Neophyte-Ronin's movie Reviews on Newgrounds

[Bonzaii Bunny II]

Odd Premise

It's already episode II and you admit it all to be a show. I think I remember Usagi Yojimbo from the old TMNT cartoons, and I'm not going to be surprised if the correlation is correct. Anyway, you're correct. Sound quality lacks in your Flash cartoons, and the effects therein are nondescript in the first place. You probably should conduct a nice overhaul. May I recommend the Audacity sound recorder and a worthy microphone that won't muffle your voice?

phredrawles responds:

I'll write 'Audacity' down, thanks. As for the overhaul...not unless I were to try and release a DVD. I have so many things that I'm trying to do, and going backwards never seems to be a good idea. I really just need someone else to handle my sounds.

[Metal Gear Fiesta]

Go David! Get Your Groove on! It's your Birthday!

Someone made excellent use of technology to spoof the beginning of an intense Game-Cube game right now... and I'm impressed!

I started to crack up as soon as Snake couldn't figure out what "Button" the Colonel was talking about. I suppose Paul Eiding's voice is hard to recreate, because neither the Playstation nor the Game-Cube versions of Metal Gear Solid had him speak in a Southern accent. It matched the zaniness, so it's a positive, not a negative.

This is something you have to watch a couple of times (in case you looked away for a moment). It's that ridiculous. It's that funny. It deserves front page honor as well as moving to the official Video Game Parody listing.

El-Cid responds:

Yeah, true dat on the Colonel's voice. I listened to it several times, but I there was no way I was going to get close so I came up with what you heard. Thanks for the feedback!

[FF: Mixed in Balamb]

On the Mouse?

Within a matter of months, you rendered a parody of Final Fantasy games with the mouse? And it looks fanastic! Everything fits into a classic Anime caricature. Production values are high and the time to make this, I hear, was short thanks to an extensive collaboration among many people.

And one of these days, I'm either telling Tom Fulp to stop playing games with the Broad-band folk, or annihilate the people on Dial-Up, because a limit of five MB per Flash submission is choking artistic flexibility on this site. We can't see anything as good as your submission without having to click multiple entries that say "To Be Continued" on them. We don't need a three-hour epic, but ten would be easier!

There are flaws, though. The sound quality deteriorated from the lack of space. I noticed several lady roles had to be filled (Tifa and Selphie would have made excellent banter), and the actress playing Quistis and Shiva couldn't make either role sound different from one another. Quistis and Shiva stole the show, by the way, as well as Sephiroth's long easy-listening joke. I imagine your next flash can feature Shiva, Quistis, and Sephiroth alone, with Vincent somewhere in between. Everyone else seemed like background noise in comparison. Yet, I still enjoyed the length of the piece and the stream of cracks kept a constant smile on my face.

Be sure to make a new flash soon. Next time, pick between the grandiosity of a long piece with an all-star cast, or the sound quality and a deeper plot, or simply light a match under Mr. Fulp's butt. Whatever puts a smile on your face!

Toonimated responds:

thanks for your review. i liked it! hmm yes, all on mouse. Its difficult to do the voices cause theres more than 14 characters that talk. Depending on score ill continue this

[Strategy Guide Ep. 1]

Excellent!

Strategy Guide is a series focused on objective instead of subjective elements of video games. If you didn't know the difference between the two, one objective element is challenge, while one subjective element is a game's story. If the game had a great story, and was simple to beat, seasoned players would feel dissatisfied. If things were reversed, players would probably enjoy the game more. If a good story and reasonable challenges exist together, we attain the hallmark game attains popular praise from players and cynical magazine critics alike.

Guido is an excitable, filthy-mouth game critic with nostalgic feelings for the Nintendo Entertainment System. He talks about the really difficult games like Gradius--where people used the "Konami Code" to beat. Pay attention and you see Guido's pet cow (thrown into space for breaking some sensitive electronics) decimated by an incoming asteroid). This Flash is fun, hilarious, and definitely deserves high praise.

In other news...

In the last review of this flash, DimmuBorgir complained about something called IRONLIONZION and how the typical Internet idiots post inane or stupid sentences with poor grammatical structure. He did say something about Strategy Guide somewhere in the review, so it sounded somewhat like a review... sort of. It sounded more like a somethingawful.com article, minus the horrid & deliberate misuse of the English language to create literary diatribes. I considered clicking the Abusive button, because it didn't seem to directly affect his review of Strategy Guide (it could have been much shorter. My review could have been much shorter, too).

I know it seems poor to say this in a review, but folks, if you want to have your voice heard, the NG BBS is where you go. Reviews are different; your voice is heard, on the expectation that you deliver a genuine analysis (or simply whether you liked it or not) of a Flash movie, or game. You risk being clicked as abusive otherwise. One review was titled "Yeah" and it talked about how to get "Free Porn" (doesn't exist) with amateurs (meaning they do it for free--morons) and never commented on the flash. I clicked Abusive.

Sorry to reiterate this, but we have to use our heads once in a while. In any case, Needle ought to keep up the good work. From the initial episode, I like where this series is going.

Needle responds:

You are wise beyond your years, my friend.

[Strategy Guide Ep. 2]

Game Strategy Satire--Heaven or Garden of Eden?

Flashes denouncing video games often do so by citing subjective reasons (art, story, character, developer or publisher, et cetera). Strategy Guide cites objective examples (gameplay, difficulty, technical standards, et cetera), and that makes a difference! Players agree fully with the message and never challenge its view. Strategy Guide capitalizes on players' time-old frustration with some games to great effect.

There are, however, problems that become ugly if untreated:

First, either ditch the alien family or keep it out of sight for most of the time. The cow's deaths (reminiscent of South Park) are funnier than racial stereotypes. The Newgrounds BBS frowns upon picking on retards for several reasons--one is that we can do better.

Second, the profanity is losing its edge. Don't dispel it completely, but use it sparingly! Substitute greater wit in Guido's narrative. (Think of players' conversations while playing video games. They are chuck full of hilarity.)

Building the universe for an intellectual property is done before scripting episodes. With the foundation in place, it is summoned when necessary--and never practice it dogmatically. Guido's tirades must be in the foreground. Everything else is secondary to that goal.

Observe The Walrus' "You Are a $%^&ing Moron" series. In the first episode, Reginold denounces Jessica Sampson in under a minute--expecting us to go along with his sentiment. Walrus realized one example per episode was not enough. After researching Ms. Sampson, he roasted her even more in the improved second episode. He experimented with two side-kicks, as opposed to about a dozen. One was killed, and the other stays in the background. Reginold's style of speech and analysis of celebrity intelligence are chief concerns, since they produce the laughter.

I DID laugh with this series, but I'm just spooked at the notion of it becoming something worse than its intent. Keep up the good effort, but just be careful about where that goes...

Needle responds:

Hey, thanks for takingt the time to write seuch an exhaustive review, I appreciate it. Very well written.

I can see where you're coming from with your arguements. I can understand you worries that this may become a cartoon that is clogged with sidekicks - and to that, I can only say "worry not". I have no intention to ever take the focus away from Guido - but other characters were necessary. One can only use one character to carry the workload so long (and I think the author of the "Moron" series will soon learn this). The family is merely there to support Guido. The game of choice will NEVER leave the focus, you have my word. If I break this word, you may blam me.

I really want Strategy Guide to be successful, but I want it to be so on its own merits. While it makes sense to compare me to other sires now, I hope in time I will aaccomplish the goal of "beging compared to" instead. I will do my best. Thank you for your feedback!