I remember looking at the pictures of Ryan's wedding and feeling weird. It was an event, that strangely, I was looking forward to. For ten years I had been reading his thoughts on games and listening talk about any and everything. Ever since Giant Bomb started I felt like I was getting to know the crew more and more. When Norm posted his gallery of pictures, I looked at them and smiled. The Giant Bomb Crew made me feel like I was in a special club.

I met Ryan once after their 2012 PAX East Panel. I told him how much I loved the Ska band. He said it blew his mind that he had such good friends that would put that together. We exchanged two sentences together. I talked to him for two minutes. Why do I feel such sadness.

Ryan talked about how he didn't mind putting his life out there on the site. How people made connections with them even though they never met. When I listen to the Bombcast, I pause it and add in my story to something that relates to what they are talking about.

I, like everyone else on this site, lost a friend. I just wanted to type up some thoughts because I know you feel the same way. I texted my wife at work about how upset I was. She understands how much I love this site but she doesn't in the same way. When she got home I told her stories about him and she listened but I felt she thought I was crazy, well not crazy, but strange morning someone you didn't know.

I'm not a major player in the community but I love reading all the great blogs and watching all the videos. I hope the site continues but I understand if it's low key for awhile. Good luck to everyone who were really close to him. It's crushing losing him...and I only talked to him once for two minutes.

And boy is my mind blown. Lightsabers, Snitches and Doom Bots...oh my. I think this is the first book in the series where I have to instantly pick up the next book and keep reading. I've enjoyed all the other books but the crazy was the end of Wolves was amazing. Imagine picking up a book about the worst experience of your life. Reading thoughts you've never shared with anyone. Really interested to see where this goes. Rolland has to find Stephen King at some point and talk to him right?? Much like Kilgore Trout talking to Vonnegut in some of his books.

I've been reading Stephen King books since middle school, I don't know why it took me so long to read the Dark Tower series. In a way I'm glad because I've read all the other books that get brought up. I love the random characters showing up and locations being revisited. What are some of your favorite books by King and did you enjoy the Dark Tower series??

I am a fan of Stephen King. When I was in middle school and high school, he was the only author I read, outside of assigned reading. I read The Gunslinger when I was in Eighth Grade. I don’t really remember enjoying it. When I went to college I didn’t really read too much. When I graduated I picked up The Gunslinger again and re-read it. I still didn’t really get into it but a lot of my friends really enjoyed the series, so I tried out part two, The Drawing of Three.

Well I read about half of it and then moved on to other books. I don’t know why I couldn’t stick with these books. Two years ago I went back and started The Drawing of Three over again and was able to finish it. I enjoyed the introduction of Eddie Dean and Detta Walker/Odetta Holmes/Susannah Dean. They added a nice escape from Roland. I also liked the jumping between worlds, which I was promised a lot of.

So I moved onto the third book, The Wastelands. I read to the part where they killed the Great Old One the Bear and again lost interest. A year passed and then I went back to it. Finished it in a couple of days and now I’m reading Wizard and Glass. I’m about 250 pages into it. I know from what I’ve said so far I sound crazy for stopping and going back. If I really enjoyed it I would stick with it. But Stephen King kept putting this series on the back burner and coming back to it.

The Stand is my favorite book by him so when they get off Blaine at the start of Wizard and Glass and appear to be in The Stand universe I got really excited. Also I think Randal Flagg showed up at the end of The Wastelands and talked to Tick Tock Man. So when Roland started his flashback I was sad. I do want to know more about his past and so far it’s pretty interesting but I really want to hang out in The Stand universe.

I’ve been told the next two books are mostly flashbacks. I’ve also been told I should stop reading ¾ of the way through book seven The Dark Tower because the ending is one of the worst things a friend of mine has ever read. I think I will keep with these series but like the author and even the main character it might take me a lifetime to do so. Do you have any thoughts about it?? Let me know!!! Thanks for reading.

Dark Places

A couple of friends wanted to start a book club so I joined. I've never been in one before so why not. The person hosting this month picks the book so she picked Dark Places by Gillian Flynn. Most of us read her latest book Gone Girl this summer. We all enjoyed it so we decided to go back and read an earlier book by her. Overall I enjoyed it but not as much as Gone Girl.

