Category: Zelda

Not symmetrical

Nintendo’s been going on and on for about a year now about the “asymmetrical gameplay” experiences that the Wii U will foster. It does look neat, and I think the little demos that they’ve provided seem like they’ll be fun for a while, but I wonder if there are any long-term applications for this style? Having an extra player play a support role in games like New Super Mario Bros U and Rayman Legends is a decent way to start, but I hope that somebody can do something really compelling with this bold new idea.

Oh, did I say “new”? I meant “thing that Nintendo has been doing intermittently and nobody cares about.”

Asymmetrical gameplay isn’t a new concept. It’s not even just a Nintendo thing. All it really means is that the two (or more) people are playing the same game and doing a different thing. Mario Party alone has been doing it for over a decade with the 3-vs-1 mini-games. Hell, Gyromite on the NES can be (and works considerably better as) an asymmetrical multiplayer game if you ditch ROB and have a friend use his controller instead. And that’s all the way from the 80’s.

I suppose those ones kind of make a point for the style though. Referencing the “nobody cares about” part of my statement earlier, let’s take a look at Super Mario Galaxy‘s multiplayer mode. Well, multiplayer in the sense that two people have controllers in their hands, anyway. All the second person does is wave around the pointer to collect star bits and stun enemies. Sure, you can point novice players in the right direction, but there’s a hole on my face that could accomplish the same thing more efficiently. New Super Mario Bros U’s “Boost Mode” is pretty much the same thing, and I can’t imagine it’s going to be much more compelling.

Why this is one of the big selling points of the Wii U, I don’t know. I suppose it’s because of the GamePad and the ability to give opposing players different views of what’s going on. That is what makes it truly asymmetrical, after all. But even that”s not new. Do you remember connectivity? That Nintendo buzzword from 2003 that never took off?

I may be misremembering, but the first example of GameCube-GameBoy Advance connectivity was Pac-Man Vs. This was a great idea. One player is Pac-Man, and he sees the entire maze on his GBA. The other players are the ghosts, and can only see a small area around themselves on the TV screen. So what you have is a multiplayer Pac-Man, but in a way that the ghost team doesn’t have such an overwhelming advantage. It’s brilliant, but was unfortunately much too hard to actually find, because it was given away as a limited free sample. It was also included in the GC versions of a handful of Namco games, but they weren’t of much interest to me and Pac-Man Vs, despite its brilliance, was not worth the price of a full retail game.

On the other hand, you have The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker. It featured a really cool multiplayer mode that most people probably didn’t even know existed. When you encounter Tingle in the game, he gives you a device called the Tingle Tuner, which you can use to summon him through a GBA. Here, a second player (using said GBA) is given a radar and several actions that they can use to help or hinder Link. The problem is that once the Tingle player gets bored of dropping bombs on Link, the whole experience is pretty shallow. Maybe some people like watching a radar and occasionally telling Link where a secret is hidden, but I sure couldn’t get my brother to commit to the role. I usually just had my GBA connected and sitting next to me so I could find the hidden items that are only visible through the GBA.

This mode can also become infuriating for the Link player, because every one of Tingle’s actions costs rupees, and those rupees come straight out of Link’s wallet. It’s especially bad in The Wind Waker, because it’s easily the most commerce-driven Zelda game. Also, the bomb thing.

If you really want to stretch, you could probably consider the first Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles to have asymmetrical gameplay. Not because each player had a different radar on their GBA screen or anything, but because the game sucked for whoever had to be the Bucket Bitch and was fun for everyone else.

I’ve never used them, but a couple of the Wii Guitar Hero games have a mode called “Roadie Battle” where two guitarists compete. Each of those guitarists is paired with another player who has a DS that allows them to send power-ups to their teammate or try to sabotage the opposing guitarist. It’s a spin on the “support player” idea that Wind Waker and Mario Galaxy use, but they do it right by keeping that support player engaged at all times, whereas the other games end up leaving the support player with nothing to do quite often. Maybe the game itself isn’t as compelling as a Mario or Zelda title, but at least you’re not bored.

