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maligna87
Reviews
Makurosu furontia (2008)
Big promises... very bad effect...
I saw many Macross series, I guess my favorite one was Macross 7 as it at least had a lot of quite decent music, as most Macross had...
Macross Forntier however is absolutely based on it's visual side, with no other aspects taken care off. We can see a quite nice display of machinery, sci-fi equipment and themes that are most valid for such series, but on the other hand, they are mostly CG, it's one of those "Computer Made" animes, not a drawn one, like Cowboy Bebop Movie, Zone of The Enders, and quite a lot of rest. I do respect hard work people once put in their crations, but as I see computer-generated models, rendered and such, I know the work was much simplified and it's obvious I'd rather vote for a hard working animator that draws every scene one by one, and not only fix some 3D props, mixing them in shape of action-scene.
It does look nice, flashy, catchy, but as it's only thing this series has it does earn this one star. Whole rest, is awful...
Starting with Music! Unlike Macross 7 where band of our main hero - a weird champ with difficult but mysterious character, played us some nice Rock music, in Frontier we are back to most cheep, cheesy pop that hurts your ears the moment you hear it. It's so 'sweet' emotional gibberish, where words like: kiss, lover, my heart, baby are tossed against the listener's face like it was a bukkake party with rapist gummy-bears. Absolutely no style, kinds of songs that has no rhythm and you can't remember them even if you try, that's cause they are this cheapest kind of pop you can hear every year at any station, that gets outdated after a month and no one seems to remember it. Amount of pop music and color of "PINK" is sooo intense you simply BEG someone spills a bucket of black paint over your eyes for just a second.
Heroes: They have no characters, and every single one is a huge cliché of stereotype already knew from THOUSANDS of other animes. They are all perfect, beautiful, skillful, good, they have no floods(with minor exceptions) it's like watching a Barbie or Pony movie, in space... Main characters are AGAIN school kids who pilot GIANT ROBOTS and are only one's who can save the Galaxy, before EVIL consumes it. - Read this sentence once more and perform a palm face, now... I command you! So, those kids are basically this obvious scheme, we spend day at school and at night, we get into our huge robots and fight, just to go back to school and pretend like nothing happened or thousands of people haven't died at all. Be ready for tears, not yours, but tears of our protagonists, as they spill them in gallons, mourning any tragedy, starting from stepping on the tiniest grass leaf - what in this ULTRA-politically correct world is seen as act of terrorism. Everyone there is so hot that a cover of a DVD with all of characters displayed might be even mistaken for a hentai-porn. It's literally like a Sope Opera, but with no sense of humor, instead everything is taken seriously, with not even a trace of cynicism or sarcasm - what makes it even worse to watch.
Story... Is there any? A city-spaceship along with whole fleet is attacked one day by an ugly robo-bug enemy that slays humans for no particular reason and so our main hero enlists to become a pilot, so he and his 14-17 year old friends can save universe of hot schoolgirls that happen to be mostly army officers in mini-skirts.
And I wasn't sure if the main man of the series was actually a man at all. At first I tough It was a girl, basically most people there are girls, even if they claim to speak like men, and if not flat chests you would never have guessed. There is no sense no connection between scenes, things happen like in bad action game, where all of the sudden you are suppose to fight other enemies and so cut-scenes along with story are simply an excuse to introduce more "WeirdShit"! Come to think of it... it has more to do with Serious Sam series then with Macross I remember.
So... Let's sum it up shall we? It's just unbearable experience. This anime is a pain to your imagination, and insult to your intellect... unless you are completely brainless. Characters are spoon shallow copies of clichés, of clichés that were made of old clichés: Characters 0/10
Kids saving world in name of ideals, love, stuff like that, also unoriginal idea, that was already made so many times it's absolutely below any grade. Story 1/10
If it was drawn and not pc-made it would have been better. Or at least i would respect it more. Animation 7/10
Music -7/10 !!! MY EARS! MY EARS! AGHHHH!
MechWarrior 4: Mercenaries (2002)
Astonishing series of True Dense Sci-Fi!
I wondered where to post this review, for I wished to make a brief summary of what Mechwarrior is in GENERAL. Mechwarrior is said to be a male-fascination series, but as a female I'm not really much into destruction and firing my lasers, but the story behind it all.
For years, since very first BattleTech game FASA company released, we've been introduced to grand world full of political conflicts, plotting, treason, trade, and all in atmosphere of futuristic idea of monarchic societies, which I also share, as a realist (The idea of Democracy's self destruction is obvious for every well educated sociologist, politologist or economist) - People from FASA created awesome fresh universe with ideas, stories from local and space-wide. IF someone was to put it all into books, we'd receive over a HUNDRED of novels that would easily force every other pro Sci-Fi or Fantasy writer to blush in shame and go away. Think Tolkien created a big world? Nope... Mechwarrior's (Battletech) universe is something way beyond expectations of anyone.
But why Mechwarrior isn't that famous? Well, because it is AMBICIOUS world, demanding, not simple, cheesy mass like Star Wars or Star Trek, but a world of moral mid-grounds, greyness, where nor good or evil exists, where powerhouses struggle for political domination and SIMPLE people got to prove their worth with hard work and long service and not some absurdal childish super-powers. It's fresh in world where all pop-culture get's dominated by clichés, stereotypes and badly made reruns of cheep ideas. Mechwarrior stands out with characters who needs to create their own depth by deeds and not flashy clothing, silly over-sized haircuts(check J-RPG's) or ridiculous powers. It helps me to assimilate, to get into this world, cause I know it is a place of normal people and their chance to show what their real role is in a conflict they got involved, by 100% professional piloting of super-sized war-machines.
