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Saturday, June 20, 2015

Woke up Angry.



Has your subconscious ever screamed at you to quit your job? Because the other day mine handed over the reins in a huff. Within seconds of consciousnesses I was fuming over the gulf of how much I loved my job when I started to how shafted and rejected I feel now. That's never happened to me before and it concerns me for a couple reasons.

One, sleep's never come easy to me in the first place and it seems my nocturnal side may be presenting a sort of ultimatum. Because I wake up exhausted every single day now. It's not... depression, I've been down that road and I remember what it looks like. So what the hell is this?

Two... I ain't exactly hauling in marlins when it comes to the job hunt. This is good money for the hours and I genuinely like all my co-workers. Though I haven't been much for conversation the last week or two. A lot of my friends jumped ship as well and I guess I should take the hint. 

2 years at some restaurant isn't worth loosing sleep over. I need to hunker down and see if my measly English degree can get me a real job. Jesus god I'm tired.

Tuesday, June 16, 2015

Naughty Dog is still killing it.


I thought F4 broke my excit-o-meter, because nothing after that even moved the needle. Sure, stuff looked rad as hell, namely that new Ratchet and clank business. But nothing jumped out at me.

But then I was all "I got time for Naughty Dog. they made my first video game and they've nary let me down since."

That was the best driving sequence I'd ever seen! It wasn't a game of chase the way point, you had to figure out how to strategically avoid that truck and even though the player had all the answers he still broke every fencepost and fruit stand in that city and won my physics heart.

These muthers are just incapable of phoning it in!



Sunday, June 14, 2015

Fallout is Minecraft! Minecraft is Fallout!


If he'd ask nicely... I'd kiss that man and so would you.
I'm uhh... I'm indisposed. I expected F4 to be good, this is so much more. Putting Borderland's piecemeal gun parts into the guiding hands of the player is one thing. Being able to tear the raw material out of the game's walls and make "Your Town, USA" is another thing. Making power armor not just a piece of armor, but it's own gameplay element complete with a motherf**king jet pack is another thing.

Also, V.A.T.S. is back... you can play as a woman... 11-10-15... dogs are cool.

I'm gonna lie down.



The Witcher 3 is like... really long, you guys.


I planned on finishing it up and reviewing it days ago. But this is an absolutely massive game in ways I'd not expected. It puts Inquisition to shame in just about every respect and I quite liked that game. I've played the main quest line almost exclusively, I even failed a bunch of missions just because I wanted to power through what I thought would be the end game.

But it turns out the final act is exactly that. An ACT. Not a single dungeon crawl, not a half-assed finale battle, but a solid 10 hour ACT. When most games are passing out on the finish line, Witcher 3 is gearing up for another mile.

An extra mile, you might say.

Thursday, June 11, 2015

Oh... HELLO Tales from the Borderlands. Nice of you to start to begin to join us.



June 23? I'm trying to understand. I know you live all the way out in California and it takes alot for you to make time for me. I just wish you'd talk to me first, though. You keep saying you can make it out every 2 months. But the last time it took 4 and this time it'll be an even 3. I don't mind waiting. But it would have been nice to hear something, hell, ANYTHING about this a month ago.

I love our time together, seriously, you've been incredible. I'm starting to think... there's someone else.


Tuesday, June 9, 2015

Avellone has left the building.


Chris Avellone, chief creative officer, and head writer of my favorite game ever made... has left Obsidian. This dashes my hopes for a true successor to New Vegas to ever exist and that stings really hard.

He's the best writer in the business and his work at Obsidian was tremendous. Between NV, South Park, and Pillars of Eternity his reign was truly supreme. My bet is he'll probably end up with his buds at inXile, as he co-wrote their next game. Maybe that was cause for termination? Maybe.

Sunday, June 7, 2015

Hannibal, Antipasto: Review


This, unlike any other show that's ever aired, doesn't give a single f**k about what you think. It's going to do what it wants, when it wants to. It's going to blare an out of tune pipe organ in your ear while a woman passes out after pulling the entire length of her arm from a dead man's throat.

This is a bizarre, violent, show that follows more of a nightmare dream logic than a real story structure. This season it's decided to completely reinvent itself after last season's "get out of contract free" cliffhanger that left nearly every single main character bleeding out in Hannibal's mansion. Hannibal has coerced Bedelia (his former therapist and now "wife") into being his European camouflage. As he murders his way into a respectable position curating an Italian art exhibit. He straight up sits in his competition's office feasting on the man's liver so he can give that man's wife a cute little shock.

There hasn't been a horror film in years with this kind goofy, yet enthralling, kind of sadism. This is the one-of-a-kind folded steel carving knife to SAW's blunted cleaver. It makes sumptuous visual high art out of a mumble core penny dreadful script. And thankfully, IMDB tells me everyone's contract renewed, so the core cast will show up... eventually.

Not before Hannibal showed us that they totally could have built a show around just the two of them and part of me wishes they had. Settling into life with a possessive monster has a lot to do with bath tub based dream sequences and trips to unsettling, and fancy, Italian butcher shops. How come our butcher shops don't have rabbits and game hens hung up to bleed? Thanks, FDA.

Antipasto is a day in the life. All story threads that seem to lead to further intrigue are surgically dealt with by Hannibal's indiscriminate and defensive hand. It's a short film rather than an episode, capped off with Bedelia staring longingly at a train station security camera. Screaming for help on the inside. There's even a film within a film and it's some of the best character work in the series to date. Did you think Hannibal made Eddie Izzard just eat his own leg and then killed him? No. No he didn't. It's the greatest character send off I think I've ever seen. It's slow, horrific, and hypnotizing.

Apparently the Red Dragon is going to feature this season too, but to be honest... I'm already stuffed.