Poll of the Day > Spider-Geek: Homecoming

(+) Yeah! (+)

The Wave Master posted...

Suikoden and Suikoden II are some of the best games you can play, retro or otherwise.

They available on some eshop these days?
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The Wave Master posted...

It's not a bad choice considering Marvel killed his hopes and dreams after Avengers 2. Which wasn't that bad of a movie, but it wasn't that good either. Middle ground effort because of a lot of studio interference. Basically the Spider-Man 3 effect.

I'm not sure I really buy that, though.

With Spider-Man 3, there's definitely a feeling of studio demands for Venom completely ruining everything Raimi actually wanted to do (not helped by the fact that he was clearly enamored of/homaging the 1960s/1970s version of the character, while the entire Venom storyline was a very tonally different slice of 1990s bleh), combined with a sense that Raimi basically went "Well, you know what? Fuck you" and more or less tanked the whole premise on purpose because they killed his interest.

In the same vein, you also have Jon Favreau, who after directing Iron Man 1 & 2 left the franchise - apparently because he was annoyed by studio interference (so much so that he felt the need to go make a barely-veiled movie complaining about it). But even so, he still made fairly serviceable films.

So while I acknowledge that executive meddling CAN ruin a film (but not necessarily so), I tend to have less sympathy on that score when it comes to Marvel Studios movies - because, as much as people whine about creative freedom or too much executive control, at least in Marvel's case, there's a pretty clear case of that overarching control being used to preserve the tone and meaning of the original work, and to produce movies and characters that can more easily interlock into group films (precisely the sort of thing DC/WB movies NEED, but have literally never had - and likely never will, because WB isn't directly answerable to DC, and WB clearly doesn't want to be making comic movies in the first place).

Because of that, I tend to be much more on Raimi's side, and even willing to acknowledge Favreau's complaints, but I'm less likely to care when someone like, say, Edgar Wright complains about interference because I get the impression that he was the one fucking things up far more than Marvel was. It's unrealistic at best and asinine at worst to sign on to make movies as part of a massive existing franchise with literally decades worth of narrative and expect to be given total creative control to fuck everything over in whatever way you like.

In Whedon's case, I'm even less sympathetic because I've actually READ Astonishing X-Men, and feel like maybe he shouldn't be as involved with comic book properties as he thinks he should (a similar criticism I'd probably direct towards Kevin Smith, among others). I've also watched Buffy and Firefly, which means I'm much more apt to pick up on the various Whedon-isms that give away some of his weaknesses as a writer and director.

The first Avengers film was awesome, but part of that was the uniqueness of seeing that sort of crossover movie for the first time, and that most of character-establishing work was already done for him in advance. As a stand-alone, it's good, but not great - and the second film was worse. It's kind of telling that the Russos managed to make a better Avengers film without even calling it Avengers - and I'd much rather see them helming the next movie than him.

The biggest complaint he has seems to be that the studio made him shoehorn in the Thor Ragnarok tie-in scene (which he did a poor job of anyway), and that he spent too much time on the Hawkeye's family scenes (which he did). But neither of those things explain why there are other aspects of the movie that are weak or lacking.


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The Wave Master posted...

I don't know why he thinks it's going to be different across town.

Probably because it seems pretty clear that WB doesn't actually give a fuck about comic movies, so he figures between their lack of interest and their desperation they'll let him get away with more because of his previous successes.

Warner Bros always seems like they're almost embarrassed to be making comic book movies, and that they're only doing it because their superiors farther up the chain are ordering them to because money. Which results in a lot of attempts to make comic book movies that aren't really comic book movies, or that sort of act ashamed of their own source material, which winds up being kind of alienating.

It works well enough for Batman, because Batman's generally somewhat grounded anyway (well, as much as a man who dresses up like a bat and punches crime can be), but when they try to extend that type of thinking to less realistic characters, they hit a brick wall.