The main character is Libby Day. She was seven years old when her older brother murdered her mother and two sisters. She ran and hid in the woods and survived even though she lost three toes and two fingers to frostbite. The novel takes place Twenty Five years after the murders. She has been living off all the donations people made in her name after the tragedy and a self help book she published. The money is running out and she doesn't know what to do. Enter Lyle, President of the Kill Club. The Kill club is a group of people who investigate violent crimes and try to get verdicts overturned if they think the wrong people are in jail. Lyle thinks Libby's brother, Ben, is innocent and he wants her help to prove it.

The book switches perspectives each chapter. Libby's sections are told in first person and take place in the present. Then it jumps back to the day before the murders. While in the past it is a third person perspective of Ben and Libby's mother Patty. It shows how poor and down on their luck the family was. It also shows how twisted things can get when looked at with incorrect information. Like Gone Girl this novel is dark, not as dark as Gone Girl though. There are a few good twists but in the end I was under whelmed with the ending.

Royal Rumble

This is my favorite PPV of the year. Even when I was a little kid growing up I loved this event. I like how there are surprise returns, even if they get eliminated a few seconds later, it was great seeing the Godfather. The past few years my friends and I have bet money and drawn numbers. It adds to the fun being able to cheer on the people who come out with your number. It's also fun finding out your number is Heath Slater and knowing that one is a total waste. What bothers me a little is when the Rumble is not the final match. The past two years this has been the case. I understand why Punk vs The Rock is on after the rumble but it is rubbish. The title event should be the main event but this is Vince logic we are dealing with.

The Del Rio vs Big Show match was ok. I'm not a fan of The Big Show. I don't understand why he keeps getting title shots. The use of duct tape to keep him down was funny and a good way to end it. I was surprised Team Hell No didn't lose the titles to the Rhodes Scholers. They finished Anger Management the Raw before and had their final hugs. Why not push a new rising team like Cody and Sandow but again this is WWE. I guess they want to keep them together a little longer before the split them. Maybe they will drop the titles at the Chamber PPV and then have them fight at Mania.

The Rumble it’s self was a blast, other than the ending. The return of Jericho was perfect. Have Dolph run his mouth before the match and then send in someone he is afraid of. I had no idea Jericho was returning so when his music hit everyone I watched with flipped out. I don’t hate Cena as much as other people. I think the Rumble is a good place to highlight younger talent and then give someone who is good a huge push to become great. When Cena won they kept saying “Cena is going to headline Wrestlemania”. Of course he is. Even if he didn’t win he would be in the main event, because he is John Cena. Oh well what can you do, other than write a blog about it.

I think Punk should still be the champ. I understand that Cena fighting The Rock for the title will get a lot of sales of the PPV but not as many as they think. People bought last year because it was once in a lifetime. When else would these two fight. I bet random people that bought the PPV thought the match was for a title. I don’t think the idea of Rock Cena 2 Electric Rappadoo will draw the same people in because they saw it last year. “But this time it’s for the title” the ads will say, “And it wasn’t last year??” the non-wrasslin fans will respond. Oh well. This isn’t officially the match yet…Maybe Punk will win it back at the Chamber PPV…maybe.

Thanks for Reading!!!!

I know this is mostly a video game site, mostly?? Movies have been something I’ve always loved as much or maybe even more than video games. We are now in “Award Season” for movies. I’ve watched the Oscars each year as long as I can remember. Even though the movies I enjoy the most don’t get nominated, each year one or two things does and I get really excited. For the past few years I’ve tried to watch each of the movies nominated for Best Picture. This weekend I was able to watch three of them, here are their stories…

Zero Dark Thirty

I have to admit I wasn’t very excited for this movie. I wouldn’t have gone to see it in the theater if it wasn’t up for Best Picture. Kathryn Bigelow’s last movie was The Hurt Locker, which won Best Picture and Best Director in 2010. I was happy she won over James Cameron and Avatar. War movies are not my favorite genre so I didn’t have high expectations for this movie but I didn’t go in with negative thoughts either.

