Plants vs. Zombies – Game Review

We all know a bout Pop Cap, the little indie game company that gave the world such cell phone games as bejeweled, and the widely popular Peggle. Well the masters of bored housewives games have now struck gold with their newest game, Plants vs. Zombies, a tower defense game that takes the new hottest villians on the block, zombies, and faces them against cuddly looking plant life. (Seriously, zombies have been coming up a lot recently. Not complaining :3) Tower defense games mostly populate the internet browser world of flash games, and consist of the user building an army of different types to defeat another army of different types, and to otherwise keep that secondary army from passing your defenses. Simple enough concept that Pop Cap has taken to a completely different level.

You thought it was going to just be a simple day. The sun is shining, your grass is cleanly cut, oh and a horde of zombies are calmly waiting to eat your brains across the street. Guess it’s time to do some gardening! Plants vs. Zombies makes you think quick on your feet as you choose between 48 different zombie fighting plants to face off against the crafty 26 types of zombies. Each new level in Adventure mode brings a new plant to your arsenal and a different variation of zombies to kill. With 50 levels in the adventure mode and multiple mini-games, puzzle modes, and survivor stages, you’ll never stop planting.

Something about this game just pulls you toward it’s creativity. First off I just love the zombies (and if you know me then you know I just love zombies.) Their are so many different shapes and forms that they come invading on your lawn in. From the normal zombies, to the traffic cone zombie, to the pogo zombie, and others like the bungee zombie. It just adds so many different levels of challenges to this game, but with those challenges come the different types of plants like the sunflower, the peashooter, and the repeater. It’s just a downright fun game that’ll have you enjoying every new add-on you get. Endless puzzle mode, survivor mode and the great Zen garden all help give this game longevity even after you’ve unlocked everything else.

I haven’t even mentioned one of the funniest parts of the game. Your good buddy throughout this entire ordeal, Crazy Dave. Dave will who up right from the start stating the obvious zombie invasion and just starts off with the craziest lines you could think of. When it finally comes down to defending your lawn, the best tip I could give you is to keep your sunflowers protected. Earning sun is the only way you can win against the undead intruders. Each plant has some amount of sun before they can be planted. The sunflower costs 50, the basic peashooter costs 100, the frozen peashooter costs 175, the walnut costs 50, the tallnut (n_n best character) costs 125, and it goes on and on. When you unlock the night mode and pool mode in adventure you get two plants that cost no sun, since during these events sunlight doesn’t naturally fall.

Alright, now to move on the few flaws. It’s a Pop Cap game so you know that it will have a repetitive nature to it (if you stick by it’s sense of humor and cute characters or not…) If you can stick by this game until the end you’ll find that the difficulty really doesn’t rise up at all. Sure the last boss can be a bit difficult the first time around, but he’ll be easy once you know all of his moves. Certain mini-games can be a bit challenging as well, but nothing that can’t be handled. You can also play the adventure mode over again with a harder difficulty, but if you’ve unlocked all the plants and have learned the basics of the game you still won’t find it to be difficult. I’m not going to knock it though, this game is unbelievably fun and with just those two flaws I really don’t see why you wouldn’t pay ten bucks on Steam to own it.

Plants vs Zombies Music Video that follows the credits of the game. It’s similar to last years hit title Portal’s ending song and is just as enjoyable. n_n

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Rating: 4/5

Pros: Great Humor. Best Tower Defense Game I’ve ever played. Lovable Characters. Thriller Zombies. :3

Cons: Can be repetitive if that bothers you. On the easy side.

Fast Food Panic! – Quick Review

If you’ve ever played Cooking Mama and have said to yourself…”What the f%#@ is the point of this game?!”…Then Fast Food Panic is for you. Fast Food Panic is a game for both the Nintendo Wii and the Nintendo Dual Screen (which is the version I played) and as obviously stated, it’s a cooking game. But, unlike Cooking Mama, you’re not just cooking for the pure enjoyment of letting it go to waste! No no! You’re cooking for your own little restaurant, with your own paying customers, and your waitress that runs the front of the house. You as the chef have a dream of having the greatest restaurant there is! This gives the game a goal to reach toward, unlike the stated competitor.

