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March 26, 2018

Quick update

So the last few weeks have been hectic, yet again. I've had plenty of breaks from work, but stuff just keeps happening and slowing me down in writing my reviews.

I'm doing my best to write articles, but my sleep schedule has changed quite a bit lately with work, and it reduces my free time during the week.

Don't worry, I've got content ready - btut only for two weeks ahead of time. I love to have four or more weeks of reviews written ahead of time, and I'm currently at 2 (mostly because of the very long GTA V review, some time ago, which was a lot longer to do than expected).

There will be content this weekend. On Friday afternoon? Unfortunately, probably not. Expect content on Sunday morning, maybe. It's Easter, after all. And the next review might feel a bit à propos with the occasion...

On my end, I'll be working to build a buffer the best I can. I am seriously considering doing two Steam Packs in a row, if I can't find a game long enough for a 2,000-word review. I mean, there is plenty of choice - but I also have many games that would require 5 parts or more.

I'm also considering spending a lot of time discussing RPG Maker titles, as I recently rounded them up in a list of their own, and... well...


...let's just say I won't run out anytime soon!

And in the meantime, other stuff kept happening to distract my attention, though for more information you might want to check the article just beneath this one.

March 25, 2018

#ChangeTheChannel

Oh, how the mighty fall.

So, it's not exactly a secret that I have been inspired into writing reviews by watching Channel Awesome: Doug Walker (the Nostalgia Critic), and everyone else who was, or still is, on the site (Brad Jones, Lewis Lovhaug, Allison Pregler, Joe Vargas, Nash Bozard, Jacob Chapman, Lindsay Ellis, Todd Nathanson, Kaylyn Saucedo, the list could go on). It's also not a secret that, were it not for Channel Awesome, this very blog would not exist. The NC was one of those online shows I took great pleasure in watching, sometimes coming back to the same episodes dozens of times. Oh, and the anniversary specials, let's not forget them: The first year anniversary brawl, Kickassia, Suburban Knights, To Boldly Flee and, to some extent, The Uncanny Valley. Joining the site was a dream for me, as it was for hundreds of fans out there.

Of course, while we saw these great talents improve and become better online critics and entertainers, we - the fans - were unaware of the nightmare behind the scenes. Not so much for the separate shows themselves, but for the enterprise as a whole. Stories date all the way back to the very beginning: Did you know that the Nostalgia Critic doesn't belong to Doug Walker? The rights to the character belong to the site's CEO, Mike Michaud. All the content producers who joined the site didn't sign any contracts, yet had to agree to some ground rules - one of them being to make, at minimum, one video every two weeks. Although there was no real oversight, and the focus was still all on the NC. The site WAS known as That Guy With The Glasses at the time.

The anniversary specials were the precise moment when things started going wrong; each film has a history of misadventures for multiple producers involved (examples range from people getting hurt during filming, to poor set conditions, to lack of food and water in spite of long filming days!). One would probably need to write an entire goddamn book to cover everything that has been revealed by various ex-producers of Channel Awesome during the last two weeks.

There had been signs of this back in 2012 after the release of To Boldly Flee, when some particularly sardonic commentaries made piques at actual behind-the-scenes drama. It reached a peak in January 2015, when Allison Pregler (then known under the nickname Obscurus Lupa) was fired, and her boyfriend Phelan Porteous (AKA Phelous), who also produced videos for the site, left to show his support for her. I should also mention that the site had seen some pretty rough times between To Boldly Flee and 2015; the epic, 210-minute film left viewers with the impression that it really WAS over. Doug retired the Critic to pursue other video projects. One of them was Demo Reel, which was tolerated by a few, disliked by some, outright hated by the crowd that wanted more NC. That particular decision had struck a blow on viewership, not just for Doug, but for everyone else on the site - with the main cash cow gone, some viewers jumped ship instead of staying for the dozens of video producers on That Guy With The Glasses.

What happened on January 2015? Well, to say Allison was "fired" isn't quite right, as she and the other producers weren't employees in the proper sense of the term (again: no contracts). This was at a time where, to make ends meet, content producers had to include breaks for ads within their videos (AKA midrolls), in order to benefit from monetization. This was shortly before Patreon became a viable alternative for creators. Midrolls were necessary for many, but not very popular in the eyes of the higher-ups at Channel Awesome. Especially Mike Michaud. The man was notoriously difficult to join whenever someone on the site had a question or a suggestion, and would often take weeks or months to respond. We are talking about the CEO here. Meanwhile, if he had a question for a producer, that producer had to reply very quickly. Instead of addressing the producers directly on Skype about midrolls, he would leave comments underneath their videos about the issues he had with them, because it's so much more dignified to hang the dirty laundry out in the open for all the fans to see.

Doug's answer to those worried about paying their bills was simple: Make more videos. Just overwork yourself for views, and the money will come in. I suppose his viewpoint made sense to him, the man who gathers hundreds of thousands of views on every video in a matter of days, while everyone else either struggles to gather an audience or doesn't get enough views to make a decent living from their art. Not to mention that many producers needed to keep a side-job for that reason. That's when Patreon came around. However, in private messages sent to everyone in the company, Rob Walker (Doug's brother, only marginally better than Michaud) explained that advertising a Patreon was basically "e-begging" (yes, really) and forbade producers from putting forward their Patreon pages in order to make ends meet. It took a minor controversy for the change to happen, but Michaud and the Walkers later caved in and allowed reviewers on the site to advertise their Patreon pages.

However, when the first Patreon ads were posted to Channel Awesome by Brad Jones, apparently they didn't message their "employees" (air quotes) to say that it was now OK. Allison confronted Mike about this, and he asked her if she had time for a quick call. She had things to do that day, away from the computer. Two hours later, Mike and Doug set up a Skype conversation with her - while she wasn't at home - and waited about 15 minutes for a response... and so Mike promptly fired her. Of course, I am reporting on this, but Allison has written her own piece about this, and her words will convey it better than I would. You can read the original article here, and view the Skype conversations here. For the record, I am bringing up the midrolls and Patreon cases as one of many poor decisions from the higher-ups of Channel Awesome, because it ties into the rest of the story.

