Spacewocket
It means nothing but it sounds good.

Author: Sardoken

Zelda – Link’s Awakening (2019)

By Sardoken on

Link’s Awakening wasn’t only my first Zelda game, it was also the first game I completed, not only on Game Boy, but on any Nintendo gaming system. Yep, you read well, I never owned a console before the Game Boy. I was a computer dude and by the time that the original Link’s Awakening was released, I was gaming on an Amiga 1200.

Anyway, that year, I had a very nasty bronchitis that kept me home for several weeks (smoking sucks, glad I quit). All I had to cheer me up was the video club and my Game Boy.

I was already used to play adventure games, but this was entirely new to me. The island exploration unlocking as I solved dungeon puzzles and gained new powers that enabled me to jump further or carry heavier rocks, it was brilliant.

Soon, I was known to be the dude who had completed the game and my friends were calling me everyday to know the next step of the trading sequence. Were those my 15 minutes of fame?

When I found out that Nintendo was about to release a remake of the game, I was overjoyed, especially because I instantly loved the art of the new version. I purchased the game and added it to my backlog.

Last week-end, I’ve finally completed Link’s Awakening and I have enjoyed every minute of it. The game is almost identical to the original, only with cute new graphics. I’m probably going to play it again soon… Some day… (let’s be real, my backlog is huge).

A few facts about Link’s Awakening that I didn’t know until recently:

  • Development began after-hours by Nintendo staff. It grew into an original project under the direction of Takashi Tezuka;
  • The majority of the Link to the Past team reassembled for Link’s Awakening;
  • Tezuka wanted the game world to feel like the television series Twin Peaks.
  • Princess Zelda is not featured at all in Link’s Awakening, though she is referenced by Link, initially confusing Marin for her;
  • Peach isn’t the only thing from Mario that you can find in Link’s Awakening, there are also Goombas.

To many people Breath of the Wild is the Zelda Game of the Nintendo Switch, to me it’s the remake of Link’s Awakening.

17th Wedding Anniversary

By Sardoken on

17 years ago, I was getting married to my soulmate, my partner in crime, Inge (aka Soforah). Much has happened since then, we’ve changed apartments a few times, we’ve moved to another town, Inge has found a new job… Some things haven’t changed, we’re still the same geeks who enjoy to game and watch TV together. Inge has changed my life for the best and I only wish to be as good to her as she is to me. I am a lucky man.

The Purge – Season 2

By Sardoken on

I love the entire Purge franchise, I enjoyed each movie and I had a really good time watching the first season of the TV show. Inge and I had kept the second season for a binge day and we haven’t been disappointed. After the first episode, we were instantly hooked and we didn’t go to sleep before the end.

The principle remains the same: anti purge folks fighting the new founding fathers to put an end to the deadliest night of the year while other people fight are being targeted by vengeful murderers.

It’s packed with action and the few drama scenes aren’t long enough to break the rhythm of the show. The cast was great, I especially enjoyed Derek Luke whom I recognized from 13 Reasons Why.

As usual, the entire show had me thinking “what would I do on such a night?”. Well, nothing’s changed, I would still fortify my place, wait for the night to be over, watching the news while listening to the sound of the mayhem taking place outside.

By the way, it feels weird to write this post while the streets of many U.S. cities are looking a lot like a scene from the franchise. Maybe the NFFA isn’t such a bad idea after all…

Witches casts and miscasts

By Sardoken on

Wicked witches are probably the best protagonist in fantasy. In cinema or on TV, the casting is often done right and correspond to the right image of the witches in fantasy. Unfortunately, sometimes, the casting is wrong and the result is, for me, a huge loss in quality.

Let me state first that it has nothing to do with skin tone, this isn’t a purist post about witches in fantasy. That’s why I posted a picture of the Weird Sisters from The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina. Three different colors, all three perfect in their roles.

Witches spend their lives learning secret knowledge, hidden from the world. They are more powerful than kings and, as such, are often regarded as threats. They work as council for the rulers or as enemy of the free world. They have a scarred side, the price they pay for messing with the natural order of things and a beautiful side, the one they show to the world.

