Blast from the not so long gamer past: Hellboy:The Science of Evil

Hellboy: The Science of Evil. A game that was released around the same time as the movie Hellboy 2: The Golden Army. I am a fan of Mike Mignola’s work and most of the Hellboy series and Del Toro’s work with movies. The game is produce by both Del Toro and Mignola. When released the reviews were harsh. IGN gave it a 3 out of 10 and so did much of the major game reviewers of the net.

Nazi1:"Should we help Claus?" Nazi2:"Shit dude I don't think that's a great Idea."

After reading said reviews I was shocked and displaced. I wanted to play the game for so long. I heard about and it seemed like a really great game. But take it from me most reviews aren’t true. All the reviews for Alone in the Dark said that the game was horrible and pointless. I disagree, I found the game to be interesting and very challenging. Sure it had it’s moments, but I got over them.

The game is made by Konami, a hit and miss company. Their only hits have been Metal Gear Solid, Zone of the Enders and something else that I care not to remember. But also to mention that this isn’t the first HellBoy game ever made. This is the second, but its possibly the last due to the fact that not many cared for this game. The first game; Hellboy: Asylum Seeker, which was for the playstation, but is a total flop, the graphics were horrible, character design was shit and it didn’t go very well. It can be downloaded on the playstation network I think. The game takes place mainly in Romania, but takes you to places like Okinawa, Japan and a Nazi castle. Hellboy isn’t always alone, he’s either having snappy comments about his enemies, dying people or just in general skeletons that he talks to. And there’s multiplayer for you and your friend(s)

Now this happens when you don't have friends, you being the frog monster

Like I said the game is a general Beat ’em up and of course I like the story that Mike wrote up for it. Your hunting down a witch in Romania, but it starts out in a graveyard. Later you flashback to 25 years ago when your in Japan stopping an Evil Nazi’s plan. Also the Nazi has a robot-Nazi-gorilla called number 4 working for him. Then you flash back to Romania. The story is very very good, but if your a fan of Hellboy and only enjoy anything that deals with the comics or movies then you shouldn’t play this game, but if your open minded about 3 separate stories, then you can play should play the game. But honestly, fanboys keep an open mind about this.

I loved the movies and I read a lot of the books, but to me the game is an extension, of the mythos. What gets me though, is why do many fan boys hate the game, but not the movies and animated movies? Meh, cant please them all I guess. The controls are able to getting use to, but the X button will be your best friend, next to the Y button. If you have seen the movies or read the comics, you know for a fact that next to the hand of doom HellBoy uses his gun to do most of the talking. You of course get to use his gun, and it’s many types of bullets. There’s explosive, shotgun, fireflies, crystals, flowers (don’t ask) and so on and so forth. The right hand does come in handy. When you click both sticks (hah) you go into Hellfire mode which doesn’t last long, but helps when your in a though spot.

The game, of course, does have it’s many of downsides. Let’s start with the ammo. Christ when it runs out, your fucked when you need. One part of the game has to make so frustrated about this one type of ammo that you need to go back and grab some more, but when it runs out. The Nazi zombies wont die.

Except for this guy. He wasn't a very good Nazi.

The combat isn’t that bad, there’s no combos, just only x-x-x-x then that’s it, a few Y’s here and there, but that’s it. Done. You can charge your right hand of doom, by holding down y, but your enemies can get a good hit on you by then. Sometimes, you can get achievements for doing stupid things like jumping off a cliff 20 times. Killing 25 or 10 or 50 enemies with certain weapons. I guess those can be good things, I guess. The game leaves out most of the characters that are able to be played. Like Abe and Liz. I’m a fan of Abe. Liz…not so much. Lobster Johnson, yeah funny haha, but total badass.

The enemies are difficult and very annoying. In the Romania level, when your in the town, Hellboy can be ridden by the homunculus (I think that’s what they are), they tell you the controls to take them little bastards off your back, but it rarely works. Also some of the boss battles, are short lived and aren’t very, boss like.