More producers left on the same day as Allison and Phelan: Kyle Kallgren, Andrew Dickman, Lidsay Ellis, though Kyle and Lindsay's departure is unrelated. I should probably say that by 2015, a LOT of producers on Channel Awesome were planning to leave, for one or many reasons. Some of them had found their audience and were migrating to their own website or YouTube. Others simply couldn't stand the hypocrisy of the higher-ups, or felt restricted by the site. And then some others were genuinely fed up with the behind-the-scenes horror stories, or had seen their experience with the site go from okay to downright miserable, sometimes due to personal mental or physical health issues, a few too many tasteless jokes, or actual reprehensible behavior from certain folks... Each person who left had their reasons.

You'll probably tell me, "But Channel Awesome hired new producers in 2014! The site is doing okay! And Doug, he seems so nice!" Yeah, um... the big issue with Doug is that he basically has no say in the company, despite being the closest the site has to a mascot. Mike and Rob pull the strings, and the best Doug can do is listen to what's going on and, ultimately, side with his brother or Mike. It's self-preservation; Mike owns the rights to the Nostalgia Critic, after all. Doug is pretty much screwed if he loses the NC, and he seems deathly afraid of having to return to a non-creative job. Doug is either unaware of the behind-the-scenes crap, or he actively participated to it while remaining blissfully (or willingly?) ignorant of the harm done by his attitude towards the other content producers. And whenever he got caught into a controversy, he would either dance around the issue, or side with Rob and Mike. Which is what he did when Allison got fired. And if Doug was questioned about it on his Facebook page - or in person at conventions -, he would gladly block or ban anyone from speaking to him again.

Old news? Not really. The stories are spread across the entire history and lifetime of the company, but the ex-producers of Channel Awesome remember their experience. It was all sparked by a tweet posted by Allison Pregler on Twitter. The thread has since grown into a massive retelling of the situation, with dozens of awful situations retold and commented on.



If you decide to read through that thread, set aside about two hours. I wasn't kidding when I said "horror stories". Some of those date all the way back to the first anniversary special, the "Brawl". And there may be even older stories. The thread itself has turned into  a Twitter hashtag movement.

I reported, long ago, on how I was blocked by Doug on Facebook for bringing up the situation in 2015 in person at a convention, as a sign of what would become CA's way of dealing with criticism. However, this isn't my story. This is the story of 19+ producers who got together and shared every last bit of awfulness behind the Channel Awesome company that they were willing to share. In fact, new events have been revealed since, stuff that hadn't been shared in the open three years ago. Many stories are horrifying. Of note, not every ex-producer has been willing to share, and those who don't want to talk about their years under CA must be respected in their decision.

Some of the producers involved in the thread got together to play Jackbox games, and the evening was streamed by Kaylyn Saucedo (MarzGurl) on Twitch. It was a special event to hear these online critics and producers discuss their past experiences, throw shade at the awful business practises, and rip the Walkers and Michaud to shreds at every chance they got while playing Drawful, Quiplash or Tee K.O.). The team spirit felt intact between them. Maybe it's because they were all sharing unpleasant experiences coming from the exact same source, but the whole felt like a reunion between friends and there was something oddly heartwarming about this.

The twitter hashtag #ChangeTheChannel was born a few days later, and has since spread the news about Channel Awesome's practises. The hashtag has a goal that might never come to fruition: Change the situation. Some fans ask for some actual Public Relations work from the Walkers or Michaud (which will never come, as they have about as much talent in PR as a slug has talent in footracing). Some fans are more direct: Fire Michaud, end the Nostalgia Critic, or close the whole site altogether. The new talents hired in 2014 will survive, as all these producers can be joined on social media, with their videos on YouTube (as every decent alternative video-hosting website has shut down since). The hashtag has led to the creation of videos discussing the situation, recaps of the thread, and much more. Here's a sketch by Cinematic Venom on the situation, taking potshots at the company's heads while recapping many of the events recounted in the thread. The producers who participated to the thread are also building a Google Document with every story they can remember about their time on the site, with the document to be made available when it's finished.


Speaking of PR, whoever manages the Channel Awesome Twitter account apparently went the same route as Doug did with Facebook. Every person who so much as mentions the hashtag #ChangeTheChannel in response to the tweeted advertisement for the latest NC episode (which, for the record, is about the recent live-action Jungle Book movie) has been unceremoniously blocked. It's practically a badge of honor now. The Streisand Effect does its thing, however: The more they try to hide the hashtag, the more people ask what it's about and why they want to hide it. Which leads to more people being blocked, and subsequently finding out.

If you don't want to bother reading through the thread (which is understandable, since it branches off like crazy), here are many of the situations described, some of which have been mocked in the video by Cinematic Venom.

