Top favorite 2016 releases

2016 is almost over thank the gods, while the year was filled by awful celebrity deaths and wars and destruction and Donald Trump and Brexit it also had some pretty interesting releases, the following are my favorite releases regardless of their medium and in no particular order :

• Monster Hunter Generations
  
  Monster Hunter Generations was my entry to the Monster Hunter universe and I loved every moment of my my 211 hours in it, I am planning to go back to it at one point or maybe play MH4U until Monster Hunter XX comes out in west, please Capcom.
• The Weeknd : Starboy
  
  The RnB star Weeknd comes back with another album that hit all the right notes for me, with tracks like Starboy, I Feel it coming, False Alarm and Sidewalks, Starboy proved itself to be the gift that keeps on giving.
• Arrival
  
  if you are a sucker for a good Sci-fi that is not about humans kicking some alien ass you will love Arrival, from one of my new favorite directors Denis Villeneuve he brought a beautiful and deep and emotional sci-fi flick which I will be rewatching for years.
• The Nice Guys
  
  Ryan Gosling had a really good year and even though I really loved La La Land I had to give The Nice Guys another shoutout, directed by Shane Black and co-staring Russell Crowe, The Nice Guys takes place during the 70s and it is a funny buddy movie that I haven’t seen anything like it in years, I will kill for a sequel.
• Shadow Tactics : Blades of the Shogun
  
  I talked about this game a lot this year and I yet to finish it, I really enjoyed this title it is fantastic and made with so much care, I hope that this game is successful and the production team behind it can make similar games in the future.
• Black Panther 
  
  Written by multiple award winning writer Ta-Nehisi Coates the 2016 Black Panther is a very different and grounded version of the character back to the Marvel line up, it has been a very well received and compelling series so far and I really hope they keep up the good work.
• Westworld
  
  HBO’s new show proved its self to be an amazing Sci-Fi mystery show, from start to finish the show never had a dull moment and at the end of the 10 episode run it gave me answers and questions for the next seasons to come, truly an achievement.
• Overwatch
  
  Blizzard’s first new IP in more than a decade turned out to be a triumph, the addictively fun gameplay and the insanely good cast of characters and a very good community (so far) made my experience with Overwatch really enjoyable, here is to more of that.
• Deadpool
  
  The first R-Rated comic book movie was this year’s best and probably one of the best superhero movies ever made, the funny and crazy brutal movie made me watch it over and over with every chance I get.
• Pokemon Sun/Moon
  
  I am a big Pokemon fan and a new entry means take my money Nintendo, I am around 15 hours into the game and I really like it, the beautiful graphics and new mechanics and quality of life improvement really makes the game fun and fresh again.

I am still going to make a Favorite movies list in the coming days and also favorite episodes list soon.

Macbeth (Review)

Macbeth is directed by Justin Kurzel staring Michael Fassbender and Marion Cotillard and it is an adaptation of the 1606 William Shakespeare tragedy, the film came out in 2015 to positive reviews.

The story takes place in Scotland during a Civil War, Macbeth played by Fassbender is leading King Duncan’s army to the war and emerges victorious and from here a series of events play out which lands Macbeth on the throne. while the story of Macbeth is largely known since it is a Shakespeare play the film gives some more depth and difference to the characters which I thought was fitting and let the film standout on its own. also the production value in the film is very beautiful with stellar cinematography from Adam Arkapaw and amazing make up and costumes that stood out.

It is said that Macbeth is a very difficult character to play because of the way the character evolves from a war hero to ruthless tyrant and back to a broken man but I think this adaptation allowed Fassbender to create a man haunted by war and blood broken and trying to figure out where is his ambition leads in that regard the film is successful however it does sidelines Lady Macbeth to a point that she is only in the film in few scenes. her character was supposed to be a menace femme fatale, but in this adaptation she is more or less a partner in crime who shares her husband’s love for power.

I had some major issue with Macbeth, it is a problem that I think what made the film fail at the box office because it wouldn’t relate to or enjoy and that is the script, it is written in an old and extremely difficult language that is hard to figure most of it out, I had to read about the events of the movie after I finished it just to understand what exactly happened because the dialog lost me so many times while watching it, I don’t understand loyalty to source materials but I also believe in judging a film as a standalone and Macbeth failed to make me enjoy it as much as I could have if it was written is an easier to understand language, and I had to rely on the visuals to follow the story which also proved to be difficult for its rather bizarre and abstract direction.

