weird – Pinkie's Paradise

I am on my Couch, yet I feel Lost: Pinkie Watches Labyrinth

Hear Ye Hear Ye, Princess Pinkie is here with a new Movie and Shows Post!

Greetings my Loyal Guests and Subjects! It may not be a surpise to you that I really dig the strange and unique and seek out these movies , games and anime on regular basis. One weird product in the movie industry had eluded me for the longest time.. but today I finally managed to get that film under my belt. In this movie David Bowie plays the Goblin King, a baby stealing , delusion of a man who creates several musical intermezzos in this oddball of a fantasy movie. Today I shall tell you of that time I watched Labyrinth.

The Wizard of Wonderland…with Puppets

In 1986 Jennifer Connelly starred in her breakout role in the movie Labyrinth, a Jim Henson movie that pits the ,then still a child, star against a pop singer. Which usually isn’t such a great idea. Child actors are known for their hokey acting.. and how poor children are written in movies, and singers…. well… just name a well acted movie starring Justin Timberlake… It is a movie that has the audience and the critics sharply divided on Metacritic , scoring only a 5 out of 10 from critics and an amazing 8.4 out of the audience. So such a bit difference is already weird… What’s weirder is.. I kinda agree.. with both sides. In their own way each is a very fair way to look at the movie. The first thing you need to ask yourself is, do I like Jim Henson’s work?! Jim Henson , should you not know the name is the big name behind the Muppets and Sesame Street, he is the master of puppets and his creatures are recognised all across the world, and while these creatures may not be anywhere near as Iconic as some other Jim Henson products, you can tell this movie is his. Which I find a huge boon!

The plot follows character Sarah who is rehearsing for a play about the Goblin King, however she has fairly recently gotten a stepbrother, her stepmother being over protective over little Toby forces Sarah to take care of this little brother much to her chagrin, she feels like the forgotten child, remembering a rhyme from her play she wishes that Goblins come and take her little half brother away, That they do! Immediately Sarah regrets her actions and tells the Goblins to give her brother back, the Goblin King , Jareth played by David Bowie floats to her window and tells her he can not undo the wish. She has 13 hours to travel trough an amazing fantasy land that is one giant Labyrinth to go to Jared’s castle and reclaim her little brother before he is turned into a goblin himself and stays with Jareth forever.

The movie clearly targets a young audience, with little consequences and stuff like death or injury being replaced by less harsh, but way more looney consequences. Like falling into the bog of Eternal Stench.. an event that will cause you to stink for the rest of your life. Amnesia or turning into a Goblin replace death as well, and the risk of injuries is often being played for jokes, such as creatures who can rip of their own head and toss it , put it on another creature and just have fun with it. When someone is crushed by a rock they just fly off like a bowling pin, and more like that. It makes the movie quite whimsical and delightfully lighthearted. However the dialogue has been written to appeal to a younger audience as well, which can at times feel a bit unnatural, like you are watching a high school play. Since the movie kind of sets this in a twisted version of a high school play though, I am not sure if it is an actual downside. It just is presented in a rather unnatural way.

The movie has a lot of similarities with the Wizard of Oz, in the sense with that there is a path to follow.. more or less but events constantly throw the journey off, and it even has more in common with Alice in Wonderland, with characters being extremely strange and the riddles and puzzles that have to be overcome are tackled in a manner that Alice oftenly would. The characters that join the main character however do really resemble the party format of Oz again.. with an ugly treacherous gnome/dwarf that finds friendship along the way, a ogre like creature that becomes braver as they go, and a dog knight that learns some humility and that fighting is not ALWAYS the answer. Very cute, and pretty well executed. The biggest trouble is that it kind of falls short when compared to it’s greatest inspirations, but those are pretty much masterpieces so I don’t really hold it to that standard. I can see why a critic would conclude it’s an inferior product though..because it is… however there isn’t that much in the genre anyway and as general entertainment I could not help but be slightly enamoured with this flick.

Twists and Turns

The moral of the story is where the “problem” of this movie lies. I will explain why I write “problem” in quotation marks a bit later on. The moral of this story and that the main character has to learn is “Life can be unfair sometimes, we just have to deal with it when that happens” .. or something like that. It is indeed unfair if a parent favours one child over the other, but it happens especially if one child is newborn and the other is in their teens. It is unfair that some pappa’s and mamma’s don’t stay together and you have to allow another person in your life. These are troubles Sarah has to face before the movie even starts.. but throughout the journey this theme is forced in pretty hard. The Labyrinth cheats! If she is smart enough to mark the route, little creatures will change it. A worm.. which by the way is the most adorable thing EVER .. tells her that sometimes she can walk through a solid wall! Sometimes solving a riddle and clearing an obstacle will immediately resolve in a new punishment. For a movie about making progress that can feel a bit lackluster.. and make progress feel more like a Deus Ex Machina than earned.

For example at one time Sarah is solving lots of mysteries in a row, some hubris sets in and she tells him, this is super easy. He then fast forwards time to give her 4 hours left instead of 8.. or something. Why not fast forward it all the way so you win?! Why give her a chance? Why come up with a riddle segment and have Sarah solve it.. if you give her the punishment for failing it anyway.. on a fundamental level it feels wrong. The movie isn’t satisfactory in that regard. Stuff happens because it happens, and normally I would HATE a movie for that. I hate a lot of anime who do that.. but this one gives clear hints on what is going on, you just have to assume something, something most people really do not like to assume these days. To enjoy this movie you have to watch it .. as an analogy rather than an adventure.. because while the events are fun, the actions taken end up being inconsequential due to the chosen theme.

I did not end up minding it all that much in retrospect when I saw the big picture but there where times I felt very frustrated. The character of Sarah is a big offender in this as well.. for the first half of the movie she is extremely whiny. She complains how unfair the maze is and how everything works against her. She vents this to characters who do not deserve it and the whole idea of wishing her brother away because she is studying a play and hates his crying noises already makes her feel quite bratty. An argument can be made that Jareth, the Goblin King is more appreciative of the baby than Sarah is and he’s the better choice. The movie fixes that later on but at several points in the movie I found myself rooting against Sarah! If you close your mind off because of that before the midway point, this movie might indeed suck. I don’t like children and Sarag began to annoy me just as a child would .. and then I realised… she is annoying but most children who would not be crippled by crying would react like this.. I as a child would have probably reacted like this.

The movie makes the odd choice to leave a lot of responsibility at the mature viewer, you have to poke through some things, if you take everything face value and “as seen on screen” this movie might not satisfy you. Like a fairy tale, we seem to walk across a beaten path with a cookie cutter morality and a clear sign of who will be the victor at the end. However if you poke a little deeper there a lot there. Do these events really happen? Or is it Sarah’s mind trying to cope with how unfair life is and allowing her to grow enough to learn a lesson. Do we sometimes need to let go of reality and it’s unfair to escape.. so we can later on face that unfairness.. that to me is what this movie is really about. What we see MIGHT have happened… but if she imagined it.. all those silly things that did not make sense before make sense.. after all she is creating the scenario and it also all feels very much like the mindset of a child, every single event even how the story sometimes derails into something so fantastical that it does not make sense… maybe Sarah ‘s true labyrinth is that of the feelings in her own mind. Kids get a cute little adventure, yet there is something for a mature audience as well. You just have to work your grey matter and imagination a bit to find it.

And then there’s Jim

The creatures we encounter on this adventure are so fun! I especially enjoyed Ludo the ogre , stone summoner and the worm! Oh I loved the worm so much! It had like 3 lines of text but it was great. It just tells Sarah there are doors that she can sometimes not see and she can move through some wall! But he also keeps inviting her over for dinner! Inviting her to come inside.. there is no clear indication of what he means inside, nor what’s for dinner. There is just a worm… in blue with a scarf that tells her you can go to a wall or come for dinner. I do not know why I love it so much but I absolutely adored it. Then there is a wise dwarf, with a talking hat who bestows wisdom on passersby. The hat looked a lot like the minish cap from zelda, even speaking in the same sarcastic tone. Two door knockers, gargoyle like by design one with the knocker in his ears the other in his mouth. One can’t hear one can’t speak! Find out which door is correct. I love this kind of stuff. Sir Didymus being a dog riding on a dog was great as well, especially since one is a puppet and the steed an actual dog! It is also quirky and even all the goblins felt unique!

This movie, while an original story feels very much like a fairytale.. but also like a hodgepodge of fairy tale tropes.. like a kid or young girl trying to write her own story, including moments where the story derails… a great example of this is when Sarah loses Ludo as her guardian, he just falls trough the floor for no reason, nor is a reason ever given after reuniting with him.. he just comes out of a tunnel… but while alone Sarah comes across creatures that look a lot like Kowakian Monkey Lizards from Star wars..but bigger.. in pink and yellow and orange fur. They sing a song and toss their heads around to tell Sarah they want her to play as well and will rip of her head. It feels so extreme for this story, very Alice in Wonderland.. and very much like I used to write when I was young.

There is an encounter with Jareth on some MC Escher like stairs, where trough camera choices I got absolutely confused which was the point and it felt great. For a movie about a Labyrinth I truly felt lost, Henson made most of his characters so insanely quirky that they become self aware of their quirk. Like the guardians with one always speaking the truth and one always lying, by all the questions they have been asked in the past and all the mystery they forgot who is who themselves.. and aren’t even sure if they should lie or tell the truth thus if Sarah goes trough the door and falls trough a hole we aren’t sure.. did the creatures accidentally flip roles, is the hole actually progress, you can feel lost if you allow yourself too and if you immerse yourself.. and a lot of it is due to the wonderful cinematography, amazing creatures and fun effects.

Some events have this level of theater effect to them.. like a stone coming in rolling very slow based or a pebble clearly on a wire being moved towards the main character. It feels like one of those old stage plays, like the Muppets is supposed to be I guess. It feels intentional yet hokey, it takes you out of the movie enough to give it a proper thought.. but also allows you to enjoy the wonderful creatures more. Like the hooded goblins with numbered helmets.. we see them several times but never see why their helmets are numbered.. not until way later where they end up being bowling pins to Ludo’s special attack! A super simple joke but long before that they were on my mind as to what the secret of thiose numbers could! It is all some great work and because it’s so hokey and forced at times.. it doesn’t age as poorly some effects feel like they were intended to feel wooden and forced.. so even the puppeteering that aged worse.. can be seen as semi intentional! Great work Mr Henson!

We are all mad here

If you asked me if I enjoyed this movie I would say yes! If you ask me if I had a good time while watching it, I’d be a bit more reluctant to say yes. The second half of the movie is a great ride so would a rewatch of the first half.. but the first time you watch this… or the first time in a long while … eeeeh…. Sarah is a brat and that ends up being great as we really go on a journey with her towards a better version of herself..but she comes across very abrasive from the start and only when she accepts the maze ins unfair, she becomes a remotely likeable character That is relatively late in the movie to start liking a main character. That’s the whole thing I think.. if you hold it to normal movie standards this is odd! Maybe to odd It doesn’t fit the normal criticising format. So if you review it as just a movie.. maybe it is bad. Reviewing by your normal, story, music, acting etc standards you can easily rate this a 5/10! Sure there is plenty of things wrong with this movie.. at least in the sense with how one normally reviews movies.

If you see it as a quirky visual fairy tale made by Jim Henson… that is a childs day dream about coming to term with the fact that she has a new family now and has to accept her new little brother as well as him getting more a spotlight than her you are in for a great time! This is NOT a movie that you measure by the normal standards, it can’t… well it can but in doing so you’d already be missing the essence of this flick! It doesn’t fit the standard bill. For once I do not really have a weird analogy for you this time because this thing is really unique! Labyrinth is not just a movie… Labyrinth is Labyrinth. If you can watch it with the goal of understanding or experiencing this wonderful product, rather than “put on a movie” a great time awaits you, that you will remember long into your happily ever after. The Bowie songs though will fade away rather quickly.

Did you see Labyrinth?! What did you think? Who is your favourite character? Let’s get lost in the comments but be sure to bring your Bedroll in case we really get lost! Because remember folks!
Friendship is magic but dreams are even more wonderful!
Oyasumi!

I want a Real Estate on Paradise: Reviewing Video Game Castles

Hello Little Lights! In real life I am quite content with my new place in my real life. Yet virtual me has much more of a struggle! I am not made for a tiny little hut! I need an Estate to keep all my things! Not one of those villa mansions either.. I want something special! Something that screams.. someone who is more than just a manager lives here!

So I hired a realtor as we checked out some fairly iconic real estate.. You know I’d probably alter it just a bit so it is safe for me to use.. but you know a girl has to have inspiration. Anyway I found this Realtor named Phil.. he kind of is a geek! Met him in some virtual game.. and today we are looking at some of the most iconic Real Estate in video games.

Dracula’s Castle (Castlevania)

Phil : So this is the first place I would like you to see, it’s a classical gothic structure, stemming from 1094, and belonged to a guy named Mathias Cronqvist, a powerful alchemist that lived up until the end of the 1990’s. It has about 200 rooms and can travel dimensions and locations, as it has shown up in Europe, Transylvania but also Japan as well. It is also known to change shape and sizes to fit wherever and whenever it is needed. I will be honest, the original owner has passed away in the castle.. as I am legally obligated to tell you this… in fact he has been murdered in his castle by a blonde man with long hair and a whip… and the palace might be a bit of a fixer upper.. but I think it can provide you years of happiness

Pinkie: Phil this is Dracula’s castle from Castlevania isn’t it?! Why do you use to name Mathias Cronqvist, now I have to explain to my readers that in Castlevania lore, Dracula is not an alter ego of Vlad Tepes, but of an alchemist who made himself immortal through his science and all that stuff. Besides I am not sure this place is for me. It looks quite gloomy. I might become more than a manager soon, but I am pretty sure I won’t be turning evil or a vampire! If anything I am trying to become less nocturnal and Rainbows can’t be out in the dark.

Phil: Well it has a library, it has a dinner room, it has a piano room and even it’s own swimming pool! You made a big deal out of wanting your own swimming pool which I don’t really get because don’t you have some amazing pools in Paradise?! I guess this palace is a bit of a fixer upper, you might need to fix some staircases fixed but that should not be to hard! It comes pretty cheap ever since the creators wanted to fix more on pachinko machines, the castle has been neglected a bit so you can pick it up without overspending.

