Categoria: Monsters

[EXPRESSO] Helltaker STEAM | Best Grills

Helltaker STEAM

So, there’s this new game on Steam, describing itself as “a short game about sharply dressed demon girls”, with promise of anime harem (but again it points out “Suggestive clothing and poses. Don’t put your hopes too high though – it’s all tame.”), and it’s free. You can already see why it’s become somewhat of a sensation in the community. Which leads us to this question: are the demon girls cute? (YES)

As far as gameplay goes, it’s not what you might think given this premise, a puzzle game where you (as a sharply dressed and shades wearing badass) kick blocks, skeletons, get keys, avoid traps and proceed through Hell in a turn based fashion, with a turn limit to reach the end of the each level, where you meet a different demon girl in a visual novel-esque segment where you choose from a couple of replies and hope you charmed and/or convinced the hell cutie to join the harem. Otherwise they’ll stab you to death or give you a bad end of some kind.

Fairly good puzzles overall, but the game lets you skip them if you just want to get to the demon girls, with great character designs and very good music.

My main gripe isn’t the short lenght (you can finish it in 1, max 2 hours), is that the multi-stage boss fight at the end requires really fast reflexes and to keep moving around really fast… in a game that’s 90% turn based puzzle game without timers or urgency. It comes out of nowhere and feels more frustrating than it should, since the game doesn’t prepare you for that in any way. It’s like if at the end of a Dynasty Warriors battle you were forced to play a long RTS style map.

Still, quite good and quite the treat!

expresso-icona

Shark Month approacheth

Sweetness And Lightning same song

So yeah, as this month comes to a close and coincidentally i go back to work, i’d like to announce that you will see a lot of shark movie reviews in june, as this quarantine was quite boring, with 15 planned reviews, and maybe some extra ones, if i have the time.

And no, i don’t plan to review JUST shark movies in june, nor i planned to dub it “shark month”, but you get the point!

Mega Python VS Gatoroid (2011) [REVIEW] | Potter, You Fool

Mega Python VS Gatoroid 2011

There is something to be said when even The Asylum decides to NOT bother giving sequels to another random giant monster movie fully undeserving any kind of second chance.

Yeah, this isn’t the starting point of another Mega “insert animal name” series, or a “spiritual sequel” to the 2000’s movie called “Python” (which got an actual sequel two years later), this is a one-off for both the Mega Python and the Gatoroid, the latter being a very tortured pun not on a popular energy drink brand, but on the fact they “roided up” a fuckin alligator. Continua a leggere “Mega Python VS Gatoroid (2011) [REVIEW] | Potter, You Fool”

Piranha 3DD (2012) [REVIEW] | Piranha Ate My Bunghole

Piranha 3DD 2012 poster

Piranha 3D was a good b-movie, directed by well respected and trustworthy horror director Alexandre Aja, who basically remade the omonymous old Jaws ripoff (produced by Corman, because why wouldn’t it be?), with 3D because it would have fit perfectly, is that kind of b-movie, the creature feature with killer fish, bikini ladies, and a party or holiday of some sort as the reason to gather people around, because fish is people too, and ripping off Spielberg never went out of fashion.

So a couple years later we got Piranha 3DD, a sequel… that’s actually a sequel, instead of just another movie about killer piranha slapping a “2” on the title, directed not by Aja, but by John Gullager, best known for the Feast Series, Zombie Night, and yes, it’s Glu Gullager’s (of Return of The Living Dead, The Last Picture Show fame) son.

And he took a surprisingly “smart” approach with this one, because why bother trying? Continua a leggere “Piranha 3DD (2012) [REVIEW] | Piranha Ate My Bunghole”

2 Lava 2 Lantula (2016) [REVIEW] | Superfastula

2 Lava 2 Lantula 2016

Oh yeah, baby, because parodying the Fast N Furios titling stylization is still kewl.