Then there are some who act like bosses, but die like bitches

The good side is that, it’s Hellboy, c’mon you can’t get more awesome than that. Your gun cant keep the enemies back so you can get a few good punches in there. The Y button also helps puch away a lot of enemies. The one-liners do help keep Hellboy more funny and well in character. The settings are great and right for the Hellboy universe. The enemies are cool and makes me love the game more. Since it’s a beat ’em up it has to be repetitive, it suits the game well. The character designs are almost reminiscent of the animated series ones. Hellboy’s finishing moves on his enemies are funny and badass yet repetitive. Some of the puzzles can be tricky, but everything has an answer and if you can’t get by them then just continue beating the ever loving shit out of your enemies with your fists, swords or the many types of ammo that’s at your disposal. The extras are fairly enjoyable. Behind the scenes, interviews and beautiful art.

Now for the decision. The game offers up little bad gameplay and controls, but honestly it can be forgiven. The controls aren’t a complete train wreck and the graphics aren’t either. All I’m saying is that if it was suppose to look like the comics then it’d would either look like cel-shading or just sharp, but no it’s more of the animated movies kinda style. The music, direction and style is all picked out by Del Toro. After you immerse yourself within the universe long enough and have an open mind about what your playing then you stop caring about the little parts that are bad. The game should have been put out on the marketplace instead of being sold in stores. The setting and atmosphere keep me attracted, so does that art and characters. In order to love a game like this you don’t have to be a fan at all really. Yet if you want to be more understanding of the world and characters then you should probably start reading some of the comics and watch both movies and both animated movies as well, for good measure. If you played the game and disagree then fine. But give me your reasons why you hated it and don’t be a troll. Hellboy: The Science of Evil gets a 3 out of 5 in my book. Its a rental, or if you have sometime to kill or if your in the mood for a beat ’em up then go for it.

Top 10 superpowers.

Man what I would do for to gain superpowers. The only problem is, they do tend to take horrible turns for the worst and awesome ways of making life way better. This is my top 10 list of superpowers.

10.Invincibility:

Warning: Major pansy right here.

Yeah Awesome: Being Able to take a bullet to the head and then strangle the gunner with your hands does seem really badass. You can handle pressures that normal folk can’t handle gives you the right to say “stand back ma’am I can handle this”. You can walk into fires and walk out without a scratch. You can walk into a bar and win the fight with everybody in there. You can walk into the middle of a gang war and settle the whole fight with your fists. You can skip right into a war zone and save people. You are the best damn thing out there!

Oh shit, weakness: Sure your invincible and possibly unstoppable at the least. But you still are human on the inside. You can feel things, you can see the fear inside those who are afraid of you, you could kill somebody on accident and be sent to jail. You could try to rebel and be evil, but you have to sleep sometime or you can get tired given on your type of power. Like Superman it could be a type of item that can weaken you or like the Juggernaut where if your held still you can’t destroy everything in your path. Maybe the scientists can get your blood sample or silica to make an antidote to stop your unstoppable ass.

9.Immortality:

Great game. Great immortal

That’s what i thought. Yeah Awesome: You can move along the ages of the world without death’s cold grip on your soul. Your power over life is gracious. You can go to clubs and get drunk and not die of alcohol-poisoning, well unless you have the type of immortality that matter’s with whole age only and if you get shot in face you die motherfucker die type of immortality. Hitting on girls does take time to improve on, but hey you have your whole immortality to work on it. If you do have the type of immortality in which you can survive anything and live forever than possibilities are endless. You could walk into the ocean and discover crap that some normal folk can’t. You could be sent into space and witness things that would blow your mind. You are almost a god!

Oh shit, weakness: Not a day goes by in which you screw somebody and think to yourself. “Wow, Im a million years old and I still never got with that one babe in my math class.” or “Jeez, I never thought about having so many kids. They’re all dead by now.” Your life will be plauged with the death of those who have gotten close to you. Your life will be filled with oddities, but you will leave a mark in those of who you got with and they’d soon notice at their death bed’s that you’ve never changed, literally. You havn’t change since the day you two met. Sure you could actually go to the depths of the ocean and and go away into deep space, but your memory is forever, you can never forget. If your the only immortal then your alone in the world. Your going to be completely alone and sad, the worst part is. You can’t off yourself.

8.Invisibility:

Look at the smug look on his face...oh wait.

