Well, I finally made it. It took me a hell of a lot longer than I ever thought it would, but I finally made it to my 100th Post! Congratulate me and shower me in wealth for I am the new king of blogger! AH HA HA HA HA HA HA!
No? No money? No crown? WELL, TO HELL WITH YOU THEN!
Anyway, it's been a long road. There have been many posts, many views and people who have disagreed with my views. But over the months I've come to regret certain reviews, lists, and franchise vs. franchise posts. I feel that I was either too harsh on or not harsh enough on some of these posts or placed something before something that was more deserving of the spot. So this post is a look back. Consider these my official revisions to the various posts I've done. Either my opinions of said games, books and films have changed or I just didn't properly review them and I feel that this is a chance to revise those errors. This is The Illusive One's 100th Post: A Look Back at Crap I Did Wrong.
Fable 2
Previous
8/10
Current
6.75/10
What's changed? Well, in all honesty, not much. I just gave it way to high of a number. That's it. For a fantasy RPG the plot just sucked, the missions weren’t hard at all and of course you had that bullshit ending. Not much else to say other than I just screwed up with what number I should have placed as the rating. Keep in mind, however, this was one of my early reviews so you really can't blame me for screwing up so early in my blogging days.
Assassins Creed 2
Previous
10/10
Current
9.75/10
There were two things that I failed to take into account during this review, which keep it from its perfect score. The first were the graphics, which could be a little off and almost creepy at times, especially in the beginning. Throughout the game Desmond actually has the same scar on his lip that Ezio has. That is just lazy programming. The other main issue is that the controls were a little difficult to get a hold of at the start of the game and could be really awkward and clunky at the start. And those are the things that keep it from being perfect in my book. Little things but they added up and once again keep in mind that this was one of my early reviews so it only makes since that it would have flaws.
The Elfstones of Shannara
Previous
8/10
Current
7.5/10
While I still love this book, I have to admit there were just a few too many times it seemed to insult my intelligence. For one thing, I saw the ending coming a mile away and it in itself seemed a little to deus ex machina for my taste, and I like deus ex machina resolutions. But this one was just a tad too predictable. Then there were the rover characters. Now, I liked it when these characters popped up everywhere when I first read the story, but now it just seems stupid. I mean, the world is a big place so why the hell do Wil and Amberle keep running into the same rovers over and over again? It just doesn’t make any sense. I may still be a little too lenient on it in my rating but it was still a review that I felt that I wasn't harsh enough on.
The Wishsong of Shannara
Previous
8/10
Current
7.25/10
To put it bluntly, it just wasn't as epic as the first two and the plot came off as being a bit underwhelming in comparison and the main protagonists were kind of two dimensional. Not much else to say on this one other then it should not have been an 8 and, like Elfstones, I still think that I'm being a little too generous with it.
Fallout: New Vegas
Previous
8/10
Current
8.25/10
By now most of, if not all, the glitches have been fixed so with that out of the equation it really helps the all around experience. Like the previous game, there was just so much fun stuff to do and to see that I didn't even notice when I first did this review. For example there were the Thorn hunts and various other missions I missed the first time I played through and there were a lot of improvements to the general gameplay such as weapons mods and being able to look down the sights. That simple. Not much else to say other then I probably should have paid more attention to what was a better game then I originally thought.
Jason and the Argonauts
Previous
7/10
Current
6/10
Even though I really liked this film, from a strictly critical point of view it was pretty crappy. The acting sucked, (even for the era), the special effects are horribly outdated, the romance between Jason and Meda was just random, and the ending sucked. So there you go. That's Jason and the Argonauts.
A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010)
Previous
7/10
Current
5.25/10
To put it simply, it's just another crappy horror remake. Crappy acting, underwhelming gore, a predictable, clichéd ending. Enough said. Let's move on.
The Pillars of the Earth
Previous
9/10
Current
7/10
To put it simply, this was ultimately a very dull miniseries. There just wasn't anything compelling about it and the way they tried to intertwine historical events into the story seemed very forced and out of place. Add that to a predictable ending and you get a seven instead of a nine. I honestly don't remember why I gave it a nine but there it is so let’s move on.
Fable 3
Previous
8/10
Current
7/10
To put it simply, I really wanted to like this game. I did so to a point where it clouded my judgment of a proper review and there are a few other instances where this happened throughout my blog. But in this case, the combat wasn't much more then button mashing, it held your hand through every mission, the graphics were extremely cartoony, the voice acting and characters just sucked, the plot was predictable and their wasn't really anything that separated it from the crowd that hadn't been done in previous Fable games. So there you go.
The Top Ten Villain List
Looking back there are a few things I would change about this list. For one thing, I would have given a few more details on each of the villains rather than just skim through them the way I did. Second, I probably would drop the Man in Black from Lost down to number eight, and would have replaced the Dahaka from Prince of Persia: Warrior Within with Anton Chigurh from No Country For Old Men. However, for the most part, this is a list that I still stand by even if the writing quality of it wasn't top notch.
