How I Lost 200 Hours of my Life...to a Woman.

Who's that girl?

That's right, a woman.

Let me tell you about her.  Her name is Ceolairah (you would say it Solara).  She is a working girl who does odd jobs all across the country, so, naturally she travels a lot.  She isn't particularly wealthy, but she does own property in some major cities.  I cannot really tell you too much about her past, but from what I understand things weren't always as good as they are now (there may have been some jail time early on, but for what is not clear).  She was born and raised in an arid climate near a desert and as a result rarely gets sick, which is a good thing.  She has no particular religious or political affiliations; she just kind of does what she feels is right based on the situation at hand.  Perhaps because of this, she is quick to make new friends and rarely comes into town without someone waiting to see her about something or other.  That being said, she has always kind of been a loner, not really needing or asking too much from her friends or her family (if she has any, I don't really know).  And yet, I get the sense that she carries the weight of the world on her shoulders sometimes.  Not to get melodramatic, but it is almost like she has some bigger destiny or purpose out there that she is chasing. I certainly think she is destined for great things!

Ceolairah is a complex and amazing woman with more depth and subtlety than one might expect when they first meet her. She is strong and fearless, she is noble and yet cunning at times, and no matter what, she always comes out on top of the situation.  Maybe that is why I have been so enraptured with her for the past several months.  Maybe that is why I have done everything in my power to spend time with her at every opportunity since I met her.  Maybe that is why as soon as I am done typing this, I am going to go meet her again.

But Ceolairah is not like other girls, my friends.  Oh no indeed.  Ceolairah hails from a world not like ours, for Ceolairah is a child of Skyrim.  Yeah, that's right, I took two whole paragraphs to rope you in for that big, super nerdy payoff.  And now you have to live with it (sadly so do I because I wrote it and took about 3 times as long to write it as you took to read it).

Ceolairah at home in Riften, ready for battle

200 freaking hours of my life (and counting...) I have sunk into this ridiculous game.  200 hours.  If someone sentenced you to 200 hours of community service, you would just pay the fine or take the jail time.  And yet willingly, no, eagerly, I have spent 200 hours completely engrossed in this absolutely incredible world...errr... I mean game.  And when I say engrossed, I mean like basement dwelling nerd level engrossed. It is sad. Really really sad.  I have not been pulled into a game like this since way back in the days of Might and Magic VI (during which my girlfriend and I literally pulled the couch up to the PC and took turns playing while the other would sleep).  Maybe I am a sucker for deep RPG's like this, but boy did this game zero right in on what appeals to the big fat nerd inside of me.  And as before, I will blame it on a woman, but this time that woman is my wife.

It's her fault.  She's the one that said, "that Elder Scrolls game looks really good and everyone is going nuts over it, can we please buy an XBOX360 so I can play it?"  I wondered if any one game would be worth buying an entire system for, particularly in an era when the XBOX360 stands for everything that I feel is wrong with modern video games.  But, she insisted and I relented.  At the time I was busy wrapping up LoZ:Skyward Sword (probably the most epic Zelda game ever and contender for best Wii game ever and maybe best adventure game ever), so I didn't have time to get involved with this new Skyrim game.  But the wife played it and she got sucked into it, big time.  She was playing Skyrim on the living room TV and I was playing Zelda on the gameroom TV and we were two huge losers that rarely saw each other for about 3 weeks. I am just thankful I married a video game geek like myself, otherwise I have a feeling I would have been packing my bags for Skyrim in the near future...

Finally, I began my Skyrim adventure.  Trust me, I was entirely ready for this to be a disappointment.  Modern video games on the power systems always make me nervous because I don't really buy into the philosophy that gave birth to the power systems.  I am not a graphics whore and I don't dig online play. But the response from the wife was good and the game looked very interesting.  Kids, I had no idea...

Maybe I am new to modern gaming, but this game is incredible.  It is the best RPG I have ever played.  The game is huge, the world is immersive and the adventure feels endless.  This game offers the fantasy RPG nerd pretty much everything they want.  Open exploration is the name of the game.  Even though the game starts you off with the foundation of the game's two major quests, one political and one epic, after you escape your pending execution you are pretty much free to roam.  You can make your choice and follow the faction of your choice, you can head for the nearest town, or you can just strike out on your own and see what the world has to offer.

How freaking cool is this???

And oh my, what the game has to offer.  There are dungeon crawling quests, heroic quests, good deeds, evil deeds, assassinations, thefts, and general bitch work.  In addition to all of that you can learn all kinds of skills from blacksmithing and weapon enchanting to alchemy and pickpocketing.  There is so much to do and so much to learn that it can be a little daunting at first.  But fear not, just pick the first quest in front of you and let the good times roll.  You do have to be careful, however, because there are a lot of quests out there; one estimate put it up there in the four digits.  If you are not careful your quest log can get so full you'll have a hard time figuring out just what to do or where to go next!
While some of the quests can feel a bit repetitive, particularly if you complete a series of barrow quests, which are basically dungeon crawlers where you are seeking an object, back-to-back with noting else in between, but if you mix up your experience you can almost entirely avoid quest burn out.  Quest burn out won't set in for a while, though, because the game manages to keep the level of newness and fun very high and there are cool new things to see and find around pretty much every corner.

More than just Tundra, baby!

Which was another concern of mine.  Watching the wife play, I noticed that this game was dark, visually.  Lots of snow and earth tones, I feared the game was going to be drab and dull and monotonous.  Wrong again.  While Skyrim is a cold northern land, the geography is wildly diverse and features a wide variety of landscapes ranging from the obvious snow capped mountain to steamy hot springs.  You can explore everything from forested groves to sunken ships.  Yes, I said it, sunken ships!  There are pirate coves and entire subterranean caverns illuminated by phosphorescent fungus.  Plunge deep into the heart of ancient ruins of the Dwemer (apparently the dwarves of Skyrim long vanished from the face of the realm) and ascend the frozen peaks of the highest mountains to seek out the homes of Ancient Dragons.  It is rarely dull picking your way across the landscape of Skyrim.  So much to see.

Yep, that's a sunken ship.  And it's not the only one...

But all of that isn't just window dressing.  The game is deep and the world is even deeper.  I'll give you the extreme example right off the bat:  there are books, lots and lots of books, in Skyrim. These books are not just quest items or ways to learn spells, these are actual books.  Someone, somewhere at the creative offices of Bethesda sat down and wrote books to include in this game that amplify the stories and lore of the world.  I am not kidding.  You can probably spend 25 game hours just sitting down and reading all of the books.  Some are short, only a few pages deep, but others are virtual novellas.  These books cover pretty much anything you would want to know about Skyrim from history and mythology to treatises on combat and alchemy.  There is an entire library devoted to writings on the aforementioned Dwemer!  The available knowledge about this imaginary land is so deep it borders on Tolkien.  Don't feel obligated, you are only actually required to read maybe a handful of books to fulfill quests, but the knowledge is out there if you want to know more.
And it's not just the literature that fleshes out the world.  The NPCs are much deeper than your standard RPG fare, and even the stock guards will have different things to say based on what is going on with your character progression or the major game quests.  There are nine major towns in the game and many smaller farms, mining colonies, and villages all rich with characters to meet, interact with, do favors for, and possibly even marry! It feels like the game is actually designed with the purpose of absorbing you into its world.  I would wager that it is difficult to play this game for any amount of time and not be drawn into it.  (If you don't believe me, check out Skyrim mom).

