What If? Planning a Playstation Cinematic Universe

What If? Planning a Playstation Cinematic Universe

If you read my Ratchet and Clank review, you may remember that I referenced a scene that may indicate more Playstation films in future. The scene in question involves Clank scanning his databanks to determine Ratchet’s species, with two dismissed suggestions including Sly Cooper and Jak’s sidekick Daxter. The knowledge that there will be a Sly Cooper, coupled with this joke, led me to wonder if it would be followed by a Jak and Daxter film, then others (Assuming they get made, they’re going straight-to-DVD, if Ratchet and Clank crashing and burning is any indication, but I digress.) The idea escalated from there and quickly got ridiculous.

Introducing: How I would do the Playstation Cinematic Universe!

Has science gone too far? On this occasion, I daresay it has.

Phase 1

Uncharted

To start things off on the right track, you need to introduce audiences to a charismatic, snarky, yet likeable figure. Uncharted’s Nathan Drake is the perfect candidate as far as being Playstation’s Iron Man goes. His film borrows liberally, and I do mean liberally, from Indiana Jones, though it does at least have a contemporary setting and put its own mark on the treasure hunter niche. Fitting enough for a treasure hunter, as they go in search of old treasures. At the end, Drake is hired for a task by Gabe Logan from Syphon Filter, surprising everyone who was expecting a cameo from Uncharted 2’s Harry Flynn.

Jak and Daxter

This film introduces audiences to Jak, a young lad who’s been pumped full of nasty Dark Eco and developed a dark side that swears, is a dick to everyone and generally acts like a grumpy teenager. And then there’s Dark Jak. Heyooo! Did you like how I misled you into thinking regular Jak was the dark one? There’s also Jak’s friend Daxter, who was also infected with Dark Eco, except he turned into a little orange rodent instead. The duo must defeat Gol the Dark Eco Sage, as well as avoid the attention of Samos, who wants to punish the boys for disobeying him. Since Jak has the hots for his daughter Keira, this is easier said than done.

The film doesn’t do terribly well, and ends up being mostly forgotten, though it does have a few fans. Indeed, the main point of interest is the unexpected appearance of Nathan Drake near the end. However, the apathetic response does mean Jak 2 is unlikely to be made. To be honest, that’s for the best. Retooling your cutesy platformer into a dystopian Grand Theft Auto wannabe may have been audacious originally, but it doesn’t hold up very well at all, and is rather embarrassing today. In addition, the foreshadowed next villain Cyber Errol gets one-shotted by Nariko in a tie comic, and the rest of Jak’s supporting cast vanishes into the ether.

Daxter was an annoying little bugger anyway

Uncharted 2

So Jak and Daxter didn’t really pan out. Back to safer ground with Nathan Drake for Uncharted 2 then. This time, Nate faces off against the loony Eastern European war criminal Zoran Lazarevic, who is searching for the lost city of Shambhala and the legendary secrets surrounding it. Also included are the introduction of Nate’s brother Sam, Heavenly Sword’s Nariko, who has been appointed by Gabe Logan to keep an eye on Nate, and an alcoholism subplot. As such, there’s barely any room for the main plot, and Lazarevic is not a happy bunny at the end of it. At least they killed him off so that there’s no possibility of him coming back anyway. Foreshadowing this time around includes the Blades of Chaos being in Nate’s treasure room for some reason and a scene at the end where Gabe Logan visits an amnesiac young girl and her pet cat as the duo wake up in the middle of nowhere…

Gravity Rush

The girl and cat duo at the end of Uncharted 2 are Kat and Dusty of Gravity Rush fame. Kat has gravity powers which she uses to protect the town of Hekseville until she ends up being banished thanks to the scheming of her rival Raven. Kat must now learn what it means to be a true hero, find her way home and defeat Raven, which she manages to do by banishing Raven elsewhere. This film’s cameo is given to Lazarus Jones from Ghosthunter, who observes Kat from the shadows during one of her battles against Raven.

God of War: The First All-Star

Going back in time to ancient Greece is God of War. This film tells the story of Kratos, a decorated general of the Spartan army who gives himself to Ares when on the verge of death. Ares accepts and fashions Kratos into the ultimate warrior, part of which involves severing Kratos’ attachments and morality by making him kill his wife and daughter while in an uncontrollable rage. Guess how well that works out for Ares. Go on, guess. At the end of the film, Ares is destroyed when Kratos opens Pandora’s Box, but in an unforeseen side effect, Kratos is transported to the present day with no way of going home. Now all the pieces are in place for the big crossover movie.