  • There have been instances of sexual harassment by people from the site. Lindsay Ellis was slutshamed during filming of the first year anniversary brawl, with lies about her being spread by someone whom she does not name. Then there was Mike Ellis, who was the COO of Channel Awesome along with Michaud (the CEO) and Rob Walker; Mike Ellis was fired a few years into the site's existence. Sean Fausz (AKA HopeWithinChaos) added to the thread a disturbing story of sexual harassment directed at him, from Mike Ellis, shared through Twitlonger. Also about Mike Ellis, the only PR person Channel Awesome has ever had, Holly Christine, had to be protected by other producers when the guy was finally fired.
  • I haven't kept up to date with every piece of info about them, but there have been very worrisome reports of behavior from two of the earliest contributors to the site, the Amazing Atheist and That Aussie Guy... who were dropped early on, but maybe not quickly enough.
  • On the topic of Holly Christine, the PR person of CA... Michaud wanted her to upload the videos to the site in the evenings, and she worked every day - including holidays, and even on the day of an important medical operation. In fact, she was fired on the day after the operation. Because she wasn't at work; She was recovering from the operation. Oh, and unlike others, she did sign a contract, one that prevented her from working for another network site for a few years.
  • Doug has a bad track record with the female producers. The Nostalgia Chick was meant to be just that: Someone who reviews "girly" nostalgic shows and films, and nothing else, which is one reason why Lindsay distanced herself from the role eventually. Doug isn't the sexual harasser kind, but claims of misogyny have been circulating... Doug has also displayed a lot of terrible opinions about LGBT and trans communities, mostly through poor jokes and decisions (such as having a Wachowski played by a man durng a skit).
  • During To Boldly Flee, a scene involves Nostalgia Chick being assimilated by Mechakara, a villain from Lewis Lovhaug's comic book review show Atop the Fourth Wall. The original draft of the script made it sound far too much like a rape she would come to enjoy, which she refused to play - modifications were made, but no, they didn't remove the awkward sex puns that immediately followed that scene. Later in the movie, Lindsay (as a Nostalgia Chick turned into a parody of Seven-of-Nine from Star Trek) fights Allison, and both women were uncomfortable with the scene. Instead of listening, Doug brushed off their demands and basically went "Nyeeeeeeeeeeeeeh justdoit."
  • Also about To Boldly Flee: The filming of this 8-part, 3.5 hours long miniseries (or movie?) took place over 8 days, with days of filming often as long as 18 hours. Doug had to be told basic movie production things, like having water and food for the actors to use between takes. Doug wouldn't bother studying each reviewer's character to portray them more closely to the way they are in their separate shows, leading to situations like the one described here by Lewis Lovhaug, AKA Linkara.
  • Again with To Boldly Flee: The nightmares continued in the special effects department. For many scenes, Phelan Porteous (Phelous, and Allison's boyfriend) worked on the special effects, for free no less. Showing them to Doug, he at first received a very positive response. However, Doug and Rob apparently were dissatisfied and thought Phelan was half-assing his unpaid special effect work, so they sent another producer (Welshy) to spy on him to make sure he was actually doing the work. Welshy, being smarter than that, told Phelan about the situation. Read Phelan's own actual post about the situation, posted on January 2015.
  • Speaking of which! Yet another PR disaster, when Allison was fired and some others quit along with her, someone at CA posted an update to the site: "Channel Awesome would like to announce that Andrew Dickman, Kyle Kallgren (Oancitizen), Allison Pregler (Obscurus Lupa) and Phelan Porteus (Phelous) have parted ways with us. We wish them the best." Let me repeat: "would like to announce". Not "is sorry to announce". Oh, how two words can change the entire meaning of a message. They didn't even bother to spell Phelan's family name right!
  • On January 23rd, 2014, Justin Carmichael (known by his username JewWario) shot himself in the head in a bout of severe depression. Mike Michaud refused another producer (Nerd to the Third Power)'s offer to make a tribute video for Justin, basically saying "You're not big enough, it's not gonna give us enough views". Subtext being that it won't bring enough ad revenue. Because that's what matters in homaging a friend, amirite? Also in the following week, Doug Walker made two suicide jokes that couldn't have been timed more poorly - and one of them is the basis of an entire review.
  • On the switch from That Guy With The Glasses to Channel Awesome, a few producers were let go, with their video archives never transferred to the new website... and were never told about it. One of them was Benjamin Daniel, AKA Benzaie.
  • As stated in Allison's Tweet posted earlier, the Walkers refused to lend their studio to other reviewers, despite them at first saying they could open it to be used by various reviewers.
  • There was that time Channel Awesome held a Kickstarter and collected 90,000$ to improve the studio and create a few more shows. The money ultimately went into a game show that lasted a few measly episodes (because what's the interest in an online, trivia-answering game show?). None of their other Kickstarter promises were achieved, and it's been said that the only reason they did do the game show after all was because Kickstarter had begun investigating them to see where the money had gone.
  • And oh yeah, I mentioned the person behind the Channel Awesome twitter account blocking every single person who so much as mentions this whole controversy, didn't I? For guys who make a living critiquing stuff, the Walkers sure have a problem with criticism... To make it more insulting, this is happening one year after "Where's The Fair Use" (#WTFU), a hashtag campaign started by Doug to call out the system behind YouTube, which makes it all too easy for malicious people to abuse the Fair Use system in order to steal monetization from videos, especially reviews and the like... and how YouTube completely ignores creators.

And that's not getting into other horror stories that may not involve the Walkers or Michaud, but different video producers who have done reprehensible things and received no consequences. Here's just one example...

Here's another list compiling even more examples of horrid business management from Channel Awesome - a list more complete than mine.

Sorry for the very long and very dark article, but even as I post this nearly two weeks after it started, the story just won't end. It's still going on. After the hashtag was formed, more people from the site left, notably Todd NathansonLewis LovhaugWilliam DuFresne (AKA That Dude in the Suede). I suggest you keep an eye on that hashtag, as it will keep on growing. My advice is: Look for every content creator you like from Channel Awesome, those who left and those who are still there. Follow their websites, their YouTube and Twitch channels, their Twitter/Facebook/Tumblr pages. Drop Channel Awesome completely, but not the people who are/were on it. All of them deserve views, except Doug.

EDIT: The producers have now released their document. 69 pages. I talk about it in my second article on the matter, an update to this one, and I also talk about Channel Awesome's "apology" (I couldn't air quotes more if I tried).

March 23, 2018

Rabbids Go Home

(title card coming... hopefully soon)

They... sleep on lights?
First they invaded Rayman’s world. Then they invaded the “human world” (or something similar to it, anyway). Then, they invaded human culture. That’s when Rayman got tired of being the second fiddle, and left back to the Glade of Dreams. But we weren’t done with these guys, oh no. They are still in the human world, and they have developed a new obsession: The Moon!

Rabbids Go Home was developed by Ubisoft Montpellier and released for the Wii on November 1st, 2009. Things are going to get weird, but hey, I’m coming for the ride, as long as it’s better than last week’s game.

"This is the biggest round street light I have ever seen!
Let's go sleep on it!" 
Life goes on normally for the humans, while their invaders have found refuge in the junkyard. It’s nighttime, and the moon is full. So large, in fact, that there’s probably another part of the world suffering from a tidal wave or something. The Rabbids suddenly notice the Moon, and (we assume) they decide they want to be on it. I’d love to analyze that train of thought, but these are the Rabbids we’re talking about: That train derails every 2 minutes. And yet, with this idea, they all decide to team up!


March 16, 2018

Rabbids Rumble


In preparation for this review and the next, I revisited the four games I reviewed back in February 2015. My criticism of them still stand. I won’t come back on them, you can just go back to read those reviews instead. Speaking of, I think I strained my arm with the cow-tossing mini-game again. Peachy.

I remember loving these games so much, I spent an extra part listing my favorite and least favorite mini-games from each title (using the abbreviations RRR – Rayman Raving Rabbids -, RR – Raving Rabbids – and R – Rabbids – to keep things shorter). RRR1, RRR2 (for DS and Wii), RRR TV Party… and of course, those were only the beginning. These were followed by Rabbids Go Home, which marked the clear divide between the original trilogy of games and every one that followed. Rayman was no longer the victim of these invaders’ antics… Nah, the humans were the victims instead.

