Find Your Flame and One Way Dream are also amazing. The game's credits themes sung from Sage's perspective, Dear Father (the base game's first credits theme) and the credits theme of The Final Horizon DLC, I'm With You (vocal version) were both truly touching and heartfelt in their own ways.

Voice Acting

Needless to say, the current Sonic voice cast has significantly improved since their last game appearance. Roger Craig Smith gives Sonic a more mature tone of voice, showing just how much he's developed as a character over the past two games and became more humble. Ryan Bartley does an excellent job portraying Sage, Colleen O'Shaughnessey (Tails) is great as always, and Cindy Robinson (Amy) gives a more reserved and less high-pitched voice performance on par with how she sounded in Sonic Boom and Sonic Forces. Dave B. Mitchell's performance as Knuckles has greatly improved since we last saw him in Team Sonic Racing, giving the character a more stern, yet somewhat laid-back tone. Mike Pollock's performance here is one of the most nuanced portrayals of Dr. Eggman in the entire series, retaining his usual hamminess and humorous tendencies while also showing a much wider range of emotions which haven't been seen since as far back as the Adventure games or even 06.

Theme/Message

Throughout the game's story, the pervading and most impactful theme is that of love, in all shapes and forms. Specifically, including Sonic's general love for the people close to him, Sonic and Amy's love for the world, the love between friends Sonic and Knuckles share, the familial love Sonic and Tails share as surrogate siblings, the developing love between Eggman and Sage as a bond of father and daughter, many relationships and bonds demonstrated between the Ancients/Koco, and so on. What makes it particularly powerful here is how unafraid the story is to touch upon how these bonds may be stressed by separation, strife, grief, despair and loss, and still manage to prevail in the end over impossible odds.

Conclusion

Overall, I love Sonic Frontiers for reverting the Sonic franchise's writing style back to how it was before the Pontaff duo came on board, and it's a good foundation for the future of Sonic games. The Meta Era titles from the previous decade were holding Sonic back and were generally the worst part of the franchise in my opinion. The comics are awesome, the movies are awesome, the Sonic Boom TV series was generally well-received (even though I personally can't stand it), and from what I've seen of the first two seasons so far, Sonic Prime is easily the best Sonic show since Sonic X in my opinion, whereas the games since 2013's Sonic Lost World have been failure after failure with the exception of Sonic Mania. The story and writing quality of the game series started going downhill with Sonic Colors in 2010, and while the gameplay of both Colors and Generations is admittedly good, it still doesn't excuse the downgraded writing quality and boring childish stories. I'm happy that the games aren't holding Sonic back anymore, but are more on par with everything else Sonic is in. Here's hoping the new era of Sonic will prove itself to be a bright new future for the Blue Blur.

My final score:

5.6/5 (Great)

#sonic the hedgehog #sonic frontiers #review #blog post #opinion post

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popculturebuffet · 11 months

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Thomas the Tank Engine Retrospective: Series 5: Alec Baldwin Your Worthless (Comission for Lachey V)

Hello all you very useful engines and welcome back to my long retrospective look at Thomas the Tank Engine's golden age. It's hard to belive we're almost at the end. At least of this stretch. After this we only have one more part of this retrospective guaranteed.

The rest is up in the air: Lachey is considering seasons 6 and 7 and i'm considering the rest of the movies, the two more recent series.. seeing where the franchise has been as of late. But whatever wind blows I doubt I'll ever be free of the railway series and i'm okay with that. It can get boring at times binging 25 episodes of a childrens show, and belivie me it does, but the weird highs, production values, and endless material make up for it.

So for series 5 the good Rev Awdry had passed. It was a sad day: While I joke about his weird hatred of Henry being happy.. because it's fun, the guy did have a creative spirit and most of the eps up to this point came from his imagination. We woudln't have Thomas without him.

So with that this is the first season to simply go for all orginal stories. Some were based on real stories by David Maidment, who worked with the railway children charity and had shared some stories while asking the show to donate. They brought him on as a railway consultant, their last one for over a decade. Guess the others wanted to brick Henry back up or something.

Series 5.. is one of the best of the series and probably my faviorite. I've said that before but while it has plenty of the bollocks I love from this fine franchise, the stories are generally really well done and creative children's tales: While their kept acurate to a railway, these tales have more fun with character and it's a bit easier to keep track of who everyone is personality wise compared to previous seasons. It mixes "trains get punished for their hubris stories" with some more adventurous stories: we get a hunt for a lost castle, stepny nearly getting smelted, Percy getting stuck as a runaway, Henry plunging into the sea, and as a finale, a giant sapient bolder trying to murder our heroes

It gives the series something it needed more of: variety. While stupid train children getting punished for their hubris will never leave this franchise on penalty of death, it's nice to break from that and these types of stories play better to an older audience, which while good for the grown ass man who has to watch all these is also good for kids as they might stick with thomas longer if the stories keep their intrest. The messages it teaches are still valid, you just gotta throw a little razzle dazzle in there once in a while. It's why Owl House wrapped a fairly important message about religoius dogma and societal othering around magic, shipping and an owl tube.

This season also shifts things as this is the last time Micheal Angelis did his voice... and the first of two times someone else did in the use. Ladies, gentleman, they's, thems, and that beautiful rainbow in between I submit the glory that is Alec Baldwin narrating Thomas the Tank Engine.

WIth George Carlin retiring the US needed a new voice. Unlike Carlin who largely stuck to the style Ringo Starr and Michael Angelis used, with the voices being kind of samey, Alec Baldwin tried to give each character a unique voice. The idea.. is actually good. It's something the sreies needed and it makes the engines more distinct.

In practice though.. it's very clearly Alec, while a talented actor and terrible, TERRIBLE husband and father... has a pretty limited voice range. Some like Thomas or Toppam Hat, are fine. But then we get the bizzare ones and man oh man are they fun: Gordon and Henry sound like the dumbest cavemen he could imagine, which works for Gordon as he is the biggest idiot ever, but is weird for Henry who while proud never came off as an overly proud brick wall like his buddy. He's the one who gets put behind brick walls.

