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Woo-hoo! I'll join in on this Best of 2008 thing!

Best Movie: The Dark Knight
- I didn't really go out to see much of anything this year. I still have yet to see Iron Man, but was told that I had to see this. So I did. It was very good, though just a wee bit over-rated. The Joker was awesome, yes. But Two-Face was under-appreciated, and I hate Christian Bale's Batman. I like his Bruce Wayne, but hate his Batman. Give me Michael Keaton's Batman any day. He was low-key, and didn't talk like a douche. Judging from the title, I thought that this movie might have been an adaptation of Frank Miller's, The Dark Knight Returns. Alas, I was wrong. It should have been, though. Because that graphic novel is much better than this movie. Not that this movie is bad by any means. Only other thing I went out to see was The Hulk. And that sucked.

Best Book: Post Office, by Charles Bukowski
- Okay, this came out years ago, but I started getting into Bukowski this past year. So, for me, it's a new book. It's the sequel to Factotum, and the prequel to Women. If anyone's ever struggled with a menial service job... this book is for you. Bukowski's writing is so raw, yet he captures the human condition so accurately. Definitely recommended.

Best Game: Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots
- While not the greatest game in the series (that honor still belongs to the original MGS), this game definitely deserves the Game of the Year slot. The gameplay is great, the graphics are beautiful, there's tons of replay value and easter eggs, and it's an epic and stunning conclusion to a great game series. While I'm a little saddened that there may be no more Metal Gear games, I feel that this game should remain the last, as it wraps up the story quite nicely, and that Snake went out the way he should have... a hero.

Best Comic Series: Scud: The Disposable Assassin (#21-24)
- Okay, for this one, a little history. Scud: The Disposable Assassin was an Independent Comic Book series that began in 1994. Scuds are robotic hitmen that you buy out of vending machines. After they kill their assigned target, they automatically self-destruct. Hence the term, 'Disposable Assassin'. The story begins when a particular Scud (Heartbreaker Series: 1373) is hired to kill Jeff, a female plug-headed mutant. While fighting Jeff in an abandoned factory, he notices the warning label printed on his back through a mirror which reads, CAUTION: This unit will self-destruct upon termination of target. Realizing that he doesn't want to die, Scud shoots off Jeff's arms and legs, and puts her on life-support. He then becomes a freelance assassin in order to pay for her medical bills. The series ran bi-monthly for 20 issues and then ended abruptly in 1998 with a cliffhanger which left Scud's love interest dead, and the fate of the entire world at stake. The guy who wrote the comics, Rob Schrab, was having a lot of personal problems, and left the series in order to pursue a career in Hollywood. So the series laid dormant for an entire decade. 10 years. I read these comics as a kid, and loved them. The art was so bizarre, and so were the characters. And it's full of great action and gunplay. It was just a fun comic. I waited months and months for #21 to come out, but it never happened. But back in '07, Schrab announced that he would be doing #21, and finishing the series. It released in four parts in early 2008, and then he put out a huge omnibus trade paperback with all the issues: #1 - #24. It was a great conclusion to the series. Everything... all the plot threads were tied together so perfectly in such a neat little bow that it would make one think that he had this ending in mind since he first began the series, though he originally had a much darker ending in mind. Which leads me to...

Best Event: Comic-Con 2008
- If you've never been to one, I highly recommend you hit one up before you die. It's a total dorkasm. This was, by far, my highlight of 2008. Hot women dressed up as video game and comic book characters, panels and previews for upcoming, highly anticipated movies and T.V. shows, comics, video games; the works. They had a Watchmen panel where they showed extended footage. They had the actual Owl Ship prop that they're gonna be using in the movie. Being such a huge fan of the graphic novel, just seeing the ship in real life, with my own eyes, was beyond awesome (but they wouldn't let us inside it -_-). I met Kevin Eastmen, and he drew me art and signed my original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles comics (the real Ninja Turtles, where they all wore red sashes and drank beer, not that cartoon crap). I kicked a bunch of people's asses in the new Street Fighter IV (which is awesome, by the way). I met Rob Schrab, and he signed my hardcover Scud omnibus. I got to pose with some Storm Troopers, I got really drunk most every night, and I got laid. Oh, and Jill Valentine:

Ok, I forgot to contribute to the best of '08.

Best Music Album: Mudvayne-The New Game
Best Single:Fish Out of Water-Mudvayne

Best Movie: Wanted

Games of '08:
Left 4 Dead
Fable 2

I think we all do to some degree, Notte. crying

Oh yes, because 1997/1998 graced us with some real class act movies... Mouse Hunt, Flubber, Polly, Home Alone 3, Joe's Apartment, and *gag* Good Will Hunting, were some real masterpieces. rolleyes

The sequel, that is. 1995 brought us the first one. The Double Dragon Movie? What a weird movie. I really can't determine whether I like it or not.

Okay, by request, I'm moving my response to a post in another thread here, because it was deemed off-topic. So if you're not involved in any way, feel free to skip this if you like.