You could call it... an invasion.
After which the franchise grew bigger and bigger, with entries for home consoles and portable devices. “RR Travel In Time”, where they take their madness to various epochs of human History; “RR Alive and Kicking”, which makes full use of the Xbox Kinect; “Rabbids Land” on the Wii U; “The Interactive TV Show” discussed in last week’s review, along with the TV show; and “RR: The Big Plan”, a VR title because you just have to have bunnies literally come at you now. But it was released only for the Google Daydream, so meh. There’s a few games on iOS as well: “R Big Bang”, “R Heroes” and “R Crazy Rush”. Oh, and a cheap Facebook game that never let you have any chance of moving forward without paying real money. Because that's how Facebook games work. Then, last year we had the massive smash hit “Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle”, released for the Nintendo Switch, and which lovingly mocked every overused trope under the sun of the Mushroom Kingdom. Put that one in the list of crossovers that worked surprisingly well. It was like Ubisoft hosting a friendly roast for a franchise belonging to their adversary.


But of course, there’s also today’s game, Rabbids Rumble. This one was developed by Headstrong Games rather than Ubisoft, and was released on November 13th, 2012. It was released solely for the Nintendo 3DS, for a simple reason: This game makes full use of the portable console’s capabilities. You’ll notice that mini-game collections do that often. I even remember when I bought this one: January 2015, G-Anime, first convention I ever went to. Hey, what’s a convention if not a great place to buy used games? As a fan of the Rabbids, of course I jumped on the occasion to buy this one!


Just look at the box. Looks fun, doesn’t it? A bunch of Rabbids dressed in various silly disguises, ready for a brawl. And the back of the box says there’s over 100 Rabbids to collect in this game! 100 different battlers! And there are still mini-games, too! What’s not to love? Okay, enough time wasted: What’s the game like?

March 9, 2018

Rabbids Invasion: My Episode Suggestions

Okay...I’m not planning to make a full-on post about this. Rabbids Invasion has a LOT of episodes, so a Top 12 is almost impossible, and besides these episodes are too short to warrant that much text. Instead, here are some of my favorite episodes; feel free to check them out whenever you want. I’ll just say why I like these episodes.

Go here to read the Rabbids Invasion review.


“Rabbid, Are You There?” – The Rabbids set out to mimic a burglar breaking and entering into a house, and their antics prevent the burglar from succeeding in his task. Said antics also end up affecting the apartment above, in which a fake psychic is trying to scam people into giving him more money, pretending to speak to ghosts and spirits. Two plots that combine in a smart way!

This is entirely too much work for something that could
be solved in 5 seconds. Rabbids in a nutshell.
“Escalator Rabbid” – One bunny is trying to climb up a descending escalator, so he can reach the bunnies on the next floor and get some of their candy. He thinks up a dozen different ways to achieve this, yet keeps failing – while completely missing the fact that there’s an escalator going upwards only a few feet away! This one shows that the Rabbids are very stupid, but also bizarrely resourceful, even if the solutions they find are complex and ineffective, and the best solution, the obvious and easy one, is invisible to them.

“Omelet Party” – The “pilot”, in which Rabbids stumble upon a chicken coop, start racing using chicken as steads, then learn to provoke egg-laying from chickens and use them in an egg shootout… In other words, the absurd and silly stuff you’ve come to expect from these idiots.

Is that a... Jesus analogy or something?
“Rabbid Test No 98005-C: The Blue Rabbid” – In my eyes, the BEST episode of the show. John and Gina, the scientists, watch over seven Rabbids in their test chamber, and decide to paint one blue. What follows is a lesson in prejudice as the Rabbids belittle the lone blue bunny, and then the second one that Gina also paints. She turns two more blue, with the unpainted ones now the minority that the blues start belittling. This leads to a battle between both groups. Eventually, Gina erases the paint off one side of a Rabbid, making him half-blue half-white, and this one reunites the Rabbids as friends again. Touching, smart, and deeper than you’d expect from such a show.

While John panics in the Rabbid body, the Rabbid...
starts acting like a bird.
“Being Rabbid, Parts 1, 2 and 3” – Yes, the laboratory episodes are some of the best, and we have a trilogy here. In trying to comprehend the Rabbids, John switches brains with one of his test subjects. The Rabbid in John’s body gets into the control room… When Gina arrives the next day, she sends John in the Rabbid body out to the junkyard near the lab, where the bunnies regroup. Since he speaks human, the Rabbids start treating John like a king, but he manages to return to the lab… only for the brain transfer, done by Gina, to go wrong and leave Gina into the Rabbid’s body now. When she is sent down into the junkyard accidentally, she meets Lapinibernatus, the smart prehistoric Rabbid, who creates a Rabbid-to-English wristwatch translator so that she can understand him. Finally, a smart person Lapinibernatus can talk with! Unfortunately, John arrives, rescues Gina (leaving Lapinibernatus behind), and sets everything right, restoring Gina to her real body. Phew! These episodes would probably be together as #2 on my list of favorite episodes. The third one, in particular, is very touching.

A perfect Rabbids Invasion movie would have Gina
look for Lapinibernatus to help learn more about the
Rabbid species, since he's smart like a scientist.

Examples include "Diet Rabbid", in which one Rabbid tries
to slim the others down with exercise so they can enter
their makeshift machine. Problem being, they made the
entrance was too small, and no amount of exercise could
make them slim enough to go inside.
“The Rabbid Games” – The Olympic Games, in alien bunny flavor and all the stupidity they display. The running gag of the “female” Rabbid trying to sing and being constantly interrupted is a highlight.

Many episodes from Season 2 in which the bunnies try to get to the Moon. These include “Diet Rabbid” (in which one puts the others on a diet to go into their space shuttle, even if the diet is ineffective because they forgot to make a wide entrance on their shuttle) and “Green Rabbid”, which has them building a pile of stuff like they do in Rabbids Go Home.

Rabbids know Elvis? ....Impressive.
“Rabbid Anthem” – The Rabbids make a singing talent show in the junkyard, to find the perfect one to sing their anthem before they send one of theirs to the Moon. However, there’s only one participant, who tries over and over with different disguises, and he sings horribly off-key… until he inhales helium and does an adorable Elvis impersonation. And then, sometime later, the helium wears off. That one has laughs, cuteness, and drama when it all goes south.