Playstation All-Stars

Having signed on Nathan Drake and already having Nariko and Lazarus Jones on the payroll, Gabe Logan goes out to hire Jak, Kat and Kratos, and not a moment too soon, as Raven’s back! Turns out Kat banished her to the Chimeran homeworld, and Raven built an army of Chimera before coming to Earth to get her revenge. The Playstation All-Stars spend a lot of the movie bickering amongst each other until Raven kills Gabe’s subordinate and beloved minor character Lian Xing. Don’t worry, she’s not really dead, she comes back to life in time to get her own spin-off! Lian’s death brings the team together properly and they kick the Chimeran invasion force six ways from Sunday (Literally, in Kat’s case.) At the end of the film, it is revealed that Raven’s benefactor for the Chimeran army was Daedalus, the villain of Resistance 2. He smirks at the upcoming challenge, but stays in his snazzy space chair for the time being.

Phase 2

Uncharted 3

After Playstation All-Stars made more money than God, video game movies go mainstream. Capitalising on this new surge of interest is Uncharted 3, which goes on to make more money than the first two put together, but not God this time, despite being a highly divisive film for several reasons. The plot involves Nathan Drake investigating the legend of Iram of the Pillars, only to be pursued at every turn by the Illuminati, leading to numerous Illuminati Confirmed jokes. The Illuminati are led by Catherine Marlowe (think Helen Mirren if she were evil) – at least, until the big twist where it turns out she’s not really the leader of the Illuminati, she’s just an actress pretending to be the leader, and the real leader is her henchman Talbot. The twist doesn’t go down well, because Marlowe is so much more charismatic and interesting than Talbot, who is yet another evil counterpart of Nate (We’re up to about 5 at this point), and quickly becomes a joke. Nate says at the end that he’s retired, but nobody believes him for a second. Worse, he says this to Jak, which only gets people asking why didn’t Jak help Nate with the Illuminati?

Gravity Rush: The World Pillar

After befriending the other All-Stars in the crossover film, Kat goes home to Hekseville, where she gets curious about how far down from the floating city she can go, and is joined by Raven, who insists that she’s turned over a new leaf. They eventually find that the Nevi jewel thief Alias is down there creating gravity storms that take away the girls’ gravity powers, but they don’t need them to beat him up. It turns out at the end that, no, Raven hadn’t reformed after all, she just wanted Alias out of the way so that she had less competition for taking over Hekseville herself, and figured that getting Kat’s help would get Kat off her back, and she wouldn’t suspect a thing when Raven makes her move. Just to make doubly sure, Raven also disguises herself as Kat’s mentor Gade.

This film isn’t all that popular either, between the further increased focus on Raven, Officer Syd’s comic relief role getting old and a forgettable villain. Whisper it – Is the Playstation Cinematic Universe broken?

God of War: The Ghost of Sparta

No, it isn’t broken, as God of War: The Ghost of Sparta ends up being a major return to form. Kratos gets misty-eyed over the good old days in Sparta, as he’s not sure what to do with himself now that barbarian hordes and mythical creatures are a thing of the past, literally, and he’s worn out his 300 DVD from watching it too much. At least he has a sort of kindred spirit in Nariko. That’s when he finds out that his brother Deimos, thought killed as a child for being frail and sickly, was in fact taken by Zeus and trained as a living weapon to destroy the enemies of the Greek Pantheon. Since Kratos killed Ares in the last film, he’s now number 1 on Zeus’ hit list, and thus the stage is set for the most violent family reunion you can imagine. On a side note, Gabe Logan and his agents were all pawns of Zeus, and not actors pretending to be pawns of Zeus, so Kratos kills them all, though he can’t bring himself to kill Deimos, and Zeus takes advantage of this moment of weakness to defeat Kratos himself. The post-credits scene sees the Fireflies operating on two people, a teenage girl and a man in his fifties. The leader of the Fireflies, Marlene, refers to their patients as “The Last of Us.”

Ratchet and Clank: Fiends with Benefits

After the game-changing last film, it’s time for a break in the shape of something lighter in a new setting. This means Ratchet and Clank are lucky enough to get a second chance. Their first adventure isn’t being adapted again, as this isn’t Spider-Man after all. Instead, the new film adapts the story of Ratchet and Clank: All 4 One, which involves Ratchet, Clank, Captain Qwark and Dr Nefarious being captured by the space station Ephemeris and taken to the zoo planet Magnus. The friends, enemy and whatever Captain Qwark is to the others must temporarily work together to escape Magnus and find a way home, while avoiding recapture by the masterminds behind the zoo, Drs Croid and Binklemeyer, and their pet Mr Dinkles, who it turns out is brainwashing the scientists to do his bidding. Daedalus visits the zoo, but it’s his day off, so he doesn’t do anything.

