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PC Game Preview: King Arthur 2

By
Tony Odett
– January 24, 2012Posted in: PC/Mac, Previews

 

Can't do that in Total War.

Shogun: Total War founded the genre of the hybrid RTS/turn-based strategy game over a decade ago. But while the Total War series has long been the most well-known in the genre, it has grown stale over time, with frequent installments upgrading the graphics, re-using the same ideas, and, over time, eroding the enemy AI to a degree that player triumph in nearly every battle is inevitable.  Thankfully, there is another player in the sub-genre, and they are bringing something fresh to the table.

The 2007 release of King Arthur: The Role Playing Wargame brought a new spin to the game. Instead of simply raising troops and fighting battles, it challenged the player to take on a new role-playing experience as well. This hybrid, instead of merely providing you a few new units to fight the same battles, led to playthroughs that felt completely different from any of the Total War efforts (which, at the end of the day, all felt very similar). And now with the King Arthur II release at hand, Paradox provided us with a preview code to look at their next effort.

Despite some hokey voice acting, King Arthur 2 presents a grand tale that begs the player to continue onward. It’s refreshing to have a strong story element to a grand strategy game, which gives the campaign more weight. Instead of fighting battles to take a province and get more funds for raising troops, I’m battling to stop evil, or save my home from rebels. This is a significant departure from the genre norm, as other games typically focused solely on taking territory for the sake of glory or victory conditions. Narrative gives meaning to battles, and attaches one much more closely to the action.

A nice of vipers. Sounds like a good place for a nap.

The RPG elements add an interesting twist to the action. While other games have generals who possess traits, the decisions you make along the way will determine what qualities your main character possesses on the battlefield. Is he a wizard? A powerful warrior? Then he will wield magic or strong combat abilities when a foe is on hand.  And like any good RPG, the game includes boss fights against unique enemies.

If I were to caution anything about these games, it’s that they take a lot of machine to run. The stunning visuals (they attempt here to take your breath away as often as possible) will eat your video card alive if you aren’t properly equipped. Each unit’s soldiers are uniquely rendered, and the massive battlefields are littered with beautiful terrain. Paradox is known for games that are more substance than style, so the King Arthur games are a bit of a departure from their normal fare.  Having been brought into the Paradox fold by Europa Universalis and Hearts of Iron, I was surprised to see that this game was so graphically heavy.  Don’t get me wrong: I like it. I just wish I didn’t have the urge to go out and buy a $4,000 laptop after playing it.

The battles themselves may seem like the typical “order masses of men into each other” that you get in the genre, with flanking tactics and mixed units being the keys to victory. However, these battles are changed significantly by the additions of hero units, along with huge and dangerous enemies that can easily smash your units to bits.

In a games industry that seems complacent, that never pushes boundaries and offers consumers exactly what they wanted and no more, King Arthur II is a boundary pusher.  I’ve really enjoyed the time I’ve spent with King Arthur II so far, and can’t wait to get into the full game when it launches January 27th. Having battled back the hordes with Arthur’s knights, and returned from the dead to kick some ass in Dead Legions, I look forward to see what else Paradox has in store.  Look for Vagary’s review in the coming weeks.

Guarantees an "arrowing" experience.

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Just In Bailey: Cleanup in Raccoon City!

By
Joey Alesia
– January 24, 2012Posted in: Columns, Editorials, Joey's Blog, Just In Bailey, Staff Blogs

(Note: I understand the concept of hardware limitations.  Try to suspend your disbelief a bit.  It’ll be funnier that way.)

It takes a team to make a video game.  You have designers, artists, coders, producers, directors, marketers, and yes, even bloggers.  The creation of a game is no easy task.  There is so much that goes into a video game and we take it all for granted.  Well, I would like to recognize one of the most prominent figures in gaming.  This figure does their job and never says a word.  They are so good at it that you don’t even know they exist.  This figure works all hours and doesn’t even complain about not getting paid overtime.  Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to recognize and say a big “Thank You” to:

The Video Game Janitor!

Have you ever left a room of decapitated zombies only to come back and find it completely empty?  That’s the Video Game Janitor hard at work.  The blood is cleaned up off the floor.  The bodies are disposed of, following proper procedure of course, and even that smell of decay is gone.  The Janitor even disposes of dogs and monsters.  Did something just crash through a window and scare the crap out of you?  No worries.  Just walk away.  It’ll get cleaned up.

