Search
Search results
Sonic the Hedgehog 2
Games and Entertainment
App
One of the greatest adventures of all time re-mastered for mobile devices! Speed back in time and...
Ain't Nothin' but a Winner: Bear Bryant, the Goal Line Stand, and a Chance of a Lifetime
Book
No university has won more football championships than Alabama, and Barry Krauss played a key role...
Rat Scabies recommended Slade Alive by Slade in Music (curated)
Mobitee Golf GPS Rangefinder Scorecard Flyover
Sports and Navigation
App
Over 200,000 downloads! ...
Tides of Madness
7.3
Rate It
Tabletop Game
Tides of Madness is a sequel to Tides of Time and features gameplay similar to that design. Tides of...
Movie Metropolis (309 KP) rated Thor: Ragnarok (2017) in Movies
Jun 10, 2019 (Updated Jun 10, 2019)
Utterly preposterous
Thor is arguably one of Marvel’s strongest characters. Played by the superb Chris Hemsworth since 2011, the God of thunder is one of the MCUs most popular assets.
It’s unfortunate then that he’s been lambasted with the weakest solo films of the entire series, the son of Odin really has deserved much better.
Thor’s inception in the first of his three solo outings was a competent if unremarkable origins story and the less said about Thor: The Dark World, which remains the poorest film of the entire MCU, the better. Now, just in time for Infinity War,Thor: Ragnarok rolls into cinemas. But does it do its leading man justice?Imprisoned on the other side of the universe, the mighty Thor (Hemsworth) finds himself in a deadly gladiatorial contest that pits him against the Hulk (Bruce Banner), his former ally and fellow Avenger. Thor’s quest for survival leads him in a race against time to prevent the all-powerful goddess of death, Hela, (Cate Blanchett) from destroying his home world and the Asgardian civilisation.
This third film for our mighty Avenger is really something. A film more akin to Guardians of the Galaxy than its overly stuffy predecessors. Director Taika Waititi in his first big-budget feature has managed what many had thought was impossible, he’s given Thor a rather brilliant movie.
But how? Well, he’s realised what no-one else has. The premise surrounding our titular hero is utterly ridiculous. Rather than shy away from that and create something serious, he’s embraced it with humour, music and my goodness, a lot of colour.
If you thought Guardians of the Galaxy used every colour on the spectrum, you ain’t seen nothing yet. Thor: Ragnarok is quite something to watch. From the gold-tipped spears of Asgard that glisten like never before, to the trash-topped planet of Sakaar, everything is dripping in colour.
“Casting Goldblum in the role of an immortal game-player really is an inspired choice.”
Speaking of Sakaar, it contains one of the MCUs best new additions: Jeff Goldbum. Sorry, I mean the Grandmaster. Casting Goldblum in the role of an immortal game-player really is an inspired choice. The 65-year-old legend has made a career on playing himself and it works exceptionally well here. His improvisation is absolutely spot on.
Ragnarok throws up a few other surprises too. One being that Chris Hemsworth is absolutely hilarious. He and Tom Hiddleston bounce off each other incredibly well and we see real chemistry – the chemistry that should have been evident from the start. Cate Blanchett also turns the cheese up to 11 as the latest throwaway Marvel villain, Hela.
She fares better than the majority of Marvel villains and is certainly more interesting than Christopher Eccelston’s, Malekith, but they never quite make the impact that the scriptwriters were clearly looking for. Nevertheless, Blanchett is excellent.
Thankfully, Thor: Ragnarok doesn’t suffer from the absence of Natalie Portman’s dull Jane Foster, and though she is referenced early on, newcomer Tessa Thompson as Valkyrie provides a fitting replacement and possible future love-interest for our intrepid hero.
Unfortunately, it’s not all good news. Surprisingly the first 30 minutes feel incredibly rushed as numerous loose storylines are brought together and the improvised nature of the script lends itself to a little too much humour. Yes, we get it, Marvel films are funny, but this should not be at the expense of the more emotional sequences that the movie tries to put across.