The main reason this movie didn’t appeal to me was because I think it’s a cash grab to make a movie about the raid on Bin Laden. I know they were working on another movie about him when they found out they had caught him they switched gears, that movie will be out in a few years as a sort of ‘prequel’ they say. Shouldn’t this movie be out in ten to twenty years to remember this victory in the war on terror??

The movie starts with a black screen and we hear real phone calls from the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. I know this is used to set up what we are fighting for…but we already know. We’ve all heard the 9-1-1 call of the lady asking if she was going to die while the responder cries. We know what was taken away from us that day and I felt this was a cheap way to start the film.

From there on it’s the Jessica Chastain show. She has a brilliant performance as Maya a Central Intelligent Agent on the hunt for Bin Laden. The only back story about her character is given to us two hours into the movie. The CIA Director, played by James Gandolfini, drops a line about how she was picked out of high school to join the CIA. Up until this point we don’t really know why she is on this case. We know she has lost team members along the way, which fuels her passion to find the top target but I’m still not clear why or how she started the mission. I guess it wasn’t important.

The final thirty minutes of movie is the raid on OBL’s complex. This was done well and kept me on the edge of my seat. This was an action packed scene. It was well paced and held the tension the whole time. I didn’t know a lot of the details of the raid so I interested as it unfolded. They didn’t really lay out the plan in advance so we were along for the ride. When Bin Laden is shot they don’t make a big spectacle of it. There isn’t a large celebration, they continue with the mission. They don’t show a close up of the bullet as it kills him. In fact they hardly show his body. You get long shots of it and you see his beard. The troops were not sure going in on the mission if he was going to be there. It’s a bit after while they are packing up as many files as they can that someone mentions, ‘I fired the bullet.’

I liked the Hurt Locker more than this film. Although the raid was thrilling and fun to watch the rest of the movie really dragged in spots. Jessica Chastain was fantastic and deserves the nomination for Best Actress but the whole thing didn’t capture me like the last thirty minutes or The Hurt Locker did. This is a little long, check back tomorrow for Beasts of the Southern Wild and Silver Linings Playbook

This is going to get a bit personal, sorry for venting in a blog post but I don’t really know where else to go. I’ve talked to some of my real life friends but they don’t really feel like I feel. Maybe some like-minded bombers might be in my shoes. Please give this a read and chime in if you want!!!

So my wife wants to have kids. Not right away but in the next two years she would like us to start trying to have a “family”. I thought her and me and our fluff ball of a cat made a pretty good family. Right now I don’t really want kids. I’ve never really understood the desire for children. It’s not something I would leave her for. I’m sure there will come a day when I’m a father but the idea of it keeps me awake at night. A little version of me is something that shouldn’t excited. Well the child will be half mini her, I hope more than half, it still worries me. I hate who I am so why would I want to pass along my issues to someone else.

I was the only child of two older parents growing up. My Mom was Forty and my Dad was Fifty Five. My parents didn’t really like each other. Growing up they would hang out in separate rooms watching TV. If they wanted to talk to each other, instead of going to the others lair they would yell ‘pick up the phone,’ and they would talk over the dial tone until the operator came on. I had my own lair, with a TV and various Nintendo consoles. If they were ever in the same room for too long it would typically result in a fight. I didn’t really hang out with them very often. We just kept to ourselves. This is what family was to me. Two people who didn’t really like each other and avoided the other whenever they could.

At school I was bullied all the time. From first grade till ninth, I didn’t really have a lot of friends. High School I joined drama club and made some friends but the kids I grew up with in the same grade still picked on me. In elementary school I think it was the worst. They would pick on me and I would get mad and try to fight back and would end up in trouble. I seriously had my own desk in the office. I think it was because I would calm down and relax in there, since no one would pick on me. Most of the kids in the neighborhood were younger than me by three or four years. I would hang out with some of them but a few times their parents would ask me to stop hanging out with them and "find someone my own age."

Anyway I wrote about all of that to show what I think growing up is. I don’t want to create a life that has to deal with grade school. College was awesome and I made friends and wasn’t really picked on again but it took a lot of tears and awful thoughts to get to that point. I was barely strong enough to make it, what if my child gets it worse?? I hardly talked to my parents and didn’t really connect with them most of my life, my father died in 2000 and I talk to my mom a lot but she is more of a bother. My wife and I are really happy and not at all like my parents but they say having a kid is really tough and puts a strain on the family. I just don’t see any positives from having kids.

