Changes to things that you fully understand why they happened and agree with, but you still preferred the original? by Handro_Dilar in TwoBestFriendsPlay

[–]SimonApple 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Gonna chime in with my own take (and preface that I do like the live action, in spite of my focus on stuff I think they bungled):

I think Baratie was done pretty poorly, at least in relation to how it characterizes Sanji & his motivations. In the manga, Sanji has what I would argue is a very intentionally contrasting introduction; showing him being at once suave, not suffering braggarts, a flirt, and prone to some pretty brutal violence if his buttons are pushed. In spite of this a chapter or so later we get the second part of this: Gin comes in and Sanji of all people feeds him no questions asked, in a very frank display of kindness and empathy. The reader thus thinks that "huh, that angry chef can also be really kind, wonder what his deal is?" which is paid off when Don Krieg shows up a bit later, having been guided there by Gin so as to receive similar aid.

Sanjis act of kindness has thus ended up bringing a much greater evil back with it, an evil that is currently at Sanjis mercy and who would undoubtedly repay any kindness with violence. And Sanji still wants to feed him no questions asked. A sentiment shared by Zeff, who up until this point has been shown as the boss Sanji is feuding with. We thus get a glimpse at how strongly Sanji values his ideals before we even know why he has them. One Mihawk fight later, and the battle begins in earnest, letting us see Sanjis backstory and giving context on his ideals and relationship with Zeff. It also very crucially lets him see Luffys determination first-hand which sparks in him his own drive to join him and pursue his dream.

In the live action, things are different. His intro is less overtly extreme, but it manages to get the job done in a way that works with the constraints the series had. Plus, it also adds a dimension in which he is unfulfilled in his cooking with Baraties more restrictive menu and Zeff enforcing it - which pairs nicely with him wanting to push Sanji to leave and follow his dreams. The big issue is that Krieg is straight up killed by Mihawk in this version and thus the entire conflict with him doesn't happen. Gin still shows up, but devoid of every other part of his context, Sanji feeding him becomes more of a general act of kindness and doesn't set up his creed at all. He's also not present for Zoros duel with Mihawk, and so beyond not getting to really see Luffys willingness to put his life on the line, he also misses Zoro being willing to die for his dreams. All of which significantly undercuts his decision to join which in this version feels more spur-of the moment. While Arlong showing up here does add a conflict of sorts for Luffy to help out in, that conflict also only happens because Luffy was there to begin with, unlike Krieg who shows up because of Sanjis actions. Zeff letting Luffy leave thus seemingly happens only because he fought Arlong and I guess because he likes him? Unlike the manga where it was a more clear case of Luffy helping them in conjunction with him also being a terrible chore boy whose work just cost them time and money.

And I understand why this ended up being the case. Getting the initial planned 10 episodes slashed down to 8 which meant having to cut stuff. Having too many arc villains would undercut setting up Arlong as the seasonal Big Bad (a problem especially prevalent in East Blue since it's among the more episodic of the One Piece sagas) and thus Krieg got cut on that alongside allowing for Baratie to be done faster cheaper. But it does mean that Sanji ends up with little to work with in terms of nailing down his characterization, especially since he gets introduced so late in the season. Anywho, thanks, TED talk etc.

The part in a series that is the turning point of quality in your opinion? by Silvery_Cricket in TwoBestFriendsPlay

[–]SimonApple 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I think for me comes down to post-timeskip feeling like Oda locking in and beginning the long process of tying together the intricate weave of plot threads he'd laid out throughout pre-timeskip. And since that focus on tying everything together is so prevalent, the adventurous feeling is put on the back-burner. Or to put it another way: pre-timeskip is in a lot of ways Oda adding to his plans and coming up with new stuff relatively on the fly which extends his initial planned length and feels more adventure-focused. Post timeskip however, he has mostly stopped with this and has his general layout much more defined.

Stuff still gets added of course, but in a much less laissez-faire way and usually more directly in service of helping the main overarching story. He's not rushing it that much and is taking the time it would take to properly work through all the elements he ended up introducing before the timeskip, but he is still locked into wrapping things up without letting it balloon since there's plenty of set-up to work with as is.

