Game EXP: What Remains of Edith Finch

I feel like I am not qualified to talk about Giant Sparrow's 2017 first person exploration game What Remains of Edith Finch, but I am going to any because I recently finished this game and it was far more beautiful of an experience than I could ever convey with my clunky words.

I received a free copy of the game through Epic Games back in January after they launched their own client, so that was the platform that I played in on, using my fiver year old laptop.  I would say that for the most part, the game ran fine when I played it on medium settings even though the recommended settings suggested that I play it on the lowest settings across the board.  Yeah, my laptop chugged a bit and only crashed once shortly after I started, but once over the course of a number of hours, maybe five I think, is not too bad for a PC game running on a five year-old laptop. I do not think that I ever hit 30 fps, but this game is not about how accurate you are with a sniper rifle and 150 yards out, but about a young woman exploring her family's past.  I do not want to give away any more than that because for me, going into the game fully blind meant that I did not know what to expect and that made the entire game a lot more impactful.  Think of it like a mix between Dear Esther and Gone Home.  So if walking sims or similarly-styled games are not your thing, then I would still recommend this game because of how well the entire game was created.

In What Remains of Edith Finch, you play the character of Edith Finch as she explores her family's home in the Pacific Northwest, on a small island off the coast of Washington State.  The story it told through Edith's narration, voiced by Valerie Rose Lohman, who did a phenomenal job with the lines that were written for the character.  This story is played through a combination of present day exploration and through visualizations, some are fanciful to the point of absurdity, while others are the exact opposite and are steeped heavily in reality.  

One of the things that I loved about how the story in WRoEF is told, is that the histories of Edith's family are all told in a slightly different style, although all are in first person.  One stage/history might have you using WASD to swing on a swing set, while another has you grabbing a fish with the mouse, then moving it over under an industrial slicer.  The mechanics keep you, as the player, engaged in a way that you are simply not just walking from one instance of talking to another, but by actually participating in the history of the Finch Family.  And it is in this participation of inevitability and fate that make some of the stages/chapters kind of hard to complete from an emotional sense.  Because the Finch family is beset by tragedy, as the player you may pick up how a particular chapter is going to end before it does, but you are forced to play it out until the end.

That is part of where a lot of the emotional impact of the game comes from.  Combined with Valerie Rose Lohman's reading and performance as Edith, WRoEF elicited a very strong emotional response in me.  There were times when I was clenching my jaw holding my emotions back so that I could progress through the narrative.

Now, I did not take many (read any) screenshots while I was playing for two primary reasons.  The first one being that I was frequently too wrapped up in the story to think, "Oh this is nice, I should take a picture," and the second reason being that Epic's gaming client does not allow for ease of screenshots like either the Switch or Steam's client (F12).  Had I taken pictures, they would be dotting this article with pictures that taken out of context would not mean much, like looking through a strangers photo album (old time Facebook for you younglings out there).  And that's kind of what What Remains of Edith Finch boiled down to its base element, exploring someone else's family history with narrative.  There were no hidden un-lockables, collectables, or epic lootz in order to proceed.

This was a beautiful game in the purest sense of the word.  And no words I can write here can fully express my wish for everyone to play this game on your system of choice, and I am seriously considering picking this up for the Switch too, if only to actually give money to the developers instead of gracefully mooching from Epic Games' generosity.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
Instrumental

Movie Rankings: End Credits

If you are just joining us, this is the end of a four part series where I look at the movies in our home collection and how various Internet sites have ranked those movies.  Part 1 covered the ideas behind this series and how I would go about tabulating all of the information, Part 2 looked at the rankings from IMDb, Part 3 looked at scores from Rotten Tomatoes, and Part 4 delved into Metacritics less than complete list of movies.  I had considered posting about a combination score using all three of the sites listed above, but that would still leave out nearly 35 titles that did not have a combination of all three scores; which I know I already did by including Metacritic.  So rather than rehash the formula I used over the last three articles, I am just going to go over my impressions while writing this series as well as what my final takeaway after the last couple of weeks.