So Giant Bomb, does anyone reading this have kids?? Is it something to celebrate not to fear?? Let me know!! Thanks so much for reading.

I fear I am becoming a Video Game Hipster, is that a thing?? "I only play games that were made by four or less people," might become my new motto. The idea of a group of friends coming together to make something really hits a part of me that would like to do that same thing. So I've been staying away from the big budget games and picking up every indie game pack on steam and spending hours looking at Green Light for something I might like. Another factor is the price. You can get five to six games for the price of the major releases. Sometimes even more if you wait for the deals.

I still enjoy the major releases, the game I played most last year was Skyrimjob, even though I was a little late to that one. I used to watch E3 to get excited for the major games that the big three announce. Now I just watch and hardly get excited for The Phantom Pain, Watch Dogs and The Last of Us. I'm sure I'll still play major releases but right now I've got Indie Fever.

Total Recall (2012)

I don't know why but I wanted to see this movie. I love the original movie and I enjoyed the short story. I read that the new one wanted to more like the short story, if that is true they still failed at that. The short story takes place mostly at Recall as they find out this guy has many things erased or hidden from his memory. The main thing they said about this movie is they were NOT going to Mars. Fine, I'm ok with that, a little sad but since the story had nothing to do with going to Mars I guess I can get behind this too.

I watched this late at night. When they introduced the story, I don't know if I was too tired to follow it. The world has become mostly inhospitable because of chemical warfare. There are two places left on earth to live. England, which has a different name than that, and The Colony, which is around Australia. The Colony is where the workers live and they travel through the center of the earth each day to go to work, I think. Also everything is built on top of each other. They can no longer build out so they must build up. So there are many levels to everything. Ok, I guess it wasn't that complex.

Colin Farrell plays Quaid. A Robot assembly worker who dreams of a mystery girl and fighting the robots he builds. He goes to recall to have memories implanted of being Secret Agent Man. But he is already a secret agent, or is he, so it all goes to hell. He was able to sell the "I have no idea what is going on right now" character. He is also a decent action star so when he has to kill a room full of agents, he can become that too.

Kate Beckinsale and Jessica Biel play his wife and the mystery lady from his dreams, in that order, or maybe not that order. I couldn't really tell them apart. There would be scenes of them shooting each other and I could not keep track of which one was on his side. Also Walter White shows up as the Governor or President of New New England. Bill Nighy showed up as the Resistance leader, I loved him as Billy Mack in Love Actually, sadly he didn't have a little mutant baby in his stomach.

The movie was alright but I'm not sure why it exists. The original still works as movie. There are a couple of winks to the original like the lady with three breasts, You're going to wish you had three hands. I gave the biggest chuckle when Quaid travels to the New New England, I should have really looked up what they called it but I just don't really care. The Two Weeks lady from the original is there. She even says Two Weeks...Like in the original!!! But it just made me think that this isn't as good as the original. In total honesty I feel asleep at the end of the movie. I'm not sure if Quaid beat Walter White or not. I guess that makes this a uninformed review but I just couldn't get into the movie. I was pretty excited to watch it but it just made me want to watch the original.

Thanks for reading!!!

Thanks a lot for checking out my blog. I hope you will follow along with me as I try to write a new blog each week. As a reward for dealing with my crappy writing here are some free codes for steam!!! Let me know if you redeem them. Add me on steam if you want more friends!! Rentfn

Darksiders, Red Faction: Armageddon, Metro 2033, ect - XCZ6L-FZGWV-86BY0

WarHammer 40k Dawn of War - MF3KC-JQYY3-E2QYK

Wizorb, BIT.TRIP.RUNNER, Gratuitous Space Battles, and Jamestown - ZP729-PTTAJ-5H434

So I want to write more, which I say every year. So I wanted to write a movie or game review each week. I thought this would be a fun way to write more because I would get to watch a lot of movies and play a lot of game. Even though I'm a little late I have a review of Les Mis ready to post. I know this isn't really screened but I didn't know where else to post it. So if you want to read about what I thought of Les Mis comment. If not no worries. Take Care.

