Ahh, Suicide Squad Kill the Justice League. Truly one of the greatest games of all time. A game with characters so perfect they make Kratos look like 3rd grade fan fiction. A game so juvenile that it could make even your angry grandpa happy. A game where all of my sexual fantasies about King Shark are rolled into one! Yes, Suicide Squad is peak gaming and a new household name in the gaming space.

BUT WAIT! Not everything in the community is all sunshine and rainbows. There is a sub section of this universe’s fandom that is crying out saying how this game is terrible and that the Arkham Games are so much better and that the developers don’t care anymore. Ugg, and that is just absurd! I mean yes, this universe HAS retconned itself several times willy nilly but is this game really worse than the older Arkham Games? Well let’s find out as today we are going to compare! Old vs new! All of the Batman Arkham games vs Suicide Squad Kill The Justice Leage and see how they compare to see which one is truly the best series. Starting with the most important thing in any game…

Graphics

Okay so first is the visual style of these games and yo, what the fuck is up with this ugly green filter in the original version of Arkham Asylum? Why they put that they? Did they just put that there because they watched The Matrix like ONCE and thought it’d be a good stylistic choice? And why the hell are ALL of these games set at nighttime? Makes for pretty repetitive visuals, don’t they? I mean I find it hard to believe Batman does everything in these games in only one night each.

Good think they fixed that in Suicide Squad and set it in both day AND night. I mean the only reason I can think of as to why all the Arkham games are set at night is because it’s actually a perpetual nighttime. Arkham games fail hard!

Gameplay

Well as disappointing as that was let’s move onto the gameplay! So what’s your main methord of attack in the Arkham games? Punching. Yeah, cause that TOTALLY is a good way to defend yourself, just punching. But in this game? You get something MUCH more sensible! Guns! Oh sure, in the Batman Arkham games we get a gun but all it does is just shot out a electrical charge that doesn’t even kill opponents and that’s it. Oh and despite being a bat, all you can do is glide while the Batwing is only used for fast travel.

But in Off Yourself Squad Unalive the Justice League, you get actual guns that kill people and can jump REALLY high and even fly! Yeah, fuck Batman Arkham!!! It’s like Toy Story actually. If you can’t fly, you’re not superior, get the fuck out of Andy’s House. Speaking of, isn’t it great that we are getting a new Toy Story as well? Because why commit to a definitive ending for your series when you can just milk it?

And the boss fights? Okay I’m sorry but why the fuck do people praise the Mr Freeze fight so much? Because you can’t use the same tactic on him twice? So? That’s not deep or anything, that’s just the game tricking you into thinking this fight is much better than it actually is! Or how about Deathjoke where the fight always will randomly get interrupted by quicktime event counters? Honestly, I think the developers were over paid a lot for these boss fights. But Unalive Squad? Straight to the point! Just shot the bosses, counter when needed! None of that un-necessary “depth!” Arkham fails again!

Map Desing

Okay so why the fuck does everyone praise Arkham City so much? This shit is so overrated! It’s literally just a small walled of section of Gotham City that’s run down to all hell and that’s it! Oh sure, there’s several indoor areas you can enter but guess what? That’s irrelevant because these areas only exist to make the map seem bigger than it actually is! And look at Arkham Origins! They literally just re-used Arkham City’s map for half of this one! How lazy were the developers of this game? “Oh but there’s a bunch of Christmas Decorations and stuff.” So? Or what about Arkham Knight were you have a chance to see a Jokerfied version of certain billboards and advertisements around Gotham as an effect of Joker’s blood! What an un-necessary detail! Honestly, if you ask me, the art department of this game was over paid.

Suicide Squad is much better in this regard because aside from the time of day actually changing as state earlier they don’t do anything stupid like wall off a whole area of the city while trying to come up with some lame lore reason why.

Characters

Okay so Arkham Asylum had like what, two playable characters who were basically just the same with very insignificant changes. City, four with the same issue. Origins, do you get my point yet? And all did the same thing overall. Punching. Like, who the fuck punches there oponents? Susicide Squad though? Eight characters, all unique movement styles and actually doing the smart thing and bringing guns with them! Thank god!

And I don’t care if Knight had like 8 characters to play as as well, they all were the same anyway at the end of the day being punchers! But Suicide Squad? Guns! How cooler is that!?!?

Story

Of course, what’s the point of setting Suicide Squad Kill The Justice League in the Arkham verse without giving it some continuity? And…

Yeah, anyone who praises the Arkham games for their story is a fucking sad loser who gets no bitches. The stories in the Arkhamverse are melodramatic and for chumps. Every so often I get some butt hurt fanboys asking me “HOW CAN YOU NOT FEEL EMOTION OVER THE ENDING OF ARKHAM KNIGHT? ☹” Bitch please! I just spent the whole day grinding out trophies for some Saint Patricks Day looking redditor just for the sake of the games true ending and I’m meant to feel emotion over an “ambiguous” ending that isn’t even ambiguous anymore? Only emotion I felt in that moment was that I didn’t have to play that garbage anymore. Or how about Origins that seriously thought we’d be fooled by Alfred dying when we know he’s alive in the other games? Or how it always comes down to the fucking Joker in these games being the villain?

Suicide Squad Kill the Justice League's story works because the gameplay and the story both match the tone! The sillier dialogue matches this games more energetic and wacky tone so much! There’s no silly melodrama or tension or “character development.” Not to mention Harley Quinn killing of Batman is a metherphore for Rocksteady finally letting go of their past that has shacked them for so long. Anyone who whines about this moment is stuck in the past and is a nostalgic blinded baby who hasn’t gotten their pacifier taking out in a long time and probably still drinks from juice boxes they get from their mothers!

“bUt SuIcIdE sQuAd Is TwO sIlLy!” YOU FIGHT SCARECROW IN A LITTERAL DREAM WORLD IN ASLYUM AND THE MAD HATTER FROM ALICE IN WONDERLAND IN CITY YOU FUCKING TURD!

“bUt I wAnT a MoRe SeRiOuS sUpErHeRo GaMe!” UGG! If you want a more “serious” superhero game go play the Super-Man or Wolverine games! Suicide Squad is better because it didn’t fall under the same “more serious tone” traps those games did!

“bUt ThEy ChAnGeD tHe GeNrA!” Suicide Squad is innovating! If you can’t keep up, then you deserve to be stuck in the past! Your just an old boomer who can’t accept anything new and would rather technology be stuck in the 80’s. This is the future of gaming! Live service battle passes that encourage you to play the game more and more or miss out forever on cool gear. And if we were never able to see how good stuff like this was then we might as well of let Hitler win World War 2. Out with the old, in with the new!

Yes, Suicide Squad has won this one! But what do you expect? Warner Brother, who are the publishers of this game, have made some wonderful content in the past like Velma and rightfully cancelled that one Looney Tones movie that was so forgettable I can’t be fucked remembering it’s name so it’s no surprise that this game would be as good as it is. For those who still insist that this game is trash and that the Batman Arkham games are better than please do us all a favour and find one of the bottles under your sink and drink it! At least then you’d be feeding some worms! Just remember to wrap yourself in plastic before you die, that way when all the piss and shit leaks out from that disgusting husk that is your body no one will have to clean up after you! But for everyone else, then I welcome you to the future of gaming!