Let me give you a sample from an average day in Skyrim.  I start the game in my house in Riften, the lake town in Skyrim known for its connection to the Theives Guild.  Yes, that's right, I said "my house," because in Skyrim you can own property in many of the nine principle towns.  This usually requires a sizable amount of gold and the completion of several quests specific to that town, but once you purchase a house you own it, you can sleep there, store your gear, and even decorate and upgrade your houses to include things like Alchemy Labs and Vegetable Gardens.  I know; it is very cool.

So anyway, I start in my home in Riften and I decide that today I want to explore some Dwarven ruins.  It just so happens that yesterday a woman in town begged me to take a strange artifact from her and return it to a Dwarven ruin located nearby.  So, I take a moment and scout out the local shops to see if anyone has any arrows I can buy, and then I head out for the ruin.  Not too far from town I am stopped on the road by a thief who demands all my gold.  I have the option of fighting him right there, trying to persuade him to leave, or intimidating him into just leaving me alone.  He doesn't take kindly to the intimidation and so I am forced to pull out my warhammer and decapitate him on the spot (yes you can do that and it is very, very cool).  Semi-random encounters like this make up a lot of the ambient charm in Skryim.  Having dispatched the thief, the rest of my journey to the ruin is fairly uneventful.  I run from a few angry bears and wolves, but other than that, no major problems.  I spend the next few hours plunging into the depths of the Dwarven ruin ferreting out the secret of this mysterious artifact.  The end result is that I get a permanent status effect called Ancient Knowledge that improves my Smithing Skill by 15% and gives me a bonus when wearing Dwarven Armor.  Time well spent.  During this time I also improve my lockpicking skill to 98 and find all kinds of goodies in the various chests and on the bodies of my fallen enemies.

Upon leaving the ruin, I immediately find myself in trouble.  The ground is shaking and there is only one (or two I suppose) reason for that:  Dragon.  An Elder Dragon to be exact and he is right over head.  I pull out my Dragonsbane sword, specially enchanted for killing dragons, and get ready for battle, but before I get the blade unsheathed, I notice that the beast is not after me at all.  It has apparently raised the ire of a passing Giant and is engaging him in battle.  Again, this is one of those ambient moments that make you think that maybe you are looking into a window on a real world.  Wild animals, dragons, giants, and other humans (like bandits) are not just enemies to you; they will in turn attack each other and sometimes have particular axes to grind.  There is one Orc stronghold that is relentlessly beset by Giants.  So occasionally you can get someone or something else to do your bitch work and you can reap the benefits.  In this case, the Giant is taking a pretty good chunk out of the Elder Dragon, which is a good thing.  So instead of barging into the fray, which could get me killed by either or both of them.  I decide to wait out the winner and then take on whichever that might be, hoping that the previous battle will have sufficiently weakened the victor.  It takes a minute, but finally the dragon wins, however it has been pretty severely injured by the Giant and cannot fly.  This makes it easy pickings, so I pull out my bow, crouch in the nearby stand of trees and zip a few arrows toward the dragon.  This gets his attention, but does not kill him, so he turns my way and lets out a blast of frozen breath that slows me down and does some damage.  As I am recovering the dragon is now upon me, so I draw the Dragonsbane and let loose with a power attack!  This just happens to be enough to finish the monster and I am treated to an awesome cutscene of me putting the dragon down.

That's me killing a dragon!

 After relieving the dragon of the two arrows I put into its hide (oh yes you can!) as well as few hundred gold he was packing around and several of his bones and scales, I decide to make my way back home to Riften; after all I have treasure to unload.
Back in Riften, I drop by the house first; since I spent so much time fighting dragons and exploring, it is around 10pm when I get back and the shops are all closed.  Once home, I take a few of the items I picked up and place them in one of my storage chests, a couple of others have new enchantments I need to learn so I take them to my Arcane Enchanting table and deconstruct them to learn their enchantments and while I'm there, add a few enchantments to raise the value of a some items I plan to sell.  Finally, I place a really cool helmet I found, but do not currently plan to wear, on my dressing mannequin for display (I know it's nerdy, but trust me this is so cool).  Housekeeping complete, I hit the sack and sleep until morning.
The shops open around 8am, so I take the things I plan to sell around the various vendors and see who can take which items off my hands.  The shopkeepers do not have bottomless wallets nor does every shopkeeper buy or sell every kind of thing (at least not until you master the art of Speech), so you cannot simply unload everything on one guy. I manage to get rid of most everything and now I have enough money to pay one of the warriors who lives in town to train me in the One-Handed Weapon combat.  Once my training is complete (you just pay and it raises your level) I make my way over to the Temple of Mara, a religious institution in town.  The various temples in Skryim can give you temporary status upgrades that offer various benefits.  After receiving the blessing of the temple, one of the acolytes tells me about a ghost who is wandering the prairie seeking out her lost husband.  The acolyte bids me to find this ghost and help reunite her with her lost love.  Before setting out, however, I need to stop by the Blacksmith and craft myself a new pair of Dragon Gauntlets with the bones and scales I collected, and so the day goes on, you get the idea...

There is so much to do in this game it feels like it will never end, and I guess it really doesn't have to until you literally do every single quest that is offered you and max out every single skill available.  You can spend your time crafting weapons, killing ancient Dragon Priests, you can become a vampire or werewolf, you can raid bandit camps and be the hero of the town, or you can lurk the dark passageways as a lethal assassin.  The game is completely wide open.  Completely.  You can do as little or as much of the main quests as you like.  You can pay as much or as little attention to the world as you like.  The little sample given above doesn't even begin to illustrate just how diverse your experience can be.

Breathtaking views of amazing landscapes!!

And therein also lies Skyrim's biggest appeal:  replayability. I have spent well over 200 hours with this game, I have done countless quests, I have explored as much of the map as I think it possible, I have completed the epic quest, and yet I cannot wait to start the whole game all over again and this time be a totally different character.  Ceolairah is a noble, brave warrior who does what is right and does not take sides in the political upheavals of the world.  She pursues her destiny and helps those in need, living and dying by the edge of her blade, the tips of her arrows, and her unmatched Sneak skill.  I have really enjoyed playing the game with her character.  But next time, I am planning to be a devilish Kajiit (cat-man) who is an rebellious assassin who is an unmatched thief and master of the magical arts.  And I as jazzed about that as if I were starting the game for the first time, maybe more so.