Verdict : Overall Macbeth is a very well made adaptation of a classic tragedy, Fassbender stands out as the title character and he gives a raw performance to bring Macbeth to life however the difficult writing and the abstract direction kept me from enjoying the film as much as I would have otherwise. (7.0/10.0)

Her (Review)

Her is directed by Spike Jonze staring Joaquin Phoenix, Amy Adams, Rooney Mara and a very special performance from Scarlett Johansson. the movie came out in 2013 and I did watch it back then but I didn’t enjoyed it as much as I did last night when I watched it for the 2nd time.

Theodore played by Pheonix is a man who just went through a break up and going through a divorce he is working a handwritten letters writer in a futuristic society where people rely on artificial intelligence operating systems for most of their day to day work, with the introduction of OS1 a new type of intelligent operating system that evolves and grows with time Theodore finds himself bonding with her and ultimately forming a relationship with her despite her being a program.the OS named Samantha is played by Scarlett Johansson and from what I read she wasn’t originally cast as the role and only came on board later when the filming was done but she and Phoenix really give an amazing performance their relationship was very very believable, the romance didn’t feel forced or fake which kinda made the movie feel so weird, in a good way. one of my favorite characters in the film is Amy which is played by Amy Adams who is playing Theodore’s collage friend, what I loved about that character is that you could see into her life and her issues without her story taking such a big turn and changing into something forced and pushed, also Catherine played by Rooney Mara who played Theodore’s ex which also gives another window to Theodore’s life by showing his past and him growing into the character he grew into.

The film’s setting is very interesting, it is not so far into the future and the technology they are using is not Star Trek level of Sci-Fi which makes the characters and the story relateable, so the film has a complex social commentary side to it which takes on our obsession with technology, love and romance in a cleaver way and that is what makes the film so good. it is also a very well made film it is a very cheerful and interesting color palate and a very beautiful cinematography from Hoyte van Hoytema to make the two hour film very very enjoyable. Arcade Fire composed an interesting and beautiful score for the film which only adds to the quality and the polish of the final product.

Verdict : Her is a very impactful film giving us a glimpse on what the future of technology and love might look like. (9.0/10.0)

Kubo and the Two Strings (Review)

Kubo and the Two Strings is directed by  Travis Knight and staring Charlize Theron, Matthew McConaughey and Art Parkinson and it is a stop motion animation from Laika the same production company behind titles like : Coraline, ParaNorman and The Boxtrolls. in my opinion they are one of the best companies working in animation films right now in the same caliber as Pixar and Studio Ghibli.

Kubo is the story of a young boy who lost his eye and lives with his mom who seems to have some kind of brain condition, Kubo goes to the nearby town every day to put on a show and provide for his sick mother, but for some reason he always leaves before nightfall because his mother told him no to be out at night because they are hiding from someone, I wont say who or why and I wont spoil anything just know everything in the story will make sense by the end of it and it will unravel in a fantastic way.

Laika’s work is really one of the most impressive things I have ever seen, and the fact that it is all stop motion it really blows my mind, the details in the faces are so amazing it just brings the world to life. paired that with couple of love able characters one a Monkey and the other a beetle also a very scary looking villainous sisters and you are in for a very entertaining film.

one of the things that I really enjoyed about this film was the way the film was structured, it felt like an old school RPG game, even the way they introduced the characters to the protagonists and the way he figures out his quest it is really like an RPG game and I loved that about the movie, this is why I feel like games like The Last Of Us that was cinematic and introduced its story in the cinematic way did better than any game based on a movie, same situation was with Kubo the movie told its story in the same structure a video game would and it did it better than any movie that is based on a video game because the movie did understand its medium and that is very important I wish those who are adopting video games into movie will understand this point.

Verdict : Kubo and the Two Strings is a very well made stop motion animation movie that delivers a nice story in a fun and interesting way. (8.5/10.0)

La La Land (Review)

La La Land is directed by Damien Chazelle staring Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone. It’s a movie about two young aspiring artists, one being a Jazz Musician (Gosling) and the other an actress (Stone) and their journey to fame and realizing their childhood dreams. I saw this movie today and it was my very first press screening and I was pretty pumped about it, and to prepare for it I did watch Chazelle’s 2015 film Whiplash the night before which I reviewed and loved and I gotta say La La Land takes some of the concepts that Chazelle established in Whiplash and takes them to a fantastic new level.