The first thing: I used the word "surprise" and variations of it a lot.  Like, a lot-a lot.  Well, a total of 14 times over the course of four articles (not including this one because it is still in the process of being written) seems like a lot when you are writing/reading/rereading them.  In my defense, I could not think of a better way of describing the "Huh. . ." sound I made whenever I came across something that did in fact surprise me.  I was legitimately surprised when I saw how low Tideland ranked from Metacritic's scores, just as I was surprised when I saw that there were only four movies on IMDb that ranked 9.0 and higher; these being The Shawshank Redemption [9.2], The Godfather [9.2], The Godfather: Part II [9.0], and The Dark Knight [9.0].

Which moves onto my next point, that IMDb apparently only has four movies that are worthy of a 9.0 and higher rating.  I know I already touched on this but I kind of wanted to expand on it a bit.  I know my feelings towards Rotten Tomatoes comes across as pretty harsh, which I acknowledge it is, only that I recognize that IMDb's ratings might come across as more pompous.  Kind of.  Only having four films above a 9.0 seems pretty harsh, but I actually appreciate that there are not any 100 scored movies.  I do not think that there should be any movies with a perfect score, or at least to date there shouldn't be.  I do not know if I believe that there is a perfect movie.  Flawless storytelling, memorable soundtrack, perfectly casted, sweeping cinematography, appropriate costumes/set design/props, etc?  Sure there are films where I felt that there was nearly nothing wrong with them, but I still do not know if I would call them perfectly flawless movies.

And then according to Rotten Tomatoes, we have six flawless, 100% Fresh rated films.  Six films out of I cannot figure out how many, are perfect examples of the film medium.  Although apparently not all six films made it to the official Rotten Tomatoes Top 100, despite the fact that Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri has a score of 90% with 343 reviews by critics; I haven't seen TBOE,M, so I cannot comment on the fact that it is part of this list.  Although according to this list, The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi are also the cream of the Top 100 layered crop, sitting respectively at 40 and 23.  So I genuinely have no idea how to interpret this data here.  Maybe a lower score from a larger pool of critics is weighted more than a film with a higher rating from fewer critics?  Maybe their algorithm is on par with the Atiyah-Singer Index Theorem?

And as for what Metacritic finds to be the best movies of all time, there are eight movies earning a 100 point Must See rating, three of which are by Alfred Hitchcock: Rear Window, Vertigo, and Notorious.  As was the case with how Metacritic rated the movies in my own collection, the films that are rated highest here seem to be more varied than the previous two sources.  There are a number of films that I did not find on either such as Three Colors: Red, My Left Foot, and Mean Streets, among a number of others.  This variation I do greatly appreciate, although there is still the issue that 35 of the films in my collection are not listed on Metacritic's site.

So why do this?  Why put together the scores from various sites for all of the movies in our collection?  Why talk about it for over two weeks, dedicating five articles to the whole endeavor?  Because I love movies as a medium.  And after finding out that Tideland, Jackhammer Massacre, and Your Highness are not considered to be watchable films, that does not mean I am going to purge the collection.  If anything, it will make me want to rewatch some of the films that were at the top and bottom of their respective lists, and that is really the whole point of buying movies.  To rewatch them*.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
And the Tale, Boldly Told, of the One


*And if the film has some great commentaries too.  And blooper reels.  And just a butt-ton of special features.  But mainly the commentaries.

MIDI Week Singles: "Heroic Feats" - Burly Men At Sea (NS, PS4/PSV, PC, Mac, iOS)

"Heroic Feats" from Burly Men at Sea on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4/Vita, PC, Mac, iOS (2016)

Composer: Plied Sound

Album: Burly Men at Sea (Original Soundtrack)

Label: Self Released (Bandcamp)

Publisher: Plug in Digital

Developer: Brain&Brain

This track, only heard at least once, probably more after you complete various stories, happens after you finish the game.  At least the first time anyway.

Burly Men at Sea is an odd and charming game that allows and kind of requires multiple playthroughs.  It is built into the mechanic, so if you stop playing after the first time you reach the credits and hear this song, you will probably feel cheated out of however much you paid for this game on whichever platform you are playing it on.