 

A funny thing about the Video Game Janitor, not even time travel is an issue.  Across the ages guards are assassinated on roof tops and in alleyways.  From the Holy Land, to Italy, to Constantinople, dead bodies are left everywhere.  But, without so much as a whisper, the bodies are cleaned up off the streets by the Janitor.  The Janitor has seen war, has faced the battlefield, and has cleaned up after every round of Call of Duty.

 

Not even superheroes need to worry about clean up.  It isn’t the NYPD or the Gotham City Police removing the numerous thugs from the crime scenes.  The cops always arrive too late.  Take out Thug #1 and Thug #2 from the Gotham Museum.  Leave the room and come back.  They’re gone right?  And not a siren to be heard or a badge flashed.  The Janitor strikes again!

It would seem there are only a few places the Janitor dare not go:  the barren wastelands of Washington D.C. and New Vegas as well as the land of Tamriel.  The bodies just seem to pile up there.  Why the Janitor chooses to leave these places alone is their own business.  I say the Janitor has gone above and beyond what their original job description was.Sometimes the Video Game Janitor is so good, bodies will get removed before you even leave the room.  Occasionally, the Janitor may get carried away and try to remove a body before it is incapacitated or dead.  Can you blame them though?  It sounds like an awesome gig to me.

So, ladies and gentlemen, the next time you are traveling through Raccoon City with the members of S.T.A.R.S., or though 15th century Italy with Ezio Auditore da Firenze, take the time to admire the cleanliness of the streets, the lack of dead bodies, and the fresh lemon scent.  Don’t just thanks the makers of the games.  Thank the one who keeps things running clean and smooth.  Thank The Video Game Janitor!

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XBLA Review: Joe Danger: Special Edition

By
Magnus Risebro
– January 24, 2012Posted in: Reviews, Xbox 360

Joe Danger: Special Edition features vibrant and catchy music, however, the sound that will ring in your ears after playing is no melody, it’s the gut-wrenching “KERCHUNK” of failure. This sound near-constantly jabs at your ears during the 6 or so hours it takes to finish the career-mode. But whenever that horrible effect is played you’ll instantly punch the Back button to start your umpteenth attempt of the level because the one-more-go-factor shines with this one.

Essentially, Joe Danger is a physics-based, more complicated Excitebike focusing on traversal rather than racing. As titular stuntman Joe Danger, you ride your motorbike through a series of side-scrolling obstacle-courses filled with platformer-style hazards. Interspersed with these standard levels are races, which ramp up the chaos a few notches. To progress, one performs level-specific challenges such as collecting items or finishing within a set time. By doing this, stars are earned and used to unlock new levels.

Great controls are largely responsible for how entertaining the game is: The bike-physics are tuned to a perfect sweet-spot between nimble and weighty, making it satisfying and simple – though not necessarily easy – to pull off jumps, flips and tricks. Contrary to certain other precision-based, platforming-style games, the controls in Joe Danger are never a hurdle between player and game, and instead manage to reach the ideal state of any control system – to feel nonexistent.

The second half of Joe Danger’s Yin-Yang of great gameplay is the level design. Early on, the game teaches you the simple key concepts; boosting, tilting the bike in the air, and jumping. Subsequently, your skills with these concepts are tested in an increasingly devilish fashion. Often, the game tricks you by repeatedly incentivizing a certain maneuver, only to throw out a situation where you must deliberately NOT perform that maneuver to succeed. The level design consistently forces you to keep an open mind and rethink your techniques, giving the game a slight puzzle-game feel.

As for the volume of content: Besides the 6-8 hour career mode there is an additional, Special Edition-exclusive, “The Lab” campaign featuring extra-challenging levels, as well as a level-editor similar to LittleBigPlanet (though not nearly as comprehensive, and sadly lacking the ability to share levels with anyone but your friends). Both of these provide more Joe Danger, an undeniably good thing, but are definitely complimentary rather than essential to the game. Finally, there is split-screen multiplayer, which I could not test, but imagine is solid.

Giving the game a pleasant vibe is the Pixar-like aesthetic. Cartoony and colorful backgrounds, hummable and upbeat music, and Joe’s regular shouts of “Wahoo! Yee-haw!” will glue a wide grin to your face, at least until the challenge becomes too much and you start Dragonborn-shouting cuss-words at the screen. Nonetheless, the jolly presentation is a nice element, and certainly improves the game’s experience.

Joe Danger is everything an Arcade game should be in the classic sense. It’s to-the-point, it’s easy to learn yet hard to master, and above all, it’s fun. Even with the “Kerchunk”-based ear-torture, it’s well worth 1200 Microsoft points.

