TheChris92

I'd say one thing about ME2 - It had some interesting characters, especially those written by Chris L'Etoile (who mostly was the mind behind the science of the Mass effect universe in the first games). It also had some genuine laughs. I found that that plot and everything felt downright pointless & unengaging. Also the overall gameplay was dumbed a bit too much down to just a generic shooter.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind One of the best romantic-dramas in the history of all cinema, with a very nice unique mixture of science fiction -- It's also incredibly heartwarming. I've watched it again for about the 15th time and I always love it. Basically, it's what one could expect from the crazy surreal minds of Charlie Kaufmann or something out of Spike Jonze. What I'll say about this movie is that in terms of how it's made, the editing, the cinematography and narrative structure -- It's just spot on. Nothing is out of context, but all of it is put together so as to challenge the viewer's attention as well as their emotions. It's as mind-boggling confusing as it is quite simple. It's a story about love, what else do you need to know? Plenty, I'll say. Much of the story, for instance, deals with memories being erased, and thus the film presents these memories in an un-chronological order,while Joel, and the viewer alike, explores them as they slowly disappear from the minds of our protagonists. It's quite incredibly charming to see Jim Carrey as Joel & Kate Winslet as Clementine, losing their minds together. They center themselves so well that we end up really caring about their escapades and the outcome of this erased loving-relationship. Before the viewer even realizes it, they'll come to understand that what they've been watching from the beginning of the film is actually Joel's memories, which have seen disappeared or buried themselves away. As the film kicks off Joel is seized with an inexplicable compulsion to ditch work and take the train to Montauk, and on the train he meets Clementine. To anyone's knowledge, ours, as the viewer, and Joel, they've never seen each other before, but looking at the signs of affection Joel awkwardly presents towards her simply by looking at her back.. Gives the slightest sense of deja vu.¨ As the plot develops too and time is moving freely, dizzyingly, forward and backward in time, they will each experience fragmentary versions of relationships they had, might have had, or might be having. It's incredibly poignant, surreal and romantic. Despite the less than encouraging scenes of frustrations the film presents their relationship, and how very different they are (one is shy and compulsive, the other is extroverted and wild) they still make for excellent chemistry. They complete each other as they both desire companionship and love from each other. It's love that spans the boundaries of science and heck.. even reality. ' This what makes this film work so well alongside the incredible performances from Winslet & Carrey -- Winslet playing a completely different kind of character than what she's done before. It almost felt like a transformation, or Jim Carrey who truly let out what he's really capable of as an actor and allowed us to explore a different side to the actor in the role of Joel. There were even moments in the film, where I could tell "Yep, it's still Jim Carrey" but the best thing. It works so well for this film. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is a journey within the human mind, and like Jonze's Her, it explores the basic desires of companionship, but also the things we can never replace. At the end of the day, our memories are all we really have, and when they're gone, we're gone.

I've generally grown tired of zombie settings, especially after Resident Evil stopped being good, alongside Romero, and seeing zombies be shoe-horned into almost any game they can get away with as of today. I am, however, a fan of Bloodlines so I'll give this game a looksie.

I honestly wanna see Obsidian do a Futurama RPG after this - I loved this game a lot. Heck, I'll be onboard for any new ideas after Project Eternity :D

Agreed. Partly the reason why I like the Witcher is the focus on the politics, I just don't like most of the characters. Had Dragon Age taken that path I feel it could have turned out to be much more interesting.

I like the Origins stories too and I don't particularly see the idea of having the character be pre-set a Grey Warden or something to be all the better for a stronger plot. I thought the Origin stories provided plenty room for feeling like it's your story, and sure it might not have made a larger difference of the actual plot -- Well beyond somebody occasionally walking up to you and saying "Hello, you are an elf" and if you are human presumably it'll be "Hello, you are an ****". Having the Origins stories gave the game a sense of bigness and replay-ability, at least to me, and I really enjoyed the game all the more for it. DA2 tried to do something different but utterly failed its own premise of 'Rising to Power' which was pretty much the main motto for its marketing. So, yes, we were expecting a personal story of a Ferelden refugee fleeing to a strange land to make a fortune for himself. Interesting departure from the typical world-is-about-to-explode plot. It's almost like playing a Rockstar game suddenly. It starts out with Hawke doing random things, for random people, then a treasure hunting expedition is brought up which has bad-**** written all over it. They come out of it pretty much unscathed though, so then the story skips ahead to a Qunari uprising and you're thinking "Now we are getting somehwere" -- That's solved too. There's only a short while of the game left. Right at the end the Mage & Templar stuff occurs and ends, for the sequel. In conclusion. DA2 doesn't have much of a story at all, it's a big ol' mess of random coincidences which slightly compliments the nuisance protagonist whom is as about involved in the plot as any of the game's faceless NPCs. One could describe the process of DA2's 'plot' as BioWare having 'withdrawal' from writing 'end of the world' plots, then suddenly giving up the otherwise promising stuff and showing what they really got swinging around. BioWare moving out of their comfort zone seems to only have negative repercussions, which I suppose explains why they brought back races for Inquisition which actually sparked my interest in the game again.