Then we have other ones like James who has a camp gay voice. There's .. no other way to describe it. Alec just used his sterotypical camp lispy gayman voice he kept in reserve because it was the late 90s, and it somehow works. We also get weird one offs , so many, from his ATTEMPT at doing a woman voice for Lady Hatt, to annie and clarabell being suddenly southren, to a cockney accent for Stepny. It's VERY obvious the show simply had too many voices for Alec's range and he pulled out every stupid acent, every inflectoin and every steroptype he had to make due.

I can however give him credit that.. at least he tried. He genuinely cared. He also had a sense of humor about the james thing

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Granted the way they frame it is very... 2000's, but I can give him credit for acknowldging "yeah... yeahhhhh".

So with that let's settle in for a very Alec Baldwin Thomas the Tank Engine under the cut

1 . Cranky Bugs It's a new season and that means a new asshole to harass our stupid train children. In this case it's Cranky

Who i'm still not convinced isn't THIS Cranky in a lovematic grandpa situation. At any rate this Cranky/That Cranky is a crane whose also an asshole.. granted about 2/3 of the cast could be described as "(insert vechile) whose also an asshole". In his case he tries bossing the trains around, and Gordon and James don't help by agreeing with him, causing incidents. As is the natural order of things, god punishes Cranky for his hubris, with Thomas and Percy saving him. While he's still a racist crack ballon, he's no longer dominating.

2. Horrid Lorries

Cranky has learned absolutely nothing and taunts the trains about being replaced with Lorries. Which i'll give the us dub of thomas as I assumed, this being american they'd pull a 4kids and redub the british terms. But nope. Alec Baldwin uses all the british terms you'd expect, which felt weird at first, but I got used to and i'm happy they didn't try to half assedly take away one of the core parts of the show. Kids.. kids aren't dumb enough to need to think that every show takes place IN AMERICA.

Anyways some Lorries show up, are assholes, get smited for their hubris, and i've seen this sort of thing before. They vow vengance though so I can't wait for the sequel: The Lorries Strike Back.... annnnd looking at the wiki their only seen in this one episode.

3. A View for Gordon Gordon gets tangled in some stuff and plows through a wall. You can only imagine my joy. That said this is a solid one: gordon complains about the view at the new station.. and some shenanigans send him THROUGH a wall. And to the Fat Controller's credit he dosen't finish putting gordon through a fucking wall but instead just puts a nice window there. IT's also nice to have a story where Gordon isn't a complete tool just about 50 percent of one.

4. Lady Hatt's Birthday

This is both one of my faviorites for the season and the series in general. It's Sir Topham Hatt's birthday. Aka the Fat Controler Aka Jimmy the Reach. It's a simple fun romp as he tries to get to his wife's birthday party. Also he has a wife now. and kids. Human ones not just his stupid train children. It's just a bunch of fun slapstick as he falls in mud. I've seen this plot before but it's thomas the tank engine: it's introducing kids to this plot. it gets a pass. It's something diffrent from the usual hubris and the ending is sweet as she dosen't raise a fuss over him being so dirty. She just wants to get dirty. And on that horrifying mental image..

5. James and the Trouble With Trees James nearly gets murdered by a tree to be punished for his hubris. I honestly forgot that part of the plot. James also throws a fit about not getting to pull the special express. I will say I do like Thomas rescuing him, for once NOT rubbing the days lesson in his enemy's face. It shows he's a good guy.

6. Gordon and the Gremlin: Gordon is a dick, we get jokes about Gremlins but sadly no actual gremilns. We do meet Toppham Hatt's mother. Also if your curious I'm using his actual name more.. because the shows using it more. It used fat controller before but this season with more of his family appearing they've switched to just calling him Sir Toppham hat. I of course will alternate between their hilarious crass first name and the more respectiable second because i'm a smart and mature adult. And because it's funny.

7. Bye George!

George the racist Steamroller is back... I honestly forgot he existed. But he provides a fun one that I forgot was as fucked up as it was. So George is tearing up some railway and being a racist monster who wants to kill all trains and railways, is delighed. He tars up some to trip up thomas.. but then fucks up by blocking duck... which causes Gordon , who'd already been approved to pass to crash into the guy and murder a car. Shockingly not only was Gordon's first murder unintetional but he feels bad about it... granted it comes off like a large reason for it is he's worried about what his angry fat controlling god will do to him, but the Fat Controller knows it wasn't his fault and will tear the ass off whoever it is. So George is forced to work in lumber for a week, both a shockingly lenient sentence and a fitting one. He's gotten soft in his old age.. do characters here age?

8. Baa! A ram eat's the fat controller's hat. That's about all that's really intresting here. I do like the idea: a station decorating contest but execution wise it's just sorta there. Still a ram ate a man's hat which is more than I can say for other bog standard thomas episodes

9. Put Upon Percy Percy's trucks are assholes and nearly cause him to get killed in a mine collapse. And it's sentences like this that remind me WHY I do this series, pay aside. I also grew to like Percy this season as he grew out of being just "thomas 2" being more of a whiner, but in a relatable way.

10. Toby and the Flood

This one.. dear god. Okay so Toby is sent to inspect a dam. Simple enough.. but then it floods. Again simple enough... while Toby is on a rickiety bridge sending toby up river. This is another faviorite mostly because the sense of tension is real. I genuinley thought Toby could die, and given this series attitude toward death and not being bound by the books it easily could've happened. Granted Toby Toys are still being made I think, so he's thankfully invunerable as long as he has merch, but it's still a pretty harrowing episdoe and the effects work is top notch. how they pulled off an ep this ambitious I have no idea. Probably experince working with water from Tugs.

11. Haunted Henry This episode is dripping with atmosphere is Henry is hautned by a ggghost that turns out to be an old man instead who tried to warn Henry's crew who wouldn't listen. A nicely spooky episode, helped by me seeing it during spooky season. Spoo-ky!

12. Teething Troubles We get a new disel, another one whose entirley friendly. The twins are around and both sound like scratch from adventures of sonic the hedgehog for some reason. That's.. really all this episode has. We've seen a friendly disel before. WE've seen the twins being assholes before. The only thing we haven't seen is Alec Baldwin doing his best stratchy voiced robo chicken.