Now, Suicide Squad Kill The Justice League is pretty much a perfect and flawless game but if I had to give a few suggestions for the next game, here’s what they would be.

-More microtransactions

-More DLC

-More time limited content

-More battle passes

-More monetization

-And make it only playable with an online subscription

Hello there. I am… Umm… EllmoTheSpectacular! Yes, that’s it! That’s my name! And today, we are going to be looking at a very interesting piece of media. But first, let me give you a bit of backstory on this. Because this movie is based of a popular video game franchise. 007!

For those two young to remember, 007 was a super popular video game series centred around the adventures of British secret agent James Bond. And they were super amazing games two with the best game in this series being Goldeneye for the SEGA 64. It was one of the most influence First Human Shooters in all of gaming. And in an already banger video game series. James Bond was my hero! He made quips and… umm… he made a lot of quips that stuck with me.

So imagen my surprise when I found out that Goldeneye was such a popular game they ended up making a movie about it! How could I NOT check this out!? Now imagen how disappointed I was when I actually watched it and found out how much this movie DISRESPECTED the source material! First off, the visuals. Good fucking lord, this looks NOTHING like the classic game! Why does it look so real life? Why do the characters have changing facial expressions? In the original game the characters all had unchanging faces and didn’t talk! All the important dialogue was done though text! Already of to a bad start with this looking NOTHING like the game it’s based on!

Oh but it doesn’t end there folks! This movie get’s even worse beyond just the visuals! First off, they skip over James Bond’s fight to the dam and just open on James getting ready to bungee jump the dam. Oh and how about Bond killing the guard in the bathroom by chocking him!? Everyone knows he dies from Bond shooting him in the vents. Or how about how Alex meets Bond BEFORE the chemical room when they actually meat up AT that room in the game!? Or how about the bombs Bond set being timed when they are ACTUALLY remote activated!? Oh and the worst part? During the escape in this movie the plane is already taking off and Bond has to catch up to it on a dirt bike WHICH HE DRIVES OF A CLIFF AND INTO THE PLANE!? HOW UNREALISTIC IS THAT!?

Good fucking lord, we aren’t even past the 10-minuet mark and already this movie has so many issues! And spoiler alert, this only gets worse! Because then we get the opening credits set to a song that wasn’t even in the game with some questionable imagery with “sexy ladies” and “sexy poses.” And then after that we skip ahead to nine years later and do I even need to explain what’s wrong with this? They skipped over so much of the original game! We don’t get to see Bonds first mission to Severnaya or the silo! Instead, we get this pointless car race scene with this car that was never in the game and this dumb casino scene that also was never in the movie and Xenia… having sex with someone who she then chocks out erotically? Okay, as much of a God I wish that were me moment this is, holy fucking shit! Did this movie really have to go THAT far? Aside from the fact that this WASN’T in the original game either, who was this movie even made for? Deviants? Edgelords? Man, the disrespect towards the original game is real!

Oh but finally, we get to a part that’s actually from the game, the frigate. Except, oh my god, they screwed this part up two! In the original game the ship was already out at sea and James Bond had to sneak onboard to rescue some hostages while also planting a tracking bug on the Pirate Helicopter which he then follows for his second trip to Severnaya. How do they tackle it in this movie? The ship is still docked, James doesn’t make it onto the boat to save anyone and the helicopter is stolen without it being tracked. Did they even play the original game while making this movie?

Well clearly not because the next scene is of the base in Semenya. The base where James Bond meets with Natalia in its prison and they escape together. Not in this piece of shit movie! Instead, the base get’s attacked by Omorov and Natalia escapes on her own with Bond never having his meeting with her! Sigh. Oh and what a wonderful surprise, more scenes that were never in the original game with Bond getting a debriefing from this old crone that was never in the game who also calls him a “sexist fossil from the Cold War” and if you had any doubts about this movie being bad before, this scene should show you otherwise! Not only are they disrespecting the game but also the character by having him be insulted as well! Who the fuck even is this lady anyway and why is she in my James Bond movie!

Anyway, James goes to Russia to meet with the ex KGB operative but NOT in the park like in the game but rather in some club and almost shots Bond’s family jewels off, this movie is trying WAY to hard to be adult and edgy, and THEN he goes to the park to meet Janus. And at this point I’m pretty sure the writers were like “How can we make Alec look even more evil in this movie than he already is in the game?” “Umm, let’s add in this random face disfigurement that his original model in the game never had.” Sean Bean should be ashamed of himself for agreeing to star in this movie as Alec! Oh, and James Bond was never knocked out and put into an exploding helicopter with Natalia, we already established they met in Severnaya and James in this moment actually has to rush to save Natalia from the exploding helicopter and then are taken to the Russin… You know what, this movies awfulness has drained me so much allow me to just burn though the rest of this garbage.

The defence minister was never killed, the tank chase was set at night, they skip over the depot level, the train was stopped by James shooting the brakes inside the train itself and not because of the tank blocking the tracks, the bomb that was going to blow up the train only lasted a single minuet, Xenia wasn’t killed by strangulation, the entrance to the satellite was via a cave, Bond and Natalia were never captured during this moment, they skip the caverns section and they were not helped by any American soldiers.

So that was Goldeneye the Movie and my god, what an awful film this was! Not only did it try WAY to hard to be edgy and appeal to adults but it was also disrespectful as hell to the original source material and was clearly only made to get money of the James Bond name but not care about the original source material. Seriously, if you’re going to make an adaptation of something but you don’t bother making it a 1-1 copy paste of that original source material, you’re an asshole who doesn’t deserve anything nice! Looking at you Marvel and your shitty comics that are nothing like the original movies they are based on, how dare those pricks disrespect the X-Men with their silly colourful suits they gave them in these comics for some reason! No wonder this was the only James Bond movie they ever made, this is awful! Who would want to continue making movies after this? If you want some GOOD James Bond content, just play the games instead! I hear there’s a new one coming out soon! Now to destroy this movie in a comedic fashion. Slams the DVD of the movie on the ground and flips it the bird. Take that you piece of shit!

Generic Villian Lair, somewhere in… let’s say Hawaii.

Minion: Master, the plan is almost ready. We have found a review perfect to raid in the land of Australia.

Shadow Overlord: Excellent! Soon, my plan to add unnecessary story arcs to internet reviewers and drag out those reviews in question while the villains plan only vaguely relates to the game or movie that person is reviewing will come to fruition! Our vengeance will be at hand! The internet will soon be filled with these kind of reviews once again! AH HA HA HA HA HA!!!

Bellmo’s house, Australia.

Alright, so I got this game I’ve been really into recently that I felt like reviewing just for the hell of it, NiGHTS Into Dreams for the SEGA Saturn. Released in 19…

???: WAIT! You can’t start the review yet!

Umm… Yes I can… Also who are you anyway?

???: Don’t you remember? It’s me Jimmy from high school! Also he’s Morshu.

Morshu: Hello.

Jimmy: We are here to make your review of this game even more entertaining.

… How?

Jimmy: By being side characters in your review that will help you when the main bad guy shows up.

…… So, your basically contrived side characters added for the sake of a story I have no plans on adding to this review?

Morshu: Come on, who doesn’t love a good story arc in a internet review? All the cool internet reviews were doing it back in the 2010s and we should bring it back!

Why?

Morshu: Because it’s cool!