Among the actresses who were an absolute fit, there is Katie McGrath in the role of Morgana from the TV show Merlin. She is the perfect incarnation of anger, arrogance and elegance.

Another great cast was Jessica De Gouw in the role of the evil witch from Gretel & Hansel. She managed to transform the tension built during the movie into jaw dropping final scene.

On the other side, there is Anya Chalotra in the role of Yennefer from the TV show The Witcher. To me, she’s the perfect example of a witch miscast, she’s plump, inelegant and she really doesn’t inspire danger. She was good in the role of the hunchback, but certainly not in the role of Yennefer. I really enjoyed the first season of the show, but it almost seems that Yennefer and Tissala weren’t cast by the same people. MyAnna Buring makes a perfect witch, elegant and severe while Anya Chalotra seems to struggle walking in dressed up shoes.

TLDR: Wicked witches make a show when they are cast properly. They need to be arrogant, elegant and dangerous. Yennefer is a miscast.

Child’s Play (2019)

By Sardoken on

I remember renting Child’s Play when I was a kid, I was disappointed and didn’t consider the franchise anymore… I’ve never been scared by dolls and puppets (except Anabelle, she’s creepy), and I like to be scared when I watch a scary movie or, at least, laugh, but Chucky didn’t do either of those.

The current state of horror cinema doesn’t allow me to be picky and, in this case, it was a good thing because I ended up having a great evening watching Child’s Play. The movie isn’t really scary but it has a good vibe and it made me laugh a few times.

What made the movie greater than what I expected is the voice of Mark Hamill as Buddi, the homicidal toy doll. If you are not convinced, listen to Buddi’s song, written by Bear McCreary and performed by Mark Hamill, I find it awesome.

The new rise of physical editions

By Sardoken on

There are a few TV shows and movies that are part of our all time classics. Among them, you can find Star Trek, Stargate and Twin Peaks. You can watch some of these on streaming services like Netflix and Amazon Prime. Unfortunately, there are a few drawbacks.

With the rise of these streaming services, we’ve seen the amount of TV shows increase exponentially but, out of the hundreds of these new shows, how many are really good and, more importantly, how many would you re-watch?

Now, it is probably a matter of taste, but none of these shows come close to the quality of the shows from the 90s. The scenarios are too far fetched, the dialogues are too long and often put me to sleep instead of contributing to the plot. Do you ever see a Casa de Papel become as iconic as X-Files or Twin Peaks, which still have their own conventions nowadays. 

We don’t make classics anymore, simply because there are too many shows and the good ones are lost in a sea of mediocrity.

Something else that bothers me is that, even if your favorite show is on Netflix, it doesn’t mean that it will stay there. On a regular basis, streaming services prune their catalog to make place for the new shows and, one day, Star Trek may very well be removed. What a catastrophe it would be, knowing that it is the show of our Sunday eves for nearly 15 years.

That’s why we’ve decided to purchase a Blu-ray player. We bought the Sony UBP-X800M2. We can now rebuild our collection of classics in a format that should last for a very long time. Cherry on the cake, the reader up scales old TV shows to our wide screen format. I am not an expert but the quality is amazing and, going back to Netflix, I am now bothered by the 2 large black borders in non up scaled shows.

TLDR: Streaming services may delete your favorite shows, they do not up scale and modern days TV shows are mediocre at best. 90s TV shows are awesome and deserve a physical editions.

Luschek

By Sardoken on

This morning, while doing the dish, I realised that I didn’t mention my favourite character from Orange is the New Black. Instead of adding a paragraph by the end of my previous post, I thought that this modern-day hero deserves a post of his own.

If you haven’t seen the TV show, let me tell you who Luschek is and why I love him so much… First, you have to know that most of my heroes are underachievers like Ferris Bueller and Parker Lewis. That’s maybe because I never targeted the shiny first place, the top of the podium, it’s by far too much spotlight and too much pressure. I’m more of a “Let me sit at the back of the classroom and wake me up when it’s over” kind of person.

In that very specific category, you have Joel Luschek. He’s a jail guard at Litchfield and he doesn’t care too much about anything else but himself. He doesn’t want to hurt anyone but he’s not gonna invest himself more than just what he has to.

