From the Nintendo Vault: Super Mario 64

"From the Nintendo Vault" is a feature in which I will pick a game from Nintendo's library of games and review them.

Now, I'm a Nintendo kid. My first console was the Nintendo 64, and it still works to this day. It was part of their Funtastic series, and it was the Fire-Orange color. I have a backup which is a original copy. My second console I personally owned was a Gamecube, and it was a special copy that came with "The Legend of Zelda: Collector's Edition" and I'm still working through that one!
It came with the original NES Zelda, it's sequel, Ocarina of Time, and it's sequel and a short demo for Windwaker (which is my favorite Zelda, and serious contender for my favorite game). So, that is my background on Nintendo, and the first game I ever finished and game owned was the game we are looking at today.

Super Mario 64

Intro: The game starts off with a weird Mario head, which you could screw around with and make his head all shrunk and make him bug eyed. Good times. You then go into a save screen where you choose a save and start the game.

Starting Scene: This scene needs talking about for just how good it was. It starts with letter from Princess Peach inviting our favorite plumber over to the castle for some "cake" (obligatory sex reference). Then comes in the memorable entrance. A Lakitu Brother comes flying in with a camera on the end of a fishing line, does a fly around the castle, and focuses on Mario jumping out of a pipe, and says this.
“Good afternoon. The Lakitu Bros., here reporting live from just outside the Princess's castle. Mario has just arrived on the scene, and we'll be filming the action live as he enters the castle and pursues the missing Power Stars. As seasoned cameramen, we'll be shooting from the recommended angle, but you can change the angle by pressing the Buttons."

We then find out the Power Stars of the castle are missing, and that Bowser has stolen them! OH NOES. It is then up to you, as the player and Mario, must collect the stars and rescue the princess for that "cake".

Controls: Pitch perfect. Moving as Mario has never felt better. He turns on a dime, jumping feels sublime, even though going from moving to standing still and punching is kinda weird. The only issue I have is the Lakitu Bros. camera control. Compared to today's standards, the camera is clunky and slow, and feels weird. But it's still a blast to jump around as Mario, if you are staring into the side of a mountain.

Music: So memorable. With classics like "Bom-Omb Battlefield" "Dire, Dire Docks" And "Slide Theme"
You seriously cannot go wrong with this game's music. It's full of whimsy and wonderment that you can't be hating on it.

Gameplay: It's Mario. You should know this by now, but if you don't, Super Mario 64 is a 3D platformer (one of the first to do it correctly), where you jump, climb, slide, and smash enemies in order to find Power Stars, 60 out of which you need to fight Bowser and finish the game. The castle is a hub-world, allowing you to run around it and jump into portraits (sometimes in rooms, others in halls) which are the worlds in were you find the stars. Once you have 8, 30, and 60 stars, you can enter 3 "Bowser" worlds, which ordinarily have tough platforming sections, and the big fight against Bowser.

In Short: Super Mario 64 is a fantasic game, with so many things to be praised, like the music and revolutionary 3d platforming, that its shortcomings are shadowed. Go buy a Nintendo 64, a copy of this, and have a ball.

I'm Darahas, for politcally (in)correct gamers saying, until next time.

My review on: Europa Universalies III(3)

Ahhh yes, This game, Made by Paradox Interactive in my opinion is one of the best games out there. It expands upon the series and so far has 4 expansion packs.

Gameplay: 10/10
The gameplay just lets you come back for more, You can play any country from 1338-1820. The replayability is great as you never know whats going to happen this time.  There are achivements as well!

Music: 10/10
The music blends well with gameplay and has a nice selection.

Moddability: 10/10
The moddability of this game is amazing, You can mod the timeline... Modern world mod? Done. WW2 mods? Done... You can add and remove provinces as you like. There are plenty of mods out there.

Difficulty of playing: Semi Difficult.
The game is quite difficult, And you need to start a new game a few tries to get the hang of it, But once you get the games economy, etc... its a cake walk to play.

Customer support: 10/10
Paradox Interactive gives great customer support if there is something wrong with your game.

