Category: Random

Megalomania, Pyrotechnics and Freedom of Speech: A hard rock retrospective part 2

When I was in the 7th grade I entered the world of band for the first time. My band instructor was a little pushy, his name was Mr. Hall, for some reason or another he really tried to get me to play the saxophone. I tried it out for the back to school parade and I hated it, I couldn’t get any sounds to come out of that thing that any reasonable human would consider pleasant. So I switched to percussion. He was against this because, in his views, percussion was easy and only lazy kids wanted to play drums. It was true the majority of the drum line in our school were lazy, pot-smoking good for nothings, myself and one friend being the exceptions. Still I quickly fell in love with banging the trap set and begged him to put me on the pep squad so I could play fight songs at the sporting events. We started out with a classic easy rock n roll tune called Rock N Roll Part 2, aka “the Hey song!”

Over the years I fell away from drumming despite my very strong desire to keep going. I would bang my drumsticks on anything I could, cardboard boxes, pots and pans, trash cans, whatever it took. I was able to cobble together a make shift drum set when I was 14 using money I earned throwing newspapers at people’s houses. Once I firmly got into my teen years I was clamoring to form my own heavy metal hair band with my friends.

Glam Metal, Hair Metal, pop metal, call it what you want, the 80’s took the fully established hard rock genre and took it mainstream. What memories I do have of the 80’s largely consist of hair bands rocking out to their various anthems.

Def Leppard- Pyromania

As a drummer, it would be my duty to pay homage to the band world-famous for having the “one armed” drummer. Okay so they have some good music too, especially Foolin, by far my favorite heavy metal ballad, if you can call it that, and Rock of Ages, among many other rock hard tunes. It might be their best work, it might not, but by the time Pyromania lights the metal world on fire, the hair bands have firmly become the norm.

Ratt

As someone whose initials spelled RAT, and whose nickname was “THE RAT” all through school, this was a band I had to check out. I instantly fell in love with Lay it Down and Round & Round, their two biggest hits to the best of my knowledge. I was able to get one of their greatest hits CD’s and discovered the draw of power rock. They might be tame by some standards but their music was just hard enough to keep throw coals on the hair metal fire throughout the 80’s. Too bad it all died suddenly when Nirvana crawled out of bed and said with a shrug, eh, entertain us.

MTV

Nothing was more instrumental in bringing heavy metal to the forefront of American pop culture than the budding MTV and it’s constant rock videos bombarding the youth with images of hot babes, fast cars, and loud guitars. This was the era where Freddy Krueger and Jason Vorhees were gutting teenagers with hair metal blasting in the background to set the mood.

If you really want to trace the rise of metal music, look no further than the introduction of the rock music video and the video stars that would soon follow. By the end of the decade every metal video was just trying to be more outrageous than the last, eventually leading us into the 90’s where music videos took on a more artistic approach with the rise of shock rockers Marilyn Manson and Nine Inch Nails.

I have written extensive articles both here and in college on the importance MTV had on American youth culture so I will just say dust off the VCR and pop in the VHS copy of Hot for Teacher if you want a reminder of what the decade was all about.

Van Halen vs. Bon Jovi

Musically the two aren’t that similar. But if you were alive in the 80’s you know the impact they had on your sisters sexuality. These two bands were the symbol of heavy metal rock stars as sex symbols, pushing the mantra of sex, drugs, and rock n roll deep into the minds of American teenagers. Van Halen was edgier with their music, while Jovi was more of a showman in their concerts. Both bands came out of the other end of the 80’s relegated to relic status, while Jovi made an attempt to make a come back in the 90’s alternative infested airwaves, Van Halen were all but forgotten by the mainstream.

One thing the two bands did was really help push the divide between the hard rockers and the glam rockers. Bon Jovi appealed more to the masses while Van Halen stood as a symbol for the troops to rally behind. The core metal audience was splintering into sub-factions by this time and these two bands were among the dividing forces.

Megadeth vs. Metallica

Here comes another fork in the road. The rise of “thrasher” metal is largely credited to the formation of these two bands, whose DNA is very inbred in some respects. The bands both kept taking metal music to even darker places with Metallica being able to cross over into mainstream success while Megadeth remained a reminder of the hardest rockers of just how heavy, heavy metal could get. There were other dark bands of the time, Dio, White Zombie, a few others, but these two stood up and carved out their own little corner of the market, then started a metal war whose repercussions were felt throughout the entire rock industry.

Joan Jett and the Blackhearts

Hard Rock gets a vagina. Okay that might be a little crass, but hell metal music is all about tits and ass so suck it up, whiners. Joan Jett was one of the early punk rockers with her band the Runaways, and she emerged among a world of male metal bands to be the lone wolf woman warrior for the female power rock of the decade. Sure you had rock n roll bands comprised of woman leads before, and after, namely the Go-Go’s, Heart, Hole (yeah an all female band named themselves hole and I get flack for making a vagina joke) and Garbage. The list goes on. Still, Joan Jett was able to prove women could be hard rockers too.

Everyone remembers her anthem “I Love Rock N Roll” it’s a rock classic. I enjoyed her music with the Runaways more, which yes I discovered thanks to a certain movie. Still, she had the balls to stand up to the men who dominated metal music and I gotta respect her for that, to some degree. Not to mention her music wasn’t half bad.

Live shows and stadium rock

In the early days of hard rock, metal was a fringe movement. It was born out of the punk rock scene where the bands were making a statement. That statement was make noise and have as much fun as you can while disrupting the establishment every chance you could. By the 80’s metal bands had risen to become the dominant rockers selling out arenas all across the globe. Sure new wave bands like Devo, Duran Duran, and the like, would emerge in the 80’s to slow some of that fire trying to keep rock music in the center of the pop world, but it was still the decade where arena rock finally became a real thing. There were bands selling out arenas in the 70’s, sure, but they weren’t the bands playing this new, harder sound, not as as much anyways.

Once the live shows became a mainstay bands had to resort to theatrics to keep concert goers happy. This was the period where pyrotechnics were quickly becoming staples of the rock concert. Costumed bands like KISS lead the way, groups like Twisted Sister, Black Sabbath, Motley Crue and Guns N Roses would take on the mantle before passing the torch to Manson and his spooky kids in the 90’s.

By the time you get to the end of the 80’s heavy metal is starting to wane. Mainstream America has started to discover a new, edgy sound in the form of gangsta rap, which would soon supplant heavy metal as the go-to sound for the counter culture of the teenagers looking to piss off their adult role models. Sure heavy metal was loud, it was flamboyant, and it glamorized a darker lifestyle, but hip-hip had guns, pimps, and thugs rapping about killing cops, raping hoes, and cooking crack. Times were changing, and the two were bound to merge sooner or later. Enter Rage Against the Machine and the rise of Rap Metal…

For those about to rock: A retrospective on the evolution of hard rock- Part 1

My first exposure to headbanging was while watching the film Ace Ventura: Pet Detective. It was a comedy film about a dimwitted animal lover solving crimes. It was a Jim Carey movie, it was the 90’s, it was a comedy movie. I thought the scene where he goes into a rock club and the guy was “headbanging” to the rock music was obviously a joke, nobody actually did that, right? Little did I know it wasn’t a joke, it was a very popular thing.

