VGFlicks: Warcraft (Part 2)

Continuing from Part 1 - go read it if you haven't.

Only getting worse from here

"Capture me if you must, but please, no violence in front
of my baby!" - Durotan (not really)

The aftermath of the overpass battle: Durotan is now considered a traitor to the Horde, but offers himself to let the other Frostwolves go free. Orgrim is offered to be the new leader, but he is reticent to both that and accepting the Fel from Gul’Dan. Untrusting of them, Gul’Dan orders the Frostwolves’ encampment burned and its inhabitants killed or imprisoned, but Orgrim has enough time to warn Durotan’s wife Draka so she can flee with her infant. As for the humans? Lothar is drinking his family loss away. And Garona, staying by Medivh’s bedside, learns that the Guardian traveled to a lot of realms in his youth and even found love… in her world.

Medivh and Garona's  relationship as father and daughter
is one of the few things to be merely implied by the movie
but stated openly in its novelization.

Yeah, one change to this adaptation is the implication that the protector of Azeroth is Garona’s father, rather than her lover as is the case in the games/comics. Then again, over there, Garona is half-Draenei rather than half-human, but that’s delving a little deep into the lore of a franchise I have little experience with, so I’m really going off of what I’ve learned. It’s a couple floors lower on the Warcraft iceberg than I’m willing to go. And considering how debated their union in the games/comics is… well, let’s just say it’s less of a headache to make them NOT lovers here. As a bonus, if he’s her dad, Garona born a green-skinned orc foreshadows that Medivh has been battling corruption from the Fel for a long time.

VGFlicks: Warcraft (Part 1)

Contrary to impressions I could have given, I was never actually big on fantasy epics. I don’t know why. I feel it may be that I prefer stories that remain grounded into some level of reality. I was never big on The Lord of the Rings, but  Harry Potter, trying to ground itself into a semi-real Britain despite the fantastical elements of the setting, worked better for me. It’s the same for science-fiction; I’m always more interested in sci-fi that keeps a foot into the world I know, to some degree. (Although, sci-fi stories that stray from that mold do tend to interest me more than fantasy going the same route.)

Hence why I was reticent in reviewing Warcraft, which I had heard of before. Based on the series of the same name by Blizzard Entertainment and directed by Duncan Jones, this is currently the highest-grossing video game film adaptation of all time. I saw moments, but never before sat down to watch it in its entirety; I will be seeing it for the first time for this review. I must’ve bought the film on DVD, like, 4 years ago if not 5, and only took it out of the plastic packaging this month.

Also of note is that this film, released to North American theaters on June 10th, 2016, is not an adaptation of World of Warcraft, even if that is the most famous title of the franchise as well as the biggest MMORPG of all time. The film aims lower by adapting the very first game in the series, Warcraft: Orcs and Humans, released in 1994. As a result, it tries to pull quadruple duty. First, it adapts the game's story. Second, however, is that it does so while integrating lore and elements from later games, which expand the tale and add relevant details. Third, however, is that there is an attempt to not overload viewers with lore, despite so much of it being necessary. Fourth, finally, is to still be approachable to whomever isn’t familiar with the series (like me!).

Obviously, I’m gonna do my best to move past my own bias. Let’s at least see whether the film manages to accomplish these four goals.

Retrospective 2022

#IStandWithUkraine

Every year is the same deal; a couple words about the year before I go over what I did for the blog throughout the previous 12 months. This time is no exception, but 2022 was… fuck me, it was a depressing year. Not terrible on a personal level, but worldwide? Well, let’s see…

The Russia-Ukraine war that began in February and is still going on. The resulting international turmoil caused gas prices to skyrocket (and they’re not quite back to where they started). That, in turn, had a disastrous effect on the prices of everything, causing inflation like we've seldom seen before in a single year, and if we’re not already in a recession, we’re headed that way. The Covid-19 pandemic, while much less disastrous than it was a year ago, is still around; and as I said, it might have become endemic, but hopefully there’s work being made on vaccines that can deal with all variants at once. Somehow, I still haven’t caught it. Everything piled up made for two dominant sensations all year: Dread and exhaustion.

In the world’s most cynical moments across the last 12 months, the best entertainment was pointing and laughing at several of the ultra-rich losing their fucking minds in radically different ways. Weird how Will Smith, of all people, set the tone for the year. I hope buying Twitter was worth it, Musk. The less said about Kanye the better. Same for Trump, but hopefully 2023 is the year his accumulated bullshit comes back to bite him in the ass.