That's what I like about this game too... Mechanoids ain't same thing as Humanoids - and game creators know that. Those are not some almost femine looking stick figures like those from Japanese games about robots, but true robust steel daemons, that move and react as they should. You can customize their armament, got to keep in mind heath management is a factor too - if you overheat your machine's reactor it can blow up! But most of all, tactics! You don't run in and shoot, you got to play it out reasonably, as you got an ammunition to take care of - don't waste it too fast, cause you can replenish it only before a mission.
I know why it has so few fans - cause it is games for people who really care, for those who like to dig in the universe full of conflicts, stories, and well designed plots - it's a real joyride. In fact reading Mechwarrior novels, rulebooks from old Battletech RPG's and such, kept me really up for long weeks and discovering secrets of some intrigues were better than some of crime-novels I've read recently.
Thank you, FASA... Thank you, because you simply prove with every Mechwarrior game that you care and respect mature and serious players, not only giving them a simple fun of blowing something up, but you care for such little details like the story and background - a tiny part of a game, but you show you really love what you've created.
Thank you and I hope for more... HAIL House Davion ^^ and Loyalists of His Majesty Duke Hanse of New Avalon!
Dragon Age: Origins (2009)
A NAIVE display of dull clichés, Waste of time.
Let me start by saying that this game actually made me register on IMDb to share with you with my opinion, as feeling of utter-disappointment is just smashing!
I won't talk here about game systems, graphics and that kind of aspects, as my only concern in RPG's is plot, story and characters - all that create a true, good RPG base.
Well what to start with? Let me just state the obvious... If Tolkien was still alive he should sue BioWare for a shameless brutal rape they just made upon his works. Dragon Age is absolutely worst type of Fantasy world I've seen, mostly because it is so schematic, so stereotypic, so cliché based, that if not the monstrous advertisement campaign BioWare sponsored this game would NEVER be noticed. It's just everything we have already seen so far and I mean EVERYTHING. It's most stereotype-spam-stuffed game that shamelessly tries to call itself a 'breath of fresh air' in world of RPG's. Even architecture is same as in Tolkien's world, but to hell with that.
AGAIN the plot is about army of Evil, Darkness, Deamons, Monsters (and other things that sound spooky) invading the world for no particular reason, but to destroy stuff and wreak havoc... just because. ((The SAME story is in almost every GOD DAMN Fantasy RPG! Oblivion? Army of Evil Deamons Wants to Destroy the world... Neverwinter Series? Army of Evil/Demons wants to destroy the world... LOTR? Sauron and his Evil army wants to Destroy the world! Myth and Magic? Army of Deamons and monsters wants to destroy the world... World of Warcraft? Army of Deamons wants to destroy the world... Diablo? - guess... It's always the same... you call a fantasy rpg and you got same thing again and again. Ever since I played Baldur's Gate nothing changes, it's same fantasy, saving world in name of goodness and some pseudo-moral politically-correct mumbo-jumbo. - Just because it's good to be good and so we should do good stuff.))
Honestly! What's wrong with you people?! Speaking of Ripp off's even those damn scenes in this game are insanely similar to what we saw in LOTR - one of our Mentors just finished off enemies (that strangely looks like Orcs from the Tolkien's world), looks in direction of distant mountain peaks above which dark clouds gather, and lava bursts into air from volcanic craters... Just call it Mordor, would ya? Capitol of Dwarfs and battles in underground halls where 'darkspawn' roams - yeah... does not recall Moria even a little bit, does it? Oh! And of course a forgotten king who happens to be our fighter-friend, while evil impostor takes his place and governs lands o men. Similarities go on and on...
Story is a naive copy of everything made already... I had this feeling writers of this game just needed excuse to incline some cinematics in between battle sequences, or give reason why to mindlessly grind anyway. It's like they read some random cheep fantasy book you can get for one buck from basket with 'no one want's to buy this crap, but kids'-kind of books, rewrote whole story, changed names of places, characters, fixed new geography, used same models from last Neverwinter game(remade for needs of new graphic engine) and voilà!
I can't believe same people who created Mass Effect (that was a great game with a world made from scraps, professional and serious, with decent climate and style.) made Dragon Age.
Another bad thing is voice acing - it is absolutely awful! No climate and atmosphere at all... random people often use language you can hear on the street, or in school, that not even a little bit resembles to medieval period. There is even this Dwarven girl who talks like some random high school Stacy that sucks lollipops and play with her hair, while flirting with teachers. Characters can't decide to which culture they belong, sometimes they use accents, sometimes not. They act like they were stuffed with wood and their voices are just a fail... simply a fail. Imagine yourself a situation, where whole village is overrun by monsters, world is besieged by daemons and evil that wreaks havoc everywhere... And people we happen to talk with, that just saw how their friends got slain and impaled, talk with you like nothing really happened, like they have a wonderful time, just finished reading morning newspaper and await for a hot cup of tea with pinch of sugar and a slice of lemon. They sound so dull and boring you can fall a sleep in the middle of dialog.
Political correctness was elevated to a whole new level! I am a woman, I understand concepts of equality... BUT PLEASE! Is it made for children?! or does American censorship just stalks for easy prey to suck out millions from one of many lawsuits it's ready to unleash upon BioWare? I loved KOTOR series, where sometimes supporting a tyrant and dictator caused more good to the planet that was under rebellion, than supporting weak princess that ruined economy and so on. It was nice to see that not always choosing obvious good is good in fact, that was tricky, made players to think twice, to make a right judgment... And Dragon Age? It's all same Democracy/Socialism = good, progress, peace, flowers and happy children dancing. Monarchy/Authoritarism/Free Market = Evil! Death! Suffering of Poor people! Little crippled children digging graves for little dead butterflies on dry, blood-stained meadows.