200 hours, people!  Two hundred very, very, very nerdy hours.  I came home early from work, I passed on hanging out with friends, I retreated into my inner nerd just to play this game.  It is that good.  Honestly.  If the game has a downfall, it is the absurd load times and buggy nature that I feel are kind of the trade off for a game this deep.  Those things are annoying, but I was having so much fun and in such awe that I was more than willing to forgive these minor grievances.  If anything the long load times were great bathroom breaks and opportunities to refill my water glass.  You know, the essentials.  Look, I played Skyrim so much I literally dreamed about it...more than once.

Ceolairah at home as the Archmage of Winterhold College

So if you wonder why there haven't been many updates to the blog lately and feared that I had given up, fear not!  I have just been distracted by a very intriguing young lady and her adventures in a snow covered land.  And if you love RPG's even just a little bit, you owe to yourself to give Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim a long look.  Just remember to pick your kids up from school and pay the electric bill, or things could get really tricky...

Marvel Movie List #24 HULK

#24 HULK

The Incredible Hulk is the nuclear era's Jekyll and Hyde.  It is the story of the struggle between the rational man (ego) and his inner beast (id).  It reveals the truth about human nature and the struggle of our inner duality.  Bruce Banner's story is that of a desperate search to mediate (superego) the two sides of his personality.  It is a classic story and when well told is compelling and speaks to something in all of us.

I wanted you to know the above going in because that is not quite what you are going to get in Ang Lee's interpretation.  Part of this is due to directorial vision and the rest is left to some questionable acting.  To put it bluntly, Eric Bana's Bruce Banner would just be the Hulk all of the time.  Bana is irritated and frustrated for the duration of the film and he makes the audience uncomfortable right out of the gate.  His characterization of Banner is so one sided you find yourself hoping he will turn into the Hulk just so he can stop being so obtuse.  You are hoping for this, of course, until the neon green spongy-looking Special Effect shows up.  Once that happens you are hoping that Netflix is still running the Bill Bixby Incredible Hulk TV show (which it is at the time of this writing!) so you can see what the Hulk should really look like.  Seriously, somewhere between Ferrigno's body paint and this 3D cartoon, there has to be a more realistic looking Hulk (and there will be some improvements farther up on the list, but we are dealing with the here and now), even at this point in the evolution of special effects.  But I'm jumbling things up a bit here, let's stay on task...
This is yet another movie with no likeable characters.  Bana is so angry all the time and Jennifer Connelly's Betty is so weepy and empathetic that you have a hard time wanting to relate to either one.  Further more Nolte's role as the lead villain provides so little for ol' Nick to do that you almost feel sorry for him instead!  So I am never sure who I am supposed to like in this film.  I know it is meant to be Bana, but he gives me no reason to like him.  Is it a directing or acting mistake?  I find that I pretty much don't care.  If I have to choose, I think Sam Elliot was a decent cast for Thunderbolt Ross.

This will always be the Hulk to me.  You cannot replace him with a Special Effect.

So with no characters to like, I turn to the story to find something here to enjoy.  No such luck.  The Hulk was created when Dr. Bruce Banner was caught in a gamma radiation explosion as he was rushing onto a nuclear test site to save a young man who had wandered onto the site.  It was the freak result of a selfless act.  This makes Banner the victim of circumstance and thus a sympathetic character.  In this version Banner is the victim of bizarre genetic experiments conducted by his father when he was a child that bear fruit when he is bombarded by gamma rays trying to save another hapless character.  Same basic idea, but because this is no longer the nuclear era we have to add in that little unnecessary genetic bit.  Why?  It takes away a lot of the sympathy for the character and instead makes him a victim of a different kind.  You must be very careful when you tamper with the basic premise.  It worked originally for a reason.
That aside, the rest of the story is a hodgepodge mystery to piece together why Banner reacted to the gamma rays the way he did.  It takes far too long to get to the first appearance of the Hulk and there isn't enough worth watching to make me believe that the Special Effect is worth the wait.  The early scenes between Bruce and Betty are dry white toast and neither one give me anything that indicates that they have chemistry together or any reason to be drawn into this tragic plot.  I am reminded, sadly, of the romance in Attack of the Clones.  Once the Hulk is on the scene the movie shifts from being a science drama a la Andromeda Strain and instead becomes an action film in the vein of Mission Impossible 2 with all of thinness of substance and motive implicit therein.  The Hulk smashes things and beats up on tanks and explodes gas stations and none of it means a damn thing to anyone.  We go from dry white toast to pop rocks in absolutely no time at all.

Finally, after what feels like hours, we get to what is supposed to be the big showdown between Banner and his nutjob father.  And for some reason, before that showdown can occur the U.S. government has decided it would be a good idea for Banner and his father to have a nice little chat.  And here, and ONLY here, do we get anything that is watchable in this film.  Had the editor on this film left the entirety of this movie on the cutting room floor with the exception of these five minutes, you might have been able to make a case for this being a great Hulk movie.  These five minutes by themselves make a decent Hulk film, the remaining 133 minutes completely undo anything that is done well during that time.  Try it some time.  What you'll get is a 5 minute absurdist play that speaks more to the themes and essence of the Hulk than any of Bana's mumbling or the Special Effect's jaunting about a desert canyon.

Unfortunately Ang Lee junks the rest of the film up with shaky special effects, unlikeable characters, and a needlessly complicated plot.  It is almost unbelievable that drivel of this magnitude comes from the same guy who, only three years prior, gave us the mind-blowing, epic Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.  It almost feels like the story was played down because it was based on a comic book and the result is a movie that feels as thin as a comic page.  The only reason this is better than Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance is because some of the cinematography looks competently done.  Hulk remained on the bottom our list for a long time because it belongs in the bottom of the bin.  If you haven't seen this movie yet, give it a pass.


Aimee's Take
The Hulk is one of my favorites--and not from childhood. My exposure to the Incredible Hulk properties was largely minimal until the husband decided I should probably read some of Peter David's run on the Incredible Hulk comic book. Five issues deep, I was in love. I didn't need an origin story, I didn't need to know what had happened before. The book itself caught me up to speed, and I was thoroughly happy.

This particular run of the Hulk is deeply psychological in nature. Not just regarding the Hulk himself. The complexities of the relationship between Betty and Bruce, Rick and Marlo... Hulk and everyone. Doc Samson alone is worth a look, in my opinion. Now, I did this reading in 2009ish. I had already seen two Hulk movies. Revisiting them, I suppose I had certain expectations for how rich--how full--the story could be.