Soon afterwards I would continue my exposure into the metal scene. I watched the pair of time traveling metal-heads Bill N Ted on their various quests. This was around the time I started to really question why on earth anyone would listen to this hard rock music. I wasn’t even sure what constituted hard rock to begin with. Not to mention I wasn’t even completely accurate on what people were calling rock music. My dad was an old time rock n roll fan and he would always correct me saying this band or that bands was not rock n roll, they were hard rock or heavy metal or something else. My dad wasn’t exactly an authority on rock music either, he just was sort of glued to his childhood favorites and dismissed the music of the youth. I wasn’t quite so dismissive, however I was more into dance music, electronic music, hip-Hop, disco, funk, and pop music. I was having a hard time determining not only what was hard rock, but what was the appeal.

Doing my research it appears rock n roll has it’s roots in soul music, bar music and blues. None of these were genres I was a particular fan of in my early days so I had to dig a little deeper. The earliest example I could find of a mainstream song that was the beginning of the hard rock sound was Helter Skelter by the world-renown Beatles. Having listen to this song a number of times during my research I can almost hear the start of what would become, what I considered, heavy metal, yet it still sounded really primitive to me. I didn’t spend a lot of time chasing down all of the obscure references, I stuck to the mainstream stuff like Born to Be Wild, I Can’t Get No Satisfaction, Dude Looks Like A Lady, and Smoke on the Water. None of these were too hard but they were often cited as the early examples of the scene.

As someone who has thoroughly studied the roots of techno, house and rap music, I can attest that different fans while share different tales of what lead from one sound to the next. The branching path of genres and sub-genres in rock music is just as complicated as the branching genres of the dance scene. To this day I can’t get people to tell the difference between Techno and House, whereas to me they are as different as night and day.

My earliest attempt’s at this included me creating a playlist of songs that one could follow from the old time rock n roll to modern day hard rock. Depending on what the end goal is determines which sub-genres or paths you cut off from the main path. For example, punk rock also has it’s origins in a lot of the same bands that metal does, yet punk eventually lead to alternative, grunge rock and ska, sub-genres I have more experience with than true metal. That didn’t stop me on my journey to find the path of least resistance.

I started with The Beatles.

Helter Skelter is such a different sound from anything I had heard by them up to that point. I don’t mean to sound as if I was around for it, I mean in the timeline. I do listen to Beatles but I was more into their early pop stuff not so much their later stuff.

When I originally did my digging I downloaded the various songs from iTunes and created a playlist when I did that I tried to see if the dots connected in a manner that made sense. I noticed there were a few missing links.

Admittedly I am missing a few sounds from some of the bands I know are often cited, yet I have no samples of their music to go off. Call me whatever name you wish, I have, to this day, never sat down and listened to a Led Zeppelin song, not one. If I have heard one of their songs, in passing I imagine or perhaps in a movie or TV commercial, I wouldn’t recognize it unless it was pointed out to me. So why am I writing this if I can’t call up the sounds of one of the bands often regarded as the fathers of metal? Sometimes you have to make do with what is available to you, also this is my journey so I wanted to discover this my own way. That being said, I have listened to bands that were described as inspired by or similar to Zeppelin so I can say that I am at least vague familiar with the sound they are attributed to.

Judas Priest

In my search I didn’t want to start entirely at the roots, I wanted to see how Beatles, Elvis Presley, Chuck Barry, Buddy Holly and others could morph into AC DC, Metallica, Iron Maiden, etc. I did pick up Alice Cooper’s School’s Out which I also cited as one of the bridge sounds, but Judas Priest was the first record I picked up that had a very prot-metal sound. In later years their music evolved more into the sound I always attributed as hard rock or heavy metal, depending on who you ask. I often used the term interchangeably with the understanding metal was the harder stuff. Now that I have done some more digging I discovered it’s even more complex than that. I placed Judas Priest at the earliest point of Heavy Metal on the timeline.

KISS

Specifically Destroyer and Alive but I dug through their entire catalog, first through their various compilations, beginning with Smashes, Thrashes, and Hits, and working my way back. KISS doesn’t have the hardest of sounds, they are more hard rock or even edgy rock n roll than metal, but they have the attitude and the look of what would become the signature metal theme, the dark medieval fantasy tones, some would describe as satanic but let’s not split hairs. Anyways they had the theatrics for sure but their sound was admittedly soft in comparison to what would follow. Still they are at the early point as well. They are also cited as a starting point for punk rock, but I won’t follow that path here.

Deep Purple

This is another one I place under the category of proto-metal. They have a very hard sound in some songs, but a very 70’s blue rock vibe. I did listen to more than one song, but the one that really matters is Smoke on the Water. This is another point where you can really start to hear a new sound emerging from the underbelly of American counter-culture.

Black Sabbath

Once you get into “the other Alice Cooper,” Ozzy Osborne and his ilk, things really start to get serious. By all rights you could make a case Sabbath and Ozzy are about as close to what would become Metal as it gets. If you follow them through the 70’s and into the 80’s, even after all the shake ups and restructuring, their sound is very much in line with what I would classify as heavy metal and hard rock at the very least.

Iron Maiden

This is the point where Metal begins to emerge as it’s own thing. By the time this band hits the scene it’s fully developed. It would be really hard to argue Iron Maiden isn’t heavy metal, and from what I have heard this is the goods through and through.

Now I could have spent more time on proto-metal bands like The Who, The Kinks, Zeppelin, or any number of others. As I did my digging though, I realized that while there are individual songs or even portions of entire albums that are recognized as having elements of what would become metal, they were still entirely different sounds in their own right. You could make a case that without the sounds of the Jackson 5, Hip-Hop wouldn’t be what it is today, but you could be hard pressed to make a case for Michael and the Gang being rap.

AC-DC

This is one of those transition bands you could argue is really just “hard rock” and that would be fine by me. Without getting into sub-genres I classify rock into the following top-level categories: rock n roll, rock, hard rock, metal, grunge, punk, ska, and alternative rock. For the most part there is a TON of overlap, I still try to avoid splitting hairs over what sound equals what genre. AC-DC is one of those bands I could firmly place under rock n roll, rock, or hard rock, but I would be hard pressed to call them full on metal and they certainly aren’t punk or ska. At least not as I understand them to be.

You will notice as I go through this series I don’t often stray from the general consensus, at least not up front. However as I discover more to this story I fully intend to give credit where due. As I looked into this it took on a life of it’s own. Consider this entry number one in a series where I take a deeper look at the origins of this music genre that I have found an affinity for, yet continues to boggle my mind and elude my sense of true understanding. Until next time keep on head banging friends.