But of course I am - There are several factors one can judge a movie from -- Aesthetically, the cinematography, soundtrack, the framing, then there's the entertainment, story, plot, dialogue. Since I'm a film student and a general lover of cinema I'm gonna judge on all fronts. Like how Gravity was damn boring but it was a pretty well-made movie. My verdict here is that because the source material is already so uninteresting it hurts the film. But as a film, it was decent enough, despite a few hicks like say the soundtrack. It was okay. Happy now?

I made that point too "What's even worse is that it is incredibly hard to care about these characters at all, or why they doing it, partly because the story itself "Stealing from pop-culture icons like Lindsay Lohan or Paris Hilton" isn't that interesting,". What is also important is what makes for compelling storytelling. A movie needs to entertain too so regardless if the movie is based on a true story it also needs something to entertain, whether it be adding elements to the story to spice it up a bit. The Bling Ring sadly didn't but I still sort of enjoyed it. I like Sofia Coppola, love Lost in Translation, I know she can do better than this.

I liked Croshaw's review - Think it sums up my feelings on the stealth genre of today quite nicely.

Well, one could argue that the characters 'make the story' - I mean, the story in Kotor isn't bad it's just a cop-out of A New Hope, where the Empire is replaced with a Sith Enpire & the Rebels are the Republic. Oh, and the Darth Vader equivalent is now a 1 dimensional brute, who is about as interesting as a pine cone. What made the game for me was characters like Canderous or Jolee - The sprawly open feel the game had. I had played Sith Lords first so I found it less interesting than Obsidian's for lots of Reading. Characters & plot being one of them. So, I suppose it's true that a stronger plot is needed for Bioware but it's never been what made them at first to me anyway.

To be fair, Monte - A strong plot has never been BioWare's best seller - Some people will argue Baldur's Gate begs to differ but I never liked it myself - So maybe that's just me. It's always been the characters who stole the show. even Gaider thinks so. They are at the very least more compelling than most characters in games I know. From Kotor & onward, the plot has always been tirelessly predictable, not to mention how easy distinquishable the good guys and bad guys were. 1 dimensional villains and everything.

The problem is that the movie did not engage it's viewer quite adequately enough to care about these characters or their story. @Hurlshot I'll remember that in the future. Thanks for your comment

I still think the whole basis of "only a Warden can slay an Archdemon" because otherwise it'll just hop right out of its shell and go possess some other bloke (something along those lines), thus apparently transforming into a new one, to be ludicrous. It's a tired fantasy trope, where your character will inevitably draw the stick "of only one who can stop them" kind. It's tired, however, because realistically it takes armies of men to combat a threat on this massive scale. Instead of resorting to cheap plot devices like the Catalyst in ME3, or be too reliant on old fantasy clichés, I'd like to something more down to the earth in the future. I severely dislike Gerald in the Witcher, but I like the idea of how his character is very much passive towards things going on around. In general, that is -- Despite his formidable combat skills and ability to seduce any female creature in existence. He retains a certain neutrality to worldly affairs without seeming like he's just a spectator or nuisance like Hawke in DA2.

That's probably because it's inspired by The Road, along with a few other post-apocalyptic tales -- All of them dictate their central premise around humanity's state of mind after the world has come to an end. if it wasn't obvious enough then one could simply look at Joel, who even looks like Viggo Mortensen's character from the film adaptation. What's rare though is, as you said, it chooses to explore unnatural ground, like a father & daughter relationship with an open mind. To the game's credit it's rather welcome since it actually did it quite well as opposed to campyness of Uncharted.

Let's not forget about the infamous BioWare hands - They seem to look slightly better in Inquisition.