Pinkie: Sure Phil, then tell me how we get from the main hall to the dining room. If you can explain it to me in less than a paragraph I will consider buying this place.

Phil: I think that’s a bit unfair.. it is easy enough! All you need to do is gather a red orb from the music room, then kneel at a pond , a staircase that leads your underwater will be revealed. You need to follow the tunnel and then choose the third mirror on the second floor from of the study and enter it and it will take you straight to the drawbridge that if it is open will take you to the dining room, If not you might need to take a little detour by getting a grappling hook..to move onto a higher platform.. but we can just build a staircase there to work around that.

Pinkie: I think you know why I am passing on this. I don’t want to need Nintendo Power to find my bedroom each night.. let’s go look at the next lot.. but before we go.. I really need to pee, could I use the bathroom here?!

Phil: Sure all you need to do is walk up the half broken stairs, take a little leap of faith down from the overpass, defeat the giant bat in the pantry so it drops a key that lets you access the west wing. Follow that to the end by jumping a few gaps and dodging some medusa heads and it will lead you right to the clock tower the bathroom is at the top.. it really is nice for the drainage.. you never have any smell or annoying kids throwing fireworks in the sewer to make your toilet spill.

Hyrule Castle (Legend of Zelda Series)

Phil: Okay.. I am sorry you died twice while trying to get to the bathroom, that was my fault.. This palace is actually owned by a titular character. It follows a more classic structure and has plenty of space. A princess much like … Oh right… A Smash Brothers character I guess, lived here and many of her incarnations have found happiness in this castle. Her father has been murdered in it only once .. so it already has way less deaths to it than most other castles we will visit. It already has been restored properly for the potential of Breath of the Wild 2.. and it has only gotten larger over time.

Pinkie: This is actually quite nice Phil.. but there seems to be a very thick wallpaper on the walls, I don’t really like it. .can I paint over that?! It seems like it might go a bit soggy if I do.

Phil: Don’t worry you can paint over it.. the thick wall paper has been in place because the castle got devastated and converted to a fortress of evil for a bit.. during the era of the hero of time. You know six magical seals were placed. spirits of some sages were imprisoned.. it all resulted in a bit of an edgy architecture, the rightful owner restored it to its previous condition.

Pinkie: Ah I see.. how unfortunate for the rightful owner! I would not like it if someone came and took my castle and made it into a dark fortress! So what’s that greenish looking residue on the ceiling, it kind of looks like mold!

Phil: It’s dried in Algae actually, you see a couple of years later the country of Hyrule got completely flooded and the castle became completely submerged for many years! The princess became a pirate and all that unless a new hero could be found.. but after the evil was defeated it dried right up! You might find a few pin bones here and there..but nothing a good round with a vacuum cleaner can’t fix up.

Pinkie: Okay.. but is it still a flooding hazard now? I mean I am Dutch so we know how to make dry land…but that sounds awfully costly! I also notice a lot of plaster work has been renewed and the cellar has a do not enter sign? Why is that then?

Phil: Well fairly recently the entire castle was destroyed because the evil forces took over four fire giant animal mecha’s and layed the castle in ashes. The hero of the wild took control of them back.. but not before the evil created all sorts of spider cyclops.. it really hurt the drywall. The evil was defeated by the giant animal mechas firing a combined beams at him… but unfortunately the wine cellar now is just a crater. You know.. this castle does end up getting cursed or destroyed a lot.. given how unlucky you can be this might not be the purchase for you… I might be able to sell it to Pepper though.

Pinkie: Who is Pepper? Why would you sell him this thing? This is a timebomb! It gets destroyed like every other generation?! And why do all the shadowy corners of the castle have this dog pee scent to them?!

Dr Wily’s Castle (Mega Man)

Pinkie: Phil are you really trying to sell me Dr Wily’s castle?! I mean the music here is SOOOO good that I would almost consider it ..but this is an architectural nightmare. I know my taste in things can be a bit garish at times.. but this is pushing it. Maybe Indigo and Kuro would like it but why would I like a building that has a huge satellite dish, a giant skull and some ribs.. a rocket.. that in the original design actually is more like a bullet.. and some silo’s that look like they belong on a farm?! I want a brick castle not a steel one! That is super cold and I am a fairy type! Steel is super effective against me! So no I can already tell I will pass on this one.

Phil: Yeah I guess this one might not be for you, you are going for a more classical vibe right? You know as Realtor I am obligated to at least show you a different style. But if you look for a princess castle we will look for something traditional. Sorry about that sometimes I can make this mistake as I come from such a Modern Family.

Pinkie: Okay.. I wrote that joke.. and I might not get any emmy’s for it .. but for the sake of this post i’ll say, You are a funny man Phil!

Phil: Thank you, it’s actually a fact that if you look up the word funny inside an encyclopedia you see my face! I am very proud of it! And sorry for wasting your time! But hey isn’t it cool to see this in real imaginary life?!

Ted: Actually that word is pronounced encyclopeahdia! I do agree with Pinkie though this place is an architectural nightmare.. besides it garish looks those eyes in the skull will give very big problems with heat regulation, the use of such varying materials such as bone, steel , brick and red plastic will also make sure that your house expands in various degrees when it is heated up by sunshine which would cause significant structural damage over time. The palace also has a lot of self destruct buttons which is trouble when you run with a cast as wild as Pinkie’s.

Pinkie: Who invited you here?! You know what.. you can stay.. lots of these palaces have been needing changes , you might be useful. Besides.. now I got two sitcom characters and WandaVision is super popular right now.. I might be able to bank on their success by doing this weird cross over thingamajig myself.

Ted: Cool, while we go to the next lot , how about I tell you the story of how I met the mother of my children?!

Phil & Pinkie: NO!!!!!

Princess Peach Castle (The Mario Series)

Phil: So you seem to like Nintendo so I figured let’s try this one as well, this one might be a bit pricey to get but it needs the least work. It is in functioning order.. and it also doubles as a dimensional hubworld , you can hang up a painting of Scott and jump straight through his blog by jumping through a painting. I love Scott! he talks about such great tech! There is room for a lot of those rooms.. and the castle is pretty much cleaned of all other furniture so you can move right in! The times of the princess being kidnapped is mostly over now, she recently plays a more active role in adventures so she is looking to move into a bit of a smaller place. With a bigger kitchen so she can make more cakes! Also perhaps a bit of added security! So yes you might need a few tech upgrades here and there but over all I think this could be the perfect castle for you!

Pinkie: You actually might be right Phil, I really like this one.. though I really need to do something about that stained glass Window that is shaped like Princess Peach! I mean I don’t like the coconuts of the island to start worshipping the wrong person! I know I am getting some design changes soon.. so I might not look her a lot.. unsure do you think we can change that window Ted?

Ted: That may proof a bit trickier than you think you see that skylight opens up a dimensional portal to the sky domain if light shines trough it.. if we wear it down at the wrong time of day…or take to long we may actually rip a fabric in the space time continuum which could have disastrous results.. We may even be dragged straight to hell as depicted by the Poët Dante who’s famous work Inferno has become the blueprint of ultimate dystopia as we know it! If I were to quote him in the original Italian it would go a little something like this….

Pinkie: Shut up Ted!

Frederik: Oh Hai everyone.. I see you chose a second grade realtor.. while actually I am the one that should have been listed, so I just came to tell you all that and maybe start a bit of a fight with Phil.. as it will be good for the ratings! I know what you are going to see, Frederic you work in New York and the Mushroom Kingdom is not in there.. but if you have ever seen the Super Mario Bros movie.. you know the Mushroom Kingdom is actually set beneath Brooklyn.. so this is my turf! How dare you take on other Realtors.

Pinkie: Go away Frederik I doubt any of my readers will know who you are! I wanted to use a Realtor for this post most people know and I first selected Kirstie and Allan from House Hunters UK .. but I opted out of that as well.. so you can go away too! Don’t you dare bring Josh Altman into this either.. these castles are not Million Dollar listings.. we pay fictional money here not real!

Frederic: Oh.. why did you not say that from the beginning anyway.. not interested then.. see you later alligator! I must say I love Paradise though! Can I grab a cocktail?! Maybe some of the delicious food as well?

Pinkie: Yeah yeah go ahead.. I am am busy! Phil… I love this place. It’s so cute and girly and it has a nice garden . how much would I need to offer to get this.. and could you please send these toads away?! It might be kind of unprofessional to let them hear how excited I am about this! They may make sure Peach gives a higher counter offer.

Phil: Oh no you don’t need to worry about these Toads Pinkie, they won’t spy for Peach, they come with the castle

Pinkie: …….. I’m Out!

Where did the "Shaking Toad" gif come from? - Album on Imgur

A Minecraft Palace

Ted: Pinkie, is your existence not based around that of the V-Tuber and do you not seek to return to YouTube once your health Issues pick up?!

Pinkie: That is true
.. why?!

Ted: One word:
Minecraft

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is confused-pinkie.png

Pinkie: Building my own castle?!
That seems like a lot of effort.

Ted: For Realz
And hey the effort could be video content!

Pinkie: I don’t want to spend two months building a palace and I bump my head all the time! If everything has blocky edges I’d hurt myself a lot! Plus I ‘d have to use a lot of cheats.. unless we find like a very little version of Steve that can just build a huge palace that it seems round it might not be a very good idea.

Ted: Look what I found though it is a tropical Sandstone palace made in Minecraft set on a tropical island! It has a lot of space, and you can completely customise your house! It could be a fun thing to do with some members or Staff as well. You know build Paradise Island in Minecraft! There. Sandstone will keep you cool on hot days but also holds some heat in winter so it is a good way to build a home, it beats making a house of wool blocks and then getting a fire don’t you think!

Pinkie: Wow that’s a pretty palace I’d like to make something like that.. but let’s be honest I do not really have the patience for that. Could we not just imagine this is kind of like my palace?! Just a lot of pinker?! Also who told you about my wool castle?! It still hurts! It was so fluffy! Then it was all gone! Let’s pass on Minecraft for now and wait untill I have enough followers to help me build such a thing!

Stormwind Keep (World of Warcraft)

Phil: Okay this one might be a bit bland for your taste, but it is highly customisable.. It’s built out of mostly white bricks, and has held kings of Stormwind for many generations. It’s also set in a world where cities and castles can fly.. so getting it to Paradise should not be too hard. It comes with a courtyard, throne room and has several rooms that can easily be adapted to suit all your needs, it even has a bit of a protective wall, to keep the simps out! It hasn’t been destroyed as much. Lot’s of rooms and no Toads. It doesn’t come with any staff as most people prefer to be stuck to a Stormwind of the past. There is a lot of time shenanigans with a gnome, it somehow exists in several realms and some of them are pretty dead and we might be able to snipe one of these during a server merge or a Timeweaver event or whatever they are called.

Pinkie: Hmm I don’t dislike Stormwind keep! It does look nice without looking braggy! Those Lionheads can be replaced I assume?! How about the blue roofs can we make them pink Ted?!

Ted: I got into a lot of troubles due to Lionheads so I will happily take this one down .. Stormwind itself has coloured roofs for all districts, the mage district has purple shingles if we sun bleach them those will appear Pink.. .. Would you like to change the Lionhead into an effigy of yourself?

Pinkie: Eeew No! But yeah the Lionhead is a pretty tacky icon.. like .. oh we are a human organisation in a fantasy setting.. lets use blue banners and golden Lions.. .for some reason that is really unoriginal. It is a bit of a bland generic and the castle has that around it as well but.. to be honest it is filled with a lot of characters that are spoofs of other things, so it does really fit! Let’s make an offer! So how much do you think we should offer Phil?!

Phil: Oh don’t worry all we have to do is tweet that Diablo II Remastered will NOT have HD cutscenes.. that should shut down a server or two! It will be cheap! Oh and have you heard about the new subscription plan?! This place will be a steal!

Pinkie: Ahhh Cancel Culture at it’s finest! Now we should go on a hunt for some nice things to customise my new place! Thanks Phil.. Thanks Ted! And thanks to the reader who put up with this entire post! I hope you all shine on little lights! Oyasumi! Oh and if you want to help me in the accessory hunt.. you might want to consider supporting my Kofi!

Pinkie Plays: Final Fantasy VI Return of the Dark Sorcerer -Episode 5 – A Stream of Hard Encounters – Finale

Romhacks are strange little creatures my little lights! I encountered an amazing rom hack of one of my favourite RPG’s of all time! While it shines in all it’s weirdness it also has the writing style of a 13 year old goth kid that writes fanfiction based on My Chemical Romance songs filled with “my first fantasy” tropes! Add in an increased difficulty and we got a Rom I both love and hate at the same time! As we draw closer to the conclusion of the first “arc” in this game the question remains! Will we continue this journey ? Let’s find out!

Bye Bye Butter..uh Starmie?!

Last episode we left off right before the boss fought against the Skull Train. If you want to read more about if you can find the entire series at the bottom of this post! We need to solve a puzzle and I discover the little Onion Knight works like Celes! He has Runic.. except he has no magic.. which might make him more useless, except for a very situational pair up.. like the party I am in now… minus the Drakkar who can actually cast magic! Regardless the Onion knight looks like he might be great for the fight against the Skull Train…. and he is not going to fight along! Great! Oh that other Reaper they talked about last episode joins in and casts doom on my best party member?! Of course! Go right ahead… Fuuuu , this will be a hard one won’t it?!

I get absolutely destroyed within SECONDS of starting this fight, Mr Grim can burn 350 hp easily and the train can attack as well! I get whooped so fast my doom counter did not even drop below 60! That’s a bit ridiculous… but it turns out I forgot to heal! I was at half health…. heh! Whoops! The next fight goes a bit better, and I actually manage to win though everyone was one blow away from death and I completely drained my supplies of revives and I think potions as well! Turns out however this is a double feature! Another Boss fight appears right after this! Luckily it’s not my main party who gets in the fight here but Arc the Onion Knight and Reaper.. the uhm.. Reaper..WAIT let’s call him Shinigami to avoid double words! That fight is pretty easy though as I can exploit Arc’s Runic to pretty much not be touched while Reaper deals heavy damage to the evolved Mister Grim! The fight is so easy that it is almost a cutscene. After that whole thing the story continues mostly like normal Avalon who takes over the role, but not gameplay of, Cyan sees his wife and son depart to the afterlife with the train like normal. After literally being forced to wait for a while gameplay resumes and we can wrap up this part of the story.