Yeah Awesome: Ever had an embarrassing moment in which you just wanted to disappear? Remember that time that all your friends dared you to go into the chick’s locker room? Remember that time when you felt like being invisible? Well, would ya look at that you are invisible! Now remember invisibility comes with alot of responsibility, but you already knew that right…well whatever. Next time that kid starts to make fun of you, you can just get the jump on his blind ass, and by blind I mean you could possibly throw dirt or paint thinner into his eyes. it all depends on what visibility you have if it’s the kind that ensures that both you and your clothing is invisible then your all good. If it’s the kind where if your still wearing your clothes and you look like a god damn ghost, well that’s sort of a perk. I mean if you have the not-going-invisible-clothes invisibility then your going commando into the girl’s locker room.

Oh shit, weakness: Well besides the fact that your almost the master of assassins and spies you do have a few problems with your invisibility. The whole clothes not disappearing thing is not good considering that your still slighty visible. And with some account that you Do sneak into the girl’s locker room there’s a slight chance that when you do see the babes undress your “emotion” could make you visible which doesn’t really put you into a great situation. Think of all of the possibly ways of nobody finding you when your invisible. When crossing the street turns deadly. When getting into a car crash and being forever invisible and dead is pretty bad. When trying to get attention because your permittly invisible and you need help turning back. The list is almost endless.

7.Flight/Levitation:

FEAR ME, YOU PRICKS!!

Yeah, awesome: Turn your life around by skipping class and flying through the skies as fast as you can go! Your ability can make you as free and an eagle. Your probably thinking on your next destination on which to travel to, whether it’s a nice beach or cool exotic location in the Caribbean, you dont know and you don’t care as long as you fly from point A to point B. You zoom past your school, job and the boring parts of life!

Oh shit, Weakness: Sure it’s loads of fun going through the air and almost breaking the sonic barrier and possibly rob a bank for money, but have it ever occurred to you that your movements are being watched. Now dont think that other freaks are watching you or aliens are watching you. Your flight patterns are monitored by the military. Your on the radar and the government might notice you as either an unauthorized craft or ufo. Knowing any countries government, they’ll see you as a threat. Either way you might be shot down. Im pretty sure that you can’t take on a stinger  missile head on.

6.Mind control:

"Now take off all your clothes and call me The Dark one."

Yeah, awesome: Your boss is a dick, a chode. He always busts your ball for no good reason. He had sex with your wife to prove something: That he’s better than you. One day you just sit there in your cubicle, twitting your thumbs. A thought pops in: I wish boss would staple he face to the desk and lights his balls on fire. Soon screams can be heard. You run to the source of the screams and surprise surprise What you thought just came true. Every little thing you think up about somebody they’ll do it. You start to move things around with your mind, weight lifting shit is easy when you can pick up a can of cola and then chuck it at a hobo. Then you’ll pick up that hobo and then chuck him at a little kid. Soon not only are you the boss of your own company, you able to create anything you can think of. Once again your almost a god!

Oh shit, Weakness: Sure you might be able to take on the world, but Im sure that with all this power your mind has been taking a toll on your whole mentality. One second your wife is in love with you then second her corpse is splattered against the side of the wall because she admitted that she cheated on you with the gardener. Skank. You can’t take it anymore, anybody that gets near you either turns into something weird like a chimpanzee that farts waffles or you turn their inards into the paint on the wall. There’s almost no way you can undo the evil things you did. Usually the government would step in and capture, dissect and experiment with your powerful brain. Hopefully you can use what power you have left and reverse time to the moment of your boss lighting his testicles on fire.

4. Shapeshift:

Ok, long story short, it's both a vampire and werewolf. Still can transform.

Yeah awesome: Transformation is badass. You want to be a tiger, your a tiger. You want to be a dragon, well dont start burning down the town. When you want to blend into a crowd all you need to do is become a different person. You are the master of disguise. Now once again there are many interpretations of shapeshifters. One is that you can only turn into a wolf…boring. Another is just animals. My favorite is everything. When you go hunting the deer wont know what fucking broke it’s neck and shot it in the brains. You could be another person and confuse them and everybody around them. Who,what,when,where and why is just what your a master at avoiding.

Oh shit, Weakness: Well after a few hundred persona changes your wondering on who the hell you might really be. i mean are you that guy who was just on the news for an alledged burglary? Or are you that girl who o.d’d on meth and you just turned into her to make her family happy again. You were somebody, but now your anybody. That and given that you do turn into somebody, that certain somebody might be on a hitlist or they might be up for a beatdown. Watch your back.