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Oh, and on general geeky subjects, here's an article for Wave:

http://www.cbr.com/spider-man-when-did-he-first-live-in-queens


...and here's one for everyone that I found interesting, because I was never actually aware of it before:

http://www.cbr.com/borg-star-trek-next-generation-writers-strike


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^Kinda relevant: I worked with the guy largely behind Voyager, The Next Generation, and Enterprise:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brannon_Braga
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ParanoidObsessive posted...

http://www.cbr.com/borg-star-trek-next-generation-writers-strike

I would also speculate that the original reptilian idea for the borg was still used far later as the basis for Species 8472 in Voyager...
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as i continue playing Suikoden i'm still really digging the game...but i'm really starting to develop a pet peeve with this game.

the number of people that join my actual party just before a scripted fight and automatically get put in the back row whilst being completely incapable of attacking from the back row is totally unacceptable.

not that its hindering my progress in any real way shape or form, but ffs.
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After so, so many years I finally started playing FFV.

You know the trend from classic RNGs to have a ton of random encounters, give you little reward (at least at first), and make you grind for ages to get anything done? FFV more or less turns that up to a high end of the scale, though not as bad as "Legend of Dragoon" did. I also can't help but look at the story and say "This is going to happen, isn't it?" and, not five minutes later, it does with all the subtlety of a bunch of brightly-rainbow-colored rhinos stampeding through a library. Like, the story itself is cute and possibly decent, but the storytelling could have been better if Square worked on that for a minute or three instead of making the combat a grindfest with a needlessly high encounter rate.
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FFV has the worst story of the three SNES FFs. Unlike either IV or VI, V goes back to the older FFs and adheres to the "save the crystals to save the world" plot. It also has some serious pacing issues. You really only play the game for the job system, which was done better in Tactics (which, coincidentally, I'm replaying for the umpteenth time), and Gilgamesh.

Also, I don't think any FF did random encounters as poorly as II, and that's even taking into account that hallway in the Cavern of Earth from FFI, where every step leads to a random battle. Fuck FFII.

FFV is actually one of my favorite FF games just because of how badly you can break it with the job system.
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Entity13 posted...

You know the trend from classic RNGs to have a ton of random encounters, give you little reward (at least at first), and make you grind for ages to get anything done? FFV more or less turns that up to a high end of the scale, though not as bad as "Legend of Dragoon" did.

The random enemies in LoD gave you so little XP, you could pretty much run from 80% of encounters and still be over-leveled by the time you get to the final boss.
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Wrestlemania was pretty damn good last night. 5 plus hours of wrestling goodness, if you're a fan, but one of my favorites, The Undertaker wrestled probably his last match last night.

http://screengrabber.deadspin.com/the-undertaker-leaves-the-ring-for-probably-the-last-1793946290

It was emotional and sad.
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WhiskeyDisk posted...

FFV is actually one of my favorite FF games just because of how badly you can break it with the job system.

FFV is one of my least favorite FF games among the ones I don't actively hate (VIII, XII) or outright ignore (XI, everything from XIII on) just because of how there's almost literally nothing to it other than the job system.

Even FFII felt like it had better writing - which is sad on multiple levels - but what really makes FFV fail so hard for me is that it follows after FFIV (one of the better FF games ever made) and directly precedes FFVI (one of the better FF games ever made). It's like, how can it drop off SO hard in the middle when the games both before and after it are so much better?

It doesn't help that I played FFV years after it was released (probably around the time FFVIII or IX were coming out), so I was already comparing it to games years ahead of it in development and tech. But even just compared to its contemporaries it seems like so much ass.

It's not even the best implementation of the Job system in FF games (again, Tactics and IX were roughly contemporary by the time I finally played it).


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The Wave Master posted...

Wrestlemania was pretty damn good last night. 5 plus hours of wrestling goodness, if you're a fan, but one of my favorites, The Undertaker wrestled probably his last match last night.

http://screengrabber.deadspin.com/the-undertaker-leaves-the-ring-for-probably-the-last-1793946290

It was emotional and sad.

The only thing I took away from the Undertaker match is that they're never going to turn Roman heel, and that the crowd is going to continue to hate him from now until doomsday.

The big surprise that caught me off-guard was the crowd reaction during the Goldberg/Lesnar match, where it seemed like there was actually a strong pro-Brock undercurrent. Definitely unexpected.

The Hardys showing up wasn't entirely unexpected, but it was still cool nonetheless, and the swerve to introduce them was very well done.