Playstation All-Stars: Age of Polygon Man

The All-Stars come back together for the sequel – well, most of them anyway, no Ratchet and Clank yet. Having gotten sick of people asking him why he didn’t ask Jak to help him fight the Illuminati in Uncharted 3, Nathan Drake has used a Blast Core he found on an off-screen expedition to create a new All-Star to hang around with. Unfortunately, Polygon Man quickly turns evil and threatens to take over the world. On the plus side, they do find new recruits in the form of Joel, Ellie and Knack, although Joel ends up getting shot to death by Polygon Man saving Lazarus Jones. Bugger.

This film ends up being very controversial, partly for failing to live up to the first one, as Polygon Man completely fails at being intimidating, there’s too much going on, and the Fireflies are wasted, showing up only to be killed of 20 minutes in, and partly for issues regarding Nariko. Between the crack pairing with Jak being met with outrage led by bitter Keira fans who still haven’t given up on her coming back, to the sterile monster line that was interpreted a whole bunch of different ways, all of which angered someone, the poor girl is now nobody’s favourite All-Star. At least people are still demanding that she get her own film, for what it’s worth.

Daedalus appears at the end, but again he doesn’t do anything. He says he’s totally going to do something next time though, for realises!

Sly Cooper

Surprising everyone who thought a Playstation All-Stars movie meant the end of the phase, the master thief Sly Cooper steals that honour. His quest, to steal back his prized family heirloom the Thievius Raccoonus, a book containing thieving techniques passed down through the Cooper clan for generations, from the Fiendish Five, a criminal gang who stole the book and killed his parents. Hot on his tail is Inspector Carmelita Fox, a spunky police officer who hates crime and all criminals, even the honourable ones, and won’t shy away from keeping her itchy trigger finger on her shock pistol. This film does better than expected despite the last minute departure of the director, which is attributed to the dreaded words, Creative Differences. The leader of the Fiendish Five, Clockwerk, is actually the leader and not just an actor pretending to be the leader.

Zone of the Enders, AKA The free game that came with the Metal Gear Solid 2 demo

Zone of the Enders,

AKA The free game that came with the Metal Gear Solid 2 demo

If you’ve ever wondered what a game based on Neon Genesis Evangelion would be like, look no further than Zone of the Enders, the story of a teenager from Space Japan who needed therapy years ago and suffers a mental breakdown thanks to the horrors of war. Also, there are giant robots and they fight each other. Sadly, Zone of the Enders is unable to reach the lofty heights of its inspiration storywise, which is all the more disappointing as the producer was Hideo Kojima, creator of Metal Gear, which is renowned for its plot and characters. Speaking of Metal Gear, this game is infamous for selling very well, but the vast majority of players buying it solely for the Metal Gear Solid 2 demo, only to trade this game in en masse once the full version was released.

In the distant future, Jupiter is under attack from the evil despot Nohman and his army of mechs. 14 year old Leo barely manages to escape a robot attack that kills his friends when he stumbles across Jehuty, a mech intended for battling Nohman’s forces. Now it’s up to Leo to transport Jehuty to the military so it can be handed over to a trained pilot, after a quick stop to pick up his love interest Celvice, of course.

The big issue with the plot is the character of Leo. The protagonist of Neon Genesis Evanelion, Shinji, is notorious for being whiny, irrational, incompetent and generally a bag of neuroses, and Zone of the Enders mimics this for Leo. Unfortunately, it goes a step further and throws grating voice acting and poorly justified angst on top. Leo’s big issue is that he suffers from survivor’s guilt after he chose to save himself instead of helping his friends, and because of this he refuses to fight the enemy forces because he doesn’t want to be responsible for the death of anyone else. So far so good, except the rank and file enemy mechs are unmanned drones and by refusing to fight them, he’s only getting more people killed through his inaction. He continues to complain even after a level which involves hacking into one of the enemy mechs and piloting it through an energy field that’s fatal to organic life forms. He should have remembered this and taken solace from it, but he doesn’t, seemingly forgetting it for the sake of the plot. Only the boss robots have pilots, and all but one eject safely after their machines are defeated. The one exception is Viola, the main antagonist, who is fought three times over the course of the game, and chooses to die after the final battle, as she’s fatally injured and her mech is falling apart. To be fair, her death scene is surprisingly well done, possibly the one time the plot achieves the dramatic tone it’s going for. It helps that Leo shuts up for a bit while Viola waxes lyrical about destiny, choice and her own impending death.

