I'm Sitting At The Dock Of The "Bay"

  Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, a staple of the generation of the last 30 years. Shall we do the list? We shall, a comic in 1984, in 1987 a smash hit cartoon show that lead to one of largest and most popular toy line, a trilogy of live action films, and a live action tv show. Then a complete reboot in 2003 with a new cartoon, a animated film in 2007, and in 2012 a new cartoon leading to another huge toy line! 

     

     So with a strong catalog and with so much for fans to enjoy, what is in store for us in the future? How about a brand new live action reboot! Sounds great to me, Michael bay producing? Okay sure I'm on board I dug, and highly enjoyed the transformers movies well 2 was weak but that last hour was fun! 

     So I know the cool thing for fans to do is hate Michael Bay especially if they think they have a voice on twitter or online blogs. Despite what people think he didn't "rape my childhood" mainly because my childhood happened 30 years ago, and the transformer movies are new, he didn't "Lucas" things he didn't take the old cartoons and re-edit them or add shit! He just did an updated re-imaging of something from the 80s. 

     I get the idea of saying he "raped my childhood" the idea is you watch or listen to something and boom it snaps you back to childhood and you feel young again I get it, I do, I collect 80-90s toys mainly TMNT toys, so I know the feeling. Seeing that the transformers films were not around during my childhood they have no effect on my childhood, nor should they on you.

    If you listened to our podcast then you know I have found a way to bring up the new upcoming TMNT film and my excitement for it, so how do I feel now that I've seen the teaser trailer... Even more excited, now I really can't fucking wait! I love the scope, I love the size, and I think the design of the turtles works great Leo looks epic, Mikey looks great (with the mask on) Raph and Don still not a great view but I love he has tech on his back!

     I can tell the have took things and elements for every  incarnation of TMNT and put it in the film. I like the origin story I like that it's new, so what if it's different after 20 years of seeing all the cartoons, and, movies, and so on it's refreshing, it's a nice take on it, I like the whole their enemy is their creator! It puts a little more emotion in it, plus I'm willing to make a prediction and possible spoiler alert I'm willing to bet splinter is Aprils dad and guess what I'm fine with that too! Here is why, if I don't like the film I still have everything else from my "childhood" to enjoy!

     In closing I'll end with this for all you cry baby fan boys think about. From the 1984 comic to the 1987 cartoon, they changes were just as drastic. I'll break it down for you, the over all look of the turtles was a huge change, from a pointed beak, all with red head bands. Splinter being a rat Turned to a humanoid rat, April worked in Baxter Stockman's lab not a reporter, Baxter was a black scientist, no Krang, no bebop, no Rocksteady, shredder is killed in the first comic not returning for a long time. The turtles were mutated by radioactive ooze accidentally dumped in the sewers.  Now the cartoon their heads became larger with a small round beak, all because distinct with 4 different colors, splinter has a man turned large rat, shredder was the main bad guy ruled by a new character, Krang, Baxter became a white inventor later into a mutated fly. Then the turtles were mutated by shredder as he dumped the ooze in the sewer trying to get splinter! 

   So what is the differences between all that and what they are doing now? Well I guess it's because Michael Bay didn't have anything to do with the cartoon! 

Real Steel: World Robot Boxing Game on Kindle

    Robots and boxing, when put together are two things that any child, and or man-child should find to be awesome. I found the Real Steal World Robot Boxing game on the Amazon Kindle App Store, and I couldn't help but download it and start playing. The game starts off as quite addicting, and you can't help but want to work your way up the ranks, just like Atom in Real Steel the movie, and become the WRB Champion.

  The game play is pretty simple you have the four directional buttons to move your robot, and then there are two different punch buttons, one for a basic punch/jabs, and the other for stronger punches that do more damage. Then there is the block button, which is self explanatory. As you go along boxing different robots you get money for every fight and you can use that to upgrade your boxing bot, and you can buy other robots too.While playing the game you'll realize that you have a limited amount of power for fights. You start off with five power cores, which translates to one fight per power core. There are in app options you can purchase to give you more power cores, gold coins, upgrades for your robots, and to purchase robots, but you don't need to spend money to actually play the game to the end.

  Real Steel World Robot Boxing also has multiplayer options for your friends who have the game. There are two options for multiplayer, there's online, and local. My understanding is that the online multiplayer allows you to box against other random players on the internet, and local will allow you to box anyone on WiFi, or Bluetooth. I tried to play the online mode but you get a coming soon message when you tap it, which has been there since I first started playing around Christmas 2013. I unfortunately don't have anyone to play via the local option so I was unable to test out any of the multiplayer options.