Dio: Holy Diver [REVIEW]

Ronnie James Dio is probably best known for his run with heavy metal pioneers Black Sabbath. However, some may also know him from his project beforehand with Ritchie Blackmore (or, if you're a real fan, then maybe even from the Elf period), of Deep Purple, who joined together to form Rainbow. After Dio left Rainbow, he went on to join Black Sabbath, and helped the band release some of their most memorable work. After he left Sabbath, he decided to pursue a solo career to show people that he could make music on his own perfectly well. Holy Diver, Dio's debut album, shows that very clearly. While it's not the best metal album of all time, it certainly has its memorable moments. Holy Diver is the band's most well received album, while the others are generally received as failures (relatively) by critics. Some tracks on the album really stand out from the others- namely, Holy Diver, Rainbow In The Dark, and Stand Up and Shout. The rest of the songs are good, with the only 'bad' song being Invisible. Rainbow In The Dark went on to become a surprise hit, landing at #14 on the US Mainstream Rock Charts (while Holy Diver only reached #40.) The song has been used in multiple venues, such as the popular game Rock Band 3.
Overall, this is an amazing album. Ronnie James Dio influenced so many artists in his career, and appeared on albums from numerous bands, ranging from Black Sabbath to Tenacious D. Unfortunately, he passed away last May. RIP Ronnie James Dio, one of the greatest metal vocalists of all time.

★★★★★★★★★☆
(9 out of 10)

Serious Sam 3: BFE Review (as of yet)

I've been playing through the wonderful first person survival shooter, Serious Sam 3: BFE. Here is what I've been thinking about it so far.

Story: Hard to explain. Sam goes to Egypt for some scientists with his army buddies, when their plane crashes due to aliens invading Cairo. Hi-jinks insue. Don't want to give away too much. It's a prequel to Serious Sam: The First Encounter, so if you wanted to play through the series, it would be in this order.

Serious Sam 3: BFE
Serious Sam: The First/Second Encounter
Serious Sam 2

Result: 6/10 (Kind of forgettable, but it gives an excuse of blowing s*** up.)

Gameplay/Difficulty: GODDAMN THIS GAME IS TOUGH. With a variety of enemies (such as headless kamikaze bombers who yell WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH while chasing you, and skeleton horses), a standard health system of picking up items to increase health, and no regeneration, this game gets really tough, but exhilarating when you are down to 25 HP, with no armor, with an army in front of you. The guns are fun to use, although shotguns are overpowered, and it's just a blast to plow through everything in sight. For added difficulty, pirate the game. (I do not endorse pirating). The pirated edition adds a invincible, quick as the speed of light, hurts-like-a-mofo PINK scorpion enemy. "Oooh. My pride ;_;" On normal, this game is hard. Oh, by the way, they will throw armies and hordes of baddies, I wasn't kidding. You will love that FPS's have incorporated back-strafing.

Score: 8/10 (Masochists need only apply).

Variety: It's the name of the game here, figuratively. You have a co-op campaign, a multiplayer deathmatch which is kinda of imbalanced (more later), a survival mode, and a version that can played modded.

Score: 9/10 (So much fun to be had).

Multiplayer: Do not want. I would stay away from this. Only 4 maps, all poorly designed, and with SS3's weapons (which are designed to help blast through waves and waves of mobs), it generally is a hardcore version of CoD's hardcore or Battlefield's multiplayer. You die, respawn, die, respawn, etc. S

Score: 3 (Needs a lot of balancing, some fun can be had, if you are insta-gibbed.)

Music: My ears. They came.