The Blade Itself
Previous
8.5/10
Current
8/10
While writing this review I was still fresh off of Best Served Cold so my feeling towards that book leaked into my review of this one. The main problem with it was that it the book just seemed to be a bunch of events that just happened to interconnect. That's it and, other than the characters, there just wasn't a whole lot driving it and brought down the book's quality as a whole.
Before They Are Hanged
Previous
10/10
Current
9/10
Like The Blade Itself, I was still caught up in Best Served Cold when I wrote this review and couldn't think of anything wrong with it. Have I now? Why yes I have. The main problem with this story is, as with all part 2's nowadays, is that it ends on a cliff hanger and just build up to the next installment of the franchise. With this story, I was really aware of the fact that this was just stepping stone to the third book and it diluted the all around quality of the story.
Last Argument of the Kings
Previous
10/10
Current
9.5/10
I honestly don't remember why I gave it a ten. Maybe because it was so damn action packed and fast paces compared to other fantasy novels but it wasn't perfect. It isn't anything I can specifically pinpoint but there were just a bunch of little things that were a tad predictable and these just added up and keep it from a perfect ten.
The Top Ten Fantasy Cliché List
To be perfectly honest, this was a list that I was never satisfied with and many times I considered doing a reedit of it or just rewriting it completely. Like my Top Ten Villain List, I didn't really address the cliché as well as I should have and that always irked me. But there are actually a few things I would change now. For one thing, I would have put The Average Joe Becoming a Hero, The Protagonist With Secret Ancestry, and Farm Children or Children of Innkeepers Becoming Heroes clichés all in one slot because they almost always encompass one another and my splitting of them just seemed like an attempt to make the list longer. I also would put the prince or princess love interest cliché at number ten and the evil wizard/politician cliché at number three. In retrospect, it wasn't my best post and I don’t remember what went wrong with it but those are the changes I would make and consider those the official spots.
The Top Five Games of 2010 List
Although I stand by this list for the most part, there are two major changes I would make. For starters, I would have replaced Castlevania: Lords of Shadow with Call of Duty: Black Ops. Why? Because it was just the better game. The gameplay was more intense, the plot was better written, the voice acting was great, and it had a great multiplayer system. I don't entirely remember why I placed it below Castlevania but I may have been fresh off of Lords of Shadows and that probably had something to do with its placement at number 5. The other major change I would make would be to put Red Dead at number one and Mass Effect 2 at number two. Why you may ask? Well, I actually replayed through both games recently and Red Dead held up a lot better. The plot was better, the story was more involved, the characters were interesting, and the general gameplay was a lot more fun and interesting. So there you go.
Dragon Age 2
Previous
8.5/10
Current
8/10
Yea, I was kind of in denial about this game's plot. While I still maintain that the plot and characters were interesting and other reviewers were too harsh on it, it was just an all around underwhelming game, especially compared to Dragon Age: Origins and the Mass Effect games. It wasn't bad but it wasn't great either. It was just ok and as everyone has pointed out, in plot, environments and characters it felt like a step back.
Tron
Previous
7/10
Current
6/10
Like Fable 3 and Dragon Age 2 this was just something I really wanted to like and I let this cloud my numerical rating. It was just a very dull movie with crappy acting, outdated special effects, and underwhelming action. And to be honestly, I'm not surprised it flopped at the box-office upon its release. So there you go. My real rating for Tron.
On The Angry Video Game Nerd
And
The Nostalgia Critic
Even though these were two separate posts I decided to put them together because they kind of suffer from the same yet complete opposite problems. With the Angry Video Game Nerd I feel that I was a little too harsh on him. This is because when I wrote the post I had already been watching his videos for about two years and as a result a lot of his stuff seemed old. With the Nostalgia Critic I had only been watching his videos for about three months so he was still hilarious to me and I may have praised him a tad too much. So that's that. Not much else I can do except to say.
Tron: Legacy
Previous
7.75
Current
7/10
This was a post I regretted doing almost instantly and to this day it's the only post I considered deleting or rewriting just because I was embarrassed at how bad and off key it was. Just about every praise I had came from comparing it to the previous film and my review suffered greatly for it. For one thing, even though the action was a lot better in this film then it was in Tron, it still sucked. It was poorly choreographed and suffered from choppy editing that went all over the place. Then there was Garrett Hedlund and Olivia Wilde in this film and by god they were awful. Headlund was just boring as mud in this film. The way he talked was bland, he looked like he was stoned all the time and had no facial expressions. And like Flynn from the first film he adapted just a little too quickly to his environments. Then we have Olivia Wilde who wasn't quite as boring but was just as bland. To put it simply, whenever she talked she read her lines horribly. It seemed like they were trying to be funny with this character but whenever she talked the lines just sounded bad and bland. She just didn't seem to put any effort put into the part and it suffered for it. Not much else to say on this one, other then I'll never let this happen again in my movie reviews.
So that's it for my 100th post and hopefully that redeems me of all the mistakes in ratings I felt I've made. And Korsgaard, if you have a problem with my new rating of Tron and Tron: Legacy, suck it because I don't give a shit what your opinions of these films are. So until next time, this is The Illusive One sighing off.