Ang Lee's Hulk is a terribly disappointing exercise. No likable characters coupled with an abysmally complicated plot leads me to feel like there's nothing here to entertain, much less sustain my mind. Add to the mix a film which is miscast, altogether too long, and plagued with poor (perhaps dated is better) special effects... and you have a bad movie. I feel like the movie has good intentions, but it really fails to understand the motivations of the characters. There's no reason to have Bruce so disconnected from his past, and there's no reason for Nick Nolte's character to have all those bizarre gamma dogs. There's no reason for Bruce to be so terribly moody all the time--or so built. There's no real dichotomy between the skinny, wimpy scientist and the primal emotion and pure strength of the Hulk. He's already shades of the Hulk before he even transforms. I guess, there's just no reason for most of the things we watch in this film. I think I understand why people initially liked Hulk: in 2003, there were few new comic book movies in the field, and I think the "Ang Lee" branding had everyone a little starstruck. Simply put, we didn't know what we were watching, and it didn't seem so bad. But it was. It was.

And that, my friends, is why until the unspeakably horrible Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance hit theatres... Hulk sucked up the bottom of our list.

Marvel Movie Ranking Project: #25 Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance

We are not condoned by these people.

Electric Frankfurter's Official Marvel Movie List

There was a time when the Superman movies of the 1970's were all anyone could ever want from a super-hero movie.  And they were pretty good, for their time.  Then came 1989 and Tim Burton showed the world that super-hero movies could be so much more.  Burton's Batman ushered in a new era of super-hero movie that went beyond the cliches and silliness that gave us Bat Anti-Shark repellant. Sadly, as the era was born, so would it die.  All of the good work done by Burton was quickly undone by Joel Schumacher and his cornball train wreck that was Batman and Robin, which harkened back to that techno-color time of yore in all its goofiness.  All was not lost, however, because even as Rome was burning, a new generation of "comic book" movie was rising from the ashes.

One year after Batman and Robin put comic books back in the kiddie pool, Marvel decided to throw their hat into the ring with a risky venture based on a third tier character:  Blade.  While Blade didn't make quite the splash Batman did nearly a decade before, it did set the tone for a new age of super-hero film that would redefine the genre and prove that the subject matter transcended the spandex and beach ball breasts that had come to misrepresent it.  The following years would see movies featuring the best of the Marvel super-heroes including Spider-man, the X-men, and various Avengers as well as intelligently crafted non-Marvel films such as the much anticipated Watchmen, V for Vendetta, and a re-invented Batman franchise.  However, this period was most definitely the Marvel era of movies.

Being huge comic book nerds, myself perhaps more than Aimee, we have relished in the days of great movies based on some of our favorite super-heroes and as part of that relishment (my word, you are free to use it) there have resulted some very intense and sometimes heated debates about the hierarchy of how certain movies stack up against one another.  Eventually, those debates sparked a project and the fruit of that project you are about to be subjected to..I mean "read."

Over the course of the next 25 weeks the wife and I are going to tell you exactly how the Marvel movies of the past 14 years rank.  Over that period of time Marvel has released 25 major motion pictures based on characters from their comic books.  Many of them have been very good; many of them have been not so good, and some of them have been down right terrible.  We will begin our journey this week with the absolute worst of the worst and we will work our way to the very top sometime in August.

So if you love comic books and/or super-heroes and the movies that feature them, and if you really enjoy our snarky take on things, then you are in for a treat.  Each week Aimee and I will give our individual takes on the movies as we rank them and will also provide insight as to how we arrived at our rankings.  There have been a few spirited conversations over the course of our viewings as we have hashed out these rankings and those will most definitely reveal themselves as we make our way through the list.  We both have pretty strong opinions and we'd love to hear some of yours as well.  We'll also be offering you some of our insights into how we view the genre and where we see it going as we leave this era and head into a new future of comic book movies.

Join us will you as Electric Frankfurter brings you the Official Rankings of the Marvel Era of Movies.

#25 Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance

Obviously this movie is bad, it's on the bottom of the list.  The only tragedy is that there are not more movies on this list so that Ghost Rider 2 could be ranked lower than 25.  It is that bad.  We won't even talk about the obvious mis-casting of Nicholas Cage as Johnny Blaze, we can save that for the original Ghost Rider and I promise you won't have to wait long for that discussion.  We won't have to talk about that because the movie is so bad you almost believe that Cage might have to save the film from the depths of boredom.  I'll spoil it for you: he doesn't.
You could almost make a case for this movie being watchable excepting for two very important flaws: one, the movie has no likable characters whatsoever, none, and two, the movie is dull.  One reviewer said that for a movie about a man who is regularly on fire you would expect it to be less boring.  I agree.  Ghost Rider himself shows up maybe 4 times in the entire film and for at least two of those appearances pretty much all he does is stand there and wait for the editor to edit him into action (I am not kidding).  Everything that does not include the Special Effect (because let's face it, that's all he is) is dry white toast.  Paper thin characters, uninspired villains, a meager plot that is barely explained along the way, and insufferable scripting all add up to 95 minutes of very arid film.  And this is a super hero action movie, people!!!  I'll give you the plot right now and spare you the time:  The devil is after his son so that he can transfer his essence into him that he may remain in the mortal world to work his ambiguous evil.  Ghost Rider is charged with protecting the boy (the son of the Devil).  The end.  Snore.  What is the end game?  What happens if GR succeeds?  What happens if he fails?  Who cares?  If he fails, then nothing changes and the Devil goes on walking amongst people, status quo.  If he succeeds then we have the son of the Devil walking around being the son of the Devil with no real purpose in life and always plagued by the fact that he is the son of the Devil.  Now, you tell me which conclusion I am looking for.  That's right, neither.

But hey, plot isn't everything, sometimes a great actor or character can help carry a film along (wait until we get to X-men Origins: Wolverine).  Maybe Ghost Rider2's redemption will come in the form of very interesting performances of very interesting characters.  That crunch is the sound of a saltine, because we are coming up dry again, kids.  The only character that I even wanted to see on screen, apart from the Special Effect, was the boy's (son of Devil's) mother, but only because she was kind of hot in that trashy goth way.  That alone is not enough to carry a movie my friend, not by a long shot.  I could scope out that kind of action in the lobby of the theater.

