No Lives Left

  There is a pizza place a couple hours away from where I live that is simply one of a kind. The place smokes it's own brisket and puts it on a pizza with homemade barbecue sauce. It's delicious and it's probably the only halal brisket pizza in Southern California. It's an amazing treat and each time I ever have a chance to have it, I oblige. Sadly, those chances are very few and far between. It always strikes me as funny to daydream about a pizza place when there are just so many  around (some with better quality pizza). All it takes is one refreshing idea to make pizza seem new and special. While being so far away from it can be a detriment, it somehow helps with adding quality to the experience. I savor the moment since there aren't many opportunities to have it.   On another note, there is a shawarma spot near where I live that my friend owns. I've been supporting the place (and my friend) ever since they were selling sandwiches out of a pick-up truck at far...

  I love my Nintendo Switch. Despite it being under powered, it's still an awesome portable gaming platform with fantastic titles that don't actually look like they are from the PS2 era. Nintendo puts out stellar games year after year and none of them have to be played sitting down. Not to downplay that the Switch's docked mode which is great for when you have guests or want to experience gaming on the big screen. As I've grown up, life just naturally makes it hard to plays games for extended, uninterrupted periods of time. Nowadays, even if I have free time, I get anxious thinking about starting a game thinking that some new distraction will pop up and take me away. But with a Switch, I can always pop open a game and make some type of progress and be able to put it away quickly if something pops up. So when Valve announced the Steam Deck I got a little giddy. The thought of experiencing all my PC games on the go was rather tempting. Imagine playing the latest AAA game ...

Elden Ring , probably my most anticipated game in recent memory, is finally upon us. And the game has delivered in spades . I mean seriously, this game is immense.  Elden Ring  is almost an amalgamation of all From Software's recent releases. It's got the bread and butter Dark Souls's combat formula and aesthetic. It utilizes certain stealth mechanics from Sekiro . And there's probably something from Bloodborne  too but...uh... mumble mumble.... And while George R.R, Martin did have some credit for the work on lore building and story, Elden Ring  still uses the sparse breadcrumb tactic From Software loves so well.  Not to say that story in Eldin Ring is a throwaway. In fact the lore is much easier to stomach and decipher than previous From Software game. The breadcrumb trail is a bit more...breadcrumb-y. But the overarching story is just a stable glue that holds your interest enough so that traversing the gargantuan land of this game feels rewarding all the tim...

This might be a bit incoherent since I want to get my thoughts out quickly and get back to playing Elden Ring (yes, it definitely has a hold on me). Possible spoilers below (but I'll try to be cryptic). Batman has been around for 80 years and I think it's safe to say that it's hard to come up with an original story or fresh take on the Caped Crusader. So many writers, artists, and movie directors have taken the reins on his IP and have served up quite a few homers over the decades in every form of media. I'd say that Batman is arguably more popular than Superman, if not, well known.   Despite the popularity, every Batman movie has featured some sort of flashback to Batman's origin story. It's either the gun being held by the crook with Thomas Wayne in the way trying to protect his family or the scene of an orphaned boy on his knees in between his two parents. Heck, even the Joker (2019)  had a scene for that as well. It gets old and it gets tired.  Thankfully M...

I haven't finished Shin Megami Tensei V (SMT V) . And kind of don't want to. But I have gotten so far into this game that I don't think I can pull myself away. The combat is equal parts entertaining and equal parts frustrating. However, the frustrating parts raise to the top a lot more frequently like a drink that is equal parts ice and equal parts water.  And that's the main thing with SMT V : It's mainly about combat. If you pick up any entry into the Shin Megami Tensei series, it's almost an unspoken rule that the plot takes a backseat (I'll get to that later). Many cutscenes are less than a few minutes and mainly are added to introduce characters you'll be fighting at some point in the game.  SMT V is also a very slow burn, a game that requires lots of patience, planning, and (the frustrating part) a lot of luck. The game punishes you for being unprepared but doesn't give you the best methods of being prepared. Let's break this down a bit:...

The 0% was left in on purpose... I don't know the exact point where the joy that comes from playing co-op left me during my tenure in Outriders. Maybe it was the constant lag that was initially felt after the tutorial prologue. The lack of verifying that I was, in fact, doing any damage was quite the concern for me. It could have been my internet connection, but I normally don't have many problems with my connection. It could have been my friend's connection as well, but we all live in Southern California. The frustration was real. Maybe it was the constant crashing I experienced when I first purchased it on the PC that created that  negative (and lasting) impression. Maybe it was the guilt-inducing trauma of having to delay/impede my group of friends progress while I spent hours googling any potential fixes. The fact that we only played once a week made the whole stress of troubleshooting killer. It definitely led to my decreased enjoyment of the game. And despite hours of...

  Finally back for the new year. I know it's almost a month too late, but I finally got a chance to watch  Spider-man: No Way Home (in theaters by the way).  And while my last foray into the MCU left a sour taste in my mouth,  Spider-man  really helped cleanse the palette. And most of the reason I liked this movie was how it paid homage to Spider-man as a movie franchise rather than just a continuation the Marvel Cinematic Universe.  The Spider-man franchise has proven that the MCU can have stories that don't need to  fit in  anywhere in the MCU general storyline. As I was watching  No Way Home,  I noticed how I was just enjoying the story that the movie was presenting. There were only a couple of references I had to make  that really required MCU knowledge or watching previous films.  All in all,  Spider-man: No Way Home  is a fun-filled, wild ride. It's a movie full of surprises that I wish I had never seen...