Nevertheless, Thor: Ragnarok is a resounding success, created by a man who clearly has a passion for this corner of the MCU. He manages to make an absolutely preposterous film – and that’s exactly how Thor should be. Take a bow Mr. Waititi.
A little tip – there are two end credit sequences waiting for you. You’re welcome.
https://moviemetropolis.net/2017/10/26/thor-ragnarok-review/
It’s unfortunate then that he’s been lambasted with the weakest solo films of the entire series, the son of Odin really has deserved much better.
Thor’s inception in the first of his three solo outings was a competent if unremarkable origins story and the less said about Thor: The Dark World, which remains the poorest film of the entire MCU, the better. Now, just in time for Infinity War,Thor: Ragnarok rolls into cinemas. But does it do its leading man justice?Imprisoned on the other side of the universe, the mighty Thor (Hemsworth) finds himself in a deadly gladiatorial contest that pits him against the Hulk (Bruce Banner), his former ally and fellow Avenger. Thor’s quest for survival leads him in a race against time to prevent the all-powerful goddess of death, Hela, (Cate Blanchett) from destroying his home world and the Asgardian civilisation.
This third film for our mighty Avenger is really something. A film more akin to Guardians of the Galaxy than its overly stuffy predecessors. Director Taika Waititi in his first big-budget feature has managed what many had thought was impossible, he’s given Thor a rather brilliant movie.
But how? Well, he’s realised what no-one else has. The premise surrounding our titular hero is utterly ridiculous. Rather than shy away from that and create something serious, he’s embraced it with humour, music and my goodness, a lot of colour.
If you thought Guardians of the Galaxy used every colour on the spectrum, you ain’t seen nothing yet. Thor: Ragnarok is quite something to watch. From the gold-tipped spears of Asgard that glisten like never before, to the trash-topped planet of Sakaar, everything is dripping in colour.
“Casting Goldblum in the role of an immortal game-player really is an inspired choice.”
Speaking of Sakaar, it contains one of the MCUs best new additions: Jeff Goldbum. Sorry, I mean the Grandmaster. Casting Goldblum in the role of an immortal game-player really is an inspired choice. The 65-year-old legend has made a career on playing himself and it works exceptionally well here. His improvisation is absolutely spot on.
Ragnarok throws up a few other surprises too. One being that Chris Hemsworth is absolutely hilarious. He and Tom Hiddleston bounce off each other incredibly well and we see real chemistry – the chemistry that should have been evident from the start. Cate Blanchett also turns the cheese up to 11 as the latest throwaway Marvel villain, Hela.
She fares better than the majority of Marvel villains and is certainly more interesting than Christopher Eccelston’s, Malekith, but they never quite make the impact that the scriptwriters were clearly looking for. Nevertheless, Blanchett is excellent.
Thankfully, Thor: Ragnarok doesn’t suffer from the absence of Natalie Portman’s dull Jane Foster, and though she is referenced early on, newcomer Tessa Thompson as Valkyrie provides a fitting replacement and possible future love-interest for our intrepid hero.
Unfortunately, it’s not all good news. Surprisingly the first 30 minutes feel incredibly rushed as numerous loose storylines are brought together and the improvised nature of the script lends itself to a little too much humour. Yes, we get it, Marvel films are funny, but this should not be at the expense of the more emotional sequences that the movie tries to put across.
Nevertheless, Thor: Ragnarok is a resounding success, created by a man who clearly has a passion for this corner of the MCU. He manages to make an absolutely preposterous film – and that’s exactly how Thor should be. Take a bow Mr. Waititi.
A little tip – there are two end credit sequences waiting for you. You’re welcome.
https://moviemetropolis.net/2017/10/26/thor-ragnarok-review/
Purple Phoenix Games (2266 KP) rated Camping with Sasquatch in Tabletop Games
Jun 18, 2019 (Updated Jun 25, 2019)
You campers like to have fun, right? Well let me warn you of the dangerous Sasquatch in these here woods. You don’t want to get tangled up with him. He will eat your fishy fishies, your s’mores, and your bathing suits. Don’t believe me? Keep reading.