Alright, no more bashing Cooking Mama. Fast Food Panic starts off by giving the player a great manga like style fresh from Japan. It makes beating each level more enjoyable only because you know that afterward you’ll be enjoying a funny little short with your two main characters. Getting through each level to get to those shorts involve pleasing your paying customers. During the first stage the inspiring chef is introduced to sushi, which is easy enough to make. Two swoops with the stylus from a rice container (this game sometimes demands perfection when doing some tasks…for example if you don’t place the tip of the stylus just right you may not scoop up anything), a bit of pushing together to form a nice rice patty, and then a little memorization game for the two toppings and there you are! A nice sushi dish for your parturient. How well you preformed creating the dish will effect how much joy your customer gets from it. Each step in creating the dish is rated from bad, good, great, and perfect. It’s not hard to achieve a perfect, but accidents do happen and as the player will learn, this game can become very hectic very quickly. Different types of customers ranging from your average people, to critics, to the fatter customers who will order up 5 meals at a time, all help give this game a different challenge. Even the front of the house chips in with it’s own problems. It seems the customers have finished eating so you’ll have to tell the waitress to clean it up. Oh a mouse is running a muck? Call the waitress! Some guests have arrived! Don’t forget to greet them! Sometimes she’ll even scream for help that will trigger a brief mini-game that can include, ringing up the total bill, cleaning off a table, putting away the dishes, or even delivering food. All these of these events add to the joy meter that must be filled before the time runs out to beat each stage.

This would be the perfect little title for the Nintendo DS if it wasn’t for a few big flaws…

The first being the actual length of the game. This game only gives you fifteen stages. Fifteen! That’s nothing for a game like this! Most player will be able to breeze through this game in just a day and it’s really a sad fact! Sure you can play a harder difficulty if you haven’t already, but it just doesn’t seem as enjoyable without the expectation of a new challenge.

The next problem with this game is the lack of multiplayer! How am I suppose to play against my girlfriend if their isn’t even an option for it! We both loved this game but it just seems to spit in our face!

Last but not least…the mini games. They’re so passable that it just seems like they threw them in. I understand that the NDS was meant to be played with the stylus but when all you’re doing is furiously rubbing at the screen with no real reward at the end…why do it? The game is just making an excuse to scratch up the screen. Not all of the mini games are bad of course just a few really spoil the bunch.

Fast Food Panic…you could have been so great! Why, why did your developers gimp you so badly? It’s an enjoyable game, but don’t pay full price for it!

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Rating: 3/5

Pros: Strong gameplay elements. Enjoyable art style.
Cons: Way too short! Lackluster mini games! No multiplayer!

Land of the Lost (2009) – Movie Review

Land of the Lost is originally a kids television show that aired back in 1974. It was produced by the Krofft brothers, Sid and Marty. The characters that starred on the show were the Marshall family, Rick, Will, and Holly Marshall, who were on a ordinary expedition when suddenly something went wrong and found themselves falling randomly into a waterfall. When they awoke, they came to a strange world where they came face to face with dinosaurs, primate called the Pakuni (which were kind of interrupted as early forms human beings) , and the lizard species, the Sleestak.

A remake of the 1974 series was done in the early 1990’s which became one of my FAVORITE kid shows. I always wanted that DAGGER. >.< They only changed the names of the characters with a few more additional characters to the cast.

Now, in mythology or in science fiction, there came a time when people have talked about early human lifestyles and what type of other species that existed. I’m not too familiar with the subject, but they were labeled as the reptilian humanoids. Basically there saying that back in the day, human beings weren’t the only superior race with the ability to dominate the Earth. However, there are thousands of articles portraying another story saying we evolved from them or the unknown wars that early human beings won in order to continue to survive up until now.

