Favorite Things of the Week!

     Since I’ve responded to most of my entertainment in a negative fashion this week, I’ve decided to spend a little time dabbling in the lighter side of affairs. What did I waste my time on this week that made me smile or giggle with glee? Against your will, you’re about to find out.

Let’s approach this topically, shall we?

1. Music


     You know what I love? The Metal. You know what I love even more? Metal that makes you light-hearted and giddy. Not possible, you say? Never heard of such a thing, you say? Well, that would be because you have never listened to video game metal. That’s right. Here are my picks for this week. playlist.com should assist you if you desire to listen to these tracks, just enter the name of the track into the playlist search bar, and you can sample the crunchiness.

Mario/Zelda Medley by Super Mario Bros./Legend of Zelda

      Unfortunately, I couldn’t find where this track originated from. Oh well, I’m not worrying about it, so you don’t have to. Just enjoy the thick, heavy guitar with the mario sound effects. If that doesn’t make you chuckle/rock out, then there’s no way we can ever be friends. I wasn’t as impressed with the LoZ guitar melody, but trust me, if you peruse rock renditions online, by comparison this track still has top-tier guitar work.

Storm Eagle X Mix by wiltedroses


     If you haven’t played Megaman X for SNES, shame on you. Assuming you’re not home, go home, repent in sackcloth and ashes, fast for three days and three nights. After that, don’t return to your house until you are clutching a SNES and a copy of Megaman X in your clammy grasp. This is solid platforming action. Megaman has never been better/harder. Likewise, the music is fresh, a thicker, fuller approach to the squealy speed of Rockman’s NES incarnations. Yes, it’s still fast, but now with more soul. Wiltedrose’s mix exemplifies this fact, giving new life to 16-bit sound. I like how wiltedroses sticks to the source material except where it is warranted. A little guitar solo interpretation never hurt anyone. Okay, it hurt a little, but I made sure my face didn’t melt on the carpet.

I Thought the Seventies Were For Spacey Rock?


     The bands Styx and Journey had a child. Once that child hit his angry adolescent years, he listened to Nu-Metal. His name is Fair To Midland. This band steals my heart every time with it’s unique and varied sound. I can’t tell whether I’m listening to Johanne Sebastian Bach, Muse, or Incubus. Seriously. It’s that good. What? You don’t think that sounds good?

Go listen to these three tracks, and see if you can’t appreciate some of their pleasing keyboard lines, riskily high vocals, and full but clean guitar riffs. Also, note the variance in the track intros and track progression.

Kyra Cries Cologne
Tall Tales Taste Like Sour Grapes
Walls of Jericho


    My work is done here.

2. Video Games


     Battlefield: Bad Company 2



     Rewarding unlocks. Sharp graphics. Chaotic but tight gameplay. A destruction system that is both convincing and dangerous, in terms of gameplay. What are these descriptions referring to? No, not Hello Kitty Roller Rescue for Gamecube. I’ll give you a hint: it might be in the paragraph title. BFBC2 is the most fun I’ve had in an online multiplayer FPS since… well, Halo 3, but that’s because I’m a Halo nerd. Best moment of my BFBC2 career: booby-trapping our team’s bomb with C4 and hiding nearby, then detonating it when the enemy team comes rushing into the building. A suicide by building destruction, a double kill and a defensive kill later, I had a smile on my face that could only convey thing: I just killed myself and walked away with several hundred points and an exploded building. I- am a man.
     *sips coffee*

3. Movies


     No movies were my favorite this week. You fail, Hollywood. Iron Man 2 does look promising, though… here’s looking to the future.
   Look! The future! … Always sneaking up on me…

Rock, Hell, and Video Games: Part 3

And you thought this was going to be social ethics.

     I’ve already screwed up the order of these topics, but I thought I’d save the shortest for last.
     From Hell was released in 2001, directed and produced by the Hughes Brothers. They had previously directed such films as Dead Presidents, American Pimp, and Menace II Society. The film is a bit uncharacteristic for them, and it comes out in the pacing and coherence of the movie. While it touches on topics related to some of their other films (several of the characters being prostitutes), the fantastic/spiritual aspect of the movie makes it much more than their standard social commentary.

An 122-Minute Non-Sequitur


     From Hell is based off of Alan Moore’s graphic novel of the same name. I say based off of in the sense that it uses Moore’s book like a trampoline to jump into an abyss of seemingly random scenes. …I retract that, that’s a little extreme. It only feels that way because one of the biggest questions of the narrative remains unanswered in various aspects. That questions is simply “why?”- why does Sir William Gull undergo an apparent demonic possession without an explanation? Why does Frederick Abberline suffer visions of the future with no reason as to why they started in the first place? It seems the common theme of this film is utter confusion. It fancies itself a nightmare, attempting to emulate that feeling you get after a horrifying dream shocks you into a hyperventilating cold sweat, and the only question that comes to mind was “ What was that?” However, as I watched the movie it began to switch from leading towards a thrilling conclusion to a dull ending that was over before I could register if anything that happened was of consequence. An even bigger question to me than “why did this happen?” was “why did I sit through 122 minutes of a movie that was incoherent?”
Go read Alan Moore’s novel if you prefer feeling informed over confused.