A lot of the rest of the show fell kind of flat, though, and there were a few pretty significant missteps. The crowd seemed dead a lot of the time, or actively hostile (to the point where they were clearly muting unwanted crowd reaction in multiple matches). Most of the matches felt somewhat rushed (understandable) and underwhelming. It doesn't really feel like it was all that spectacular a show.


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For over a 5 hour show a lot of the matches did feel rushed. A great deal of them didn't take the time to tell the psychology needed to tell a good in ring story to flesh out the story lines of the past few months.

The Jericho/Owens match comes to mind because that was the most fleshed out feud of the entire show. It's just the nature of the beast when it comes to a bloated shoe like Mania. That and Jericho is taking time off to play music with his band Fozzy.

Roman needs a heel run and could succeed at it, but Vince just isn't going to let that happen. Why? I'm not even sure because he was the heel in this feud. He is well on his way to being Cena Jr or Hulk Hogan Jr, and no one wants that. It's not smart.

If this is Taker's last match; then he will be missed. Also, Roman is terrible.
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The Wave Master posted...

Roman needs a heel run and could succeed at it, but Vince just isn't going to let that happen. Why? I'm not even sure because he was the heel in this feud. He is well on his way to being Cena Jr

You answered your own question - they absolutely want him to be Cena Jr. So much so that people have been accusing of trying to "clone" Cena via Roman for years now.

Cena, for all that "smart" fans tend to dislike him and for all that he gets a minor undercurrent of boos at live events (see also, the crowd booing while he was proposing, to the point of them having to mute crowd noise), sells a metric fuckton of merchandise. And for the WWE, that's a pretty major indicator of how "over" they consider someone (see also, the reason why the New Day keeps having a strong presence on Raw). They don't really care if something like 25-30% of the audience is shitting on Cena as long as the other part is still buying his merch and going to see him in movies.

In Roman's case, he actually sells fairly well when it comes to T-shirts and the like, and he has the big strong muscle idiot look that Vince loves so much, AND he's related to the Rock (a shame he doesn't seem to have inherited any of his cousin's charisma), so the WWE is pretty happy with him. Their assumption is that if they keep pushing him as hard as they have been, and basically keep giving him the traditional babyface booking, he'll eventually get over enough for them to benefit from him in the role of #1 face in the company even if a minority of the crowd continues to hate him.

The real problem is that, whereas Cena might be generating something like a 30% negative/70% positive reaction, Roman's closer to the reverse. And with the crowd reaction so strongly against him, they keep feeling the need to mute all the boos - which makes the crowd sound utterly dead for every Roman match (which means the home audience is always going to feel like he's a dud in every match). Or worse, people notice the manipulation going on and then knee-jerk turn on him because most people don't like it when they notice they're being lied to. Add to that the fact that the constant face push is probably alienating more people than it's winning over (see also, "Rocky Maivia"'s first run as a smiling happy-go-lucky third-generation wrestler babyface), .

But the WWE have always had a sense of knowing what the fans want better than the fans do (along with a stubborn unwillingness to bend), and it's only gotten worse since Hunter and Stephanie took over (to the point of multiple little "fuck you" moments to the crowd where they're pretty much straight-up taunting their own audience because they know there's no real competition to worry about losing fans to). And because of that, they'll probably keep pushing Roman until he's utterly loathed by the fans, and damaged to the point where he can't really be salvaged at all.

A good, strong heel turn could absolutely revitalize him and potentially win fans over, but as is, he's like an anchor made of turd dragging every show he's on down.


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I know I'm really late, but what did y'all think of Suicide Squad?

I first watched it when it first came out and I heavily disliked it.

I just watched it for a second time, after about a year and it's actually not half bad when you suspend your disbelief and let go of your DC knowledge and expectations. It kind of lives in it's own universe as a wild / weird / and strange action movie, and it's pretty fun
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Suicide Squad is terrible. That movie has editing, pacing, plot, and characters development problems out the ass.

Saying all that... it is still light years ahead of Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice.

The DC murder-verse is terrible and those fools should stick to animated movies, but then they do something like mess up "The Killing Joke" and I just want to scream.
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Are any of you playing or plan on getting Persona 5?

