Super Star Wars Lands on PS4, Vita: The Force Is Strong With This One

Posted on November 19, 2015 by geelw

It feels 100% weird to say this, but there’s an old Super Nintendo game on a new Sony console and not so new handheld that’s a nice surprise for any Star Wars fan. Granted, Super Star Wars was also on the eShop for the Wii back in 2009, but this updated version for the PS4 and Vita offers a number of tweaks that include new save features, leaderboards, trophies, and updated display and controller options. Nope, it didn’t get a big HD visual overhaul at all, so hopefully you’re happy with the original 1992 SNES visuals in all their 2D and Mode 7 pseudo 3D glory:

if you’re grinning like a loon because you have a PSN account, a PS4 or Vita (the game is Cross Buy, by the way) and $9.99 ready to fly out of your wallet, you’re already buying this before you’ve finished this sentence. Me, I’m still a little freaked that there’s a SNES game on a non-Nintendo platform and the earth hasn’t exploded from that fact. Oh,and new players to this one will find it hard as hell and a bit janky in spots. But it’s still a ton of challenging fun as well as a nice nostalgic trip into the past. Whatever strings Disney pulled to get this to happen (I’m thinking that this was a Sony Imagesoft-produced game back then may have helped) sure worked out alright although it would have been a better deal to get the SSW trilogy out for something like $20 or so.

Eh, we’ll see what the future brings for those ancient games about a galaxy far, far away. This new deal has me hoping that Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic I and II show up on a Sony console at some point. Playing both of those classics on my Vita would be a total mind-blowing thing to see happen in the near future..

Vendetta: Curse of Raven’s Cry: Arr, Yeah – It’s Not Dead In The Water

Posted on November 19, 2015 by geelw

Remember a game called Raven’s Cry that was supposed to pop up a while back on PC and consoles? Well, it sort of did (on PC) but didn’t survive the harsh critical waters thanks to a number of issues. Reality Pump Studios moon-walked off the plank it was on, went back to the drawing board and has polished up their open world pirate RPG to what looks like a tasty finish.

The newly titled Vendetta: Curse of Ravens Cry has a release date of November 20 (hey, tomorrow!) looms on the horizon for Mac, Linux and SteamOS in both Standard and Digital Deluxe Editions for users who want their games in that particular format. Console and packaged retail versions of the game will arrive sometime during Q1 2016, but don’t expect to see this on the PS3 or Xbox 360 at all as those “old” systems have of late been consigned to Davey Jones’ locker when it comes to getting new releases, arrrr!

Five screens below and publisher TopWare Interactive has just put up a nice interactive map of the places you’ll go on your ship with your not so jolly crew. As far as I can tell, there are no whales to deal with in the game, but as you can see, Here There Be Tygers… er, leopards. That screen is kind of amusing because it looks as if both that feline and that pirate are thinking of that new coat they’re going to be wearing when the smoke clears.

As to the seaworthiness of Vendetta, it’s probably safe to say that Reality Pump has set the ship righter that it’s previusly been, but the proof will be in the parrot pudding starting tomorrow.

Review: The Last Crown: Midnight Horror

Posted on November 18, 2015 by geelw

Platform: PC
Developer: Darkling Room
Publisher: Iceberg interactive
MSRP: $4.99
# of Players: 1
ESRB Rating: N/A
Official Site
Score: B+ 85%

As adventure games go, The Last Crown: Midnight Horror works exceptionally well as both an entry level point & click game for those new to the genre as well as a game fans of ghost hunters Nigel Danvers and Lucy Reubans’ previous (The Lost Crown) and future (The Last Crown: Blackenrock) exploits. The tone is lighter and the humor ranges from sly to flat out intentionally corny, but it all works quite well in this short taste of Halloween-themed horror. Even better, it’s only five dollars and worth every cent you’ll pay and then some. Continue reading →

Blu-Ray Review: La Grande Bouffe

Posted on November 16, 2015 by geelw

Despite its outrageous excess in nearly every scene, you may find yourself quite famished after watching Marco Ferreri’s disturbing comedy La Grand Bouffe. The potent stew of food, sex, madness and death the four principals undertake during the film’s 130 minutes isn’t for all tastes and in fact, might even be offensive to more sensitive eyeballs and stomachs. Of course, that’s exactly the intent of this 1973 endurance test.

