Penny and Aggie

You know that series that catches you completely off guard? One that you are only warm towards in the beginning, but slowly works its way up to favorite status? That series for me was Penny and Aggie; a story about two girls who hate each other in high school (original, I know) but slowly become important parts of each other's lives. Their relationship slowly grows over the years, becoming something neither one of them expected. Sadly, it ended far too quickly when it was just getting to the part I truly adored about it-- and didn't end too well, in my opinion. But at any rate, let's get started on my first webcomic review. (aw yeah, awesoooome)

Famous last words.
Well, last straight words.

Story
The plot of this story varies between high school drama and slice of life. What's nice is that the comic matures and grows up along with its writer and artist, so the one-shot comic to comic episodes are short lived. And at the same time, the characters do too. Where Penny and Aggie start out as one-dimensional archetypes, they slowly become molded into complex women tangled in each other's lives. They don't want to start caring about each other, they never planned it, but slowly they do.

Until finally Aggie truly starts questioning her sexuality. There have been hints here and there about the possibility of her being gay, and other characters mused about it as well, but it was all foreshadowing until halfway through the series that she realizes that she's not all into men. And slowly, the two girls realize there might be something more to their friendship than, well, friendship.

okay in some areas it's not so subtle but you get the idea

Eventually, the two do finally admit their feelings for each other... or at least admit they want to explore the relationship between them. Considering they only get together in the last part of the series, I won't go into too many details about their relationship. However, it does allow them to look at what they really want out of life, and what they want out of themselves. I was rather surprised when there relationship never hit the typical cliches but ran into actual problems and concerns I myself ran into when I finally realized my own sexuality. Many of the concerns Aggie had were the concerns I had, so it was nice to finally have a gay character to relate to.

That being said, the story wasn't entirely revolved around their sexuality. One of the most moving chapters to me was one dealing with Aggie's conflicting emotions regarding her mother's death and her own blossoming adulthood. Then there's that mind-blowing chapter where all the possible futures Penny has gathers together to make a decision that will affect her for the rest of her life... For a high school drama, there's a decent amount of depth and thought.

And surprisingly, there's a lot of metaphor and symbolism throughout the series, something you don't find a whole lot in the "non-artsy" stories. Take this defining moment for Aggie:

Wait for it...

Uh oh indeed.

Grade: B
Not a fan of how gimmicky the beginning is, and the ending is a let down, but everything else is truly wonderful.

Art
Since this story has seen two different artists and has been around seven years, PaA has understandably seen a dynamic art style. Where this comic is fortunate, however, is that even the initial art isn't hard to look at, which is more than you can say for many other fledgling comics. However, my preference lies with the initial artist, Gisele, rather than the artist the series ended with, Jason. Gisele grew into an expressive, more human style, whereas Jason's style has a doll-like feeling, and tends too rely on only a few expressions. In some cases, Jason still needs to work on his anatomy (something I need to work on too in the comic world, bawhahahabaw). Unfortunately, with the exception of a few comics, the entire series is in black and white. This is a shame, because they seem to have access to people who can color-- which suggests they're sacrificing quality for quantity. This theory is backed up by the rush job they did with the ending, which is terrible.

For the most part at least, the art progresses rather nicely and is good. It's not great, but it's better than most of its counterparts.

Grade: B


Overall
Bottom line, Penny and Aggie is by no means perfect. It grew through out its entire life, and ended with more room to grow. Most of its flaws could be overlooked if not for the rushed ending-- T, the writer had planned for it to end this September, and when it was obvious that the story was going to run a little long, most of the story was cut out in favor for a "time skip" ending. You know, one of those endings where they flash forward to the future and explain everything we missed? Yeah, that kind of ending. Much of what they talked about were things I would have liked to seen. They were things I cared to find out about and seen fleshed out. And considering the next project T and Jason were going to work on was a spin-off of two of the characters going to college together, it makes me wonder if they just got bored of the Penny/Aggie romance. If that was the case, why all the build up? Why not implement it sooner? Why would you build up their romance to leave it so... lack luster?

The ending is what you remember most, and this ending has tainted the rest of the story for me. It's the reason why I can't give it an A despite how far it came from the beginning. It was like they learned absolutely nothing... and it was very disappointing.

Overall Grade: B


You be the judge. Visit Penny and Aggie at:
http://www.pennyandaggie.com/index.php?p=1
(The default page leads to the spin-off. I could care less for that noise.)

Latest Addiction: Read Dead Redemption

Few games have the ability to push the line of "No, they won't do that. They can't. Can they?" But in 2010, there was at least one game that left such an impact on this gamer. An interesting storyline, unique characters, and general badassery makes this game. Grand Theft Auto meets the Wild West meets... Kill Bill? This is Red Dead Redemption.

Now, while this game did have a nice emotional impact, that's not saying this game didn't have its faults. At times the story telling can be a bit weak and some controls take a bit getting used to. It can also be pretty preachy throughout the game, to the point that it becomes more of a political statement than a realistic story plot. So let's dive into this game and take a good hard look at it.

Overall Plot
Enter John Marston. There is no clean voice over or fancy opening that sums up the plot of the story; rather, there is an air of some mystery around this man that you control around the untamed West. There's a long amount of time spent watching John sitting in a train. Yes, the intro is essentially watching him listen to different people talk on the train about people who will have little bearing on the plot. Perhaps RDR is trying to set a tone of suspense, but it falls a little flat. I often found myself asking my friends, "Okay, so when is the game going to start?"

After a very long intro, the game quickly picks up. After the introductory chapter you learn that John is a former outlaw trying to reform his life. However, the federal government didn't just want to grant him immunity after killing rich folks (shockingly) and decided that he must round up his former gang members and, one by one, put a stop to them. If he doesn't, they will execute his wife, another former gang member, and his innocent son. The task of taking down these notorious outlaws is daunting in itself, but he also must do a series of tasks to get strangers on his side and help him. Sometimes he makes unshakable bonds, like with the MacFarlanes, and other times he makes horrible enemies, but you can pretty much see their heel-face turn coming a mile away.