It looks amazing from the streams I have watched the last 2 days. However, I am way short on money with the wedding to buy video games. Nevertheless, video games like Persona 5 are off the list until Christmas at the earliest.

Speaking of marriage. It's on Aprill 22, just a few weeks away. We are going to get the marriage license on Friday so there is no turning back now.

I laughed when Scarlett told me that the marriage license only cost 25 bucks. That's a tiny amount of money for so much work and potential problems or bliss.
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I played 5 hours of Persona 5 so far. It'd be somewhat pointless to share my impressions of it considering I'm still going through tutorials.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

In Whedon's case, I'm even less sympathetic because I've actually READ Astonishing X-Men, and feel like maybe he shouldn't be as involved with comic book properties as he thinks he should (a similar criticism I'd probably direct towards Kevin Smith, among others). I've also watched Buffy and Firefly, which means I'm much more apt to pick up on the various Whedon-isms that give away some of his weaknesses as a writer and director.

This so hard.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

Warner Bros always seems like they're almost embarrassed to be making comic book movies, and that they're only doing it because their superiors farther up the chain are ordering them to because money. Which results in a lot of attempts to make comic book movies that aren't really comic book movies, or that sort of act ashamed of their own source material, which winds up being kind of alienating.

That same thing was a turnoff with Fox back when it first started to get into the comics game with X-Men, although they've been improving. I was pleasantly surprised by Days of Future Past and Apocalypse since, other than trying to get their money's worth out of J-Law, they were halfway decent films although Apoc tried to do way too much leading the thing to jump around non-stop and have character motivations flip left and right.

The Wave Master posted...

Wrestlemania was pretty damn good last night. 5 plus hours of wrestling goodness, if you're a fan, but one of my favorites, The Undertaker wrestled probably his last match last night.

http://screengrabber.deadspin.com/the-undertaker-leaves-the-ring-for-probably-the-last-1793946290

It was emotional and sad.

Like most PPVs, I skipped and just recapped highlights later on. (And, in general, WM has some worse habits than most PPVs in terms of just obnoxious false finishes.)

And, in general, the saddest part about the Undertaker's possible retirement is that his last match was *another* loss and attempt to set up Roman Reigns. If VKM was capable of planning ahead these days, I would almost wonder if the first loss was meant to just Reigns over since, to some extent, everything with Brock the first time seemed to build up Reigns.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

The only thing I took away from the Undertaker match is that they're never going to turn Roman heel, and that the crowd is going to continue to hate him from now until doomsday.

Which in general is stupid because a lot of faces only got over thanks to their heel runs. They're trying to clone Cena, but they forget that Cena was a pretty hot heel for a while (and only got over *because* of his initial heel work) which helped him early on as a face.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

The Hardys showing up wasn't entirely unexpected, but it was still cool nonetheless, and the swerve to introduce them was very well done.

The thing that kills me about the Hardyz is that the Broken gimmick is off the table right now thanks to that TNA lawsuit. So yeah, they're back but they're just the Hardyz again (and man is it hard to get used to Matt acting like Matt). Great way to introduce them, though.
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I've started playing EVE: Online.
God help me.

Otherwise, finally saw X-Men: Days of Future Past and XM: Apocalypse. I had serious misgivings about both films and, in general, I had little faith in Fox's ability to deliver X-Men films after X1-3 and XMOW:Logan. As a result, I had skipped First Class (also the trailers looked awful). However, DFOP was surprisingly good and Apoc was reasonably decent.

My big problem with Apoc (besides not enough Jubilee) was just how much they tried to cram in there, which lead to a *lot* of jumps early on and flimsy character motivations. Plus that one scene with Quicksilver at the mansion starts to drag on towards the end and, later on, I was wondering why they even bothered with that but I guess it was a good excuse to allow Stryker's forces to easily subdue the team and then there's the somewhat plot hole involving the mutant-disabling field not stopping Jean's powers from hiding the second team when the soldiers came to take out the first team. I guess it's just a matter of the field disabling them from going beyond that area? Really doesn't make much sense in general.