What I like about this song, is that it kind of ties together the experience of playing through the story at the end, or at least at the first ending.  In the game, all of the sound effects are done with voices as opposed to traditional foley work.  There is a voice literally saying "ting-ting-clang" when you come across a black smith.  A lot of the music in the game is performed on instruments so it was nice to hear the closing song once again done by only voices; there are other a capella in the game as well so this is not the only track to make use of this.

I want to believe that there are only three voices singing this final song, coupled with the fact that it is called "Heroic Feats" which is what our three burly bearded brothers are after the whole time.  However, for whatever reason, my ear cannot tell if there are three voices, three parts, or eight people singing four and-a-half parts.  Better ears are needed I guess, but I still envision our three bearded protagonists sitting around a table after one of their adventures singing this song.

And I hope you enjoy this song from a game that is being played for a short while before I drift off to slumberland.

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

Instrumental

Movie Rankings: Metacritic

This is part four in a series where I look at how various Internet sites have ranked movies that we have in our collection at home.  Part I was my reason for starting this series of articles, Part II looked at the rankings from IMDb, and Part III went into the ratings from Rotten Tomatoes.

Before I get into the movies themselves, I need to point out that Metacritic disappointed me quite a bit in which movies they did not have ratings for.  With most of the nine movies that I listed from Rotten Tomatoes, there were 24 additional films that simply did not exist on Metacritic's site.  Films like Dragonheart, Immortal Beloved, The Transformers: The Movie, and Monty Python's Meaning of Life.  To me, it definitely seemed like there were a number of foreign films missing like Ringu, The Ring Virus, Suicide Club, Rashomon, Uncovered, and Akira, as well as a some of the older films like Captain Blood, Yojimbo, and 13 Ghosts (not to be confused with the 2001 remake Thir13en Ghosts).  I felt that this did not alter the final results too much as I do not see Dragonheart or Suicide Club being in either the top or bottom five.  It just made me a little saddened to see a site as "comprehensive" as Metacritic missing so many movies for no apparent reason.  And it is not like these are obscure films either, as there is a page for the Japanese manga based film Uzumaki which is surely not as well known as Akira, or Immortal Beloved.

But anyway.

Top 5 Films (Hypothesized)

• Aliens (1986)
• Akira (1988)
• The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
• Seven Samurai (1954)
• Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (1980)

MetacriticTop 5 Films That I Own

• This is Spinal Tap (1984)                                                          [92]
• Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975)                             [93]
• The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)      [94]
• Dr. Strangelove (1964)                                                               [97]
• Seven Samurai (1954)                                                               [98]

You know, I am kind of okay with these top five films.  And I am kind of okay with their order too.  Kind of.  I probably never would have put Monty Python and the Holy Grail or This is Spinal Tap this high on their list despite the fact that I love Holy Grail and I think Spinal Tap is hilarious, especially after the list from the previous two sites.  It was actually pretty refreshing to see comedies in three of the top five spots, because .  I think it is kind of like what films you would expect to win the Oscar for Best Picture.  A comedy, unless it is a heartfelt comedy, probably will not make the list.  Just look at the list of nominees and winners of the Oscars for Best Picture and you will find that comedies only dot the numerous other titles and rarely win at that. So it was nice to see the likes of Monty Python and the Holy Grail, and This is Spinal Tap making the top 5.  Still not surprised about Return of the King being rated so high, but you all know what I have had to say about that movie. . .although I am thinking I should do a full on article why I feel like that is my least favorite of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. . . maybe. . .

But now onto the the poorly rated movies!

Bottom 5 Films (Hypothesized)

• Beowulf (2007)
• The Happening (2008)
• Jackhammer Massacre (2004)
• The Postman (1997)
• Waterworld (1995)

Metacritic Bottom 5 Films That I Own

• Silent Hill (2006)                [31]
• Legend (1985)                      [30]
• Thir13en Ghosts (2001)     [30]
• The Postman (1997)           [29]
• Tideland (2005)                  [26]