One of the very first points that I noticed while watching La La Land is the love affair with LA and Hollywood. Despite how competitive and unforgiving it is there is so much magic in show biz and so much energy in LA and for someone who hasn’t been there it was nice to see the director’s love for the city. La La Land doesn’t have a very complex and deep story, on the contrary it is very simple and straightforward which was the same situation with Whiplash and I think this is where Chazelle’s direction really shines; he doesn’t focus on the story or other characters, it is just about two characters going through life and affecting each other in different ways. While Whiplash was about a mean tough instructor basically bullying and abusing a young musician, La La Land was about two talented people supporting and pushing each other through their struggling carriers, you are not getting side stories and Plot Bs in this movie and I think that was amazing.

The movie of course is a musical and just saying the word “Musical” is enough to turn some people off, but I think La La Land was a different case. The music doesn’t drag, it is actually quite magical and not all of the music in the movie are songs. Some of them are really good Jazz music that gave me shivers, it was a beautiful piece of work that played right in front of me and I loved every moment of it.

The performances in the movie are great and both actors do their parts justice, especially the dancing scenes which is nothing short of masterpieces, they are so well choreographed and probably rehearsed for months to look that amazing. One more thing that I particularly enjoyed was the lighting in the film especially at night and indoors, they were so well made it just made the already beautiful film much better looking.

Verdict : I can’t find a single bad thing about La La Land, if you love Movies or Music go watch this film, I shouldn’t be surprised if the film takes a large number of Oscars home this year. (10/10)

Whiplash (Review)

Whiplash is directed by Damien Chazelle staring Miles Miller and J.K. Simmons and it is the story of a young drummer’s struggle to make it into one of Shaffer Conservatory’s top band which is run by a ruthless instructor played by Simmons. The film came out in 2014 and it was a very well received movie but for some reason I didn’t watch it when it came out but I am invited to a press screening for Damien Chazelle’s new movie La La Land tomorrow so I thought I should give Whiplash a go before I watch that to acquainted myself with the director’s style and boy I felt bad for neglecting this movie for two years this is an inspiring jaw dropping film that blew my mind.

it doesn’t matter if you are familiar with the musical instrument that is the main focus of the film it doesn’t get really technical while it also gives you an idea about how much a pro player have to practice every day in order to get somewhere in a highly competitive music school and it get violent, really fast. for a movie about music you will be surprised how much blood and violence is in it and they are not coming from knife wounds or gun shots it is from the music and their hands bleeding while they play it, quite frankly it is hard to watch sometimes and that is the strength of the film it is really powerful and well shot the camera is placed so well you basically feel like a part of the set, to top all that it is a very well edited and really well paced.

I never considered Miler Miller a great actor and I contribute that to his past roles which he mostly played the teenager who is going after girls and what not, but in this movie he really raised his caliber he was really great and embodied that struggling ambitious guy very well, Paul Reiser also appears in this movie which is nice even though he is only in it for few scenes but he was great. now lets talk about J.K. Simmons, if the others is like a good baked potato and creamed spinach his performance is a 40 day age New York steak he was so good and terrifying and commanded such presence on screen it felt like the rest of the actor were sitting next to a volcano he was really scary, if I was a drummer and he did to me what he did to Miler Miller I will just quite and be homeless it is not worth it at all, he was very well rewarded for his role he won the Oscar for it. what is interesting is he was the supporting actor but his performance really made him the center figure.

Verdict : Whiplash blew me away with its great direction and editing and it dropped my jaw on the ground with its amazing performances, it quickly claimed a spot in my all time favorite movies list. (10/10)

The Man in the High Castle Season 2 (Review)

The Man in the High Castle is an Amazon show based on the Philip K. Dick book and it is about an alternative history where the Nazis won the 2nd world war by dropping an Atomic bomb on Washington D.C. and that lead them to conquer the rest of the world and divide it with their allies The Japanese Empire, I wasn’t a big fan of the first season despite my love for PKD and his novels but the show left me with nothing but a sense of misdirection between the show’s main mystery and a love triangle that didn’t seem like it was going anywhere interesting fortunately I think Amazon found their footing with the 2nd season.