DFOP, which I thought I'd hate after seeing the leaked Sentinel designs (which I didn't love, but were more passable in the film) and the "huh" casting of Peter Dinklage as Bolivar Trask (which was kind of a waste given how much screentime Trask gets, but it still worked), turned out to be the far better of the two in most regards. Granted, the whole time-travel explanation is a little flaky, but most of the rest of the film worked in some regard with some of the plot points being in keeping with the comic counterparts (particularly since Magneto *has* taken control of sentinels and used them against mankind, both in the normal and ultimate continuity). In general, though, it was a pretty fun film with a serviceable story
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shadowsword87 posted...

I've started playing EVE: Online.
God help me.

*checks calendar*

Huh, we're still in 2017...
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Zeus posted...

shadowsword87 posted...

I've started playing EVE: Online.
God help me.

*checks calendar*

Huh, we're still in 2017...

I mean, it's not like they stopped and there's nothing else like that.

UPDATE: I was told to not get into it by a streamer because I was a poor college student, so that's no good.

If someone tells you not to smoke meth; then why the hell are you going out there smoking meth? (Referring to EVE: Online.)

It's not good for you, it's addicting, it's a time sink, and it's going to take all your money. Like meth. (Maybe even your teeth.)

Entity is trapped in Final Fantasy XIV purgatory, and we might see her again in 2019, if we are lucky.

I'm going to get a sausage biscuit. You sit there and think about what you have done young man. And when I get back I hope you have learned your lesson.
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To be clear: I don't have the MMO addictive tendencies, I get bored way too fast (I have gotten a strong dislike for grinding).
Plus last time I tried it out, I did stop and completely forgot about it.

I just wanna fly around in complex ways and poke different stuff and have fun with it

shadowsword87 posted...

To be clear: I don't have the MMO addictive tendencies, I get bored way too fast (I have gotten a strong dislike for grinding).
Plus last time I tried it out, I did stop and completely forgot about it.

I just wanna fly around in complex ways and poke different stuff and have fun with it

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elite:_Dangerous



shadowsword87 posted...

UPDATE: I was told to not get into it by a streamer because I was a poor college student, so that's no good.

It's a game where you can literally lose hundreds of dollars worth of real world money in seconds when players blow up your stuff, so yeah, it's really, really not a game for the poor. Or for people with lives. Or outside interests.



Zeus posted...

That same thing was a turnoff with Fox back when it first started to get into the comics game with X-Men, although they've been improving.

I usually don't give Fox too much flak, because they sort of came right out of the door swinging with the original X-Men films. Apart from Blade (which predated them by a few years), it was really the first time a Marvel movie was done RIGHT.

Fox had a few stumbles later on, but it never really seemed like they were embarrassed to be making comic book movies, as much as they didn't quite understand what made certain properties successful in the first place. So their main weakness was more when they picked filmmakers who should never have been working on a certain film, rather than a more endemic problem that taints every film.

I'd probably lump Sony into that same sphere. In both cases, it seems like the success or failure of a given movie creatively hinges on the director, whereas with the DC films, it feels like failure is kind of inevitable even before a director is cast because the higher-ups are actively sabotaging themselves. Fox and Sony are at least capable of getting lucky and casting a director who respects and understands the source material and is capable of nurturing it, even if they don't always DO that.

That being said, Sony seems to be sabotaging the deal with Marvel already while Fox shat out the last Fantastic Four movie, so I'm not cutting either of them TOO much slack.



Zeus posted...

If VKM was capable of planning ahead these days, I would almost wonder if the first loss was meant to just Reigns over since, to some extent, everything with Brock the first time seemed to build up Reigns.

Supposedly, it's being hinted that the current plan is to keep the belt on Brock and then feed him to Roman as well, because the WWE refuses to rest until they've managed to brainwash us all into loving him in spite of the fact that everything they try just makes people hate him worse.

His promo on Raw should be absolute proof that he could be the hottest heel the company has ever had if they'd just TURN him NOW. But they won't, because he still sells T-shirts, and all they can see when they look at him is Samoan Cena.



Zeus posted...

The thing that kills me about the Hardyz is that the Broken gimmick is off the table right now thanks to that TNA lawsuit. So yeah, they're back but they're just the Hardyz again (and man is it hard to get used to Matt acting like Matt). Great way to introduce them, though.

