Matt VS Kid: Round 2

Things haven't been going so well.

Since last we spoke, I've turned green, toppled from multiple floating rock formations into the yawning abyss of death--yawning because it's totes bored by my repeated topplings--and stuck like a chump on Level 1-3. It's not like I haven't tried. I have. Hard even. It's just something about this game--this frustrating, frustrating game. If my daughter's first words aren't "shit balls" or "dammit to fuck," I'll be very surprised. Sorry, Mia and Pep-Pep.

The Eggplant Wizard? Maybe?

So, in the spirit of frustration, I scoured the internet for cheat codes. I'm not proud of it, but I have never been above using cheat codes and secret warp zones to beat a video game. If I can't beat a video game, I don't see the point of its existence. Video games are created to be conquered, to give the gamer a sense of accomplishment. True, finishing a game with nothing more than the street smarts you've accrued through a lifetime of sitting six inches from your television moving a blocky, Italian plumber through a world of anthropomorphic mushrooms is way more satisfying than cheating, but, as far as I'm concerned, in the world of gaming at least, cheating is an acceptable, "last resort" move.

So, I found several pages of passwords, reset my game of Kid Icarus, and started cheatin'. Only none of the pilfered passwords worked. Not one. I tried them all and NONE OF THEM WORKED! As a result of my scheming ways, I was forced to start over from Level 1-1. I got through it in record time. Since then, I've been stuck in 1-2. I hate you, Kid Icarus.

Irritated beyond belief, I made my way to the Wii Store and purchased two new titles. I needed a break from Pit and his toppling. First up, Double Dragon.

Did you know that Double Dragon opens with a woman getting socked in the stomach and carried away by a motley crew of degenerates? I didn't remember that. Kicking, punching, and baseball-batting my way through three levels of Double Dragon alleviated some of my Icarus Anger. Then I learned, that in Double Dragon, you only get three lives and when those are spent, you start over ON LEVEL 1! What? Why are old Ninetendo games so hard? WAAAHHHHH!

Irritated anew, I turned to a man who has always been there for me. When every other game in the world let me down, this beautiful, mustachioed man and his series of colorful good-times has never failed to amuse me and accommodate my limited video gaming abilities:

Of course, I'm talking about Mario. Who did you think I meant? Q*bert? Spyro? Ratchet and/or Clank?

Anyway, I bought Super Mario Bros 2, a game I loved as a kid. I love the music in this one too, in fact, if I'm in a good mood, I tend to whistle, and the song I'm usually (see also: always) whistling is the Super Mario Bros 2 theme. I love it!

I've pretty much been playing Super Mario Bros 2 ever since. It comes with its own set of frustrations, but, I don't know, at least it's not Kid Icarus.

Will I buck up and give Kid Icarus one last try? Or will I devote the rest of this month to Mario and his pals? Or will I leave my basement and gaze once more upon the sun, swear off video games and embrace adulthood? I guess you'll just have to stay tuned.

Saturday Morning News Bits: PETA hates Mario, baby knives, Kim Kardashian, and dead Munchkins

1. PETA OFFICIALLY RUNS OUT OF THINGS TO PROTEST

This week PETA called out fictional video game icon Mario Mario for sometimes wearing a magical tanooki-suit:

"Tanooki may be just a "suit" in Mario games, but by wearing the skin of an animal, Mario is sending the message that it's OK to wear fur," PETA says.

Is he? Mario's tanooki-suit also gives him the ability to fly. Isn't he kind of sending the more dangerous message that wearing a costume can grant you the gift of flight? It's not like kids everywhere are wrapping themselves up in Grandma's mink coat and jumping out of their bedroom windows shouting "For the Mushroom Kingdom!" It's a game. And kids are stupid. Most of them don't even know what a tanooki is. Most of them probably know wearing animal fur is wrong too. Just let 'em play their video games and get fat on Cool Ranch Doritos. Geez, PETA, do you gotta ruin everything we love.

Of course, why take on the Super Mario series when there is a game far more callous in it's treatment of animals: Joust. Have you seen this thing, PETA? Grown men in suits of armor riding on the fragile backs of ostriches?!? Now that is some sick stuff!

Also, everyone knows a real tanooki-suit would come with giant furry testicles.

2. THE MORE YOU KNOW?

Remember, new parents, don't let you infant children sleep with sharp knives. They'll probably kill you in your sleep, most likely in some kind of gory, Satanic ritual.