… How is adding a story arc to a game review cool or even interesting? Most people who watch these things do so because they are interested the game or movie the reviewer is talking about.

Jimmy: Well umm… Err… Because it’s cool?

Sigh First off, I don’t know either of you. You are a character I never went to high school with and only exist for the sake of a Bully reference most people won’t get because this is a written review and your physical appearance is exclusive to my mind only. And you are a side character who originates from the one Zelda game no one even likes outside of memes. And second, if I wanted to make a big and epic story involving a bunch of characters, I’d write a fan fiction or make a short film. NOT randomly inject a story into a review where I barley talk about the game at all. So please, can you get out of my house before I call the police and let me review this game in peace?

Jimmy: … Fine, asshole. Come on Morshu, let’s go throw rob the nearest Nintendo store. Both leave the house angry!

There isn’t one in this country! Sigh Anyway, as I was saying, NiGHTS Into Dream came out on the SEGA Saturn back in 1996 and even after all these years it’s still seen as one of SEGA’s best…

Cameraman: Umm wait Bellmo, you need to do the sponsored contest.

… Groan Fine. We are being sponsored by none other than Generic Sponsor Brand who have allowed me to hold a contest for all my loyal subscribers. The prize is none other than an authentic sealed copy of the movie Foodfight because I couldn’t think of a better bottom of the barrel prize for this joke. All you have to do to enter is type in the comments “Pick me! I’m willing to look like a mindless sheep for a useless prize that’s not worth the time and effort it took for me to comment” and I’ll probably pick you! … Okay I did the contest announcement; can I review the game now please!?

Anyway, development of NiGHTS Into Dream actually began in 1994 not long after the release of Sonic and Knluckle and was thought up by Yuji… Television static.

News Reporter: We interrupt this review you clicked on the video to watch for a breaking news bulletin. A giant evil shadow villain who looks vaguely like the main villain of the game BellmoTheGreat is talking about is attacking the city of Gametopia!

Oh my fucking God, is this really what we are calling this city now?

News Reporter: Earlier today we received a message from the strange villain who said this.

Shadow Overlord: Internet reviews aren’t fun anymore! They get straight to the point of the subject they are talking about. No more! We need reviews with story arcs again! We need to drag out these reviews with long storylines, unnecessary side plots and characters who… TV Static again, then it changes back to the game

Christ, what was the point of that? Anyway, the main gameplay of NiGHTS sees you playing as of course, the title character as you fly around…

Cameraman: Actually Bellmo, your meant to fight that Shadow Overlord!

… Why?

Cameraman: For the fate of the world!

… Dude, this is a review on an old SEGA game from 28 years ago that I’ve been really into recently and that’s it! It’s not some secret plot to save the… Is instantly teleported to the city and is flying just like the character NiGHTS does in game! Because we need to have this plot tie into the game somehow! Annnnnd I’m literally here where I don’t want to be.

Shadow Overlord: So, we finally meet foolish human!

Yeah wonderful, what do you want? I got a game to review and time to fill in and an audience who want to see me talk about the game.

Shadow Overlord: I want reviews to go back to how they were in the 2010’s! I am the shadow of those reviews.

So, you’re basically a contrived and unnecessary character added into a review that doesn’t need it and adds nothing?

Shadow Overlord: Yes! And I will spread my influence on every reviewer ever.

Oh god please no stop!

Shadow Overlord: Oh you can beg all you want but you will never…

No I mean like actually, stop! This isn’t a movie, it’s a game review on a video game! Like I told my “friends” before, most people who are clicking on this would be reading because they are genuinely interested in my opinions on NiGHTS Into Dream or maybe even the series as a whole. NOT because they want to see something they could just as easily see in a movie or short film. There are literally people on this platform who do that without tying it into a review, why not just be the villain in one of those.

Shadow Overlord: But… internet reviews need storyarcs to keep the viewers’ attention!

Why? And for the love of God, don’t say “because it’s cool” because even as a teenager in the early 2010’s who sat though these kinds of reviews I thought storyarcs were unnecessary.

Shadow Overlord: … Yes it was cool!

Look I hate to burst your bubble pal but internet reviewers back in the 2010’s adding story arcs to their reviews was nothing more than a fad and literally the only reason they did it was because they thought it was cool and everyone else was doing it. These reviews work way better when they are actually about the game or movie themselves. Doesn’t help that a lot of these reviews tied into each other either. Seriously, everyone complains about the MCU because they think you need to watch every single movie and TV Show they release just to understand it (which isn’t entirely true for some movies, like I watched both Black Panther films this year without watching Infinity War or Endgame and still enjoyed them) but some of these story arc reviews back in the 2010’s, oh boy!

Shadow Overlord: But… but it’s…

Yeah yeah yeah, it’s “cool” or whatever. Look, you can have short gags or jokes in your review, there is nothing wrong with that. That I’m fine with so long as the gags don’t overstay there welcome and are relevant to the game in question. But don’t derail the whole review for something 99% of people didn’t click on for. And don’t even get me started on the ones where only about 10% of the video is the actual review, those were the worst!

Shadow Overlord: … So, you’re saying you’d rather the overly long video essays people do nowadays that can go up to 8 hours?

God no! I dislike those just as much as reviews with story arcs! I joked before that this was a fad and those are two! No game needs to have a video stretched out to 12 hours just to explain stuff that could be explained in like 10 minuets! But at least those actually talk about the thing they are reviewing and don’t try shoving a “save the world” plot into it instead of just making a whole separate video.

Shadow Overlord: …… Well shit, now I’m depressed and don’t want to take over the world anymore. Congratulations, you beat me via depression.

Great, can you send me home now? I wanna actually talk about NiGHTS now! Is teleported back home. Thank you.

Now then, the gameplay of NiGHTS Review ends. Don’t forget to like and subscribe!

Just watch the Futurama episode Anthology of Interest Part 2, specifically the Raiders of the Lost Arcade section, instead. It does the whole premise of this movie better and is actually funny.

Do you love Halloween?

Do you love dressing up?

Do you love using Halloween as an excuse to dress up as something even though you can dress up during any point in the year?

Did you not get a good costume before Halloween and am struggling to get a good one but are also willing to do anything to get a good one no matter the consequence?

Well good news because I got the perfect solution that will not only give you a super realistic costume but also won’t cost you a dime. All you have to do is follow these simple step by step instructions.

Step 1: Get a knife! A knife will be crucial to creating this costume as it will be our main instrument for making it. Preferably you will want a surgical knife because creating this costume will require a fair amount of precision but if your feeling confident, you can also do this with a kitchen knife two. Or hell, maybe even a sword. Just make sure the blade is clean before you use it. Good hygiene and all that!

Step 2: Take some drugs! Lot’s and lots of drugs! Preferably you’ll want something that makes you cease to feel pain such as… umm… okay honestly, you’re going to have to consult your pharmacist for that, I don’t know the names of a lot of drugs I’m sorry. Or hell, if you’re in a hurry, just buy some drugs from a black market dealer, I’m sure they won’t give you a bad product or anything. Anyway, all that organized you are now ready to begin!

Step 3: Start by cutting your skin! You will want to take that knife and cut around your whole body. And thanks to the insane amount of drugs you should of taken before this step you won’t be feeling any pain! If you are feeling pain though, take more drugs! If your still feeling pain, stop! Just… actually stop everything your doing! Please! Anyway, you can stop cutting once you make it back to the area where you started from.