Everything else in the film is just a lesson in poor film-making. The editing is atrocious.  The directing is spastic and erratic at best, and not in an artsy way.  I was not kidding when I said Ghost Rider was literally edited into action in some of the sequences.  It feels like the director has no idea how to shoot a movie or what makes a good shot, sequence, or narrative.  The treatment of the character is a joke at best and shows that no one in the development of this film understands the source material.  Ghost Rider is the earthy incarnation of Zarathos, the Spirit of Vengeance.  His sole mission on earth is to resist his master's bidding and protect the innocent from harm.  Despite that, GR does very little protecting of innocents (we can go all day on whether the son of the Devil is inherently innocent, but this film does not deserve to be the launch point for what would be an intelligent debate) in this movie and for the most part just lusts after the souls of everyone he meets.  Where in the hell does that part come from?  What's worse, despite making it clear in the film that Ghost Rider = Zarathos, a demon, hence possession, Johnny Blaze is able to rid himself of his "powers" as Ghost Rider by spending the night in a cave (think Empire Strikes Back, Luke in Dagobah, only very, very stupid and uncool) and the Devil is able to give his "powers" back to him by breathing fire into his face. I could buy this if there was an explanation of how Zarathos' power was subdued by something in the cave and brought back by the fire breath.  I could also buy Zarathos being forced out via exorcism and then re-possessing Blaze by his wishing for it.  Instead, I think we are supposed to believe that sleeping in a cave and confessing your greatest fault somehow causes time to reverse and the contract you signed with the Devil to be unsigned.  Yeah, ok.

Look, you and I have already given this movie far more time than it should ever deserve.  Neither Aimee nor I had any problem whatsoever walking out of the theater and declaring this one of the worst movies we had ever seen, much less the worst Marvel movie of the Modern Era.  This movie is a real stinker and if you ever see it you only have yourself to blame.  In the hopes that I can convince you to spare yourself, I am going to close this critique with the only two things in Ghost Rider 2 worth looking at so you can just get it out of your system:

Aimee's Take: 

Ok, look. I like movies that are bad. Sometimes, it's nice to just take your mind off the hook and forget all your troubles. I like to ridicule movies. I am a child of the MST3K era. I can see the value in a movie that is so laughable you just have to enjoy it.

This is not that movie. This movie is so bad, it's like being punched in the face over and over again while your attacker says "Quit punching yourself!" Because, by purchasing a ticket to this mess, I am, indeed, punching myself.

We can save a lot of my basic problems about this characterization of Ghost Rider and the part being miscast by 45 years or so until we get to the franchise's earlier installment, because the problems haven't changed here. Instead, I will say that this movie, in 2d, made me dizzy and gave me a headache. It is all "shaky cam" and spinning and odd prismatic blue-screen cut-ins that make no sense at all. The plot is non-existent, the dialogue is beyond terrible (by comparison, George Lucas is a master of understanding human interaction and emotion), and the characters are unlikeable. By the end of the film, I realized I did not care one way or the other who won this meaningless fight. The devil seemed like he might be ok. On the other hand, I had already seen that Nic Cage was insane. 

This movie provided itself with two excuses to show Johnny Blaze's bare ass (thankfully, ONLY in comic illustration form) and two excuses to show Ghost Rider peeing fire. By the end, I had folded down three theater seats to lay down in, and for the first time in my entire life, I considered whipping out my cell phone to entertain myself. I really doubt the other four people in the theater would have minded. 

In the end, this film was boring, had very little to do with Ghost Rider at all, and felt like some kind of bizarre monument to bad film-making. As in, "Oh yeah? I'll show you--I'll go make the worst movie you've ever even conceived of. It will be so bad, it will make your children cry in shame and all who see it shall be scarred for ever, left to cling to the wreckage of their sad lives as they come to grips with the fact that they spent $14 to be here and the only thing salvageable about the entire experience is the fact that the concession stand allows you to butter your own popcorn." 

That's it.  Join us next week when I'll explain to you why you only need 5 minutes to make a good movie out of a trash pile.

Twelve Months Sixty Dollars and a GameBoy Advance: December

Twelve Months Sixty Dollars and a GameBoy Advance, December...errrr....

Wait a minute!  What happened?  Where's the game of the month?  What hidden gem or magnanimous mort have you uncovered this month?

Sorry Charlie!  No feature!

What why?

We interrupt your regularly scheduled feature for an important announcement from the Stan man himself.  So without further ado, here it is:  (if you don't like rants, then I suggest you go here)

Seriously people SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL BUSINESSES!

Why don't we have a feature for the final month of this project?  I'll tell you why.  The locally owned second hand store, MUST HAVE MUSIC AND MORE, that I exclusively shopped at for this project (and last year's project, and for 3 years before that) closed it's doors for good at the end of November.  It's a freaking tragedy.  That's why there is no feature.

The second hand store is the lifeblood of the classic gaming community.  They are the only ones that care about classic, old, or used video games and the people that enjoy them.  Does Best Buy care?  No.  Does GameStop care?  Hell no, they don't even carry PS2 games anymore and the system was still getting new games not so long ago!  No, the only people who care about the classic gamer are the independent folks who probably love classic games as much as you do.  However, those little guys still have to compete in the Big Boy world with juggernauts like Best Buy and GameStop and the only way they stand a chance at surviving is through the support and dollars of good people like yourselves.

Look, I'll not lie to you, this rant comes from a very personal place.  Over the past four years I got to know Neal, the very cool cat who owned MUST HAVE.  He is a great guy and he has a great dog.  He knows his classic video games and he is never too busy to help a wayward customer find out if A Sound of Thunder is a good game or not, or even what kind of game it is.  He is also just an all around great member of the community.  He opened his store in 2007 because he saw an opportunity to be his own boss doing something he loved.  From the first time I went into his store, sometime in 2008, I could tell this was a real dude trying to do something cool.  His prices were MORE than fair ($8 Metroid Prime in 2008, seriously), his selection was always strong and he knew his games pretty well.  We spent a lot of time just hanging out chatting about games and game genres etc.  This dude understood video games as a love and passion, not just as a way to make money (something our other "major" local second hand has lost sight of).  This is why I wholeheartedly threw all of my money and support behind his store.  It was a place that took the time to get to know me and made me feel welcome as more than just a customer.

However, I alone could not keep MUST HAVE in business.  The $20 or so a month that I can scrape together to spend on movies and video games just wasn't going to do it. But I know there are other classic and used game gamers in this city other than myself.  Not to mention that MUST HAVE also sold DVD's and CD's.  Where were these people?  To my knowledge MUST HAVE was one of only three local stores at the time selling used games for non-modern consoles.  Has eBay really killed off the second hand market?  I cannot believe that, eBay really sucks these days? So what gives?

Have we all just bought into the mentality that we must pay more and patronize the Big Boys and their knock-off bigger market local equivalents (heck at least they are local, even if they are gouging you a bit because they can).

Honestly, people, I don't know what we are doing as a culture.  Are we so deluded by convenience?  Are we so easily led into following the herd?  Do we not care?  I am guilty; many times it has been "easier" to go to the mass market.  I have avoided a "couple of extra dollars" that the little guy has to charge to stay in business.  But I am also able to see the error of my ways and make strong efforts to correct those mistakes.  I have not set foot in a Wal-mart in several months, I honestly cannot recall the last time I was in one.  I want to make a serious effort to support my neighbors and my friends and the good people in my community who are taking a stand and making an effort to provide what the mass market cannot: care.  It sucks that it took this kind of loss to wake my lazy ass up.  Sad really.

