3/15/2009 - Some people are not meant to do game reviews.

The title says it all:



It's rare to see a review of a review, but in this case, it's definitely needed. For those who don't know the Street Fighter franchise, the mistakes the reviewer makes probably seem trivial. But for those like myself who are Street Fighter fanatics, the review is atrocious. I don't have complete hate for the first Street Fighter movie, but I agree that it should NEVER be referenced in a Street Fighter game review... unless it's a bad Street Fighter game.

7/24/2008 - TOP 3 WORST internet browsers

I think the Angry Video Game Nerd has really started a trend. He was the first to come out with reviews of really bad video games complete with profanity-laced screeds. There have been many on YouTube and other sites copying him with varying degrees of success. Not surprisingly, there are other people who have taken the same approach in reviewing bad movies as well. You could say it's like "Siskel & Ebert" with Tourettes syndrome. It's such a successful format that you could apply it to anything that can be reviewed. So why not review bad web browsers in the same way?



He's right... you probably don't remember when you had to pay for a web browser. That was before there were online stores and paid advertising on the internet. Ah, the simpler days.

7/5/2008 - Spider-Man 3 How It Should Have Ended

I don't know at what point Spider-Man 3 got all of the hate that its getting now. It seems to be pretty popular to hate Spider-Man 3, even though there are a lot of other movies that deserve more. I thought it was fine even though it clearly is the least enjoyable of the three Spider-Man movies. My major criticism of it is that because director Sam Raimi wanted to wrap everything up as a trilogy, he threw too many things into it for one movie to handle.

I thought the origin of Venom was pretty spot on, but his inclusion as a last-minute villain left much to be desired. I would have really preferred Eddie Brock getting possessed by the black suit and then fade to credits as a major cliffhanger for the next movie. I mean it would have been pretty epic to have Spider-Man and Venom battling it out during the course of an entire film.

And they should have saved the Gwen Stacy storyline for that movie instead of shoehorning it into this one. I mean if Gwen Stacy were to serve just one purpose in a Spider-Man movie, that would be for Peter to fall in love with her and then be killed off by a major villain so that Peter could be the victim of even more angst. At the very least, Gwen should have been the "damsel in distress" at the end of Spider-Man 3. If you think about it, the last girl Eddie saw Peter with was Gwen. So why kidnap Mary Jane?

I guess the reason for Raimi's decisions was that he wanted the Sandman to be a sympathetic villain and he wanted Harry Osborn to eventually to forgive Peter. With that in mind, I guess I can overlook some of the plot contrivances (the alien suit just happening to land near Peter, for example), and the usual Sam Raimi weirdness (the Peter song and dance routine). A lot of people are less forgiving, however. The folks at "How It Should Have Ended" eschewed their regular format of critiquing a movie's ending and went on to provide a parody of the entire movie for Spider-Man 3:

11/21/2007 - Past Favorite: Dragon's Lair

I state in my profile that I got addicted to YouTube after watching the videos of the Angry Video Game Nerd. What really got the ball rolling was this video review of the game Dragon's Lair for the NES. It was made by a prolific video blogger (who calls himself Jedite) at a time when video game reviews on YouTube exploded in popularity. Jedite now produces a regular feature on his YouTube page called "Q & A" where he answers any question you pose to him about video games. He is such a dedicated gamer that these Q & A's are almost always spot-on factually, and they're entertaining as well... for some reason it's fun to watch a geek rant about his favorite subject.

Jedite's most popular video, however, remains this one, and it's easy to see why. Dragon's Lair for the NES is notorious for it's frustrating difficulty -- and it's not a kind of difficulty that is rewarding like Contra. Jedite spends the entirety of this nearly 5-minute video trying to get past the first level. Needless to say he does not make it, but his attempts and profanity-laced reaction is worth the price of admission. When I first watched this video, I laughed so hard that I had stomach cramps the next day.



Because of the popularity of this video, numerous requests have been made to James Rolfe for his take on the NES game. Just yesterday, The Angry Video Game Nerd finally released his review of Dragon's Lair. It has truly come full circle.

10/17/2007 - TRAILER - "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" - Angry Video Game Nerd

October is definitely my favorite month of the year. The summer heat in Arizona begins to dissipate. The year is winding down. And it's Halloween time! That's right, it's the time of year when I can watch horror movies all month and not be considered weird. It's not that horror is my favorite genre, but as a guilty pleasure, it can't be beat! I've become so desensitized, that I watch horror movies now to appreciate it as an art form, rather than as an attempt to get grossed out.

