STAR WARS EPISODE 7 THE FORCE AWAKENS!!!

THERE IS A NEW STAR WARS MOVIE COMING OUT!!!! I feel so much better having typed that in all caps.


LOGO!!!!

Now I am a HUGE Star Wars fan. Ever since I was little. I literally don't remember a time where I did not like/know what Star Wars is.

Speaking of Star Wars, Disney Infinity 3 will make Star Wars characters playable. Because Disney owns Star Wars.

But back to Star Wars Episode 7! First of all (and I will assume you know what I'm talking about), Luke Skywalker, Han Solo (plus Chewbacca!), and Princess Leia will return. Which is a plus in my book!

Second of All, the new Sith Lord (have no idea what his name is) has a revamped Lightsaber. How is it revamped? It has a cross guard.


Sith Lord!

And while on the topic of his Lightsaber, there is so much controversy over it. Some people thinks it's cool, Some people think it's silly. I personally like it for two reasons. First and foremost is that it solves the number one problem with Lightsaber fight scenes is that you can just slide your blade down the the other Lightsaber's blade and chop off his hand relatively easily. But thanks to that cross guard you can't really lock blades with this dude. Plus, the main blade on that Lightsaber is like 10 times longer than a normal Lightsaber. But like I said, there will always be haters.

The second reason is I always like a variant of a well known weapon (that same logic applies to bosses). Sure we got Darth Maul's duel-bladed Lightsaber designed to look like a bo staff, but I like Lightsabers better when they go with the sword motif. And yes I am fully aware that Episode 1 was not the greatest of Star Wars movies.

Anyway, something also worth mentioning is that the Millennium Falcon is also returning. Easter egg in the teaser trailer! In the original trilogy the Millennium Falcon had a circular satellite dish on the roof. If you watched Episode 6 you would know that very late into the movie this same dish was knocked off.

 
The Falcon!!!

If you looked closely you can see that a rectangular dish is taking the original dish's place. CONTINUITY!!!!

Now something important to note is Star Wars Episode 7 takes place a VERY long time after Episode 6. Thus the returning characters are much older. And as is the case in every big movie franchise, new characters show up. The day before I wrote this I got a magazine featuring a interview with the actors/actresses in the movie. I won't spoil the background of any of the new characters in the event their origins happen to play a key role. If you want you can go do the research yourself if you want spoilers. But if you want spoilers, then you are crazy. Seriously, why do people watch spoilers for movies?

Ignoring spoilers the most important thing to know is that Disney are the ones making this movie. Because Disney owns everything! Seriously. They do.

There are currently two trailers on the Internet for this movie. In the event you are reading this blog post in the distant future when the movie is already out then ignore this entire sentence. Also leave a comment on your opinion of the movie when it comes out!

That is literally everything I know about Star Wars 7 and for once I don't have any websites you can go to for more information. But on the plus side this movie is coming out December 18 2015. And as before this part of the post is completely irrelevant if you are reading this after the movie comes out. But it's still worth a read!

Yooka-Laylee!!!

This post is about the game with the best title ever. Yooka-Laylee!!! NOTE: It's pronounced "ukulele".

 

LOGO!!!

Yooka-Laylee is being made by Playtonic and the members of Playtonic mostly consist of ex-Rare members. Back in the 90's Rare made one of the most iconic platforming duos. Banjo (a bear) and Kazooie (a bird).

But this game is about the one pair of cartoon animals that couldn't be more strange but cool at the same time. The heroes of this game are Yooka (a chameleon) and Laylee (a vampire bat). 

 

These guys!

Now Yooka-Laylee is a platformer (yay) that unlike some platformers don't require expensive toys sold separately *cough* Skylanders *cough*. A PURE PLATFORMER!!!!! 

 

Gameplay!

Players control Yooka and Laylee simultaneously. They basically work in tandem. Yooka the chameleon can use his/her (the creators of the game are keeping our heroes' genders a secret) tongue as a grappling hook (which is cute and awesome at the same time). Laylee the bat can do a sonar blast to stun enemies. Yooka and Laylee also have a roll attack where Yooka rolls up into a ball and Laylee rolls him/her around. Laylee can also flap his/her wings to let Yooka do a Glide.

On a side-note this game was the fastest game to reach a million dollars on Kickstarter. In less than 24 hours. Yeah. I think it's safe to assume Yooka-Laylee is getting a massive hype train.

Anyway, combat is not the highlight of the gameplay. That goes to collecting things. Which is fine by me because when I play any video game I make it my mission to get all the things. I MUST HAVE ALL THE THINGS!!!!