You know, this one surprised me too, but for the wrong reasons.  I can understand Silent Hill making the list because again, it is a movie based on a video game.  I thought it was better than a 31 because for me, as it worked well on its own and did not require previous knowledge about the game and I thought was one of the better adaptations to date.  I should note that when I saw the movie, I only had a small bit of information about the series and had not played any of the games yet.  But Legend!?  Really!?  I mean I guess if you do not like over-the-top high fantasy full of rhyming Dwarves, unicorns, swamp hags, and stories where good triumphs over evil.  Maybe the people reviewing the film had only seen it (and rated it) with Tangerine Dream's soundtrack and not the original score by Jerry Goldsmith?  But Gene Siskel calling the film not ". . .the least bit artful" is rubbish in my opinion.  This low rating I genuinely do not understand.  We already talked about Thir13en Ghosts, and The Postman so I will skip those and go to the equally baffling low Tideland.  Terry Gilliam films run the gamut from Tideland [26] to Monty Python and the Holy Grail [93] and everything in-between.  Even Conklederp was surprised and confused by the low rating.  "Way too disturbing for kids and too weird for most grown-ups."  "Tideland" is borderline unwatchable."  "The worst that can be said of the first two-thirds of "Tideland" is that it is tiresome."  "His latest effort is pointless and an excruciating bore."  Well, there are 12 more negative critic reviews that you can read if you want, but I think you get the point, one that is apparently lost on me because I really enjoyed Tideland.

So what is my take away from Metacritic?  I do appreciate the variation in not only the top 5 movies, but also that top 10 which include titles like King Kong (1933), Being John Malkovich (1999), and Alien (1979).  The bottom 10 also included (by now standards like) Your Highness, and The Happening, but also had UHF with a paltry low score of 32.  In the end though, I do not know if I see myself actively visiting Metacritic for all/any of my movie scoring needs, especially if they are not going to have ratings for 16% of the movies in our collection.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
Instrumental

MIDI Week Singles: "Stage 3: Cadillac Heights" - Robocop 3 (NES)

"Stage 3: Cadillac Heights" from Robocop 3 on the Nintendo Entertainment System

Composer: Jeroen Tel

Album: No Official Release

Publisher: Ocean Software

Developer: Probe Software

With all of the posts about movies this last week, I thought it appropriate to feature music from a game that was based on a movie.  Because for some reason movie/game tie-ins never seem to be as successful as the movie, likewise with movies that are based on video games.  Unless you are talking about Willow on the NES, that was a great game based on, in my humble opinion, a great movie.  But we are here to talk about the untitled "Stage 3: Cadillac Heights" from Robocop 3 which I first came across during my time with #AllTheNESMusic.

Now, I have never played Robocop 3 (or any of the games in the Robocop franchise), so after watching a playthrough of the game I was a little saddened by how muted the music is in the game.  I had first thought that maybe the music volume was turned down, but before starting the game, you are given the option to play with the music on or off.  So it just appears that the music volume in-game is not very loud and gets pushed into the background once guns start blazing.  But since Robocop isn't called Cuddlecop, I guess it does make sense to sacrifice the volume of the music for sound effects.

With "Stage 3: Cadillac Heights," what I like about the song is that it does not give off any Robocop vibes, but it does sound very 80s.  Had this song been recorded with an army of synthesizers and not just a MIDI keyboard (or essentially a MIDI keyboard) .  The song is quite bouncy, which kind of works in this stage when you get to use the jetpack so movement becomes a bit floaty.  What "Stage 3: Cadillac Heights" does have, at least to me, is a metropolis feel to it.  Based on the name alone, Cadillac Heights sounds like it is supposed to either be an upperclass neighborhood, a neighborhood that used to be upperclass before it fell into disrepair, or that it was always a slum that had an upperclass name slapped on it.    Or I am just wrong altogether; I guess my lack of Robocop lore is showing a bit.  For me, something about the staccato-ness of the melody, that there are no sustained notes anywhere in this song, comes across that things happen quickly in dystopian Detroit.  Almost as if Metropolis in Sim City were to take on a dystopian future, there would still be a hint of what the city used to be like.

That is what I hear in this song anyway.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
Machine Infected System Controlling

Movie Rankings: Rotten Tomatoes

This is part three in a series where I look at how various Internet resources have rated movies that I have bought over the years.  The original article contains my reasoning behind devoting so much time and effort to this series, while the second article looks at the ratings from the Internet Movie Database (IMDb).