13. Stepney Gets Lost

Should be "Stepny almost dies". This is another one of those more adventurey stoires I mentioned, as on his way back from working at the quarry, Stepny gets lost and things esclate quickly as two disels, arry and bert, kidnap him, assuming him to be scrap and put him in the smelting shed, where h'es clawed. Stepny VERY NEARLY dies, the second near death in only 4 episodes, and it's incredibly tense. It's only thanks to the Fat Controller getting there just in time the poor guy life. I do like the FC in this one as he's nicer: he gave Stepny the assignment in the first place because he needed a change of scenery. I prefer this later characterization of a guy whose firm.. but also will do nice stuff for his stupid train children over the angry abusive god he was early on. He's still got SOME shady aspects, but he's mostly nice.. just like modern day god.

14. Toby's Discovery This is another personal faviorite and another classic, as Toby is taken by the Hatt's on an expedition to find an old castle someone found on a map. The concept itself is fun but the idea is also great. finding the castle is real easy, they just follow the line bu tthe visuals are beautiful and the castle itself looks fantastic. We also get a nice little ghost story as Toby hears rumors of a ghost.. but it's just Betram, a new engine.. or is he? My fan theory is that Betram, a narrow gage engine whose a fan of Toby's, is actually Smudger. While he has Smudger's face simply because he's a refit of duke with a diffrent face, it'd make sense: it wouldn't be the first time a train was replaced or the first time a train got refitted and Smudger WAS missing. It's better than the idea that the poor guy died rusting to death so i'm going with it. Smudger is reborn bitches!

15. Something in the Air

Henry takes some asshole pills and thus rushes into his assigment.. despite thomas trying to warn him some track had eroded, leading him into a lake. Once again, top notch water effects.

16. Thomas, Percy and Old Slow Coach Now we'r eback to some old fashioned messed up Thomas the Tank Engine logic as Thomas and Percy meet an old engine named , and I swear to train jesus this is true, Old Slow Coach.

Now if you thought the name was bad... your right but it gets worse: turns out she's due to be scrapped.. and they just HAVEN'T GOTTEN TO IT. And as we find out later she's in the fat controller's jursdiction. Look am I suprised the fat controller has done some train murders? yes. Do I think he has saw traps but for trains? also yes. Do I think he mentored John Kramer? Of course. But did I think he scrapped his trains. No I can't say I did.

So our heroes try to think of a way to save her. Luckily for once the angry train god that choo choos his way through this universe and decides to use his smiting powers for good.. I mean mostly. He does casually blow james up for no reason. Maybe Train Jesus was working out his homophobia still. At any rate another fire breaks out with some workman's quarters and Thomas and Percy suggest OSC replace them. Granted it's as TEMPORARY lodgings.. but given a disaster occurs on Sodor once every few episodes, crisis housing will always be needed. Horay!

17. Thomas and the Rumors The children's playground dies and since there isn't a kind old man rethinking his life as he dies from cancer to fight for it, the Fat Controller is using Harold to survey. The trains think he's replacing them, it gets in Thomas' head, their wrong as usual, Thomas learns not to gossip, next.

18. Oliver's Find: Oliver ends up down an old branch line and finds a house the Fat Controller decides to make into a rest spot. I forgot who oliver is between seasons. Next.

19. Happy Ever After This is a fun one. Not much to mock really: A bride is getting married on sodor and needs her bridal package, i.e. something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue. So the fat controller uses his engines to fill in. IT's a really sweet, fun little episode. In the spirit of it, and since i'm not using an image for EVERY episode this time, i'm going to try do this challenge. okay something old

Cocaine with sunglasses, a gag I haven't used in some time Something borrowed

Somone Else's running gag. Something new?

My new oc, Fred the Murder Engine and for something blue

A wholesome marge simpson meme. Woo nailed it. next!

20. Sir Topham Hatt's Holiday

Hey hey hey it's fat controller's vacation. Lady Hatt complains about a suddenly southren annie and clarabelle but is fine after their cleaned. The real show is that FC has Harold take his family to his country place.. and it takes FOUR DAYS TO GET THERE. FOUR DAYS. Does.. does harold Need fuel? did he stop? did they ever stop? where on sodor is only accesible by plane 4 days away? The logistics here will forever haunt me, just like a bi plane haunts the hats. Solid enough episode.

21. Percy's Surprise Percy is burnt out working in the coal mines so naturally his trucks, who haven't fufilled their seasonly attempted murder quota, break one of his cables. What follows is a thrilling ep as percy nearly murders everyone and can't stop. IT's geninely tense with me worried for Percy's safetey and everyone elses as he barely survivies. top notch episode.

22. Make Someone Happy James wants to make people happy, takes Ms Kyndly to see her sister after her transport gets derailed.. not literally for achange. A genuinely sweet little tale. 23. Toad Goes Backwards Toad, the tram train is tired of going forwards. his trucks are dicks, as is their nature, and push him forward so he can't help but nearly run everyone over. like the percy one this is thrilling and I was genuinely worried toad would die. Again I know these trains won't die as long as they have merchandise but whose buying toad merch I ask you? Me. I will. Hook me up.

24. Duncan Gets Spooked

This one sure did happen. And Duncan sure did get scared. And I sure do not care. Next

25. Snow

Scarlowe gets caught up in snow, he really hates the snow. He just needs a song and I think I have just th eone for him.

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Also holy shit it took me several decades, and at least a good one and a half since I became a fan of his via garfield to realize that was Lou motherfucking Rawls. This dude is awesome and to help convince you , here's the muppets

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... as you can probably guess I don't have much for this one. It's fine and the snow looks fantastic. They've really stepped up their game this season and season 4 had also done it. It just gets prettier each season. Anyways now for our finale... and this one I can't stop thining about

26. Rusty and the Bolder

Okay this one.. is an all time classic and the first Thomas Finale that's felt like a season finale. While my playlist on youtube had snow last i'm going with the wiki. So a giant bolder is precariously perched on a mountain.. it also ocasoinally has an ominus HAUNTING stone face. It's genuinely unsettling.. and then it gets free and proceeds to slasher villian stalk EVERY SINGLE TRAIN IT CAN. No really it nearly runs into most of the lines trains. Thomas gave us a slasher film with a bolder hunting trains. A TRAIN MURDERNIG BOULDER. see this is what gets me up in the morning: while I love writing about really good stuff.. sometimes I just love bizzare nonsense and Thomas is a mixture of geninely good children's entertainment and morbid bizzare nonsense. I'll miss this show whenever i'm done I swear.