So yeah. I’ve got just a few examples here (and most of them are a stretch at best), but I think I’ve made a decent case that asymmetrical game experiences probably won’t hold up as a Wii U back-of-the-box bullet point. Developers are really going to have to step up if they want to make asymmetrical experiences that will matter. Nintendo Land has at least two variants on Pac-Man Vs, but you’re going to need something with a little more depth than that if you want people to care.

CD Review: The Greatest Video Game Music

Foreword: Just so nobody gets the wrong impression, I really like this CD. I just want to share my thoughts on it. Not all of them are nice. Thanks for understanding.

Among the many, many wonderful things Stephanie bought me that were amalgamated into my wedding gift (that girl spoils me rotten) was a compact disc entitled The Greatest Video Game Music. I can’t help but feel like maybe the London Philharmonic Orchestra was trying to start something with me there.

Calling your compilation The Greatest Video Game Music is setting the bar pretty high, as we video game nerds love us some video game musics. A cursory glance at the back of the cover confirmed my suspicions that it was something more akin to The Most Marketable Video Game Music. More evidence of this is that the image on the cover is a soldier with a cello on fire and a helicopter in the background. VIDEO GAMES ARE NOT ALL CALL OF DUTY. Goddammit. Stupid Sony and Activision ruined everything.

Anyway, that’s starting to deviate from my point. Or is it? I don’t know, I’m confused about where I was taking this. I guess something about how many games are represented on here that I didn’t even know had music, nevermind music that anybody bight consider to be the greatest. Oh, sure, you’ve got representation for the mainstays like Super Mario Bros, The Legend of Zelda, and Final Fantasy. There are a few you might not not think of off the cuff but definitely belong there, like the Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty and Tetris themes (more on the latter in a bit). Then there’s… the rest.

“I didn’t even know ____ had music.” You can fill in that blank with any of the following games that are represented on this CD: Splinter Cell: Conviction, Fallout 3, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, Modern Warfare 2, and Battlefield 2. There are a couple others in there that puzzled me, most notably Bioshock, Oblivion, and Mass Effect. I know that all of these games had music, but none of them had memorable music. Chalk that up to the games being so immersive that I didn’t notice music in the background if you must, but I couldn’t hum you a single tune from any of those titles. The tracks from these games didn’t even seem familiar to me when I listened to them, so that.

Back to that contingent of FPSs though. Is it really necessary to include tracks from both Modern Warfares and Battlefield 2? I can’t imagine that anyone who plays those games cares at all about the music in them. Same thing with Splinter Cell. They probably could have replaced at least two of those entries with something a little more fitting, say a track each from Sonic the Hedgehog 2 and MegaMan 2? You know, games with music that people actually care about. Maybe even too much in some cases. Halo 3‘s inclusion I give a pass because it’s just not a personal interest; I’ve heard many people laud the Halo soundtracks.

The two that really make me scratch my head are the tracks from Advent Rising and Angry Birds. I’ve never even heard of Advent Rising. And Angry Birds. Angry. Birds. Nobody but nobody who is going to buy this particular CD is in the Angry Birds demographic. Yes, I played it. But that was before I downloaded real games onto my phone. Is there even any music in Angry Birds past the title screen?

Uncharted, Grand Theft Auto IV, and World of Warcraft also seemed a little out of place to me. But at least those are gamers’ games and not paint-by-numbers FPSs.

So maybe I think the track selection could have used a little fine tuning. Of course I do. Every single (real) gamer who looks at this CD will have a whole lotta corrections to make. There are so many games out there with fantastic music that it would be impossible to pare it down to a mere 20ish tracks, even if you didn’t double-dip for a few franchises. The real question here is if the compilation that the London Philharmonic Orchestra chose works. The short answer is “Yes.”