The article today looks at how the rankings and reviews from Rotten Tomatoes feel about the movies that I have purchased.  Specifically the "Tomatometer" rating as opposed to the Audience Rating, but not because I hold established film critics to a higher esteem, but there is less of chance of critics review bombing something because they were butt hurt over their favorite character being killed off, or that a person of color was cast.  Some quick context, is that I am generally not a fan of the Rotten Tomatoes site and how they score movies.  I guess I do not really mind their titles for what they consider to be a bad movie, only that over the years, I have found that some of my favorite movies (Waterworld, Event Horizon, Suicide Kings, and Willow) are all considered to be "Rotten" and apparently not worth your time if you want to watch any movie since 1895.  I honestly get so worked up when reading some reviews that I feel like the person reviewing/rating the movie would rather be doing anything else and how in the bloody loving hell could I (meaning me) ever enjoy something so boring and bland as Mallrats.  "The fatal flaw in plotting the material is that we don't care."  You know what, fuck you Roger Ebert!  I love Mallrats.  Maybe it is just me, but Rotten Tomatoes, as a whole, seems to put itself up on a gold-pressed latinum pedestal as the only worthwhile source for what movies you should actually like.

Ugh!  But anyway.

But I knew that I could not do this series without including Rotten Tomatoes because it would be like covering video games without ever talking about Xbox Games (which I know we do not do a lot of here, but that is because neither Dr. Potts or I are made of money so we do not have the resources to have one of each console in order to be a more complete site).  I should mention though, that Rotten Tomatoes' library of rated movies was not nearly as complete as I would have hoped as there were, as of June 4th, 2019, nine movies that were not listed or had ratings.  These missing movies included the following:

• Ju-On: The Grudge (2000)
• Jackhammer Massacre (2004)
• Shrunken Heads (1994)
• Shikoku (1999)
• Uncovered (1994)
• Dead Space: Downfall (2008)
• The Ring Virus (1999)
• Pet Shop of Horrors (1999)
• The Gamers (2002)

Top 5 Films (Hypothesized)

• Aliens (1986)
• Akira (1988)
• The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
• Seven Samurai (1954)
• Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (1980)

Rotten Tomatoes Top 5 Films That I Own

• The Terminator (1984)         [100%]
• Seven Samurai (1954)           [100%]
• The Crimson Pirate (1952)   [100%]
• Captain Blood (1935)             [100%]
• The Hidden Fortress (1958) [100%]
• Sanjuro (1962)                        [100%]

Surprise!  I decided to include six movies for the sole reason that they were all ranked at 100%, and I could not decide to leave any off, not because I love them all (I do not think I have actually seen The Crimson Pirate), but because I wanted to be impartial.  But as for the top six here themselves, I love that The Terminator is ranked higher than Terminator 2: Judgement Day (which has a score of 93%) since I am in the camp that enjoys it more than T2.  I was kind of surprised to see three Kurosawa films all ranked 100%, but then at the same time not.  His movies, or at least the ones I have seen, are well shot, edited, and follow characters that you genuinely develop an interest in.  I had thought that Rashomon would have ranked higher than either The Hidden Fortress or Sanjuro, but I guess those two movies have had a greater influence on Western cinema than Rashomon, but that is just an assumption.  Again, The Crimson Pirate I have actually never seen so I cannot really comment on whether or not I agree that it is a perfect film by tomato standards.

Bottom 5 Films (Hypothesized)

• Beowulf (2007)
• The Happening (2008)
• Jackhammer Massacre (2004)
• The Postman (1997)
• Waterworld (1995)

Rotten Tomatoes Bottom 5 Films That I Own

• Resident Evil: Apocalypse (2004)     [20%]
• Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008)  [18%]
• The Happening (2008)                        [18%]
• Thir13en Ghosts (2001)                        [15%]
• The Postman (1997)                              [9%]