But it fits, given the tongue-in-cheek tone of the first Lavalantula (still think it should have been Lavantula, but whatever), which was a decent, enjoyable B-movie about lava spiders from director Mike Mendez (Big Ass Spider, the “Friday the 31st” segment in Tales Of Halloween), a genuine one that actually sets out to be fun and not just in the “let’s make as bad as possible on purpose” trend. Continua a leggere “2 Lava 2 Lantula (2016) [REVIEW] | Superfastula”

Lavalantula (2015) [REVIEW] | Can’t Stop The Dante

Lavalantula 2015

Oh yes, because every bad hand of Scrabble has the chance of becoming a SyFy Original, but only few chosen puns can become a Sharknado spin-off, featuring even Ian Ziering as as a “seal of approval” of sorts. And Phantom from Devil May Cry (along with its many sons) needed a new gig anyway. Continua a leggere “Lavalantula (2015) [REVIEW] | Can’t Stop The Dante”

Monster Island (2019) [REVIEW] | Some Monsters Mild Aggression Tantrum

Monster Island 2019.png

Cards on the table: it’s an Asylum production, and is both directed and written by Mark Atkins, who brought us Sand Sharks, Planet Of The Sharks, 6 Headed Shark Attack, and Knight Of The Dead, just to lay off the sharks (poor things).

The UK DVD cover art is actually decent, and promises a mindless monster melee between giant squid, werewolf thingies, reptilian monstrousities and one that seems like an Orga rip-off… I love these covers, i do, but often than not they end up being better than the movies themselves, when we talk mockbuster and D-movies powerhouses as Asylum, and like the bottom feeders they are, this time they released Monster Island to steal the breadcrumbs of Godzilla II: King Of The Monsters, which came out on the 30th of May 2019 in US theathers, and this one on the 1st of June, 2 days later. Continua a leggere “Monster Island (2019) [REVIEW] | Some Monsters Mild Aggression Tantrum”

[EXPRESSO] Ninja-Kid NSWDDL | Ninja In The Hood

Ninja-Kid NSWDDL.jpg

Yeah, why, not, with sales on Neo Geo and arcade titles on the Switch eShop, let’s talk about arcade platformer Ninja-Kid, developed by UPL and now emulated by Hamster, who also brought to Switch and PS4 many arcade classics, including In The Hunt.

And no, this isn’t the american version of that NES GeGeGe No Kitaro game, also called Ninja Kid (without hyphen) for the NA release.

This one isn’t exactly what i would call a “classic”, and i’m honestly glad i bought it on sale. Not because the game itself it’s bad, it’s just that the old god Chronos hasn’t been too kind on this action platformer from 1984, that feels a bit like Ice Climbers (while pre-dating the Nintendo game by 1 year), due to how you have to move to jump or double jump, otherwise you’ll drop to the platform below.

It’s a simple game where you can jump to stun enemies, throw shurikens to defeat them, move upwards the mountain/castle/stage and once you get rid of all the foes, you can proceed to the next level.

There are three backgrounds/stages (and a bonus stage if you collect “three strange balls” without dying), but while enemies become more varied and more dangerous each level, there isn’t any end, it just loops the levels/background and keeps going, but that’s basically it. There is some strategy with approaching the enemies, but still, there’s not much to it, nor there was supposed to be more to it, as this was meant to be played in an arcade in 10 minutes burst at max.

That said, it’s a fun arcade oldie, once you get around the responsive but odd jump controls, and there’s satisfaction if you wanna go for the high scores, with the usual extra modes found in Hamster arcade re-releases.

Decent!

decaffeinato-icona

Earth Defense Force: Iron Rain PS4 [REVIEW] | Mechas and Motherships

Earth Defense Force Iron Rain PS4.jpg

Once in a blue moon, D3 Publisher decides to entrust a niche series like Earth Defense Force to a different developer, instead of Sandlot, who curates the main numbered series (which itself tells you that it’s niche, but not THAT niche) since the very beginning and still do nowadays.

Last time Vicious Cycle Software developed EDF Insect Armageddon (which isn’t as bad as most EDF fans make it to be), a spin-off made with the intent to try and appeal to a broader audience, by basically posing the question “what if Americans made EDF?”. The answer being a decent game that didn’t convince many estabilished fans, but did help on making the series more known. An actual ending (the plot just stops at the end) would have been welcomed, though. Continua a leggere “Earth Defense Force: Iron Rain PS4 [REVIEW] | Mechas and Motherships”