If it does then I sure haven't them yet *wink* *wink*

I have heard that the original builds of Dragon Age didn't actually have a dragon! (I think Uldred was the main villain) Though this is all looooooong before my time, so it's just hearsay at this point. I seem to recall that the game has been in production since 2003 or something. Think that's the first time news came up about it. Were you to remove the Dragons it would simply be A Song of Ice & Fire minus the sex-part. Gaider would smithe me for saying that.

Stick of Truth, right now -- Just realized I missed a Chinpokomon in one of the story areas where I apparently can't go back... FUUUUUUUUUUUUUU -- Oh, well, I'm game for some more playthroughs. Having a blast with South Park.

I'm now reading his posts in a Southern state accent. Good fun! Anyway, I don't want to derail things anymore. So, Dragon Age Inquisition actually seems to have plenty of Dragons this time around. Imagine that?

I'm not sure I'd agree, especially given you picked Garrus and I don't recall feeling the same way (and extending into ME3, he's probably one of my favourite "friend characters" in a lot of gaming). I found one of the (few) major improvements in ME3 over ME2 was that character development for several characters didn't become a matter of "calibrations" if you weren't in a romance for them. I remember actually writing to Casey Hudson about it and getting a reply that it was definitely something they were going to improve, back in the days when I still cared. I feel like I should probably add further exposition to my previous posts, so perhaps even the loonies like Grom can understand my disposition. I'm in no way of the opinion that all BioWare characters are essentially carebears. The kind that won't open up unless you hug them or don't provide enough of the recommended love to do so -- Something along those lines. I'm merely saying that from my perspective, experience, however you wanna word it. Some characters don't get that same development unless they weren't romanced. I've noticed a pattern like that and I simply find it to be rather annoying.

oh, we suspect that he/she understood us. is easier to claim we in unintelligible than it is to refute. ... we will say that he/she woulda' been better off avoiding use "o "sunshine." is clear we struck a nerve. is better off not to admit such when trying to claim that Gromnir postings is indecipherable. one o' the more inept attempts to marginalize our posts that we has seen, but not unique. HA! Good Fun! Gromnir I can understand your posts but it takes time to focus on the structure of what you are saying, but for someone where UK English isn't there first language I can imagine it will be difficult. So don't think people are being facetious when they say " they don't understand your posts" ...there may be truth to that oh come now. truth to tell, our grammar as Gromnir is better than 90% of posters on this board-- our adversarial relations with pronouns notwithstanding. speaking as one who has learned a couple different languages, we suspect that our idiosyncratic speaking is more grating on a native ear. that being said, we s'pose it is possible that our posting were too... complex. we will concede that the danish in question simply could not grasp the concepts contained in our response. in the future, we will try to post slow and low for the children, foreigners and/or poorly educated members o' the community. happy? Perhaps it'd please the gentlemen to know that I must certainly did comprehend thou latest post -- And I dare say -- I find it rather distressing that thou would resort to petty insults based on my country of origin and follow through with it in a manner as if I wasn't currently present. Be it a jest or not. I made the choice of not trying to make truth out of your earlier post as I perceived it to be deigning. Pleased to make your acquaintance too. I bid you a good day, ser

No one is saying that - Although the response you provided to my statements came off as you trying to bait me. You weren't trying to actually engage in a discussion or offer a counter argument. You were simply stating something totally irrelevant to what I said. Romances are optional? So what? What does that have to do with me not liking them? Hope that clears things up a notch.

oh, we suspect that he/she understood us. is easier to claim we in unintelligible than it is to refute. ... we will say that he/she woulda' been better off avoiding use "o "sunshine." is clear we struck a nerve. is better off not to admit such when trying to claim that Gromnir postings is indecipherable. one o' the more inept attempts to marginalize our posts that we has seen, but not unique. HA! Good Fun! Gromnir I can understand your posts but it takes time to focus on the structure of what you are saying, but for someone where UK English isn't there first language I can imagine it will be difficult. So don't think people are being facetious when they say " they don't understand your posts" ...there may be truth to that I think I should probably comment on this -- Allow me to clarify that I'm perfectly adept at the English language, probably better at it than my own at this point. The way he put he sentences together though and the grammatical structure made no sense to me. It's like someone trying to speak in old Shakespeare English to make themself seem more intellectual in some matter. So I responded with the usage of 'sunshine' which was meant as a snippy remark.

Dat Soundtrack -- HNNNG

Truest of stories - Although, I prefer Saints Row 2. More customization, less drinking wackers-aid from a clown shoe, funny humor too.