3.Mind Reading:

"So that's where they hid my remote control for the tv, the swine!"

Yeah,awesome: Ok I could be a dick for doing this one because this sort of goes in the same catagory as mind control, but I see them both as two different things. Anyway, when having the ability to read minds your life changes. One second your talking to your best friend. You then read their mind to only find out that they hate your guts and think that your annoying as fuck. You soon read the minds of people who are hiding secrets. You can slmost predict on what people are up to. Your ability to read the thoughts of others can go into the possibility of digging deep into the sub-consions of your peers and then everything starts to pour into your head, everything you want to know about that person becomes clear. Soon you can see that even the most annoying person is really just a sad little ego energized prick. If your powers become more stronger maybe interrogation could just be a blink of the eye. Hopefully you dont fully invade another person’s mind, you might make their skull explode.

Oh shit, Weakness: Yeah going into people’s minds: fun. Discovering many dark secrets and other shit that’s not really great to see: Bad. The idea is great it’s just the reality is people are fucking crazy. People have very, very disturbing minds. Like I said, you read your friends mind and then you discover that they hate your fucking guts. That’s not great to know. There’s a slight possibility that you don’t read your friend’s mind and your read that crazy kid’s mind in the back. Your head will be full of horrid images and other things that are scary on many levels. And with the possibility of making a person’s skull explode or just giving them a really evil headache could be possible if your brain is really really strong with the whole mind reading. If not you may have a backfire with your plans.

2.Ultimate knowledge:

Oh yeah, Awesome: I hate tests dont you. I also hate my I.Q. at which I dont know what number level it is at currently. Wish you knew what your crush wants? Wish you had the right answer to what the cops were asking you? Simple if your a super genious. Your whole day would be simple with school and at your job. Teacher says that you’re wrong then just correct her up the ass. The boss askes you why you have been called into his office, you can just tell him the answer and tell him something very disturbing about his wife. You can be a one man scientific team. You can find the cure for cancer, diabetes and hiv all in one month. You can make Stephen Hawkins go crazy in his robo-chair. Space travel would be a scrrible away. You are the cure to mostly what’s wrong with our planet!

Oh shit, Weakness: With a great amount of knowledge of everything it seems that your too busy with saving the planet. Too busy to pay attention of your current condition, the condition is that your losing all of your humanity. Your becoming a Doctor Manhattan almost

Say that you met this really nice girl and you two hooked up because you knew what she loved and since you know everything you knew everything about her. Well you knew her, but she doesn’t know you anymore! You have a dark side of things. You know who is who and what they stand for and they’re whole entire life basically. When your done your job with this planet, man kind will discard you like a toy. Maybe if you could travel back in time with a time machine…

1.Possession:

The usage of toothpaste must be denied in hell.

Yeah,awesome: Ok now you might be thinking that this doesn’t deserve be number one, well I have one thing to tell you. FUCK the  police. Nah just kidding I have a friend who’s a police officer, he’s not a pig like the other 95%. Anyway, hate living your life with everybody ridding your ass like a camel with a fat chick on your back? Well posse a person and go on a killing spree, exit the body and then reak some more hell. If your a good enough posseror then you will leave your body and control the person or object and if you die as that person you will return to your body alive. Being picked on by some guy then posses the dude, make him walk into on coming cars and then leave at the last moment. Like I said objects can be possesed as well. Can you say floating knife fight?

Oh shit, Weakness: Well if your possession consists of your body being turned into whatever you turn into your find, but most of the time. Your body is just a shell. When you lose that husk of yours then it’s freeball for your husk-ass. Plus you could lose the time to go into something then and the time when you go back to your body. if your astral projecting then that’s completely different. If your in the form of smoke you might disappear. If a liquid then you might evaporate. Yeah this is a double edged sword right here. And you could posse something that you may not want to possess and that object might be something that goes somewhere that’s not clean…

Notable Mentions: Teleportation. Phasing.