The long answer, if you’re up for a few more paragraphs, is just a lot more music/game nerd over-analysis and picking. And the first thing that I want to say is that I hit the nail on the nose: the two Modern Warfare tracks and the Battlefield 2 theme are ultimately forgettable. Generic war-sounding tunes, mainly to a marching drum beat with some technoey stuff thrown in to try to differentiate them. Sorry, LPO, you shot too wide. Reign it in and play for the people who love video games, not the people who play shooting games because that’s the fad right now. Gamers love video game music, Bros do not. Not a single Bro will buy this album, and that is the hard truth of it.

The Advent Rising, Oblivion, Splinter Cell, Fallout 3 and Uncharted tracks didn’t make a mark on me. Its not that they were bad, it’s just that they didn’t stand out in any special way. They sound nice in my ears, but not so much that I’m ever going to have them buzzing through my head when my earbuds are out. The track included from Bioshock made me wonder why it was there, because it was more moody ambiance, and not actual music you might listen to independently. I can see why fans of the games might get into any of these tracks though.

You know, what? No. The Splinter Cell track wasn’t forgettable, it actually sounded kind of like it came out of Metal Gear Solid, just less grandiose. I consider that a compliment; MGS games usually have pretty solid soundtracks.

I was impressed by how much I enjoyed the Grand Theft Auto IV and World of Warcraft tracks. The GTAIV inclusion (“Soviet Connection”) isn’t particularly elaborate, but it’s got a punchy percussion line and some beautifully deep horns. The strings throughout lend the piece a real sense of gravitas and tie the whole thing tegether in a neat little bow. The WOW track (“Seasons of War”) works in a strong but not overstated vocal group, and works up from a very slow, somber start into an almost victorious melody before rolling back down into more of a battle theme that makes brief use of an almost tribal-sounding drum phrase. Again, it’s not big and flashy, but that’s probably what makes it so great.

The MGS2 theme is practically untouched, which is great because that track’s official form is perfect. The same goes for “Liberi Fatali” from Final Fantasy VIII. I guess the orchestral version varies a bit, but it hews quite closely to the original and that is just the way I like it. I was honestly a little disappointed that they didn’t do much in the was of arranging for Super Mario Galaxy‘s “Gusty Garden Galaxy,” because since it was recorded by an orchestra to begin with, a more elaborate arrangement would have been the best way to make it stand out. I love the song though; the string chorus alone is enough to put a big smile on my face.

That brings me to the set of songs that sit in a strange limbo between my opinion poles. “Super Mario Bros Themes”, “The Legend of Zelda Suite” and “Final Fantasy Main Theme” are all fantastic songs. So why was I kind of disappointed with their showing here? These are where the legacy of video game music really begins. These are the big three. It is not my place to question them.

I don’t know why, but I have a hard time appreciating hi-fi versions of the SMB theme. It just sounds wrong when played on anything more advanced than maybe a SNES sound chip. The LPO does a fine job with what they’ve got, but I guess I’d just rather they’d taken a piece from a more recent game. Nintendo doesn’t even re-use the original Mario theme all that often (in the main series), and when they do it’s in its natural state or heavily arranged so that it sounds okay without the blippity-bloopities. The underwater part sounds beautiful on strings, but the rest of the song was not meant for real instruments.

I’ve heard this particular Legend of Zelda suite before. I was sad because I wasn’t expecting a repeat. It’s still great though!

The Final Fantasy theme is a stirring string-based piece with some faint horns to give it a little body. It is the most beautiful track on the album. It is so deeply ingrained in my soul that sometimes I get a little misty-eyes when I hear it in a new FF game. What could I possibly have against it? I was secretly hoping it would be the Final Fantasy IV version of “Prelude”, which I like just a little bit more.