He is constantly broke and needs no convincing to start smuggling in phones or drugs to round up the end of the month. When he finally manages to make some extra cash, instead of fixing his financial situation, he prefers to buy himself a pair of Back to the Future Nike and nothing less than a DeLorean. (image source: Reddit)

That’s why, as a tribute, I added the quote “What would Luschek do?” to the list of the random descriptions of my blog.

Orange is my new black

By Sardoken on

A few years ago, when I was on burnout for 5 months and our apartment was destroyed and we had to sleep on the broken concrete in the freezing winter without heating and people in my family were dying, a few things kept me from completely losing my mind, one of them was Orange is the new black.

When Inge got sick with what was probably Covid-19 for 3 creepy weeks of isolation and fear of contamination, the show we watched nearly every day was Orange.

So, I don’t know why we always turned to OITNB in those moments, especially for the two horror fans that we are, but these girls have been an awesome source of entertainment for us in 2 of our most not-so-funny-moments.

The thing that I love the most about TV shows is character development and Orange is incredible at doing that. After 7 seasons, we really had the feeling to have been living with the girls, sharing their stories, so much that, when the show was over, we both got super emotional (even space marines have feelings, y’know). You know which other TV show had us super emotional by the end? Star Trek Voyager, which also casted Kate Mulgrew… Coincidence?

I enjoyed practically everything in the show, but what I found amazing was the retrospectives of the girls’ lives before jail, especially the episode about young Red in Russia, which ended with this super awesome song by Mumiy Troll:

Another thing that I loved about the show is that, even if it’s filled with humour, it doesn’t always ends well, it even gets sometimes really unfair, sad and dark.

The final credits gave me the blues, not because of the story, but because it really felt like a farewell and I already miss them. Who will cheer us when everything goes wrong now?

So, I’ll conclude with the wise words of Nicky Nichols: “Everything is a dildo, if you’re brave enough”.

Corsair RGB

By Sardoken on

When I built my PC, I wanted a water cooler, so the airflow inside the tower wouldn’t be obstructed by a huge PCU heatsink.

For my peace of mind, if there’s a water cooler inside of my tower, I need to see it so I’m sure that it isn’t leaking. So, I purchased a windowed tower.

Since a few component were RGB by default, I purchased a few more, so I could create a nice colour scheme.

Among these parts were two Corsair 12” RGB fans which I was planning to use as back and top exhausts. I was very surprised to see that they were not lighting up. That’s because I had to connect them to a RGB Hub and a RGB Node Pro, which were not provided.

I wish that I had knew that before purchasing the fans separately, because these devices aren’t provided in single fan packs, you have to purchase a two fans pack or purchase, for the exact same price, the devices separately.

So, you have only two options:

  • 2 x RGB fans + RGB Hub + RGB Node Pro (+/- 140,00 eur.);
  • A pack of two RGB fans which includes everything (+/- 80 eur.).

I wish that I had knew all this before purchasing my fans and, above all, I wish that the hub and the node were merged into a single device. Actually, I found out that there is such a device, the Node Core. Unfortunately, it isn’t sold separately and I couldn’t find any pack that includes it in Europe.

I gave up and I purchased an extra 2 fans pack (I now have a few spare RGB fans, yay) and I installed the Hub and the Node Pro. It was very easy thanks to the great cable management in the back of the NZXT tower. The control of the colours is entirely done through Corsair iCue and I enjoy the result. I am now living in pure RGB bliss.

We Summon the Darkness

By Sardoken on

The movie isn’t bad but it could have been so much better if it wouldn’t have turned into another comedy slasher film.

Spoilers ahead!

Worst cliches used in this movie:

  • Having the prisoners escape as just as they are left alone is so unsurprising, it’s sad;
  • One of the three girls had cold feet from the start, how couldn’t the two others notice?
  • Using a spray and a lighter under a door… Really?
  • Of all the years I’ve spent being surrounded by metal heads, I’ve never seen anyone acting as retarded as the dudes from this movie.

It had potential but the story line or the lack thereof makes it a disappointment.

We watched it until the end though, probably because of Maddie Hasson as a sexy goth girl (the other two looked like Elle models wearing leather jackets).

Extra points for using a grass trimmer as a weapon and the brief appearance of Johnny Knoxville.