While the whole redeeming one's self bit isn't exactly original and neither is having a morally ambiguous character, where RDR truly is original is that it's willing to go a step further than other games. It's realistic where others are more fairy-tale-esque; graphic where others are more vague. It isn't afraid to kill off characters central to the plot and doesn't make much of a side-show to drag out one's emotions along with it. The way the game plays to your emotions is very subtle, and it works. And of course, the ending was both expected and unexpected at the same time-- you suspected it was going to come, but you weren't sure if RDR had the balls to make it happen. Long story short: it does.

Fucking gov'ment scum.

However, for all its emotional subtlety, there are certain points that the story just drags out. You could make a drinking game out of RDR for everytime someone mentions how the government is interfering with people's lives. Granted, it IS interfering with John Marston's life, but he used to be a murderer, and technically still is depending on how amoral you play him throughout the game. But with everyone else it begins to get pretty annoying. In the final chapters, you also get a bunch of new points beat into your head, but I won't spoil it for you.

All in all, RDR's storytelling is varied. Too understated in some areas, and too strong in others. However the story still manages to tug on your heart strings (assuming you still have one).

Grade: B
Good story, but doesn't come without its own share of problems.

Script
Alright, the reason why I was so forgiving with the bash-you-over-the-head points is because I realized most of the problems ultimately laid with the script. While some of the points were stretched so far they became plot points, ultimately they were just a collection of problems with the script. For some reason the writers thought it was appropriate to repeat certain points over and over. One could argue that it was because these points were "important" and needed to be driven home, on the other hand it came off as pretty annoying and unoriginal.

The script's saving grace, however, is when the characters aren't trying to come off as innocent country folk, it's just fun to watch them interact with each other. I had so much fun I almost want to replay the entire thing; it's like wanting to watch your favorite movie over again. Luckily, this makes up for a majority of the machinima cut-scenes.

Side Note:
The side quests range from hilarious to down right disturbing, but they were all fun to do. Not many of them take a lot of time to do, either, so it's just a silly detour.

Grade: B
Some points are annoying, but it's generally fun to watch the characters interact with each other.

Gameplay
While RDR does have some problems with its script, the greatest problem it has is with its lack of challenging gameplay and awkward controls. Now, I am not very good with shooter games, and yet I breezed past most of the levels. Truly, if you have enough medicine, you can survive any encounter pretty easily. That is, after you get used to the awkward controls. When I say awkward, it's sort of hard to nail down what exactly the problem was. But once you play, you'll notice it from the moment you begin to move John around. And this isn't standard RockStar controls-- I started playing immediately after finishing Bully, another RockStar title.

Another problem I had was the amount of button mashing required to move around quickly. Was there really any reason to have a button to make the character run, and repeatedly tab to have them sprint? Can't you just have someone run that fast from the beginning, and hold down that button to sprint? I was genuinely worried about getting carpal tunnel at some point because of this.

But once you get used to how the controls move, the way you play is relatively simple: shoot your way through the bad guys and save the day. There isn't much of a challenge to it. So while it isn't broken, I can't say I actually enjoyed the actual gameplay of it. The collection and ambient challenges were neat, but what RPG doesn't have collection and in-game achievements nowadays?

Grade: C
Not broken, but not even really that good.

Graphics
I have to say, I really did like the look of this game. The starlit nights in Mexico were absolutely beautiful in HD, the animals looked realistic, as well as the people. However, there were a few glitches here or there, but for the most part, I was able to enjoy the story and not be distracted by bad graphics. The blood while skinning animals were a bit unnecessary but, you know. It's RockStar. It's going to be exaggerated.

John Marston. Cowboy. Vigilante. Flower-picker.

I almost stopped and said to someone, "Isn't this beautiful?" Before realizing it was a completely fake reality on a number of occasions. This is by far one of the best points RDR has to offer.

Grade: A


Music
Ahh, another point I really loved about RDR. Again, it was subtle, but when it was used, it really added to the tension. Instead of going into too much detail, I'll just share a song that was played as the final chapter began:

Grade: A


Overall
Yes, this game is not without its problems. But in the end of it, it was an excellent game. It'd hard to summarize what an emotional experience it was... so for once, I'm turning to a simple youtube comment, because it captures the feelings I had for it in a way I can't top.

Literally I pushed my horse so hard to get to Beechers Hope when I heard this song. One of the few times you just become full entangled in a game and the experiences of the character you play. I honestly, felt a desperation to get back to the Wife and child that I didn't have. -- PatInferno, from the video above.

I'm having a hard time returning this game back to the rental, because it means this journey will finally be over.

Overall Grade: B+/A- 


Final Verdict: Buy it.

My Bookshelf: Battle Royale

She's fourteen.

Breaking up the light-hearted, idealistic lawyer games, is a manga series I've been meaning to review for a long time. This is quite honestly the most gruesome, heartbreaking stories I've ever read. From the twisted mind of Koushun Takumi comes the blood-lust dystopian tale known as Battle Royale. Originally a novel, it was later adapted to a live action film and then a manga. I've only had the pleasure of reading the manga version, but I plan on picking up the novel as soon as I can find it. A word of warning, this story is not for the faint of heart. If you can not stomach graphic gore, rape, and potty-mouths I do not suggest picking up this book. Certainly don't if you're not at least 18, as there is near-pornographic levels of sex depicted on several occasions. Hell, I don't even recommend reading this review as I'm going to show several graphic gore images.

... and Wikipedia claims it's a romance novel. Hah.