In many cases, I do remember reptile like human beings used in video games during my SNES era. A great example would be Chrono Trigger, where you travel to nearly 10,000 BC (I think) to help Ayla, the prehistoric warrior fight the mighty lizard king that threaten to kill off the human race.

Anywhoooooo…

Land of the Lost in 2009 became a big budget film starring Will Ferrell as Dr. Rick Marshall, Anna Friel as Holly Cantrell, and Danny McBride as Will Stanton. The film is directed by Brad Silberling. If your a fan of the original TV show, this is a definite must see film due to the fact that most of things that occur during the film is based off the 1974 TV show.

The story starts out on television broadcast as Matt Lauer is hosting the Today show and is interviewing Dr. Rick Marshall. He discusses his research and asks him to explain it a little more in detail. Rick explains his theory on time warps and how it will save the world. After hearing about Rick’s theory, Matt was speechless and like everybody else, he labeled him as a nutcase and he's out of his mind. The interview went from bad to worse when Rick nearly attacked Matt.

Since that interview, Rick has been laughed at, and was nearly pushed down the latter in the science field to a teacher at George C. Page Museum where he gave his presentation about a device that can work to create time warps, the Tachyon amplifier. When all seemed lost for Rick, a very attractive woman came to his classroom and confronted him about his research. She introduced herself as Holly Cantrell and encouraged him to go back into his research. Rick had opposing decisions to whether or not continue his research and to create the device, but after a long night, Rick developed the Tachyon amplifier.

With no time to waste Holly and Rick traveled out to seek out a signal which the amplifier can detect and exert the particles which cause a tear in time and space for developing time warps. They get a strong reading in a cave and see that it is a tourist attraction, The Devils Cave. They meet up with the tour guide, Will Stanton and they head out into the cave in a raft.

As they are traveling in the cave, the device reacts to nearby particles and cause the cave to shift in the water path’s movement. The raft was traveling on its own downward as Will claimed he doesn’t know what is going on. Eventually the raft is lead into a waterfall as everybody onboard it fall.

Our main characters wake up in a parallel world where many things from 10,000 BC to anything from modern time where piled like garbage around the sand. The view of the sky looked as if they were on a different planet.

Holly is amazed by the accomplishment and looks toward Rick and asks him what this all means now.

Rick promptly is proud of his accomplishment and entering the Land of the Lost and proudly shouts, “Yes…I know what this means, MATT LAUER CAN SUCK IT!”

Aside from everybody else that was watching the film, I enjoyed it very much. I knew this film was going to be awesome for me at least since I knew the entire back story and it was really fun to see something from my childhood brought to life in a parody like CGI film. I admit, there are parts in the film that seemed like…ugh or meh…but it was all for the randomness I guess. And there were hilarious parts such as the GIANT Enemy Crab. xD

All in all, I give it a 3 out of 5 based on only the film ALONE.

FanBoy Statistic – 5 out of 5

Pixar’s UP – Movie Review

A few words for the audience.

I just wanted to start this review off by stating a few key things about the average movie theater viewer. You’re all a bunch of dickholes. Excuse me for being one of those few people who actually enjoy watching a movie they just spent good money for. Why? Why is it so hard for people to just put away their god damn cell phones for a close to two hour movie? You phony fucks growing up nowadays. Do you see those messages that us regular movie viewers must deal with because of assholes like you? Can’t you just put that piece of shit phone away, shut your fucking mouth, and for GOD SAKES just sit down and enjoy the film? Better yet..wait until the movie is on DVD and just sit at home and do your little fucking texting, that way your parents can actually see what worthless offspring they’ve given birth to.  What’s with these bitches nowadays who have to yell out their emotions during a film?