Watching Marcello (Mastroianni), Michel (Piccoli), Ugo (Tonazzi), and Philippe (Noiret) eat themselves to death over the course of the film isn’t a pretty sight. But this is one of those absurd, perverse masterpieces that doesn’t need any pompous over-analysis. The four friends decide to meet their maker because each of their lives has reached a point of no return and they’re fed up enough to get fed up to the point they flee this mortal coil. So what are four wealthy and seemingly sane men to do but lock themselves away in a lovely mansion and order up a massive supply of food they then cook and eat of more than humanly possible?

If you said “have an orgy!”, give your self a pat on the back with a hand greasy from chicken fat and put this Arrow Video release on your want list. Yet again, it’s one of those great 2K restoration jobs stuffed to the gills with bonus features. Expensively prepared dishes, exploding toilets, a beautiful blue Bugatti and lots of exposed flesh all await your soon to be engorged eyeballs, is all I’ll say… Continue reading →

Blu-Ray Review: The Happiness of the Katakuris

Posted on November 14, 2015 by geelw

I’ve never seen The Quiet Family, Jee-woon Kim’s 1998 horror/comedy film that inspired Takashi Miike’s oddball 2001 “remake” The Happiness of the Katakuris. But I’m going to track the original down one of these days just to see how that film inspired Miike to make one of the more out there genre films of the previous decade.

While its not anywhere close to perfect, a bit too long and not even a tiny bit frightening, it’s certainly somewhat gleefully disturbing thanks to the cheery performances by the main cast and the black comedy revolving around the mostly accidental deaths that occur in and around the family’s small, out of the way mountain inn. The Katakuris bizarre mix of live action, wild stop motion animation, mild gore and full-on musical numbers make it a knockout flick worth repeat viewings provided you like what’s here. Miike, known for more his prolific output in multiple genres as well as some truly memorable extreme films (Audition, Ichi The Killer, Gozu) infuses The Katakuris with his trademarks and adds a decidedly Japanese sense of “no matter what!” spirit that gets the family through its assorted misadventures. Continue reading →

Blu-Ray Review: Eaten Alive

Posted on November 13, 2015 by geelw

While The Texas Chainsaw Massacre was (and still is) a memorable horror film experience, Tobe Hooper’s follow up, 1976’s Eaten Alive (released in 1977) was and is memorable for entirely different reasons. While it’s got a compelling and frightening performance from Neville Brand and that bathed in red sound stage set makes the film even more frightening, there’s a “too many hands” feel to the production process that makes the film more of a “B” than it deserves to be. That said, it’s yet another excellently produced Arrow release that’s worth a buy for the solid 2K restoration job and copious special features as well as the chance to see a film you may not have heard of previously (or had forgotten entirely).

Then again, given the incredibly sleazy origins of the “allegedly based on actual incidents” story here, Eaten Alive also works quite well as a pure “B” flick. Running a tidy 87 minutes, no time is wasted here as Brand’s psychotic veteran motel keeper, Judd, kills off a local lady of the evening after a tryst gone wrong at a brothel nearby sends her scampering for the hills after the madam (Carolyn Jones) gives her the boot. Judd runs the Starlight Hotel (one of the film’s many alternate titles along with Death Trap, Legend of the Bayou, Starlight Slaughter and Horror Hotel) which also happens to have a live crocodile as an attraction living in a penned in “swamp” outside. You know that Judd and his “pet” are going to be pretty busy as the film progresses and the victims show up as if there’s a massive magnet yanking their cars in that general direction. Continue reading →

What’s Cookin’? “Meanwhile, Back At The Ranch…”

Posted on November 13, 2015 by geelw

Fun Fact: I am not at all a fan of ranch dressing, but for some reason people keep giving me bottles of the stuff. I somehow ended up with six unopened bottles over the space of two months this year thanks to friends buying it for parties and almost no one touching it. At least it was organic ranch dressing of a certain brand that seemed to not have a ton of terrible stuff inside those bottles.