Now that the tough part is done, the personal year: Mine went fairly well. Had a steady job all year, went to the United States for a convention, did and got a lot of fun stuff… Yeah, there isn’t much to say really. Despite all going fairly well, I have the impression that I was sort of… angry, this year? Maybe it’s the accumulation of everything in the previous paragraphs, but I also felt I was talking a lot about heavy topics on this very blog, and it might have been too much.

From February, I talked about Nazis in several reviews (Pokémon X / MadWorld / South Park), wrote articles discussing pretty heavy topics (Doki Doki Literature Club, the Top 12 worst marketing campaigns), problematic creators (and J.K. Rowling only sinks lower every day)... It was a heavy year, and though I feel I said what I had to say, I really hope future years for this blog aren’t as heavy as this. The downside being that, whereas I covered a LOT of games in 2021 by virtue of having two sets of Quick Reviews, I covered a lot less games this year (end result is 37). That said, some of the articles posted this year now rank among my favorites, so that’s good.

Oh, and this year I also joined Backloggd in order to keep track of everything I’ve covered and plan to cover. Check out that collection here!

Well, time for the retrospective.

My favorite reviews/articles of 2022

10. Say No! More. I rarely get to use styles or effects in my Quick Reviews. For this very No-focused game, I tried to keep the tone of someone selling the game like a program. If only it felt more like a game than an interactive film…

9. Doki Doki Literature Club!. A tough one, I may have been a little heavy-handed on the game’s discussion of difficult topics, but that review had been a long time coming and I’m glad I covered the game. I’m also glad that despite my commentary, I tried to keep the same creepy feel through the images, the comments, the implications and the tone of the article overall. (By the way, did you notice the titlecard for that one was a gif? Took me forever to make that work.)

8. Eternal Senia/Legend of Mysteria. This year got me covering two more RPG Maker games that went in completely different, yet both clever and inventive ways. One is more of an action RPG, another goes the route of a point-and-click mystery. This is why I want to cover so many of these games even if some would consider them inconsequential; there’s a trove of creativity to be found when looking for the better games to be born from that RPG-making software.

7. All VGFlicks, ranked worst to best. With how far I’ve come with this blog and the many film reviews I’ve done on it, I felt this catch-up was most appropriate, and helped me condense my points about each film (including many that I hope to cover in greater depth later) quite well.

6. South Park: The Stick of Truth. Another article that was a long time coming, and the M-Rated Month was the perfect time for it. Stick of Truth had been sitting in my library half-played for a while and I felt I had the right format now to cover it properly (as an example, I wouldn’t have done it in the days where I didn’t split my reviews with undertitles).

5. The tricky question of supporting problematic creators; An essay-ish. The introduction to this year’s anniversary review, the two LEGO Harry Potter games, is a very odd choice for this list, but I like my points and like the conclusion I come to. It’s not the best thing I’ve ever written, but I felt it had to be said and I had to weigh in on the J.K. Rowling controversy(ies?) before tackling anything related to Harry Potter. Either way, it’s done.

4. Pokémon X. This was another big game for me to cover and I felt I did it justice, covering absolutely everything that I felt worked with and what didn’t, across Gen 6 in general, but in Pokémon X in particular (seeing as most of my issues involve the plot of X and its sister version Y).

3. TOEM. Little to say with this one, I thoroughly enjoyed my experience with the game and, though it was a Quick Review, I felt my appreciation really shined through in spite of the short format.

2. Pokémon 2000: The Power of One. One of my best analytical reviews so far. I’ve found myself coming back to it frequently to re-read my own words, that’s how good I felt I had managed it. Really a highlight of my year, and on top of that, it’s covering a film I was looking forward to reviewing. Hopefully Pokémon 3 isn’t gonna wait another 7 years!

1. Top 12 Worst Video Game Marketing Campaigns. That idea hit me like a ton of bricks just as I was completing my Quick Reviews this year and, even though in my review cycles it wasn’t the “right time” to publish a Top 12, the idea entranced me so much that I just had to. The writing went so well that I wrote the entire thing in maybe three days – and that’s including all the in-depth research. It’s one of the articles I’m most proud of in the history of the blog, and I feel it’s one of my works that I would recommend to a new reader. Hell, this one feels it could actually break through in a big way.

Favorite title cards this year

The 10 worst games reviewed on the blog in 2022

10. Rayman 3: Hoodlum Havoc. The bottom of the list is made of games that weren’t necessarily bad per se, just disappointing or lacking in some areas. While it brings interesting ideas to the franchise, Rayman 3 has a few too cumbersome ideas and mechanics that make it a bit of a pain to play.