Les Mis Review

I first listened to Les Mis when I was in middle school. When I was in Seventh grade I went to see them perform ‘Good News.’ From the start of the show I wanted to be involved in live theater. I remember going to the Library and looking at their CD section. I’m not sure why I grabbed Les Mis but it was the selection I made. It was the two disk original London cast recording. I rushed home and listened to it right away.

From the first notes I was hooked. I listened to those cds over and over again. My favorite recording of Les Mis is the 10 anniversary recording at Royal Albert Hall. I’ve listened to it hundreds of times. I know it so well that it could be a negative. Whenever I’ve seen the show live, which I have three times, I always compare it to that recording.

I bought the film highlights cd before I saw the movie. I did this for a few reasons. After seeing the international trailer for the movie, I was a little worried. The singing while shooting concerned me and Russell Crowe worried me. After listening to the CD the only thing I was worried about was Eddie Redmayne as Marius. Something about his voice bothered me…but I’ll get to that later.

So now onto the film, I really enjoyed Anne Hathaway as Fantine. She isn’t in the film very long but made the biggest impact on me. ‘I Dreamed a Dream’ was the best performance of the film. I thought the live singing was most effective with this song. It can be very soft and low and loud and powerful the next second.

While the live singing worked well for this song I thought the direction in most of the solo songs didn’t work. Most of these scenes seemed to be filmed on one take without a lot of cuts. So the camera was focused closed on the singer so we could see all of the emotion they felt. This didn’t work for me. I thought the tight shots were awkward. Of course I can’t think of a better way to film it but something felt weird with the long shots holding close to each singer.

I also felt ‘One Day More’ fell short. It works so well on the stage because the entire cast is close and tight. On film there had to be many cuts between many different scenes. You lose the power of the song with each cut because whichever character is being focused on you are paying attention to their part of the song, instead of the whole. Overall I wasn’t a fan of the ‘Live Singing’. I won’t fault them for trying but there needs to be more power behind most of the songs in Les Mis and this way of singing didn’t work for me.

Russell Crowe didn’t really work for me. He was able to hit some notes but not a lot. ‘Stars’ is a really powerful song that explains who Javert is. He wasn’t able to use his voice to display that power. I saw him being compared to Pearce Bronson in Mamma Mia; he was not at all that awful. There was something about Redmayne’s voice that I didn’t enjoy. It sounded like the parody that ‘South Park’ did when they had Colm Wilkinson direct the third grade musical.

Overall I enjoyed and would recommend it to anyone who is a fan of the show or movie musicals. The music in Les Mis should be belted out, in my opinion. So the choice of singing live while filming hurt the film for me. I can’t think of any shows where this style of filming would work in its advantage. The movie is making money so we might see this style in the future, not sure that is a good thing.

Crayon Physics Deluxe

Crayon Physics Deluxe came included with a humble bundle. I played this a few years ago on my iPhone. You would draw a shape to help solve the puzzle. The look of the game was great. It looked like a child’s drawing come to life. I didn’t play much of it but I think I got tired of it. Looking forward to giving it another shot.

Hate to say it but wasn’t really a fan. I enjoyed scribblenauts more because picking the right word was more fun than drawing the right piece. Does this mean I’ll never be a famous painter, guess so. The look and music were everything I remember. It’s a wonderful game don’t get me wrong, just not my cup of tea. I can see why this was such a popular game. I had fun trying to draw the right pieces but in the end I got stuck and didn’t really want to figure it out. It’s ok to call it quits on a game…right?? Even though I thought it felt a little off playing it on my phone playing it with a mouse was worse. If you want to play this game get it for IOS or android, if its there.

Darwinia

You guessed it, humble bundle. I really have no idea what this game is. The picture background in the steam library doesn’t really give any hints. So I guess I go into this knowing nothing. Darwinia wasn’t for me. They can’t all be winners in the humble bundle.