Bitch 1: Oh my god..that’s going to make me cry!
Bitch 2: That is SOOO funny!!
jb: *bashes their fucking skulls open*
jb: NO! You don’t say an emotion..you do it! Stop failing at life!

Oh..and if I ever see anyone taking pictures in front of me..let alone two sets of bitches letting off two flashes at the same time while the trailers are playing I will take the cameras and smash them against the walls. O___o Fucking kids these days are just ridiculous.

Now on to the movie!

In Pixar’s nature UP begins with a short called Partly Cloudy.

This cute little story takes the idea of the baby delivering stork and explains where these birds actually retrieve the precious newborns. Up in the skies the friendly clouds sculpt these babies (be it human or animal) out of the fluffy clouds and brings them to life with a bit of lightning. Gus, the main character and a bit of a loner compared to the other clouds, is a master at crafting only the most dangerous babies. Crocodiles, porcupines, rams, and other newborns all cause trouble for Gus’s ever so loyal stork Peck. But, when the babies become a bit too much to handle (hilarious outcomes with each one), poor Peck leaves Gus to find a new cloud friend. Gus’s emotions become eratic as he causes a thunderstorm followed by a brief rainstorm. Peck soon returns to Gus with a gift of football equipment to make him more suited for Gus’s dangerous newborns…that is until the eel comes. It’s a great little short that really gets you into the mood to watch UP.

I hope that five minute short really did lighten your mood, because after the first fifteen minutes of UP, you may just be crying in your seats and clinging to any love ones you may have near you. A very emotional twist leaves our main protagonist, Carl Fredricksen, a grumpy old man with sad thoughts of promises he could not keep to the love of his life. When life becomes too hard to stand, Fredricksen decides to finally keep one important promise he had made to his wife Ellie, to fly their home to Paradise Falls in South America. Carl met Ellie when they were both young after watching their idol Charles Muntz, a great explorer who traveled to far off lands with his canine companions. Using countless helium balloons, Fredricksen lifts up his house from it’s foundations and sets off on his adventure, urbanites to him that he had a stowaway. Russell, a Wilderness Explorer who happened to visit Carl the day before trying to earn his “assisting the elderly” badge, had returned the day of Fredrickson’s lift off because he had supposedly found the “snipe” that Carl had sent him out to find the day before. After the duo find trouble passing through large storm, they eventually end up in South America, on the wrong side of Paradise Falls. This is when the truly hilarious parts of the movie begin. You also meet (in my opinion) the most lovable characters Pixar has ever created.

 

Even as you just meet Dug the dog you just fall in love with him…sorta like how he falls in love with Carl when they first meet.

Dug: My name is Dug. I have just met you, and I love you.
[he jumps up on Carl]
Carl Fredricksen: Wha...
Dug: My master made me this collar. He is a good and smart master and he made me this collar so that I may speak. Squirrel!
[looks to distance for a few seconds]

Dug is thought of as an outcast of the pack. He’s tricked by the group leader Alpha into going out for a special mission (which is supposedly going to be a short on the DVD release). Like the rest of the pack, Dug is searching for the bird creature that was the cause of his master’s, Charles Muntz, lose of reputation and fame. On his search he meets and befriends Fredrickson and Russell and discovers that they have also found and befriended the bird who Russell quickly names Kevin. Dug requests Kevin become his prisoner in the cutest fashions. The group is eventually found by Muntz and taken aboard his airship as welcomed guests only to leave as his sworn enemy when it’s discovered that they’re protecting the bird. This leads to later actions scenes and that usual life changing event for the main character.

This is an all around great movie for any age. The humor is just spot on, the emotions are true to life, Dug and Kevin are beyond lovable. (I want the Disney store plush of him. o_o) You’ll want this film in your collection as soon as it comes out on DVD so you can watch it’s lovable goodness over and over again! Words just can’t do this movie justice, it’s something that shouldn’t be spoiled in a review but should be shared with good friends.