9. Particle Mace. Again not that bad, just that it’s about as simple as it gets, being basically a new take on the classic Asteroids.

8. Just Dance 2. Only on here because, when compared to literally every other game I’ve covered in the series, it’s lesser. Which I can understand; it was the second title in the entire franchise. Still, its failings are only more noticeable as a result.

7. Fortified! We now hit the part of the list where games failed to keep my interest – perhaps due to their own flaws, or simply because the topic didn’t keep me invested. Either way, they’re not necessarily “bad”, but certainly seem to miss that little something. Fortified!, while having the clever idea of mixing tower defense and real-time strategy, falls into that category for me.

6. The Deadly Tower of Monsters. Same for this one – while I do appreciate the tone of the game that’s made like an old ‘60s film with cheap special effects being commented by the director, I tried to play as far as possible into it but eventually the gameplay and repetitiveness annoyed me.

5. The Swapper. Same chorus as the previous two, and yet again it’s a game I really wanted to enjoy – it’s well-regarded, but it took too long to find its stride and I lost interest. Shame, too, because a Metroidvania-like made out of Claymation with a unique puzzle platformer mechanic should have made for an incredible experience.

4. ShipLord. Yet another game that feels like it’s “missing” something. Or a lot of things, really.

3. God Game: The Odyssey. What if Lemmings, but on the sea with water- and wind-based mechanics? Clunky is the result. Not particularly good or fun overall, though there are clever puzzles now and then. Really there isn’t much else I could say about this one.

2. The Maze Escaper. It looks pretty, at least when it comes to lighting and reflections, but it’s just mazes, over and over, and some robots. Really feels like someone making a demo game to test a new development software and selling the end result. That said, I still do hope this paves the way to projects from that same creator that feel more like proper games.

1. DETOUR. This game combining real-time strategy and resource management could have been so much better, but I gave up at the first level past the nine-level tutorial. The difficulty ramps up much too quickly for players to keep up, and the gameplay becomes quickly annoying and bothersome, especially in regards to the CPU opponents. Really not worth your time or money. Yeah, worst game I’ve covered this year, easily. It’s not even pretty.

The 10 best games reviewed on the blog in 2022

10. Super Win the Game. In a year spent reviewing several great games, making this list was a lot tougher to make. Then again, it’s tough to make every year. Says a lot that at the bottom of the list is a very difficult but ultimately completely fair and balanced platformer (no, this isn’t meant as a pique at Rayman 1, what are you talking about?) that I greatly enjoyed playing through.

9. Just Dance 4. I’ve covered so many Just Dance games by this point that I don’t know if they should even be on the radar for this list, but JD4 has a great selection of songs, cool extra songs and modes, and the Dance Quests really add substance and challenge that other entries in the franchise don’t have. Hard for me to say whether any older Just Dance games are must-plays, but this one was worth more than what I spent on it!

8. Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion. An adorable Zelda-like featuring living veggies, an intriguing story, and pretty good twists and gags. When a game makes me wish it was longer, then it’s done things right. A bit on the easy side, but still very good.

7. Rayman 2: The Great Escape. I really enjoyed doing that Rayman retrospective late in 2022, as I had 4 Rayman games waiting to be played and I went through all of them in rapid succession. Of them, Rayman 2 was a definite standout and, though it has little things that feel missing now that I’ve played through the others, I feel it was an excellent foundation the franchise could have kept building on.

6. The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth. I still haven’t gotten past Mom’s Heart, but whatever. On the topic of roguelikes, I was glad I actually got to cover the definitive, genre-defining title this year. Yeah, it’s pretty damn tough and you need a very peculiar sense of humor to really appreciate it, but damn, if it gels with you, then it’s one Hell of a ride that might just never end (I’m not even at 100 hours, but people playing it for thousands of hours is not unheard of!)

5. Pokémon X. Yeah, I have my gripes about the story, but let’s be honest – despite that downside, the rest of Pokémon X is actually pretty great. Then again I’m biased for Pokémon games with a greater number of creatures to catch. The world is nice to explore, and the new gameplay mechanics were implemented quite well. It may not be the best main series title in the franchise, but X and Y deserve a lot more credit than they usually get.

4. Superliminal. Talk about messing with your senses. Not only does this inventive puzzle game focus on visual and perceptive trickeries, it keeps on finding new ways to astonish the player with these tricks. One of the best experiences all year, and one I heartily recommend to everyone who hasn’t tried it yet.