Let me break it down like this: Let's just say for hypothetical purposes that we took RE3 and all the Outbreak games out of the main canon timeline. Okay, so we got RE0 - RE1 - RE2 - RE:CV - RE4 - RE5. Will the main plot of the story have changed in the slightest? The answer is no, because they explain right in the beginning of Code Veronica that Raccoon City got nuked. That's all we needed. Furthermore, taking RE3 and the Outbreak games out of the timeline would delete plotholes that RE3 and the Outbreaks created in respects to RE2. If we took RE2 out of the timeline, then we can forget about Ada, William Birkin, Sherry Birkin, Leon, Claire, and numerous other characters that have returned and played a role throughout the series. If we take Code Veronica out of the timeline, then we can forget about Wesker's return, and how that was explained. We can also forget about Sherry being in Wesker's possession as well. Take RE3 out of the timeline, and we have no Carlos or Nemesis. So what? Does that change anything in context to the rest of the games? NO. Know why? Because it's a side-story.


This is so sad. xd You're basically re-wording stuff that I've already said and twisting it around, trying to turn it into a validation for your stance on the subject. Let's rewind here. This is what you said:
"I mean, with CV, we already knew Umbrella was over with, so what was the point of that? For Claire to search for Chris? I find that hardly qualifying for an entire game." - to which I replied:
How did we know Umbrella was over with in CV? Admittedly, it's been quite a while since I've played through it, but I don't recall anything pointing to that fact. Code Veronica was much more a direct sequel to the series than RE3. RE3 was very much a side-story, and didn't really progress the overall plot in the slightest. I've always considered RE3 to be RE2.5 and CV to be the true RE3. And it was very relevant... until RE4 came around and nullified the whole thing. Sound familiar?


Do me a favor. Look up the definition of a side story. RE3 doesn't have a major purpose outside of the city being nuked, which was explained in Code Veronica anyway. And I've already pretty much eviscerated the rest of this argument at the start of my rebuttal. Moving on.


So, basically... another point for me? Zero for you? Okay. By the way, if you play Umbrella Chronicles, you'll basically realize he had all the components he needed. If you don't know all the facts, then you shouldn't be speaking on it in the first place. Know your s**t, 'cause you don't know nothin' about it.


Um... yes, she did! She finds Chris's Diary in the S.T.A.R.S. room very early on in the game, which informs her that Chris has gone to Europe. So, no, she didn't spend most of the game searching for Chris. Did you even play the games? An open ending? Okay? Well, RE2 wasn't an open ending, obviously. They followed up with it. So I'm not quite sure what you're getting at.


*face-palm* Let me draw it out for you: Claire goes searching for Chris at an Umbrella installation. She is captured, brought to another Umbrella installation where she discovers some of the origins of a Virus that Umbrella created. That's not a coincidence. Last time Leon started a new job, he ran into a zombie-infested city on his first day, which Umbrella was ultimately responsible for. He also ran into a woman named Ada Wong. Leon is now a government agent, assigned with the task of rescuing the President's Daughter as his first assignment. He is not searching any Umbrella installations, and as far as he knows, Umbrella is over. The President's Daughter is being held captive by the Los Plagas, which are bunch of parasite monsters. Two new jobs; two new types of monsters? He also runs into Ada again, and learns that Umbrella is also involved. He didn't go out looking for monsters. He didn't go out looking for Ada. He didn't go out looking for Umbrella. It was all coincidences. Lots of 'em. Yes, I will accept it as the story. But I still find it pretty silly.


So... basically you're making presumptions of what happened in Umbrella Chronicles? You're basically telling me that, even though you don't know if anything major was revealed, that there was no way Wesker could do jack? Okay.


rofl @ irony. It's a pretty safe bet based on what happened in Umbrella Chronicles; a game that that you haven't played, and are basically disregarding, yet you claim you have the facts. You don't have any of your facts straight, dude. xd It's not like you even have to play the game. Just look up the plot on Wikipedia or something. It looks like Spencer may be making an appearance in RE5 as well, so it's possible that there may be a little more to Umbrella than it's incarnation in RE4, but that still doesn't change much. Even going by that, you're no more right than you were before. Because if that's the case, RE4 still isn't a side-story by any means.


Funny. You post in the thread, and then tell me to take it somewhere more appropriate after Bio already told you to. Don't type so much? Sorry, but I'll type whatever is sufficient to get my point across. If you don't like it, I suggest not entering into debate with me.

Same here. sad

@Thee Stranger: You're decidedly right. My dispute in this altercation is the fallible one. I have come inadequately arrayed with information to remonstrate against your knowledge of the series. As such, I concede defeat and egress this debate. In other words, I got served.

In other news, My Bloody Valentine 3D was simply overwhelming. Literally. I have a Migraine from the optical effects, albeit it's definitely worth it to witness a gun being positioned in front of your face, fearful of when (Or if at all) it will erupt. Which it does. And holy s**t was it astounding when it did. All the deaths are majestically composed, fully utilizing the technology to incorporate creative kills. And did I mention it was ROFLarious?