Step 4: Pull off your skin! Just pull it ALL off! And again, won’t hurt because of the drugs. If it does hurt though at this point, sorry but your two far in to back out now so don’t be a pussy.

Step 5: Optional but take out any remaining organs. Not like your going to be alive for very much longer after all the shit you put your own body though just for the sake of a quick and easy costume. Remember to store your organs in some clean jars so that they can be donated to the local hospitals later.

And that’s it! You have just made a super realistic skeleton costume! One that will surely terrify your friends and family! Enjoy hitting up the town and terrifying everyone you can. And make it count two because the likleyhood of you getting your skin back on after this stunt and still being alive are pretty slim! Subscribe for more totally safe and not damaging to your health guides!

I should be sad over the closer of my Twitter account especially since I closed it in the same month it would of turned 10 years old, but to tell you the truth I'm not sad about it! At all! In fact, I'm happy to be done with that place! And I'm not the only one who's done this either! And there are good reasons why I and a lot of other people have finally caved and decided to close our Twitter accounts. Granted my reasons for closing my account personally go beyond just the main reason everyone else is but it is still a contributing reason.

And since I know some people will be wondering, yes I DO have an account on Twitter's replacement BlueSky here. I mean I'm probaply not going to browse that a whole lot with how much I've been trying to stay off social media as a whole for the sake of my own mental well being but it's still there for people who want to follow me there.

So why is everyone renacting the story of Exodus and leaving Twitter? Take a guess, another stunt from pharaoh Elon Musk, the pretentious self absorbed prick he is. Look, it's hardly a secret at this point that ever since Elon brought Twitter the site has become worse and worse. From the random name change calling it X when there was nothing wrong with Twitter to start with (and also literally no one calls it X anyway even after the name change) to making it impossible to see the likes of those you follow to banning the site in Brazil for some reason to the most recent shit he's pulled, changing how blocking works and being in support of having any pic you upload to the site be used for AI Generative Content! WITHOUT giving you the option to opt out!

First there's the whole blocking BS. Because now it's that people you have blocked for whatever reason, mostly that person being an asshole or harassing you, can now still see your posts. Yeah, they can't interact with your posts but this still defeats the entire point of blocking. And this change is coming only a few weeks after I had to block an artist I regret commissioning because because they got exposed a few days after I commed them that they were a terrible person so you can imagen how I feel about this!

Then there's the whole AI shit. For a while now Twitter has has this thing called Grok which was an AI trainer for generative AI and do I even need to explain why I don't like this!? Thing is, you could opt out of it in the past! You could have it so that your posts CAN'T get used for AI Content. I mean it sucks that this thing was even implemented and sucks that more and more corporations are trying to find some ways to implement AI in the first place but at least it gives you the option to opt out. Now? You don't have a choice! Your posts can potentially be used for AI weather you like it or not!

I'm sorry, but as someone who regularly commissions artists to draw stuff for me and posts my comms everywhere I can unless said otherwise by the artist I use to always post them onto Twitter. I don't want something I commissioned both for my own enjoyment and to support artists I like being used for this kind of crap! And considering most of the best friends I've made these past few years have been artists themselves I can't say I blame them for wanting to do the whole mass exodus to BlueSky.

So what's the other reason for me finally caving and closing my account there? Take a guess, it's just a hostile and toxic hellhole that was doing a number on me! Remember how I made that vent post about why I've grown to hate the internet, or I guess rather social media as a whole? Yeah, Twitter was the absolute worst of it and it's been like this for several years at this point honestly, even before Elon came along and made the site even worse! If it wasn't people making rage bait posts for attention because "negativity sells" it was people being massive bigots or scumbags who would get upset at anything that stared a woman or had pronouns or it was incredibly thinn skinned people making a fuss over the smallest and most pointless shit ever like what games get ported to what system or not, what fictional characters who most people probaply only remember because of a meme they are attached to die of screen or who animated a 10 second clip of a Wired Al music video! I mean this sort of bullshit wasn't exclusive to Twitter alone but if someone was afraid to admit they liked a certain game/movie/show/whatever because of how some people on Twitter were acting over it and towards the people who did like it, I can't say I blame them for being afraid to express themselves. I was for certain things because of Twitter discourse.

So yeah, the shit Elon's pulled recently was mostly the straw that broke the camels back. And I'm only really making this because some people who might still be on Twitter and followed me might be wondering where I've gone. And I'm sorry if anyone who did only ever follow me on Twitter got worried over my recent action of closing my account. But I at least want you all to understand why I did go though with it and why I'm not going back there anytime soon because I am about at my limit with that site and this shit I had to go though. My BlueSky's still up so follow me there if you want to.

This isn’t going to be a happy post. In fact, this is a vent post about something I’ve wanted to get of my chest for a while now. The internet.

I’m going to be honest, outside of chatting with friends, these past two weeks I’ve been coming onto my computer to browse the internet, or I guess rather social media, less and less. Twitter I’ve been trying to stay off the most only really logging onto that site to either check my DM’s since at the time of me writing this I’m getting a commission worked on for me by someone on Twitter or to like something someone sent to me on Discord but never really scrolling thought my feed, Youtube I’m only using for guides for games or to listen to music that’s not on Spotify, the only sites I haven’t changed how I use recently have been Newgrouds, DeviantArt, Furafinity and Tumbler for catching up on art by artists I follow. Then it's usually straight to hopping of and playing some video games or doing whatever I need to in real life and not coming back on for a long while, sometimes not even until the next day. I mean I still occasionally make posts to Twitter but never scroll though it.

And there is kind of a reason why I’ve been feeling less and less motivated to browse the internet as much as I use to. Because I REALLY do not have the best opinion on this platform and I feel like I’ve made that pretty obvious in the past. And this isn’t me saying “Oh, the internet use to be good in my day but now it’s awful” like I have some rose tinted glasses on or anything. No no, I am fully aware that the internet has always been a bit of a hellhole of toxicity and negativity. I mean if people genuinely believing that Wind Waker was the worst Zelda game before it even came out all because of the cartoony art style doesn’t show that then the shit Jake Loyd and Ahmed Best had to put up with after Phantom Menace came out in theatres will.

Despite all the negativity and drama I’ve seen over the decades I’ve used this platform, I’ve always tried my best to ignore it and do my own thing. Note that I said tried! Because sadly, that has gotten harder and harder for me to do because it feels like the internet has just become even more negative and hostile than it already was. And that negativity can sometimes rub of on me and some of my posts. Which then bleeds into how I’m feeling in my own personal life which isn’t helped by how bad my year has been so far. It’s even gotten to the point where I’ll sometimes delete certain status posts after a few hours, maybe even minuets, because I worry I’m making things even worse which then that negativity rubs off on other people and I don’t want to be doing that because I’ve always tried to spread positivity, either through my commissions, jokes, memes or just generally trying to be a good person.

In fact, for a few years I have even wanted to just up and quit the internet entirely because I couldn’t stand some of the worse aspects of this place but always stop myself for a few reasons. As someone who’s made some really great friends thought this platform leaving it would be a terrible idea because I’d basically be abandoning the only good and real friends I’ve ever managed to make in my life. As someone who uses this platform to commission artists to turn my ideas into art leaving would also be a terrible idea because aside from just not really having the patience to learn how to do art myself there wouldn’t be a whole lot of options for making those ideas of mine a reality and my motivation to write actual stories still isn't there anymore. That’s not even counting how the internet has become such a key part of our day to day lives weather we like to admit it or not from online shopping and movies and shows exclusive to streaming sites.