 

Dusted off the old Nintendo Wii today

As one of the few people who stood in line on launch day I can say that the Wii’s massive popularity was no surprise to me. I often look back on the console with mixed feelings. A little over a year ago I picked up two Wii’s at a flea market and haven’t done a whole lot with either of them since. Today as I was playing some Minecraft I was starting to remember how fondly I loved the good old GameCube. I was thinking to myself how much I wish I had the money to go out and buy a GameCube and pick up a copy of Harvest Moon: A Wonderful Life to go back in time and play a game I enjoyed tremendously over a decade ago.

Well turns out I had forgotten that I bought a copy of the game a while back and it suddenly hit me, I had a Wii, I had a GameCube controller and sure enough I pulled my copy of The Legend of Zelda Collector’s Disc off the shelf and inside the case was my little while GameCube memory card. I dusted off the Wii, hooked it up, configured the Wii remote, threw in my copy of Harvest Moon and what do you know my old save from all those years ago was still in tact. I loaded it up and picked up my farm life right where I left off, little baby Mark showing me his toy car while wife, Nami, was in the kitchen apparently mulling over “life on the farm.”

Harvest Moon isn’t even an exclusive to the GameCube, yet it remains one of my fondest games for it. I remember putting endless hours into this game when it was brand new. I haven’t put that many hours into a game since discovering Minecrat, which I mostly play as a Harvest Moon substitute anyways. I didn’t spend a lot of time before I booted the Wii memory manager up just to see what other game saves remained in tact. I must have cleaned house at some point as most of my favorite games were gone. Still there were plenty of saves ranging from Metroid Prime, dozens of retro collections, Smash Bros. Melee, even my Robotech Battle Cry save was still there.

It wasn’t quite the same as hooking up the quaint little purple lunch box I fell in love with over a decade and a half ago. However, there was still a little of that GameCube charm left in the dusty old Wii. I always tell people the GameCube wasn’t a failure, it was Nintendo’s BEST SELLING console of all time, when you factor in the motion controlled redesign that Nintendo slipped into people’s homes through the back door. While most people who picked up a Wii were probably getting it for Wii Sports, Wii Fit and any number of waggle-wand casual fluff, some, like myself, picked it up as a full on replacement for our beloved, underappreciated little ‘Cube that could.

I don’t currently have hardly any games for the GameCube. I do expect I will be picking up a few just for old times sake in the near future. As I look at my small game collection I see five GameCube discs on the shelf. That wouldn’t be quite so bad if I didn’t have twice as many Wii games. The real reason I haven’t bothered trying to get back into GameCube collecting is the same reason I got out of Sega Saturn collecting. The units didn’t sell well enough to reach mass market saturation. That makes the games harder to find in good condition, which makes them more expensive all the time. Still, there is a very strong possibility I might talk myself into seeking out a few choice titles here and there in the near future. I would be more than happy to trade away my dust old Wii for an actual true GameCube someday. After all, I have a Wii U which is basically a Wii with it’s backwards compatibility. In the meantime I think I am going to be spending more time digging into the handful of GameCube games I do have to see what new memories I can make as I try to reconnect with old memories.

I sometimes go back and forth between SNES and GameCube, trying to decide which is my favorite Nintendo console of all time. I don’t have anywhere close to the time, or money, to begin collecting Super NES games, so I might just have to settle for my second favorite for the time being and be okay with that. One of the reasons I do wish to own an original GameCube over just a Wii is the Game Boy Player. However, as those are also getting expensive I might pass on that for a while. Again, it’s not urgent that I acquire one since I have a Game Boy Advance and a Game Boy Color.

I miss the days when I had a GameCube with a collection of 60 or so games, a half dozen controllers and a good old Sony Trinitron CRT tube television set. For now I can get by with a Wii hooked up to my HDTV LCD TV playing GameCube games.

 

New theme live, new features on the way

First, I updated the theme. That was long over due. I am not entirely done customizing it to fit the tone and mood of the website, so be prepared for more changes soon.

I also added a couple of social media buttons. As of right now all I have set up is a Facebook page and a Twitter account. I don’t know if I will be setting up any other social media accounts for the site or not. I might add a few additional share buttons but I haven’t gotten around to that just yet.

The Youtube channel is getting closer to launching. I don’t have any firm plans on what video content is going to be on the channel, just throwing around a few ideas. I want to make sure if I do any video content that it’s worth watching while also easy enough to produce so to not interfere with my other projects. I do have a full-time job that takes up a lot of my time.

I am thinking about doing two podcasts instead of just the one. The primary podcast is going to continue being the casual podcast where I sit and play a video game and leisurely talk into the microphone each week. I am working on getting a second podcast together that will shoot for a once a month schedule. This one will be more “polished” with a few guests and a video feed to accompany the audio. This one is going to take me a little longer to get up and running. I have an idea what I want to do, I am just working on getting a few regular guests that are willing to sit in and make it happen. I have at least a couple of people willing to do it and a few others I am trying to get on board.

I am also branching out in the types of articles I write. I don’t want to be a theme blog where the theme determines what I write about, I want it to reach an audience who appreciates the tone of my writing and the topics I write about. I don’t want to have a site dedicated to a specific theme, topic, or genre that forces my hand while limiting my creativity. And yes, that does mean politics are certainly not off limits.

Notice how the site is, mostly, devoid of photos? Part of that is I have no interest in stealing photos from other websites or photographers. I might occasionally download a public domain photo or something that is easily under the fair use category, but for the most part I want to ensure any photos I run on this site belong to me, either photos I took with my own camera, created myself using a photo editing software, or photos a contributor directly provides to the site.

Music reviews and movie reviews are coming. I want to do this, I have a lot of thoughts on a lot of different audio recordings that I think I need to get written down. Movie reviews are a little harder to get motivated to write. I don’t want to do anything that is going to bring any copyright notices against the site. As such I am working on finding out how to get licensed clips directly from studios for the purpose of reviews. I know you can do this, when I worked at the TV station we were able to do that so I know there are services out there. I remember a previous website I ran I had a paid subscription to a file video service so I know they are out there. I will look into what I need. I hate it when people just use other people’s IP without permission and then cry fair use when their ability to make money off other people’s works gets prohibited. It’s always better to just get permission first and then you have nothing to worry about.

That is the latest site update. Be sure to check back often and tell all your friends to share this website, follow us on Twitter and Like us on Facebook.

The 90’s French Fried Youth Culture

In 1995 Kevin Smith released a movie in theaters called Mallrats. The movie celebrated the 90’s consumer youth culture by spending the majority of the film following two homebodies just wander around their local mall looking for things to do in an attempt to forget about their lady troubles.