The Waterfall scene! The group hits a dead end and Sabin normally solves this by jumping off a waterfall! If Shadow accompanies you he leaves you here.. but this time his counterpart decides to come along despite refusing the parties friendship! We jump off the waterfall and get YET another bossfight this time against Starmie and Staryu, while the pokemon theme plays! This fight is HARD! Logic dictates to take down the weaker Pokémon instead but that turns out to be the wrong strategy and I am sent to a watery grave! The second time I focus my damage on Starmie and barely scrape by! It was fun to hear The Pokémon Wild Encounter theme rendered in Final Fantasy Style fanfare music though. A nearby town tells me about the ravenous Pokémon! I also discover the Oboro has gone…. *sigh* just when I spend tons of money in shuriken! … Well I guess at least we defeated Starmie!

The Onion that Tracks

The new town is a sleepy little town, I stock up on supplies, buy a new weapon and give him some relics to make him deal more damage by holding a weapon with two hands.. it makes sense since he is a kid and would be small! Lots of references in this town though! There is a Legend of Zelda II , Zelda sleeping in a bed! There is a Miqo’te shopkeeper and some reference I do not understand.. something about being born to be a farmer.. and Luffy.. the Pirate King is a shopkeeper! I don’t know why.. I don’t why the man gave up on his dream but now he sold me a pokey stick! Maybe this is what he will do after he has found One Piece.. but where is the rest of his crew! The other store keeper was “some bald guy” so his Nakama are gone. Either way it is sad to see your heroes fall. So to cheer me up I decide to let Arc play some hide and seek with some local kids! I win the game and they tell me about a diving helmet.. that the three heroes plan to use to cross yet another river to get closer to where they need to be!

This leads to a small treasure hunt on the map to find the right location Luckily I find my location fast and Arc doesn’t take long to find the treasure either! He is such a good little hero! The wild enemies before here I could take on with relative ease, but now that we jump into the river I begin struggling a lot! I barely make it to shore but I already wasted a lot of my recently purchased supplies! If the difficulty keeps up being this tedious I will admit I am going to end this series at the end of the first story arc. I don’t mind difficulty hacks but I have trouble rhyming them with games with such a silly tone! I just wanna see all the strangeness not grind for hours on end or learn movesets by wiping without a hint of a chance! It’s kind of annoying that way! If i wanted to play a difficulty hack I’d download a difficulty hack!

The Onion Knight guides us through yet another cave and I waste a great item that gives more MP on him by accident.. whoops! I really did not mean to do that! Might come in handy after I get some Espers though! If I ever will.. I am kind of curious to see what they did with Espers though. I might have missed an encounter with a Mermaid but after so many pretty tricky boss fights or at least back to back boss fights I am happy that I can take it a bit easy! I follow the dungeon and wash up in another town.. I guess this midway point was made so I could heal a bit and find an item?! I was never really sure! Regardless in the new city we encounter Final Fantasy VII character Cait Sith who tells us we will find a treasure, so I venture into the wild to find enemies too weak to level on and no treasure anywhere! That is a shame. I had back to town and boarded a ship towards our avenger end game reunion thing! The little Onion Knight gets seasick and says I don’t feel so good.. then it seems as if he dies…..but he probably is just very seasick just like I would be on a boat! This finally ends this chapter.. that is a fair bit too long! Time to reunite with our main character!

To Boldly go where we have been before

This story bit was always my least favourite, because it does not involve a whole lot more than backtracking to areas you have previously visited. Not that long ago either! Plenty of enemies are still the weak ones with only a challenge here and there! We go to Fraust which is most definitely not Narshe and go back through the caves where our adventure began, with enemies at the level as if our adventure just began. I almost can not contain my excitement.. I know I asked for easier battles here but this is a bit ridiculous! And then Gilgamesh shows up on a bridge…..not the one from Fate though which I think is a missed opportunity but it’s classic Final Fantasy Gilgamesh.. and traditionally you fight him on a bridge so I guess all is well.. the fight is challenging but fair, if not a tiny bit tedious due to his insanely large health pool. I do manage to slowly chip away all the damage though and I come out on top. Time to walk through an old dungeon again! Strangely this is the entire storyline Aurora gets.. this is it.. nothing more happens except for some plot exposition about the enemy that is coming, after this we jump straight into the arc finale!

After exposition that is almost exactly the same as the original it is time. The Blackthorn empire attacks! We have to make our final stand to protect the Esper and prevent the Magi Wars… all changes here are strictly in name only and for once I am fine with that. This is indeed the moment this arc has been building up to! It’s okay to keep this intact as is it such a pivotal moment. After this battle i have to decide if I will continue playing or not.. but as it turns out the game has made the choice for me. We start the battle with one of those sieges, where you move your troops to block all paths to an npc or the battle will end. Everything goes well but these npcs are quite tough to beat and there are a lot of them. After spending about an hour on these few battles alone there is a boss that wipes the floor with me.. Luckily due to the format here I can try again . After three attempts I succeed… and then I have to beat Kefka still.

Kefka is insanely hard by now you have the ability to make 3 parties and you have 9 people.. so three people per party right? No… if we do it this way I found Kefka completely unbeatable. He cast Confuse, he can petrify , he can silence to avoid you healing from that, he casts regenerate he casts slow.. the only way you even stand a chance it with the Onion Knight hoping to absorb his spells, but my damage output is to low if I don’t put him in the party with Ronan.. and I did not! Kefka regenerates so fast I can not deal damage… or while I can I need to spend every other turn healing.. and that means Kefka goes back up to full again. He has spells that halve your level so if the battle lasts too long you don’t deal damage anyway, the only option I think is Avalon who is actually with Arc.. but I can’t keep him healthy enough to deal enough damage. I spend 20 minutes alone in this boss fight and with no way to swap your party after your initial choice I have to go through another 90 minute slog to reach the boss?! No.. this is where I am done.. already doubted to continue as it’s just worse written Final Fantasy by now.. but with this type of difficulty I can’t have fun in a weird game like this.. The fate of the world refused to change and with my game being saved at an awkward spot.. I can’t go back to fix it either..Too bad the journey ends here.

Onwards!

I do not mind difficulty in games, but I am a bit iffy about it in RPG’s! Playing a 40 minute turn-based battle, just to find out you took the wrong party members and you can not actually beat the final stage of this fight isn’t fun! Let alone if it is preceded by another 40 minute long strategy thing, that was also hard. In the end the Romhack falls into the pitfall of a lot of rom hacks, being to hard to be enjoyable. I am sure I COULD beat this.. but I would not be having any fun anymore it would become homework. The amazing encounters do look amazing later on… but the story is just to rough at other places for me to care. It is a great cross-over.. but a very mediocre game that can be insanely unfair and unfun.. even though it also shines brightly at times. Let’s hope our next adventure will be the best of both worlds.

If you have a weird or fun Rom Hack you want me to play trough let me know in the comments! Due to my health not being that great I am trying to decrease the amount of episodic content I put out, to fit my currently more “when able” upload schedule! So lots of recommendations would be appreciated! Thank you for keeping reading this blog, even while I am not producing as much stuff as normal and struggling a bit!

The Return of the Dark Sorcerer Series

Pinkie Plays : Final Fantasy VI – Return of the Dark Sorcerer Episode 4 – Poison Pokemon and Pigs

by Princess Pinkie 4 Feb 2021

Pinkie Plays: Final Fantas VI – Return of the Dark Sorcerer Episode 3 : Old Love

by Princess Pinkie 28 Jan 2021

Pinkie Plays: Final Fantasy VI Return of the Dark Sorcerer (Episode 2) The Level 1200 Boss

by Princess Pinkie 22 Jan 2021

Pinkie Plays: Final Fantasy VI: Return of the Dark Sorcerer (Part 1) Professor Oak is a Bad Guy?!

by Princess Pinkie 9 Jan 2021

Pinkie Plays: Final Fantas VI – Return of the Dark Sorcerer Episode 3 : Old Love

Hello Little Lights, I once more return to one of the more bizarre Rom Hacks I have played. My favourite Final Fantasy got transformed into a bizarre mix of RPG and Anime references. So far we recruited Cloud Strife, fought enemies from Dragon Quest and Disgaea and in the last episode we fought against Predator, Vega (from Street Fighter) and of course Raditz! The heightened difficulty might make this a bit troublesome though! Let’s see how our adventures go this time and if we will go for a fourth instalment!.

It’s Boring Again

I just left from a fairly challenging dungeon so I expect the game to go lenient on us, yet the first enemy of the new area is a Mind Flayer, which takes a lot of violence to take down, two ki blasts, a poison nova and and Blade Beam from Cloud! Why don’t I mention Aurora! Didn’t see anything? No she did not because she got turned into a pig! Now this is a change from the status Toad.. but I would think a Toad is a bigger punishment?! So why a pig?! Doesn’t Gi Nattak, the creator of this Rom Hack know that frogs are better than pigs?! Except as pets! Bulbasaur is a Frog and Tepig is a pig… and guess which one is the better starter! I do like the little light the mind flayer has on top of it’s staff though! I feed the party pig a Tulaberry and it turns back into Aurora.

I decided to level everyone up to at least level 12 and kind of make a promise to myself that in each new area i will gain one level for everyone… However I do spend very long grinding and getting this done! However the result is pretty good! Aurora learns a spell that should petrify but for now seems to insta kill at the cost of costing a lot of Mana and Ronan learns a new combo.. as I try to master this new combo I spend a fairly long time to familiarise myself with it, the shoulder buttons followed by up down seems simple but for some reason I kept messing it up! After what seems like a long time for search an early level however everyone is the level I want them to be and I can enter the lair of the Crimson Blades and speak to Astral.

Unfortunately for me Astral is not the spirit thing from Yu-Gi-Oh ZeXal, I didn’t really expect it to be.. but that was the only Astral I know and with how this game has been going I would not even be surprised to fight the Robot Micheal Jackson from Moonwalker so who knows! It’s just some fruity old wizard who upsets Aurora by talking about Pandora’s box though! She got controlled by the slave crown and all that.. but once again I find myself a bit disinterested when the story takes itself so seriously. I know this stuff happens in the original game and I like it there but here it is just told much less adequately which comes from the lesser sound design

Bonetrousle on a Rivier… with Rick James

This game shines best when it is being out of the box and here the creators are once more stumbled by their own ambition. Cloud begins talking about how someone important to him was killed by the Empire and that is kind of interesting.. is it Aerith?! Locke had a sleeping beauty of his own … will Aerith be that person..does that mean Tifa will be Celes?! The scene is ruined though by his second line “I joined the Crimson Blades to avenge “That Person” .. that’s not how you talk about people that are important to you! You address them with a proper pronoun.. I might be nagging here.. but this is annoying to me.. it just feels like a fake line to keep us in suspense. It feels written. FF VI was so organic.

I decide to let Aurora join the rebels without much issue and the river scene is next, for some reason the trees are blue and the rocks are green.. it does feel nice and otherworldly and Ronin plays like a bunch of Moogles. He can inverse (shift the enemy to a backrow) or cast Miracle which I think is a group heal but I am not fully sure what it does! Choosing my directions I assume the choices will differ from the original so I go wild and pick! I do find some treasure underway but nothing all THAT special! The music here though is killer! It has this Sega Genesis Vibe to it that I really really like! See this game is at it’s best when it is like this! I make my way down the river fully expecting a hard boss battle. I spare Aurora from using her magic! So she can nuke the boss which normally is Ultros… but this time it’s… RICK JAMES?!!

No just kidding, it’s Ultros.. whose saying he is Rick James! That’s ..random?! Ultros does look a bit different though all orange like and more defined.. like in later editions. Bonetrousle plays as the boss theme! What the heck am I in for?! Turns out it’s nothing special! Ultros is a bit of a push over! It does spout a lot of referential stuff though. Boondock Saints, Lord of the Rings and much more! He even calls people out on their class which is kinda cool! Then the whole Not-Sabin gets separated from the group bit and that will lead to what normally is the Cyan meet. Or I could play as Cloud and meet what would be Celes. Thirdly I can play the main party and go back and go Fraust… that one I will save for last! ..I guess I will go Cloud’s adventure first! I assume this will lead to meeting Tifa. She seems to fill Celes role in more ways than one!

Shape Shifters

So for the first part of Cloud’s Story I am going to have to do that weird item trading thing that happens in Final Fantasy 6.. however this time random NPCs are replaced with characters throughout gaming history. Shang Tsung wants a drink for example..why?! Not sure! He fills no role but they edited the sprite to look like him! It just gets better after that though! Cloud buys a Silk Dress.. seeming very eager to buy it too! When the sales woman asks him if it is for his girlfriend he just says.. yeah something like that! Oooh this is going to be good! Little did I know it then.. but what follow would be a sequence of events so good I could not tear myself away! So I am all writing this after I stopped playing at this point! The goal here was simple.. find a merchant that gives you a Hourwatch,Give that Shang Tsungs grandson for access to another part of town, by the silk dress Cloud is known for.. a guard meanwhile has lost at cards and will let you on if you beat the guy who took it from him. From there on out you can go to the inn, beat a shady merchant for some rum and give that to Shang Tsung who gives you a riddle towards a secret entrance..

However there is so much more in town, the love returns, random houses have completely customised sprites such as the I am Error Guy from Legend of Zelda II. He looks like a 16 bit rendition of the original who said it while it would have been way easier to just let another guy say it , the reference would have landed anyway. There are little things like this everywhere. In the secret base Cloud transforms into his crossdressing form and he can investigate the enemy base. Inside there is a room for playing children. Much like normal..BUT, this time there is a Chrono Trigger pet in the room, there is this gameboy creature that is a reference I do not get and there is a Yoshi doll on the table. Non of it has a function but it all moves and is interactable with. Then you find the Dungeons and my suspicion turns out to be true! Tifa indeed does take the role of Celes!

