Platformation Time Again #7: Wario World NGC/SWITCH2

For context: i played and completed the original release on Gamecube, previously reviewed it (more than once), but i recently played it from scratch and finished it again via the Gamecube Classics app on Switch 2, so this review is technically a rewrite, but it’s de facto new, almost completely done from scratch and rewritten/improved/revised to reflect my opinions on the game after re-revalution.

HISTORY

Wario needs no introduction, having been Mario’s Nemesis since its debut on Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins, and having not only its own peculiar platforming series, but in 2003 it also branched off into a new genre, with the peculiar mini-games compilation of the Wario Ware series, which had just debutted some months prior.

Wario World was also a peculiar case since it was not only the first 3D outing for a series that had been 2D platformers or puzzle games of sorts (including the Super Famicom exclusive Mario & Wario, and his reskin of Bomberman games, Wario Blast), but was also not developed by one of Nintendo’s internal development teams.

It was actually handled by Treasure, a beloved software house known for classics like Gunstar Heroes, Radiant Silvergun, Guardian Heroes, Ikaruga, after their collaboration with Nintendo on Sin & Punishment proved successful, that lead Nintendo R & D 1 wanting to do so again, but this time on a 3D iteration of the Wario series/franchise.

Who would turn down to opportunity to work on a 3D “Mario” game with Nintendo’s blessing, after all?

Definitely not 2000s’ Treasure, which was in a kind of identity crisis, coming off of both Sylpheed The Lost Planet and Stretch Panic/Freak Out/Hippa Linda not being well received (nor selling well either) and them basically having to take on more and more licensed tie-in work, for anything from Tiny Toons to anime series both well known (like the Bleach DS titles and the excellent Astro Boy: Omega Factor) or obscure, like a shonen series called Dragon Driver.

Continua a leggere

Jack Frost: The Amytiville [MANWHA REVIEW] | The Teen Hellsing Years

This has been on my bucketlist for a while because it was such a transparent case to me.

As in, sometimes you have comics more or less explicit in showing their inspiration, their model to copy and emulate, happens a lot in shonen manga but it’s not always what one would assume

Sometimes it can be just a conflation of this kind of comics being very iterative and built (like most books and movies, for that matter) on clichès, on proven formats, time-tested formula, so similarities are often more coincidence than deliberate emulation of a specific series among the sea of many similar ones, expecially when in turn they influence each other as they go, and in time are themselves taken as examplse to follow.

But once i laid eyes on this manwha (a “korean manga”) by Ko Jin-Ho, Jack Frost: The Amityville, aimed at basically the same demographic of an edgy Shonen Jump series, then red the first volume, i was kinda happy in how immediatly obvious it was to me what this wanted to be.

As in, a more shonen take on Hellsing, the renowed pulp classic by Kohta Hirano about vampires, guns bigger than people, religious freaks with knives that double as lances and undead nazi cyborg monsters.

Continua a leggere

12 Days Of Dino Dicember # 60: Grunt! (1983)

Back in the mid 60 and 70s cavemen films had come back, going initially for an adventure feel, alongside other dinosaur or prehistoric themed films (most already covered here), but it became clear soon that what made One Million Years B. C. a success wasn’t the stopmotion dinosaur effects by Ray Harryhausen, but Rachel Welch in cavegirl garments, and hence these film began more focusing on the cave girls and the “historical” excuse for pseudo-nudity.

In Italy we had a tradition of sexy comedies budding in the late 60s, so in the 70s some filmakers hopped onto the bandwagon and made sexy cavemen comedies like When Women Had Tails, while others latched unto the more extreme trend of the cannibal films.

It was a fad, in the grand scheme of things, but the genre survived into the early ’80s with stuff like the alredy reviewed Caveman, the one with Ringo Starr, which i assume was the catalyst for director Andy Luotto to try his hand at a caveman slapstick comedy, with Grunt!, indeed one of the more apt titles ever for a caveman comedy, sporting the tagline “La Clava E’ Uguale Per Tutti” (lit. “The Club Is Equal For All”), also used as a subtitle for the kinda modern DVD rerelease it got and which i’m using for review.

You can find the entire movie on Youtube, but you might need to find some subs unless you understand italian, as yes, it’s a dialogue-less film…. BUT there’s also a voice over narration by the director, Andy Luotto (also in the film as the caveman that looks like a Squawkabilly) talking bollocks that intervenes here and there.

Then again, it’s not like it makes the thing have more sense (it’s mostly bollocks, including random homophobic shit and shit tier cabaret jokes), but maybe there are some german dubs around, or maybe french, as far as i know there are no official english dubs for the film.

Which makes sense since there’s just so little voiceover to dub, and no spoken dialogue per sé.

Continua a leggere

[EXPRESSO] Now You See Me: Now You Don’t (2025) | Cross-Gen Capers

Aside from the title that would have befitted the second entry in this series instead of the third (as this is Now You See Me 3), the “Ocean Eleven-esque X Robin Hood” gang of illusionists (labeled The Horsemen due to the “Knights Of The Round Table” style secret society they belong to/work for) and with ready to foil villains with incredible “magic” based performances heists are back, with some next generation members entering their ranks to help steal a huge ass diamond from an arms dealer played by Rosamund Pike.

It’s an actually very old fashioned type of plot, something not too distant from Carmen Sandiego or Lupin The 3rd, but done in a glitzy modern way with an emphasis of illusionism, mentalism, parlor tricks taken to anime style levels of ability of deception for twists upon twists, snazzy setpieces and daring escapes. The usual crime caper stuff, basically.

There’s not much to say, it’s that kind of “let’s get the gang back” kind of sequel with the injection of new blooded “tricksters” for justice members, the third installment in the series, this one directed by Ruben Fleischer (Zombieland, Zombieland Double Tap, the first Venom movie, the Uncharted film), which does a decent job, i did enjoy this more than the second film, i will say that, and that is somehow mantains that plucky energy, despite the franchise being more than a decade old by now.

It’s still the kind of very light, shiny and glitzy popcorn entertaiment that the previous Now You See Me films were, not completely mindless, but also not deep or complicated by any definition, molsty predictable but not completely, the sort you do enjoy but also kinda throway, forgotten by the very next week at best.

But it does the job decently enough in theathers.