3. KARDASHIANS KANCELLED

They haven't been --sorry if I got your hopes up--but one group of concerned citizens is trying to make this wonderful dream a wonderful reality:

"In a grass roots effort, we have collected [thousands of] signatures for a petition asking E! Entertainment to remove the Kardashian suite of shows from their programming," petition organizer Cyndy Snider said in a statement. "We feel that these shows are mostly staged and place an emphasis on vanity, greed, promiscuity, vulgarity and over-the-top conspicuous consumption."

"While some may have begun watching the spectacle as mindless entertainment or as a sort of 'reality satire,' it is a sad truth that many young people are looking up to this family and are modeling their appearance and behavior after them," Snider continued. "I'll remind you here that the Kardashian family fame largely started with a 'leaked' sex tape."

Finally, a dumb, vague, largely unfocused cause I can get behind. You can add your name to the No More Kardashian Petition here.

And before I forget: Hey, E! channel, how many on-camera hummers do I gotta give before you'll air my reality show? I've given sooooo many already. Trust me, Bald Dad is gonna be an instant hit!

4. MUNCHKINLAND: POPULATION 3

America said good-bye to one its last remaining Munchkins this week, Karl Slover. Slover was 93 and 4-foot-5 when he died of cardiopulmonary arrest. You might think Slover's life was nothing but yellow brick roads and prolonged stares of vague recognition, but his childhood in Czech Republic was a terrifying succession of horrifying ordeals:

"In those uninformed days, his father tried witch doctor treatments to make him grow," [John Fricke, author of 100 Years of Oz] said. "Knowing Karl and his triumph over his early life, you can't help but celebrate the man at a time like this."

He was buried in the backyard, immersed in heated oil until his skin blistered and then attached to a stretching machine at a hospital, all in the attempt to make him become taller. Eventually he was sold by his father at age 9 to a traveling show in Europe, Fricke said.

Slover played Munchkin Trumpeter No. 1 in the Judy Garland-helmed classic and earned $50 a week for his work. He leaves behind three Munchkins and, I presume, a closet full of tiny shirts and pants.

Movie Penguin Thursday: #14. Doom (2005)

If there is one thing first-person shooter fans, disturbed teenage outcasts, and sporadically-employed twenty-somethings can agree on, it’s that the video game Doom is, quite possibly, the best way to kill time between binging on McDonald’s cheeseburgers, looking up weird internet porn, and pretending to look for a job. It worked for me. There was a period in my maturation process that consisted of hours-long marathons of Doom, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, and Simpsons reruns, with periodic breaks for urinating, defecating, smoking, and fast food consumption, and look how I turned out. I’m happily married, my wife and I have a beautiful 5-month old daughter, I own my own home, I am gainfully employed, and now I watch my reruns on a 52” flat screen TV with surround sound. So, you know, don’t let the media tell ya video games, horror movies, chain smoking, and Taco Bell aren’t good for you. Next time you see a local newscaster moaning about violent, sexist video games (They do that, right? I don’t watch local or any news ever at all.) and the dangers of Chinese take-out, you turn the channel. Or better yet, shoot your TV in the face. Oops. Maybe there is such a thing as too much Doom. You probably shouldn’t shoot your TV. Maybe a strongly worded e-mail is enough.

In the spirit of full disclosure, I spent the bulk of my youthful “video gaming” playing a copy of Doom 2 I borrowed, and subsequently stole, from my friend, Todd. Sorry, Todd. If you are reading this and want Doom 2 back, I’d be happy to give it to you. Please don’t want it back though. PLEEEEEEASE!!!

Anyway, Doom 2. I would get home from whatever unsatisfying temp job I was doing that week, share a cigarette with my roommate, and proceed to play Doom 2—in God Mode, of course—for a couple of hours before prime time television and bed. Doom 2 was my way of relaxing, dealing with stress. The anger I felt, mostly at myself, for being kind of a failure at life, would dissipate when I was hacking space demons to pieces with a chainsaw. And, seriously, why would you use anything other than the chainsaw when playing in God Mode? If you were more of a Super Shotgun guy (or girl!), more power to you, but when you’re invincible and have the power to literally walk through walls, why wouldn’t you want to get up close and personal, Leatherface-style on these hideous hellbeasts? I’m just saying.