“Ring! Bwaaah!” – After multiple episodes speaking on flip-flops as if they were cell phones, a group of bunnies suddenly gets a real smartphone… and proceed to “discover” it in true Rabbid fashion.

So wait, the Rabbids are dreaming of conducting actual
experiments on humans? Holy crap.
“Queen of Rabbids” – The Rabbids steal a magic kit for kids out of a store… and Alice, who had it in her hands, follows them. She proceeds to astonish them at the junkyard with the various simple magic tricks she knows, and they start treating her almost like a queen.

“Rabbid Dreams” – Ending this list on an unsettling episode, where the scientists attempt to comprehend Rabbids by observing their dreams. Things… get weird from there. Seriously, don’t mess with dreams.

That’s it for the list. Enjoy, seek these episodes, discover the show. This Friday: Rabbids Rumble.

Rabbids Invasion

Well! This is probably the worst title card I've ever made!

The Raving Rabbids. What else is there to say? You’re free to enjoy them, you’re free to despise them. Personally? I like them. They’re… I’m not sure how to explain it… A study on stupidity. They’re idiots, all of them. The rare few smart Rabbids would still be dumber than any American animated sitcom dad of your choice. Their utter lack of comprehension of human society leads them to screw up even the most basic of tasks, in completely unexpected and unpredictable ways. It takes a lot of creativity to ditch all logic and imagine how these creatures with failing knowledge of our customs, lacking in the IQ department, would approach each new discovery.

At least they're not the Minions.
Multiple games, a TV show, gag-per-page French comic books… the Rabbids have outgrown the Rayman series and took control of anything they could get their mitten-like hands on. A multi-media franchise. There's the games, of course, and I spent an entire month back in 2015 discussing no less than 4 Rabbid titles and the various mini-games they contain. And spoiler alert, two more Rabbid games will be reviewed this month. There’s a lot more to say about this franchise than you’d think.

I posted a quickie review of the French comic books here; at first, I was planning to add it to this review, but it would have made for a very long article. Go and look it up here.

Well, I can throw away my atlas now. It's become useless.
We can now start talking about the actual TV show, Rabbids Invasion. It was created by Ubisoft Motion Pictures and co-produced by Nickelodeon and Ubisoft Entertainment. Of note, while the Rabbids of the games are voiced by Yoann Perrier, those of Invasion are voiced by Damien Laquet, who does a mighty fine job in the art of lagomorph gibberish.

The intro sequence sets the tone: Hordes of Rabbids running around, dragging ropes, stringing up entire continents… zoom back and Planet Earth’s lands have been cut up and reshaped to form a giant Raving Rabbid. Well that’s a novel way of “taking over the world”…

No! Not the Statue of Liberty! I am fairly certain it doesn't
like getting tied up like this! ...Or maybe it does?

As for the series itself, you might think there isn’t much to say. You'd be mistaken. There is, indeed, more to be said about this silly little TV show about unintelligible alien bunnies than it seems at first glance.

The Raving Rabbids: The Comic Books

Alright! I will soon be discussing the Raving Rabbids’ TV show. However, first, let me dwell a bit on the Raving Rabbids comic books, published in France.The books were written by Thitaume and, up to Book 9, drawn by Pujol (because French and Belgian comic book writers/artists absolutely HAVE to have a one-word pen name, for some reason), and published by Les Deux Royaumes.There are English editions of the books available, though some gags have been changed.

I could see that front page as a jump scare in a FNAF-style
"Keep the bunnies away from you" Rabbids horror game.


That one time, the fourth wall resisted.
The books contain a lot of gags without any text (not counting the Rabbid language). Many, many, MANY pages actually play with meta-humor, and it’s not uncommon to see page spreads or punch lines about breaking the fourth wall. Or the comic squares. They take full advantage of the fact that this is a book, and multiple gags rely on that to work.

One book contains the best description for a Raving Rabbid that anyone could ever hope to write (I translated it for your benefit). Also note that it’s phrased as a game show question because that particular page had Rabbids watching the show and then copying it. “I am a part of the family of long-eared lagomorphs and only speak using terms such as ‘Bada’ or ‘Bwaaah’. Utterly dumb, I tend to imitate what I see in an absurd and unpredictable fashion. When an idea pops in my head, the consequences can be terrible. Who am I?”

Then the two Rabbids mimic the concept of a game show…

I know the answer to that one! It's "Badabwaaah", isn't it?

Perfect, isn’t it?


Another brilliant element of the comic book: Did you know Rabbids were genderless? I mean, they seem to default as an all-male species, mostly because they behave so often like rude, dumb boys. And yet, the books frequently feature Rabbids who choose their own gender, usually by mimicking the tertiary characteristics of the gender they desire to be: A wig of hair, eyelashes and fruits or sport balls placed strategically at the front of the shirt. The writers get quite a bit of mileage from these jokes, too. See this gag strip of a plastic surgeon Rabbid having to close his business because a fruit shop opened next door and the female Rabbids buy watermelons to replace their original fruits.


Oh, and the Rabbids comic book have probably the riskiest joke I have ever seen in any media with kids as their target demographic. Although it’s cleverly hidden as a Rabbid-centric parody. One who knows the reference would instantly go “OH MY GOD, THEY ACTUALLY WENT THERE”. I refer to one of the paintings on this page. Explaining this joke would ruin it.

Oh, and I guess the main joke is funny too.

There were 10 books published in the series. The last one came out in stores not even a month ago, drawn by Thomas Priou instead of Pujol. Some of the later books have themes or ongoing storylines: Book 7 is about fashion, Book 8 has a Rabbid stealing panels off pages (that’s pretty Meta), and Book 9 follows a hypnotist who trades minds with a Rabbid and tries to turn them both back to normal. The comic also features recurring Rabbids with their own gags, whether it’s the Sherlock Holmes one, the cleaning bunny, the Waldo bunny who never finds a good place to hide…

That’s about all I need to say about the comics: Smarter than you’d think, a lot of interesting twists, a lot of media awareness as well. I encourage you to look up some of the pages, as there’s a surprising lot of adult jokes, and if that’s your sort of thing, you could enjoy reading through those.