Gameplay wise however she is a combination of Sabin and Setzer and Celes’s Magic. Tifa can cast a few good White Mage spells, such as Protect, Shell and Cure as well as some ice magic. She also can punch twice with both her weapons equipped. However Tifa also has Reels.. her Limit Break ability makes an appearance in this game so the character feels sooooo much like Tifa. Get three boxing gloves in a row and you get Beat Rush as an attack, get three slimes in a row and you get Water Kick.. get a non matching combination and you get Lucky rabbitt a weak heal that also casts Esuna on the entire party clearing them of any negative effect. Tifa is really powerful in this game and I really like playing as her. While her dialogue is a bit stale when it comes to seeing Cloud, they barely know each other in this world, and she wonders why he cross dresses. You have to rescue some other prisoners before you leave and the key the enemy drops is the boss key from the legend of zelda. It’s not on screen for more than two seconds yet the original item was painstakingly replaced with a new item . Kudos . During all of these events various Final Fantasy VII music plays. I love being a gamer!

The Trip to Fraust

After escaping town you’d think we would be just about done with the awesomeness, but no, we get two random Crimson Blades travelling with us. One is called Gus.. and the other.. I forgot his name already.. something like Winston. Winch.. Winny! It’s getting late and I got sucked in so I forgot to take a proper screenshot of his name! Let’s call them Good Guy Biggs and Wedge for convenience sake! GG Biggs has the ability Mimic, which allows him to Mimic whatever party member goes before him.. although at a bit lower power… this is awesome! It means I can cast Cloud’s Limit Break .. TWICE.. Tifa’s Reels.. Twice.. and well GG Wedge is a dragoon so he can leap up and come down.. and GG Biggs can copy that as well. It feels so delicious! Do I risk it all on the slots?! Those sure are my most powerful moves but there is risk involved, if I pull if off though I totally decimate the field and I love it. It feels a lot easier to get pairs than with Setzer as well, I miss about 1 in three times I think Which means that fighting with Reels is about as effective as attacking normally, with Reels more focussing on burst damage and normal attacking on reliability.

The final boss of the chapter is the iconic Guard Scorpion, the final boss from Final Fantasy VII , while it’s appropriate boss theme plays as well. But that’s not all, it’s being pilotted by classical final fantasy monster Tonberry… it’s so hard to notice but my friend pointed it out to me while we were discussing how awesome this is! Suddenly that Dragoon Jump ability is super useful because the Guard Scorpion targets people for it’s more powerful attacks. Jump.. kind of works like fly in Pokémon so imagine seeing your enemy use Solar Beam on you and then you choose Fly.. dodging the Solar Beam next turn. I felt nostalgic seeing those attacks being rendered in 16 bit.. and after that false start I had a blast with the gameplay session I had. When this game is paying tribute to stuff it is amazing! Cloud and Tifa have a cute interaction before leaving and now I have to pick if I will follow Ronan’s story or Aurora’s. I will go with Ronan’s story next and that will be our next episode!

That episode will be an important one as well. For now I have established that the content that Gi Nattak makes to highlight our amazing geeky history is amazing.. but the story content they create themselves.. is much less captivating. If I enjoy Ronan’s story I might play this game until it gets too hard for me to progress (I know I will hit that point) if I do not like it I will play the game up to the Esper Transformation and remember the amazing refferences fondly… but I will move on to a new project cancelling the show after a season finale as it were.. soon we will find out…but not today!

All Posts in this Series!

Pinkie Plays: Final Fantasy VI Return of the Dark Sorcerer -Episode 5 – A Stream of Hard Encounters – Finale

by Princess Pinkie 6 Mar 2021

Animini: Zombie Land Saga – Episode 1 – Good Morning SAGA

Greetings my sweet Island Guests, today’s cocktail is something new yet unexpected. One may find the taste a bit odd.. but it is pretty much in line with “me” as a brand! So I planned to start watching The Promised Neverland here! Unfortunately Crunchyroll turns out to block this for my reason due to licensing issues. So I found myself without a show to watch! I kind of wanted something weird or something Idol like.. so when I discovered this weird Idol show ( I did not know about it before) I was sure! Zombie Girls trying to be Pop Idols! Yes! Yes! YES!

The Summary

Sakura is a pretty girl who is about to start her second year in high school! She happily is watching an Idol-show planning to be an idol herself one day! Dreaming off the future she hops into her shoes and happily starts running towards school! Truck-Kun shows up however and we see the girl get ragdolled through the air. Heavy Metal music starts playing as we see her neck twist in an awkward position and the credits are presented in blood! Clearly this girl will not shrug it off. Yet the next thing we see is her waking up in a creaky old mansion. She has no memories of how she got here! While exploring this strange place she is attacked by a woman who looks to be a zombie! She flees into another room which is filled with other girl zombies! Scared for her life she flees the mansion. She first spots a sign showing she is in the fairly rural Saga Prefecture and then she sees a cop! When she tries to tell him of her distress, he is scared of her and even fires his gun at her! When she sees her own reflection in one of those traffic mirrors she is revealed to be a zombie as well. Confused, she collapses.. When the cop is about to finish her off he is whacked in the head with a shovel and Sakura passes out. Neat! I did not know zombies could pass out!

When she wakes up the guy, a man dressed in a vest and sunglasses tells her of the plot. He is a necromancer it seems that resurrected her and a lot of other girls who had an idol like function throughout the course of history. Calling her his number 1. Apparently she was the first one to awaken to a conscious, although she has no memories of her old life.. the other girls.. are still just regular zombies. When she asks what this “stimulated” thing is.. the man who introduces himself as Kotaro Tatsumi tells her it doesn’t matter and everything is like all that other zombie media. His plan for resurrecting these girls is that he wishes to return glory to the Saga District.. who once produced some great idols! This Idol Project he started is given a title that is quite similar to the title of the show! Would you look at that! Not quite but close enough! As Sakura is being nibbled on by one of the braindead girls Sakura asks how he plans to make them idols.. and he says he entered them in an open stage event Today!

Now in full mortal make-up Sakura discovers she has been signed up for a heavy metal open stage! This won’t go well, her new friends will surely eat the crowd. Tatsumi tells her she is responsible however .. and the performance begins. A nervous Sakura almost immediately gets booed off the stage and she narrowly avoids one of her fellow zombies to eat the audience. However when their new manager begins to play some metal music a few of the girls find themselves headbanging ..flailing their broken bodies around, as if their necks were broken.. impressing the metalheads. The blond zombie whose name I don’t know yet.. even though it was shown once.. finds a megaphone and begins screaming in it.. randomly.. it amps up the metalheads even more. Sakura sees this and just wails in the microphone as well and flails her broken body around to do some impressive headbanging.

The crowd goes wild and while staring into the stage light it seems as if Sakura remembers something.. an idol group of some kind! She is having a fun time and decides to stage dive…. which leads to the other girls following her example and munching on the audience. As Sakura remembers her first failed performance she also thinks back on those idols she met. Then a scream is heard from the house! She runs inside and finds out nearly all the zombie girls have suddenly awakened. She has an awkward talk to make.. she starts addressing them by shouting GOOD MORNING.

The Positives

Okay long Summary! But hey that is quite usual with first episodes! I had a great time with this show and it is a great show to watch in times like these. It’s super breezy and lighthearted but I also found the episode to be quite creative! The show is super self aware which gives it a nice and lovely tone. It doesn’t create false expectations, it will just give you a big stupid grin for being something so silly yet charming. I also like the visuals, it is bright despite also being washed out and zombie-like at the same time. It shows the contradiction between the world of zombies and Idols well. I also really like the voice actress so far! She just feels so right for the part and the stress and confusion in her voice can be heard when she experiences these emotions. There is a lot of colour in that voice and that is important for an Idol show I’d say! The design of the girls is all pretty amazing as well. I don’t know them much yet but I really love the bitey zombie! The Blonde and the Blue haired girl really appeal to me as well. I really like how the Blue one was depicted with a big heart on the outside. There is a lot you can do with this.

I also love how much contrast there is in this show. We see a super cute girl running out in the street.. then I see one of the most brutal truck-kun kills yet! Quite visceral! Mostly because we just see her head crack against the window and then ragdolled in slow motion as slowly parts of her body seize to function, letting go of her homework, her head falling back with eyes that grow more empty! Eek! The metal music playing with that.. while not a type of music I appreciate too much unless sung by Johathan Young, really helped this scene. The idea of cute girls singing metal on stage reminds me of the charm of BabyMetal. I like them as well… kinda! There is a constant balance between dark and somewhat edgy with ultra cute and I really dig that. I also like that the show knows you can’t really write this stuff well so they spoof it themselves, making a joke about not providing satisfying answers. I know I will not get those now.. and at least I can chuckle with it.

The Negatives

While I will not be terribly harsh on it, I do think the first episode misses a good song to bob to! Love Live had the amazing Start Dash, and while I might not expect Death Musume (Name Pending) to do the song.. perhaps a sweet idol song from future rivals or something would have been a good way to insert a bit more idol feelings. Have Sakura sing an idol song at the beginning of the show.. a song she was working on.. forgot and through the course of the show might be able to remember. In short I wanted a bit more of that “Pitch Perfect” Vibe. While I still got a very funny and colourful comedy, I don’t think it is that unfair to ask for at least a bit of music in an Idol show right?! A bit more background in Sakura’s idol dream could have done wonders! It’s good as it is but it is just something that could have been done better, in my humble opinion! Who knows maybe she will remember more later.

While I do love the idea of having a super vague story that is filled with plot holes that the characters just ignore, I do want to know more about how these zombies work, will they infect people they bite? Probably not.. given that they are dead people from across time I am 95% sure they were made by necromancy! I don’t think those zombies infect. It might be something we will see next episode! I also would not mind if the show leaned a bit more into that darkness. When we see the zombies attack the audience, show a bit of blood, confirm a fatality or something! I do like the mix between light and dark, but I feel the show could use a little more commitment to the dark aspects.. that being said I do think they will fade away a bit more as the girls become more aware so it is quite excusable! Though if that darkness DOES indeed fade away I think that would kind of be all the more reason to do it! So yeah.. again not so much a negative as it would be a point of improvement.

The Score

This episode is a clear Berry Good to me! It is a very personal Berry Good though because this show is weird and self aware . It isn’t very clean written, some things don’t make sense and there isn’t much depth. In fact if you would be able to talk to this episode and ask “Where is your Depth?” It would probably answer “Depth? Isn’t that that guy who got fired from those wizardy movies?… Oh hey look… a butterfly” So this is one of those shows that is very much not for everyone, yet I felt it is very much for me! It is also perfect for when you are feeling a tad blue, it is just cute but kind of twisted fun! I was in the mood for that so yay! It pretty much delivered what I expected from it! I really never heard of this before so I was happy to have discovered it!

I do not think this anime will enter in my top 5 anime anytime soon, though they are almost all exclusively weird shows so who knows! It might just get there.. I already rate it higher than Code Geass and Attack on Titan, so this is probably really a show for me! I hope it doesn’t go deep into lewding the Zombie girls, that would completely ruin this for me but I have no idea on what to expect! For now I kind of think it is anime junkfood. Sometimes you can appreciate that more than a gourmet meal, and while I am in lockdown, I am just a few cute songs shy of falling in love!

Turkey’s, Trailer Trash and Tires : Rubber (2011) Review

I held a poll on my twitter to see what type of movies I should review for Halloween. Good Movies, Bad Movies, Weird movies or Candy! Two people wished me to review good movies, one person wished candy reviews and the rest of you were quite neatly evenly divided between bad and weird movies. With weird movies taking the win! So for my first movie review of Halloween month I picked one I think is both weird and bad…. but the movie reviews fairly well…That movie is 2011’s Rubber

Who Directed This Movie Pinkie?

Rubber is this quasi-artistic horror comedy created by Quentin Dupieux! A director known for …… some french movies I never saw! It “stars” Jack Plotnick…who plays a failed Superhero in Mystery man! Roxanne Mesquida known for “other French Stuff” and Stephen Spinella who was a barely named character in Sean Penn’s Milk. The chubbier supernerd from CSI Cyber is also here …for a bit. Getting a 5.8 on IMDB a 46% on Rotten Tomatoes with a whopping 69% critic approval and a 5.9 on Metacrtic.. this might oly be a weird movie. .I really REALLY dislike it quite a bit more though.

What is this movie about Pinkie?

Well the plot of this movie is a bit complex. A cop/actor is trapped in a scenario where he has to solve a series of mysterious murders..realising he is in a movie he tries to manipulate the audience into dying so the movie ends prematurely so he can go home. On a second level the actual Movie is about a Tire coming alive and it discovers it has quite a bit of homicidal tendencies. Having fun killing things the tire travels across a desert state blowing people up with psychic power it discovers after being unable to destroy a beer bottle with normal means. It’s murderous travels allow it to cross paths with the beautiful Sheila who it wants to win over. However his killing spree has attracted the attention of a very persistent cop!

Haha Funny Joke Pinkie, No Seriously what is this movie about?

No no! I wasn’t actually lying, that is actually the plot. It’s a story about a killer tire blowing up people’s heads with it’s psychokinetic powers! With a subplot of a cop finding his movie to dumb and trying to boundary break it. Topped of with a sauce of the movie trying to be pretentious while actually being dumb. Which is my biggest gripe with this movie. While it might not be actually pretentious and clearly fakes this in a self proclaimed homage to ‘No reason” there is something really vexing about that pretentiousness The way it is shot almost feels as if the creator is trying to say “ooooh look at me.. I am so artistic” and while he does say that it is in a sarcastic tone.Which could work..but for me a story about a killer tire played off as something more and smarter than that…doesn’t really connect.

So… you aren’t joking?! Really?!

Listen guys you wanted me to do weird or bad movies! But yes! This movie starts with the main policeman played by that guy from Milk..talking about movies I would much rather see! But not before he drives his copcar to hit some chairs spread out on a desert road. Or well excuse me.. his driver is doing that while he is riding in the trunk. Why?! Well he explains it trough those movie questions! “Why is the Alien in E.T. Brown? No Reason…Why doesn’t anybody go to the bathroom in the Texas Chainsaw Massacre… No Reason!” This keeps going on and on telling things in movies that happen for no reason. He then tells us the movie we are about to see is made for no reason and made in the spirit of no reason. We then see the camera pan to where we the audience would be..and suddenly there is a group of desert tourists… called the audience who are going to watch the movie as a live experience.. They are given binoculars and someone mentions it is starting and we pan to a title screen and meet our main character.Note from here on out there will be spoilers but also notes .. I don’t think spoilers matter at all for this movie. Just I can not discuss how weird it is without discussing the plot.