Pros:

  • Satisfying, arcadey gameplay
  • Bonus modes provide a wealth of content
  • Charming presentation

Cons:

  • Can be hard. No-longer-fun-hard.

4/5

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Progressing Through The Modern Battlefield

By
Don Parsons
– January 23, 2012Posted in: Don's Blog, Editorials, Staff Blogs

It doesn’t matter whether I am mashing the button to get through the green waveform that greets me when I boot up Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, or  the dirty, distorted bass before the menu of Battlefield 3; either way there is only one thing on my mind. No, not social interaction, a key element in first-person shooters to a lot of people, but that next reward. I was only so many kills from unlocking the next weapon last time I quit, and I’ve been anxious to finally be rewarded for my service time and skill.

When shooters took RPG elements and added them to the mix, it was an evolution in the genre. That “just one more game and I’m sure to unlock (insert weapon/attachment/camo here)” mentality is an addictive quality for shooters. Few have mastered the progressive tree of unlocks, but two big franchises you can count on are Call of Duty and Battlefield. They both offer incredibly deep  unlock systems that can cater to various individuals. I’ve sat down and spent some time (3 hours to be exact) with both games and jotted down some numbers to share.

01:00 Hours – The Frontlines

Battlefield 3′s matches lasted longer, which is the most obvious observation. During the first hour of play, I only got four rounds in. Ribbons, something awarded for doing certain things (ie. get 7 assault rifle kills in a round), come frequently and eventually lead to medals. Both are a great source of XP, so collecting as many as you can benefits you in many ways. Throughout those four games in the opening hour, 61 unfortunate soldiers died by my hand and 19 ribbons were unlocked. Most importantly, I leveled up three times, unlocked one gun, and seven attachments (I tried to use the same two guns to keep some sort of consistency).

After an hour, the sense of reward came from leveling up my class (I played Assault pretty much exclusively for this report) to unlock a gun I could use on either side of the battlefield. The first gun in each class is different depending on which side you are playing. So picking a class and sticking with it is beneficial in the beginning, though once you get a sense of how things work, swapping classes to whatever your team needs is how a good soldier fights.

This is where the experiment got fun. Modern Warfare 3 proved its difference in structure from the opening few games. In an hour, nine games were played (opposed to four), 106 opponents were killed (nearly twice as many as in Battlefield), and 12 levels were gained. Let me repeat that part; at the end of hour one, I was level 13. I had unlocked four weapons, and six attachments (again, I used the same two guns exclusively for this experiment). Instead of ribbons, you get accolades, though they don’t add up to much when it comes to progression. I stopped keeping track of them because of that, and that usually after every game I had four to five (five being the max).

My sense of reward in Modern Warfare 3 was simply leveling up. Each level brought something new; weapons, perks, equipment, challenges (something I didn’t keep track of, but they are a serious way to level up if you pay attention to them), and more. Emblems and titles are interchangeable and you unlock them at a fairly decent rate. I unlocked nine emblems and 45 titles (at one level, I unlocked a plethora of flag emblems).

02:00 Hours – The Fight for the Middle

The second hour of Battlefield 3 was a little more tense, and I was on a better team. That meant matches were shorter and equated to more games played. Six games later and I had killed 96 people and unlocked three new guns. One particular game had massive results (33-7 on Rush), so I gained a whopping 41 ribbons during this hour.

Two levels later, I could tell progress was much slower compared to Modern Warfare 3. I didn’t feel let down at all though, as the reward system still offered plenty in terms of weight. I was unlocking ribbons like crazy, and the attachment system (which is much like Modern Warfare 3′s) kept me itching for that next kill.

During the second hour of Modern Warfare 3, I only obtained 77 kills, putting the total up to 183 (opposed to 157 total in Battlefield 3) and got seven games in. Three weapons were unlocked, with seven attachments, but by this point I was level 19. In comparison, I was only level 7 in Battlefield 3.

The close-combat and faster gameplay style of Modern Warfare 3 was definitely showing in numbers. I didn’t need to play a third hour to come to this conclusion, but since I sat down and named the requirements for this field report ahead of time, I decided to stick with it.

03:00 Hours – The Final Hour

In the last sitting, 51 kills were had and one level was gained. Nothing surprising by this point, but five games were played and 21 ribbons were obtained. I unlocked one new gun and four new attachments during this session. While all of these numbers will vary per person, the totals are vastly different between the two games, just like my feelings towards them both in terms of their addictive nature.