When I was a teenager we spent most of our free time shopping at the mall. Between visiting the record store (Sam Goody), to checking out the local hip-hop shop where we picked up our B-Boy gear, underground break dancing videos as well as those mix tapes that every b-boy had to jam to. There were two places I made it a point to visit no matter what each trip I made to the mall. The first, obviously, was the video arcade. If I had quarters to burn they were going into whichever flashing quarter munching hit of the day was. My second stop was the world-famous food court. You had to fuel up with some chili cheese fries and a big gulp of sugar-filled sludge before you could head out on your shopping spree.

One of my favorite moments in the film was when the two were arguing over what constitutes being a part of the food court. Fortunately, the experience of sitting in a dark lit video arcade munching those chili covered french fries dripping with melted cheese was not just a staple of the massive mall shopping. We also had a local video arcade that also did us the favor of clogging our youth arteries with greasy carbohydrate over load while preparing us for our later in life diabetes as we chugged all those overly sweetened carbonated beverages they sold. Some of my favorite memories were setting my chili fries on the side of a Mortal Kombat cabinet while I dumped quarter after quarter into that machine that stole all of my allowance for many years.

Going beyond the food court at the mall and the video arcade, I also discovered how my friends and I enjoyed tremendously hanging out at snack bars, the bowling alley, or even the skating rink, always immediately going straight to the guy selling the french fries covered in Obamacare bait. Good times. As I look back I wonder though, why were the teenagers of the 90’s drawn to dark, noisy places that served the sloppiest of foods. Sure you could get more than just fries, you could often get deep fried onion rings, giant sized soft pretzels, a plate of nacho chips covered in cheese and jalapenos and black olives, or if you were lazy and in a hurry just grab a ready  made slice of pepperoni pizza. The food was always junk, the games were always the same games we had at home on our Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis game consoles, and the music was the same playlist from every MTV Party To Go cd your older sibling gave you as a hand me down when they moved on to the grunge rock of the era.

One of the things that I reminisce fondly was sitting at a table with a few friends just chatting about the coolest new music video we watched, asking if they caught the latest Snick skit on All That or Kennan and Kel, or hell there were days when our entire conversation was just repeating our favorite Boy Meets World quotes to 2Pac beats.

When I try to brag about how great the 80’s were followed by how dull the 90’s became I often forget that despite the flat “who cares” attitude coming from the crybaby rock, or the lazy, no effort talent-less hacks sitting on a couch arguing over who banged who on MTV’s The Real World, I often forget it was the decade of my coming of age. The 90’s had some great entertainment, if you were over the age of 25 and had already gone off to college, started your career and were gearing up to get your family off the ground. But if you were a teenager, pre-teen or somewhere in-between, chances are your best, fondest memories of the era were the junk food you and your friends scarfed down as you desperately sought anything that was either creative, original, or more entertaining than 2 poorly animated social delinquents sitting on a couch riffing on bad hair metal music videos. I don’t look back on the decade with rose tinted glasses, I admittedly recognize the moments that I hold dear because I was a teenager or the friends I was with making those memories, yet I think when your fondest memories are the toxic waste we shoveled into our mouths just to have some sense of joy when the entire youth culture market was telling us how much life sucked and we just needed to deal with it.

That’s why I say, next time your in the mood to revisit the 90’s do it right. Pop open a bottle of ice cold Mountain Dew, rip open a bag of Doritos, pour some melted nacho cheese over the top, pop in the Mallrats DVD and let Jay and Silent Bob remind you what the decade really was, not the idealized fantasy we often pretend it was.

 

The zombie movie paradox: A look back at George A. Romero passing away

When I first started writing this blog I was still in college. During that time I was still in my phase where I had to be different just to be different. Part of that was I made it a point not to be talking about the same topics the rest of the media or internet world was talking about. I either didn’t want to be seen as needing to hurry up and get my thoughts out there first, like so many outlets appeared to be doing. At the same time, I didn’t really want to be seen as jumping on the bandwagon. So I determined my stance would typically be to take a wait and see approach to any breaking news to give myself a chance to process it, distance myself from the immediacy of it all before I made an effort to put my thoughts down. Since completing my education and leaving college to begin my career in the world of writing for the media I discovered that weather it is the local TV station or the Twitterverse, whatever is the big headline is what people are talking about. When I started working at a local newspaper that serves a small community I discovered that the words I wrote, the stories I chose to cover, the photos I took, those shaped the conversation, at least for a day, and I discovered that was part of the responsibility of the media.

Things are different with a blog. I can choose to be less formal, as I often do. Today I read the news about George A. Romero passing away. I had to do a double take to make sure it was the guy I thought t was and sure enough the grandfather of the zombie horror genre was dead. At first I also had to double check the date to make sure I wasn’t reading an old article. I hadn’t heard of him passing away previously, but there have been a few times where I was out of the loop enough I didn’t learn of a celebrity dying until months, or in a couple of cases years later. I chalk this up to not really following celebrity gossip and news that much. Once I confirmed that he did in fact die, it was the man I thought it was, and I had the correct date he wasn’t already gone and I just found out, I decided to write down on a pad that I would talk about my thoughts on the next podcast. Considering I aim to do one a week and the next one isn’t for another week, I decided to just go ahead and write down my thoughts as of right now, then if I decide to dig deeper next week, I shall do so.

The first thing I am going to say is it is rare for me to have a favorite writer, director, songwriter, band, etc., I tend not to pick favorites and honestly I don’t follow directors or even writers that closely. That being said, I will say that his original trilogy, if you can call it that, are some of my favorite zombie movies of all time. Of course, I need to get this out there, I am not the biggest fan of the zombie movie genre to begin with. I don’t hate zombie movies, I actually enjoy them quite a bit, however, I feel we just have too many out there and I have seen too many to really get excited. I was burned out on zombie movies long before I began getting fatigue keeping up with superhero flicks.

One thing you might discover about this blog is I rarely make my articles about the thing or topic I am writing about, as it is a personal blog I tend to make it about my personal experiences instead. So I am going to share some of my own memories of the Living Dead series of films. This is my best method to pay tribute to a man whose works I do revere without repeating the same life recap the other 50,000+ blogs on the internet are going to say.

My earliest experiences are when I was about seven or eight years old. I was watching the Tim Burton comedy classic Beetlejuice and there is a scene where one of the main characters says “are you like night of the living dead underthere” or something to that extent. I didn’t exactly know what she was referring to for a while. A couple of years later I was sitting in my room, I had this old black and white UHF/VHF dial TV with rabbit ears in my bedroom, and I used to stay up late at night on weekends watching the horror movies that came on. One night they were playing Return of the Living Dead. I instantly fell in love with this movie. It also referenced Night of the Living Dead so now I had two films reference a movie really increasing my interest. A about two years later I rented a copy of the Thriller music video cassette from our local video store and watched the Michael Jackson classic music video for the first time and now I was rally curious, I just had to see this zombie movie everyone kept talking about.