Rating: 5/5

Star Trek "The Future Begins" - Movie Review

Star Trek, is an original American science fiction show created by Gene Roddenberry that aired in 1966 to 1969. The story took place in a futuristic universe about the captain and his crew members in a starship called The Enterprise in deep space. This original series was cancelled due to low ratings upon its third season however spawned a large fan based community which soon lead to conventional events and literally a society of star trek fan. Due to the massive popularity, people soon began to produce their own stories, short films, plays, and many more creative works of art.

Over the course of the many years, new shows were produced such as the animated series in 1973, Star Trek: Phase II in 1978, The Next Generation in 1987 (my birth year) to 1994, Deep Space Nine in 1993-1999, and Voyager in 1995-2001. Because of the fans, the Star Trek franchise has made it up to our present day.

And so…in 2009, in celebration of a 40 year old franchise, director J. J. Abrams and Paramount Pictures gives us “Star Trek” (2009).

As I was overly hyped out and excited, I noticed a very unfamiliar presence in the air. There were more old people then young people, but it didn’t bother me when I saw a group of thirty year olds cosplaying! Yes, I saw old school fanboys, and fangirls dressing up as their favorite character from Star Trek. It was pretty exciting to see this! I’m so glad my cousins came over all the way from Utica, NY. Because of them, I got to see one of the greatest summer movies to watch!

The story starts off as the film opens with the starship, USS Kelvin, where it was travelling in space until a massive black hole appeared out of nowhere. Moments later a space battle ship with very advanced weaponry comes out of the black hole firing at the USS Kelvin. The Captain of the mysterious battleship makes contact with Kelvin and orders that the captain come aboard their ship. The Captain had no choice, but to travel to an unknown ship in order to secure the safety of his crew, he tells First Commander James Tiberius Kirk he is now the captain and if he doesn’t return in 15 minutes, evacuate the ship. He heads out to the ship that is later told to the audience that it is a Romulan mining ship, the Narada, commanded by Nero, a rogue Romulan.

The captain of the Kelvin is killed in confusion when he was conversing with Nero when the captain revealed the year it currently was and where were they from. As Nero killed him, he ordered his men to destroy the USS Kelvin. Acting Captain James Kirk ordered everybody to evacuate as well as his pregnant wife who was delivering the baby at that moment. His wife shouts for Kirk to escape from the bridge to the escape pod, he tells her he will be on his way; he just needs to enable autopilot. As he attempts to tell the computer to set it to autopilot, the computer responds that the autopilot program was destroyed and only has manual pilot ability.

Over the headset, Kirk tells his wife that he can’t make it and hears the sound of his baby. As the ship is being destroyed, Kirk focuses on the conversation with his wife asking her what the name of the child should be. They decide that he should be named after himself, James Tiberius Kirk, Jim for short. The escape pod launches as the USS Kelvin is at a collision course for impact with Narada.

And so, from this point on, it explains the story of the child, James Tiberius Kirk, and his remarkable adventure that had very heart pounding thrill ride throughout the ENTIRE FILM from being a nobody to the future captain of the USS Enterprise and coming face to face with his unchangeable destiny.

I won’t be talking more about the story because I’ll just be giving out spoilers. Anyway, on to the next thing, seeing Zachary Quinto, the guy who plays Syler in Heroes, plays as Spock who is known to become the 1st Commander of the USS Enterprise (Co-Captain). Seeing him in the trailer, I laughed so hard, but when I was watching this film, he really did disappear into his role. He is definitely a great actor and has a lot potential for future films.