The screen shows a tire covered in sand that for no reason wakes up.. it straightens up and tries to roll by itself. An art it has not fully mastered yet. So Bambi style we see a tire rolling a few feet ahead and then falling over again…….. until it is good enough to travel of course. Yet we find the first obstacle in his path! An empty water bottle! The tired seems surprised at how little resistance the bottle offers and pushes further into it. Enjoying the sound of the bottle warping. How do I know how it feels? I don’t know! They do cleverly film that way. It is even happier when it kills a scorpion..which I am pretty sure was actually killed for this movie. I bet they also had to kill more than one! It figures out it can not break a beer bottle and it gets angry as its need for destruction goes further. It manifest psychokinetic powers and by shaking slightly it can blow stuff up .. so the beer bottle gets blown up.. than a rusty tin can.. and while it swerves cheerfully across the sand it encounters a bunny and blows it up… let’s hope they did not blow up a real one!

Omg Pinkie is this real what happens next?!

We cut back to the crowd and see some exposition being exchanged by people as well as movie audience grievances playing a big role in this. You have the girls that want absolute silence, the guys who just want to have fun, the guys who loudly theorise with each other and the audience that doesn’t understand. As they bicker more we get some more tire scenes until eventually the tire gets tired..and just drops over and sleeps. The audience sleeps in the desert as well as the movie isn’t over yet. One guy in a wheelchair never sleeps however and studies the tire all night.

The next day the tire hits the road! Literally! It finally reaches the main road and decides to follow it. Here it sees Sheila for the first time ..but not before we get a serene scene of the tire drinking from a body of water……… which later is completely omitted but hey.. If you have never seen footage of a goodyear tire drinking in a shot that looks like a nature documentary about the tire.. then this movie has something new for you! I mean I am not sure if I ever saw a movie about a horney tire trying to romance a human girl either… in fact I am pretty sure this is the only movie about a tire! Regardless..most of the time we follow the tire is a close third person perspective which I think is shame. This movie might have been more interesting and less faux pretentious if it looked like we were watching it through our binoculars. The movie flirts with the idea of two worlds but then doesn’t keep us connected to the first one enough making the subplot feel more stupid than smart.

It’s easy to see what the makers are trying to do here, but there is no real commitment to anything. While the tire is chasing the woman for example it gets run over by two guys speeding. Since you established the tire having to learn things and it having simple moments like needing sleep and needing drink.. it would be nice if you made the tire feel pain or something here..It would not make sense either.. but it would consistently not make sense. Now we get a weird mix of it just being a tire and being a living thing. Eventually though the car reaches a gas station where it makes its first human kil. A semi decent head exploding effect the maker liked so much that from now on out it is all the kill we get. The tire travels on as the police react to the head blowing up thing..but since it is a tire rolling around a road and could in no way be a dangerous obstruction the police ignore it and move on ahead. The tire reaches a motel where it watches Sheila shower… it likes it!

Hahaha this sounds like a joke with a punchline! Does anything really interesting happen after that?

Well.. we cut back to the desert again and see some guys really enjoy the shower scene as well. Some women are offended that they are so loud about it and tell them to show up. “If we are bothering you go sit somewhere else” is said and so the movie delves further into the issues of a movie audience. Luckily not for that much longer as this horrible subplot is about to come to an end…sort off. By here I must say the choice in music is very strange.. as most of the time there is non.. which could work and make things creepy..but not if it’s a movie about a tire feeling lusty for a lady! Or if we see it merrily roll along a road. It makes the movie feel dull.. and unfinished. This movie could have really done with an 80’s like Killer soundtrack knowing that the tire is about to strike again. Unfortunately we just get room tone.

The Tire gets a room in a hotel and without any explanation mages to get himself onto a bed where he manages to turn of a tv and watch the Fitness channel.. liking this new girl he sees. He likes her a lot because after he is done he has to take it cold shower! That is right .. the tire .. gets a shower scene. And before you mistake this for a cgi movie.. no this tire has no face or no eyes, no expression it’s an actual tire being filmed in a shower. He can’t roll over beer bottles but somehow he can manifest in a shower…no reason why! Oh dear Arceus am I beginning to appreciate this more as I write this out?!.Nah?! Right?! ……

A few rooms away and a little earlier from the tire is one of the producer assistants, the one in cahoots with our main officer man. We see him get a phone call from a person called “the Master ”, a plotline that goes nowhere. As he apologies to this master he says he will do his duty tomorrow morning. He gets up and we see him in his boxers and a living turkey in his room! Now you may wonder.. Why does this guy who has something to do with the fake audience have a live turkey in his room?! Well it’s so that he can feed it to the audience later of course. Which he does by dumping it in the sand and everyone just pigs out over cold turkey that has been prepared by a stranger who earlier stole your stuff .. and he dumped it in the sand…why?! Oh right! … No reason!

The tire gets found in the shower and tossed out by a maid who thinks it’s a prank..so obviously she gets her head blown up in another room as the tire traps her for some reason. Again.. no visuals or no music to increase tension a little bit.. The movie knows it’s about a killer tire so it isn’t trying.While I do not mind that vision not trying because it’s needed doesn’t mean you can’t have fun with it. Give it a synth-wave killer theme! PLEASE! Give it something. But no.. the tire gets nothing and as it stares at Sheila in the motel pool we as an audience get treated to a shot of a tire on concrete.. now with a bit of music but the still shot holds on for half a minute or so….on a tire! Not a cg tire that stares at us or something.. no a piece of rubber!!….Hey title of the movie right there!

Wait when you say the audience do you mean us or the audience in the movie?!

Oh right sorry! I mean us.. because the other audience is gone. They are dead. That turkey guy poisoned the turkey and everyone except for the wheelchair guy dies in complete agony! Even the little kid is in pain while he dies. Wheelchair audience guys says he will make sure their deaths are not invaine by watching the entire movie..as we move into the dumbest part of the movie yet…As the tire falls in the water of the pool it becomes trapped there it can not move underwater. Cop guy breaks the fourth wall and tells the people on the set now that the audience has died, they can just stop the movie. Demonstrating he is immortal by having them shoot him…of course this works. He demonstrates it is all visual effects..but since the other cops don’t seem to acknowledge it he knows something is wrong. Turkey guy shows up and tells that one guy is still alive and reluctantly the cop continues the movie.

A young boy fishes the tire out of the water and has his father the motel owner tells him to do so. The cop pretending not to know the killer is a tire tries to interogate the motel owner if he knows anything about the murder of his maid..but before he can talk the tire comes around and blows up the man’s head. It turns out he did not want the young boy’s love. The cop, annoyed now, decides to spoil the plot to the other police officers and reveals the killer is a tire..which they after a while reluctantly accept. Meanwhile turkey guy tries to convince the wheelchair guy to eat a poisoned cupcake..but the man refuses so out of frustration turkey guy eats it himself and dies. The tire kills some cops who find him and the cop guy realises he needs a smarter plan. So he finds Sheila explains stuff to her.. and together they build this explosive mannequin or something that looks like Sheila.. hoping the tire will hump her… so they can blow it up?! I am not sure about that part..my attention kinda started slipping. It is somewhere along those lines though.

As this operation seems to go the way they want we suddenly here a knock! Wheelchair guy has traveled into the set and tells the cop-guy this trap makes no sense. Again it is filmed really ugly. It’s almost shot as if it is some visual novel with a character just standing there spouting lines for a while and then at a reaction shot we get a brief visual change. The sexdoll plan fails indeed and the cop is tired of it and is annoyed the man is still alive. So he picks up a shotgun.. storms into the house the tire is in and murders it off camera. He throws it infront of the wheelchair guy and tells the stupid movie is over and exits stage left. He is done with this movie. And with the tire killed so are we!…….Is what I would have said in a more sensible movie.Because we find out the tire is not dead! Well it kinda was… but he reincarnated immediately………………as a tricycle He blows up a wheelchair guy..and is done with his attachments to the mortal human flesh! This time he has a new power. He can now raises other tires and as a leader of an rubber army he sets out to murder the people of the world. The end.

Wait A Tricycle? Really Why?

No reason!

That sounds pretty bad is it really as bad as you say?! It scores better on IMDB and all! Critics gave it pretty decent grades?!

Rubber is a weird movie, it is bad as well. Yet something can be good despite being bad if you are self aware enough. This movie has self awareness in spades and some of the choices can make for an entertaining watch. My friends all liked this movie a lot more than I did. Yet I can not deal with this artisticy tone the movie tries to display. I am fine with a movie being artistic or clever if you think it through.. but this movie feels smug! It’s fake smug but still I dislike the tone of that smug so much that it still sours my experience. The comedy is almost Meme-like.. Trollish and that is not my form of humor. It is too humble for its own good! It knows it can’t make a tire scary so it never tries to.. while I think it would be hilarious to give it a big final destination like set up.. or killers of old with a soundtrack.. and them… oh right it’s just a tire! As a result it never shoots for horror .. which it kinda does aim to be?!

This movie is like a huge meme, with you or me or anyone watching this movie as it’s laughing stock. While that is pretty Meta and could turn out great there are so many details where it skips out on that same tone that I never really felt engaged with that and so it’s a dead meme! Some people can still have their fun with it.. there is some clever design but it is just a meme that isn’t all that enjoyable to watch. I still would advise you to watch it as it is absolutely an experience… it’s just not one I will remember all that fondly… and I adore weird stuff normally. I would have loved this as well if it just had a different tone! So don’t get my lowest grade, and I do really recommend you watch it because even if I went over the plot it will still offer you such an unique experience. It is a movie that has to be seen to be believed even the credits being weird… it’s just the tone that irks me a lot.

*With more commitment to it’s sub plot or without it entirely it would have scored much higher!*

If you think this movie is the only movie about a killer piece of rubber you are mistaking! Because if I can get my hands on it, the next movie reviews a movie about a killer johny! And I got some other WEIRD stuff planned out for you! Until then please consider supporting my Ko-Fi I could use a bottle of booze with these movies!

Breaking Bad X Food Wars: The Crossover AU Challenge!

Hello my Dear island guests. We all get inspired by our fellow bloggers sometimes. This time I was very inspired by the very first person who ever replied to my blog. Anime and Fanfiction as I know her or Fanfiction Anime World as her blog is known now. I knew her real name.. but I must admit it slipped my mind a little ago, so if you read this, please refresh my memory! She created a lovely idea of splicing two fandoms in some crossover! What fascinated me most is how she spliced a western show with a Japanese video game. She spliced The Owl House with Pokémon Sword and Shield. This could make a great series of blogs for my fanfiction.

As I still can’t play enough boardgames to keep up my board game versus… this would be a great substitution. So today I take part in her challenge.. and will use it as a pilot for a potential series! If I have fun writing it. Today I shall Splice Shokugeki No Souma or Food Wars.. and Breaking Bad.

_{Note: This Post will contain major spoilers for Breaking Bad, though most spoilers are only implied. The ending of Breaking Bad directly influences the plot of my new show. So a spoiler warning is in effect.}

Breaking down the Elements

No, I will not be calling this show Bad Food. Nor will I be going with Baking Bad. Instead we will be calling it Shokuji Aoi which translates into “Blue Meal” or “Blue Food” While I could make the show a super silly spoof , I opted out of that idea. There are real stakes in this anime and the theme would be less commercial than Food Wars itself..Tonewise there are elements of Madoka in this series. manifesting more in ways like Wixoss. But still mostly being a splice between just Breaking Bad and Food Wars. It would be a one season series consisting of about 12 to 20 episodes. It would go up on Netflix or HBO. While in a “complete” series” there would of course be more depth and fleshing out I will discuss the major plot points. And thus the major characters/battles.

The Important Characters from Breaking Bad

Walter White/Heisenberg

Gustave “Gus” Fring

Jane Margolis

Mike Ehrmantraut

Lydia Rodarte-Qualye

Lydia (Laura Fraser) – Breaking Bad _ Season 5, Episode 16 – Photo Credit: Ursula Coyote/AMC

The Important Characters from Food Wars would be:

Soma Yukihira

Alice Nakiri

Ryou Kurokiba

Hisako Arato

Megumi Tadokoro

There would be other characters from each show but these would be the main five for each.
I used Western naming conventions as the setting would be Albuquerque New Mexico. Yet set in an alternate version of the Food Wars universe.. In this show teams of two would compete in a cooking war. But unlike the Shokgeki this would be much more buisness like. While the Shokugeki cast fights for rewards, the Breaking Bad Members fight not to be punished Losing teams would be eliminated. For one half of the cast .. eliminated would be very literal.

The Set Up

The show would oddly enough be directly set AFTER the events of Breaking Bad. We see the final scene of the show repeated. Walter White being on the ground with the cops drawing closer to his location. On his mouth a smile.. his eyes staring into infinity. When suddenly the cops are nowhere to be seen. Jesse Pinkman shows up.. voiced by Aaron Paul …only it is not him. “Yow Bitch.. you should not have gone and done that “ he tells Walter. “Game Over Bro’ . Walter looks confused, the place he is at seems to glow blue, he sees a lab, but it almost seems to exist in negative space.. as if he sees a negative of a lab. Jesse then changes into Walt Jr ‘Dad you promised you would come home” he says. Walter groans and asks the presence in front of him to cut the bullshit.. “What is happening”. Walt Junior changes into Skyler and tells Walter he never understood. It is okay though.. he gets one more chance! Walter had been a bad person in his life.. and normally people like him do not get reborn.. but this spirit got bored so he could do with some entertainment. Walt could come back.. and reunite with his family.. but for that he would have to cook!

The presence then changes into the classic Walter..before he had been diagnosed with cancer and begins to explain to him that he will be sent to another world.. to live a new life .. a form of purgatory if you will. There he would meet a few of the people he (had) killed and would have to do battle with them. The one who loses a battle would fade away forever.. send to hell where they all surely belonged. The winner however would be able to return to their old life.. as if nothing ever happened. Getting the life they wanted back.Walter asks if he has to kill them again.. because whoever it is.. if he killed them once he can do it again. The god shakes his head and tells Walter he has to cook!

