Flynn and Freckles Review

“If I die again, I’m uninstalling this game,” is something I found myself saying a lot. Flynn and Freckles was a borderline frustrating experience, burdened by many classic 3D platformer problems. Surprisingly, the camera wasn’t one of them, but the jumping mechanics more than made up for it. This is the kind of game where ledges are spaced just far enough apart to require annoying precision. When the game introduced a double jump, I thought that would solve these pain points, but that just meant levels started placing platforms farther apart. Missing a ledge here and there wouldn’t be such a big deal if it weren’t for three other glaring issues: 1) Flynn dies if he touches water. 2) Flynn can’t fall very far without getting hurt. 3) There’s a half-second pause before Flynn can jump again.

Seriously, this game would be 50% more enjoyable if there was no jump cooldown. Alas, the game constantly sets you up to fail by having platforms that sink as soon as you touch them, and yet you have to wait for Flynn to recover before jumping to the next one. It’s ridiculous. Oh, and sometimes Flynn will randomly glitch through the ground and die, so there’s that. It’s kind of a shame, because Flynn and Freckles can actually be fun when things are going smoothly. The setting and level design and secret-finding are all passable. While the in-game treasure doesn’t have much of a pay-off, it’s still rewarding to grab those hard-to-reach chests. The quality gap between this and other indie platformers like Poi is probably too wide to ever bridge, but with a few patches, Flynn and Freckles could be a fun second place.

Avengers: Endgame Review

Avengers Endgame

I usually find trailers pretty annoying in how much they give away, and it would particularly suck to have that happen to a movie 11 years in the making, so I appreciate the Endgame marketing withholding what it did. Not that there’s a lot that can be spoiled here (but if that matters to you, navigate away from this website immediately). I mean, we kinda knew the snap would have to be undone and that certain characters would be “retiring” one way or another. What was pleasantly surprising were other character beats like a fat, self-loathing Thor or a Bruce Banner who’s finally at peace with his alter-ego. Just about everything with Thor and Hulk was fun and elevated this to a much more lighthearted film than Infinity War.

I also had no idea where the story was gonna go and didn’t think it was going to do time travel as heavily as it did. Time travel stories are always interesting but super susceptible to plot holes, depending on the rules that they establish. Endgame clearly specified that changing the past doesn’t change the future. Instead, it creates a new, alternate timeline. And I was onboard with that for most of the movie. But then we get a scene at the end with Captain America that breaks from the movie’s rules and starts to make less and less sense the more I read other viewers’ theories. Honestly, they could have just dropped the scene altogether. That and seeing Peter Parker nonchalantly return to school in a post-snap world raises more questions than the sentimentality was worth.

There’s actually a great story there that, unfortunately, we didn’t get to see about how the world deals with 50% of everybody disappearing and then, five years later, how they again deal with the same 50% coming back. That’s a whole movie on its own, and obviously Endgame doesn’t have time to explore that and give the Avengers their due. This is all about paying tribute to the handful of original MCU heroes. Newer characters don’t get much screen time. But there’s still payoff for having watched all of their movies. Yes, all of them. Even friggin’ Ant-Man 2 and Thor 2. This was a really interesting movie experience to be a part of, thinking back to all of the build-up and smaller crossovers along the way. But I hope this means we can take a break now and go back to standalone flicks for a while.

World to the West Review

World to the West

World to the West is a pretty fun adventure overall and could have been a nearly perfect one had it exercised a little more restraint with certain design choices. Most of the game’s flaws can be categorized as “too much” or “too many.” For instance, there are too many monsters wandering around in this world, and they all have too much health. Combat isn’t World to the West’s strong suit, though, so any situation that requires brute force not only feels clunky but really outstays its welcome. They should have just doubled down on the exploration and puzzle-solving aspects of the game, since that’s where the majority of the fun is to be had.

Of course, even that’s hindered by too much backtracking. Many of the puzzles require all four characters to pitch in somehow, but characters can only teleport to areas they’ve visited, so you’ll frequently have to run through the same obstacle courses again just to get everyone to the same place. This isn’t as bad as it sounds, though, because the characters are pretty unique, and the same area can feel almost brand new when approached with a character who can climb walls versus a character who can dig tunnels. World to the West is able to convey a bigger sense of scale than the map lets on simply because of the mileage it gets out of this idea. Does it feel cheap at times? Sure. But when you stumble across a new secret, you’ll be quick to forgive.