March 5, 2018

Grand Theft Auto V (Part 6)

Part 1Part 2Part 3Part 4Part 5Part 6

Finally, this is the last part! Not much left to do here: Just some words about additional side-quests, and then my final thoughts.

I bought that bar two weeks ago, and I already have to save it
from a gang! Where's the police in this city?
For the second half of Part 5, I spoke at length about all the strangers and freaks you can help around the map, with each protagonist. This time around, I’m discussing every other hobby or pastime you can access, almost anytime, all over the map. If you’re looking for new stuff to do, you’re not going to be looking for very long. Unlike a proper 100% completion where everything absolutely has to be done, only a fraction of these have to be done to get full completion of the game. The hobbies and pastimes, as well as other noteworthy stuff on the map, can be accessed usually all the time.

This heliport is mine now!
Properties: There are many properties scattered around the map. These can be bought by the protagonists, although some are limited to one or two of the three (as an example, only Franklin can buy the taxicab company). Many properties will then pay back the protagonist that bought them, although not all of them are profitable. For the record, Trevor “buying” the Vanilla Unicorn (by killing the owner) counts, as he gets 5000$ per week every Monday afterwards. Other companies will require the player to fulfill some conditions, however (as an example, the LSPD auto impound costs 150,000$ and only pays 500$ when you impound a car, meaning that to make a profit, you must tow over 300 cars – not too profitable, is it?). On top of that, properties will sometimes get in trouble and give their buyer a mission to help them, and you have to complete some of those to get 100% completion (speaking of which, you need to buy 5 properties at least, split among the characters, for completion as well – and the Vanilla Unicorn doesn’t count since you get it from a story mission).

Combo breaker...?
-Ammu-Nation: You can buy and customize any gun in Ammu-Nation. Some stores also have a shooting range, in which you can train yourself at shooting with various weapons. In fact, those (and most things on this list) count towards completion.

-Garages all over the place, allowing you to customize your cars. You can also buy a few garages to park your favorite cars, or order some new cars through in-game websites. (Can I repeat how impressive it is that this game has a fully functional miniature Internet?)

March 2, 2018

Grand Theft Auto V (Part 5)

Part 1Part 2Part 3Part 4Part 5Part 6

And it burns, burns, burns...
Building on fire, building on fire..
Time to raid the FIB! I picked the “subtle” approach, so Michael goes in as a janitor, mops the floors a bit, sets bombs and leaves, just as Franklin arrives with the crew in the fire truck. Kabooms soon follow. The crew dresses up as firemen and goes into the highest floors of the building again, and manages to steal a hard drive containing Michael’s Witness Protection information. However, the fire gets a lot worse as they flee, and they have to make their way through the burning offices. An explosion knocks out Franklin shortly, and when he gets up, he has to hurry towards the others – with FIB agents getting in his way, because they seem to have figured out the ruse. The crew manages to leave (whether one of the extra shooters dies or not depends on which people you picked for the heist), gets in the firetruck, heads over to the getaway car and leaves to Lester’s place.

"Time for hugs!"
"Don't hug me, I'm handicapped!"
"Too late! Huuugs!"

That's entirely too many guns being pointed in every
goddamn direction here.
Phew! That was some scary stuff right there. The surviving guys celebrate at Lester’s, but Michael knew this heist was supposed to be his ticket to freedom, so he prefers to hurry and go find Dave instead of partying. As it turns out, freeing Michael from his situation won’t be so easy. Steve Haines and his assistant show up, and in the altercation, each one draws their gun. Then guys of the FIB show up. Then guy from the IAA show up. Then Merryweather helicopters show up. God’s sake, even “Mexican Standoff” is not enough to describe this! In the ensuing shootout, Michael tries to escape, but thankfully gets help from Trevor who showed up, seeing there an opportunity to shoot at every authority he hates. Michael manages to flee, and meets Trevor later. The psycho says that he doesn’t want to kill his ex-friend now… nah, there’s something they have to do first: The Big Score at the Union Depository!

Trevor's sniping for once. And it's almost a miracle that he
doesn't take that opportunity to kill Michael. Guess he
does hate the FIB, the IAA and Merryweather even more.

Past this point, Michael can also go see Dr. Friedlander for the last time, and during that session the doctor reveals that he has obtained a TV show in which he might talk about some of his patients – including Michael. Using cheap, poor, obvious aliases for said patients. Bad idea, man, bad idea. Michael is obviously angry at this, and we have the option to either kill Friedlander or let him go. (If you let him go, he gets hit by a bus and dies anyway.)

These three actually form one Hell of an awesome team.
That is, when Michael and Trevor aren't jumping at
each other's throats.
As we come closer to the finale, more loose ends get tied up. First is Franklin, whose ex Tanisha visits at his fancy home, saying that Lamar is in trouble. He’s about to walk right into a trap set by Stretch – hm, we haven’t heard of that guy in a while, but it’s the same shithead who kept putting Lamar and Franklin in ambushes, to try and get them killed. I can’t wait to make that asshole pay. But first, gotta save Lamar’s sorry ass again. And this is an awesome mission in which Michael snipes while Trevor and Franklin are on the field, killing every other gang member coming at them. After Lamar is driven home, Franklin meets Dave Norton and Steve Haines, who tell him someone needs to get rid of Trevor – and Franklin is the only possible candidate.


Is it normal that I love to use explosives this much while
playing GTA V? Sticky bombs, grenades...
It's almost more fun than guns!
Later, Michael is heading to the premiere of the movie he helped create, Meltdown. However, Devin Weston arrives at the premiere and remarks that Michael’s wife and daughter aren’t here yet… then he strongly implies that he has sent Merryweather soldiers to attack them. So Michael leaves the premiere to rescue his family. And of course, we all know what that means: A shootout between one guy and at least a dozen enemies. Thinking he dealt with all the soldiers, Michael returns to his family upstairs, but is struck by a hiding guard. No worries, though! Jimmy comes to save him by turning off the lights and conking the guy on the head with his bong. And then decides to teabag his victim IRL… but then it turns out he’s teabagging his own dad instead.

"I miss the premiere of my film, I have to save my family
from a bunch of mercenaries, I kill people under my own
roof, and then I get my son's nuts in my face. Clearly, this
has been the best day of my life."