Mainly, though, I am just pissed and saddened by the loss of a great local business.  And that has only strengthened my resolve.  So in the wake of losing my favorite second hand store, I would like to showcase two of my other favorite local businesses that do a stellar job of being great friends, good neighbors and excellent businesses.

First is Wild and Woolly Video.  The ultimate source for all movies from blockbusters to the most esoteric independent, these cats have it or can point you to it.  They really know and love movies and it shows in the dedication they have to customer service.  I have NEVER rented a film there that at least one member of the staff didn't have an insightful observation or recommendation about.  They love film, love to talk film, and they know their stuff.  Wild and Woolly is a Louisville institution and they totally rock.  You can find them at http://www.wandwvideo.com/

Second is the Zone Comic Shop.  As you people well know, I am a devotee of the nine panel page.  My best friend Kyle introduced me to the Zone a million years ago when I first moved to the city and I have been a loyal customer ever since.  The Zone bucks the stereotype of the cavernous nerd den that plagues the comic book industry.  The store is well lit, clean and meticulously organized and maintained.  Oh sure, you still get plenty of arguments about whether or not the lightning version of Superman could beat Ultimate Thor, but that is inherent in the culture.  What you don't get is the feeling that you have to live in a basement and breathe through your mouth in order to belong there.  Dan Thompson is the owner and proprietor of the store and the man LOVES comics, knows comics and the industry, and is as helpful to the person who has no idea what a New Teen Titan might be as he is to a super-nerd like myself.  Dan kills it every day and puts all he has into making comic books something that everyone will love as much as he does.  His staff shares that passion and it shows.  You can visit them online at http://www.zonecomicshop.com/

You may not live in Louisville, KY, but if you ever find yourself there for any amount of time, please check these guys out, they are tops.

Ok, I have ranted enough and I am sure you are sick of it by now.  I know I am.  And besides I have lots of video games to play.  As I promised, I owe you an announcement about EF in 2012.  Well, it wasn't the announcement I had planned to make, but I do have some things to declare.  2012 will be an interesting year for EF.  Due to all kinds of things, I have decided not to do a monthly feature like the past two 12601 projects.  This is due in part to the rant you just endured, but it is also for personal reasons, mainly, I NEVER want to manufacture content for this blog that isn't honest and real and from the heart.  I want this to be about my LOVE of video games, not my slavish devotion to a deadline and content for content's sake.  So if I am not being compelled to write, I'm not going to put it out there. You deserve the best I can offer, not just me writing to fill space.  That is my promise to you.  I also promise to stay real about video games and tell it like it is.  I think my next feature will pretty much prove that in spades and I hope to have it to you before Valentines Day.

Also, I am thinking really hard about becoming a priest of Ra-El, and that looks like it will take up a lot of free time.  You know....

So thanks for reading and making 2011 really cool.  Here is hoping 2012 is even better!

Twelve Months, Sixty Dollars and a GameBoy Advance: November

LEGO Star Wars: The Video Game
by Eidos

LEGO's can somehow make anything easier to swallow, even abominations like the series of films created by George Lucas which are in no way related to, despite having a common main title, Star Wars.  That is to say, when I bought this, I did not realize what I was getting.  Fool that I am, I thought I was buying a GBA version of LEGO Star Wars: The Original Trilogy, like I have, and love, for the Gamecube.  Fool.  That is not what LEGO Star Wars: The Video Game turns out to be.  Instead it turns out to be about those other movies. Naturally, I was disheartened because I love Star Wars, but I was not to be defeated.  Subject matter aside, this was a GBA game, it was $5, and I bought it for those reasons.  I was going to play it.

Turns out my thesis was pretty much right: LEGO's can somehow make anything easier to swallow (except the LEGO's themselves, remember kids: not for swallowing).  So far I have not met a LEGO game I could not enjoy.  LEGO Batman, LEGO Indiana Jones (the original, not the one with the other levels that have nothing to do with the THREE films that comprise the ENTIRE body of Indiana Jones films), LEGO Star Wars: The Original Trilogy, the list goes on and on.  While this game, LSW, was not going to be as thrilling as those previously mentioned, I held out hope that the LEGO action could save the day; and it did.

Thanks to the general silliness of LEGO games, there is a lot of fun to be had here, mostly in the form of mowing down enemies as a tiny LEGO Darth Maul in Free Play Mode. Yes kids that is the entire reason to play this game and play through the Story Mode.  Darth Maul (one of the only cool things to come from these films) is a LEGO badass and can take down just about anyone with little effort.  Plus he looks cool with his double lightsaber slashing around. Plus, you get that always anticipated Darth Maul v. Darth Maul showdown at the end of the first chapter!  If you must play this game, unlock DM and then go apeshit.

The rest of the game is pretty standard LEGO goodness, which if you are unfamiliar, means wandering through a themed world as a character, building things out of LEGOs to help you traverse the level, solve puzzles, or rack up bonus points (in the form of LEGOs), and fighting enemies, also made of LEGOs. The game overall is pretty short, you can take it out in about 5 hours, but there is still plenty of challenge.  Some levels require great care in how you take out the enemies and if you just blunder in expecting to wreck general mayhem, chances are good you will be blown to pieces.  It is for this reason that the Jedi characters are your best to use.  They can use their lightsabers to deflect enemy laser fire either harmlessly away, or back at the source.  Characters armed the blasters can attack long range, but they also have no defense.  This makes for some sticky situations if you are not careful in how you tackle a level.  The levels aren't as deep as they would be on a console, but that is to be expected.  They are, however, just long enough to be fun to play through.

Since the films that this game is based on are pretty forgettable, I have no real idea if the game follows the plot very closely; I assume it does.  You play in various settings including a space ship, a factory of some kind, a volcano area and a forest (I know this to be the Wookie homeworld only by name), but none of them really strike me as significant like those rich settings from the original films.  There are short cut scenes that move the story along, but much like the source material, lack the charm and heart that is characteristic of most LEGO movie adaptations.  You know something is wrong when you think the scene depicting Shmi Skywalker's death is kind of hilarious.

Overall, though, I have to admit, I had $5 worth of fun from LEGO Star Wars.  It wasn't a game I was excited to play, but it was fun enough to burn a few hours on, based entirely on my enjoyment of LEGO-styled games.  I would not buy this game on purpose, nor would I ever consider paying more than $5, but for what it is you could do worse, somehow.

Next month, our final installment

AND

the announcement of 2012's exciting monthly feature, it is going to be cool!