Teleportation is something that can beat flying and super strength. I personally love this power, hallways would be simple to get through. My favorite superhereo Nightcrawler can teleport. And thanks to the whole supersede thing, he can’t get stuck in walls or people. Life would be simple if teleportation was real. The only problem is, what if you have some much on your mind that you go to the wrong place. From what I understand you have to concentrate on the exact spot that you have to teleport to. If not your going places. And what if you do teleport and accidentally teleport in somebody. Will you die or will that person explode like a paintball hitting a wall? It must be pretty tricky teleporting. Yet it’s a bad ass gift.

Somebody is gonna get a bitchslap.

While phasing through things you can go through anything, anyone at anytime. Yes this is a great way of getting through lines quicker and possibly lookng for things more easily. Your almost like a ghost if you have that kind of power. Now all of that is wonderful, but what if you turn solid and somebody is in your way? What the hell would happen? it’s a once again what if kinda qeustion. Would you two fuse together or would you both painfully die? I don’t know and I think both outcomes would bad horribly bad. But running through people and ripping out thier organs does sound fun at the least.

Mickey Mouse owns The X-men.

Today a very sad thing happend to one of the world’s greatest comic book companies. Today Marvel was bought by Disney… I’ll give you some time to take that in. It seems that disney it pretty fucked considering that most of Marvel’s comic books are decently graphic, especially Blade and The Entire Zombie war. For those who don’t know about the zombie war let me put it like this. Spider-man ripping apart Mary Jane because of the zombie hunger he has. Yeah Disney, dont fuck around with Marvel’s awesome. The only thing that resembles anything disney made would have to be the power pack and Howdard The Duck; a cheaply evil version of Donald duck.

Marvel has a few violent movie…well just Blade. As far as video games go there’s still Blade and The Wolverine Origns game. DC has it better. DC has violence and is owned by Warner Bros. so obviously they are able to have The Joker, a crazy murderous monster, say things like ‘what’s up doc?’ and it’s ok because Warner Bros. are just that loose with that kinda thing. If Disney wants to constrict Marvel with Hannah Montanna, The douche bag Bros…I mean Jonas, (well is there a diffrence?) and other horrid shit. Marvel gave us a villian like Magneto who actually ripped all of the Adamantium off of Wolverine’s bones. Can any of Disney Villains do that? Im pretty sure they have not. Well atleast Disney didn’t buy TopCow comics, if they have Im sure the Darkness would be ruined!

Let's see Disney touch this!

The Batman.

No caption needed...the picture says all. Badass.

Every time Batman is mentioned or spoke of now an’ days we all tend to think of the new batman movies with Christan flippin’ Bale and the dead Heath Ledger. Mostly everybody goes for that movie which isn’t necessarily bad because it came out last year and it’s a Batman movie that featured an almost completely new Joker which was played by Heath Ledger who died from what I can remember after it was done shooting I think in February. Well The Dark Knight is popular from what I think is because of Heath’s performance and well him dying without him ending up in the grave I think that he would have won an award for playing The Joker, well he would have won an MTV movie award unless Twilight had came out the same year then he wouldn’t have won squat. Batman: The animated series. I loved the cartoon and the version of Batman and The Joker. Mark Hamill has made The Joker’s voice, because he made it fit, so did Kevin Conroy with Batman. Infact Kevin Conroy always does Batman’s voice in all of his cartoons and animated movies (except Justice League: A new frontier) because he’s the only voice for Batman! Batman never really did stay in the present, in Batman Beyond it takes place in the future and with a new Batman. Bruce Wayne is old and grumpy, so new kid comes along and takes on a new Batman suit to take on a myriad of villains of the future.

But every time I think of Batman I think of the cartoon that I watched when I was little, not the Justice League or The Super Friends. Batman The Animated Series! The one with Kevin Conroy as Batman and Mark Hamill as The Joker, made by Bruce Timm. I hope you know what I’m talking about:

I loved every bit of the show and the Tim Burton Movies. Everything else hasn’t been able to grab my batman related attention, I mean sure the last two Batman movie have been great and able to build it’s own sort of version of Batman, but to me the Tim Burton and Bruce Timm’s version of Batman has been more appealing and better then Chris Nolan’s Batman. Not to Mention, all of Bruce Timm’s Batman villains were ALOT better than what anybody else made. Sadly for Nolan he can’t make all of the Batman villains. Nolan made his Batman more realistic, so no Clayface, Bayne, Poison Ivy, the Penguin or Killer Croc. Even his side kicks Batgirl and Robin can’t be put into Nolan’s films, so he kinda fucked himself over with that decision.