This was one of the most fun episodes i've watched and ends with Toppham hat isolating boulder.. but he will hunt again.. HE WILL HUNT AGAIN. HE WILL HU...

So that does it for this season. All in all one of the series best it's just some episodes I really don't have much to say and others are attempted boulder murder. It's a show I dearly love on some level by this point

Next Time: THE MOVIE. is it any good.. i'll see. Will it at least have alec baldwin? Can confirm. Thanks for reading.

#thomas the tank engine #alec baldwin #gay trains #thomas #percy #gordon #james #Youtube

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basedkikuenjoyer · 2 years

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Lingering Snowblood: The Saga of Oyuki

Alright class, who’s ready for a fun bonus post? Waaay back in the start of this journey, we talked a little about Okiku potentially being inspired by a figure it the story that is likely an inspiration for Kin & Momo. Lone Wolf & Cub, it’s one of the most famous series of classic samurai movies. What Hawk & Chick are based on for any Bob’s Burgers fans and the TV adaptation had the actor Oda’s said their names come from in the lead role.

In that franchise, there’s a woman named Oyuki who pops up a few times. Dancer background, unassuming lady who’s absolutely deadly when pressed, tattoo used a lot like the mask, and has a calling card of taking topknots from her fallen foes. Sounds a lot like Kiku, yeah? And if you didn’t know, “yuki” means snow so we do have that shared motif. Feels like in both cases, and the ones we’ll get to, the archetype is leaning a bit on the mythological Yuki-Onna. I was wrong though, that was just the tip of the iceberg.

So...this character transcends franchises. Wano has made me really interested in jidaigeki, I’ve actually grown quite fond of them and have a buddy who’s into old Westerns so we love talking how they play off of each other. As an aside, any RPG game masters out there...go binge an old Western TV show like Tales of Wells Fargo and you will find a gold mine of session ideas! Turns out Oyuki has a pretty cool history, and yeah it includes Kill Bill.

The funny thing is...if we’re talking Eiichiro Oda’s influences, it actually calls into question what was really pushing him to dust off Snowblood. See, she is a figure in jidaigeki, but a little before his time. That’s not a huge deal, Smokey and the Bandit came out over a decade before I was born and I still thought it was a cool Sunday afternoon movie that’s stuck with me from that single viewing fifteen years ago. Kill Bill was directly inspired by Lady Snowblood, coming straight from Quentin Tarantino himself. Oda loves Hollywood and American movies, so which one really piqued his interest for Okiku?

Because y’all...the deeper we go the more obvious this was part of the inspo for Okiku. Wano’s just a big kid giddy to show his young readers all the shit he thought was cool growing up.

Yeah, I bet you know this woman’s entire deal looking at this. Proper lady right up until that short sword comes out of the parasol...though she’ll probably whoop a wave of mooks with the umbrella alone. At the end it’s her standing in the middle of a dozen dead bodies without a drop of blood on that pretty kimono. The dancer or acrobat background is really common, vengeful motivation driving her as well as lowborn origins. Gotta have some reason she’s not content to start a family and all, right?

So this 1973 movie based on a 1972 manga’s it right? Lone Wolf was a little later and Oyuki there was mostly just a one-shot appearance that they reused for a movie. Well...see, we can go deeper.

Finding stuff like this is what makes digging so worth it. See, if we’re talking beloved Okiku...the Kill Bill/Lady Snowblood inspo is missing the mark on one big thing. Kiku’s not cold-blooded or vengeful. Let’s go back to the late 60s though, the same era that gave us a pretty feminist wave of Japanese media like Attack no.1. This was a TV drama that ran for a season, Red Swallow Oyuki. Starring the lovely Junko Miyazono who’d go on to have a nice run of movies playing the same type of kickass lady. One of those by the way was Hannya no Ohyaku. Fun bonus tie. This aired in 1968, so likely influencing Lady Snowblood, and you can find the first two episodes on Toei’s official Youtube page. With subs! It’s awesome, imagine Samurai Champloo if Fuu was the badass in charge...so Bakura Town.

Where I really think this initial iteration of Oyuki shines through in Kiku is the personality. This version, she’s really cutely naive. Raised in isolation and trained to pass on her father’s sword style, but he balked at the end. Sent Oyuki away to “become an ordinary woman.” Only use the sword to protect yourself. But of course, when push comes to shove she’ll use it to protect the innocent. Yes, it does end up feeling a lot like Himura Kenshin which is it’s own obvious part of Kiku’s DNA.

I also love this idea of Oyuki sorta taking on a life of her own. It’s very Kabuki, it was a cool character concept so why not lift and repurpose. Not quite the same, but reminds me of the thing about the name Kikunojo. How it has a history as a stage name for many famous Onnagata. But seriously...watch one episode of Red Swallow and tell me that isn’t what a story with Kiku in the lead role would feel like.

#one piece #eiichiro oda #okiku #inspirations and influences #kill bill #lady snowblood #red swallow oyuki

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thewapolls · 1 year

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So... I didn't really intend to do a family tree for stuff like the Novice Troopers in WA4, and the like thirty variations on Brionac forces soldiers since those are all just confined to one game, WA4. But as far as prologue, or at least early game enemies go, that sort of only leaves one thing for WA4...

CHORONZON, initially mislocalized as COLONZON is actually the pillar of this otherwise pretty meager family of monsters. It gets a dramatic overhaul in WA2, but then gets simplified into a floating orb again in Code F. It's actually a reference to a demon invented by famous 16th century occultist Edward Kelly and John Dee, but very notably fixated upon by Aleister Crowley, founder of the Thelema religion, and well known member of the Hermitic Order of the Golden Dawn, whom we will address in a moment...

NIGHTMARE is a curious entry to this, considering it is in fact not portrayed as a horse as in the titular Henry Fuseli painting, despite WA1 actually have two distinctive horse related enemy models (The GHOSTRIDER/DULLAHAN, and the GAMIGIN/BLOODHORN) nor as any kind of impish devil as is otherwise a little more common. No idea why it's a buncha bloody orbs.