With all the remaining villains slowly creeping onto the trio, I say it’s time to move on to the Big Score. Once again, Lester offers two options: Subtle or Obvious. Because the past subtle ways worked so well, I’m going with subtle. This particular plan involves stealing three cars of a special brand and upgrading them for the escape, then taking away a police van so that the team can use the spike strips in it. We also get uniforms, courtesy of Lester.

More gold than we'll ever need to live comfortably
for the rest of our lives!

What is this tech wizardry?
The guys use the spike strips to stop two vans of the Union Depository, and sneak into the bank as guards. They help in dragging four tons of gold from the vault into the trucks, and manage to get away. However, Merryweather men have found out and are now chasing the two trucks, though Franklin and the hacker use a program to switch the traffic lights so that the UD trucks make it safely near the strip club, the Vanilla Unicorn. They start unloading the gold bricks – totaling over 200 million dollars – when they’re attacked by Merryweather troops. The next part is probably one of the toughest shootouts in the game, mostly because it’s under a highway and the pillars block everyone’s vision and both sides can use them for cover.

It's like a miniature warzone under a highway.
Once all the Merryweather men are dead, the guys load up the stock in their modified cars and have to avoid the cops as their altercation gave them a five-star wanted rating. They make it into the highway tunnels and hide the cars in big trucks, and bring the trucks to a remote location. Good golly, they actually pulled it off! After Lester and the other heist crew members take their cut, our three protagonists split over 100 million dollars between themselves. Unfortunately, no matter how well the Big Score went, we end the scene on Franklin, Michael and Trevor getting into a massive argument and each going their separate ways.

I know it's not a big opening, but insert yourself carefully,
nobody will get hurt, and it'll be a major success.
First who goes "That's what she says" gets slapped.

A tough choice delivered by a man who makes you
wish there was an Option D: Punch the mission-giver
in the face.
After this, when Franklin goes home, he is visited by Devin Weston. The billionnaire has a mission for him: Kill Michael. Franklin says the FIB already wants him to kill Trevor, so he’s stuck between a rock and a hard place. Weston raises an interesting  option: Spare them both… and get in deep trouble against every major "peacekeeping" organization in Los Santos. You choose as soon as Devin leaves. If you pick “Option A: Kill Trevor” or “Option B: Kill Michael”, you get a particular mission to complete, though it means you won’t be able to complete every mission in the game since one of the three major protagonists will be dead. For good. And that's saying nothing of the additional effects it has on relationships between Franklin and other major and secondary characters in the game. Since Franklin is the one who has to do the job, he’ll survive no matter which of the three options you pick, so only his side-quests count towards proper completion of the game. Obviously, the best is Option C, but if you're the type who wants to see everything, nothing stops you from making three save files in which you pick different options.

"At least, if either Michael or Trevor dies, it's gonna
stop them from arguing endlessly..."
Okay, that was really mean-spirited, especially from me.

It's pretty hot in here... but I am not allowed to complain,
this is our millions being melted into new cash!
Franklin meets Lester at his place, discussing his situation. Lester doesn’t know what to do at first, but he eventually comes up with a plan that involves attracting the FIB and Merryweather into the foundry in which they’re melting the gold bricks stolen from the Union Depository. Franklin picks up Lamar, then heads inside where he manages to stop Michael and Trevor from arguing, at least until the opponents have been dealt with. They fight and kill the guards inside, then help Lamar outside deal with the waves of attackers. After this, the trio decides they need to get rid of each and every one of their opponents. They call Lester to find out where each opponent is, then go their separate ways.

The Ballas? Clearly they didn' have enough balls.
The way it’s done is very smart: Each protagonist goes after another protagonist’s main villain. Franklin goes out to murder Wei Cheng, Michael kills Stretch, Trevor snipes Steve Haines. None of them are too difficult, unless you're aiming for the Gold requirements. With these three out of the picture, we can move on to Devin Weston. Kidnapping him from his mansion isn’t too easy as he has Merryweather guards with him, but Trevor kills them all, then stuffs Weston in the trunk of a car.

"Hey, Weston. Not only are you a shitty human, a cheap
bastard, an asshole and a fake philanthropist...
But also, you car drives like shit."

FINISH HIM
Trevor, Franklin and Michael join at a remote location, give Weston a speech about how much he sucks, then they close the trunk and send the car down a cliff into the water below. And so, the three remain friends. Perhaps vitriolic friends, but still friends. Also, Michael and Trevor’s relationship seems to have improved! And so, after Franklin leaves on his bike and Michael in his car, Trevor heads home… by foot. The car he took is down the cliff after all. Cue over 40 minutes of ending credits.

It's odd how the most satisfying explosion in
the entire game is one you probably wouldn't
be able to replicate in-game.

However, as I said multiple times through this review, the Story Mode is one thing. This is a wide-open sandbox, after all. You’ve got dozens of activities on the side. Once in a while I would talk about the strangers and freaks that either protagonist can meet throughout the game, and that’s not even counting every other activity that can be done by any character! Here’s a quick rundown of the side-missions.

Returning people's stolen wallets sometimes feels like the
best thing I get to do in this game.
-Random events: These can happen all over the map and involve pickpockets, police shootouts, ambushes by criminals, or anything else that has no impact on our protagonists’ lives. These pop up anywhere on the map at random times, close to where a protagonist is at the moment. They’re usually pretty easy, and sometimes give money rewards. The best one I’ve done involved rescuing a mafiosi’s daughter and bringing her home, receiving many thousand dollars as a result. Since you must complete 14 of those to get 100% completion, I suggest doing those whenever they pop up on the map.

-Michael has three extra missions that each involve a different member of his family: Rescuing his wife Amanda from the cops after she was caught trying to steal a purse, teach a lesson to a creepy fan of Tracy’s, and save Jimmy from people he was trolling online and who had the resources to hunt him down and kidnap him.

-Train Chop. There isn’t much there and it’s not required for 100% completion. Also, it’s mostly done through a phone app. Not in the game; on your real-life phone. If you actually go through that effort, Chop will become very useful as he can find the collectibles around the map. And there are LOTS of collectibles.

Yes, you literally have to play mini-games...
on an app on your real-life smartphone...
connected to your Rockstar Social Club account...
in order to train Chop properly so that he becomes
slightly more useful in-game.
Props for creativity I guess.