Here we go, this is what I am talking about!  Except Star Wars: The Clone Wars, which did receive a brief theatrical run.  I agree that by movie standards it is not the greatest example of Star Wars or a storytelling in a movie-type format, but when viewed in the context of the show and as a four part mini-series, I do not understand where the very obvious hate comes from.  Everything else on this list I can understand why they are there.  Resident Evil: Apocalypse is a video game movie (although one that I thought was significantly better than the first Resident Evil movie mainly because it had a lot more shots that were reminiscent and derivative of the Resident Evil game series) and probably could have been a very well financed feature on the SyFy channel.  The Happening.  Yeah, I own it.  @ me if you want.  Thir13en Ghosts is not a good movie, but the make up effects, the sets, and the backstory for each of the ghosts, which is hardly covered at all in the movie, are all very well conceived and executed.  And last is The Postman, which coming off of Waterworld's heals, is no surprise that this movie tanked amongst critics.  Sure, if you already are on the fence with Kevin Costner, are not a fan of three hour reimagined western-style epics, then there is a good chance that you too would probably not want to see The Postman.

So this was Rotten Tomatoes.  Probably my least favorite site to go to to look up information about movies.  I think it is all because I view Rotten Tomatoes as a site that tells you which movies are worth viewing and which ones you should definitely stay away from.  I realize that is the whole point of a movie critic, but it is just how I view this site.  I could very well be wrong in my interpretation, but there it is.

For Friday, I will look at the ratings from Metacritic, which I only really came into knowing about through video game scores, which seem to heavily rely on Metacritic ratings to help determine if a game will be profitable and/or receive any sequels/prequels in their future.  So that is where we will be at the end of the week.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
We're In For Nasty Weather

Movie Rankings: Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

If you are just joining us, this is article two in a series where I look at the movies that I have in my collection, and how they are rated from the Internet Movie Database (IMDb.com).  The first article in this series was posted on Monday July 8th and goes into my reasons for starting this grouping of posts about movies and ratings.  I should also mention that since ratings will sometimes change (When I first started researching this series a month+ ago, I've seen Blade Runner go from an 8.9 down to an 8.2), so these scores are current as of July 12th, 2019 (which I realize is now over a month ago).  So assuming that you all have now read why we are all here, let us get to it.

Top 5 Films (Hypothesized)

• Aliens (1986)
• Akira (1988)
• The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
• Seven Samurai (1954)
• Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (1980)

IMDb Top 5 Films That I Own

1. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)            [8.9]
2. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)     [8.8]
3. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002)                        [8.7]
4. Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (1980)          [8.7]
5. The Matrix (1999)                                                                             [8.7]

Based on IMDb rankings, I have a couple of things I want to cover.

The first being that we apparently do not have any of movies that are ranked 9.0 or higher on IMDb.  By school standards, we only own B+ and lesser movies.  By that rational too, only four movies in all of cinema history have an A- or higher: The Shawshank Redeption (9.2), The Godfather (9.2), The Godfather, Part II (9.0), and The Dark Knight (9.0).  I guess I just did not realize how harsh (if that is the right word I am looking for) IMDb ratings could be.  That is not a bad thing mind you, but only four movies in all of cinema have a 9.0 or higher?  Yeesh.  Makes me feel a bit better about my poorly rated movies.

I am a little surprised that all three The Lord of the Rings movies made it to the top five, but at the same time, I'm not because I love 75% of that trilogy.  I'm not surprised though that Return of the King is currently the highest rated of the three, even though for me that was the entry that I liked the least for at least 14 different reasons (I sat down one afternoon and made a list of all of the things that bothered me while watching the movie).  I probably should have also considered The Matrix for a top spot, but I really thought that Seven Samurai would have been higher up on the list (it currently has an 8.6, right below The Matrix).

Bottom 5 Films (Hypothesized)

• Beowulf (2007)
• The Happening (2008)
• Jackhammer Massacre (2004)
• The Postman (1997)
• Waterworld (1995)

IMDb Bottom 5 Films That I Own

1. Your Highness (2011)                             [5.5]
2. Daredevil (2003)                                     [5.3]
3. Shrunken Heads (1994)                         [5.2]
4. The Happening (2008)                          [5.0]
5. The Jackhammer Massacre (2004)     [3.3]