In Albuquerque a few kids , some of the greatest cooks in their world can assist them.. he is to partner up with one and report to a battlefield.. if he fails to reach a battlefield in time .. he will automatically lose and be sent to hell. Walter Agrees , no one is a better cook than him.. even if he would encounter Gil.. and starts his challenge. Walter asks for the mysterious god’s identity who only introduces himself as Tet.. now looking like Hector Salamanca. Still thinking Walt is the best chef he moves into the streets of Albuquerque. Yet when he meets Yukihira..he realises.. that his style of cooking ain’t just going to cut it. That trickster that had fooled him. The winning cooks from the Shokugeki universe get promised one wish of this world’s god upon their return to their world. Yet if he loses.. he gets send to hell! Who is this god that likes to play games with them?! Can he get his second chance?

The Pairings

Walter White.. who introduces himself as Hank Heisenberg to Soma immediately notices how different he and the boy are. This guy is impulsive, simple and somewhat brash. He reminds him of Jesse but less of pottymouth. Both had that glint in their eyes though, both follow their heart over their mind. Over the course of the series they would develop a similar, but less toxic relationship. Their foodstyle would be Yukihara’s simple but bold dishes mixed with Walter’s chemical bag of trickery. Turning a tomato blue by causing a reaction, making a cold dish suddenly heat up by triggering a chemical reaction that would suddenly Flambé a dish. Think Soma’s dishes with a bit of magic. Over the course of the series we see them get further apart and closer together. Soma is actually interested in “Hank”’s Science and we see Walter take a mentoring role towards the kid as the show progresses.. even if they do not always trust each other. Unlike other cooking matches, in Shokugeki these challenges are done from Foodtrucks, elements that much better fit the Breaking Bad theme as Soma and Heisenberg’s food truck will be a converted camper.

Lydia the slightly timid woman working with the neo-nazi’s would be paired up with Hisako. Both characters have shown somewhat similar character traits and both are very concerned with their health in their own way. So Hisako’s healthy cooking style would be amplified by Lydia’s knowledge in that department. To keep things fair everyone has been granted your typical Isekai skill boost so suddenly Lydia knows all sorts of chemical secrets to make stuff healthier.. or heck even more addictive.. Some challenges will be weighed on sales numbers and Lydia is pretty good at making deals. So all in all this pairing would work rather well. Their Food Truck is an Eco-friendly vehicle with a slightly pretentious tone to it. To reflect Lydia’s twisted values.

Mike Ehrmantraut and Ryou Kurokiba would be paired up as both are depicted as fairly volatile right hand people. Both can stand up for themselves as they need to and both have that “hunter” quality over them. Mike in this team plays a bit the role of gatherer. In Breaking Bad he takes care of people so it is safe to say he might have a similar skill set when it comes to hunting animals to get the better produce. He also seems like the type that really enjoys fishing. Which bounces off with Ryou well. Both have this psychotic quality as well that doesn’t always show. Oftenly they are just the silent right hand man but when stuff hits the fan both can get very dangerous! And because they are the right hand man the next pairing makes a lot of sense as well. Their Foodtruck would be something of a Burglars van, with no licence plates, blinded windows and a whole lot of black!

Gustavo Fring and Alice Nakiri are a pair made in heaven. While Alice isn’t as blatantly evil as Gus she does have that same cold and logical personality quirk.. a sense of entitlement and superiority while also not being too afraid to be humble. Both are manipulative and cunning. Alice focuses on molecular Gastronomy, and Gus his catering experience will make them great rivals to Walter and Soma. They are basically a role reversal of that pair.With Alice doing what Walt does.. and Gus doing the humble style fried food Soma is known for. They are just more willing to cheat than Soma would. Alice above anyone else has a wish to rise above the rest of her family. We let this play out before the third Food Wars season when tensions between everyone were still super high. This would allow for more personal development and also keep the plot from stranding due to friendship being in the way to much. They work from a Pollos Hermanos food truck and when Alice asks what it means Gus lies to her telling it means Chicken Geniuses.. praising her intellect and skill. Alice believes this and his happy to be validated.

The Final pair would be Megumi and Jane. While Jane is hardly innocent in the series she is also the one who least deserved her faith. She just ends up being in over her head. She has the least impressive skillset. However as a drug addict she spends plenty of her money on forbidden substances. Still having to feed Brock her specialty is making something out of nothing. Managing to turn an egg and some soy into a delicious umami rich sauce, or creating a herb crust out of chives and garlic when all other spices run out. There is an honesty to her cooking .. of caring for others. Of all the Breaking Bad characters her personality comes closest to that of Soma cooking for others rather than herself. Megumi is of course a great pairing with a bit of the good guy personality and we have already seen she can bounce of Soma’s creativity rather well so this pair would do much the same. Their food truck would would have bright colours and cute fish. Jane as a mother knows that it would be hard to draw in kids to eat fish..so they have to go with something bright so they can also draw in younger people.. and thus their parents. Jane is also the only one who will not tell Megumi she will be send to hell if she loses. The poor girl is just a kid, she can not handle that.

We need to cook!

Walter and Soma would not be very compatible at first. Walter feels guilt for what he did to Jesse but at the same time triggers heavily on any boyish behaviour Soma shows. Heisenberg is very prone to be overzealous throughout. So to have a chance in this competition none of the major teams can be his first match. Instead their first match will be against Tuco and Nao both characters have shown signs of being somewhat deranged and it turns out their madness is incompatible. While Nao’s style of creating a foul smelling dish that is actually amazing would normally work, Tuco unblances her dish and the pair gets easily eliminated. As Tuco is sent to hell and Walter and Soma win by sheer luck Heisenberg realises he must take this seriously. Meanwhile Soma struggles to steal wishes from other people..because Soma doesn’t really have a wish! He just wants to keep on cooking. This will be his battle. The battle will here are less like a classical Shokugeki and more like Soma’s battle against Kuga where profit raised determines the winner. There are judges however that taste the food which may persuade some customers. In case of Tuco and Nao’s cooking this became very clear where suddenly no one wanted to eat at their truck! Even if Tuco held people at gunpoint.

Fairly soon in the series Heisenberg and Soma face off against Lydia and Hisako. Hisako confesses to Soma she is in love with Erina and wants to wish for the strength to confess. This triggers Soma to almost forsake a match.. Without Soma Walter can not win and he will not be sent to hell by Lydia.First he tries to talk Souma into focusing on the match! “Souma WE NEED TO COOK” he would shout but to no avail. So instead he begins talking to Hisako and discovers she is in love with Alice’s sister, he has seen Alice before in an earlier episode but did not face her. He then manipulates her into thinking that even if she would confess to Erina there is still a chance she could turn her down. She might be wishing for herself to go through unspeakable pain. Soma at this point is too oblivious to Walters intentions and tells her she might not do that.. but then realises Erina has been spending a lot of time away from Hisako. Walt’s words then make her mistrust Erina and almost sure she would be rejected so she states that she will wish for her heart to be closed off so she never would have to feel that pain. Now Soma gets in the fight to protect Hisoka from herself. Putting up his best dish yet.. and Lydia is sent to hell as Walter just says “Bye Lydia”. Soma, still oblivious to Walt’s cruel nature, just comforts Hisoka and tells her she will help her gather the courage to confess… he also cheers her up with his food. She nods and accepts defeat gracefully.

The Henchmen and the Pizza

This match triggers the god Tet to go discontent! It’s no fun if people take their loss so gracefully! So he alters the rules to make it more enjoyable for him to watch. Those who lose shall never have their wish granted and everyone has to write their wish down and keep it in a special sealed envelope. You can no longer change it, and if you reveal it your team is disqualified. The next important match Walter and Soma fight is Ryo and Mike.. a match against something minor would have occured in the form of Etsuya and Gil. Etusya’s wish would be very gatekeepers prompting Souma to properly dominate him to prevent him from ever corrupting their school that much. However when it is time to face Ryo , Soma struggles to let him give up his dream. In this match Walter is also having some guilt feelings in his battle against Mike. It is one of the few things he regrets. He has also been getting closer to Yukihira. In that minor match, he thought Soma a lot..who was very grateful and they made an amazing dish. Using fish eggs.. but making neutral pop rock candy in between to create a literal flavour explosion.

The challenge this time is to make a Pizza. Ryo makes a fantastic seafood Pizza but Walt comes up for a chemical reaction to make the most light air filled crust in a pizza ever.. light as a feather, while Soma comes up with a with a way to mix blended anchovy through a sauce for a less intense anchovy experience but still a flavor explosion. Before they are able to plate up though both find themselves to be unable to finish the others off. They know this will put them on top.. but both struggle to finish of their rivals. The other team sees this and begins to scream at them.

Ryo yells and Soma for just letting him win, who does he think he is.. his wish is not worth it if he did not earn it.. If Soma would let him win that wish would just be as toxic as not having the wish in his entire lifetime. In fustration Ryo throws one of the Pizza’s on the roof of Walts foodtruck. This resonates with Soma and he is back in the game. Mike tells Walter that even if he thinks Walter is an asshole.. he did nothing Mike would not have done.. he would have just done it less stupidly.. this business they were in is about survival. He would love Walter to go to hell but he would much rather send him there himself. If he really is such a quiter, he is free to give up but then he would be even less of a man than Mike thought of him now. Shocked Walter looks at the Pizza on his roof, he is reminded of his son, of his wife, of the little one! He can not quit here. Walter gets back in the game.. and he and Souma win by a small margin. Walter apologises to Mike and who scolds at him that he did not learn anything from last time. Before he is sent away he tells Walter to beat that son of a bitch Fring.

Antagonistic Battles

Before they face off against Gustavo though Soma challenges Tet to a Shokugeki. If he wins all the invalidated wishes become possible again. If he loses the Shokugeki he can get sent with Walt to hell should they lose. The god refuses this stating that only Soma’s soul would not be enough to feed him the despair of the others. So Soma changes the bet. If Soma wins he gets to alter his wish, if he loses he can be sent to hell like earlier. The god agrees and we see a classic Shokugeki. Here we see a jury appear consisting of Saul Goodman, Dojima Gin and a food critic from our world.. anyone who wants to make a cameo will do. Just a third world. A blind tasting will determine the winner and while the god conjures the most luxurious ingredients of the world, Soma manages to blow him out of the water with the first dish he ever made in the series. The bacon wrapped Pork roast… but with elements of what he learned along the way. The jury can taste that dish tells a story while the other almost felt self indulgent and arrogant of the chef. So Soma can alter his wish.. he smiles as he writes down a new one.

The match against Gus and Alice begins.. This is set up as the final battle, their biggest competitors, if they win here they can take the entire tournament. Becoming more and more aware of Walt’s cruel nature however Soma tries to redeem the man. Seeing how bad Gus is however.. makes him quickly play this match very serious! He states that he made an important wish and he can not lose! Alice and Gus cheat throughout the match, changing their prices, giving people back false change for better results..Tet ignores any plea to rectify this as he is just having fun! Alice molecular gastronomy skills allow a chicken to fry in it’s own fat. For our protagonists, as a dish the young boy and the drug lord create a steak remicincent of the chaliapin steak don, which is tenderised by the enzymes in onions.

However in this case they create gelantisnied cubes of onions that tenderise the meat and due to the gelatin texture make the brain think it has both a sauce and is even more tender. The gelatine cubes are of course also blue. Blue is also a cuisson being a way of meat being cooked.. being even below rare. So on top of the dish they present a Blue salted carpaccio with rocket leafs. The Heisenberg Double Blue they call it and with it they defeat Gus and Alice super special, chemical reaction fried chicken. As Gus’ face melts off as he is sent to hell he straightens his tie one more time and then it is over. Soma thanks Heisenberg for teaching him this. While Soma’s food style is very honest he loves messing with people’s minds so he does really learn a lot and really sees Walter as a mentor..something that changes something deep within Heisenberg.

Breaking Better

Soma and Heisenberg have reached the finals. Where they face Megumi and Jane. Megumi was super worried as she wished for her entire village to prosper. If her wish gets corrupted they will all suffer because of it. Soma tells her not to worry and that he has her covered. She should just cook to the best of her extent and make this a final worth fighting for. Walter faces off with Jane.. who stares at him with eyes filled with hate. “I was weak, but you let me die? Why” The bald man stares back and with tears in his eyes he says “I was weak as well’. ‘For the first time in my life I was someone.. not just a teacher.. I was Heisenberg’ … he then swallows. ‘But Heisenberg was nothing.. without Jesse, nothing without Saul, without Skylar and without Junior.’ I could not see it back then Jane..so you were in the way.. you had to go. I needed Jesse’. Soma and Walter whisper a bit. Walt scribbles down a few notes. ‘Soma follow this process in the exact order that way we have our winning dish , you will have your wish’.

Walt looks at Jane and tells her she would have killed Jesse as much as he would almost had.. at least he had the strength to save him.. she was weak.. she even left her own son behind for drugs. “So did you Walt so did you’. The man shakes his head. ‘No I left my son behind for his future! I pushed him away because I wanted him to be happy’. ‘You left your son because you were weak.. and you’re still weak, if you’ll go back you’ll be dead within a week so I am sending you to hell where you belong with all your weakness. Jane cries in anger but instead of breaking.. like she is sure what Walter is aiming for finds a passion to oppose this horrible man. She finds a strength within her she will prove him wrong.. IF she gets back she will never do drugs again, she hated that this man was right.. but she would force him to be wrong! Megumi gets angry at Heisenberg as well! Causing her to lose any anxiety she might have. She is particularly angry at Soma though who seems to be laughing with what Heisenberg is doing.

When the final dishes are to be revealed Megmumi shows a take on her rainbow Terrine, while she missed several flavours Jane refused to give up on this dish as this could definitely give them the win.. even though her mind was being assaulted she came up with some great choices to supplement the dish. The jury is in awe of the dish and tells Soma he has to have come up with an amazing dish if he wishes to compete. He grins and lifts a cloche. As Megmumi sees the dish she gasps. ‘Soma .. Mister Heisenberg….why?!’ Under the cloche is Soma’s Squid with Peanut Butter. A chemical reaction in the Peanut butter has turned it purple making the dish look even more gross. Soma laughed and said it was Heisenbergs idea. Walter speaks to him and tells him his name is not Heisenberg his real name is Walter White. Jane looks confused. “Walt why .. did you give up” . Walter smiles… “I am the one who decides who lives and dies.I am not the man who waits to be killed. I decided…. You did a horrible thing Jane.. but I did plenty. This Tet guy may make people able to live with what I did.. he can not make ME able to live with it. Junior.. .. he is grown up.. he doesn’t need me anymore.. but there are two people out there in that world who need you.’ She thanks him and nods.