PROMETHEUS is a recolor of the CHORONZON model introduced in WA2. It's a cool model over all, and while it suits CHORONZON's broader mystic and occult themes well enough, it's a tad strange for the Greek Prometheus to be wielding not just a staff of fire, but also one for water, and what appears to be stone, and I think wood(?), and a gear --not to mention the yin and yang suspended from the head ornament, or the vast night sky under the robe.

but finally this brings us to the WA4 entries: SCOUTER, INSPECTOR and BULLSEYE, not demons or nightmares like their predecessors, but robotic drones used by the Brionac forces. Kind of anticlimactic if I'm being honest...I've put them all together because like most of the recolors or Brionac forces they're just marginal level ups of one another in both name and design.

There's also THERION, misromanized as TEREON. It's actually part of a dual linage along side the monster MASTER CROWLEY, also butchered in localization as just CRAWLY. "Therion" or "Master Therion" was an epithet assumed by Crowley himself as god of his own religion and supposed Beast of the Book of Revelation. (Yes, Crowley was really that much of an edgelord) All that to say that MASTER THERION, shortened to just M.THERION, in WA2 seems to merge the lineage of those two WA1 monsters.

Although oddly enough there's also the otherwise unrelated monster GREATER BEAST that was introduced in WA2 and confusingly localized as XELAS initially but corrected in later games. It is more overtly based on The Beast of Revelation. In WA2 it is monster #333 in the bestiary, half of 666.

WA2 also introduces PRIMEVALS as a recolor of MASTER THERION. It appears to be named after the, then infamously unfinished stop motion monster film of the same name. It reappeared in WA5 with the only slightly mishandled name PRIME VALS. Against all odds the stop motion movie started by David Allen in the 1970s was actually completed just this past July(2023) after more than 50 years in hiatus and development hell.

Then there's the DEVONOVA enemy that shared CRAWLY's model in WA1. It appears to be a reference to an enemy in the 1970s tokusatsu series, Lionmaru(which the Guardian Lord Justine references) although the physical descriptions don't really line up very well. In any case it continues to appear throughout the franchise, sharing later models with...

MINATOUS is weird... I have no idea where this name came from. The Japanese is written as MI-NA-TU-SU[ミナトゥス] and what's super weird is that TU[トゥ] is very specifically the sound "TOO/TWO" and nothing else, so "TOU" is most certainly not how it should have been romanized, but I have no idea what it was aiming for. It's clearly not trying to be "Minotaur." It's actually weirdly close to the latin "Dominatus" meaning a "Lord" or "Ruler" or "Dominator," which would even sort of gel with the MASTER CROWLEY association, but obviously it is missing the "Do-" at the front, so that doesn't seem right... That's as close to a real idea as I've got.

and finally, A BAO A QU, a monster seemingly invented by Jorge Luis Borges for his Manual de zoología fantástica(aka El libro de los seres imaginaro) although he purports it to be a Malay myth attributed to an author and book that do not exist. (although it appears some people have attempted to trace this fictitious etymology back to a corruption of "Abang Aku," Indonesian for "My Brother.") It is much more likely however to have entered the Japanese popculture lexicon via the original 1979 Mobile Suit Gundam anime, where the A Baoa Qu was space fortress where the final battle of the series took place.

#wild arms

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courtesanofdeath · 10 months

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[Black Lagoon Anon]

So I'll definitely have to tag you in any Black Lagoon posts I post.. Especially the rare posts. Because this whole fandom is already small as it is right now. But I have been hoping that the more people talk about it, the more people would be just curious enough to want to find out about the franchise in general too.

And I keep saying franchinse because I don't know.. Wait. Did you know that Sawyer and Eda really have own spinoff mangas. Because you'll also get a lot of backstories for Eda, Sawyer, Shenhua and Lotton.

But about the original manga. I don't know how you might feel about Li's character, you may like her. So she is the new female character in the next arc after Roberta's Blood Trail. I won't say more though.

And I could definitely see you liking Le Majeur.. She is the newest female character who was introduced in Dutch's backstory chapters. And that's all I'll say.

You will also learn more about Revy's time in prison, more about her backstory. Many more backstories.

I'm keeping details vague so not to spoil you more.

I sent a Japanese clip for Gangsta. too, if you might be curious about the anime in Japanese. Since that was already mentioned you prefer Japanese. Which is fine. I don't think any characters have accents for this series that I know of. But it's so rare to find any videos for this series, regardless of language, so I've just sent any videos I can find. So another video.

Like I said.. A woman created this series, franchise - since there's a spinoff for one of the characters too.

This series is like Black Lagoon, but reversed in lots of ways. There are strong characters, including a lot of female characters. Some queer characters. But a lot of disabled characters too. There is also many of these characters who're of different ethnicities too.

The dark skinned woman you'd see, Alex, she is one of the mixed characters. Is part black, part Chinese, and part something else too. She's a mixed woman.

Doug is the young man with the dreadlocks, he is a half black man. He's black and white descent.

Galahad is obviously black.

Nicolas, who is the deaf man you've already seen, is actually half Asian from his mother's side.

Worrick is most likely European, at least of more of a European descent. Based on his appearance.

There are many other characters, but those were an example for you. And you already met Nicolas who's a canonically deaf character. His sign language that he speaks is the Japanese sign language if you may be curious. As someone who is considered disabled (by technicalities), I do enjoy seeing characters who are disabled. Especially the accurately portrayed.

And, just like Black Lagoon, graphic content will be happening. Especially in the manga. Including a lot of offensive languages. Just to warn you about that ahead of time. Oh! Another warning.. In the anime. I can't remember if it's the first or second episode, I'd have to let you know there is actually a sex scene.

And if it wasn't already obvious yet, the boys, Nicolas and Worrick are the main characters of this story. And Alex to some extent too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcmNVDWBkiU

oooh a spinoff for eda and sawyer sounds goood! sawyer is really cool and i really loved her scenes and her character is really interesting! i also love her character design! and i loooove eda so much !! so i'm definitely gonna check those out! and shenhua too omg ever since her introduction i loved her! and lotton too lmaaoo he's really funny and interesting so i'd love to learn more about him too! im excited to meet the new characters too! black lagoon has lots of fun and interesting characters so i can't wait to see more of them later on!

from the clips you've shared i can already see how diverse the gangsta characters are, which is super cool! it's rare to see characters with disability in anime, and especially in one of that genre, so that's really rad! nicolas seems so cool, i'm excited to see more of him when i get into the anime!

and thanks for the heads up about the graphic content! i'm definitely gonna watch the anime in sub, especially since i just saw that worrick is voiced by junichi suwabe who's one of my fav jp voice actors! lol

i'm really excited to watch gangsta and then read it later on! i have a feeling i'll enjoy it a lot. thank you so much for telling me about it!