Showing you the building, because most of what's inside
would be too NSFW for this blog or would require
a lot of censoring. Especially the "mini-games".
-Get lap dances at the Vanilla Unicorn. That’s not important, you think? Oh, but it is! Paying for a lap dance takes the current protagonist to a private booth and the stripper dances for them, and you can caress and compliment the girl. If you fill that lap dancer’s attraction bar, she might invite the protagonist at her place for more direct fun. After which, you get that girl’s phone number and can contact her sometimes for booty calls. You might think that’s just another element to justify this game’s M rating, but the sex isn’t shown on-screen. However, it does increase that character’s stamina, so I guess it’s good for something.

Killing targets from a taxi, from a car, from a bus.
Doesn't matter, as long as the target dies.
I should worry about all the witnesses in the bus...
...................Nah.
-Lester is the brains behind most heists, but he also has a few assassination missions to offer to Franklin around Los Santos. Each kill accomplished by Franklin durng those missions (or the first, story mode-related one involving LifeInvader, done by Michael) will have a serious impact on the in-game economy, reflected by the changes on the stock market. It’s in your best interests to learn how that system works, and always invest in a company opposing the one you’re about to affect as that opposing company’s stocks will rise like crazy as a result (as an example, you can invest all your money in Betta Pharmaceuticals before heading out to kill Brett Lowrey, the head of opposing pharma company Bilkinton Research). It’s advised to do most of Lester’s assassination missions after the ending of the game, as all three protagonists will have obtained the money from the Big Score, and thus can invest millions of dollars and get many more millions in return. In fact, thanks to this, you could reach the maximum possible amount of money every protagonist can have in this game: Over two billion dollars!

Mary-Ann is an unlikable, angry, psychopathic, asshole
of a person.
She's practically Trevor's soul sister.
Not that she'd ever accept it.
-There are two quest-givers that are met by every protagonist. First is Mary-Ann, who will challenge each of them. She gets into a footrace against Michael, takes Franklin on a triathlon, and brings Trevor in a bicycle race. Next is Barry, the marijuana legalization advocate, who gives some particularly strong weed to all three. Michael and Trevor get hallucinations and fight Xenomorphs and clowns respectively, while Franklin is unaffected by it. Thus, Barry will send Franklin on missions to prepare a smoke-in at the city hall, to help his cause. Unfortunately, he’s too stoned out of his mind on the day of the smoke-in to remember to actually make the event happen.

Since Franklin is the only character guaranteed to survive, he has the biggest number of missions from strangers and freaks. These all count towards 100% completion, unlike Michael’s or Trevor’s.
-First is Tonya Wiggins, who drags Franklin into a few towing missions for her boyfriend, who is a crackhead and too high to do his damn job;
-Beverly Felton, a paparazzi who keeps dragging Franklin into his crazy attempts at snapping controversial pictures of celebrities. As I explained in a previous part, in the final mission he doesn’t pay Franklin, so you can kill him;
And the latest Darwin Award goes to... Dom Beasley!
-Dom Beasley, an eccentric millionaire who keeps getting into increasingly dangerous stunts. His missions open the parachuting side-quests;
-Omega, a weird hippie met in Blaine County, who claims he has seen a UFO crash near Los Santos, and he asks Franklin to collect the 50 pieces of the UFO scattered around. Chop can help for this task. Getting all 50 pieces doesn’t lead to the creation of a UFO, but it does give a pretty cool buggy.
-Peter Dreyfuss, an old film director who is strongly implied to have murdered his girlfriend Leonora Johnson back in the Seventies. To find the truth, you must collect 50 letter scraps around the entire map. Turns out, he did murder Leonora. So Franklin will confront him, and has the option of killing him.
-Then there’s the quick quest about the Children of the Mountain… which just gives you a T-shirt.

But of course, Michael and Trevor have side-quests of their own. In Michael’s case:
-There’s Abigail Mathers, wife of the late TV host Frank Mathers. She asks Michael to grab a submarine and seek the 30 parts of the submarine her husband died in, to prove it was an accident, as that would give her his life insurance. Only problem being, when Michael gathers all the pieces, he finds out the airlocks were sabotaged (by her), so we have the option to (of course) kill her. Sheesh, I’m starting to feel like we’re killing a few too many characters around here;
-Then there’s the Epsilon program, which keeps asking for a bigger amount of money from Michael with every mission, and makes the missions increasingly complicated. The scariest part is that their brainwashing seems to work on Michael over time. Thankfully, after the final mission, you can snap back and kill most cultists, and gain about two millions dollars as well.

"This is starting to sound like scientology..."
"What? We aren't Scientologists! We're a lot more...
money-grubbing/I mean, more legitimate!"

Now, Trevor:
-Cletus Ewing, a hunting enthusiast who teaches Trevor some tricks with weapons, and later shows him how to hunt. Trevor can then send photos of his legal deer kills to Cletus;
-Maude Eccles, a woman who owns a bail bond office and sends Trevor on multiple quests where he has to capture bail bond dodgers. Of course, this being Trevor, he can also kill them, but the reward won’t be as good;
-The Civil Border Patrol, two rednecks who use this false “organization” as an excuse to harass and capture foreigners even if they can’t get them out of the country. As recounted in another part of this review, they eventually go too far, menace an entire family with their guns, and are promptly killed by Trevor;
It's not very clear in the screenshot, but Trevor has just
punched a sign and destroyed it.
-Josh Bernstein, a realtor who hires Trevor to cause trouble to his main rival, by destroying house sale signs and punching the guy. The reward? He lets Trevor bang his second wife. Big deal. Eventually he sends the cops in Trevor’s way, so we kill him, because we just don’t kill enough people in this game already;
-Nigel and Mrs. Thornhill, the two celebrity-obsessed weirdos that even Trevor thinks are crazier than him. They first ask him to steal items from celebrities, then ask him to kidnap a celebrity. And when they get in trouble, they ask him to kill that celebrity, but Trevor has the option to let him go instead. Just a shame we can’t kill those two freaks;
-A few quests involve the Altruists, a cult of implied cannibals. Bring 4 people to them, and a final mission will have them kidnap Trevor only to hilariously fuck up his sacrifice;
-Post-game, a mission opens at Trevor’s old trailer home. It’s Mrs. Philips, his mother, who asks him to steal a van containing painkillers. She turns out to have been a hallucination.

I’m gonna stop here for now. There’s more to do around this game, but this part has gone on long enough. In Part 6, every other possible side-quest (yes, there’s more!), then my final words (at last!) on the game.