 

Yooka and Laylee's mission is the collect these little coins pictured above called "Pagies". Why? I don't know! You have to wait for more info on the game to learn more. And there will be BOSS BATTLES! At least one boss per world!! I love boss battles. But only when the bosses are diverse, interesting and generally fun to fight.

Also there will be mine cart races a la Donkey Kong Country.

This game is coming out on Wii U, Playstation 4, Xbox One, Linux, Microsoft Windows, and OS X on October 2016. I'll be getting it on Wii U because I don't own any of the other home consoles. And I prefer home console gaming to PC gaming. I also prefer home Console gaming to handheld gaming.

For more info please go to Wikipedia because that's where I got all this info from.

PUPPETEER!!!

This blog post is about a game called Puppeteer. Why is it called that? They literally designed the game to look like a puppet show. It even has live audience reactions, curtains, a narrator, intermissions (which only happen when you click that pause button), set changes, and spotlights!


LOGO!!!

This game is similar to another game (and I am confidant most of you have at least heard of it) called Little Big Planet. They both have a arts-and-crafts themed aesthetic to them (In Little Big Planet everything is made of stitching, patches, cotton, and cardboard).

Anyway, the difference between them is that Puppeteer is a game that's literally a puppet show. And there are plenty of fourth wall breaks made by a character players meet early on named Pikarina (her dad is the SUN!!! How can the sun have children!? I don't know! I don't want to know!)

This is the story of Puppeteer. Once upon a time there was a magical theater. When the game starts up the proprietor of said theater puts on a puppet show meant to astound the eye and capture the human soul. The show is titled "The Perilous Journey of a boy named Kutaro".


Kutaro!

The story of "The Perilous Journey of a boy named Kutaro" that the titular boy Kutaro is whisked away from Earth to the Moon. Yes. The Moon. There the Moon Bear King (he's a bear. And a King. And he lives on the Moon) rips Kutaro's head clean off and eats it (there is no blood though. This game has cartoon violence. Like Tom and Jerry level violence. Purely slapstick!).


Moon Bear King!

This unfortunate turn of events actually leads straight into a pretty cool mechanic. Kutaro can use almost anything as a Substitute Head (cheeseburgers, swords, toy trains, etc). Substitute heads can be used to interact with what resembles them. They even let you access bonus levels (EXAMPLE: Using the Spider Head near a cobweb summons a giant spider that takes you to the bonus stage).

While escaping from the Moon Bear King's castle, Kutaro steals the Moon Bear King's favorite pair of scissors, which are called Calibrus. They are magic scissors. Very powerful! Yes. Magic scissors is a thing.

Anyway, once Kutaro escapes he, along with a witch named Ezma Potts, a cat named Yin Yang, and the daughter of the sun Pikarina (again, how can the sun have a child!? It makes no sense!) go on a quest to free the Moon from the Moon Bear King's tyrannical rule.

Now on to gameplay. Kutaro moves in a 2D side-scroller fashion. Kutaro can defeat enemies with Calibrus (which is his main weapon) and can also use Calibrus for transport. You see, when Kutaro snips something in midair and keeps snipping, he can stay airborne pretty much indefinitely (provided that Calibrus is always cutting through something).

 
Game-play!

Kutaro also gains new abilities as he goes along, but I won't spoil them (the last one is hilarious and by far the most useful).

Now that we got the facts out of the way, I will talk about my personal experience with the game (a.k.a. a review). Overall this game was a blast. I had fun playing the game from start to finish. My only complaint about the game is that you can only carry three Substitute heads at a time, and you can switch them out between levels, so if there is a head you want to use, you have to replay the level that head appears in just to get it.

The story was really good. It nails the whole "puppet show" theme perfectly. Every character was memorable. Something strange is that the levels are surprisingly long (which is a good thing for me. I personally don't like short but sweet levels, unless they are boss battles). Another thing that surprised me is that every level (and there is 21 in total) ends in a boss battle. And with the exception of one boss, every boss is unique. The only Boss that wasn't unique was General Dog's first form which was literally a copy-and-paste of General Tiger. At least he redeems himself in uniqueness with his second form.

All-in-All, this was a very awesome game. If this blog got you interested in buying it then, by all means, go ahead and buy it (see what I did there?). I would give this game a 9/10 stars. The only thing stopping me from giving it a perfect ten is that this game is somewhat annoying to 100% because some optional areas can only be reached with the right head and like I said, it is annoying replaying a separate level just to get that head you need to reach that elusive bonus stage. But other than that this game is fun, and that is what matters most. So yeah! Go buy this game if you like 2D platformers like Super Mario Bros or Little Big Planet.

For more info please go to the Puppeteer wiki.