Hanna – Season 1 Review

Hanna

I never did see the original Hanna film. After watching the new Amazon series, though, I have a feeling this works better as a two-hour story versus an eight-hour one. TV is usually a great medium to really get to know the characters, but at the end of Hanna, I still didn’t know much about anyone. It doesn’t help that our main protagonist, Hanna, is a robotic blank slate. While that’s arguably the whole point of the show, such an alien-like, fish-out-of-water individual really only works if there are good supporting characters surrounding her. That’s why the few scenes with teenage Sophie are probably among the best and most interesting. Hanna is a terrible teenager, of course, but Sophie plays off of that really well.

Unfortunately, everyone else in the show is pretty bland. There’s potential for a profound dynamic between Hanna and her adoptive father, but the two of them keep getting split up and dillydally in their own adventures. Both characters are fairly unlikable, anyway. Hanna and her dad constantly lie and use people and get others killed. The only reason we have to root for them is that we’re told Marissa Wiegler is much, much worse. But Wiegler spends so much time alternating between being a threat and a non-threat that she’s really just a distraction more than anything. I’m sure they have big things in store for her in Season 2, though, but I shouldn’t have to sit through another eight hours to feel satisfied with a story that could have been told in two.

Xenoblade Chronicles 2: Torna ~ The Golden Country Review

Xenoblade Chronicles 2: Torna

I’ll never say no to more Xenoblade, but this Torna expansion is definitely the weakest game in the series. And I know, I know, it’s not fair to call it a standalone game (even though it can be played as one), because it’s meant more to supplement XC2 instead of being an all-out sequel or prequel. The amount of content surpasses what any DLC pack would have provided, though. I’ve done almost everything there is to do in the game and am just over 20 hours. However, I’ve been intentionally trying to drag things out to make it last longer and am hunting down treasure chests I wouldn’t have cared as much about had this still been part of XC2 proper.

The thing is, while there appears to be a lot to do on the surface, you only have access to two areas: a watered-down version of Gormott from XC2 and a new Titan called Torna. To be fair, though, Torna is huge and has some fun secrets and gorgeous scenery. It really feels like this was scooped right out of the main game. Alas, that also makes it somewhat frustrating, because I kept expecting the world to open up even more and continue to surprise me, but you just don’t get that here. Torna’s where you’ll spend the majority of your time, and you’re not gonna meet many new comrades along the way. This isn’t a game about finding the perfect team but rather getting to know the one you’re given.

There are some familiar faces, of course, but I think this prequel does them a disservice, making once stoic characters like Jin and Brighid seem kind of silly. Plus, their whole goal is to stop Malos, but we already know Malos is the main villain of XC2, so what’s the point of any of this? Granted, the story in a Xenoblade game always plays second fiddle to its adventure mechanics. In Torna, however, the battle system’s been streamlined a bit, and side quests aren’t really optional anymore. You have to raise your “community level” a certain amount before you can face Malos, which means helping out the citizens of Torna. It’s weird to be forced to do side quests, but how else are you gonna get your money’s worth?

The Tick – Season 2 Review

The Tick

This is everything a second season should be. The production value feels higher, the jokes are funnier, the pace is more engaging, there’s a bigger cast of characters to get to know, and they seem to have settled on a more PG-13ish tone. The show still has room to grow, of course, but it’s getting pretty close to perfect. I really liked Arthur in Season 2 and how he’s fully embraced being a hero, just… frustrated that he doesn’t actually have super powers. So it’s kind of strange that he wears the suit for the majority of the season but rarely uses any of its features. I guess there wasn’t room in the budget for a lot of flying. This season seemed more about demonstrating Arthur’s soft skills, since The Tick pretty much has the hard skills covered. But their chemistry is great, and the show is smart enough to feature them together a lot.

Where the season falters is in its lack of a unifying threat for the majority of it. With The Terror on ice and Ms. Lint questioning her morality, we don’t have a central villain to root against. Some are teased but then quickly become non-issues. Overkill and Dot eventually uncover a villain of sorts on their own, but I don’t think this benefited from being a separate side quest. Overkill is funny when he has to put up with The Tick, not when he’s brooding alongside Dot. And Dot… oh, Dot… Why’d they go and give her super powers?! It seems like everyone on this show is super now… except for Arthur. Maybe that’s the point. But I felt Dot was more interesting as a normal human, where she and Arthur could help anchor this otherwise zany world of comic book characters.