The gameplay involves Jehuty flying across a map of Jupiter and touching down in marked areas to clear them of enemy mechs. There are several patrols in each area, with each patrol consisting of two or three enemies, and when enemies start to battle you, other nearby patrols can join in if they’re close. To battle an enemy, you must lock on to them before attacking, and your distance from the enemy will determine your attack. Getting up close will make Jehuty bash the enemy with its sword arm, while distant foes can be shot at with a short laser burst. Jehuty is surprisingly agile for its size, and nippy too thanks to its booster engines. The properties of its attacks can be changed by attacking while moving to activate a sword lunge or homing laser. Holding down the attack button will charge up an energy ball or spin attack, two powerful attacks with the drawback of leaving you vulnerable while you charge them up. All these abilities are tied to one button, so it’s quite impressive that the controls remain simple and intuitive to grasp, with sausage-fingered confusion leading to death being an unlikely occurrence. These tools will cover almost everything you’ll need to do in combat, with the rest being covered by your subweapon. By default, you can press O to grab an enemy or object and throw it away from you, but your other options include a decoy that draws enemy fire away from you (Essential for avoiding a particular boss’s one hit kill attack), mines and a healing shield. The combat doesn’t get dull despite the limited moveset because, although it’s not particularly fancy, every move has a purpose. There is no ability that you’ll never use, so it pays to battle often so that you can get practice using each of your skills.

The combat forms the bulk of the gameplay, but that’s not all you’ll be doing. There are some occasions during which you’ll have to save cities under attack from enemy robots by destroying them before they trash the place and kill civilians. This is easier said than done, as trying to fight carefully isn’t easy when you’re piloting a giant robot, meaning that you pose just as much of a risk to the city as the enemies do. While you keep a patrol occupied, others will continue to attack unmolested, meaning that you’ll have to either defeat enemies quickly or employ a hit and run strategy, dashing around the entire area to distract numerous enemies. In addition, any damage dealt to the cities is permanent, which can be annoying when you are required to save an area you visited earlier in the game. In particular, the first rescue mission takes place in the area where you fight the first boss, a robot so big it almost covers the screen and belches fire everywhere, meaning that it’s almost impossible to do well when the rescue mechanic is introduced, as the entire city’s most likely been burned to ashes long before the objective even comes up. There are also a few occasions where it’s unclear where you need to go next and end up wandering the map aimlessly through trial and error until you stumble across your next objective.

Despite these annoyances, the central gameplay is enjoyable enough that the game doesn’t suffer too much for it. It’s pretty short too, and while this might normally be a bad thing, in this case it’s a positive as the game doesn’t wear out its welcome too much, and ends up being the perfect length for what it is. If it were much longer than it is, the flaws would have likely mounted up and tarnished the rest of the experience to a greater extent.

Graphics: 6   The cutscenes haven’t aged well, but fortunately the in-game graphics hold up better.

Sound: 4     The bad old days of PSOne / early PS2 voice acting, cheesy but not quotable. Shudder.

Gameplay: 7      The combat may be basic, but it is fun despite that.

Lifespan: 5    The story lasts 5 hours with little replay value. On the plus side, there is a secret 2-player mode.

Overall:        The story and characters may not be very good, which is disappointing considering the pedigree behind it, but the gameplay is fun enough to overcome this issue. Besides, who doesn’t enjoy giant robots fighting?          6/10

Captain America: Civil War (2016)

Captain America: Civil War (2016)

Release Date: April 29, 2016

Films are like buses. You wait ages, then two films you want to see come out at once. Captain America: Civil War is the 13^th film of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and the first film of Phase 3. To kick things off with a bang, Cap is joined this time around by Iron Man, most of the other Avengers, and even two new heroes in the form of Black Panther and Spider-Man, both making their long-awaited MCU debuts here ahead of their own films. As you might be able to gather from the cast list, the film serves as a sequel to Avengers: Age of Ultron as much as it does Captain America: The Winter Soldier. You may also remember that I liked Winter Soldier a lot, and Age of Ultron not so much. Therefore, I’m pleased to report that Civil War sticks closer to Winter Soldier tonally, while letting Age of Ultron influence some of its events, thus serving as the best of both worlds.