So no, I’m not leaving the internet. Tempting as it would be I’m not going though with it nor will I ever for the reasons I just listed especially the friends part. However, as I mentioned before I've been coming onto the internet less and less recently and I likely will continue to be trying to not spend as much time on it as I use to only really using it to chat with friends, browse art or shop for things online because with all the reasons I’m going to get into soon paired with how hell my years been so far causing my emotional state to plummet and be inconsistent somedays, I’m sorry but I’m at my limit! I don’t know how much more of this I can really take. I have grown so many issues with this platform over the years it’s amazing I’ve braved though it for this long!

1: Sharing your opinion about anything just isn’t worth it most of the time. I mean this is one of the most obvious reasons as to why the internet sucks right? You’ll either get people being absolute party poopers or questioning how you could even like something in question if you talk positively about something or get fanboys treating you like you’re the next Hitler or wanting to dig up any dirt on you they can if you say a negative opinion. And this is under the assumption that your being reasonable and level-headed with your opinions because this issue goes the other way two! There are people who are so extreme in their opinions that even just seeing someone thinking the opposite of them even if they aren’t being dicks about it get’s them so triggered they have to be rude towards them. Oh, and let’s not forget the people who share opinions they don’t even really mean and only say them just to get attention.

I have had a handful of bad experiences in the past when it came to sharing my opinions believe me! I’ve openly admitted that I had fun with Pokemon Sword and Shield and that if I was personally having fun with a game then that’s all that mattered to me which resulted in someone with an extreme hate boner for modern Pokemon and I do mean REALLY extreme telling me that I was the reason we will “never get another good Pokemon game again.” I opened up that I didn’t really like Spec Ops The Line and gave legitimate reasons as to why and wasn't being a dick about it only to be told that me not liking it was a “me problem.” I’ve even had random extreme Anti Bronies back in the day calling me cancer and telling me to kill myself when I use to use mainly pony based PFP’s on YouTube even if I never say anything relating to MLP in the first place. Just simply having those PFP’s made me a target! I’m even scared of admitting which of the three modern consoles I personally prefer playing on the most even though I feel like it’s obvious which one I do prefer at this point because I know if I do I’m going to get a bunch of detractors calling me a shill or fanboy or whatever.

2: The amount of miss information that gets spread on here and the amount of people who are so willing to believe it and not do any actual research on the topic is actually concerning and it’s another one of those issues that’s been a thing for years now with it only getting worse and worse. I mean at the start of this year alone there was a rumour that God of War 1 and 2 were getting remade. Where did this rumour come from? Good question! Because the source for these rumours were literally NOTHING! Yet despite the baseless rumours people were still talking about it as if it was actually going to happen and it went on for several days until people just stopped talking about it entirely. Literally the only reason I could think of as to why this rumour was getting spread was because of the Valhalla DLC for Ragnarock which had a bunch of returning enemies, music and even locations from the Greek saga.

One of my favourite examples of miss information getting spread that people believed as true was the infamous Solo posters without guns drama. Back in 2018 leading up to the release of Solo A Star Wars Story there were some variants of the posters making their way online that showed the characters without guns. And because this is the Star Wars fanbase we are talking about of course they reacted to it in the worst possible way claiming that guns were going to be removed from the film entirely and that this was some kind of anti gun message that Disney were trying to push… Only for it to come out a few days later that these specific posters were exclusive to Brazil and Brazil only and is mainly a result of how differently movies can be marketed depending on the region!

Pair that with the number of fake leaks and rumours that circulate that despite being obvious at this point that anyone can make a leak people still believe anyway and then get super upset about it when something comes out and those leaks end up not being true even though it’s their own fault for getting there hopes up on a leak! (Looking at you Smash Bros fanbase.)

3: I touched on this a little before but why is everyone so overly negative and angry about everything!? Because it feels like no one can be calm or level-headed about anything anymore. You always got to make a big deal about everything now! And look, there are thing going on in the world that are worth making a big deal about and I’m not saying we shouldn’t be calling attention to those. Wars, corruption, unfair work environments, actors and animators not being paid enough for there work and corporations doing shady and greedy business practises. That sort of stuff is worth making a big deal out of because that stuff does matter. Where my issue lies is when people do this to movies, video games, shows or just fiction in general. Mainly media that people don’t like. And it’s fine to not like certain media. There are games, movies and shows I’ve played and seen that I haven't liked and probaply won't even if I give them another try just as much as there is media I love and adore. But usually if I do, when I’m asked about it I’ll just say I don’t like it and even explain why if I have to and just move on. I won’t make a big deal about it or drag out any sort of drama for several days because that’s what get’s me the most clicks and ad revenue on YouTube or because it’s the “cool thing” to hate on something. (Looking at you Anti Bronies.)

Not to mention how obsessed with hyperbole everyone is now! You can’t just say “Oh, I didn’t like this particular thing. It wasn’t for me personally” anymore. You got to ramp it up! You got to say stuff like “WORST MOVIE EVER!” or “THIS SHOW IS SHIT!!!” or “GAMING IS DEAD” or “CINIMA IS DEAD” or “THIS THING RUINED THE FRANCHSIE!!!” I’m not even fucking joking when I say that if I had a dollar for every time someone pulled the “it ruined the franchise” card just because they didn’t like a certain entry in a series, I’d be able to buy a yacht. I hear “IT RUINED THE FRANCHSIE” and “IT RUINED MY CHILDHOOD” so much and every time I do I groan and roll my eyes. Thing is, this sort of thing would actually be funny if it was mostly being played up as a joke or for satire but no, most of the people who use hyperbole like this do genuinely mean this. I mean I wasn’t the biggest fan of the 2022 Saint’s Row reboot either, I think there’s A LOT about that game that could have been handled a lot better especially the writing, but I’m not going say it “ruined the franchise” especially when I can still load up those original games and still have the same enjoyment of them now as I did back then.

I get it. Negativity sells and any publicity is good publicity and all that. That’s not even just a saying either, that’s actually been proven. Prior to their removal from the site entirely dislikes on YouTube videos still technically counted as likes and leaving negative comments on a video was usually enough to get that video trending. Plus, you’re more likely to get engagement on a video or post if your being negative about something over being positive. People do this sort of stuff for a reason, because negativity sells and that’s my issue! The algorithm prefers pushing people who are negative about everything, and the loudest voices are usually the angriest! Which leads to people making a carer of being negative.

Even if the shit they are complaining about is so petty and so not worth making a big deal out. ESPECIALLY if the stuff they do complain about makes them come off as bigots! I mean we got people who were getting upset over Starfields character customizer for daring to have pronouns in it! We got people being upset because Splatoon 3 Side Order confirmed that Acht was Non Binary. We even got people trying to convince everyone that Vivian in remake for Paper Mario The Thousand Year Door was "retconed into being trans" even though she was ALWAYS trans in the original Japanese version of the Gamecube release of Thousand Year Door and this remake was a more faithful translation of that original version compared to the international Gamecube release!