Matt's been trying to play it coy, because they're still suing TNA over it, and the WWE has openly said they're providing legal support if they need it.

Hard to say if they'll get the rights, but there ARE precedents that could allow it, and TNA (sorry, IMPACT) is on shaky ground in a number of ways (like not paying Reby or her dad).


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ParanoidObsessive posted...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elite:_Dangerous

That came out a year after I was born. And while that's fine and all, I want my games to be pretty if I'm going off poking things.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

It's a game where you can literally lose hundreds of dollars worth of real world money in seconds when players blow up your stuff, so yeah, it's really, really not a game for the poor. Or for people with lives. Or outside interests.

I mean, that's not 100% how that works, the EVE economy is a bit weird.

shadowsword87 posted...

That came out a year after I was born. And while that's fine and all, I want my games to be pretty if I'm going off poking things.

It came out in 2014. EVE is literally a decade older.

EVE's also owned and published by the company that murdered White Wolf, so fuck them.


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ParanoidObsessive posted...

It came out in 2014. EVE is literally a decade older.

Whoopsidasy, misread that.
EVE still has the benefit of being "free" though.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

EVE's also owned and published by the company that murdered White Wolf, so f*** them.

Screw you dad! I do what I want!

ParanoidObsessive posted...

Fox had a few stumbles later on, but it never really seemed like they were embarrassed to be making comic book movies, as much as they didn't quite understand what made certain properties successful in the first place. So their main weakness was more when they picked filmmakers who should never have been working on a certain film, rather than a more endemic problem that taints every film.

The big stumbling block that a lot of fans I knew seemed to have from the get-go was the decision to not use actual costumes. At the time, i defended it since the black outfits *seemed* more practical but I didn't realize how little protection leather actually afforded a person and, in all honestly, the characters *still* weren't wearing masks of any kind which is a flat-out stupid choice. In retrospect, it felt like they were trying to make comic movies while minimizing many of the comic elements.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

Supposedly, it's being hinted that the current plan is to keep the belt on Brock and then feed him to Roman as well, because the WWE refuses to rest until they've managed to brainwash us all into loving him in spite of the fact that everything they try just makes people hate him worse.

His promo on Raw should be absolute proof that he could be the hottest heel the company has ever had if they'd just TURN him NOW. But they won't, because he still sells T-shirts, and all they can see when they look at him is Samoan Cena.

The fact that Brock and Paul immediately challenged Roman really telegraphed what is a horrid plan, with Taker's supposed retirement playing the significance of the two being the only people will ever have WM wins.

In general, Brock's last run was one of my least favorite title reigns since it was a completely absentee champion who didn't even do PPVs, made even worse by the fact that it was the only belt at the time. And, up until he challenged Reigns, I was scratching my head as to why they bothered giving Goldberg the belt at all since no matter how won at WM we wouldn't see much of the champ.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

TNA (sorry, IMPACT)

They'll always be TNA to me, especially since this is a very TNA move. It really feels like nothing has changed despite Dixie being out.
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shadowsword87 posted...

ParanoidObsessive posted...

EVE's also owned and published by the company that murdered White Wolf, so f*** them.

Screw you dad! I do what I want!

http://www.pcgamer.com/world-of-darkness-will-feature-a-poetic-ui-its-not-going-to-look-like-a-game

These are the sorts of people you're associating with! You're making your mother sick with worry!


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Zeus posted...

The big stumbling block that a lot of fans I knew seemed to have from the get-go was the decision to not use actual costumes. At the time, i defended it since the black outfits *seemed* more practical but I didn't realize how little protection leather actually afforded a person

I think it was less the practicality, and more just the fact that some things that look good or at least acceptable in a comic would look utterly stupid on screen. They SORT of managed to make yellow-and-blue work as a look in First Class, but even then they kind of had to modify it, and push a bit to justify it, and it kind of only worked because in your head you're going, "Hey, it's the 60s." I was perfectly fine with how they handled it (I was WAY less fine about it when Morrison had them change to costumes like that in the comics as well, but that may be the least offensive thing about Morrison's run to me), and I definitely think it would have looked worse if they were all just wearing yellow spandex.