My first viewing. It was not on the black and white tv from my youth. It was not a VHS or even DVD rental from a store. It was one random night I was watching my then favorite TV channel G4, which is long gone now. They were showing Night of the Living Dead. I had already seen the Dawn of the Dead remake by this point but I hadn’t read up on them to learn they were connected yet. So I decided why not, I sat there and watched the whole movie, commercials and all. I was really amazed and for the first time I really regretted not seeing it earlier in my life.

A couple of years later I finally got a chance to watch Day of the Dead on good old Netflix. Again I was impressed and thought man I need to see more of these Romero zombie movies. So about a year ago I set out to add them all to my DVD collection. Unfortunately that is where the direct connections end. See I made it a point not to watch any of them until I had them all. I do currently own the three originals, but I still want to get all of his later zombie movies to see how they all stack up. That being said, I have the original Dawn of the Dead on DVD but haven’t gotten around to watching it at this time. I suppose I could just make a case that since I have already seen the other two in that “trilogy” I could go a head and just get it over with. I could also make a case that it doesn’t connect to the remakes or modern films in the series anyways, which I have all but two, I think. So maybe sometime in the near future I might try to make it a point to go back and actually watch the original Dawn of the Dead.

I am probably going to anger some die hard fans, should they stumble upon this, by stating this, I like the movies, but I prefer the Return of the Living Dead franchise more. I guess you could say I like horror comedy more than straight horror, but I don’t think that is it. I just think I liked the campy 80’s tone mixed with the imminent doom they presented verses the world he created where it was the end of the world, but somehow it just didn’t quite end.

When Wes Craven died I didn’t go back and revisit Last House on the Left, People Under the Stairs or any of his other movies that didn’t have Elm Street in the title. However with the passing of Romero in a way it just makes me wish I had seen more of his works when it would have mattered to him. I can’t say I will miss him, or his works, I can say instead that I appreciate what he did for the horror genre, and zombies in particular, and will say that I look forward to reading, hopefully, well-written articles looking back on his life, and career. I also am now thinking I have run out of excuses to keep putting off watching the 1970’s Dawn of the Dead, which I do have on DVD.

New Castlevania series on Netflix

I haven’t had a chance to watch it yet, but I have been checking out reviews and from what I gather, this might be something worth checking out. I am thinking I might give it a watch sometime this weekend and see what I think of it from there.

I am not a big fan of anime or anime style shows, so I don’t know how I will respond to this. However, I have heard it is similar in ways to Symphony of the Night, which is one of my favorite Castlevania games so that sounds promising.

I haven’t really considered why it has taken this long to get a proper Castlevania animated show off the ground. Personally, I would much rather it be live-action than animated, but I guess there might have been budget issues to consider?

I haven’t been returning to Netflix that often for the classic shows I used to watch, since they are taking them away faster than adding new ones it seems. I haven’t given any of their original shows an honest go either. I did force myself to sit through the entire first episode of Fuller House just to check it out. I had nothing good to say about that so I left it alone and moved on.

I am starting to get to the point where I accept that Netflix is no longer the service I signed up for an is now just an HBO clone, which to that end, I am tempted to cancel Netflix and just check out HBO Now, at least then I can see True Blood and Game Of Thrones and see what all the fuss is about, plus maybe get full episodes of Last Week Tonight without having to wait around for Youtube to upload pieces of the show.

Now that I think about it, I am not even paying for Netflix anyways, I am sharing my parents plan so I should look into getting HBO Now anyways. Well I am going to check out this Castlevania series and hope for the best.

Enter the darkness, if you dare

This very website has often had trouble finding it’s voice. The primary author, however, has not. The slogan, To Organize Chaos, does little justice to what is actually intended. So here is a new layout of what to expect if you dare to venture into The Spiders Lair.

First, take a second to let that name sink in. At the very center of every spider-web (Spiders lair) is a blood-sucking monster. They hide in the darkness waiting to snag a bite of blood to enjoy. The savory taste of the salty fluid that keeps most biological creatures alive is the very substance every spider craves. Another popular blood sucking monster that lives in the dark is the vampire. If you read this blog, or know the author and his friends, you would come to realize vampires are often going to come up, one way or another. From Buffy to Dracula to Castlevania, vampires are a big part of the dark culture this site intends to cover.

Sure, as a gamer, I talk about video games, and so do my friends, but what really excites me, what really gets my blood going is talking about those things that hide in the shadows. The Christian lore teaches that the darkness is the enemy. The devil, the demons, the evil spirits all make their home in the darkest places, and that the darkest corners of a man’s soul are where the worst crimes imaginable take place. No matter which side of the war you fall, fighting for the light or slave to the dark master, know your enemy is something that comes to mind.

To some, studying the evil works of the Prince of Darkness himself is akin to opening a doorway to hell, or opening a door inviting evil into your home. To others, if we are instructed to fight a spiritual war, it’s a way of knowing your enemy so you know what you are dealing with. For others, it’s all innocent and just stories. Take for example, sitting around a campfire telling scary stories. Who hasn’t heard the tale of the escaped convict with a bloody hook told to all hormonal teenagers to scare them away from per-maritial sexual relations. Now, the Bible itself, the most revered weapon, the sword in the spiritual war, itself a book laced with graphic depictions of violence, kidnapping, rape, incest, and demon possession. If the Bible is to be taken literally and one follows logically that just reading stories of sinful acts is enough to “cause” a person to sin in their heart, then the reading the Bible itself would be a sin. No, the Bible tells stories of sinners who rebel against the Word of God as a precautionary tale. No different than the cautionary tales contained within the typical slasher film. Sure the movies are often laced with detailed illustrations of sexual acts, often bare breasted woman running amok as the serial killer slices their naked bodies to bloody rags. However, the bible itself contains detail stories of sexual acts that often result in the death, dismemberment or even damnation of the participants, the moral of the story is, if you don’t know what sin is, how are you to avoid it? Another way to look at it is, just hearing a story of how a particular crime occurred is not a sin, so neither is the reenactment of said acts via Hollywood movie magic. Even many who would condemn or judge a man who watches a horror movie would make no fuss about a person reading a classic novel or work of literature that also contains graphic scenes.

This is not intended to be a sermon, not everyone ascribes to the Christian ethic, even if the Gothic portrayal of Christianity is the basis for many horror movies.

Logic does not always matter to a person with a conviction. Thus I share this, the Bible does say judge not lest ye be judged, and leave that out there where it is. The rest of this website will be devoted entirely to covering those topics that spark the interest of the author, and hopefully, his readers. To quote Dr. Dre “Journey into the mind of a maniac, doomed to be a killer since I came out the nutsack.” In other words, enter the mind of a man who is not afraid to investigate the darker side of humanity, if you dare. The site is not going to glorify or glamorize violence, evil, or criminal activity, however, there are works of fiction and art, including movies and video games, that are covered and discussed that fall into those categories, either as tales of warning what not to do, or just as examples of how the dark forces operate as a way to better under stand the enemy within.