Asides from seeing Zachary, there is someone else in the film that made the audience literally pop their eye balls!!!!! I won’t spoil it, this is part of the movie experience, and when you see that person, YES that IS the ORIGINAL actor from the 1960 Star Trek series! ^_^

Sidd gives this movie a 10/10! I WILL WATCH IT AGAIN! INVITE ME IF YOU ARE GOING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Paper Airplane Chase vs. Birds & Beans – Game Review

If you’ve given into the slave of buying the newest technology out there and you’re also a rabid fan of Nintendo, then you’ve most likely picked up the newest Nintendo Dual Screen model, the DSi. What is the DSi? Well it’s a remake of the DS Lite with a thinner body, larger screens, dual cameras both inside of the machine and on the outside shell, a smudge free shell, and a Wii style menu to choose which of your downloads you will be playing. Yes, the DSi also adds a store to the mix, which will hopefully have Super Mario Bros. 3 in it in the near future…wink wink…but back to the store. Buying the DSi gives the customer 1,000 free points to throw around at the few selections given at launch. A few of the better choices include Dr. Mario Express and Warioware: Snapped! which actually brings great use to that camera that’s always point at you from inside your DSi. But for this review I’ll be focusing on two mindless games that are respectively said in the title. Both only cost 200 points, so if you really only have that much to spend, maybe my review will help.

Paper Airplane Chase

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to play as one of those paper airplanes you’ve fondly made in your third period English class? Able to completely control it as the aerodynamic paper flies through a castle full of transparent walls that, with a single touch, can make the poor plane explode into tiny little pieces? Well now you can with this mini-game taken right from Warioware. Simply put, this game just involves the player controlling their paper airplane’s decent down a spiral castle, trying to avoid those stated transparent walls. Sometimes they move, sometimes their big, sometimes their tiny, and sometimes they make narrow paths, all together forming as many possibilities as you can get by.

The Player can choose between three options:

1. Endless Mode. Fly your plane for as long as you can last while the game records how many floors you’ve descended and the speed at which you’ve cleared them.

2. Time Attack. Fly as fast as you can through eight stages. Likely you won’t score higher then 20 and after which there is nothing to do unless you really want to get under the 10 second barrier for bragging rights. Just so you know, no one will care. :/

3. Race. Well this is fairly simple. One player flies the white plane using the left and right diagonal pad, while the second player flies the red flag using the Y and A buttons. First to the goal wins. I would have liked to see a “race the computer” option.

All around it’s a good timewaster, which any game costing 200 points will likely be. I’ve heard that a few hi scores for endless mode have been around the 160 range, while my own sad score stands at 64 so far. :D But I’ll keep going at it.

Birds & Beans

Maybe you want something a little more difficult, something you feel like you’ll be playing for days on end just to get a higher score. Something..Something that reminds you of Yoshi! Birds & Beans as well as Birds & Beans 2 (unlocked in game after playing the first game 10 times or beating the high score of 10,000) is a crafty little game in which you play as this small bird with a Yoshi sized tongue, whose trying to get his grub on. The thing is, that he’s on  this easily breakable floor, and if any of the beans fall all the way to the floor it breaks away. This leaves the player awaiting a white bean that is able to fix a piece of the ground or a flashing white bean that not only fixes a lot of the broken pieces (believe me..by then you’ll be on a small island) and also destroys all beans in play. The longer you go without getting bonked on the head, the more points you can make. Also the higher the bean is the more points you can get for each grab. Altogether a very challenging game that I could see myself trying to beat until three in the morning.

Verdict

Both games can equally a waste of time (which is the purpose of their existence.) Paper Airplanes has a multiplayer mode, while Birds & Beans is really two similar games in one. If you can afford both games then I would say waste the 400 points. They’ll be enjoyable between those times when you’re sick of seeing your pokemon or playing hatsworth. If you can only afford one, then I would go with Birds & Beans. The mascot is cute and the game is quite a challenge.

Winner: Birds & Beans

Rest in peace little friend u_u

Today the world lost the hardest little rocking guinea pig. You were always there to play some rock band with or just to squeak. We hope the best for our little friend Spazz and hope that he passed gently. Please leave fond comments if you can.

Rest in peace Spazz. u_u <3

A few photos:

View Full Album