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Itchy Boots on YT - nearing the end of season 2 - some absolutely amazing sights along the way!

 

Waitwaitwait. That's a TV series now?!

Jesus wept...

I've been meaning to watch this, so thanks for the reminder!

 

Really enjoying this at the moment, especially the Reach episode. And although I wouldn't consider myself die-hard, I've played the lot and love 'em and I don't give two hoots about the direction they've taken, contrary to what I've read.

BUT - I am going to say the swearing is out of place given the potential audience and I fkg resent yet another unnecessary tick-box Pride-washing (although the "what happens after" Louis character is interesting). Not sure about

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Keyes' fate though - doesn't seem to fit

but what they did with the needler explosions was great - could have overdone the gore on that one and chose not to. Bonus point.

Read some complaints about

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the invasion of Reach being over in one episode, but in fairness, it was a Blitzkrieg attack with much apparent prior planning, so I don't think that's outrageous.

Also fine with them being outside their armour more often and with the fact that

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it gets half-inched as a plot device

as well as MC having his lid off a lot of the time - they're exploring a different, more human aspect to these guys. They

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took their pellets out, which obviously he's never done in-game

so that's understandable and I prefer it actually, since playing a pseudo-robot always took a lot out of the games for me. No familiarity. Better to have left that one voiceless like Gordon Freeman if that's how you're going to play it. How else are you going to swing the "these were real human children" element if we never get to see them?

Cool OG Xbox appearance (plus couple of other bits) in the store on Reach gets another bonus point and the effects - especially the gravity hammer when that appears - are well done, much better than the ground war stuff in Foundation. I'm down for this one.

 

X-Men '97 (Episodes 1 & 2)
As the title suggests, this is an actual, honest-to-goodness sequel!
Not a "re-imagining", "reboot", "new take on..." or whatever the studio execs call a do-over this week.

A literal "season 6" to the original X-Men cartoon from the 1990's, it carries on directly from the end of season 5.

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Cyclops & Jean Grey are married, and very pregnant

 

Fallout

Just the first Ep so far, but I do love me some Walt Goggins so I'll being watching more.

 

Fallout (first two so far)

I’ve definitely been pleasantly surprised. From a pure “look and feel” perspective they’ve nailed it. But I knew that from the trailers, and the slightly ropey CG in some parts of the trailers has definitely been cleaned up and improved.

I think it’s a bit early to judge the story and the writing, but I remain cautious in that regard.

There are two big reasons I remain cautious: prior experience with Amazon “Originals”, and Bethesda.

The Rings of Power was such a let down. So much hype and so much budget for such a lukewarm series. Again, they nailed the look and feel, but in that case the story was a contrived mess. And I don’t just mean from an “I’ve read the Silmarillion a bajillion times” pedantic Tolkien nerd’s point of view. Even casual viewers struggled with its plot.

And then of course we have ****ing Bethesda and Todd ****ing Howard… Of course that ****ing tit got a ****ing Executive Producer credit, didn’t he… The Fallout games are a shadow of what they once were. There’s no doubt that Bethesda has done a significant amount of world-building in the Fallout universe and greatly expanded on what it once was. And their games did look good, despite the janky, bug-riddled mess that their game engines have been for well near two decades. But the spark, originality, and creativity that made original games - and Fallout: New Vegas - so compelling is largely long gone.

But, I’m optimistic so far. There’s a huge amount of attention to detail, the look and feel of the show is absolutely spot on, the comically OTT gore is present and correct (seriously, if you never picked the Bloody Mess trait in FO1&2 you missed out!), some of the story beats have been pure classic Fallout, and I’ve found myself heartily chuckling more than I thought I would.

 

Started watching the gentleman series, 3 episodes in and I'm really enjoying it so far.

Film was good too.

 

Yeah, the series is a good watch.

I've watched the film a couple of times. The first time, I watched it by myself and thought "eh, s'alright". Then I rewatched it with a couple of friends and we were having a right laugh.

 

Fallout in one hit was awesome, tried 20 minutes of the Gentleman and the cast seems pretty poor/boring Will try force myself to watch the rest later, loved the movie, so would be a shame if this turns out like that horrific John Wick series!

 

How appropriate is Fallout for a 9 year old that's seen (the less bloody parts of) Aliens?

EDIT: Forget I said that. Bit rude, according to Common Sense Media.

 

Yeah it is also pretty gory dude.

 

Oh yeah, quite gory. It's in the finest Fallout "comically OTT gore" tradition, but it's not something you'd want a 9-year old to see!

 

If they like seeing snapped off toes, cut off fingers, fingers being sewn back on, incest jokes, F bombs and ghouls, they'll love it

 

Halo, first series was about spot on for me, I only ever played the games casually so I don;t care too much if the lore isn't strictly adhered to in the telly series, I know enough to know what's what and who's who and that's working for me.

3 or 4 episodes into series 2, and it's not great, someone forgot to pay the lighting bill so half of every episode is staring at a black screen to to distinguish black blurs

 

Ha! Cheers fellas.

It's more the psychological scares and rude stuff we try and avoid, but OTT gore would also be a quick switch-off. According to CSM there's a bit of "self love" going on as well.

Adults only for this one then!

 

It's a very quick shot, maybe a few seconds at best... But there are also multiple sex scenes (albeit not graphic) and quite a few bare boobs at times.

 

Watched the first three episodes of Fallout.

So boring, ditched.

 

I finished the Fallout show today, and honestly, loved it! Probably the best game to other media conversion I've seen. I have something like a few thousand hours in the games, so it felt weird at first and then I realised it all just felt totally normal to me! There are so many tiny details they have nailed. The contrast to psudo happiness in the vaults to the grim dark of the wasteland is great, and they appear to have gone for as much practical effects as possible, I'm guessing to keep costs down, but it just gives it a better feel! I this it'll olso have a massive positive impact on the games, because as a designer seeing my designs come to life really helps when desiginng things, and all of the game designers now have sets and props and actors who have 'lived' in that world. That managed to nail the world, the vibe, and the aesthetic all while avoiding fan service. The ocasional moments where they used the game ambient music really set it perfectly.

I'm totally stoked for more! I can honestly see it spawning a run of media made from games franchises, seeing as super heros have gone stale and the studios are looking for the next genre to milk, I think it'll be game conversions! Deus ex film. COD MW series. Bioshock series. Maybe they finish Half Life as a film or series...

 

I absolutely loved Fallout. I've never played the games so don't know any of the lore, but I didn't feel at a loss because of this - most things are explained well, and the narrative trundles along at a decent pace. I did find that the vault-dweller component of the story was dragged out a bit excessively, but there's plenty happening on the surface to compensate for that. It even felt a bit like Lost at times, which I appreciated. And I laughed out loud on a few occasions... the dry humour is first class.

I wish I had the same enthusiasm for the upcoming Borderlands movie, but I'm not optimistic.

 

TIL - For All Mankind just got renewed for Season 5