And honestly, I didn't really think of them wearing leather any more than I usually think of Batman wearing rubber (in spite of the fact that he usually is). It's easier to just assume that it's some sort of space-age bullet-proof material or whatever, like when you assume the Fantastic Four are wearing outfits made out of unstable molecules or that Superman is wearing some sort of Kryptonian ultra-fiber outfit that can survive all the shit he puts it through on a regular basis.



Zeus posted...

and, in all honestly, the characters *still* weren't wearing masks of any kind which is a flat-out stupid choice.

That's one of those "evils of cinema" sort of things, though. Basically, when you're paying name actors to star in a film, you want their face on camera as often as possible. It's why Spider-Man had his mask torn off like 50% of the time in the Raimi films, and why the Marvel movies constantly cut to shots of Tony's face inside the Iron Man armor.

Even in some of the most faithful adaptations of comics, you're still going to have stuff like that tweaked to show off actors' faces.

And hell, out of every hero or hero team Marvel has ever had, the X-Men are actually the characters MOST likely to show up without masks, because half (or more than half) of them show their real faces all the time anyway (and then there's Nightcrawler...). Once Claremont took over the team, it became more and more common for them to go out without masks, and for people who previously wore masks to stop wearing masks.


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So Persona 5 is sold out everywhere in the UK(including online) save for one place that is selling it for £57. Fuck that! No idea when they will get more stock.
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ParanoidObsessive posted...

These are the sorts of people you're associating with! You're making your mother sick with worry!

I don't see her much, it's like I don't even know if she exists.

2 weeks from today and I'm married.

It's an outdoor wedding so I'm watching the weather forecast carefully. There isn't going to be any rain. So far we have lucked out. Things change, but so far so good.

Also, that sausage biscuit was good. Eve Online is still bad.
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EVE has always fascinated me. Like, despite knowing very little about the game, I love reading about these huge space battles and rival raids and factions and shit. It's like real-life story drama.

That said, I'm equally glad I've never had the urge to play it, because it's one of those things that will consume your life.

I think it was less the practicality, and more just the fact that some things that look good or at least acceptable in a comic would look utterly stupid on screen.

Basically, this.
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I mean... I'm bored already with EVE.
These things happen this fast with me.

CyborgSage00x0 posted...

I think it was less the practicality, and more just the fact that some things that look good or at least acceptable in a comic would look utterly stupid on screen.

Basically, this.

At the time, I almost bought that, but since then we've had films which showed how great comic costumes can look on film between Spidey's outfits (where the closer to comic ones blew the non-comics out of the water) and Iron Man's. Plus most of Batman's costumes -- which look like actual costumes -- have been reasonably okay.

In general, they could even have used similar materials but just gone with different colors (which would also help teammates to identify each other in combat situations to avoid friendly fire).
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I have a lot of things to bring up, but I will start with the fact that the Xbone Scropio is probably going to retail for 699.99.

I am aware that it will be backwards compatible with Xbone 1 and 360 games, but that's a lot of bones to throw at a console that doesn't have a wealth of exclusives.

In the first 4 months alone the PlayStation has given us 3 great exclusives. Nioh, Horizon Zero Dawn, and just this week Persona 5. The Xbox has given us...

Hell I can argue the Xbone One isn't worth the 250 asking price that Microsoft wants now. Yet, they are going to try to command 700 for Halo 6 and Forza 4 on a brand new console?

Scalebound looked interesting, but we will never see that game. Its off to the great big cancellation game realm in the sky.

To quote Rick and Morty: "Microsoft, get your **** together! Get it all together, your ****!"
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The Wave Master posted...

To quote Rick and Morty: "Microsoft, get your **** together! Get it all together, your ****!"

Except Microsoft is already on the way to the shit store to sell it...
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The other topic was wrestling related.

I always knew The Senator *JBL.) Was a Vince Mcmahon kissass. I have heard the rumors for years, and read a few stories from accounts from Matt and Jeff Hardy so this is not a surprise.