That said, what does one DO with all those bottles of something one doesn’t consume? I thought of putting them in a box and placing said box downstairs by the mailbox with the word FREE! written on it. That’s always good for some amusement. Not too long ago another neighbor in the building left out a box of assorted books and DVD’s and there were a few people circling that box like wary stray dogs surprised by someone putting out free food before they jumped in and took most of the good stuff. The only things left were a Jean Claude Van Damme flick I’d never heard about, some sticker books (Ed Hopper and Talouse-Latrec), and a couple of comedy books I nabbed after the dust settled.

Anyway, where was I? Oh, right:

(thanks, prestoff2000!)

Well, that FREE box of dressing was the plan until my brain sifted in “free range” with “free ranch” and I thought of doing something with chicken and some or all of that ranch dressing. “Like what?” you ask? Well, I may have taken a whole roasting chicken that I’d had in in a simple salt water brine for about 12 hours (because I’m crazy like that), drained that chicken, placed it in a gallon-size zip-top bag, added a bit of salt-free rub and poured about a cup of that dressing into that bag before sealing the bag and letting it sit for a few more hours in the fridge. Once that part was done, I may have peeled and sliced a few potatoes and placed them in the bottom of a glass baking dish on top of some foil, placed that ranchy chicken upside down atop those potatoes and popped that dish into a preheated 375 degree oven until I needed to flip the bird over and let it get nice and done.

Yeah, they call me the wrecking ball (er, in the kitchen, at least)…

I could have also sauteed some broccoli with sliced garlic and onions with a bit of red pepper flake in some olive oil and other stuff and served all that with plain ol’ white rice on the side because it takes the least time to make and my rice cooker is old but still works perfectly. Or maybe I didn’t because while that chicken turned out really tasty, I still don’t like ranch dressing. Well, on my salads at least. Oh, and I think some of those potatoes got diced into smaller bits and used in something eggy the next day. But that’s another tale for another time.

Review: Adventure Time: Finn & Jake Investigations

Posted on November 12, 2015 by geelw

Platform: Wii U (also on PS3/PS4, Xbox 360/Xbox One, Nintendo 3DS)

Developer: Vicious Cycle

Publisher: Little Orbit

MSRP: $39.99 (PS4/Xbox One, $49.99, 3DS $29.99)

ESRB Rating: E 10+ (Everyone 10 & up)

Official Site

Score: B (80%)

As someone who likes all the console and handheld Adventure Time games, it’s good to see a new one arriving so soon that’s even more of a throwback than the more action oriented titles that have come before. Adventure Time: Finn & Jake Investigations is a fine homage to old school classic point and click adventures with some nifty combat portions to keep your fingers limber. While the game isn’t all that difficult to complete (particularly if you use the hint highlight system to find clickable objects and locations), it’s a great diversion for a rainy weekend as well fun enough to warrant additional installments. It’s also the first Adventure Time game with rendered 3D characters and environments with developer Vicious Cycle doing a mostly excellent job in making Finn and company look great in polygonal form.

The game is set up as a series of “graybles” as (re)told by the alien Cuber (voiced by Emo Phillips) from his space station. While it’s not quite Game of the Year material, the story is pure Adventure Time: pretty darn amusing and as usual, chock full of goofiness and tossed off references fans will knowingly nod and grin at. Fans of the show new to this style of game will find that it’s easy to get into and play, but experts at pointy and clicky stuff new to the show may find the game lacks a certain level of challenge save fora few puzzles that require knowing how certain episodes play out. Then again, unless you’re really bad at following prompts and using a tiny bit of deductive reasoning, you can do a bit of trial and error with not a failure state in sight.

There are five “cases” to tackle in the Land of Ooo that have Finn and Jake meeting up with the usual suspects from the show and everyone is voiced perfectly as you’d expect. In terms of gameplay, most of the game relies on a simple menu system that allows you to choose Finn to do most of the investigative work while Jake assists in getting him in and out of trouble or to seemingly inaccessible spots in the environment. Talking to everyone if you’re stuck will get you some clues that range from mostly direct to somewhat obscure (yes, like the show), but you can solve bits of some cases before you’d think if you have just enough info and accidentally or intentionally talk to someone who starts giving you a short quiz about evidence you’ve gathered.