Score: 10/10 (Perfect mix between orchestra and heavy metal. Fits perfectly)

Final Score: 7/10
This game is a ton of fun, and with a survival mode (with leaderboards!) and a 16 person co-op campaign, plus rocking tunes, this game would be a must-buy if not for the slightly-forgettable story, and atrocious multiplayer (which can be SOME fun)

Darahas

Rush: Snakes and Arrows [REVIEW]

Snakes and Arrows is Rush's first studio album since 2004, and their first full length, fully original album since 2002. While Snakes and Arrows is an improvement over 2002'sVapor Trails, the album doesn't contain the vitality of their previous albums. Songs likeFar Cry, Armor and Sword, The Main Monkey Business (the most jamming they have done in years), and We Hold On come close, but still fall short. Malignant Narcissism is a wonderful instrumental, but still doesn't reach the levels of YYZ. The songs on this album are not bad by any stretch, however. One thing that I was pleasantly surprised to see was the heavy emphasis on drums on this album, as opposed to Vapor Trails or Feedback,which really showed Neil Peart's ability. This adds a fresh vibe to the album. The other instruments are heavy as well. The lyrical themes are also heavy and grave, almost too much so. The lyrics are about war, faith, and suffering. Malignant Narcissism is actually a humorous title, coming from a line from Team America: World Police, which is humorous, but seems out of place on this serious album.

Overall, this is a really great album. Just because it can't quite live up to masterpieces like Moving Pictures, doesn't mean it is not good. When you factor in that this band has been around since the early 1970's, it is amazing that their albums can retain such quality.

★★★★★★★★★☆

(9 out of 10)

Vidya game review Dungeon Defenders :D

Dungeon Defenders is a tower defense game but more badass. If you're not familiar with what a tower defense game is well you havent gamed much then but let me lay it out for yah. Tower defense is a strategy type based game where you "summon" towers and defenses to protect yourself from oncoming enemies, which pretty much sums that up, you're a character stopping The Orcs or Goblins from attacking your crystals, but what's awesome about Dungeon Defenders is you can pick 1 of 4 characters ( Well with the DLC there's 8 ). As shown in the picture that's the original 4. Squire who is a knight with no powers just strength and his sword, Apprentice who is all about using his staffs to use his magic, Huntress who uses a gun to get what she wants, and Monk who also uses a staff but you can use brute force or magic out of. Now an awesome feature in this game is the ability to customize your characters. In the beginning you choose which of the 4 you want then you get to name and color change your character. Dungeon Defenders also has collectible weapons and armor you can aquire by destroying the orc/goblin things. Among these items include weapons for all characters, armor, and pets. Yes pets. These pets buff up your towers and characters, some also do damage to the enemies. Now you can also go to shops people host or you can host your own and buy items. You buy items with the dungeon defenders currency known as mana.

You also have your own tavern which you can practice on dummies and buy/sell things from the Tavern Keeper.

Theres also all different levels you can play on which some have thier own bosses you have to beat at the end of the ammount of waves.

So in my opinion if you eve have the chance to get this game, GET IT! WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR?! GET ON STEAM NOW AND BUY IT DAMN YOU!

Oh I forgot to mention, there are 2 different types of servers, Ranked and Open. Ranked is for steam achievements and Open is for fun. There's also modders on the game like myself who mods weapons, armor, pets, and mana. You learn how to do it, more power to yah. It takes some fun away from the game because it makes it so damn easy but it's also fun to see the creatures fly across the map after one hit. Well I think i've mostly covered everything by now, so if you don't have it already, it's definatley a good buy.

------DannyBoy

Review: Fallout New Vegas

Fallout: New Vegas is one of the best games ever made.  Yes, I said best and ever in the same sentence, and it's true, Fallout: New Vegas is simply a magnificent game.  The game takes place in the post-apocalyptic Mojave Wasteland and focuses heavily on the city of New Vegas, which was not particularly damaged by the nuclear war that occurred in the Fallout Universe in 2077.  The game starts with a bang, literally, as you, the player character known as the Courier, is shot in the head by unknown assailant while you were delivering a mysterious package.  You somehow survive, waking up next to a caring doctor, who basically saved your life.  From there, you basically create your character and select few perks, then you're off into the wastes!  The Mojave Wasteland is HUGE and there a ton of things you can do as you explore the vast expenses of the wasteland.  You can complete quests, search for neat loot, and blow the fucking brains out of super mutants.  The gameplay is similar to Fallout 3, although the game features a much improved companion system and improved weapon mechanics such as iron sights.  The gameplay is relatively simple and its just really fucking fun to go around, zooming in with VATS, and watching a Fiend's head explode into a million different pieces.  The Mojave Wasteland is larger than the Capital Wasteland, there are more quests to complete, and there much more enemies to blow to pieces.  The game is simply a blast and you can easily put in hundreds of hours into the game.  While there really isn't a story to speak of, the game deals primarily with the conflict between the New California Republic (NCR), the mysterious Mr. House, and Caesar's Legion.  You can join sides with whoever you want or you can join forces with Yes Man, a robot who seeks to make New Vegas an independent city.  The ending of the game depends heavily on the actions that you made throughout the game and the fate of New Vegas rests on you.  One downside to New Vegas is that the graphics aren't exactly the best, but they do get the job done.  There are also a few bugs to contend with, but I've encountered few recently.  If you can look past the graphics, you'll find an absolutely wonderful game that you should buy immediately.  I also recommend that you should pick up all of the Downloadable Content (DLC) for the game, which add a ton of new content to the base game.