#anon #long post

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fancoloredglasses · 1 year

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Red vs. Blue (so...why ARE we here?)

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(Thanks to TheRedBase)

[All images are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions. Please don’t sue me]

Now, those who are fans will complain that Red vs. Blue (or RvB) is still airing new episodes, so I shouldn’t be reviewing it. However, I have two arguments to that:

1. This wouldn’t be the first time I’ve reviewed something still current.

(b) Rooster Teeth is no longer airing new episodes of RvB. They’re airing episodes of spin-off series.

First, a bit of back story...

The company that would eventually be known as Rooster Teeth was founded by Michael “Burnie” Burns and Matt Hullum. Back then, it was known as Drunk Gamers, and they would review video games after having more than a few drinks. Naturally, most video game companies didn’t want to give them games to review with a name like that (not to mention most banks didn’t want to lend money to a company based on the consumption of several adult beverages), so they changed the name to Rooster Teeth (which was a work-safe parallel to “cock bite”)

About this time, Bungie had created a first-person shooter franchise for the X-Box known as Halo (maybe you’ve heard of it?) While the first game was critically acclaimed, it was the second game that ties in to our story. One feature in Halo 2 was a multiplayer arena. While this sort of thing is commonplace now, it was still fairly new at the time. It was possible to link several X-Boxes together and play with each player on their own screen so other players couldn’t “peek” at where their opponents were since they were all sharing a screen (granted having all those X-Boxes and all those TVs was expensive, but STILL...)

Burns and Hullum (and their friends that were hired, including Gustavo “Gus” Sorola, and Geoff Ramsey) took advantage of this and, with Bungie’s blessing, jumped on a new sort of “filmmaking” this new technology made possible: machinema (making films in multiplayer games, usually with one player dedicated as the “cameraman”)

That’s why the first couple of seasons have that circle in the center of the shot; that’s the targeting area for the cameraman’s weapon.

Anyway, RvB told the tale of a civil war between two sides: the Red Army and the Blue Army, or at least one battlefield in the war: a box canyon on an unpopulated world known as Blood Gulch. (well, that’s how it started anyway) Why is a box canyon have such strategic importance? They never say.

[I would like to note that, since this is a video game, all of the characters look exactly the same except for the color of their armor. The only way to tell who’s actually speaking was for the “actor” controlling the character to quickly look up and down so the character bobbed their head.]

Now, let’s meet our total fucking idiots brave warriors, starting with Red Team.

Red team is led by Sarge (full name, Sgt. Sarge. If ever there was anyone born to do his job...) Sarge is totally gung-ho about the military life and is all for taking down “those no good dirty Blues!” Too bad he has no clue how to do his job, often rejecting common sense plans that would likely work in favor of the most recklessly violent plan he can come up with.

Sarge’s second-in-command is Pvt. Dick Simmons. Simmons is the closest thing Blood Gulch has to an IT guy and is a total suck-up to Sarge.

Pvt. Dexter Grif is the low man in the unit and is often the recipient of abuse from Sarge (most of Sarge’s plans involve Grif being horribly wounded, if not killed) Part of that may stem from Grif being the laziest soldier ever and likely at least 50 pounds overweight.

Finally, we have Lopez the Heavy, an android who serves as the mechanic for the Team, and is likely the smartest being in the canyon. Due to a malfunction, he can only speak Spanish.

Now let’s go to Blue Team...

The leader of the Blues (mainly due to being the loudest) is Pvt. Leonard L. Church. He’s about as clueless as the rest, but has the biggest potty mouth of the bunch.

The other member of Blue Team (wait, there are only two blues to Red Team’s four? Why the hell hasn’t Sarge ordered a full frontal assault (with Grif in front, naturally)? I mean...sure Grif might die, but I’m sure that’s a risk Sarge is willing to take!) is Pvt. Lavernius Tucker. Tucker fancies himself a ladies man, never missing an opportunity to lay down some innuendo. (bow chicka bow wow)

Early on, both sides got some new additions...

The Reds got a recruit named Pvt. Franklin Delano Donut. Yes, he has pink (or as he calls it “lightish red”) armor. I’m pretty sure he’s not actually gay, but he’s very effeminate and makes a lot of accidental homoerotic double entendres.

Meanwhile, the Blues got a tank (with an AI named Sheila) as well as a new recruit.

Pvt. Michael J. Caboose (played by Joel Hayman) is...well, he’s a complete fucking idiot (even compared to the rest; there is no way to sugar-coat it) who is convinced Church is his Bestest Friend In The Whole Wide Universe. What’s more, he’s a danger to anyone on his side (especially Church)

youtube

(Thanks to ChaosAsakura)

As a result of Caboose’s little “accident”...

...Church came back as a ghost and...

...Blue Command sent a mercenary named Tex (AKA Agent Texas AKA Allison (no last name given)), who is Church’s ex. She also has an evil AI in her armor that eventually gets loose.

...and all of that is just season one!

Now, around Season 3, Halo 3 was released, so...

The gang got an upgrade (and continue to get them with every new game)!

Now, there are 4 “eras” of RvB

Season 1-5 are known as The Blood Gulch Chronicles, and center almost exclusively in Blood Gulch (with a quick stop in a different map to explain the upgrades)

Seasons 6-10 are known as Project Freelancer, which gives a bit of backstory on the Reds and Blues, as well as Tex’s origin, and introduces members of an elite (and defunct) unit known as Project Freelancer: Carolina and Washington (or “Wash” to his friends). This also marks when Rooster Teeth started using motion capture technology to enhance the action sequences for the series instead of using machinema exclusively.

Seasons 11-13 are known as The Chorus Trilogy, which sees the Reds and Blues drawn into another civil war.

Seasons 15-17 are known as The Shisno Trilogy, which involves the Reds and Blues traveling to their past.