At certain points during play, “Combat Time” sequences become available, adding a bit of button jamming action to things. These sections are short and easy to beat, offering simple rewards in the form of collectibles Finn and Jake can use to decorate their fancy over-sized tree house. The game probably would have been fine without the swordplay and special attacks, but someone generally gets some sort of beat down at some point on the show, so you get to dish out the digital pain on a few folks who probably deserve it. Then again, without these smack laying down parts, the game might be less amusing and fun to play to some fans who expect a knockout or three (or more) before all is said and done.

While the game isn’t all that lengthy (as noted, it’s a rainy weekend special), it’s well done enough to warrant a sequel or two in the same style or at least more Adventure Time games down the road. Actually, it would also be really interesting to see if Vicious Cycle can handle the crazy and contagious energy of a more recent Cartoon Network smash hit, Steven Universe. It’s a completely different look and vibe on that show, but so far, every tie-in from the comic to the sole mobile game Attack the Light has been very well received. As usual, we shall see. In the meantime, you may as well support Little Orbit and Cartoon Network by taking Finn & Jake on a few Investigations, I say.

Review: Sound of Drop – fall into poison –

Posted on November 9, 2015 by geelw

Platform: PC
Developer: aeuio Kompany
Publisher: Sekai Project
MSRP: $12.99
# of Players: 1
ESRB Rating: N/A
Official Site
Score: A- 90%

While it starts out somewhat slowly, Sound of Drop: – fall into poison – ends up a strong cup of horror thanks to some unsettling imagery and about 30 endings to uncover, most of them bad. When junior high schoolgirls Mayu and Himeno decide to find out if Manten Aquarium is indeed hiding a ghastly urban legend, they get more that they bargained for when they decide to investigate something fishy during a full moon. In true visual novel fashion, the plot is a few wordy hours of text packed to the gills with exposition and splashes of humor. Once it dives into horror, things take a successful turn for the weird and creepy, working quite well enough to keep you hooked in for the long haul.

Thankfully, the game shies away from some of the common trappings of many mature visual novels such as “romance” angles and gratuitous underwear shots. The game’s dive into horror comes off much better without those fan service distractions and with close to 30 bad endings and four “good” ones to discover, the replay value is off the scales. Even if you manage to get every possible ending, the experience of playing the story out and seeing all the horrific fates that befall poor Mayu and some of the people she meets will cling to your brain like an ancient barnacle. Continue reading →

BUY IT! Think Geek Wants The Last of Your Caps For Some Cool Fallout 4 Swag

Posted on November 9, 2015 by geelw

So, you tracked down one of those super-hard to get Fallout 4 and expensive (and out of stock) Pip-Boy Editions or bought that Fallout Anthology for a pal in order to introduce them to the wonderful post-nuclear apocalypse world of Bethesda Studios’ new RPG (on sale now, by the way!). You’re broke and happy after all that impulse buying but guess what? You’re not quite done spending yet. Think Geek wants your last (or not last) hundred bucks (and nope, they’re not taking bottle caps) for an exclusive set of items that’s actually a darn good deal.

Available as we speak, the Fallout 4 Mystery Bundle is only a “Mystery” if you’re reading this post with both eyeballs covered. Actually, it’s called both a Vault-Tec Vault Dweller’s Orientation Kit and a ThinkGeek Fallout 4 Vault 111 Loot Box on the Think Geek site, so perhaps the “Mystery” is why the email I got calls it one in the first place. Or maybe that’s supposed to stay a mystery?

Anyway, inside that box you’ll get once you place an order are on each of the following items:

· 7” Intelligence Bobblehead

· Nuka-Cola Shot Glass

· Vault 111 Hoodie

· Full Size F04 Flag

· Vault 111 Backpack

· Vault 111 Keychain

· Vault 111 Lunch Box

See, that’s definitely worth a Franklin, right? Granted, all you’ll do is sit inside and wear all the stuff that’s wearable, stack everything else around where you’ll be camped out playing the game and keep some food and beverages handy because other than trips to the restroom, you’re not going anywhere soon.