James Rolfe, AKA the Angry Video Game Nerd, is also a horror movie buff and it shows... from his side projects with Cinemassacre.com to his reviews of two horror related games last year at this time: Friday the 13th and Nightmare on Elm Street for the NES. They were great game reviews that displayed James' talent as a filmmaker. They even included Freddy and Jason!

Well, this October, James is back with two more horror games: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Halloween for the Atari 2600. Even the trailer for his TCM review is great (this is the Angry Video Game Nerd, so be warned for some harsh language):



The opening narration is a parody of the narration from the original Texas Chain Saw Massacre movie... an unforgettable beginning to a great horror movie. The game review even includes a parody of the Chop Top character from Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2! Boy, I can't wait to see his review of Halloween. I hope he has an authentic Michael Myers mask.

Horror movies; video games based on horror movies; reviews of video games based on horror movies; reviews of video games based on horror movies by a nerd; reviews of video games based on horror movies by a nerd who is also a fan of the genre... it doesn't get much better than this.

9/13/2007 - SUPER MARIO BROS 2 Review

Like it says in my profile, I got addicted to YouTube after watching the Angry Video Game Nerd reviews. I'm pretty sure I've praised the work of James Rolfe enough, so I won't repeat myself here. However, he no longer posts videos to YouTube anymore because he's an exclusive for the video gaming site ScrewAttack. So if you're looking for an AVGN alternative, the "Irate Gamer" may be the next best thing. His reviews are in the same style as the Nerd's (some have even say he plagiarizes) and he has some pretty high production values.

I'm featuring his review of Super Mario Bros. 2 here... not because I don't like the game. In fact, I disagree with his review here, because I thought it was a pretty good game. The controls for SMB2 were leaps and bounds better than the controls for the first Super Mario Bros. Just go back and play the two and I think you'll agree. I also thought the gameplay mechanic of picking up and throwing objects was pretty innovative... just as your ability to choose four different characters with different abilities.

However, I didn't realize that the games was actually a remake of a Japanese game. The Irate Gamer explains this bit of trivia pretty well. Oh, and since his reviews are profanity laced, hide the kids...

7/10/2007 - CNASN Game Reviews: TMNT

There's no doubt that the Angry Video Game Nerd has a good thing going. He appeals to the retro gaming audience who have gone through their share of horribly bad video games by simply enumerating all the bad points about them. But by doing so as a foul-mouthed "nerd", he crosses that line from being just a reviewer to an entertainer as well.

His popularity has led scores of others to copy his style and methods, so you can find dozens and dozens of angry reviews of bad video games on YouTube. The myriad of these videos somewhat dilutes the effectiveness of AVGN's reviews, but he always finds a way to keep his new reviews fresh. I still like watching all those reviews, though. And yet, sometimes a non-angry review of a good game hits the spot too. Take this review of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles arcade game, for example:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5so3Lx7WWvE (link shown because embedding was disabled)

This one appeals to me because I've played those games many, many times... in the arcade and on the home consoles. These beat-em-ups were designed to take away your quarters, but they did so knowing that everybody would want to do so because the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were such a hot property back then. It's funny how games based on motion pictures usually turn out to be total crap, but games based on cartoons running at the time became classics. I'm not sure why that is... I'll have to think about that one.

6/7/2007 - Street Fighter II Playsets

Hmmm... here's one way NOT to pay tribute to a classic video game: make incredibly cheap action figures and playsets! There were many things trying to cash in on the success of Street Fighter II, and most of them were bad... really bad. There were some knockoff games like Fighter's History, which actually got sued by Capcom for being too similar. There was the American-produced cartoon with its action figures which were merely G.I. Joe figures that were re-painted. And of course we had the American-produced live-action movie, which may be a guilty pleasure, but there's a reason why you feel guilty watching it: it's bad.

Needless to say, anything that was not directly produced by Capcom or its subsidiaries just plain sucked. And this reviewer presents us with what is perhaps the worst example. These action figures look so bad, I can only conclude that they were made by the blind. These are probably mass-produced for the 99-cent stores. I hope Capcom sues somebody over this. I do enjoy this "angry" review, though... the special move exclamations with a British accent is priceless.

4/29/2007 - Gamespot's Alex Navarro reviews Big Rigs

Sometimes there are games so bad, that words can't describe it. This is one of those games:



A few things the video doesn't mention:
1) The computer-controlled opponent does absolutely nothing.
2) When you cross the finish line, it says "You're Winner."
3) That is the actual in-game music.