Dead Rising 2

Now we’ve come to a first in the backlog. I bought Dead Rising 2 on steam during the holiday sale. I think it was Twenty bucks. Now this game is different from most of the backlog games because this was a full game release, not an indie game. I really loved the first Dead Rising, it was one of the first 360 games I ever bought. Truth is I bought Dead Rising 2 for 360…but never played it. I think I heard somewhere that you can get achievement points from the PC version so when I saw it on sale I bought it. I also remember hearing the PC version was really well done so another reason to pick it up but mostly the reason was points.

I decided to write a little bit about it today because I make take a little longer then the hour to two hours I’ve put into games up to this point. I might try to play the whole thing or at least half. I’ll play tonight and tomorrow until I get bored and maybe check a FAQ to see how far into I am. Like I said I played the heck out of the first one. I enjoyed the leveling system, even though I was beyond weak when you start out but I released it was a game that you had to start again sometimes. I played the 360 arcade game that introduced you to the new character so I know Frank isn’t in this one. My PC isn’t the highest end rig but it should run this fine.

* Slight little update on the Dead Rising front. I went to play the game and and it went to verify my game was legit through GFW Live and and sat verifying for 20 minutes. A look on the steam forums say I might have to install the game again and run it right away. It's been having some issues with Windows 7 64-bit. The upgrade to 64-bit works wonders with Civ 5 though. So I deleted it and am installing it once more. If this doesn't work I will play it on the 360...since it's on that backlog!

Cave Story+

Truth be told I’ve played about an hour of this game but I want to play some more. I bought the Humble Bundle 4 because of this game. I heard some much about it when it was on the Wii. It sounded like a game that would scratch that retro itch I have. I grew up with Nintendo and super Nintendo so this should remind me of those good times.

Saves really have changed. Auto Saves might be the thing I most take for granted. When you beat a boss the game should just take over and jot down that you beat it and you won’t have to worry about it anymore. Not in Cave Story. You have to wait to get to a save point and you have to remember to go back and save. The rush and thrill of victory needs to be put in the back pocket. You shouldn’t rush out to face the next obstacle only to fall into a pit of spikes because you misjudged the distance of that jump and now you can’t beat that boss again. Maybe the olden days weren’t the best.

This is a fun but tough game, just what you want from an 8-bit game today. I made it to the sand zone, which seems to be around four levels in. Not sure how long the game is but I would come back to this. I like how you level each gun and it becomes stronger. Of course I wish it would stay at those levels but the more you use it and take damage the weaker it becomes. I had a stupid couple of deaths because I didn’t time jumps right. Silly me I would get excited and not think before jumps over insta-death spikes, something you should never do in Cave Story+

The story makes up half the title but it wasn’t thrilling me. You awaken with no memory and hang out with bunny type humanoids that are going to war with a doctor who wants the red flower to turn the bunnies into weapons…I think. Anyway the story was ok, there was an interesting twist about your past but that isn’t why I was playing Cave Story. I wanted to get angry and throw my controller like I use to when I was a kid. Cave Story succeeded in getting that emotion out of me. Cave Story+ is, as of this writing, $9.99 on steam. It is also on Wii, DS and IOS. I highly recommend this indie platformer that made indie platformers cool again.

Weekend Gaming

This weekend I gave up on the backlog and played a game I haven’t played in a long time, Civ 5. They announced an expansion for this game will be out in spring so it made me want to go back in. I’m not very good at this game and I’m not sure I’m playing it right but I sure do have a lot of fun. I recently upgraded my memory and the game runs so much better.

I started up a game with 4 computer controlled empires and next thing I know it’s 5:25am and I’m in a land war with Japan. Time flies while playing this game. You just want one more turn to see how this or that will go and the hours fly by. I wanted to start off a peaceful country but after some threats from my neighbors I decided it was time to crush them. Not sure If this is a good idea because I wasn’t really training army skills but who knows. It wasn’t on hard so I was able to change it up.

I also went back and played a few hours of Beat Hazard. This game is a dual joystick shooter that takes music from your library and creates levels around it. I love this game. You are able to get it on sale for two bucks, it’s a steal. Normally I think it sells for ten bucks which is still a good deal. I like playing music in beat hazard that I normally wouldn’t listen to. Most of the music I listen to makes for really boring levels. So I play a lot of upbeat, dance and pop music and have a blast. It does take a few tries to get back to the difficulty level I was used to but that was to be expected. The visuals are really intense.