Camping with Sasquatch is a super silly set collection, hand management, card shedding game in the party game genre featuring, well, Bigfoot. You are dealt a hand of cards of various suits (s’mores, hiking, fishy fishy, etc) and from the large draw pile of remaining cards are revealed three cards. On your turn you must draw a card from the draw pile, and play two cards from your hand. You score points by adding cards to the revealed cards on the table to make sets of suits Rummy style. So you can have a set of 3 like-cards, or a run(?) of 3 different cards, with Sasquatch cards in the same suit being wild. When you complete a set of cards on the table, you claim the set and put the cards in your scoring pile. Each card in your scoring pile is worth one victory point. The first player to shed his hand to zero triggers the end game, and the player with the most victory points is the winner. Duh.
Here’s what makes this game a little different and a little more interesting. The Sasquatch cards are wild. They can be used in a set or a run. Easy. However, you can play a Sasquatch card by itself to the table by slapping it down and calling out what suit it is: “Sasquatch Swimming!” When someone does that the other players must frantically slap the Sasquatch with an appropriate suit-matching card from their hand. If they cannot or if they are the last to do so they are awarded with all the cards that had just been played. In a shedding game, adding cards to your hand is always no bueno. This, however, leads to hilarity at the table, but also frustration if you play with bad sports, or uninterested opponents.
Components. This is a card game. The cards are of good quality, and the art is campy and cartoony. I quite like the art style, but some people I played with had mixed opinions on it. What I did appreciate was the one page folded rulesheet with full color Sasquatch poster on the back. I like light games with non-confusing rules. However, on that subject, I couldn’t find anywhere that it stated we could use more than the three slots to play our cards to next to the draw pile, even though there is a graphic that shows more slots in a dashed outline. We initially played the game with just the three slots available and it was a drag, man. Once we allowed some interpretation of the rules to open up more card slots, the game flowed quite a bit more easily and we enjoyed it much more.
Overall, this is just a silly game of shedding with a unique theme that we all liked. The Sasquatch slap aspect of the game gave it a nice little bump in interest for us, but ultimately we agreed that it was light and fun, but not one we will think to bring out very often. I would like to recommend this, but I will do so to a particular situational scenario. If you are ending your game night and just need a super light nightcap to help you tie one on, then pull out the ‘Squatch. He may eat your hot dogs, but he’s just trying to make a living too. Purple Phoenix Games gives this one a hairy 15 / 30.
Camping with Sasquatch is a super silly set collection, hand management, card shedding game in the party game genre featuring, well, Bigfoot. You are dealt a hand of cards of various suits (s’mores, hiking, fishy fishy, etc) and from the large draw pile of remaining cards are revealed three cards. On your turn you must draw a card from the draw pile, and play two cards from your hand. You score points by adding cards to the revealed cards on the table to make sets of suits Rummy style. So you can have a set of 3 like-cards, or a run(?) of 3 different cards, with Sasquatch cards in the same suit being wild. When you complete a set of cards on the table, you claim the set and put the cards in your scoring pile. Each card in your scoring pile is worth one victory point. The first player to shed his hand to zero triggers the end game, and the player with the most victory points is the winner. Duh.
Here’s what makes this game a little different and a little more interesting. The Sasquatch cards are wild. They can be used in a set or a run. Easy. However, you can play a Sasquatch card by itself to the table by slapping it down and calling out what suit it is: “Sasquatch Swimming!” When someone does that the other players must frantically slap the Sasquatch with an appropriate suit-matching card from their hand. If they cannot or if they are the last to do so they are awarded with all the cards that had just been played. In a shedding game, adding cards to your hand is always no bueno. This, however, leads to hilarity at the table, but also frustration if you play with bad sports, or uninterested opponents.