First, let’s wrap up with Modern Warfare 3. Progression slowed down (as it should), as during these final nine games, I only gained four levels to hit the final number at level 23. Only one new gun was unlocked (truth be told, I was very happy with my USAS for small maps and the SCAR for more open maps, so new guns didn’t intrigue me), and three more attachments for the guns I used most. My kill count for this hour was a total of 111 kills.

The Final Numbers

Games Played:

Battlefield 3: 15

Modern Warfare 3: 24

Total Kills:

Battlefield 3: 208

Modern Warfare 3: 294

Final Level:

Battlefield 3: Level 7

Modern Warfare 3: Level 23

Weapons Unlocked:

Battlefield 3: 5 guns, 21 attachments

Modern Warfare 3: 8 guns, 16 attachments

Field Report Conclusion

The two games here do progression in amazing ways. While different and unique they also both offer similar concepts, but the real difference isn’t what you are unlocking or why, but the addictive nature of them both and how they are so different. In Battlefield 3′s case, it was leveling up the class I preferred to play to make sure I had both great guns to select from and the proper gear to do my role on the battlefield efficiently. Even though progress seemed slower, I was progressing in different ways.

In the case of Modern Warfare 3, everything is simply faster. The rewards system matches the gameplay, which is a great pairing. You gain levels like crazy, and each level grants you something new; whether a perk, a gadget or a gun. So for the first few hours, you honestly don’t go a single game without unlocking something (with even mediocre skill).

Other games have their own unique (okay, sometimes not unique but blatant copies that still don’t stack up against these two) progression system, but what DICE and Infinity Ward did with their games is unprecedented. They are both true masters of their craft and have designed an addictive architecture to the shooter genre.

Activision provided Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 for this article. EA provided Battlefield 3 for review late last year, which was used for this article as well.

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Retrocore #62 “The master of Jill sandwiches”

By
Retrocore » Retrocore
– January 22, 2012Posted in: Retrocore, Shows

Today’s show had two different parts. For the first part Colin and Vivi joined me for a review of Abobo’s Big Adventure the ultimate tribute to everything that is the NES. Due to Colin’s internet not “behaving” he had to leave. Then for the second half of the show, I had Chris Vint on of Retroshock Podcast and Boots on of BlankShowCast for a great discussion on the Resident Evil series. We had a blast with this episode and we hope you enjoy. Keep it retro!!

Side A:

Abobo’s Big Adventure reviewed by Chris, Colin, and Vivi

Side B:

Resident Evil discussion by Chris Vint, Bootss, and Chris

Be sure to listen to this episode to enter our giveaway and you’ll want to follow us on Twitter as well ;) @Retroshock316 and @Retrocore_RCVGM  Follow BlankShowCast on Twitter as well! @BlankShowCast

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n00bketeers 88: Not An Episode About SOPA

By
Teh n00bs
– January 20, 2012Posted in: N00bketeers, Shows

Beezball, who is in this episode, declared that even though we spend a lot of the time talking about SOPA, we shouldn’t make the title about SOPA. Singing Pigs, who is also in the episode, happily obliged. And please be sure to show some support to 8bc.org and donate to help get their servers back up again at the following web address – http://brkbrkbrk.com/save8bc/donate.php. We owe them a lot in the music department. Continue reading →



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The Perfectly Sane Show Ep. 79: Every Game Ever

By
The Perfectly Sane Show » The Perfectly Sane Show
– January 20, 2012Posted in: Shows, The Perfectly Sane Show

Considering the dryness of the release schedule the guys oddly talk about a ton of games this week. They also get into Jeff’s parenting style, SOPA, PIPA, and answer a lot of listener questions.


Also, join us in the forums to discuss games and other stuff we like.

Music in this episode:
Strike of the Devil’s Axes OC ReMix by CarboHydroM & LuIzA

E-mail comments (or questions) to perfectlysane@vagary.tv or follow us on Twitter.

Tony – iamnapoleon1066
Jeff – JustSomeDude899
Cyrus – FozioAuditore
Chris – kariyanine

Perfectly Sane Show

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Retrocore Classic Game Music #53

By
Retrocore: Classic Gaming Music » Podcast Feed
– January 18, 2012Posted in: Retrocore: Classing Gaming Music, Shows

At last I finally drop the first music show of the year, and I must say I love it! I finally got the Mendel Palace soundtrack that I’ve been searching forever for! I shared most of the music with you all and I hope some of you will go check out this awesome, forgotten about masterpiece! Thanks for the support and listening and as always, keep it retro!

