Tag Archives: so

So… I Saw some Trailers

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So, I haven’t done one of these “so” things in a while, and I just saw the trailers for a few movies, and I want to talk about them because I am excited about them, even though like most movies released in the past few years I likely won’t see them because I have no time ever.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Just a tease really: you get to see an X-wing, the Millennium Falcon, and a couple of other cool things. I saw some people who were talking about how it’s good a black person is in the trailer. And that seems kinda silly to me. I hope he’s just in the stormtrooper outfit as a disguise, though, because I have the same problem with a black stormtrooper as I had with women and aliens being in the Empire’s military. It just doesn’t fit. Part of the evil was that everyone was a strong white dude. And the rebels had strong white dudes, strong black dudes, strong women, and strong aliens. Making the Empire more inclusive makes them less evil. My thought was “oh, a black guy in a stormtrooper outfit… wait, aren’t stormtroopers bad guys?”

Jurassic World. I have the same problem with this trailer as I had with the military dinosaurs idea that was being tossed around quite a few years ago, when I had a site like “jurassicpark4rumors.com” bookmarked. I looked at it every day because I love the movies, and the books, and just everything about it in general. I’m not too sure about the genetically modified dinosaur, but that’s more in execution than a problem as part of both the books and movies was that they didn’t faithfully recreate the dinosaurs and that caused problems. I will have to wait and see if they do the trained raptors well. They could be great, but they could also be awful, and I like the idea of at least someone realizing, (what was the point of the books?), that making dinosaurs and meddling around with DNA for profit is a bad idea.

Terminator Genisys. As an action movie, this looks awesome. As an addition to the Terminator franchise, it looks better than 3 or 4, which both made the points of the previous movies entirely moot for different reasons. It’s weird how each Terminator movie is in almost a different genre. Terminator was horror, Judgement Day was action and suspense, Rise of the Machines was action comedy, and Salvation was post-apocalyptic. We forgot the aesthetic and point of the entire series. I wouldn’t say Salvation was a bad movie (I have a hard time saying that about any movie) but it did miss the point. This one looks like it will still screw with the point of the end of 2, which was that everything was final, and that things could get better if we were better prepared, and maybe machines could be empathetic, and it was uplifting and optimistic. And 3 just threw that away. So now we have this one, and I hope it at least references the previous movies in an entertaining and well-written way.

So… I Didn’t like the New Version of Pandemic

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So… I really like Pandemic. And they recently released and new version. I was interested to see it, but not too excited, as I really like the old version. I can now definitely say that I don’t like the new version. Not because there is any change in gameplay, or anything to make the actual playing of the game any less amazing.

pandemic cover

The first problem comes with compatibility: there is none. The new version and new expansions are completely incompatible with the old version and the old version of the expansion. I can see no reason why this has to be. Especially since I quite like the older board as you will see shortly. It just alienates older fans and makes it so people who own the older game are less likely to get the new expansions. I have no idea why they would do this, especially since the old version was almost perfectly serviceable in terms of design.

pandemic new cover

However my main problem is in the look of the new version. It’s too dark. I’m not sure why everything has to be so dark these days, but it would seem Pandemic is following suit. The board looks more drab and black. It doesn’t look nearly as fun, it doesn’t even look like the world. The last board was perfectly playable and even inviting, this is dark and off-putting. The cards have been redesigned and now they’re harder to read and it’s harder to understand where they represent on the board. The character artwork is now more “realistic” but it too conveys that unnecessary darkness.

I’m not saying that an epidemic spreading around the globe is funny, but the game didn’t need to be darkened. The last set was pleasing to look at and made you excited to play. This almost looks like the map to a zombie game rather than Pandemic.

pandemic new board

I just don’t see why it needs this. I’m not a fan of the darkness that invades everything these days. Why does everything have to be so dark, especially escapist things like board games? The cartoony artwork, pleasant green and blue board, and simple aesthetic made Pandemic more fun in my opinion. I realize that they can change anything they want to, but I don’t like their changes to the game, and I certainly won’t be getting the new version or any new expansions.