Here are some of the movies, video games, music, books, comic books, and board games that delve into the darkness that this site will cover.

Movies

  • A Nightmare on Elm Street
  • Friday the 13th
  • Hellraiser
  • Gremlins
  • Ghostbusters
  • Lord of the Rings
  • Star Wars
  • Pirates of the Caribbean
  • Candyman
  • Sleepaway Camp
  • Children of the Corn
  • Child’s Play
  • Silent Night, Deadly Night
  • Prom Night
  • The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
  • Last House on the Left
  • The Fifth Element

Books

  • Dracula
  • Frankenstein
  • Homer
  • Beowolf
  • To Kill A Mockingbird
  • Sword of Shannara
  • Stephen King thrillers

Music

  • Marilyn Manson
  • N.W.A
  • Dr. Dre
  • Ice Cube
  • Snoop Dogg
  • RBX
  • The Dogg Pound
  • Garbage
  • Metallica
  • Megadeth
  • Alice Cooper
  • Rob Zombie
  • KISS
  • 2Pac
  • Wu Tang Clan

Video Games

  • Mortal Kombat
  • Castlevania
  • Doom
  • Ghosts N Goblins
  • Haunted House
  • Legend of Zelda
  • Final Fantasy
  • Silent Hill
  • Resident Evil
  • Alone in the Dark
  • Nightmare Creatures
  • Altered Beast
  • Golden Axe
  • Might and Magic
  • Wizards and Warriors
  • Pokemon (Pocket Monsters)

Comic Books

  • Dawn
  • Cry For Dawn
  • X-Men
  • Justice League of America
  • The Avengers
  • Spider-Man
  • The Punisher
  • Daredevil
  • The Fantastic Four
  • Batman
  • Vengeance of Vampirella
  • Buffy the Vampire Slayer
  • Mortal Kombat
  • Scooby Doo
  • Tales From the Crypt

Board Games/Card Games/Tabletop Games

  • Dungeons and Dragons
  • Advanced Dungeons and Dragons
  • Magic: The Gathering
  • Hunter: The Reckoning
  • Clue
  • Spellfire
  • Buffy the Vampire Slayer

So there you have, if you wanted to know what direction this site is going, the best way to explain it is the intention is to explore the darker things of humanity, through the lens of media, and develop a sense of social commentary through this exploration. Enjoy, and beware what you discover.

 

 

 

 

30 SNES games for a new collector to begin with

Now for whatever reason you didn’t already have one of, if not *the* greatest video game consoles of all time, well nobody is judging you, here is a list of 30 games to probably get you into collecting. Like my previous lists, I want to avoid too many of the obvious picks, instead focusing on games that really give you a good variety of popular and less known, but not exactly the “hidden gems” everyone talks about.

Like my other lists these are only numbered to keep track, they are not ranked.

1. Super Mario World

If this isn’t the first game you pick up with your new Super Nintendo, what the HELL are you doing collecting SNES for? Seriously it was the most iconic game of the 16-bit era, probably the best of the Super Mario games, at the very least *the* best of the 2D Super Mario games, it’s one of the greatest video games of all time. So yeah, day one pick this up it’s almost mandatory at this point.

2. Mortal Kombat II

Just like how on Genesis you can buy MK1 and skip the rest, do that with SNES but buy MKII and pretend the rest don’t exist. Not only is this the best home version of one of the best 2D arcade fighting games ever made, it’s still a pretty solid game for the SNES library. Also skip Killer Instinct, everyone says that game, we all know it was just a Mortal Kombat cash in clone so let it go.

3. Super Star Wars

I normally don’t pick Star Wars games for general collectors, they tend to be more geared to hard core gamers and die hard Star Wars fans. While this game *IS* hard, even on the easiest setting it will challenge all but the most seasoned gamers, it’s also a very good game, even if it was stripped of the Star Wars license. It has great level design, epic boss battles, makes fantastic use of the Mode 7 psuedo-3D and it just has a great sci-fi/space fantasy vibe that makes for a great action video game.

4. Kendo Rage

Before you say now wait a minute you said no hidden gems. This game is not a “hidden gem” by my definition, in fact I consider it even more obscure than that. How obscure? Well I had the game as a kid, loved it played it to death, and it took me YEARS of combing used video game stores before I stumbled upon another copy and if i hadn’t asked the clerk to help me identify the games I was describing, I might not have recognized it at first, the game is obscure. Also it’s hard. I love it because it has a good weird mix of Castlevania, Ghosts N Goblins, with some Sailor Moon and Kirby Super Star, okay I know that’s a weird combination of games, but trust me that’s the best way to describe this game so yeah do some ebay digging and see if you can get a copy, trust me it’s worth it.

5. Donkey Kong Country

The typical response is grab the trilogy and have at it. Okay look there are over 700 games on the SNES and if you spend all your time going after the super popular Nintendo 1st party titles your going to miss out, so grab the first one, it will hold you over and is a masterpiece in it’s own right, and have fun. Make sure this game is in your first 30 purchases the rest can come later, hell maybe make then 31 and 32 respectively I don’t care but keep them out of the first 30, trust me you won’t regret mixing it up with a little variety.

6. Legend of Zelda- A Link to the Past

Arguably the best Zelda game ever made, easily the best 2-D Zelda and certainly one of the best Super NES games, you have the rest of your days as a collector to go chasing the JRPG’s and the shmups, but you can’t go wrong with getting Zelda early on.

7. Battletoads and Double Dragon

I will get this out of the way, the SNES is flooded with arcade fighting games, shoot em ups and JRPG’s. The Genesis does the first two FAR BETTER so stick to getting those games on Sega, as for the JRPG’s, well there are a ton, they are pretty much all the same in some way or another, no there is a lot of time to chase those too popular, too expensive and over hyped games, grab yourself a grade A 90’s arcade style mash up featuring martial arts bad asses along side some mutant frogs. This is sci-fi arcade beat em up at it’s best. Yeah the game is also on Sega but let’s not get into that now.

8. Bust A Move (Puzzle Bobble)

Everyone is going to tell you get Tetris this or Dr. Mario that, yeah well tell them to shut up those games are best on the Game Boy, the only GOOD puzzle game exclusive (in a way) to the SNES is Bust A Move, the Taito arcade classic semi-sequel to Bubble Bobble on the NES. I say sorta, but let’s not spit hairs this is a great, ultra fun, vibrantly colorful chipper game you can’t pass up for too long. Hidden gem, no, ultra rare probably over priced, maybe, at least rare the price is well worth it this game is AMAZING.

9. Batman and Robin

There are a million and one Batman games, this is the one to get on the Super Nintendo.

10. Super Ghosts N Goblins

Arcade games are fun. Sequels of arcade games that beat the original are easily twice the fun, oh and this time it’s 16-bit. Yeah these games are short but hard, hey whatever they are still great fun and this is still as good as, if not better than, the Sega game.