Twelve Months, Sixty Dollars and a Gameboy Advance: October

F24 Stealth Fighter
by Majesco

The fun thing about this project is the opportunity to discover great new games for a beloved system that are inexpensive.  The real joy is uncovering a DK: King of Swing or Sword of Mana.  The exact opposite of that is F24 Stealth Fighter.

I was dismayed last month when the Pirates of the Caribbean game turned out to be a pile.  Thanks to F24 Stealth Fighter, those look like the salad days.  Oh how I wish for a game as playable as Pirates...

As I might have mentioned, I'm not a big cockpit fighter gamer.  I like Blazing Angels for the Wii.  I like Rogue Leader and Rogue Squadron.  If it's going to be a cockpit fighter game for me, it needs to be intuitive and easy to control.  The fancier you get and the more complicated you make the controls the faster you lose me.  And if you are going to make the controls really complicated, you need to ease me into it so I get a chance to learn (the same goes for race car games, Alfa Romeo...) and then master.  Majesco didn't get this memo.  Either that or they simply do not love me.

Maybe less cockpit and more sky would help...

Oh sure, the first mission seems simple enough: take out some enemy fighter jets in straight combat over the ocean.  Easy.  Excepting that it is next to impossible to maneuver your stealth fighter, or if it is possible to maneuver it, it is impossible to know that you are doing it right.  Oh sure, I read the 4 pages of in-game instructions on how to pilot the craft (you only have to hold 2 buttons simultaneously to alter your thrust, you know, intuitive).  I realize that all you have to do is bank left or right and climb or dive.  It sounds simple enough.  I get where the radar is and what it says.  Heck, I even get the targeting system.  But "getting" those things and putting them to use are two very different things.

Once in the air, I was lost.  Turn this way or that, fine, but it is impossible to tell if you are moving forward and if so at what rate.  A point of reference would be great, anything, a big cloud, cresting waves in the water below, I'll take it.  Instead, nothing.  But, wait, here comes an enemy jet!  That's fine, focus on it and forget about the disorienting environment.  Here it comes....WHOOOOSH!  there it goes.  Turn, turn, turn!  Quick!  Turn around and get behind it.  No wait, don't roll!  Turn damn you.  Turn!  Wait, where did it go?  Did I turn? I know I rolled, but I think I turned.  I should at least be able to see it somewhere on the screen.  The radar says it should be right there.  Maybe if I speed up, I can catch it.  Which two buttons increase speed again?  There.  Did I do it?  No way to know.  Oh, wait here comes the jet again!  Shoot!  Shoot!   WHOOOOOOOSH.  There it goes again!  Turn!  Turn!  No!  NOT ROLL!  Dammit!  Now I'm upside down.  Great.  Where is the enemy jet now?  No way to know.  Radar says it is nearby.  Maybe it is under me.  Dive!  Get that bastard!  THUMP!  Shit.  Something shot me from behind!  Turn!  Turn!  Where is it?  This is stupid.  Wait, am I still diving?  Uh-oh....

And that was about all I could take.  I spent 3 more attempts very eerily similar to the one described above in an effort to learn how to play this game.  The game fought back hard and eventually won.  I tried to use the targeting display in the hopes that it would take some of the guess work out.  Chuck Testa with another realistic mount.  (yeah, I know it's an annoying meme, but it cracks me up).  Maybe it was the game, but I just couldn't crack this one.  So I spent about 30 minutes tops (as much as my $5 was really going to buy if the game didn't grab me) and then decided it was time to move on.

Speaking of things that crack me up and moving on, let's forget the horrible waste of $5 that was F24 Stealth Fighter and look forward to Thanksgiving coming up by watching this bizarre video:

See you at the end of November....

Twelve Months, 60 Dollars and a GBA: September

Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
by TDK

Here is exactly, word-for-word, how the meeting at TDK went about two months before this game was released:

Big Boss:  Great news folks!  We landed the rights to the new Disney movie based on the Pirates of the Caribbean ride.  Test markets suggest that this movie will be big.  If that is true, then a Pirates game will sell huge!

Mid-Level Executive:  Uh, sir.  Two months isn't anywhere close to enough time to create a tie-in game for this movie.

Big Boss:  Hmm. Yes, that is true.  Even with developers working around the clock, we wouldn't make it.  The bad news is, I already have the boys down in marketing working on the ad campaign.  Do we have any development teams already working on a pirate-themed game?

Mid-Level Executive:  Well, those guys down at Pocket Studios were working on a Sid Meier clone.

Big Boss:  Perfect!  Get them on the phone!  How far along is their progress?

Mid-Level Executive:  I think they are almost to playtesting.

Big Boss: More perfect!  Call down there and tell them that we need to make a few minor cosmetic changes to the game.  See how fast they can get me a demo.

Mid-Level Executive: Uh, sir?

Big Boss:  You're right, screw the demo, just take whatever they've got and get it over to the manufacturer. I want this game on the shelves in two weeks.

Mid-Level Executive: Yes sir.

Move along, nothing to see here.

There is a moral to this story:  Do not buy Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl for the Game Boy Advance.  Even if you see it for $5, or even $2.95 like I did.
Basically it's like a kids' game that really sucks.  Slow, low on action, and riddled with boorish tasks that create the illusion of a story where there really is none, and a virtually non-existent relationship to the movie that it is supposedly based upon.

I'll waste no more of your time this month, or mine: the wife wants me to play Earthbound (I'm a virgin)

Twelve Months, Sixty Dollars and a GameBoy Advance: August

DK: King of Swing
Nintendo/Paon

You reach a point where you feel like you know a little something about video games, about their history, and about the general world that they exist in.  You know all about things like the Konami code, you know about the easter egg screen in Adventure, and you can rattle off the names of all of the robot bosses in the Mega Man franchise in chronological order by game.  When it comes the the mainstream stuff, you feel like very little can surprise you.  Then, you are wandering around your local second hand and WHAMMO! there is it: DK: King of Swing.  I honestly felt like I knew about all of the games in the Donkey Kong franchise, even stuff like Donkey Kong Jr. Math, but here was a game bearing the beloved DK trademark, that was completely foreign to me.  Socrates, you humble me yet again.

"Idiot"

 So what is this bizarre little oddity tucked away in the GBA library and how is it that I had not heard of it?  $5 would easily reveal the answer.  As non-traditional as it can be, DK KoS is a platforming game that lives up to its name in every possible way.  Those evil Kremlings are at it again and Donkey Kong (Jr) must pursue the dastardly reptiles through various worlds to put an end to their machinations.  But not by running and jumping and rolling into things as he normally would, no in DK KoS you navigate the entire game by swinging.  You see this jungle is peppered with little pegs and DK must use his powerful arms to propel himself across perilous chasm, over deadly spikes, and past ferocious enemies if he is to complete his quest.  That's right the entire game is played by swinging DK around on these pegs.