For those of you unfamiliar with Doom—I’m talking to you, Grandma—Doom is a series of video games in the first-person shooter style in which a dude walks through a bunch of doors, shooting and killing various space weirdies that may or may not also be from the pits of Hell. I don’t know. Want a history of the Doom franchise, check Wikipedia. We’re here to discuss the Doom movie—the uncut, unrated Doom movie.

Watching Doom the movie is like watching a friend play Doom the video game, by which I mean, it’s boring. The film, like the game on which it based, is basically people, mostly bulked up, sweaty dudes, walking through doors into rooms, down hallways to other rooms, and through different doors and hallways into various different rooms. There are a lot of doors opening and closing and while that might sound intensely exciting to you, it rarely ever is.

And that’s what is ultimately disappointing about Doom. I didn’t have any great expectations going into this thing, but I thought it at least might be a little bit scary. The graphics may have been primitive, but Doom 2 could be downright frightening, especially when played in the dark. And it didn’t help that the apartment in which I played was located in a less-than-great part of town. The creatures were horrifying. The impaled twitching bodies in the torture chamber were disconcerting. The sound effects were chilling, especially those big ugly demons that seemed to be growling the ominous phrase “I’m your mom” over and over again, no matter how many rounds you pumped into their bloated stomachs. Doom 2 was, quite simply, scary as shit! Doom the movie, as I said earlier, is boringer than hell.

Generally, I believe video game-to-movie adaptations don’t work for one of two reasons. Either the video game in question 1) doesn’t have enough plot to sustain a feature-length film and little-to-no effort is made to rectify this (Mortal Kombat) or 2) has a whole bunch of plot or such a wacky, off-the-wall idea or concept, that a coherent, interesting film is nearly impossible to pull off (Super Mario Brothers). Doom, on the surface, doesn’t seem to have a lot to work with, however, the filmmakers give it one helluva try. There’s an underground warp zone in New Mexico that can instantly transfer a human being from Earth to the surface of Mars. There’s a creepy laboratory where earthlings are being injected with Martian chromosomes (Chromosome 24) that will either transform test subjects into a hulking alien monster or a gravity-defying superhero depending on whether or not said test subject possesses the, for lack of a better term, “evil gene.” There’s an attractive blonde women with perky nipples. There are cool guns. None of this changes the fact that we are, in essence, watching The Rock and his alien clean-up crew walk through an endless succession of doors and down an endless succession of hallways.

The film follows Sarge, played by The Rock before he was Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, and the other colorfully nicknamed members of the Rapid Response Tactical Squad (The new guy’s nickname is “The Kid!”) as they travel to Mars via The Ark, a weird ball of teleportative goo, to find out what happened to Dr. Carmack and his scientist buddies after a particularly troubling transmission from the UAC research facility. Once there, Sarge and his team walk up and down hallways, open doors, enter rooms, and close the aforementioned doors behind them. Eventually there is shooting, but it takes an awfully long time to get there.

There isn’t much else to Doom, to be honest. It’s about what you’d expect, assuming you’d expect anything at all. The only truly interesting scene comes at the end of the film just before the fairly predictable Big Fist Fight Finale. For five or so uninterrupted minutes, the audience experiences the “walking through doors and down halls” thing first person shooter style. It’s like playing Doom only you’re not sitting in front of a computer with your pants off. It’s an exciting sequence that made me wonder if the movie might have been more successful if it did something unconventional and made the whole thing first person style, like, from the prospective of The Kid on his first mission or Sarge coming face to face with something he’d never encounter in his Marine Corps career.

I can’t imagine needing an uncut, unrated Doom, but here it is. I wonder what they cut out for the theatrical cut? I don’t wonder enough to seek a theatrical version out, mind you. I think I’d rather just find Todd’s copy of Doom 2 and play that for a couple hours.

Who Asked For This: Get Your Mediocre On!

There are video games that give players the experience of being at war. Others give gamers the experience of being a highly-skilled professional athlete. And some can show you what it'd be like to live as an overweight Italian plumber lost in a world where mushrooms make you bigger and turtles are trying to kill you. But has there ever been a video game in existence that has given players the full experience of being a mediocre pop/rap music group? There is now. Behold: The Black Eyed Peas Experience for Xbox and Wii.