Snowman Stage – Mendel Palace (NES)
Jumpers Stage – Mendel Palace (NES)
Special Stage – Mendel Palace (NES)
Swimmer Stage – Mendel Palace (NES)
Sumo Stage – Mendel Palace (NES)
Track 14 – Mendel Palace (NES)
Ballerina Stage – Mendel Palace (NES)
Track 18 -Mendel Palace (NES)
Boss Theme – Mendel Palace (NES)
Boss Theme 2  – Mendel Palace (NES)
Ending – Mendel Palace (NES)
Mushroom Forest – Little Nemo: Dream Master (NES)
Training – Mike Tyson’s Punchout (NES)
Transylvania – Ducktales (NES)
Stage 2 – Bad Dudes (NES)
The Battle of Miday – 1943 (Amiga)
Desolation Canyon – Wild Guns
Fair Conditioning – Bubsy (Genesis)
Diamond Dust Zone Act 1 – Sonic 3D Blast (Genesis)
Green Grove Act 1 – Sonic 3D Blast (Genesis)
Gene Gadget Act 1 – Sonic 3D Blast (Genesis)

Email: retrocore@hotmail.com Also follow DJ SL on Twitter! Retrocore_RCVGM



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Review: TNT Racers

By
Kyle Baron
– January 17, 2012Posted in: Nintendo Wii, PS3, Reviews, Xbox 360

No blue shells here, just balanced pickups like big car mode

Note: The Playstation Network version was played for review. TNT Racers is also available on Xbox Live Marketplace and the Wii Shop.

I stopped caring about casual racers that put an emphasis on in-game items when I realized that those games are made with quirky chaos in mind instead of refined and balanced fun. Developer Keen Games’ TNT Racers comes close to balancing both of these sides of the scale to make something special.

Rather than have players race from a traditional behind-the-car perspective, all four players in any given race view the game from the same overhead camera. TNT Racers makes this design choice significant by having anyone who falls behind out of the camera view eliminated from the race. This keeps the rounds in any given game mode short and hectic, and also encourages the racers at the head of the pack to cut tight corners around the track to move the camera that extra inch ahead. This is a big relief for players of other racing games where a few mistakes can lead to several minutes of being out-lapped in last place before the next race.

Cutting tight corners with precision, or even driving with precision at all, becomes a bit of a frustrating challenge later on in the game. Without any sort of drift function, the snappy handling can’t keep up with the turbo-speed single-player challenges, and neither can it keep up with multiplayer matches of the same speed. This leads to a lot of lost races because of accidental and all too easy collisions with the levels’ many walls, ramps, and obstacles. This can be remedied with a good deal of patient practice with subtle movements of the analog stick, but it’s a weak solution to such an obvious shortcoming of the controls.

Shadow Mode gives eliminated players a chance to grief racers

Being eliminated from a race doesn’t leave players behind. Eliminated racers take on the role of “shadows,” who are free to drive straight through other players and take their items in order to humiliate them. Ground shaking mallets, slowing tractor beams, and mini whirlwinds are uniquely available to shadow players, and are fun to use without being completely unavoidable and frustrating for the players still racing for the first place.

In fact, all of the items in TNT Racers are balanced and are handed out according to how far you are in the lead. Even the heat-seeking missiles of the game can be avoided with some deft driving, while landmines can be removed with weapons fire and any item can be avoided with a shield pickup. Only being able to hold one item at a time makes for a lot of quick decisions of whether to hold on to that repair kit instead of trying your luck at getting a steam engine to fog up the paths of players and projectiles behind you.

This refined chaos makes multiplayer a ton of fun to play, and the game provides four-player on and offline play with bots. Unfortunately, I was only able to play a few online matches as there was only one room open during the weekend after the game’s release. Granted, that match was full of rowdy players intent on turbo speed matches, where everyone would end up laughing at the smoking wreck of whoever was lucky enough to survive long enough to get first place. I doubt those online lobbies will ever fill up again, but it speaks to how fun the game can be if you grabbed three other buddies around the television.

There’s also the ’30s soundtrack, but that’s best left  turned off. At first, it’s a funny juxtaposition to the psuedo-micro machines racing around a track and shooting candy at each other, but it gets tiring and abrasive after about half an hour.