It sounds odd I agree, but after about 5 minutes of playing, the charm of this game takes over and you get totally in to it.  Everything else from the world of Donkey Kong Country is there: launcher barrels, bananas, bouncy tires, those horrid horrid bees, even secret coins, bonus levels, and the familiar tunes!  The theming is right in line with everything you love from the SNES Donkey Kong games.  Only the style of the game play has changed.  Each level is made up of 5 chapters (and you can usually pick from two) and then a final boss fight that grants access to the next level.  Due to the unconventional control scheme and game play, the boss fights are very fresh and inventive and avoid repetition that one might suspect in a game that strays from the norm.

When I say unconventional control scheme, I mean it.  The entire game is played using nearly only the left and right shoulder buttons.  With these you control which hand DK grabs the peg with and therefore which directions he swings.  Press both and he will jump straight up.  Hold both and charge for a powered jump that can also take out most enemies.  The A and B buttons are used only for power ups to either regain lost hit points or give you a temporary invincibility with which you can take out the toughest enemies or jump extra high.  That's it.  It might take a while to get used to this non-traditional control set-up (early on I nicknamed the game Donkey Kong Hand Cramps), but once you adjust, you will be swinging through the levels in no time.

That is not to say DK:KoS is not without its challenge.  While the game is on the shorter side, it is not a breeze.  Getting a handle on the controls takes time, and then mastering the skills to clear each level will ask for patience and practice and LOTS of bananas.  And of course this would not be a DK game without secrets, and there are plenty.  At the time of writing this my file is a little over 50% and I am going back to look for more secrets.  It is nuts how easy the earlier levels are, even the ones that gave me fits, after playing the more advanced levels, but the good news is, the fun doesn't really diminish, and for me that is the true strength of the SNES Donkey Kong Country games.  DK: King of Swing carries on that tradition in a most peculiar way on the GBA and is WELL worth the measly $5 I paid for it.  If you see it, pick it up!

12 Months, Sixty Dollars and a GBA: July

Sword of Mana
from Squaresoft

STEAL ALERT!!!

If you like a good RPG with solid game play, plenty of depth and a LOT of story, you can do no better than Sword of Mana for the GBA.  I kid you not.  For $5 this game is an absolute steal.  I am not a big Secret of Mana fan (I know, gasp all you like), and when I saw this game in the case at Must Have Movies and More (they changed their name, don't look at me like that) I was curious, but not hopeful.  Word of mouth had confirmed my fears and said that the game wasn't very good.  So I hesitated.  For 6 months, I looked at this game in the case and passed.  I passed it up for winners like A Sound of Thunder.  I was an idiot.

Sword of Mana is an incredible RPG that follows the adventures of a pair of youths whose fates are inexorably intertwined with the Mana Tree.  A great evil is trying to bend the power of Mana to its own dark purposes and it is the destiny of these two adventurers to prevent that from happening.  It's an old story, but it's tried and true.  When your adventure begins you may select from either the male or female character and your story will unfold accordingly.  Right off the bat, this means you get two games for the price of one.  I selected the girl story because I'm like that.  As the game unfolds you do normal RPG stuff, traveling from town to town and battling various enemies.  The battles are real time action battles, not turn based, which is kind of nice.  Turn based battling can be tedious if not properly executed.  As your adventure progresses you'll build experience and obtain different weapons.  You'll also befriend mana spirits that will enable you to use different kinds of magic based on the weapon you are wielding. 

It's all fairly standard RPG stuff, but it is a lot of fun.  There is also a surprising amount of depth in unexpected places.  Around the world, you can find different materials with which you can forge and temper your weapons and armor to improve them and give them different elemental properties.  You can also grow and harvest special fruits and vegetables that will change your weapons' attributes.  Exploring the powers and abilities of each weapon and mana spirit makes the normal grinding associated with RPG's much more enjoyable. There is plenty of fun to be had just toying around with this aspect of the game.
I will warn you, however, Sword of Mana is very story heavy.  There are sections of the game where you will spend upwards of 15 minutes just pressing A to advance the plot.  While this isn't terrible, there are a couple of places where you spend this time, enter a boss fight, lose and then have to repeat the button pressing to get back to the battle.  A save point would be nice after long swaths of story like that.  If you are into story-driven RPG's, then I can imagine no better game for you.  I did my best to follow the plot along, but it is very dense and I get the sense you cannot casually observe and get the full story.

Overall, Sword of Mana is an incredible steal for only $5.  There are easily 40 hours of game play here(80 if you play both stories) and pretty much every bit of it is engaging and fun. The story runs a bit long in parts, but this game has the good feel of a Square product (you know, pre-FFX) and promises to be a good time for RPG fans.  If you see this game for $5 like I did, do not pass it up, like I almost did!

Girl on Girl Games: Lovely Lisa

I'll admit it: I usually come down on the side opposite staunch feminism, because I feel the extreme view robs femininity of its inherent value in favor of masculine attributes. I celebrate the things about womanhood that enrich our lives and, in turn, the world. I like skirts, nail polish, and sewing. I generally do all the cooking here in the Electric Frankfurter kitchen. But, I also salute the strides made by women throughout history that have made it possible for me to also enjoy things beyond that sphere--like job opportunities, generalized education and birth control.

I think I usually give "girl games" more of a pass because I know there are bigger battles out there. If a girl likes a Barbie doll, what's the harm? Barbie has had all kinds of careers and drives a Corvette. She's had lots of wedding dresses, but somehow, she's never settled down. Barbie is practically an independent woman. 

Then, there's Lovely Lisa. No game, not even Chronotrigger, has so successfully pulled off time-traveling in such a thorough way.

Lisa appears to be a doll, but a thirty-five second internet search only revealed other dolls and a few porn websites, so I'm forced to assume this doll doesn't exist in this country. She, and her doll-like family are here to help young girls, ages 5 and under, learn to be nice young ladies. That's not my choice of words: it's the game's own parlance.

Lisa's world is represented as a town. From the town, you may access Lisa's home to perform household chores, the "career center" to try out "fun jobs", or the "charm school", where you can learn ladylike talents. Other options from this screen allow you to buy or design outfits for Lisa with points earned in the other activities.

 First, home. Lisa's mom looks a little tired to me, like perhaps she's been downing a lot of little yellow pills while running for the shelter of her "mother's little helper." And who could blame her? She's been busy, what with having six children under the age of 6, buying them all matching outfits with ribbons and bows. Dad seems like a nice guy, though; a little young for the father of a large family, but what the heck? I'm sure he can afford it.

From here, Lisa can choose various household tasks that are appropriate for a girl to do. When she helps mom, she can do the laundry, the cooking, or the shopping! Helping out with her younger siblings yields cleaning and babysitting chores--and finally, helping Dad allows her to build furniture. This is Dad's only possible chore.