4: Even if you’ve never met anyone like this personally chances are you know about at least one example of someone who’s life has been ruined because of the internet. From harassment to death threats to doxing to people just being generally really wired and creepy to others, something about the internet just invites people to being awful to each other.

Take for example what happened to Erica Lindbeak last year. You might not know her by name, but you likely do know the characters she’s played. For me personally I know her from her roles as Futaba from Persona 5 and Loona from Helluva Boss. Well, last year she spoke about her dislike of AI generated covers of songs using her voice and even asked for some of those videos to be taken down because of how uncomfortable she was with them. And what happened in response? People were telling her to get over it and that she was “ruining people’s fun” and just being big bullies to her to the point where she couldn’t take it anymore and had to close her social media account. And I’m sorry but if the real voice actor of a character expresses discomfort with there voice being cloned like this without there permission or consent and they ask you to take something down you respect their wishes! Especially when we live in an age where corporations are seriously considering use AI to cut costs and avoid paying anyone! Double so when AI cloning of dead voice actors is possible which is not something I’m fine with the idea of!

And I know I already made fun of this particular fanbase earlier but I’m sorry, the amount of people who have worked on Star Wars project that got their lives ruined because of Star Wars fans, good god! Jake Loyd; got bullied so much that he want’s nothing to do with Star Wars anymore. Ahmed Best; once tried taking his own life because of the harassment he got for simply playing Jar Jar Binks. Daisy Ridley; was driven off social media because of harassment. Kelly Marie Tran; not only had to also close her social media account because of harassment but had to check herself into therapy as well. George Lucas; openly admitted that he didn’t want to make these movies anymore because it wasn’t fun anymore! I could go on about other examples especially with recent examples like with how people were treating some of the actors of Kenobi and The Acolyte but I’d be here all day if I did. And people wonder why the phrase “No one hates Star Wars more than Star Wars fans” is a thing.

And let’s not forget how Sakurai was getting harassment over Waluigi not being playing in Smash Ultimate or over what other characters he did or didn’t add, Pokemon fans harassing Masuda on a post he made celebrating someone’s wedding day and the team that worked on the Definitive Edition of the Grand Theft Auto Trilogy apparently got bullied and harassed just because of how it turned out. I’m sorry, but no mater what issues you have with a piece of media you do NOT go out of your way to ruin the lives of the people involved in it. They are people just as much as you or I.

So there, those are all the reasons as to why I hate the internet and have no shame in wanting to spend less and less time on it recently. It has nothing to do with people still sending me random friend requests or RP requests or me being tired of any over used memes or phrases although quite frankly I could still probably count those as minor reasons if I wanted to. Again, I’m not going to leave this platform or anything given the friends I’ve made and how I have to use it as a necessity at this point for certain things but with how close to my breaking point I am I feel like trying to limit myself on how much time I spend on here outside of talking with friends and shopping is going to be for the better. Anyway, I’m sorry for such a downer post but I really can’t keep this to myself anymore. If I can end this with something positive though, I hope anyone who actually bothered reading this has a better year than I've had so far...

WOAHHHH! Holy shit you guys! A new trailer for a brand new Borderlands game just dropped just now on Youtube! So you know what that means!? Everyone’s gonna be doing trailer reaction breakdowns and trend surf for that sweet sweet ad revenue. SO OF COURSE I’M GOING TO TWO!

The trailer begins with a view of space. For those reading who are unaware of what space is, and I’m sure it’s maybe about like 95% of you, space is the expanse that exists beyond Earth’s Atmosphere and between celestial bodies and by extension, the expanse beyond the planet of Pandora which most of the Borderlands games are set in. Space has also been shown in multiple forms of media over the decades from stuff like Star Wars, Star Trek, Battlestar Galaxtica, Guardians of the Galaxy, Futurama, Super Mario Galaxy, Super Paper Mario, Sonic Adventure 2, Magic School Bus, Spla…

*1 hour later.*

Crash Bandicoot, Bayonetta and Firefly. However, do not think of going out into space in real life because there is no air in space and you will suffocate and die a slow and painful death including you head likely exploding. It is also made up of lots of stars which we can see ourselves in the trailer. Oh, you don’t know what stars are either. Well, you see, stars are luminous spheroid of plasma held together by self-gravity. The nearest star to earth is the sun. You know, that big orange ball you see when you look up at the sky every day that makes everything super-hot? Not to be confused with the game Super Hot with is a game that was release back on the 25th of February 2016 and was developed by the SUPERHOT Team. The game revolves around the idea that time only moves when you do, and you must clear levels by…

*2 hours later.*

And that’s why I think just by looking at this trailer alone we can tell that stars are likely going to play a massive role this new Borderlands game. And if they don’t, I’m going to boycott the shit out of this game and I’ll want my money back!

Anyway, now we get into the 2 second mark of this trailer and suddenly on the worlds flash “2K GAMES Presents.” Obviously, this game is being presented by 2K games but who are they I hear you ask? Well, 2K games are a gaming publisher that was originally founded as a subsidiary of Take-Two Interactive who you might recognise as the people who are also associated with Rockstar games. Who are Rockstar games you ask? Well, if you have ever played a Grand Theft Auto game in your life then you would of likely heard of these people as they are the developers…

*3 hours later.*

… and then certain user data got stolen and put up for sale.

Anyway a few seconds later when then get some more text telling us “A Gearbox Software game” and Gearbox Software are the developers of the Borderlands series starting with the first game in 2009 however there history actually goes a lot deeper than that as they were originally founded limited liability company in February of 1999 by five developers who were formally part of Rebel Boat Rockers. What are Rebel Boat Rockers? Well, they were a game development studio founded by a man named Billy Zelsnack who is man that…

*Seriously, if I actually went over EVERY bit of history behind this stuff for the sake of a dumb joke journal, I’m pretty sure the Bible would end up being shorter!*

Then, after the big text goes away, we see the Firehawks Insignia flame up in the space. As I’m sure most of us REAL FANS who have played this series since day one and have played nothing but this series for the rest of our lives know the Firehawk is what the character Lilith was called during the events of Borderlands 2. However, Lillith herself has a lot of history in the Borderlands series. She was one of the four playable characters in the original game and is widely considered to be the most overpowered character in that game thanks to her skills focusing on elemental damage. But she has an even deeper history in this series than that as her backstory is that she was a siren who were a group of supernatural beings gifted extraordinary powers which we are also told in a side mission in Borderlands 2 that only six of them can exist in the universe at any given time. That side mission being the one where you have to hunt down and kill…

*Is this joke about how long analysis videos can go on for un-funny yet?*

Then suddenly is transforms into Pandoras moon of Elpis. Elpis was a major key part of Borderlands The Pre Sequel which as you can tell from its name is a combination of the terms Prequel and Sequel.... Oh, what’s that? You don’t know what those terms mean? Don’t worry, that’s why I’m here to explain it. You see, a prequel is a new instalment in a franchise taking place before the events of a certain entry while a sequel takes place after one. Borderlands the Pre Sequel was released in 2014 by 2K Australia why as there name suggests were an Australian based studio. Australia is a country that while is was technically founded by some Portuguese guy that no one cares about it was truly founded by a British Sailor named Captain Cook. Captain Cook founded the country of Australia after…

*Okay you know what, let’s just skip to the end of this video, I got shit to do!*

And that’s why I think the writing at the end is saying “Buy Crypto Suckers!” And that’s it! That is everything I could get from this trailer after spending hours of my life going over every little detail. I’d like to thank you for reading this new journal and hope you all learned something new. Please remember to like and follow because I need that euphoria and attention and don’t forget to spam this in every Discord server you’re on because I need more views. Do you hear me? I need more! MORE! MORE ATTENTION MORE!!!!!!! … Oh right, you don’t know what euphoria means either do you? Well, it’s…

You know, there’s a lot of things people do on the internet that I don’t think I will ever understand. From people who say that gaming is “dead” or “isn’t good anymore” while also ignoring the existence of all the great and wonderful games we have gotten over the past few years to react channels on YouTube where there success is built entirely of just reacting to other people’s stuff to how people will call out how awful AI is (which it IS awful, I am not denying that at all) but then turn around and defend AI when it’s used for “fun.” I could go on about every negative trend that’s popped up on the internet but there’s one in particular I really dislike and will never understand why some people do it. Hate art.