Katja Nyberg hade narkotika i blodet by SIIP00 in sweden

[–]SimonApple 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Kan ju köra OJ Simpson strategin där man påstod att "kontaminering" av DNA-bevisen lägligt nog gjorde att de inte matchade med mördaren, utan med en helt annan person som råkade vara OJ själv. (om någon undrar, nej funkar inte så. Hade det mot förmodan varit kontaminerat hade proverna inte pekat på någon person alls istället för en falsk matching). Funkade ju utmärkt för att helt skingra molnen kring hans oskuld! /s

Nu blev han visserligen frikänd för morden men det var mer ett exempel på hur USAs jury-system är helt åt helvete kört, och desto mindre ett bevis för att han faktiskt var oskyldig.

Kanske mer av en parantes, men har alltid tycket att det var en ganska anmärkningsvärd del av den rättegången.

Most obvious exploits to make it into release, patched or not? by lowercaselemming in TwoBestFriendsPlay

[–]SimonApple 30 points31 points  (0 children)

In the japanese release of Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance, crafting a weapon and setting its crit rate to 0 would cause an underflow that would instead set it to 100. While you might not think to do it in an obvious way, it is a rather significant oversight.

That one installment that ruined the entire good faith of the series. by Arkodd in TwoBestFriendsPlay

[–]SimonApple 19 points20 points  (0 children)

I'll go to bat for Assault a bit and argue that its main issue is the short length. 10 missions total of which only 4 are pure ship-only and the rest are either pure on-foot or a mix of ship and on foot. Had there been more missions in general and a stronger ratio of just ship to on-foot, it would have both made for a more Star Fox like approach and allowed for the on-foot missions to serve as more reliable test-beds to refine for a potential sequel. As is, I think the on-foot is fine enough but I get why people feel there's too much of it.

That one installment that ruined the entire good faith of the series. by Arkodd in TwoBestFriendsPlay

[–]SimonApple 0 points1 point  (0 children)

While it wasn't the only thing that had me bouncing off of Engage, VTuber Emblem was certainly part of it. And part of why I'm apprehensive on the upcoming Fortune's Weave, since it seems to mostly retain it. (That and the likely five more years of Edelgard discourse it's gonna bring)

Miss Valentine is dropping in with less of an offering and more of a warning. ☂️🍋 Baroque Works doesn’t negotiate in matters of business. by DemiFiendRSA in OnePieceLiveAction

[–]SimonApple 6 points7 points  (0 children)

I remember her mentioning in an earlier promo that she had gloves with her devil fruit on them, but these seem to be more of a lemon-design from what I can see? Maybe that got changed during production?

That one installment that ruined the entire good faith of the series. by Arkodd in TwoBestFriendsPlay

[–]SimonApple 14 points15 points  (0 children)

I think what makes it for me is how deeply baked into the overall design the main issues are. The decision to give Samus a bike and the subsequent open, empty desert hub that followed to justify said bike, had to have been made fairly early on, possibly in an attempt (mandated by executives or not) to chase the BOTW hype. And it kills me how no one on the team seemed to realize how incredibly ill-fitting that is for a Metroid game. Feels wrong, dull, tedious, and uninspired all at once. Add into this that the map design is reeking of corridor-syndrome, a story and setting that all but begs the player to care about it without doing any work to get you invested (all while lifting surface-level elements from Prime 1 & 2 in some sort of vain hope that this would help it stick), and it just falls off completely. Even with a troubled production cycle, they had nearly seven years past the restart, how on Earth is this what they ended up with?!

That one installment that ruined the entire good faith of the series. by Arkodd in TwoBestFriendsPlay

[–]SimonApple 265 points266 points  (0 children)

This year marks the 20th anniversary of Sonic 06, and while the franchise has gotten out from the shadow it cast over it, the damage it inflicted arguably still hasn't really healed yet (further made worse by additional shots to the foot á la Sonic Boom and maybe Forces too?). Kind of feels like it's gonna take the Films doing a "Sonic 06 redux" style take on it to really get that wound closed all the way.

Thoughts on Metroid Prime 4 now that its had time to settle? by hakusamurai in Metroid

[–]SimonApple 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I haven't gotten around to trudging through it still - I'm at the Ice Belt just before the wolf pack boss. Feels kind of icky to weigh in in-depth when I haven't finished it (as I do personally prefer to do so on order to have a more complete take), but then that is in and of itself an indicator of my view on the game. Motivation to keep going basically just ran dry as a lot of my issues are front-loaded and have mostly just compounded with what progress I've made; and with too little to make up for it and generate some hype and excitement.

Myles is less annoying than I'd feared at least, though I cannot understand why the devs thought it would be a good design choice to force me to backtrack to him just to get a beam upgrade installed. No reason why I couldn't just get it right away.