11. Sim City

I don’t just put this on here because it actually, literally, is my absolute favorite Super Nintendo game of all time, no seriously I play this game almost as much as I do Minecraft, which I play more than I should care to admit. But it’s still a great game to add early on to your SNES library to show you the depth of the consoles variety while also giving you a fun Nintendo take on the Sim genre. There are a ton of Sim games on the console but the original is a good place to start. It has KING BOWSER KOOPA what more do you want?!

12. Kirby Super Star

Like the Mario and DKC games, you will inevitably buy them all, or at the very least a good lot in due time. Why not start with one of the easiest to pick up and play games in the saga? This game has a ton of variety and is one of the best Kirby games ever made. The other games do what they do better in their own way, but this game gives you a sample of all the things Kirby is known for so it’s a great starting point and the theme song will get stuck in your head. It is already stuck in your head isn’t it? Don’t lie yes it is.

13. Robocop vs. The Terminator

While the SNES is more known for it’s RPG’s and Platformers and Sega for it’s sci-fi themed games, and this game is on Genesis, this is still the better version to get, and it’s a GREAT game with tons of fun and a whole bunch of replay value.

14. Zombies At My Neighbors

This is like Zelda, everyone is going to suggest it and there is no point in putting it off, see a copy pick it up.

15. Super Metroid

Again, I must stress, this list is not RANKED so for the love of all things that is good, if you get a SNES and you get a chance to buy this game, don’t hesitate or wait because it’s not far enough on the list, it very well could be the number 1 reason to get a Super Nintendo for a lot of people. This is the game that really started the “Metroidvania” style of game play that would be very common later on.

16. Super Mario RPG

Again, the console is WELL KNOWN for it’s RPG games, and Earthbound is NOT worth the asking price so you might as well get the Mario/Final Fantasy cross over and do yourself a favor. If you really want to experience the SNES at it’s fullest potential yes you will need some JRPG’s eventually, but damn I can’t stress this enough, they are expensive because EVERYONE wants them, so get this one to hold you over and get you started, it’s fine the game is 5 star, it’s a perfect ten, I mean it’s a great game you won’t regret it.

17. Super Mario All-Stars

Okay, yeah it’s just a collection of the 8-bit games redone with new 16-bit graphics and sounds, and yeah it just adds customizable controls, and oh yeah it also adds save states, but um, why am I having to sell you on this, IT’S a collection of the 3 most iconic games in HISTORY with SAVE STATES and NEW graphics, this is arguably the first true video game “remaster” by some definitions and it’s one hell of a starting off point.

18. Mega Man X

The best 2D Mega Man game ever made? That’s for you to decide. No I lied, the gaming community decided when this game was released and our collective opinion remains unchanged. This. Game. Is. GREAT. ‘Nuff Said. Okay fine not sold, take everything fun from Mega Man games and multiply that by a dozen, beef it up to 16-bit goodness, throw in a super cool hidden SFII reference, throw away all the crap that bogged down the not-so-good Mega Man games and throw it onto the greatest game console that the Big N has ever released and you got your self a game you need in your collection yesterday.

19. NBA Jam

If I didn’t put this on my Sega list, I should have or very well could have. This game is easily one of the best, and hands down the most iconic and recognizable arcade basketball, maybe even sports game, of all time. Throw it into your SNES, plug the Red and White audio cables into your stereo, crank up the bass along with the volume and bust out those dunks that make the announcer scream BOOM SHAKA LAKA all night long.

20. Spider-Man/Venom Maximum Carnage

While the Sega fans got the better stand alone Spidey game, the SNES got this game, okay it was on Sega also but this is not the Sega list it’s my Super Nintendo list. Damn why were the 16-bit console wars so damn great? Anyways this is probably the best brawler/beat-em-up on the console, aside from a certain turtle game I won’t mention. The SNES doesn’t do one-on-one fighting  games nearly as good as the Genesis, it does the side scrolling brawlers at least as good, if not better, so this is a very good comic book themed game to really sink your teeth into. Also you get to play as VENOM, I mean dude how is that not a thing in more Spider-Man games?

21. F-Zero

Might as well. It’s fast paced, futuristic sci-fi racing what could go wrong? This was one of the earliest games to show off the systems “mode 7” capability and it was all we gamers needed to know this machine was the real deal. Since Nintendo doesn’t seem to care to make any new games in the series any time soon, why not go back to the one that started it all?

22. Final Fantasy 3

If you count this game higher than 3, go back to Japan. This is the one we all played, for many of us, myself included, this was *THE* entry point into the JRPG genre and for most it was also the template we measured all future JRPG games against. This and Super Mario are probably the easiest to get into and the best place for an entry point for someone that doesn’t want to get overwhelmed with these text heavy games too early on. There are plenty of RPG’s on the console and you have the rest of your life to seek them out, this needs to be in your collection before pretty much all the rest of them, aside from Mario that is. This game defined the genre for a generation and it wasn’t surpassed until it’s direct (but incorrectly numbered, stupid Japanese) sequel.

23. Super Bomberman

If you don’t get yourself a Super Multi-Tap for some sweet 5-player Super Bomberman pretty much as soon as you can then you are cheating yourself out of a fantastic experience. There might not be that many games that use the multi tap that are worth owning, but this game is worth the price of admission all by itself. Pretty much any console that has a Bomberman game that supports 4 or more players is going to be high on any wish list. Treat yourself and your gaming friends (and even your non-gaming friends its casual friendly) to a night of blasting bombs at one another.

24. Knights of the Round

Sticking to the theme of playing to the systems strengths, here is another worth while side-scrolling arcade brawler that is sure to keep you entertained for several hours. The game is set in a fantasy world, and I honestly confused this for Golden Axe when I was a kid, so you can bet my surprise when I plugged Golden Axe into my Genesis and I was so furious. I played this game at a Pizza Hut long ago and dropped so many quarters into it every time I got the chance. The gameplay holds up today, the music and characters are still very well done and the level design is what you want in an arcade beat-em-up from the 90’s.

25. Super Castlevania 4

There is a never ending debate on the internet, which 16-bit console was better Super NES or Sega Genesis. A similar debate is which Castlevania game was better, this one or Symphony of the Night, (I throw my lot in with SOTN but to each their own) still this very game is at the heart of that debate and one of the reasons a die-hard self-proclaimed Sega fanboy like myself still freely admits the Super NES is probably the greatest game console of all time. Sure Bloodlines on Genesis is a good enough Castlevania game, but why settle for good enough when you can get the real deal, and this game is the real deal. Think of it like this, this games is the Empire Strikes Back of the Castlevania series, it’s that good. If I wasn’t such a Sega fan I would say this game and a handful of others would be all you need as a gamer. Needless to say, this was one of the games that, almost, made me switch sides from being Pro-Sega anti-Nintendo to very much a Nintendo loyalist. Even the prospect of just a port of this gaming coming to a new Nintendo console is usually enough to get my attention.