No plot summary again, as it’s a new release. However, it is difficult to discuss some things without making allusions, so although I won’t give away any explicit details, you might be able to infer things based on what I say. If you want to be as spoiler-free as possible, I’d advise not reading this until you’ve seen the film, just in case.

Despite what the trailers may imply, the entire film isn’t built around superheroes fighting each other. The film takes its time establishing why the characters feel the way they do about the situation, and their experiences in previous films also helps add to this. For example, Cap’s dismantling of SHIELD after HYDRA had infiltrated it means it’s perfectly sensible for him to distrust some sort of overview system, in case something similar happens again. Likewise, Tony Stark would want control to keep him in check because the last time he performed scientific experiments unsupervised, he created Ultron, and even before then he used to be a weapons manufacturer. It’s made clear that them fighting each other is the last resort, done only when all other options have fallen through. I also appreciate that the film has the guts to take its central concept to its logical conclusion, and avoid having the two sides reconcile while decking some CGI monster’s face in, as it means the central conflict is relevant throughout, and not just an excuse to have Captain America and Iron Man fight each other. The Marvel films have been around long enough by now that we, the audience, have gotten to know these characters well, and they can start to tell stories such as this one that rely on the shared history of the characters, and have them mean more to the audience thanks to that history. It’s a lesson the other recent movie where superheroes fight each other would do well to learn.

There was that one scene where Ant Man fought Falcon, remember? What movie did you think I was talking about?

You may think that with such a large cast list, the film would struggle to balance everyone without having someone overshadow everyone else or be shafted. In a pleasant surprise, this is not the case. Everyone gets a bit of focus and a reason to be involved, with nobody appearing for the sake of it. Some characters offer different aspects of the Sokovia Accords and how they’ll be affected by them. Others, most notably Spider-Man and Ant Man, serve as comic relief, but are capable of being serious when necessary. Even more impressively, Cap isn’t pushed out of his own film by having to share it with the rest of the Avengers, always remembering that it’s his name that’s in the title. There are two plots running alongside each other, the Winter Soldier plot that follows on from The Winter Soldier, and the Accords plot that happens as a response to the events of Age of Ultron. Unlike many of these kinds of films, the two plots here complement each other well and blend into each other, thus avoiding a stop-start feel whenever the plot focus switches, and keeping a smooth pace throughout. It’s thanks to this pacing that, although the film is 2 ½ hours long, it certainly doesn’t feel like it.

The new characters are particularly worthy of praise. After two Spider-Men that portrayed one half of the character better than the other, we have in Tom Holland an actor who nails both Peter Parker and Spider-Man (Turns out we didn’t need Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield to perform the Fusion Dance after all – or maybe they did and Tom Holland is the result?) Everything we need to know about the character’s personality is established in only two scenes via the medium of Show Don’t Tell, and without any expository dialogue or yet another retelling of his origin story, a blessed relief as Spider-Man’s origin story is common knowledge, behind only Batman and Superman. 

(There is one thing that I should mention here. Spidey refers to Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back as "A really old movie." This line makes you old as the hills as it is, but it gets worse. Peter Parker is 15 in the film, which is set in the present day, so 2016. Peter Parker was therefore born in 2001. The Phantom Menace was released in 1999. Putting these together, you realise Peter Parker is so young, he hadn't even been born yet when the Star Wars Prequel Trilogy started.)

Chadwick Boseman as Black Panther is excellent, his character established in a comparable way to Spider-Man, but with a more prominent role as the neutral third party of the Civil War. This role is a natural fit for a foreign diplomat to play, and in his very cool-looking costume, he proves to be more than a match, carrying himself with dignity and grace, but also fury tempered with skill. Like Spider-Man, Black Panther’s character develops naturally in the film, without it needing to pause to introduce him. The upcoming Spider-Man and Black Panther films just became very exciting prospects after Civil War. Also worth noting is the enigmatic villain Zemo, played by Daniel Bruhl. He may just be an ordinary man without any superpowers, but he’s one of the Avengers’ most dangerous foes yet despite this, posing a challenge of a different sort. He’s also capable of subverting clichés and offer some new twists, with one particularly cruel one near the end that I won’t spoil. Best of all, unlike most Marvel movie villains not named Loki, he doesn’t die at the end!

War, War! What is it good for? Making kick-ass movies like this, apparently. Civil War is definitely as good as Winter Soldier, if not even better, bringing the MCU’s best series to an end with aplomb.

10/10

You have no idea how happy I am to be doing a positive review again.

And finally, a short, sad story of how friends became enemies. Like this if you cry every time.