This group of "bad" movies surprised me a bit too.  The main surprise was around Your Highness, which I thought was received a lot better than a (currently 5.5) by the general public.  Maybe I am wrong and a medieval stoner flick just wasn't and isn't what a good/entertaining movie "is."  I shouldn't also be surprised about Daredevil since I feel like the CGI doesn't hold up very well, not that it was great when the film first came out, but the extended cut (which I have and which is not technically rated) is so much better than the theatrical cut, but again.  Admittedly I have not seen Shrunken Heads as I received a copy of it when I put myself down for the "New Forbidden Zone DVD" tier for Richard Elfman's Indiegogo to fund Forbidden Zone 2.  It was a nice little bonus that I have yet to watch.  The Happening, yeah.  I own it.  @ me all you want.  I wasn't at all surprised about Jackhammer Massacre, mainly because it is a low budget indie slasher/horror indie film, but I know one of the actors in the movie and it's pretty amusing to watch.

I was very much surprised that The Postman did not make it to the IMDb list, but it is sitting strong with other 6.0 films apparently and just a bit higher was Beowulf sitting at 6.2.  Waterworld, for all of the crap I have heard/seen it get over the last 24 years, also received a 6.2.

So my hypothesized bottom five was somewhat correct (two out of five ain't bad), and considering I have a wide variety of tastes when it comes to movies, I think a 1.7 point jump between two of my worst rated films isn't too bad.

In the next article, we will look at the ratings from Rotten Tomatoes, a site that I typically stay away from since I think (thought?) that their ratings are much harsher and pompous than how I would normally regard movies.

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

Savin' It Up For Friday Night

MIDI Week Singles: "My Quiet Forest Home" - Octopath Traveler (NS)

"My Quiet Forest Home" from Octopath Traveler on the Nintendo Switch (2018)

Composer: Yasunori Nishiki

Album: Octopath Traveler (Original Soundtrack)

Label: Square Enix Music

Publisher: Square Enix

Developer: Square Enix Business Division 11

I do not know if this song crops up anywhere else in Octopath Traveler or if Duskbarrow is the only town/place where My Quiet Forest Home" plays, or maybe I was just in the right mind-space after running away from battle after battle in order to get through a forested region that was full of monsters 5-21 levels higher than my party members.  Whatever the reason was, this track hit me like a calming wave of contentment, and despite not actually being able to do or afford or do much in Duskbarrow, I wanted to stay.

Everything about this song is peaceful and serene, with no noticeable undercurrent of impending dread lurking around the corner.  From the opening theme-lette on the piano to the what I will call a cello bringing a soulful and heartfelt melody, I love everything about this song.  Maybe I am getting too sappy, but when the song loops back to the beginning and the piano is once again playing by itself, to me it is saying, just as the cello starts again, "Remember, this is why you're here."  I don't really know why that phrase pops into my head during this one specific section of the song, but it just does, and it makes me happy.

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

Across an Endless Horizon


P.S.  Now I need to listen to more of Yasunori Nishki's music to find out why I get massive Nobuo Uematsu and Yasunori Mitsuda vibes (unrelated to the fact that Octopath Traveler's visual style is reminiscent of Final Fantasy VI and Chrono Trigger).

Movie Rankings: The Concept and Pitch

The idea for this upcoming series of articles arose a few weeks/months back when I picked up Waterworld: The Ulysses Cut, which then forced me to rearrange the movies on the bookcases as well as something else that got me thinking about the movies I've bought over the years and how they have been received by society at large.

So the idea is that I have a list of all of the movies we have on DVD/Blu-Ray, specifically movies and not taking into account documentaries, TV Shows, TV Movies, or live concerts.  I could have also included VHS, but I think those are still in cold storage somewhere.  Presumably I have these movies because I like them enough to either spend my own money on them, or have asked other people to spend their money to buy them for me.  I know that not all of the movies I have are class acts, or universally regarded as good, but that's all about personal taste.  I have these films because they bring happiness in my soul on some level.  Sure, I'm not going to sit down and watch Requiem for a Dream every weekend, but I think it is a damn good film and the special features (especially the commentary) are well produced.  And so I bought it.  I also bought Reefer Madness because I think it is a hilarious movie in that the moral of the movie is so genuinely believed by the creators that it borders on parody.