What he "Allegedy Did" to Justin Roberts is a shame, and for a company that prides itself on its anti-bullying campaign it's just ironic that this goes on behind the scenes. Not shocking at all, but ironic.

http://deadspin.com/ex-wweer-on-announcer-jbls-bullying-this-stuff-is-enc-1794126676
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There are a million JBL bullying stories out there. They're a dime a dozen. However, it's still weird to have somebody play an awful character on tv then be a million times worse in real life.
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That article actually touches on the real problem:

"Dave Meltzer notes that “everyone knows how tight Layfield is with Vince McMahon” and “the belief across-the-board is Layfield’s weeding out those who can’t take it comes from above.”"

Vince has ALWAYS been the sort of would-be alpha male who has to constantly prove he's better than everyone around him, and break anyone who he feels isn't respecting him enough. He's extremely petty and vindictive, and part of his desperate need for dominance always seems to express itself as incredibly juvenile at times (see also, writing the "kiss my ass" bullshit into storylines where it really didn't belong, mostly just to demonstrate that he could make these giant, musclebound monsters and hot women actually DO it). And it's all almost certainly rooted in a massive inferiority complex (the same one that led him to bulk up massively because the people working for him all intimidated him physically) which likely goes back to when he was (allegedly) sexually abused by his own mother as a kid. Whenever he feels powerless, he lashes out hard.

"Ribbing" has always been part of the wrestling business, but Vince seems to take it to extremes. And there've always been stories about how some people in the locker room seem to go that extra mile to be shitnozzles, and Vince hasn't even remotely given a shit (because he respects it). It's part of why Stephanie's anti-bullying charity work has always kind of come across as laughable.


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While I'm sure that JBL has acted on VKM's marching orders, shoot interviews generally portray JBL as a dick.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

"Ribbing" has always been part of the wrestling business, but Vince seems to take it to extremes. And there've always been stories about how some people in the locker room seem to go that extra mile to be shitnozzles, and Vince hasn't even remotely given a shit (because he respects it). It's part of why Stephanie's anti-bullying charity work has always kind of come across as laughable.

A lot of it goes back to the carnie trash culture of the business. And, given VKM's nature, I'm not sure he so much encourages it as he just permits it because that's the sort of stuff that was going on during his daddy's and granddaddy's day. When Hogan was trying to get into the business, supposedly a guy broke his leg for fun during a match. And while Steph is starting to assert her control, her husband was a part of that culture and even during her tenure the wrestlers' court has continued. A large part of the locker room might always manage itself, kind of like how athletic leagues have tried to ban hazing but people still wind up doing it.

Granted, a lot of the newer guys coming into the business don't necessarily have this kind of attitude so we might see changes eventually. And, if the whole thing gets more corporate, some of the things will be toned down. Wrestling in general has come a long way from back when you needed an enforcer to make sure that somebody dropped the belt when they were supposed to.
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The Wave Master posted...

the Xbone Scropio is probably going to retail for 699.99.

Isn't that just a rumor? I don't think Microsoft is that stupid.
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Microsoft is that stupid. It's just a rumor of the price right now, but do you think the bean counters over at Microsoft would design a console just to lose money?

We are looking at a possible 200 to 300 dollar loss on each Scorpio sold if they retail it at 499.99 or even 599.99. It could be a ps3 situation, but I'm not sure that Microsoft is willing to sell Scorpio at a loss to obtain Market share.

It's just an uphill battle, and Microsoft doesn't have the gimmicks that Nintendo spouts with something like The Switch. So, they are going the over powered route, and if you look at video game history it doesn't always work out well taking that course of action.
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I worry about Ric Flair.

http://deadspin.com/ric-flair-reportedly-kicked-out-of-fort-wayne-bar-for-1794162632

Mainly because I don't know how much money he has left.

The alcoholic and moronic behavior can be tolerated if he still has millions in the bank, but who knows if he does? Either way he's probably going to die broke and alone, but man will he have a lot of great stories to tell.

And isn't that what really matters?

WOOOOOOO!!!
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The Wave Master posted...

I have a lot of things to bring up, but I will start with the fact that the Xbone Scropio is probably going to retail for 699.99.

I had to look up what that even was. So...is it a new Xbox console, or just a souped-up XBone? Either way, lol @699.99 dollars (really, with tax in most states, you might was well another ~$70.00 there) just for really good graphics, when they will have a new consoles in 4-6 years anyways. This might have the effect with the less expensive Wii, and push people to the Switch.
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