Are you serious? Can I really play as will.i.am, Fergie, the guy who isn't will.i.am, and the other guy who isn't will.i.am and might be named Tablet? I don't know who to pick! I love them all so much! And, wow, just look at all the dance moves I get to learn! The Hop Scotch! The Give It Up! The Pantomime! All my favorite moves I've never heard of!

The Black Eyed Peas have to be in video games now? Why won't they just go away? Wahhhhhh!

Matt VS Kid: Round 1

When I was a kid, my favorite video game was Kid Icarus for the NES. I don't know why exactly: it was irritating, repetitive, and impossibly hard. Kid Icarus did more to foster and further develop my burgeoning short temper than anything else growing up. "You mean when I die, I gotta start over?! FROM THE BEGINNING!?!" My first curse words were uttered during an afternoon round of Kid Icarus. The first controller I threw in anger was probably a result of sliding off of an ice platform for the twentieth time in ten minutes. I couldn't get past Level 1-2, yet I considered Kid Icarus the finest game Nintendo had ever created. It made Super Mario Bros look like a pile of trash in my opinion. I have some theories as to why.

First, I loved Greek mythology as a kid. I still do in fact. The idea of a video game (sort of) based on my favorite Greek myths was mind-blowing to me. True, very little of the game--that I ever saw, mind you--contained anything remotely similar to the heroic stories I knew and loved. I mean, Icarus had nothing to do with Kid Icarus. The game's protagonist was an angel named Pit who carried a bow and an unlimited quiver of arrows and fought anthropomorphized eggplants and flying baby grim reapers. The game has a lot of columns. That's Greeky.

Second, I loved the music. Still do in fact. It is so triumphant. Listen to this:

That's my jam, son!

Anyway, as I've already mentioned, I never beat Kid Icarus. I never even got close. The constant tumbling off of things into an inky black abyss, the never-ending hoard of winged snakes falling from the heavens, the grim dancing specter of death and his floating "death babies" finally got to me and I gave up. I think I moved on to Ducktales or something.

Last year, I purchased Kid Icarus via the Nintendo Shop on Wii. It was a nostalgia purchase, but I think part of me believed that at 31 I was finally prepared to conquer Kid Icarus once and for all. Yeah, that didn't go well. But now, a year later, I think I'm ready. I'm 32, I've bulked up a little (thanks, Crystal Palace!), and I've got what one might call the "skills to pay the bills." That's a thing one might say, right? Maybe it's "skills" with a "z," like "skillz." Doesn't matter. What matters is that this month I will beat Kid Icarus and I'm taking you all with me on this journey to victory.

I started this morning with a rare moment of beginner's luck, conquering Level 1-1 with the ease of a ballet dancer who is also a talented video game player. The next stage, 1-2, found me twice murdered by flying grim reaper fetuses and once toppling into nothingness. Three restarts is my limit. I was able to contain most of the fury these failures riled within me--my daughter was a mere three feet away playing happily and I didn't think she needed to witness her daddy losing his shit over a video game from the 80's--but I was unwilling to push my luck. So, right now, I'm taking a little break from Kid. The Wii is on, ready to go if and when I'm prepared for the next round. Stay tuned to GEP all month long and find out what happens. And, please, if you can find it in your heart to encourage me, either in the comments section or on our Facebook page, do so. I can do this if I know you are all behind me. Thanks. And God bless.

November already???

This month, GEP is gonna eat, breathe and sleep

VIDEO GAMES!!!

5 Film Adaptations of Classic Video Games That I Want to See Now

I think we can all agree that Uwe Boll has made a mockery of the delicate art of video-game-to-film adaptation. But is it really Mr. Boll's fault or is it Hollywood's? Simply put, it's both.

Why can't a film based on a video game be good? Many games present just as rich and complete a world as the young adult novels and British mini-series that serve as the inspiration for the bulk of movies choking our nation's multiplexes at any given time. I mean, hell, Avatar is the most successful movie of all time, and it started out as a video game, at least, I assume it did.

I think the problem is twofold. First, Hollywood is choosing the wrong games to turn into movies. Doom? Really, H-wood? I play Doom when I'm bored or pissed off after a particularly grueling day at the office. I don't want to watch someone else run around hellish labyrinths blasting demons into piles of digitized gore or chainsawing monsters into two neat halves--I want to do it myself. Excuse me if watching Wrestling's The Rock act out my darkest Doom fantasies isn't my idea of a "fun night out."