As someone who regularly commissions artists and has even become good friends with certain artists I have commissioned I have strong opinions on hate art. In fact, I didn’t even know hate art was really a thing until I started getting commissions and many artists having on there comm sheets that they won’t do hate art, and for good reason. And while I thankfully don’t see hate art as frequently as you might think, just the concept alone makes me groan and roll my eyes at. I don’t think I need to explain what it even is since the definition is in the name. Hate Art is art based solely on your own hatred for a character, series, person or anything really and usually in a manner that showcases stuff like those characters getting beaten up or dying or anything really. I also don’t think I need to explain why that concept on its own is a fucking stupid idea but since I’m bound to get some people asking me “Why are you agents the idea of hate art?” regardless allow me to answer that with my own question. Why waste your energy and creativity on making something solely for the purpose of telling people how much you hate that thing when you can instead be focusing that creative energy to create something based around a character or series you do love?

Look, I get it. We all have different opinions on different things based on certain factors regardless of if it’s loving something to not loving something. There are things that I love and have a passion for that no doubt some of my friends and followers don’t love as much as me. Just as how you all probably have something you love that I don’t and there is nothing wrong with that. My problem is when people’s hate for something is so strong they resort to making art solely for the intention of showing how much they hate it, maybe even doing it solely just to get under the skin of the people who do like it.

And sadly, I use to follow someone who one day decided to resort to making hate art. I’m not going to name names because even with me expressing how much I dislike the idea of hate art I don’t want people to go after anyone in particular but it was an artist I had been following for years up to that point and had some genuinely good art and had even commissioned them in the past but one day about a year ago they decided to actually make hate art. They made hate art of a certain character I loved but they really didn’t like sinking in actual shit and went on some big rant in their description about how much they hated them and I’m sorry, but I didn’t even have to think twice about unfollowing them because come on dude, really?

And yeah, you could make the argument that as artists they should have the freedom to draw whatever they want for whatever reasons they want and we shouldn’t control them. Which yeah, I do agree with on the whole "artists should be allowed to have freedom" part. I have always been in favour of the idea that any artists should have the freedom to do whatever they want with their medium. Even if I or really a majority of people are not personally a fan of how certain artists chose to use their talent (*cough* Pixar seriously thinking continuing the Toy Story movies after the emotional and amazing ending of 3 is a good idea. *cough*) I would be a pretty big hypocrite if I was such a supporter of artistic creative freedom but then tried to control how people used their creativity. Thing is, I also think criticising how some people use their talent is also just as fair because how are you going to ever improve if you don't take some legitimate criticism? Especially when you use you talent for a purely hateful reason as well!

No matter how much of a supporter of artistic creative freedom I might be, you will NEVER convince me that hate art is something I should be okay with or even get done myself even with the amount of characters from fiction I do hate.

For example; if I was still writing stories I could just as easily write one about Yami from Komi Can’t Communicate getting sentenced to and dying in prison because she is by far my least favourite character from that show due to her whole personality revolving around nothing but Komi and is even willing to kidnap and threaten to kill one of her friends just to spend time with her but the reason I won’t is because why do that when I can instead make Komi Can’t Communicate part of my crossover universe and write a story about a character from another franchise I like helping Komi get over her shyness and anxiety of interacting with other people. I could also just as easily commission an artist to draw for me a pic of Stella from Helluva Boss getting beaten to an inch of her life because she is a character I absolutely despite due to how abusive she is towards her husband Stolas, a character I actually do really like, and openly admits that she enjoys tormenting him on top of how she hit’s WAY to close to home for me personally as someone who had to put up with an abusive and manipulative step mother that came into my life during my teenage years who ended up being the cause of many of my personal issues or making the ones I already had even worse but even with how much I’d want to punch Stella in the face if I ever met her I will NEVER waste my money on something like that when spending it on a commission of Stolas sounds like a much, MUCH better use of my time given how much I like him more and slightly relate to him!

I know I’m not the only one who see’s just how stupid hate art is. Plenty of people agree with me that hate art is the dumbest thing in the world. I mentioned before that many of the artists I’ve commissioned in the past or want to commission in the future have on their commission sheets that they will turn down your requests if it’s hate art and I’m so glad they do because hate art is something we need to stop from being a thing. It’s just a shame that I know this concept won’t just go away because I call out how stupid it is because nothing get's you attention more than negativity nowadays!

Today is Bionicle Day!

… Okay well actually it was Bionicle Day yesterday for me because time zones but everyone else is celebrating it today so still counts. As you can probably tell from this journal I admit I rushed to put together because I got inspired to, I don’t actually have anything special planned for today. I mean I COULD just get out my old tub that contains all my Bionicle sets I own and show some of those but most of them are either deconstructed or broken and even then the idea of getting out a bunch of toys just for the sake of this day only to put them back once it’s over isn’t that appealing. So instead, I wanted to talk about some bits of Bionicle related media that I really like and hold a special place in my heart. The movies.

Now if you follow me mostly for the art I commission then chances are you know what ONE OF the reasons I love one particular movie are but in truth I actually like all three of the classic Bionicle movies and there’s actually a bit of a deeper reason for that. You see, I was pretty into Bionicle since day 1. I got the original 6 matoron from the McDonalds happy meal promotion back in 2001 and while I didn’t get every single set in this themes lifespan, I still collected enough that I was super into it from a really young age. Then I learnt about the first movie that was getting released, the Mask of Light and with how into this line I was of course I wanted it. My parents eventually got it for me after like a few weeks after it came out with me eventually getting both Legends of Metru Nui and Web of Shadows for my birthday in 2005 and of course I loved them but one of the reasons why that is was because of something I only found out while watching the first film.

Bionicle had lore! Obvious statement to say now especially with how much of a meme it is just how much lore Bionicle had but back then I barley looked up anything online relating to Bionicle and only really just played with the sets my parents would buy for me and the commercials for these sets rarely played when I watched TV so I had no idea there was actually this big, grand storyline that was going on. I mean yeah, I do remember the Rahkshi sets coming with a comic panel as well but I never really read them so these movies were my first clue that these were not just some cool LEGO toys I was building. These were cool LEGO toys I was building that were also actual characters with their own stories, personalities and roles in a world that was only going to get bigger from this point onwards. Yup, these movies were basically what kick started me wanting to pay more attention to the lore of the theme. Or at least as much as I could or have the patience for.