At the end of last season we found our main characters at three different locations and I think from here the writers made the best decision for this show which was putting each character on a different path and not having any of them meet for the whole season, each had their own story despite each story kinda leading up to the other in a way which was beautifully constructed and orchestrated. we also get more in depth with the Nazis this season which I thought was the most fascinating part of the previous season by having one of the characters live in New York and the other in Berlin. the central story of the season resolves around a political conspiracy that could leave the world in ruin and we also get to know how the resistance work and what they are doing to hurt the enemy, the best part about this season is how every story that was taking place during the show somehow even if it was in a small percentage chained to the other stories and to me that is an achievement.

We also get to know our title character, the illusive Man in the High Castle and we get some answers regarding the films and their true nature how do they work and where do they come from, which is the show’s central mystery personally I was satisfied with the answers the show provided I liked they way they provided the answer as well, it wasn’t through a character that didn’t know what was going on and have another character explain it to him they actually showed us the process which is the mark of a great writer, show don’t tell.

by far my favorite performance is from Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa as trade minister Tagomi, his calm presence really shines throughout the series and it is a really nice departure from his 90s roles which was mostly a martial arts villain, also the main three characters had an improvement in their performance as well it is like they took an acting class or something, Rufus Sewell is also great as the SS Obergruppenführer John Smith and his family struggles which gave some humanity and depth to his character despite how brutal he actually is.

Verdict : Over all I really liked the 2nd season of The Man in the High Castle and I am very excited for season 3 sometime next year, I just hope to god they keep up the good work and not start another love triangle. (9.5/10.0)

My favorite Games of 2016

Ah 2016, A weird year of course but it had some pretty good games that I enjoyed a lot but I haven’t played all of the there are still games in my drawer that I need to start soon, keep in mind except for the #1 on this list the rest are in no particular order :

• Inside
  
  Playdead’s creep fest was a midfuck filled with great moments and amazing artistic designs that I enjoyed a lot, I am planning to replay the game sometime next year or when it comes to other platforms like Switch.
• Deus Ex : Mankind Divided
  
  Building on Human Revolution’s fantastic foundation the 2016 follow up really impressed me with its variety of mission design while it didn’t have a really memorable story it made up for it with the enjoyable stealth mechanics.
• Final Fantasy XV
  
  I am a sucker for the RPGs and Open worlds and FFXV does marry the two in a good way, I haven’t finished the game yet but I really am enjoying it a lot, this is going to be a game that I will spend over a 100 hour as soon by the end of the year.
• Monster Hunter Generations 
  
  My entry to Monster Hunter franchise was amazing, I spend 137 hours in the game and I am still playing it daily, it has everything I want in a game, it is fun and deep and very challenging, if you haven’t played the series I highly recommend it but first say goodbye to your social life, good thing I didn’t have any to begin with.
• Uncharted 4 : A Thief’s End
  
  The Nathan Drake franchise ended in a spectacular fashion, while definitely not the last Uncharted game since they already announced a new title but this is the end to the treasure hunter Nathan Drake and his adventures with Sully, Alana and his brother Sam.
• Shadow Tactics : Blades of the Shogun
  
  Another game that I am still playing, Shadow Tactics is a game I didn’t know about until the day it came out and I have been loving it ever since, it is so good and difficult and put MiMiMi Production on my radar.

Games that could have made i to this list if I played them :

• Dark Souls 3
• Dishonored 2
• Pokemon Sun/Moon
• Fire Emblem Fates
• The Last Guardian

Finally, the game I enjoyed the most this year and it shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone since it is basically everyone’s game of the year :

I have never liked PvP games but Overwatch made me fall in love with it after spending 200 hours in it I completely lost my self in it, it is so much fun! I am currently taking a break from it but I am planning to go back to it sometime in January.