The most surprising tracks on the disc, I found, were those from Halo 3 and Mass Effect. Mass Effect especially because I’ve played through the game twice and never noticed the music at all. But if “Suicide Mission” can speak for the rest of the soundtrack, it must be amazing! The track starts of with a fairly simple beat, and then layers on instruments one by one, until it builds into an incredible “here we go to save the world” kind of thing. It’s deathly serious, but keeps your spirits up by mixing in some uplifting phrases into the generally foreboding melody. It’s perfectly suited to the atmosphere of Mass Effect, and I feel like I should give the game another round so that I can stop to appreciate its musical accompaniment.

As I said before, I expected pretty good things from the Halo 3 song, “One Final Effort,” and I was not at all disappointed. I thought it was really weird how much praise the Halo soundtracks get, but if the rest is as good as this single example, I might have to look into actually listening to the full soundtracks.

The brightest spot on this disc, however, comes totally out of left field both in the fact that I wasn’t expecting it to be my favourite track, and also because it starts way off from the source material. The Tetris theme, of all things, is apparently where the LPO decided to really show their stuff. It opens up with a peppy drum line, onto which other instruments gradually join, and then finally launches into a brief piano solo of the main riff. A horn comes in, and the drums return, then things just go out of control with the melodies and beats changing almost as much as the instrumentation. About three quarters of the way it slows down into a horn-driven waltz, and gradually picks up steam again in layered repetitions of the tune until the end.

Oddly enough, it kind of ends up sounding like it was arranged to fit into the Kirby’s Air Ride soundtrack.

Understandably, you kind of have to work with the Tetris theme to make it compelling. In its natural state, it’s repetitive and basic, not unlike Tetris itself. So it stands to reason that if you were going to have an orchestra play it, they’d probably want to do a little arranging. And this is great! The end product is marvelous! I’m just a little disappointed that the rest of the CD (or at least what I’m familiar with) didn’t take nearly as much creative license as this single song did. Granted, you might also argue that gamers want to hear the music they love in a format that they recognize, but there are entire communities based around remixing video game music. I really think it could work.

Anyway, I’ll stop talking about how this CD could be “better” now. It’s great the way it is. Maybe I haven’t gotten that through enough. It’s wonderful. I really like it. Big props to the London Philharmonic Orchestra for this one. If you’re going to buy an album of video game music as played by a major orchestra… well, I’ve never seen another one, but I’m sure this one measures up nicely to any others that could theoretically exist. There are certainly far worse ways to spend twentyish bucks.

I think if I’d seen it live I would have complained a lot less.

24 sentences of materialism

Alright kiddies! I totally forgot to do a “24 Days of Materialism” feature this year, and the best thing I could come up to sort of replace it is this: The 24 Sentences of Materialism. It’s basically the same concept, I choose 24 things I like and tell you to buy them, only this time I’m ripping off the long-dead Video Game Article‘s “One Sentence Reviews” feature. So here’s a list of video games, albums, books, and TV shows that I love and think you should buy for yourself or your loved ones (and also a link to a related webpage for each). Honestly, I think this is the hardest thing I’ve ever written. It’s terribly difficult to express everything I want to say about a product in only one sentence.

1. The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword – Take one part Ocarina of Time, one part Wind Waker, mix well, and then tweak everything just slightly: provides a surprisingly fresh Zelda experience!

2. Monster Hunter Freedom Unite – Why not help persuade Capcom to bring MH Portable 3rd or MH3G by picking up what is easily the best game in the series to date (that is available outside of Japan).

3. Groove Coaster – A rhythm game that’s incredibly simple, but will still suck you in with its trippy visuals and eclectic track selection.

4. Volchaos – A rather superb Xbox Indie game that brings back the glory days of video games: short, challenging levels, and a great sense of satisfaction when you get them right.

5. Fallout 3 – I don’t know why I don’t spend more time with this game; it’s so unlike anything else I play and all the more wonderful for it.

6. Super Mario 3D Land – The game that justifies the 3Ds’ existence.

7. Super Mario World 2: Yoshi’s Island – Getting this game (and The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap) for free because I paid too much for my 3DS makes it totally worth it.