Second, the studios making these awful films are changing what made the games so awesome in the first place. For example, Super Mario Brothers: The Movie. Have you seen this thing? Where's the whimsy? The bright colors? The toe-tapping music? SMB:The Movie is a boring slog through a dark, dirty underground world ruled by Dennis Hopper--who plays Bowser as a growly lizard man with blond cornrows and not a spiky-shelled snapping turtle with a fire-red pompadour and a fondness for airships--and his De-Evolution Ray. WHAT??? This isn't the Super Mario Brothers I played obsessively after school. Where are the castles? Where's Toad? You gave us Yoshi, but look at him! He looks horrible! How the hell is that supposed to cart around Mario's fat ass?

Hollywood, I'm here to help. I'm not a gamer, per se, but I do have a passion for old school titles, and this morning I have for you 5 video games I think deserve serious consideration for movie adaptation. If you like what you see, contact me at my e-mail address (giantpengy@yahoo.com) and we'll talk finder's fees. Enjoy.

1. Kid Icarus: Angels are the new sparkly Mormon vampires! You think girls went nuts for Edward Cullen? Wait until they get a load of Pit. Black clothing, dour expressions, and body glitter will be a thing of the past. It'll be togas and Jesus-sandals once Pit makes his triumphant--and, frankly, long overdue--appearance on the big screen. And guess what, Hollywood, I've made it easy for you to get this project green lit and under way. A fews year back, when I was both underemployed and without a female companion, I wrote a seven page treatment of my vision for Kid Icarus feature film. I think it's pretty great. I'd be willing to meet with you and go over specifics, but I'm gonna need you to fly me out to LA on a private jet. It's not that I think I'm better than your average air-commuter, it's just been on my bucket list for a while now.

Why Kid Icarus needs to be a movie NOW: Two words: Eggplant Wizard.
2. Blaster Master: We haven't had a really good "boy drives a futuristic tank through a creepy underground world on a mission to save his runaway mutant pet frog" in so long it makes me physically sick. This was a standard issue storyline in the Golden Age of Hollywood, practically its own genre (Wikipedia it!). Blaster Master has everything that makes movies great: tank-driving children, underground peril, and enough killer mutant animals to choke a goat. Hell, a whole herd of goats!

Why Blaster Master needs to be a movie NOW: This kid drives a tank. AN EFFING TANK! Also, the antagonist of the story is named Plutonium Boss. How messed up is that?! Wow!
3. Dig Dug: Wouldn't it neat if someone could take the most rudimentary of classic video game concepts (dig tunnels; pump baddies full of air until they literally burst) and turn it into a real thought-provoking piece of cinema art? I doubt one could do much with, say, Pac-Man, but I have no doubt that someone out there (Takashi Miike, maybe, or that guy who made The Host) could do something both challenging and grotesque with this source material. Maybe Taizo Hori, the little dude doing the pumping in Dig Dug, is hired to dispose of some creepy crawlies who are freed after a drilling company upsets their ecosystem and the movie is about how he kills some of them, but than discovers they're not so bad or maybe the drilling company is all corrupt or something. I don't know.

Why Dig Dug needs to be a movie NOW: Because even if it sucks, wouldn't it be hilarious if there was a Dig Dug movie? I think so.
4. The Legend of Zelda: Legend of Zelda was probably the one game I played just as much as Super Mario Brothers growing up (that is, until SMB 3 debuted, than I was all about some Raccoon Mario). It is criminal--CRIMINAL, I say--that Zelda has not yet been turned into a feature film franchise. All the elements are there for an epic, Lord of the Rings-style success. I mean, c'mon, it's been a horrible cartoon ("Well, excuuuuuuuuu-se me, Princess!") and a sugary breakfast cereal, but it can't get the Peter Jackson treatment? For shame!

Why The Legend of Zelda needs to be a movie NOW: I want to see the Weta Workshop's take on an Octorock. Can you imagine? I think it would give me a nerd boner. For real.
5. BurgerTime: I want a There Will Be Blood-style adaptation of BurgerTime directed by PT Anderson and starring Daniel Day-Lewis as Peter Pepper. The only scenes resembling actual BurgerTime gameplay will occur during a PCP-fueled hallucination.

Why BurgerTime needs to be a movie NOW: The world needs a gritty, behind-the-scenes look at one man's meteoric rise, and subsequent tragic fall, set in the fast food industry.