Components. This is a card game. The cards are of good quality, and the art is campy and cartoony. I quite like the art style, but some people I played with had mixed opinions on it. What I did appreciate was the one page folded rulesheet with full color Sasquatch poster on the back. I like light games with non-confusing rules. However, on that subject, I couldn’t find anywhere that it stated we could use more than the three slots to play our cards to next to the draw pile, even though there is a graphic that shows more slots in a dashed outline. We initially played the game with just the three slots available and it was a drag, man. Once we allowed some interpretation of the rules to open up more card slots, the game flowed quite a bit more easily and we enjoyed it much more.
Overall, this is just a silly game of shedding with a unique theme that we all liked. The Sasquatch slap aspect of the game gave it a nice little bump in interest for us, but ultimately we agreed that it was light and fun, but not one we will think to bring out very often. I would like to recommend this, but I will do so to a particular situational scenario. If you are ending your game night and just need a super light nightcap to help you tie one on, then pull out the ‘Squatch. He may eat your hot dogs, but he’s just trying to make a living too. Purple Phoenix Games gives this one a hairy 15 / 30.
Purple Phoenix Games (2266 KP) rated Virtual Reef Diver in Tabletop Games
Nov 19, 2020
Ahh, ze Great Barrier Reef. How I would love to see you! To swim with ze fishies and see ze beautiful colors! But alas, I am no great diver, and have only snorkled once – in ze Caribbean. I am very interested in ze marine life on ze reefs surrounding Australia, and so when I heard of a game from one of our favorite publishers (who happen to be Australian) featuring photos of ze Great Barrier Reef I knew I had to take a look.
Virtual Reef Diver is an educational card game that helps to bring awareness to happenings of the Great Barrier Reef and even implements ways for players to participate in the studies of this natural wonder. The winner(s) of the game is (are) the team who scores the most points at the end of three rounds, and also hopefully learns several new things along the way.
DISCLAIMER: We were provided a copy of this game for the purposes of this review. It is not my intention to detail every rule in the game, but to give a general idea of the feel of the game flow. You are invited to download the rulebook, purchase the game through the publisher directly, or through any retailers stocking it. -T
To setup, shuffle the Action card deck, the Reef Disturbance deck, and the Reef decks separately, placing them on the table. Each team, or player, may be given a Classification Card (reference card) as well. From the Reef deck deal 12 cards face-up on the table in a 3×4 (or 4×3 whatever) grid. Each round a new set of 12 cards will be dealt to the table. Determine the starting player/team and the game may begin!
Players will decide at the beginning of the game which mode they wish to play: Standard or Advanced. I will be previewing the Standard mode. On a turn a player will choose a card from the grid and attempt to identify its type: Hard Coral, Soft Coral, Algae, Invertebrates, Fish, Marine Mammals, or Technology. If correct, the player will collect the card as a trophy and it will be worth VPs at the end of the game. The next player may then take a turn identifying the type of card and collecting if correct, or leaving on the table if incorrect.
All cards are worth VPs except the Technology cards. These, once correctly identified, will allow the player to exchange it for an Action card to be used in the future. Action cards can be very powerful at different times during the game.
Once all 12 cards have been taken for the round the players will reveal a Reef Disturbance card. These typically will have players discarding cards of a certain type, or several cards at once. Some Action cards will negate these effects, so having them ready is great strategy. The grid may now be replenished and the second round started. The game ends at the end of the third round and players count up points to determine the winner!
Components. Again, while this game is in production, I treated it as a preview, and these are final components. That said, this game exists to benefit the Australian Government-funded citizen science website ACEMS. Further, this game is a bunch of cards in a box. The photos on the main Reef cards are mostly quite nice, with a couple looking perhaps a little outdated. The other graphics on the game are fine. They don’t get in the way, and are functional. The cards themselves are also fine quality. Nothing in the box is exquisite nor subpar at all.
The gameplay is something that I am struggling with as a reviewer. You see, this is a VERY different game depending on the mode you play. I will probably always play it on Standard mode because I can guess what type a card may be, but the Advanced mode also awards extra points for identifying the common name, taxonomic family (scientific name), and habitat of each card’s subject. That is for eggheads, man! I’m just a normal American-educated gamer. I don’t know that stuff! So the Standard mode is relatively easy to play and be good, where the Advanced mode is for those times when you have, let’s say, a Scrabble or Chess snob who revels in being the most intellectual person in the room. That’s not at all a bad thing, and I hope any real eggheads know I am kidding around. I am merely jealous at how smart many people are.