8. Anima: Ark of Sinners – It’s not really very good, but you can see potential shining through the blandness and kludgy controls.

9. Tron Legacy Soundtrack – Oddly enough, this is probably my favourite music to listen to while playing Minecraft.

10. Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers – The Live Anthology – Just slightly less than four hours of pure delight.

11. Bound Together – Who could ask for more than an Earthbound tribute remix album?

12. Back in Blue – I love OC Remix but don’t generally love their albums, but this Mega Man 9 tribute is awesome all the way through.

13. Private Line – 21st Century Pirates – There must be something in the water in Finland, because they’re so good at hard rock/metal.

14. How to Survive a Garden Gnome Attack – This one really should be mandatory reading for every human being.

15. The Forever War – Best novel I’ve read in… forever?

16. 5 Very Good Reasons to Punch a Dolphin in the Mouth – This comic collection goes beyond hilarity and does its best to teach you some very important lessons.

17. GameSpite Journal 10: The SNES Turns 20 – What kind of gamer wouldn’t want to read a book all about SNES games?

18. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Ultimate Collection Vol. 1 – A huge, beautiful history lesson.

19. Futurama Season 6 – The first few episodes are kinda weak, but the quality shoots up after that and has me very excited to get BD set of the second half.

20. Community Season 2 – Abed’s Uncontrollable Christmas.

21. Criminal Minds: Suspect Behaviour – It’s like Criminal Minds if Criminal Minds sunk all the budget into the script and had first-year college students do the rest.

22. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (80’s) – Campy, cheesy, corny; whatever you want to call it, it’s all goofy nostalgia.

23. Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood – I liked the original series, and this one is better in every conceivable way.

24. Fringe Season 3 – Somehow this show has gotten to a point where I feel it might be better than LOST.

Cart way before the horse

So I was reading this interview with Shigeru Miyamoto, and at one point he mentions that he thinks that The Legend of Zelda would be a good franchise to have Retro Studios work on next. I don’t even know where to start on that one, but the frothing demand bird should be here any minute.

Yeah, I don’t really want to get into speculation on a new Zelda game before the last one’s been out even a month. Go read that interview.

TE @ C4

It’s gotta be… weeks now since I went to Central Canadian Comic Con. It was cool, I must say. Though I guess I’m not as much of a nerd as I thought it was because it was (local) Nerd Mecca and I wasn’t super-psyched about it. Oh well. I took a few (blurry) pictures while I was there. Everything from Minecraft to papercraft, and even one ass that did not belong in that costume. Actually I took a few pictures of those, but I figured one is enough to prove my point and deleted the rest. Be thankful. There’s an alternate universe where this post is all pictures of asses that shouldn’t be seen by human eyes.

         

         

              

         

         

              

              

         

I like lands in three dees.

I was going to write a post about how sad I am that I only got a week to play Super Mario 3D Land. Then I realized how stupid that was. I’ve beaten the game already. Full clear, too. I really did pour every extra hour I had over the last week into the game. Yes, Skyward Sword is going to be eating up most of that free time for a while to come, but I still have lunch hours and other not-at-home downtimes to use to plug away at Mario.

Obviously, the game is worth playing again. Hell, you have to play through it two times to clear it completely anyway. But it’s a fun game! That should really go without saying. I don’t have an exact record of how many times I’ve played through Super Mario World and Super Mario 64, but I can assure you that both figures are in the double digits.

The real tragedy here is that between Mario and Zelda, I’m going to be completely ignoring my recent-ish purchase of Bit.Trip Saga. I talked a bit about Runner not long ago, but hadn’t played any of the others until I picked up the collection. The other games are generally just as good a Runner, with the exception of Core, which I like a little less because I’m terrible at it. They’re not the most robust or feature-packed games, but they are fun and addictive, which is really all you need. As fun as they are though, I don’t have enough drive to play them over other games because they’re high-score games. A game can be super fun, but if there’s no sense of progression I will most likely leave it by the wayside. Runner is the only one that really has any complexity to it (beating stages and collecting gold), and I’ve already played the WiiWare version of that one to death. I guess Fate is a little more complex too, and that’s probably the one I’ve played most via the Saga.