26. Primal Rage

Again, fighting games are almost always better on the Sega Genesis, that’s pretty much a given unless you live in a weird bubble where the 6-button pads never existed, if you bring up the crappy 3-button pads in a debate I walk away, seriously nobody games with those everyone has 6-button pads and all things being equal, the 6-button pad is better, the Genesis is faster, look fighting games are best on Genesis, RPG’s are best on Super NES, let’s just agree to that. Still, Primal Rage is one of those rare fighting games that is still great even on the Super NES. (I can hear the fanboys screaming at their monitors right now, you picked this over SFII!) No I didn’t but hell, SF II is played out at this point, It’s available on so many consoles, in so many varieties, seriously at this point if you are getting into SNES collecting STAY FAR AWAY from SFII games, period. They were good, damn good, at the time, they suck by today’s standards, and I don’t mean because the arcade port is available. Look let’s focus on this game, probably the LAST arcade game Atari ever had their hands in that was worth a damn and let it be that, the Atari swan song that it is and still a FANTASTIC fighting game, actually good on the Super Nintendo. If you are serious about playing SFII, play it on any console BUT the Super NES, and ignore the fanboys who never experienced SFII the way it was meant to be played. Or at the very least, get this game first and find yourself having fun appreciating one of the rare fighting games that was good on the console and pick up those thousand SFII clones at a later time.

27. Sunset Riders

Another one of those side scrolling arcade action games the system is well known for. I know there are people who can’t look beyond the JRPG’s, but if you aren’t a fan of those don’t get so down on the Super NES just yet, I know the fanboys make it sound like those are the best games on the system, thankfully you and I aren’t fanboys, at least not Nintendo fanboys. Okay, so infighting and trolling aside, yes this is a very good game. It does have it roots in the arcade and yes there is a Sega port of this game, this one is nearly identical in most ways but as I understand it very good and you don’t want to just turn your SNES into a JRP hub up front now do you? If you like arcade games this is a great port, for what it is.

28. T2: The Arcade Game

This is another arcade game, its also a shooting game and fortunately it does support various peripherals so you can sample the different play styles. The arcade game is still better in every way but this is a good game to pluck into your SNES console and get a few minutes of great fun before you get too bored, and it’s good to come back to from time to time.

29. Super Smash TV

Notice my lists are heavy on arcade games, well there is a reason for that, they are quick and easy to pick up and play, they are often fun even today, and they really try to demonstrate what their respective console was going for. This isn’t the best version of the game ever, but it is playable, and if you get yourself a Super NES Advantage stick, or two, your good to go. This game was not just a staple of 90’s arcades, it was one of those games that got ports across the spectrum of home consoles and was well worth playing, depending on your willingness to adapt.

30. Street Fighter II Turbo

Ignore everything I just said, this is *THE* 16-bit SFII game to get. Ha, had you fanboys going for a second didn’t it. Okay, so most of what I said above is mostly true, this is still the best version of this game available on the Super NES and it’s one of the few good fighting games on the system. Super is better on Genesis, and frankly, just about any system it’s on but Super, and the original is garbage, it is just accept it and move on. But this version is still damn good, for what it is. I had a Genesis and I played SFII SCE and Super SFII all the damn time. When I did get a Super NES I fell for the lies the fanboys told me and bought these games, one by one, trying to recapture the magic of the Sega versions, to no luck. There are different opinions and if you live in a vacuum where you will never own a Sega Genesis, and play only on the Super Nintendo, I guess your 12 years old and it’s 1994 all over again, anyways, then yeah get some SFII games and have fun, but I strongly recommend getting them on anything newer and if you have to play them on a 16-bit console get the Genesis versions, with proper 6-button controls and flip the fanboys a middle finger.

There is my list, sorry if this got heated I just deal with a world that distorted the facts to a twisted reality where Sega always sucked and Super NES was always just assumed to be the best ever. Despite being an honest to god Sega fanboy, again my online handle is segagamer12, and the Genesis was my first home console I ever owned, I do freely admit the Super NES is better, but only by a very slight margin and only because of a couple of games that push it over the top. However, when it comes to fighting games, Genesis is better in almost every instance. You just have to GROW UP and stop talking about the stupid 3-button pad like here in 2017 it’s still the only joystick available for the console.

 

What are the best movie snacks?

Going to the movies or staying home on the couch, watching movies and eating junk food is an all-American past time. So what are the absolute best snack foods for the right movie watching experience?

 

Popcorn

Buttered is best, the more the better. If the popcorn is not dripping with butter then just add more butter. Weather you are going out on the town or sitting at home, the number one movie snack is of course buttered popcorn.

I don’t like to buy the “movie theater” popcorn. What I prefer is to buy a bag of raw seeds and cook them on the stove in a kettle. I cook them either with melted butter or I use vegetable oil to pop the seeds. I then like to get a bottle of that butter salt and sprinkle that onto the freshly popped corn. Sometimes I will add a layer of melted butter first before adding the butter seasoning. If I am in a hurry, broke, or just stuck doing the microwave popcorn, what I do is cook the corn first, melt the butter in a bowl and then mix it into one bowl, pouring it back and forth into another, larger bowl, to ensure the butter is evenly distributed. If you are going to snack with your movie, you might as well snack right.

Twizzlers

Not red licorice, certainly not black licorice or just licorice for those that know the difference and you can keep those Red Vines to your self thank you very much. The best secondary snack to accompany your movie experience is a package of Twizzlers. Preferably the cherry ones but strawberry are just as good.

Reese’s Pieces

If there was on lesson to be learned from Stephen Spielberg’s alien film E.T. The Extra Terrestrial (aside from how to NOW make a good video game) it’s that the proper sugary movie going snack is those little peanut butter candies.

Pepperoni Pizza

You can scarf down buckets of popcorn, bags of candies, and all the Twizzlers your stomach can handle, but the best meaty snack, by far, to have with a good movie is a slice of pepperoni pizza. The great thing here is it can be cold pizza, it can be thick crust, thin crush, Brooklyn style, Chicago deep dish, it really doesn’t matter but a nice slice of pepperoni pizza on the side of your movie goods is the best way to make sure you get that couch potato thing going just right.

Pretzels

The sugary snacks are fine but movies are best enjoyed with salty snacks. Popcorn is number one salty snack for movie goers, but a good bowl of pretzels can also hit the spot. Just be sure to have enough soda on hand or else you might over do it.

Soda

Normally I would say take your pick, a good cola or a root beer is probably best, but I could sit down with an orange slice, a Code Red Mountain Dew, or even a Dr. Pepper, it’s all good just make sure you have enough to balance out the salty snacks, but not too much to disrupt your movie going experience with unscheduled bathroom breaks.

There you have it, the best snacks for sitting down and watching a movie.