Life is Strange: How an Ending can Ruin a Game

There’s an old expression that goes “life isn’t about the destination, it’s about the journey.” A lot of narrative fiction takes this same approach. We spend most of our time watching movies or playing games, traveling towards a final goal. But the ending; it’s only the bit at the end. The real bulk of the experience comes from all the juicy bits in the middle. It’s easy for me to say that when a narrative ties up in a nice, neat little bow. But when the ending to a story throws you for such a loop that it ends up leaving a bad taste in your mouth, then I’d argue that an ending can be just as important as the 20-100 hours that came before it.

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Stop confusing me with your movie titles

The fact that there is a new Ghostbusters movie in the works is something that keeps creeping up on me every time it slips from my concious memory. And it bothers me. Before you blow up though, I’m not bothered by the fact that it’s a female cast, I’m not that bothered by the fact that it’s being directed by Paul Feig (a man whose crude style of comedy isn’t really my thing). No, the thing that bothers me the most is that it’s God damn called Ghostbusters.

Ghostbusters was a movie that came out in 1984, Point Break was a movie that came out in 1991, Star Wars: Battlefront was a video game that came out in 2004. It’s one thing to start reusing titles from old ass movies, but calling something the same thing when it’s still fresh in every bodies memory is pointlessly confusing. And Ghostbusters is always fresh in my mind because it’s Ghostbusters! … the first one, with Billy Murray. Continue reading “Stop confusing me with your movie titles” →

Dragonball Super still isn’t that great

I’ve been watching Dragonball Super on and off. I wrote about it once before on here, specifically to talk about the lack of quality animation and their choices to retell the Beerus and Resurrection F movies again in the anime. Of course I still watched them, maybe hoping for some minor changes to fix my gripes with some parts of those movies. But mainly I have been looking forward to the original plot for Super

Well they’re a few episodes into a totally original arc now and I’ve got to say, Dragonball Super still isn’t all that great. It’s a sad story I’ve seen many times before; fondly remembered series gets a revival, then proceeds to be fantastically mediocre. As strong a thing as nostalgia is, it can blind people from seeing that sometimes, things run their course. That they end for a reason. Continue reading “Dragonball Super still isn’t that great” →