Shadow Tactics : A Love Letter to Commandos

Eighteen years ago back when Eidos Interactive was one of the top publishers in the industry, back when games on PC was sold on CD-ROMs they published a game called Commandos Behind Enemy Lines the game was Pyro Studios a Spanish developer, it was well received (IGN 8.2, GS 8.4) and it was followed by another title called Commandos Beyond the call of duty which was based on the same engine but with some really difficult levels. my history with Commandos goes back to 1999 when my dad used to work at the UN, one of the expats had a copy of Commandos and gave it to my dad and he had it installed on our state of the art Pentium I, 32MB Ram, 1 GB HDD which I have no idea what kind of graphic card was on it, before that I used to play games like Age of Empires and Command & Conquer on it so I was familiar with the mouse based strategy games despite my start with consoles like NES and SNES. I fell in love with the game right away and it started my love for stealth games, the rush I felt after taking down a squad of Nazis without being seen was unlike anything I felt before it.

Commandos is a tactical strategy game that let you control a group of special soldiers that are sent behind enemy lines to sabotage the Nazis and win the war in the allies favor, each soldier has a number of special abilities and you need to use it all to win against usually overwhelming odds, there are missions that you could lose if the enemy raised the alarm and those were the really memorable ones, also the mission doesn’t end the moment you take down a target or kidnap a general, you need to escape and that could be tricky as well, over all if you don’t know what you were doing and don’t experiment chances are you can’t beat it.

in 2001 Pyro released Commandos 2 Men of Courage that introduced a more sophisticated gameplay that was much more action oriented, to me the game was a lot easier than the previous games but the fun missions and beautiful graphics made it one of the games that I enjoyed a lot, in 2006 the final Commandos game Commandos 3 Destination Berlin came out and it brought back the difficult gameplay that I loved about the first two games, from here the series had a downfall first the series went the FPS rout with 2006’s Commandos: Strike Force that wasn’t well received commercially or critically I personally didn’t play it because it had nothing to do with Commandos and after that the series didn’t see a new release especially after Eidos was sold to Square Enix. the series I loved for years is lost.

Enter Shadow Tactics: Blades of the Shogun:

Developed by German indi developer MiMiMi Production and set during Japan’s Edo period the game has nearly identical game play to Commandos the major difference being the characters are so well designed to play together they all become a very big part of your success, in the more action oriented missions of Commandos some of the team members became pointless to use that is not the case with Shadow Tactics. the game is much more stealth based and very difficult even on beginner difficulty,  so far I have only played four missions and I am loving every second of it.

Rogue One : A Star Wars story (Review)

Rogue One is directed by Gareth Edwards staring Felicity Jones, Diego Luna, Mads Mikkelsen, Ben Mendelsohn, Alan Tudyk and Forest Whitaker.  the film is the first of the Anthology Star Wars films that will be released in between the main series and this is the story of the rebel group who extracted the Death Star plans that Princess Leia had in A New Hope.

The strongest aspect of the film in my opinion is the director’s understanding of the nature of the film, it is not there to start a franchise of Rouge One sequels and establish characters that will go on for decades on the contrary it is a full realized stand alone movie that tells its story within the Star War Universe to completion and it does it fantastically. there are call backs and cameos from major Star Wars characters mainly Darth Vader and Tarkin but they don’t take center stage the main characters of Rogue One do.

The best character in the film is the leading lady Jyn Erso played by Felicity Jones, Jones’s innocent charming works really well with the character and her performance is really good throughout the film you understand what happened to her and how she became who she become which made me care really deeply about her and her journey, while we don’t get much of background from Diego Luna’s character his performance is still pretty good, the crowd pleaser is K-2SO an imperial droid that is reprogrammed to serve the rebels and he is really really funny. Darth Vader is in this movie for two amazing scenes I kinda expect this to be his final appearance for many reasons one being James Earl Jones is 85 years old, so it was nice to hear Vader speaking few lines and that other scene which will blow your mind, Seriously it is AMAZING!

Rogue One’s visuals are probably the best I have ever seen, Gareth Edwards is a man who understands visual effects, his first movie Monsters had a small budget of 500,000$ but still managed to bring amazing visuals same goes to his 2014 Godzilla movie, also there are two CGI characters in the film even though they were amazing I could straight up tell they are CGI and it hurt the experience a little bit, very very little though. Also it really helps that the film had an amazing score.

Verdict : Honestly I don’t have anything bad to say about the movie it is really good, it is a dark story about the not so “fun” side of Star Wars to show you how cruel the empire really is also the director of the film cleverly made this movie canon without affecting the other great films in the franchise, by the end you will understand why you never heard of any of these characters before and it is one hell of a tragedy.