Season 18 was its own storyline, while season 14 was a series of “alternate reality” shorts (including an episode where the Red and Blues end in the Rooster Teeth offices). Following Season 18, Burnie Burns left Rooster Teeth to pursue other projects and Joel Hayman was fired due to making some inappropriate tweets (which violated company policy) in 2020.

So, with the actor playing Tucker the only Blue still with the company, I guess the Reds won...?

But this isn’t the end of Red vs. Blue, as there was a spin-off series with an all-new crew, as well as occasional “PSAs” from the remains of the original cast.

youtube

(Thanks to Rooster Teeth)

In addition, Rooster Teeth recently announced the final season (with Burnie Burns returning) this fall.

I should note that every episode is under 10 minutes long and, once a “season” is finished, Rooster Teeth splices them together into a continuous film and releases it on DVD. The DVD’s extras (starting with season 2) give a highlight reel of the story thus far.

The one on Season 5′s DVD sums up the Blood Gulch Chronicles rather well...

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(Thanks to SystemFreaKk13)

If you would like to watch the series, it’s available on Rooster Teeth’s website, as well as YouTube.

At this point, I normally would be fishing for requests for episode reviews, but given how the series is laid out, that’s not exactly possible.

#red vs blue #rooster teeth #burnie burns #matt hullum #geoff ramsey #gus sorola #machinema #halo #Fan Colored Glasses

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confused-possum · 2 years

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I saw a deadline article saying Toy Story, Frozen, and Zootopia all have sequels in the works. It made me think about how I feel sad for Toy Story. I watched the movies a lot as a kid (apparently; I don’t remember — these are my mothers words you have to trust) but I don’t have much love for them. I think they’re objectively very well made. Even the fourth is well made on a storytelling and technical level (in a sort of vacuum, I’ll get there). But every movie after 3 feels sad. Like they’re being announced as proof of ROI to investors, not a good story to make. The third might have also fallen under that end of things as well.

The first two Toy Story movies came out at a time when Cinematic Universes were not common. As far as I know the more common practice was of a shared world/universe or a shared setting of some kind. Things like how maybe all the Pixar movies connect and some have a real Pizza Planet car in them. Very reference based, in the background. Enjoyable to those who notice but not a sticking point (or marketing point). Which, to me, is what makes these new projects feel more hollow. Their original idea goes beyond analysis. The story gets incredibly complex in the overall look because somehow these toys have to say goodbye to a major part of the original movie AGAIN. This is what makes the storytelling fall flat in TS4. While most of the movie is technically, logistically INCREDIBLY well made, the ending falls flat. We watched the toys say goodbye before, it was a big part of the third movie. In fact, outside of the movie the audience related MORE to that goodbye because most assumed there would not be a forth installment in the Toy Story series. Extratextually, this final goodbye is equal to the toys and the audience. It was a very powerful moment…that has become less powerful since it actually wasn’t the final goodbye. The story has been extended beyond its natural end.

Zootopia! This is a different fucking movie by a lot. This movie came out the SAME YEAR as Captain America: Civil War. The MCU has arrived and will not leave. The story of this movie is clear made to serve as a way to display an entire world of animal interaction that had been worked on long before the movie came out. There were initial plans to make more movies/series in the world. There was an idea about an island where all the birds you didn’t see in the movie are floating around. And after watching this movie I was left wanting more. This is a slight dig at the movie and a true feeling of being excited about this world. (Confession: animals are my special interest and I will pay 100x more attention to every aspect of something of the characters are animals) So clearly I’m biased but also the movie was designed with the intention of being a UNIVERSE. It was a selling point as it had been established by the MCU for the people who give movies money. It’s added movies feel way too late, it feels like the movie didn’t return on investment the same way the MCU did and instead of investing in the new IP to create fondness it prioritized what made them money in the short term (because all public companies require constant growth with no limit because capitalism has festered like a horrible disease in this nation).

Frozen is weird. It doesn’t have the built in wider world that Zootopia has but it’s continued existence does feel like it’s pushing past the boundaries of its story like Toy Story does. Frozen, as a basic idea, had been in the minds at Disney for decades and in the works since 2008 (with a small development break until Tangled did well and then they moved the idea to a 3D project). The movie was not expected to be…what it became. The productions since then have felt like scraping the bottom of the barrel because this franchise made Disney so much money they can’t leave it behind. That would scare the investors (they’re skittish). The second movie got rushed to release which meant it’s a lot of set up for no real payoff that makes sense.

Funnily enough, the original frozen idea began from an idea of looking at an act of true love differently than other Disney movies, which is what ultimately happens at the end of that movie. Productions past it, especially undeveloped and rushed productions, have LITERALLY moved past the original idea. It mirrors the transition into cinematic franchises that came around the same time of it’s release. For context, Frozen’s release year also included: Iron Man 3; Man of Steel; Monsters University; THE SECOND OF THREE FUCKING HOBBIT MOVIES; F&F 6; and fucking Oz the Great and Powerful. The movies making money/being funded were with IPs and we’re with shared universes. The development of this movie took long enough that the media landscape changed and it impacted every sequel frozen will ever have.

I don’t know what to do with all of this but like…it’s saddening. Many franchises are extending beyond their natural stopping point (I haven’t said Endgame yet but I’ll say it here) and there are movies made to be franchises being passed up and rarely given the chance to forge fondness for the original world. This is just a constant cycle that “proves” the belief that only IPs make money more. As long as we have our power set the way we have it I don’t see the system changing anytime soon. Just kinda sucks.

#movies #frozen #toy story #zootopia #media analysis #I can’t stand it here sometimes

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supertrainstationh · 2 years

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More PKMN Violet thoughts...

I mentioned in a previous blog post how I preordered Pokemon Violet to ensure I had it delivered to my house in time to stream on my my Twitch channel on release day instead of gambling on questing from store to store to find a copy like I did for Pokemon Legends: Arceus, and how it was unusual for me to preorder video games under any circumstance.

But maybe it's more interesting that I had enough faith that the new Pokemon Violet and Pokemon Scarlet games would meet my expectations to actually pay money in advance to secure a copy in the first place.

I've been playing Pokemon since the original games first came to North America, and Pokemon Sword and Shield were the first games in the series I found myself uninterested in after seeing the preview materials and hands-on impressions. What I saw painted a picture of games that lacked the quality I required for me to spend my money and time on them.