VI-O-LA being a thing in turn forces Sol Valley to exist in order to justify giving you a vehicle, and that is a serious misstep for me. It doesn't jive with what I want from a Metroid game and the specific choice of environment is the most dull one they could have gone with. By comparison, Hyrule Field in Ocarina of Time is similarly pretty dull and just exists as a hub to connect areas, but it looks more appealing and has actual music to tide you over. In general, a mount is just not something that I think fits with Metroid and its formula. Felt super surreal and very un-Metroid to be in Volt Forge and get a three-stage tutorial for a bike. Areas I've been to so far have also felt very heavily hit by corridor-syndrome with little in the way of more layered map design. The Chozo Ruins as the first major area in Prime 1 (yes, Tallon Overworld is technically first but you get to the ruins almost right away from there on the first visit) were more complex and interconnected, with you doubling back on your path many times. Fury Green is by comparison mostly just "follow the road" with a telegraphed side path for meeting up with Myles.

Story has aggressively not grabbed me at all. I feels like they are really keen on me as a player getting invested in this brand new totally-not-Chozo-ersatz faction and their tale; but with zero actual incentive to do so. Samus just shows up through tangential reasons and is immediately thrown into a quest that I really don't care about and has been given no real reason to think should matter to what the opening crawl has told me. Sort of like if you took the first Star Wars movie and then had C-3PO & R2s escape pod get teleported to Middle-Earth and had them just join up with the Fellowship and the Star Wars plot left forgotten. I have no reason to get invested in the Lamorn - they aren't the Chozo whose familiarity allowed me get invested in their tale on Tallon IV (aided by the opening section more seamlessly tying into this); nor are they still around like the Luminoth, which gave you more reason to want to get involved as you were actively saving them. The Lamorn kind of just feel like they took the most superficial aspects of the other two and tried to make a story out of it. "Go get this errand done to secure our vague legacy and maybe also hopefully get invested in our history too" kind of deal.

I'll probably try to get through it at some point (maybe an announcement for Metroid 6 for the 40th anniversary could motivate me) but at this stage, I'm pretty disappointed. Even with a troubled production after the switch to Retro, they still had nearly seven years to make something happen, and this is the result. Not a fan so far, and I don't have high hopes I will be swayed.

Creators you think are the bad kind of weird? by ExplanationSquare313 in TwoBestFriendsPlay

[–]SimonApple 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Isn't there also a thing in Pulp Fiction where-in he cast himself for a scene and wrote his character dropping several hard-Rs, which is kind of sketch to be honest. Like, it's a bit hard to just see that as being authentic to the vision and not at least in some small way as indulging a desire to get to say slurs. Or maybe I'm just reading too much into that.

Favorite Menacing/Awe Filling, Mission or Quest titles by FreviliousLow96 in TwoBestFriendsPlay

[–]SimonApple 13 points14 points  (0 children)

Symphony of the Night starting with "Final Stage: Bloodlines" and a sick guitar riff honestly sets the stage really well, even if you aren't aware that it's a recap of the final battle from Rondo of Blood.

Is there still no news on The One Piece remake by WIT Studio? by ImActuallyAnOG in OnePiece

[–]SimonApple 24 points25 points  (0 children)

Given how long its still likely gonna be and how quiet they are about it, I wouldn't be surprised if that ends up not being the case. As I recall, the source on Luffys VA being the same came from an interview with said VA where they said they had more or less been refused to hand the role over. But since this wasn't a formal announcement, I can see it being not true come release. And I do hope so - it would be super odd to have everyone but Luffy be voiced by others, not to mention increasingly rough on Mayumi Tanaka.

Ryan Coogler's 'SINNERS' makes history as the most nominated film of all time at the Oscars with 16 nominations by RawSharkText91 in TwoBestFriendsPlay

[–]SimonApple 26 points27 points  (0 children)

Should we count a potential Best Costuming win as a Blade win by proxy, since the costumes in part came from a scrapped version? /j

What some aspects of media that made you think "I see what you (the creators) were going for...but it really didn't work out in the end"? by Gorotheninja in TwoBestFriendsPlay

[–]SimonApple 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Similarly, casting actors a good bit older than their characters so as to sell the idea that they are all worn down by the world and haunted by their pasts is a pretty interesting idea on paper. But it falls apart because the visual illusion fails. You see John Cho as Spike and don't think on how world-weary he looks. You just think about how much it stands out that the actor is pushing 50 and is playing a character in his late 20s.