Now, once I got down to putting all of our movies in list format via Google Docs, I then listed what I thought would be my top five movies as well as the bottom five movies.  Again, these are not movies that I think are actually bad and deserve to be in the top/bottom five, but how I think any of the three sites will rate them; in that The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King is my least favorite of the LotR trilogy, but I think it is many other people find it more highly regarded than the first two films.  I also did not take into account different versions of the same movie, as is the case with the Lord of the Rings movies.  I have the extended editions of the film, but not the theatrical release, but often times extended cuts will not be ranked on IMDb, Rotten Tomatoes, or Metacritic, so I just went with what was listed; but I do try to point out the difference where applicable.  I also did not give separate top/bottom fives for each site although I wouldn't've been surprised if the top five for IMDb ended up being different from Metacritic.

So I pulled the ratings for all of my movies from IMDb, Rotten Tomatoes, and Metacritic, for scoring, but will not be combining scores from all three, rather just tabulating scores from each site, then I sorted by site and will discuss the top and bottom five movies that I own.  To briefly clarify, I will only be listing and talking about the top and bottom five movies that I have as ranked by these sites, so you will not see The Godfather, or From Justin to Kelly because I do not own either of those two.

One really interesting thing I discovered was that there were some Metacritic and Rotten Tomatoes scores did not exist for all of the movies that I have.  Rather surprising for titles such as Akira, Dragonheart, Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, and Freaks.  There are plenty of other titles that were not listed, but I am not going to list everything, again, because that would be boring for all involved.

Oh, and I will not be putting up my list of all of the movies and ratings because that would be too cumbersome and let's just not go there. 

The upcoming articles will include (again) my top and bottom five as well as the top and bottom five for each site, but for the premier article, let us just start off with what my hypothesized top and bottom five movies will be.

Top 5 Films

• Aliens (1986)
• Akira (1988)
• The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
• Seven Samurai (1954)
• Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (1980)

Upon putting these films together, it seems like I believe that the Internet at large likes older films, seeing as how four of the five are 1988 and earlier, with three of those four in the 80s.  Maybe I am guessing that 80s nostalgia is rather high at the moment?  

Bottom 5 Films

• Beowulf (2007)
• The Happening (2008)
• Jackhammer Massacre (2004)
• The Postman (1997)
• Waterworld (1995)

In Friday's article, we will look at what the top and bottom five from the Internet Movie Database (IMDb) from the movies that I have and compare that list to my predictions here.  So if this has at all interested you, then you're in for a treat with a look into my brain, what movies entertain me, and what the voting Internet population thinks of the movies that I have purchased over the years.  If this does not interest you at all, well then just hang in there for a couple of weeks and we will return to our regularly scheduled broadcast.

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

I Didn't Mean to Scare You

MIDI Week Singles: "Mission 02" - Top Gun: The Second Mission (NES)

"Mission 02" from Top Gun: The Second Mission on the Nintendo Entertainment System (1987)

Composers: Hidenori Maezawa, Yuichi Sakakura, Harumi Ueko

Album: No Official Release

Developer: Konami

Publisher: Konami

I was looking through my list of songs to use, and oddly enough, this was the most patriotic song that I could find that I would listen to outside of it being July 4th tomorrow.  That and I did not feel like using the 3.47 second clip of the Star Spangled Banner from Blades of Steel.

I did play Top Gun: The Second Mission a lot as a kid, probably because I watched Top Gun a lot although I cannot remember if I bought the game for myself or received it as a gift, but that is beside the point.  The point is I never finished the game and could only make it to the second mission in the game before I finally died and then used up however many continues you were allotted.  I don't think I even ever made out of the tree dodging sequence, but I did try my darndest.

And by dardest I mean that I played Mission 2 for hours upon unverified hours, which is probably why I have fond memories of this song despite my inability to actually get through this mission.

What I do like about the song itself is how much is going on and how many sections there are to it all.  Which then is one thing that I would change.  I feel that the first 9.6847 seconds of the song should not have repeated, that it should have been just an intro and then repeated at the 9.6848 mark when the song does repeat at the 54.5 second mark.  And holy damn that guitar-esque solo is something else.

On that note, have a happy 4th of July tomorrow.  Or don't.  Either way is fine with us.

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

Like Small Children We Play