With all of the cartoons recently made like The Batman or Batman, The Brave and The Bold and the dvd only release Batman: Gotham Knight. It’s hard for kids to see which Bat is Batman. Of course I’m going to say “Hey everybody if you wanna know the real Batman then watch Batman: The Animated Series and The New adventures of Batman (which features Superman, but he wears his underwear on his outside). But this time all I can say is that Batman can take on many, many, many styles and even if  he’s dead…no really he’s dead in the comics, don’t belive me look it up! Back to what I was saying, all of the cartoons and movies that feature Batman is all you need to see who is the Gotham Knight, the Dark Knight, Batman!

BTW, There’s a new game coming out. Batman Arkham Asylum. I just played the Demo and it’s freakin’ Emoeswa! So if you have one of the next gen. consoles and enough money in your wallet for a new game, pick it up on the 25th.

I am the knight!

Video game based movies lecture thingy. Warning *extreme traces of Nerdiness.*

As I was watching my daily feed of HardNews on Screwattack.com, I learned that InFamous is to become a movie. I’m fucking happy about this when I heard it, but in retrospect I’m not. If your a nerd like me you will see that game based movies arn’t really the greatest, infact they always fail.

When making a movie based on something that everybody loves, you have a choice; make it the way in which will make fans go into nerd-rages and fucking start killing and posting angry comments on both random sites or create a movie that fans, viewers and critics will love and enjoy the experience that was in the game. There’s just one thing about the problem though, how do you get an experience out of a game then place it into something like a book or a movie. While playing a game, you can be pulled in it’s world and storyline. Movies and books can do the same, but with video games its almost completely different, instead of watching a game or reading a game you interact with the game, you control the game.

When a game gets a sequel fans become excited to the point that they might start jumping off walls and murdering people who don’t think equal as they do about the game. The same almost goes for the movie, when a movie gets a sequel almost everybody that seen the first become excited for the release for the new and awesome sequel that everybody will be fucking hyped up for. Books, not so much from what I know it’s like this. “Dude Stephen King is coming out with a new book and it’s about these monsters that devour people’s sanity by whispering to them while they sleep. That sound awesome, right?” “Sure, whatever, did you hear about our dimension being ripped apart accident by the Large Hadron Collider. They also say that time travel is impossible, funny huh?”

The only way of a game being put out there into the media by movies or books instead of being a game. Halo is a great example, it has 5, 6 or 7 books out there and it’s in the works to become a movie then look at the way it’s been loved by millions, but still the entire Haloverse might be ruined by one measly fucking movie. Much like Transformer…*hiss*

While playing a game you can change the way you play it. An example of this is a strategy game like Civilization or Halo wars, in which you have the choice scratch that you have many choices. You can go head on into battle, think things through or just commit suicide. With movies you obviously can’t do that because your not in control, the decision has been made by the writers and/or director and not you. Some books you can choose your destiny, but that’s not really entertaining as a video game, but still great.

Fans always want a movie that’s based on something to be close as possible to the story. Ever since the first movie that was based on a game things have been horrible. Play Super Mario Bros. the original game then watch the trailer for the movie. I’ll wait…

Still here? Awesome. As you can see people enjoy video games, but when something like the horror in the link above was made it changes their perception of Hollywood. Even if the movie is based on a book or tv show, fans still want it to be close to the story.

In all movies based on game franchises, comics and/or tv shows turn out to be shit-Transformers2

Sometimes Hollywood becomes lucky with a script and director and then they got themselves a great blockbuster [photo above] but most of the time they have a steaming load of dinosaur shit. This has been a great chat, but I have some fallout 3 to play. Kaboom.

same old same old…but new :D

I have news that was annouced awhile back. I said that I’ll be putting up comics that I MADE. I’ve been pussyfooting around for too long and now that I have a blog and seeing that it’s getting moderate views I think that it’s time that I put up a comic that I and my great friend John wrote. I did that art and I spent  alot of times on working on them so if you don’t like them, tough shit for you. It maybe up sooner or later so dont expect to see it yet. The one I am working on is about 5 pages long so yeah daily life goes down a drain for a short while until I can find a better way of making the comics.