RATING:  9.5/10  EXCELLENT!

Metallica and Lou Reed: Lulu [REVIEW]

(Taken from my own blog at musicreviewsbyme.blogspot.com)

(Shameless self advertising)

I consider myself a fairly big Metallica fan, so when this album got released under my nose, I was shocked. Really, Death Magnetic was hyped before its release, with songs being revealed, leaked, and faked with frequency over YouTube. It was a full two months after its release that I even knew of this album's existence, although I wish I had stayed in the dark. Why do I wish this? Because, simply, this may very well be the worst album ever released. Seriously, Limp Bizkit can barely compete with this!

For starters, whoever decided that Lou Reed and Metallica just had to do a collaboration needs to be dragged out behind a barn and shot. The idea is so ridiculous, that it makes Snoop Dogg's collaboration with Buzz Aldrin seem normal. Okay, maybe not, but still, it's strange. What do Lou Reed and Metallica have in common? Nothing at all, that's what!

As for the songs on this album- they are of the worst kind. Long, overdrawn, poorly produced, pretentious and sloppy. The instrumentals are uninspired, although not downright terrible, the vocals are boring and unfitting at all to the music, and the lyrics are just plain STUPID! As a testament to the album's poor production value, Lou's vocals sound like they were recorded before the song was even played, separately. It sounds like Lou is just kind of doing his thing, barely maintaining a connection with the melody, sometimes just going off completely. Lou's voice also sounds terrible, and you really have to wonder WHO exactly thought it was a good idea for him to sing on a metal track. Half of the time it sounds like he's just talking into the microphone. It's horrible.

However boring the instrumentals may be, however horrible Lou Reed's voice is, all pale in comparison to the lyrics on this album. My God. When I first listened to one of these songs on Youtube, I thought it was a joke, honestly. With insightful lyrics such as 'I'll swallow your sharpest cutter, like a colored man's dick.' , 'if I waggle my ass like a dark prostitute, would you think less of me?' and James Hetfield yelling about how he is a table (I have no idea, I really don't), this album didn't have a prayer from the get go. Even if the instrumentals were of Master of Puppets quality, and we had 80s Hetfield singing, this album would still be a giant waste of time. These lyrics attempt to hoodwink you into thinking that Lou Reed actually has something to talk about, throwing in obscure metaphors and ridiculous bars. The lyrics on this are so damn pretentious, but have little actually meaning. Wait, I said little? Scratch that, no meaning. I swear, the word 'dick' is used more on this album than on most rap albums. The lyrics are good for a laugh if you're in a bad mood, but the really bad thing is that Lou Reed is completely serious. He honestly thinks what he's talking about has meaning, and it's sad. 'I would cut my legs and tits, when I think of Boris karloff and Kinski.' What? Seriously, a five year old could make better music than this, and probably have, on multiple occasions.

My recommendation for this album is to listen to it on Youtube, and laugh for the people who actually spent money on this. When I heard another Metallica album was out, after Death Magnetic's step in the right direction, I was pretty excited for their next album. Technically, this isn't a studio album, but a collab. Either way, it's pure horrible. On a side note, Lou Reed wants a Lulu 2- that is scary.

★☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆

(1 out of 10)