The other game I feel bad about neglecting here (and let’s ignore that list I posted two weeks ago) is Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor Overclocked. I got it for my birthday and have been slowly making progress in it over the last couple months, but I’ve sort of hit a brick wall. The SMT series has a reputation for being hard, and knowing that I chose to play the game on easy mode, yet I’m already running into battles that I’m barely making it through. And I’m really not very far into the game. So the reason I’m shying away from this one is the difficulty barrier. It’s not so much that I don’t like hard games, it’s just that I don’t really have time to learn hard games. The back half of Super Mario 3D Land is downright evil sometimes, but it’s all just reflexes. You’ll never fail because you didn’t take into account what element goombas are weak against. Whereas I’d revel in games like Devil Survivor back in the day (see Final Fantasy Tactics), spending hours learning and breaking them, I just can’t afford to fight a battle multiple times just so I can pin down the right team I need to win. This isn’t a detraction from the game itself of course! I do really like it, but it’s just not likely going to see completion until I decide to sit down and focus on it and it alone.

And there ends my complaining about not having enough time for my favourite hobby. For now. I’ll be far to entranced by new Zelda over the next few weeks to care. I’ve also taken the liberty of scheduling a couple articles on the next two Sundays. Yeah, articles. Not sure if those really matter now that I’m WordPressin’ it up. Ehhh. I’ll keep it a thing for old times’ sake. Maybe the next time I reinvent the site I’ll just mesh them in with everything else.

The inconsistent hype train

I think it’s a tad odd how excited I am for The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword. Well, I mean, no, it’s not odd at all. A new console Zelda is always a huge deal for Nintendo fanboys. What I mean is that it’s a much bigger deal for me than Twilight Princess was. Maybe I was so excited about the Wii launch that my hype for new Zelda was diminished a bit, but I don’t remember being nearly as excited for it as I am Skyward Sword. I know for sure that I wasn’t counting the days.

Then again, I don’t think I’ll ever be as excited for a game launch as I was for The Wind Waker.

Last week I did have the privilege to play the Skyward Sword E3 demo via my cousin’s husband’s (There’s gotta be a word for that. Cousband?) Homebrew Channel. Needless to say, it only served to get me more excited for the full game. And then they invited me over to play a leaked copy of said full game the next night. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever said no to, but the demo was already more than I should have played. Legends of Zelda are big things, and I decided to save myself so that I could savor it properly. I had a big ol’ sex metaphor ready to go here, but decided against actually typing it. You can see where I was going, so it shouldn’t be hard to figure it out yourself.

Anyway, I’m really kicking myself for not saving one or two vacation days for this. Yes, I’ll play all day long on Sunday, but after that I don’t even know when my next chance to see it will be. Thursday? Stupid work. I wish it would just go away for a while.

And for old times‘ sake: ZELDA COUNTDOWN : 4 DAYS REMAIN.

Wishlist

So I’ve played a lot of video games over the course of my life up until now. Only now, real life gets in the way a lot and I spend a lot more time longing for video games than actually playing them. It’s a sad state of affairs, but it’s the way she goes. I’ve decided that for fun, I’m going to make a small list of game accomplishments I’d like to make in the next year. Keeping in mind of course, that this is the abriged version. I could go on for days about games I want to play.

Another note of minor importance is that these aren’t in any specific order. I’m just noting them as they come to me. Putting them in order would likely be impossible. Oh, and none of these are games that I’m actively playing. Most have been set aside in favour of other games, and a handful I haven’t even started playing.