I found that the graphics and presentation unimpressive, that certain features that would otherwise be taken for granted were lacking or absent, and that the overall package reflected lapses in quality, with plenty of rough edges that would have never been expected from a mainline game in the Super Mario or The Legend of Zelda franchises.

When I shared this opinion on Pokemon Sword and Shield, I sometimes got push-back saying I was being a "graphics snob", which is absurd given that my main video game platforms have been Nintendo systems, even when the competing PlayStation and Xbox systems have significantly outclassed Nintendo's in terms of high performance visuals for more than fifteen years.

I was also told I was being unfair for judging Pokemon Sword and Shield based only on trailers and pre-release materials. If those weren't enough for someone to judge whether or not they'd enjoy the game, then Game Freak and The Pokemon Company didn't do their job, and that's not my problem.

The other thing I was told was that I was jumping on a "hate bandwagon", and participating in part of an irrational movement to defame the games.

If anything, my long running interest in having a Pokemon region inspired by Great Britain had me crossing my fingers for the most impressive game reasonably possible, and it was only reluctantly that I began to admit to myself that I wasn't compelled to buy Pokemon Sword and Shield.

Reviews and impressions once Pokemon Sword and Shield released confirmed my concerns.

However good and fun those games may be, that release not only suffered from the fairly conservative approach Game Freak has taken to modernizing the Pokemon games, but also suffered from being rushed by the urgency to provide guaranteed best-sellers in the form of mainline Pokemon RPGs for Nintendo Switch during a time of uncertainty in that system's long term viability.

Another factor I feel contributed in a rushed development timeline for Pokemon Sword and Shield was the need to renew the cycle of the Pokemon business model, in which new generations of the main RPG games form the basis for new anime, merchandise, and spin-off games.

Some said that as a hardcore Pokemon player, I was being overly critical, but as someone who plays Pokemon RPGs mainly for the story, and has zero proficiency or interest in competitive breeding or battling, I'm about as casual of a fan as someone can get in terms of gameplay habits and interests.

One thing I heard often from fans of Pokemon Sword and Pokemon Shield that were sticking up for the games were them saying that I had unrealistic expectations, arguing, "Well, it's a new Pokemon game just like on 3DS, but now on Switch in HD, what more could you possibly have been expecting?"

To my lasting delight, Game Freak answered that question for me with the reveal of Pokemon Legends: Arceus.

That's what I was expecting from a truly progressive, home console quality Pokemon game.

While there are still some issues with how the game presents it's plot to us, one of those being by the habit of its script to include events or situations which the developers are either unwilling to, or unable to, animate on screen in the form of a cutscene.

This leads to shameless cuts to black in which events unfold merely through text set against sound effects, before fading back in to show the aftermath.

But within the limits of what the low performance Nintendo Switch hardware can reasonably and reliably generate, the world of Pokemon Legends Arceus is vividly portrayed, and teeming with life.

Just as important to me, Pokemon Legends: Arceus was willing to part with conventions of past Pokemon RPGs, some of which were not so much expertly crafted game design choices, as much as they were limitations of the late 1980's Game Boy hardware that the original Pokemon games were designed for, that were carried forward as series staples.

People from Game Freak and The Pokemon Company were unusually forward in explaining that the reception to Pokemon Legends: Arceus would shape the future of the Pokemon video game series.

After voicing my disappointment with Pokemon Sword and Shield, and admitting that if future Pokemon games followed this format, I would have to bow out from being a fan of the games, I was excited by Pokemon Legends: Arceus, and decided to make sure I was there on release day to support it.

I even went as far as to say that Pokemon Legends: Arceus was something of a last chance for the gameplay of modern Pokemon RPGs had to retain me as a player, as I was more than happy to let future games pass me by and accept that my interest in the franchise was now limited to spin off material and appreciation for the world and its creatures and characters.

While certain elements of controlling the characters and operating the interface were complex in a way that pushed me out of my comfort zone, this was a necessary evil of a more sophisticated game that eschewed old-school RPG simplicity, and I was pleased with the result.

If Pokemon Sword and Pokemon Shield reflected the innovations and advances that were later seen in Pokemon Legends: Arceus, even with all of that later game's imperfections, I would have accepted these as the growing pains of a franchise slowly transitioning from being a low-tech handheld RPG to something worthy of a modern, if low-power, home console AAA release.

It was my hope that the ideas introduced in Pokemon Legends: Arceus would form the basis for future "main series" Pokemon RPGs, and even speculated that Game Freak was so overly cautious about significantly overhauling the Pokemon formula that they would only allow for these changes to be implemented into a spinoff game to see if the public accepted them or not before basing the main series around them.

When a Pokemon Presents was announced in 2022, I know I wasn't the only Pokemon fan crossing their fingers, actually hoping and praying that a new generation of the Pokemon RPGs would not be announced at that time. I, like others, was hoping for Game Freak to take as much time as possible to develop the new games based on the lessons learned from Pokemon Legends: Arceus.

When Pokemon Scarlet and Violet were revealed, and looking significantly far along in development, to the point where it was clearly being worked on in tandem with Pokemon Legends: Arceus, I very quickly formed a speculative hypothesis that I still stand by now.

I think that if Pokemon Legends: Arceus bombed at retail, and the reaction to its changes to the traditional formula weren't taken kindly to, they would have scrapped Pokemon Scarlet and Violet as we know them today without revealing them to the public, and instead worked on a more conservative build of those games (or different games entirely) based on the Pokemon Sword and Shield model, which I feel no shame in calling a HD 3DS-style game.

So with the release of Pokemon Scarlet and Violet nearly upon us, I'm just happy to live in a world where I'm actually excited enough about these games to have paid in advance to have it delivered to my home on launch day.

If simple graphics and limited tech alone were enough to ward me away from Pokemon, I wouldn't have fallen in love with the original games in 1998, which were released on a system that was technologically already out of date when it launched about a decade earlier in the late 1980's.

I look forward to sharing my first-hand experiences with Pokemon Violet as I play it on my Twitch channel when it comes out on Friday, November 18th.

#pokemon #pokemon scarlet and violet #pokemon scarlet #pokemon violet #h writes stuff #h blog #written on pomera #nintendo switch #a.griffin writes

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