A majority of the lore for Bionicle was told though books, both comic books and story books. And even back then I wasn’t much of a book reader only really reading books that were required of me in school or this one Mario themed choose your own adventure book on a train ride during a school trip where we had nothing else to do since we couldn’t bring out portable game consoles. My mindset back then was basically “if it doesn’t involve characters actually talking or moving pitchers I’m probably not going to be interested” and one of the few Bionicle books I did get I only really wanted because it came with a version of Tahu’s Hau Nuva after it’s been poisoned by Lerahk so most of my Bionicle lore knowledge came from the movies.

Granted that probably might not of been the best call on my part growing up since with how expansive Bioncle’s lore is these movies tended to be VERY condensed versions of that years storyline at the time and would often skip over major parts such as the Toa Metru’s hunt for the great disks being condensed into a minuet long montage with the Morbusa from that half of 2004’s story only being seen in the background of that montage and not being able to see the Toa Hordika test out there new abilities like they do in some of the comics. Hell, Web of Shadows actually has a pretty big lore breaking error in it with Nuju using X-Ray vision even though while Nuju’s mask does have some degree of X-Ray vision one of the negatives to being a Hordika is that you CAN’T use your mask powers!

But, with how my preferred way of consuming media growing up was purely visual could you really blame me for wanting to get my lore from these movies!? To the films credit, Web of Shadows DID also have Roodaka, Norick and Nuju’s voice actors from the film doing voice over for a few comic panels in the special features of the DVD and also a short preview of the flash animations for that year so I did still engage in some of the lore outside the movies.

Another reason why I enjoyed the movies as much as I did growing up, and this is going to be a VERY hot take I know but it’s actually because of the designs they gave the characters in the movies. Some people REALLY do not like the movie designs for the characters because of some of the liberties they took for certain characters but I actually think they look really dam good. Stuff like how the Nuva chest pieces are uniquely coloured for each toa instead of all just being purely silver like they are in there sets, having actual hands and fingers, the Turaga having robes re-enforcing the whole wise elder thing, the Rahkshi being actual nightmare fuel compared to their original sets, female characters like Gali and Nokama having slimer figures compared to the male characters, the Rahaga’s helicopter blades that get lowered when not used, the Hordika have one arm that was permanently having there weapons fused to them while still having a semi normal if elongated arm which really helped drive home how the Hordika transformations literally turned you into a monster, it’s hard for me to not like these designs a lot. Granted they aren’t perfect translations of the toys since Pohatu doesn’t have the inverted torso his set usually does and Makuta not looking a thing like his actual set (although to be they were basing his design of an early prototype LEGO sent over during Mask of Light’s production and his finalised design for retail hadn’t been decided yet) but most of the issues I do have with the designs are so minor they aren’t worth me making a big deal over. I never had Sidorak growing up but even if I did I’d MUCH rather his design in the third film than his original set. I DID have Roodaka though and let’s just say it caught me off guard when I found out she was a woman. Yes, I really did think Roodaka was a guy before watching Web of Shadows. Considering Roodaka’s race consists of both male and females AND there’s not body differences between either gender meaning that even the guys have those boobs… yeah.

Still on the topic about how these movies presented themselves there’s also the soundtrack to these films and allow me to be blunt. Holy fuck, these movies go hard with there soundtrack! It’s kinda hard to explain how good these are though a written form but I seriously encourage you to look up the soundtrack to these films and give them a listen. They are actually all officially on Spotify to my surprise, and I am so glad they are because it’s a great trio of soundtracks. I mean they had no reason to go as hard as they did with the soundtrack for a direct to DVD movie trilogy, but they did and I love it! These movies might not be perfect by any means especially since Mask of Light literally resurrects a character a few minuets after he dies which I hate in ANY story but the amount of work they put into these movies on top of just being really fun movies with some pretty good morals if you look into them is what kept me watching them multiple times as a child.

When I got back into Bionicle again last year one of the first things I did was watch these movies again since they were all on the Bio Media Project website which is an archive of every single bit of Bioncle related media there was including the movies and I still enjoyed watching them as an adult as I did as a child. I mainly used Bio Media Project for watching them because I haven’t been able to find my old DVD copies of these movies. Sadly, Web of Shadows was the last movie we would get in a long time. The Bionicle storyline might have continued but we were not getting anymore movies at least until 2009 which was always sad to me. Because the storyline from 2006-2008 was this big multipart story where Mata Nui, the God of the Bionicle world, was dying and our heroes needed to find the Mask of Life to save him with the story arc eventually ending in the reveal that Mata Nui wasn’t actually a god but rather a giant robot and everything that had happened in the lore up to this point had been happening inside this robot! AND the toa sets for 06 and 07 specifically were some of the Matoron from 01-03 which included Jaller and Hali who were in the first movie so seeing a film where these characters I knew as being small civilians who were barley able to defend themselves turned into super powered badasses would have been so cool. Honestly, I just wanted to see how these hypothetical films would of adapted the character Karzani! That guy is the definition of “Oh good god, how are we going to translate this mentally unstable miss mash of parts into our style!?!?”

I would try to make more of an effort to play the flash games beyond this point since I did go onto the internet a lot more from 2005 onwards to varying degrees of if they were cannon or not and also got Bionicle Heroes which even as a child I knew wasn’t cannon but it wouldn’t be until 2009 when we would get one more Bionicle movie. And it was terrible!

This isn’t even a “Oh, I grew up with this movie and loved it back then and now as an adult I don’t like it” thing either. No, even as a child I knew this movie wasn’t very good! Unlike the previous three movies which were made by Mirirmax, The Legend Reborn was done by a new animation studio of TinclleTown Toons and it shows. Because to put it bluntly, this pretty much felt like a watered down version of the previous three movies. The animation to me at least looks worse, the soundtrack was pretty forgettable, the dialogue felt incredibly awkward at times, it toned down a lot of the more darker aspects of the previous films for silly slapstick and while the characters do look a lot more accurate to the toys this time they also for some reason put these spinning gears on them that are pretty distracting. Yeah, it’s not a very good movie. The worst part about this movie being as toned down as it is was is that the story line of this year was set in a pretty violent place as well and outside of the Glatorian Areans where you couldn’t kill your opponent’s there were no rules on Bara Magna and anything goes. It was pretty much the Bionicle equivalent of Mad Max but with cool cyborg people. I watched this last year as well and had to stop in the middle of the climax because unlike the last three movies I couldn’t download an MP4 of this one so I had to stream it from Bio Media Project itself since I wasn’t aware it was the only Bioncle Moive you can still buy normally today via Youtube for some reason and it froze before the reveal of who the traitor was. I only ever watched this film once before this point and it was the night after my mother got me this film and I really don’t think I missed out on much not rewatching this as much as I did and I’m only really talking about it here because I know if I don’t, I’ll get a bunch of comments asking me about it.

So yeah, that’s pretty much all I have to say. The Bionicle Movies excluding Legend Reborn were my favourite Bionicle related media growing up and with how into Bionicle I’ve been again since the middle of last year I thought it was only appropriate to talk about it for Bionicle Day. Now then, since I am still in a bit of a nostalgic mood I’m off to go play some Bionicle Heroes while blasting the movies soundtrack and then maybe later visit the old websites on my Windows XP Virtual machine. Because 2000’s nostalgia is like cocaine to me right now!