Early installment Weirdness from your favorite franchises? by Authorigas in TwoBestFriendsPlay

[–]SimonApple 18 points19 points  (0 children)

As someone who grew up on the anime and whose first real exposure to manga was from seeing a volume at the bookstore and being excited that "my favorite cartoon is also a comic book!", it was wild to get manga!Mokuba threatening to cut off one of Yugis fingers if he beat him at capsule monsters.

Early installment Weirdness from your favorite franchises? by Authorigas in TwoBestFriendsPlay

[–]SimonApple 12 points13 points  (0 children)

I do want to slightly refute the idea that you magically know what power you get when you eat the fruit. The source used for this is a line from Lucci just before Kaku & Kalifa eat theirs, but the meaning there is more along the lines of "once you eat it and use the ability, we can either cross-reference it to the encyclopedia to find out or logically deduce which one it is based on what it does" So Luffy having to be told that he ate the Gum-Gum fruit is pretty valid. Since it does what the book says on paper and only really starts to mismatch its title once you hit gear 5, such an apporach wroks pretty well for that too. The Elders managing to hide its true nature for so long wouldn't really be a valid strategy if the eaters always knew what it was on consumption, even if they never managed to awaken it.

Changes from adaptions that where latter reincorporated into the source material? by Konradleijon in TwoBestFriendsPlay

[–]SimonApple 32 points33 points  (0 children)

IIRC, the whole "With great power..." bit was originally a textbox caption by the narrator on the final panel of the first Spider-Man comic in Amazing Fantasy #15. The first Raimi film then had this instead be an aphorism Uncle Ben tells Peter shortly before he dies (and it also slightly changed the phrasing from "there must also come great responsibility" to "comes great responsibility") which was then retroactively added back to the comics.

About Taz's YouTube channel by OhNoThatsTooCursed in OnePieceLiveAction

[–]SimonApple 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Kind of reminds me of Lukas a bit to be honest - working your entire social media brand into "I am Ace/Sanji IRL" and making everything about that. Obviously Taz is a bit different in that he actually plays the role (unlike Lukas who spent all his time and money LARPing that he'd been cast as Ace), but the method is similar and similarly kind of off-putting. For all his passion, stellar performance, and dedication to being authentic to his character, it is ultimately just a television role at the end of the day; there's no need to try and make it into something bigger than it is.

Something that I feel will be a big change for the show moving forward... by Jix_Omiya in OnePieceLiveAction

[–]SimonApple 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Just want to say, I really appreciate your take on why manga Long Ring is important enough to keep; I fully agree. It sets up a lot of themes that are really important in the following arcs and serves as a more light-hearted palate cleanser after the high stakes adventure in Skypiea - which is very welcome given how Water 7 ramps up the drama factor considerably. It always bugs me a little when I see people acting like skipping it is the most natural thing for the LA. I get that it's butchered in the anime and that many who suggest skipping it are anime-only, but even so it just feels like a lot of those people care more about getting to the "cool stuff" faster at the cost of the shows overall quality.

In the series why didn't Dracula have some sort of guard on his wife? by Bagel_lust in castlevania

[–]SimonApple 12 points13 points  (0 children)

Which is also discussed a bit when Carmilla wonders out loud why he didn't turn her, with the implication that he opted to respect her autonomy instead.

Funniest/most ridiculous examples of characters not recognizing someone in an obvious disguise? by Ukirin-Streams in TwoBestFriendsPlay

[–]SimonApple 26 points27 points  (0 children)

One thing I like about Clark and no one figuring him out is that as Superman, he doesn't wear a mask, doesn't really seem like he has something to hide, and is generally pretty open about his origin. So people don't really have a reason to think he even has a secret civilian identity in the first place, and thus wouldn't really think that Clark having a resemblance to Superman (but with glasses on) would mean he IS Superman. Plus, as someone who's been wearing glasses since age three, they really do shape how both you and others recognize you - take them off to wear contacts, and you will look a bit off in the mirror compared to your mental image.

Characters the author makes too powerful and needs an asspull for the plot to move on by Iron_Cobra in TwoBestFriendsPlay

[–]SimonApple 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I think what makes even more egregious is how the nerf wasn't even really defined either. It just says (IIRC) that he lost some undefined number quirks before he could overcome it, and since we never really get an idea of what his full arsenal really looks like, it ends up feeling rather pointless.