Hellsenberg

Tet scoffs.. Hah but now Soma will not have his wish. Soma tells he trusted Mister White he saw him change.. from a cruel drug lord into a loving teacher, trying to do what is right for his family and the people he loved. He knew he would do the right thing here. Soma then reveals his wish. “I wish for everyone’s wish to be lost forever’ “By your own rule.. this wish now must be negated.. and can never come true” The God yells in frustration..but then laughs. “Well played, you have bested me twice’ ‘Young Tadokoro , plenty of fish and wealth shall descend upon your village and it will prosper during your lifetime and the next.. now you and Jane go Home. “Walter White.. it is time for you to go to hell’ Walt nods but asks.. “Could I ask you for a final goodbye.. I know I was a bad person but this has to give me some good will’ The god thinks.. ‘No one will be able to see you.. just a final look’ Walt nods. That is plenty.
A little later Jane suddenly is back.. she’s in a hospital. Jesse is sitting next to her bed.. he seems to have thought she slipped in a Coma.. misremembering her death.He looks weak.. cried out.. like he has been through hell since her death.. As she opens her eyes a flicker of hope returns to his eyes.. it’s not much.. he is almost too weak to stand up.and give her a hug. Almost… A single bag of Heisenberg money is suddenly underneath ther hospital bed.. they do not know how it got there.. but they do not care either. They will use it to start anew.

Walt Junior is sitting on the couch watching some tv when suddenly there is a knock on the door. “Don’t open it” says Skylar. It’s late.. they can come back tomorrow. Something compels Junior to go to the door .. as he opens it there is no one where.. yet he can not help but feel watched. Weirdly he feels loved at that very moment.. A big gust of wind shows up.. it’s about to storm. .a lone black pork pie that blows across the street, but no one can be seen. Just for a flash old memories overwhelm Junior a bit and a single tear rolls down his cheek. He closes the door and walks back into the living room. “Who was it?” Asks Skyler.. As Walt takes one last look at his wife and baby Holly.. as his spirit transitions into the afterlife he says “I told you Skyler. I am the one who knocks’.

And that brings and end to this crossover between two series that should not really cross-over! Yet that is part of the fun! Check out Fan Fiction and Anime World’s take on her challenge! I might turn this into a series on here taking the challenge up on a monthly basis! Do you have any idea for a cross over let me know!

Five Presents I’d give myself for my Anniversary (Anniversary Day 5)

I have made these type of posts before where I show you a list of stuff I want to buy! Fun gadgets, cute plushies and much more this wonderful world has to offer. I have been wanting to make another wish list for quite some time now but I never could find a theme! …. well Blog Birthday gifts are as good a reason as any so I picked five gifts I’d gift myself.. themed after my blog! It might also help you yesterday’s give away/contest .

For those who haven’t noticed yet , I am a big fan of pink things , that are also bright and bubbly!

Sanrio’s Hello Kitty would make a good mascotte for me if I was not that scared by human girls who actually look like cats. You can blame a certain musical movie for that. So I guess I will stick to Bonbonribbon as my favourite Sanrio mascotte! However that last one doesn’t have this awesome pink cereal dispenser! Why do I need a cereal dispenser anyway? Why for my Pinkie’s Saturday Anime Adventure posts of course! My blog series where I watch anime as if they are saturday morning Cartoons! Sure it is nice to poor unicorn fruit loops from their box and see the actual unicorn.. but the box is red! This dispenser is PINK! And also slightly geeky! People could walk in my box of a house, see the pink dispenser filled with the soft coloured fruit flavoured loops and be like…. yep that fits her really well!

For some reason these things sell really well though! So I am currently unable to by one but since this weeks is all about hypothetical gifts anyway I’d stay it’s still a legit pick! If I ever have any spare money laying about I might actually get this one for “the memes” but as it is right now I do not actually have space for it in my little apartment! In a slightly bigger house I totally intend to get this though! It’s cute , pink and so me! It’s also very sold out everywhere so I will travel across the lands searching far and white. To pink my house and cute it up, to put cereal inside! A great gift and if I go through the effort of gift wrapping it which I suck at by the way, I bet it would look like a really impressive big box of gift! Yay! Big gifts!

Those who have been following me for most of the year know about my love for plushies and something coming up on that front as well! But the heart always wants more!

Among the Galar pokémon Alcremie turned out to be my absolute favourite, even blowing my expected favourite Galarian Ponyta out of the water. I just fell in love with Whippy my Alcreamie. It might be a contestant from one of my favourite pokémon ever at this point alongside Sylveon and Bulbasaur.. there is just one big difference. I do have a bulbasaur and Sylveon plushie but no Alcremie one! So that should change! While searching for it I stumbled upon this custom made life sized one! It looks so sweet I’d kinda wanna lick it.. but that is probably a bad idea!

Not only do plushies taste terrible this specific store is quite outside my price range as well! A 7 inch Plushie could still go for about $95,- and the life size Appletun.. which by the way is also amazing and I definitely want that as well goes for as much as $250 dollars US. THat is like way way way…..(way) outside my plushie Price-Range. While The Alcremie is not currently in stores I suspect it would cost around $150 dollars based on its size! A normal Alcreamie Plushie would run about $30 dollars and will most likely be the one I actually end up getting. Yet since this is a wishlist I thought I’d add the stupidly pricey one just because it is so much more fun to see! I do not think it’s overpriced either.. because clearly a lot of hours go into this one! I am just pointing out this is something I am not currently able to do! I do believe in the power of dreaming however and if there are people with budget left and a desire to own Pokémon that are custom made for you! Reverse search the image and trough Deviant art you can find a webstore!

This next gift is based on some of the interactions with people i had as a blogger! And of course my general “image”

In my attempt to be a real world anime girl, there are a few items and experiences I need. One of these items is a Phone Strap! I once promised to give Irina one as she would give me one! Yet just like I never actually gave her one.. I doubt she is giving me one! She doesn’t even know where I live! However I have found the perfect phone strap for her! I would present that here! Check to the side! That is perfect for her isn’t it?! I am so good at looking up phone straps!. Perfection! I dare you to disagree! It works on so many levels!

I have found a few good options for myself but I finally encountered something that really spoke to me. I am not sure what it is from but when I saw this picture it just spoke to me. These are apparently called Star Hoppe Chans! It’s like a mascotte that became popular due to phone straps! So it is perfect. I considered getting a pokémon but all the other 893 is Pokémon would be sad they are not my phone strap! A unicorn would also be a cute phone strap but this slime with a lot of sparkly things ..just sings to me! In my research for a cute phone strap I had like 12 options sitting for me and then I saw Hoppe Chan. It symbolises my randomness quite well! As a slime can change shape! The extra elements also seem to have little to do with the slime so we are a match made in heaven!

Now of course this would break one phone strap trope, the anime friends having matching phone straps. Irina’s strap and mine would not look alike! So I looked on but I stepped up my game these had to be a bit weirder. Then I found the Hello Kitty Eco Hime Toilet Sound Blocker. Which is like a Hello Kitty medal thing in pink or purple you plug in your phone or key strap or whatever and when you go to the toilet it drowns your own watering sounds by playing the sound of running water. Think of all the social inconvenience we save with these $45 dollar a piece phone straps! I mean I can almost buy 60 Hoppe Chan’s for that money and like 120 if I get like a Toilet Blocker for me and Rini-Senpai.. but yes.. having the ability to play water sounds while at a toilet sounds… barely useable. Like at a friends house I will just turn on their faucets..or in small bathrooms there usually is a sink! So the only place I could use it in like theme parks or stuff..where 20 other woman are making peeing sounds themselves. I would be like the most relax japanese woman ever if i went to live there. I might just play Pink Fluffy Unicorns to distract people if I really felt awkward but at least this gadget comes in pink!

I am quite obsessed with weirdness, like I would love to have things in my house and people constantly asking. What the heck is that. When they point out at a brown like object next to my tv!

Then I an go like ‘Oh that is my Shouting Vase, it contains my anger’ and then they would be like ‘Nani?’ as I would explain this to them. A shouting vase is like a japanese invention that “absorbs” your screams.. Think of it like screaming into a pillow without hundred of dust mite thingies going inside your body! It your anger is like a pistol, this is your silencer. Then it also has the metaphorical meaning of now containing your anger! Like it got Mafubaad (Evil containment waved..an evil sealing technique from Dragon Ball) into a jar! That is lot better than having the anger float around your house! Many salty gamer should have this one! Playing a lot of retro games that are often quite hard a shouting vase can really come in handy for me.

That isn’t everything though! Since I have started watching Uwe Boll movies I have found myself cursing the guy a lot! He really doesn’t make the greatest movies! Postal was one of the worst movies I ever saw and I really have a destructive review ready for that one. My experience could have definitely used a shouting jar. Social Media also frustrates me sometimes and I say some things that are not very nice about some people I think are not very nice either. I won’t tell you who they are but a certain author is at least among the many more! I try to censor my swears on my blog so I think my potty mouth should belong into pottery as well! With this gadget I can even seem more innocent and pink than I actually am so it is totally on brand!

For my last gift I considered a full batman samurai armor to prove my weebness to the world.. but that would not fit plus at $6500 I would not even buy that with fictional dollars. My second options I considered was a hello Kitty Vacuum cleaner! I really like this one but I could not find out anything about it’s dimensions! It might be for kids and my back is to bad for for such an endeavor also.. my vacuum is mostly hidden from people and I would like people to see the awesome gifts I have gotten.

So instead I settled on candles! I love candles! But what I love more is messing with people’s heads! The company that makes this cup noodle candle makes lots of candles that look like other stuff. So I would like to host a party and put a bowl of cup noodles on fire than Light it like a candle to see the people look surprised. There is also a Miso Soup Bowl one that looks quite amazing. Or like a bowl of nuts one! Yet this one is definitely the best.

It like has an actual cup noodle lid on them you can remove.. the packaging looks genuine and me and my friends love Samurai cup noodles or basicly any japanese noodle commercial noodles! They are amazing things! I really can’t wait to see their stupefied face and think this candle is like the coolest candle they ever saw! I’m vein like that I wish to give them that rabbit hole experience whenever I host something. That’s just me! Even movie watching nights usually have an element of surprise to them! I’d love to do a Action Bollywood Movie Day where we go to an indian place in the middle and where we play indian styled Batsu games with some spicy stuff as punishment! Other times I’d invite them to totally random night.. will we play a game? Will we watch an anime? Will we go out for drinks who knows the dice decides! So yes those candles really we enforce my weirdness! Yet with $19 dollars a money it feels like I am burning a 20 dollar bill.. just kinda slowly! I bet it would start NOT look like cup noodles really fast though.

And those are the gifts that I would give myself now you can use this knowledge to find something you’d think is fitting for me and participate my <Anniversary Week 4>’s Special Give-away! If you haven’t found out about that one yet click here to read all about it!
Respectively all these gifts either depend my flavour as a blogger, my choice in content or events that have been going on on this blog so I think these are all neat gifts to give to myself? What do you think! Don’t forget these are all hypothetical gifts only! I am not buying myself a 150 dollar plushie! What Hypothetical gift would you give me?! Post that in the comment of on the post by clicking on THIS link.. and maybe you win a gift from me instead!
Yay!

The Balad of Tamago Tomodachi

Hello my Island Guests! I wrote this thing when it was really hot! A little something different from my usual stories! No Titles, no chapters! Just a small bardic verse about an unlikely hero! With a bit of inspiration from books i have never read! Also with a bit of Bananya in mind! I just watched that show before writing this and maybe it messed me up a bit!
^{<NB This post has been formatted to look the best on visiting my website on PC.. the Phone or Table version look passable..not sure if it works in WordPress Reader so be warned>}

Our story begins with a girl who is really nice,
she is the pink manager of a place called paradise!
While her blog felt so pleasant and continued to thrive,
Pinkie had some difficulty adapting to the heat in real life!
But make no mistake, this isn’t a story about Pinkie in the end!
No this is the tale of her very special friend!
You say when day Pinkie was so hot she, she melted to her seat.
When she yelled out! “Omg my drink is now boiling in this heat!’
She was crying in panic “I am going to die of thirst”
When we meet our protagonist, even if this encounter wasn’t their first!

Suddenly an egg sat down on the table looking kawaii as fuck!
Daiyobu! It said to girl hugging her duck!
Pinkie sparkled and said ‘Thank Arceus, Tamago Tomodachi it is you’
The egg smiled back at her and said “Hi Pinkie, it’s nice to see you too!’
He then picked up an ice cube.. he had used as a stool!
He dropped it in Pinkie’s drink which now again was cool!
Which she used to cool herself, with gulps so big and greedy!
“Thank you Tamago Tomodachi.. you just helped the needy!”

♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
Yes you are my best egg friend!
♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
You are with me till the end!
♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
Thank you for keeping drinks cool!
♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
Oh yes my friend, you rule!

Yet it was not over, Pinkie still was melted to her seat and could not run!
When suddenly she began colouring all red from the sun!
The girl tried to dive away, whining “Oh no! That shade of pink is not on brand!”
Her Egg friend swiped away some sweat and said “It’s okay I understand”
He then threw some plushies and pillows of the couch to build himself a ramp!
He then rolled of that slope and nearly smashed himself on a lamp!
Yet Pinkie would boil.. that much was certain,
If our egg friend would fail to reach the curtain!

So he pushed himself on and bravely rolled and zoomed across the floor,
until he finally done it! He reached the balcony door!
The curtain was there all he needed now was to pull it the right!
Yet this is a feat that is hard to accomplish with egg like might!
Yet if he not do it his friend would soon be completely red!
So he latched on the fabric and began rolling before miss manger was dead!
With an oomph and a sigh the curtain zipped shut,
ass the egg got unborn and landed near Pinkie’s butt.
Both egg, and manager now we’re safe and well!
But Tamago Tomodachi felt a power inside him beginning to swell!

♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
Yes you are my best egg friend!♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
You are with me till the end!
♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
Yes you roll at egg like speed!
♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
Closes curtains in your time of need!