That being the case, this game would work well for a group of younger gamers eager to learn about the marine life on the Great Barrier Reef, or those looking for a relaxing quasi-trivia style card game. Need to amp it up and play on Advanced mode? Go for it. I’ll still be flailing about like a clownfish out of water trying to understand the difference between hard and soft coral and how to distinguish them. Seriously. Take a look for yourself and help out a VERY worthy cause in the process.
Virtual Reef Diver is an educational card game that helps to bring awareness to happenings of the Great Barrier Reef and even implements ways for players to participate in the studies of this natural wonder. The winner(s) of the game is (are) the team who scores the most points at the end of three rounds, and also hopefully learns several new things along the way.
DISCLAIMER: We were provided a copy of this game for the purposes of this review. It is not my intention to detail every rule in the game, but to give a general idea of the feel of the game flow. You are invited to download the rulebook, purchase the game through the publisher directly, or through any retailers stocking it. -T
To setup, shuffle the Action card deck, the Reef Disturbance deck, and the Reef decks separately, placing them on the table. Each team, or player, may be given a Classification Card (reference card) as well. From the Reef deck deal 12 cards face-up on the table in a 3×4 (or 4×3 whatever) grid. Each round a new set of 12 cards will be dealt to the table. Determine the starting player/team and the game may begin!
Players will decide at the beginning of the game which mode they wish to play: Standard or Advanced. I will be previewing the Standard mode. On a turn a player will choose a card from the grid and attempt to identify its type: Hard Coral, Soft Coral, Algae, Invertebrates, Fish, Marine Mammals, or Technology. If correct, the player will collect the card as a trophy and it will be worth VPs at the end of the game. The next player may then take a turn identifying the type of card and collecting if correct, or leaving on the table if incorrect.
All cards are worth VPs except the Technology cards. These, once correctly identified, will allow the player to exchange it for an Action card to be used in the future. Action cards can be very powerful at different times during the game.
Once all 12 cards have been taken for the round the players will reveal a Reef Disturbance card. These typically will have players discarding cards of a certain type, or several cards at once. Some Action cards will negate these effects, so having them ready is great strategy. The grid may now be replenished and the second round started. The game ends at the end of the third round and players count up points to determine the winner!
Components. Again, while this game is in production, I treated it as a preview, and these are final components. That said, this game exists to benefit the Australian Government-funded citizen science website ACEMS. Further, this game is a bunch of cards in a box. The photos on the main Reef cards are mostly quite nice, with a couple looking perhaps a little outdated. The other graphics on the game are fine. They don’t get in the way, and are functional. The cards themselves are also fine quality. Nothing in the box is exquisite nor subpar at all.
The gameplay is something that I am struggling with as a reviewer. You see, this is a VERY different game depending on the mode you play. I will probably always play it on Standard mode because I can guess what type a card may be, but the Advanced mode also awards extra points for identifying the common name, taxonomic family (scientific name), and habitat of each card’s subject. That is for eggheads, man! I’m just a normal American-educated gamer. I don’t know that stuff! So the Standard mode is relatively easy to play and be good, where the Advanced mode is for those times when you have, let’s say, a Scrabble or Chess snob who revels in being the most intellectual person in the room. That’s not at all a bad thing, and I hope any real eggheads know I am kidding around. I am merely jealous at how smart many people are.
That being the case, this game would work well for a group of younger gamers eager to learn about the marine life on the Great Barrier Reef, or those looking for a relaxing quasi-trivia style card game. Need to amp it up and play on Advanced mode? Go for it. I’ll still be flailing about like a clownfish out of water trying to understand the difference between hard and soft coral and how to distinguish them. Seriously. Take a look for yourself and help out a VERY worthy cause in the process.