3. Rayman Legends. Though I said I loved the second game in the Rayman series, Legends is probably where I felt the most fulfilled, with not only 5 new worlds and tons of extra levels, but also a selection of stages from Origins, and a bunch of playable characters and other bonuses to look for. Pure awesome.

2. South Park: The Stick of Truth. As said earlier, I was due to play through that game, and I’m glad I did. Though I felt it was on the easy side, the utterly wacky world of South Park, recreated to perfection by Ubisoft in both look, feel and humor, is a treat to visit, and there are so many extras and other stuff to do around the place, even with the crazy story that’s presented.

1. TOEM. The years keeps being stressful, so a game like TOEM feels like exactly what the world needs: A stress-free, adorable, gorgeous, relaxing, simple yet effective title. One so fun, I pushed through to 100% it. The journey to TOEM was worth every second. I can’t recommend this one enough.

The 10 goals I had for this year, and whether they were accomplished

10. Do a set of Quick Reviews – Done!

9. Redesign the blog – unfortunately not done, but I’m holding out hope I can do it in 2023!

8. Update the other pages of the blog: I’m not sure I’ve actually fully done it and checked whether each link opened to a separate tab, but I do know that I’ve improved the Index page by adding a link to the main page of every game I’ve played on Steam. Still need to give more love to the other pages, as well.

7. A review of a South Park game – Done!

6. Review the LEGO Harry Potter games – Done!

5. A list of all the video game movies reviewed on the blog so far, ranked worst to best – Done! It was even my first article this year after the previous retrospective.

4. More reviews of Ubisoft games – Done! Between South Park, Just Dance, and the four Raymans, I can say I’ve done that one alright. Hoping 2023 brings more.

3. A full month of Pokémon reviews – Done! Okay, that’s just two pieces of Pokémon media, but still, it counts!

2. To grow the community around Planned All Along: Eeesh… I’m not really sure I’ve managed. That said, I did make some friends to spread the word around a little more1 That counts for something!

1. Make a video for YouTube – Not done… but I’m holding out hope to do it someday.

10 new goals for 2023

10. As promised every year, a redesign of the blog.

9. Also promised previously, an update to the other pages of the blog.

8. Once again, make more attempts to grow the community around Planned All Along.

7. Make a video for YouTube – yeah, my four failed goals for 2022 are back at the bottom of the list this time.

6. Once more, I’d like to cover more games from UPlay. Isn’t it bizarre that I covered more UPlay games than 3DS games this year, and as many UPlay and Wii games? (seeing as my article on Just Dance covers two games…)

5. Cover more Wii games this year. Goes with point 6 to say that I’d like to bring back some of the spotlight on my games in Nintendo consoles, which have been waiting a while by now.

4. Following points 6 and 5… Cover more than one 3DS game this year.

3. A full month of movie reviews. Films are another pile that’s been steadily increasing while I covered Steam games, so I would like to do maybe 2 or 3 films this year. Already thinking of the ones I feel like covering.

2. Once again, I wish to stream more often – I’ve done it a little more this year, especially at the end of the year when I tried to 100% Rayman Legends (I achieved that on December 30th!). Maybe 2023 will be the right time?

1. If my finances are nice enough: Get a Switch! Been wanting one for a long while. It’s purely in the realm of hoping things go the right way for this to happen.

The games I’m removing from my Steam collection this year

Chainsaw Warrior

Gunpoint

Luna’s Wandering Stars

Q.U.B.E. (+Director’s Cut)

Size Matters

Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP

The new list of favorites, with roughly 1/6th of the Steam games reviewed so far

New: Gaming plans for this year

Starting with this year, I’m making a list of games (mostly those reserved for Quick Reviews, but also a number of semi-randomly-selected titles across my entire collection) that I wish to get through and review this year. I might not actually manage to cover all of these, those are just games I hope I can get to. The way I had of doing the list includes a lot of non-Steam games. The picture below: The Left column is the next set of Quick Reviews (unless I expand one into a full review), the second is the year’s hopes. Beneath the picture are the non-Steam games.

Non-Steam:

3DS: Super Mario 3D Land, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D, Pokémon Sun (+UltraSun?);

Wii: NiGHTS: Journey of Dreams, Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sand, Super Mario Galaxy 2, Monster Hunter Tri;

UPlay: Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, Beyond Good and Evil, Assassin’s Creed III.

Well, that’s it for this year. Have a good 2023 – here’s to hoping it will go better than 2022.