Pros:

  • Balanced and creative array of items.
  • Simple controls and smart game design keep things approachable and bite sized.
  • Endearingly cute artistic design of vehicles and tracks.
  • Multiplayer is incredibly fun, but…

Cons:

  • No-one is playing multiplayer online.
  • Music gets irritating fast.
  • An e-brake would’ve made the quickly paced “turbo” matches more approachable.

4/5

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2011 Year End Awards – Chris Scott’s Top 10 Films

By
Chris Scott
– January 17, 2012Posted in: Blogs, Chris' Blog, Editorials, Staff Blogs

Another year has passed us by and once again I spent a lot of that year watching films, a great many of them in the theater. Sadly I didn’t get to see everything I wanted, stuff like “Drive”, “Moneyball”, “Warhorse” and “The Artist” will have to wait until early 2012 or whenever they are released on video. However, out of what I did see this year, there were a slew of films that kept me thinking about them well after I saw them, the below are the best of those films.

10. Insidious

The ghost story has been done to death, which is probably why I didn’t give Insidious a chance at first. However, this simple tale of parents attempting to save their child from the clutches of evil spirits is a terrifying thrill ride. Directed by James Wan and written by Leigh Whannel, the team behind the original Saw, the film does something many horror films today don’t do, it provides actual scares.

9. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2

I won’t deny that I was highly disappointing in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1, however Part 2 makes up for it in every conceivable way. If you are a Potter fan, this is the culmination of a journey that started a decade ago and director David Yates handles it with grace and dignity.

8. Our Idiot Brother

Paul Rudd plays Ned, the titular character whom is a free spirit that lives life to the fullest. But the film isn’t really about Ned but rather his sisters, who are so wrapped up in the minutia of their lives that they have forgotten how to actually live them. Ned, through a series of awkward, yet hysterical instances, comes to show them they have been doing it wrong. There is just something about Rudd that is charming and endearing and Our Idiot Brother captures it majestically.

7. Fast Five

The Fast and Furious movies have always been one of my guilty pleasures but with Fast Five, the pleasure is no longer guilty. Fast Five is hands down the best action movie of the year. While the Fast crew already operated like a well-oiled machine under the guidance of director Justin Lin, it is the addition of The Rock that really pushes this film (and series) into overdrive. The Rock looks reinvigorated and once again able to claim the action hero crown and his energy was seemingly infectious as Vin Diesel is on fire in this movie.

6. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

While I’ve yet to read the book, I loved the original Swedish film. I felt it was an engaging mystery with a great sense of pacing, as well as some excellent acting performances. Unsurprisingly, at least to David Fincher fans, this English language version actually improves on the original in nearly every way. Lisbeth (played by Rooney Mara) is a deeper character here and that makes a lot of the changes carry more weight. The only reason this isn’t higher on the list is because I had seen the original and because of that a lot of the tension of the investigation just wasn’t there for me.

5. Source Code

Every once in a while a film comes along and surprises you with how smart it is. Source Code is one of those films. Director Duncan Jones delivers a tight, tense, sci-fi thrill ride and most surprisingly it is done almost entirely by repeating the same eight minutes over and over again. Source Code is a film that makes you think, presenting both a solid mystery as well as some interesting ethical questions.

4. I Saw the Devil

I love a good revenge thriller and there were none better this year than the Korean language film, I Saw the Devil. The film is excessively violent and gory and at nearly every turn it threatens to fall victim to becoming just another torture porn film, but somehow director Jee-woon Kim is able to walk the tightrope instead delivering an artistic tour-de-force exploring the destruction of a man’s sanity in his pursuit for revenge.

3. Hugo

At its core, Hugo is a whimsical story about an orphan who befriends a young girl and has a wondrous adventure but hidden amongst the simple adventure is Martin Scorsese’s love letter to his craft. It is a film about remembering and celebrating the past, while at the same time pushing forward to new adventures. Simply put it is a film that anyone who has a love for the medium should see.

2. Super 8

If Hugo is Martin Scorsese’s love letter to film making, Super 8 is J.J. Abrams love letter to Stephen Spielberg. There is such a classic feel to everything in Super 8 that at times it is hard to imagine that it did not come out 25 years ago. But what the film does the best though is capture the magic of 80s era Spielberg and in doing so Super 8 effectively made me feel like a kid again, entranced by the magic of the silver screen.

1. The Muppets

Call me a fool all you want but nothing this year put a smile on my face like The Muppets did. It is without a doubt the funniest, most feel good movie of the year. It gets everything right about The Muppets and in so doing, delivers a perfect viewing experience that can bring a smile to even the most hardened of hearts.

Those are mine, what are some of yours?

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