  • Final Fantasy XIII : Defeat Vercingetorix
  • Final Fantasy XII : Complete the story / acquire all Espers
  • Final Fantasy VI DS : Complete the story
  • Dissidia: Final Fantasy : Earn “All characters at Lv50” accomplishment
  • Dissidia 012 : Start playing
  • Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together : Complete the story
  • Monster Hunter Freedom Unite : Complete offline quests
  • Monster Hunter Tri : Play it sometimes
  • Monster Hunter: Dynamic Hunting : Get all cheevos
  • Secret of Mana (iOS) : Complete the game
  • MadWorld : Complete the game
  • Little King’s Story : Complete the game
  • Epic Mickey : Complete the game
  • Earthbound : Play again
  • Super Mario Galaxy 2 : Find all green stars (June 11/12)
  • Pokémon White : Complete Unova Pokédex (Oct 6/12)
  • LEGO Rock Band : All single-player cheevos
  • Catherine : Complete the game on Normal difficulty
  • Guitar Hero Van Halen : Complete tour mode (May 23/12)
  • The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D : Complete Master Quest
  • The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker : Play again
  • Deadly Premonition : Start playing
  • Batman: Arkham Asylum : Start playing (Jan 2/12)
  • Fallout 3 : Complete the story (Jan 15/12)
  • Picross 3D : Complete all puzzles (May 14/12)
  • MegaMan Legends : play again (June 7/12)
  • Borderlands : Complete all story missions, all reasonable secondary missions
  • Luigi’s Mansion : Play again (Aug 29/12)
  • Pikmin 2 : Story mode full clear
  • Pikmin : Play again
  • New Super Mario Bros. Wii : Complete World 9

So yeah. Ain’t nobody can say I’m not a goal-oriented person. The relevance of my goals is questionable, but I have them. Game developers really should stop making new ones so I can catch up though. Maybe just put a freeze on new games for 2012? Not that it really matters. Once Super Mario 3D Land, The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, and Mario Kart 7 arrive, it’s all over anyway.

November reigns

Well sir, I’m gonna have to call it: November 2011 is going to be the best month ever. I’m sure that my wedding day will still be the best day of my life, but May is going to have to work really hard if it wants to compete for month.

Oh, and by the way, I’m basing this on the fact that the new Muppets movie is in theaters on November 23rd. Officially I’m very excited, but I also can’t help but wonder who opens a movie on a Wednesday? That’s just crazy. Nobody goes to the movies on a Wednesday. I’ll likely be too absorbed by Skyward Sword to remember to go right away anyway.

Anyway, The Muppets. I can’t imagine that it’s going to be a bad movie; the trailer alone is awesome. Especially that first one from a long time ago, where they faked you out into thinking it was a romantic comedy and then Kermit showed up. And it’s co-written by Jason Segel, which should be more than enough. If you watched Forgetting Sarah Marshall (and there’s no reason not to have), you’ll remember the Dracula puppet rock opera. I still wonder why that hasn’t been adapted into something bigger. That little five-minute scene is more than enough reason to sit through the whole rest of the movie. If you still can’t make the commitment, look up “A Taste for Love” on YouTube.

I don’t have a taste for musicals. Every time I watch a Disney movie and the characters stop what they’re doing to sing a song about how it’s awesome to be completely irresponsible (The Lion King) or how much they yearn for true love (anything with a princess), I get annoyed and wish I could skip to the next scene. Somehow, the Muppets always manage to get around it. I’m not sure why I’m so much more open to music on film when Muppets are involved, but I am. Maybe it’s because they do it so well. Head back on over to YouTube and poke around there for Muppets music video covers. There is tons of it, and for the most part, it’s all golden.

So now, really, the only way I can think of that could make November even better would be for there to be no snow. And/or for me to be able to find some time for (non-portable) video games. Things had been so good over the last few months, but in October I think I’ve logged maybe two hours in Darksiders. That’s it. 🙁