  The biggest issue I have with the game is that I can't have a robot fight beyond it's league. If you're robot boxer is in a lower league, you can't have it fight in higher leagues, and vice versa. When I first started the game I wanted to take my robot boxer, and work my way up to the championship, and I was quite disappointed when I realized that I couldn't. Overall I have to give Real Steel World Robot Boxing a 3.5 out of 5. It's a fun game to play, and I do suggest giving it a try considering it's free.

 

7 Days to Die: A Survival Horde Crafting Game - Alpha

  I had a chance to play 7 Days to Die, the alpha version, a game who's subtitle really describes it all, A Survival Horde Crafting Game. I was first introduced to the game by a couple YouTube commentators. I didn't actually decide to try it out until recently when a couple co-workers at my day job started talking about playing it.

   7 Days to Die takes place in a post apocalyptic world where zombies are everywhere, and you have to do your best to survive. My first experiences with the game involved the game lagging on me a lot. The game is in alpha stages so I wasn't too surprised about this, but when I went further into researching into this, it turns out that it is a more common problem on mac, and not so much on windows, so I rebooted my mac to a windows 7 side I have installed on a partition, and started again. Doing this changed my experience with the game completely, instead of feeling helpless, and hoping that when I shoot at a zombie I don't lag or drop 30 frames at a time, I'm now able to move smoothly through the map, and actually have a chance fighting off zombies.

  In the game you start off trying to find and save items to help you survive. This includes food, water, weapons, tools, and building supplies. While doing this you need to fight off zombies and try to find safe places to stay at night because this is when the zombies become faster and more powerful. During the beginning stages you tend to just start off by trying to learn how to craft simple items and try to find an attic in a random home every night to stay in. You'll also learn very quickly to try not to make too much noise at night because that will just bring more of the undead to your doorstep. Playing the game with others helps with the fun factor a lot, and it helps when you have a horde of zombies coming at you. Eventually you'll realize that resources are limited, (at least in the alpha) and you'll need to learn to craft all the items you need, and to live off the land.

  Overall I really enjoy playing 7 Days to Die, for a game that is only in the alpha stages, it already has great functionality, (a least on the windows side). You can see great things coming for this game. I have to give 7 Days to Die an easy 4.5 out of 5. It lost a half a point for the issues I had running it on a mac, but I still had fun in the end. If you like crafting survival games with lots of zombies, I suggest you give 7 Days to Die a try. Here's the game trailer from Steam below.

The Animal that is PAX East 2014

  It's that time of year again! PAX East 2014 is around the corner, and it's time to get ready for another great gaming filled weekend. Every year PAX East seems to get more and more popular, and every year I've been lucky enough to get a ticket to go. As many of you know, I've gone to PAX East from year one. It's something I didn't appreciate as much as I do now. Don't get me wrong, I was excited about it every year, but now it has grown into something of a tradition. I'm enjoying it more now with the interviews I started to do last year, instead of feeling like I'm attending PAX East, I've become a part of it in a way.

  PAX East is more than just a gathering of gamers, developers, and vendors. It's a community of people who become a family for three days. Last year I ran into two people I knew from high school, we all had gone in our separate directions after high school, and I always seem to run into an old college friend. Here's to PAX East, and I hope to see you there.

TheRetroAve.com is One Year Old!

  Today marks the one year anniversary of TheRetroAve.com. When we started this site we made a basic goal for ourselves to do at least one post a month, with us working normal day jobs, we knew that sometimes it would be hard to take the time to commit more than that. We ended up averaging just over one post a week, and now we plan on averaging this much or more for another year.

  We couldn't have kept TheRetroAve.com going without the support of everyone helping to get the word out there, and we send a very special thank you to all of you.

  TheRetroAve.com has plans for this year to expand a little more on top of the goal of averaging at least one post a week. As things develop we'll start giving updates on these things.

  Again thank you for the support, and here's to another year!

BROFORCE the Brototype!

  I played the free to play Brototype of Broforce, and I have to say it was fun. It's a side scroll shooter, where you play as different characters inspired by different action stars like Rambo, Ash, Robocop, and even the Terminator. The game is pretty strait forward shoot the bad guys, and save any other action heroes who are trapped in random cells. As you save these different action heroes you become that hero, which also gives you an extra life for each one you save.

  As I stated above I played the prototype also known as the Brototype version of the game. You can pre-order the full version for release which looks like it includes even more action hero inspired characters, more levels, and the ability to play multiplayer with your friends.

  In all it looks like it going to be a pretty fun game. If you'd like to try the Brototype click the link below..
The Brototype

  If you'd like to see more, or even pre-order the game check out the game developer's (Free Lives) website.
http://www.freelives.net/broforce-game

  Here's a video of some development footage if you'd like to see more.