The sun was now shut out, but the war was not yet won!
There was still more out there that had to be done!
Pinkie was still stuck to the couch and had to be freed,
otherwise soon her raw egg friend was all in range for her to eat!
‘Leave me behind Tamago Tomodachi, I’m done take my money and go’
The Egg shook his head and said ‘No my friend… I can not….. just no!’
Girl and Egg then loving held hands,
When the egg got an idea and yelled ‘Pinkie take of your pants’
The manager just plushed and yelled in distress!
‘HENTAI!!! Baka! I do not wear pants I am in a dress’
Tamago Tomodachi sighed ‘I have a plan but you won’t find it sweet’
‘Yet it will certainly help you get back onto your feet’
‘Do it’ said Pinkie mimicking Emperor Palpatine,
And so the egg would go on with his plan even if he wasn’t too keen!
He rolled outside and yelled to the sky!
‘Oh yellow devil, monster of the buzzing nest I summon thee, please come nigh!’

After a meeting, Tamago Tomodachi hopped inside.. as eggs can clearly hop!
He knew this thing would scare his friend..but at least it would do the job!
Moving back to Pinkie, he hopped feeling buzzing but also bloated.
‘Look my friend what I just brought’ said the egg all sugarcoated!
Pinkie gazed at her egg friend with six legs resting on it’s shell.
When Pinkie cried in Terror ‘Tamago Tomodachi.. WHAT THE HELL’
On his head was a wasp , Pinkie’s biggest fright!
Who ripped herself of the couch to flee from this demon with all her might.
The egg them rolled over the wasp, killed it dead by making it flat.
It dusted off it’s kawaii little hands saying ‘Well that takes care of the that’

♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
Yes you are my best egg friend!
♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
You are with me till the end!
♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
That wasn’t a funny Yolk!
♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
They are Kowaii , yes these wasp folk!

It was finally over, the day , it was saved!
Egg and girl , many trials they had braved!
Yet Pinkie felt troubled, a feeling so strong,
She looked at the egg and asked “Tamago Tomodachi, is something wrong?’
The egg heaved and sweated as it began to crack.
‘I don’t feel so good Mister Stark’ he said.. ‘I can’t feel my neck’
‘I am Pinkie not mister Stark, you may not be snapped and just have a heat stroke’
The egg just looked at her.. ‘Something is growing inside of me..it hurts..it..’ and then Tamago Tomodachi suddenly broke broke!
‘Holy Crab Cakes’ said Pinkie ‘my best friend just exploded before my eyes’
Pinkie looked shocked.. before adding “Just when I was craving for some omelet with rice!’

Egg shells where everywhere and on her face a single tear,
When “swoosh!” a tug on her dress ‘You should not eat me I’ve been in your fridge for over a year’
Pinkie looked down and saw a white body with a sunshine yellow face with on it a beaming grin!
‘I am here Pinkie, I guess I was never what I appeared on the outside but the good stuff within’
Pinkie softly hugged her friend and said “You are just like a Kinder Egg, just filled with surprises.
And that my dear Island guests was the story on how this protein filled hero rises!
It is also where this weird story now ends!
If you enjoyed my weird outing, please let me know in the comments!

♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
Yes you are my best egg friend!
♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
You are with me till the end!
♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
I really thought you died!
♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
But thank god you just got fried!

♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
Yes you are my best egg friend!
♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
You are with me till the end!
♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
You really smell quite strong!
♫ Tamago Tomodachi!! ♫
We have been friends for very long!

Pinkie Plays a Sports-Game? Ninja Baseball Bat Man Review

When you read this title you might think about the caped crusader playing a sports game against his enemies the league of Shadows… kind of like Mega Man Soccer for example. However if you read close you see it’s Ninja Baseball Bat Man not Batman and not Batmen either. However the Bat Men in this arcade delight are in a way Batmen! You see the story of this game is something along the lines of Roger, Ryno José and Straw were relaxing one day when suddenly a golden statue of their coach got stolen.. Six separate items. Now these four heroes have to travel through America and fight powerful baseball and Japanese themed foes ..also sometimes other stuff like crying airplanes or smiling orbs of nothingness, to get these six items back before the evil villain can use them to conjure up the almighty King Babe .. with them.. which he then controls! So yes.. the biggest enemy in this game is Babe Ruth.. legendary baseball player.

A batman in the english dictionary is described as a soldier who works under a superior as a servant. In a way these Ninja’s work under their coach and they retrieve a statue instead of doing their regular job so I guess in a way that would make them batmen. So if this game ever gets a sequel.. and I REALLY hope it does I suggest the title Ninja Baseball Bat Man Batmen! As you may have guessed this game is rather zaney! Combining Ninja culture with the american sports culture leads to some very interesting scenarios in this beat them up that I would describe as a relatively easy adventure across seven stages. I spend 23 quarters on this game. Well I would have if this was the old arcade days! Since this is actually my first time beating an arcade game I am not sure! We will find out in the future! Anyway as far as beat em ups go this one is really amazing! I just felt like a kid again! I played this game by myself so it was actually a bat woman not a bat man.. neither was it bat MEN. I played for myself so I would not be a batman either.. I think.. Brain ouchies!

Choosing one out of for Bat Men you move across west coast of america and make your way up to the east coast.. kinda! We get stages like Las Vegas, Texas and Chicago all ending with a big showdown in New York. I kinda forgot where the first two stages are set. It doesn’t really matter anyway because aside from Chicago and Vegas they aren’t very recognisable. The first stage is some kind of giant airport.. so I would assume it is LA based on what I know of the city. Giant halls and such. Then we get a stage aboard a big ship and a battle in the harbor.. so San Francisco maybe?! Vegas we fight our way through a casino and in texas we visit a haunted mansion. Chicago has a lot of gangsters, New York a lot of building scaffolding.. It kind of reminded me like that stage in turtles in time. A LOT! In fact?

In this game you can take on the roles of José the leader of the bunch who fights with average stats. He has a cool personality.. stern but fair! A good leader. Then we have Ryno.. he is the stormy one of the group.. using his two tiny bats, he attacks super rapidly but his attacks are super short range.. he is the most rash of them all! Then we have Roger. Roger is the big guy in yellow, his club has been made into a maze by fitting a baseball on it. He is slow but he has a breakdancing like move and he loves to eat , mostly pizza. Straw is the guy who attacks with the longest weapon almost a staff. He is the most chilled out guy of the group.. not as zany as the others. He just gets the job done.. he walks slow as Fudge though. While there are some special moves that show up as ninja abilities such as Ryno summoning storms and some other stuff that is a bit hard to explain.. These guys usually stick to their sport moves for the majority of the game. Ninjutsu is possible.. but tricky at times.

What is great is that every fighter feels unique and all of them had their moments where I found them more usable than the others. For example Ryno performs really well in bigger packs with low HP while Straw is really good at the later stages of boss fights and slower beginning of stages. Roger is great for the final tougher enemies prior to a boss and of course for pummeling the boss itself. Jose finally is good against armoured enemies, and in general the tougher stage foes. Still I am pretty sure these guys aren’t humans so they must be mutants… hmmmm I heard this before. Not sure where but for some odd reason I feel really like dining on baseball soup tonight! Gross!

I was really amazed how different characters felt from one another and this kept my adventure fun! Which was needed because this is a two button arcade cabinet. You have your directional keys, your hit button and your jump button. By pressing both jump and punch you can use a special moves but there are also some hidden behind some streetfighter like combo’s I think which I could not figure out how to reproduce. Each are character unique though. For example Straw can attack an enemy on the floor , Ryno can leap into the air and bounce of enemies with a homing like attack and Roger hits REALLY hard. This guaranteed that I needed quite a few continues as some characters are very poorly equipped against certain situations..but it also meant there was some depth to this. I liked it.. losing a live in arcade games is ..inevitable.. they are designed like that, the ability to switch character on a game over keeps the game fresh and fun!

The enemy design and stage design really contributes to that as well. So much is done to keep things fresh. While like traditionally a lot of enemies make their return in later stages they either get new mechanics, like turning invisible for a brief moment when you hit them in the haunted level. Other options are that some of the items the enemy carry varies.. thus is looks like a new enemy. For example there are some crushers that in earlier stages drop a Mani Neko.. which gives a small chance for an item drop I think (Not sure because I’ll be honest I never hit with a lot of them) and in later stages they come equipped with a Tanuki statue…which I never once hit… (I think), It ain’t much but still I never felt like … blegh it’s THAT enemy again. Other examples include that we get other methods to deal with enemies. Later in Chicago for example we get the baseball bat enemies from stage 1 again. but this time we drive around in a small car to run them over.. or get bombs that deal fire damage and if bats gets set on fire they instantly die, screaming.

A lot is happening in the stages as well, in the background baseball people hang out and play, in the foreground cheerleaders pop up shooting laser beams or throwing around food for you. In the haunted mansion level when you reach the dining room, you can eat all the food on the table..because obviously you could. It doesn’t always make sense either. For example in the New York Stage you keep seeing a stadium in the background.. at one point you see it sprout turbo rockets as it flies up towards you.. dropping of a fresh batch of new enemies. It really is a spectacle to behold and that is what makes this beat em up so much better than most arcade counter parts. It doesn’t get boring because you never know what you get to expect. From a boat you could suddenly be lifted up by a giant arm that brings you to a factory where Giant Baseball shaped machines crush Mane Neko in the background and the casino is always super vibrant. You never know what is next! A big plus in the genre.

What I really loved was the bosses! They are so creative and random! If you didn’t know yet I love randomness! The first boss fight is the windy plane ! A airplane you fight… INSIDE a PLANE! If you beat it enough it becomes a crying unicycle! So sad! I wish I did not have to put it down! I tried sparing it .. but it kept driving over it..so WHACK! I had to put it down! It’s a fairly straight up fight! But a very solid first boss! Straw is a really good match for it.. I think! I worked really well when I re-encountered it again! Straw is really a good shout out for the first stage in general.. I’d say over all he was my favorite bat man!

In the second stage we fight Mad Lax.. which is two Lego coloured baseball people sitting in a pink female-ish monster truck like buggy. Said buggy can obviously summon some wind up crocodiles toys..which are bright blue. Since this boss spawns a lot of adds I suggest taking Ryno into this fight. He can quickly deal with those pesky adds and is quick enough to catch up with this fairly fast enemy. Oddly Roger is quite good as well.. using his special move he can quickly pick off some tightly packed crocs! Blimey! This boss fight doesn’t do all that much special things either but it’s pink so that’s already amazing.

The third boss is the Deffending Slotmachine and no that is not not a typo, that’s actually how the game spells it so that’s his name. This fight is rather random. Ideal you step in first with Roger and finish him with Straw but if you want to save on quarters I’d say that Jose is actually best equipped for this fight. He is a bit of everything so no matter what this boss throws at you you can counter it. This boss mainly fights using stage hazards so the two I pick are kind of a hassle to use. I really lucked out with Straw getting him into a stunlock like state and finishing it without to much quarters relieved from my fictional pants. Wait.. I meant fictional quarters… darn it.. you are going to use that against me aren’t you?.

We then get to my favorite boss! The Ghost Buffalow of Texas.. he is a possessed refrigerator with a buffalo head mounted on top.. giving himself a chicken body by possessing a shield, two violins some chandeliers a carpet and some swords. Roger is your friend here because you want to get in those heavy hits. But in its second phase it has some pretty wide AoE attacks so switching to Straw will almost be mandatory. I couldn’t do a thing anymore. Still ever since I was a kid I dreamed about fighting my refrigerator with an animal head made into a turkey! Now I finally did!

Florida the fifth stage ends off with a showdown against the mechanical alligator. A bit of a generic boss that reminds me of Leatherhead of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.. .. wait.. is THAT the franchise that’s like this game? I am sure it isn’t ?! He is very big and one of the most tricky bosses out there! His tail can detach and become an powerful enemy itself. However Jose and Straw really do the trick here. I clobbered him with Roger at first but that got me nowhere fast. Wasted 3 quarters on this man! I could have bought some soda for that! Luckily when he is defeated he turns into a crocodile leather purse so that makes up for things!

The second to last both is the gangster boss of Chicago! This is a menacing god father who has two Kawaii twin tails sticking out besides his fedora. If you manage to get around his attacks and beat him up a lot you can reveal that underneath the hat is yet another tail! Triple Tail! Kawaii as Heck! He just wants to be loved and look cute! .. But unfortunately for him I really got good at playing as Straw.. so I whacked him until he was not cute anymore. This boss-fight was a bit of a deception.. kind of a push over. Using Straw’s basic special move i would whack him to one side of the screen then piledriver him and rinse and repeat until the chicago mobster was no more! I really liked his name and gimmick though!

The final stage is a quarter devourer.. we get a lot of Umpire enemies (which are like double shielded ghosts that drop bomb enemies when their two shields are broken) there is a small boss rush before the final fight.. and then we fight The King Babe! This boss ate 5 Quarters! Jose is definitely the one you should use here. My usual suspects were just too slow to deal with those charging attacks. Eventually I got unlocked Ultra Instinct on Straw though (Not an actual unlockable) and I piledrived this guy into oblivion! He is just the meanest baseballer you have ever seen! I did not know Babe Ruth was this evil .. but I am glad this game showed me! I wouldn’t know who the guy is though.. so unless he looks like a video game boss I have a problem still!

This game is amazing, the combat feels a bit floaty ..as if I hit air.. but weirdly in a nice way. If you play Turtles in Time.. hits feel to not do anything they just pop enemies.. Final Fight for example has really connecting hits. While I would have preferred Final Fight I liked this sensation as well. It felt as if I was making attacks.. but they did not really hit.. still I got the sensation of swinging. The weirdness and the tempo make it less serious and viceral which improves the atmosphere. The special moves DO have that nice WHACK! Sensation to it.. which makes me want to use them more and fight a bit more diversely.. which games like these need to stay varied. The special moves also do not take away HP which is a godsend and a rarity in this genre. The game can be finished in about the same time as watching a movie so it’s also a nice thing to just pick up and play. Perfect for people like me who want to show you what kind of weirdness there is in the world of video games. This is a wonderful time and with a friend to play with you it will even be more wonderful! If you can get it.. it’s certainly worth a try! As far as arcade games go, this sits among the best I have played! (Right now at least) So since it now is a favorite of mine……

Do you know of any (preferably short) but weird games I can play?! Have you ever played this game?! Next week i’ll stick with the same genre and look at other weird things that allegedly can be Ninja’s but after that I am still looking for ideas!