A Green Mushroom

Star Trek Beyond In this episode: Void and Beej discuss their lifelong histories with the Star Trek franchise. Beej was introduced to The Original Series by his father when he was a wee tot, and Void found The Next Generation in syndication, eventually coming to Voyage with his family. Both guys are big fans of the Abrams reboots, and can appreciate how the TV and film franchises are split between the Prime universe and the Kelvin universe. That way both purists are happy, and so are mainstream fans. Regarding Star Trek Beyond, there are lots of spoilers in this cast, but we do tell listeners when they start. You can be sure that the first third to half of the show are spoiler-free, and then we dig in on the new movie. Overall impressions: Star Trek Beyond are beyond positive (heh heh, get it?), and we think the series has hit its stride. We had our origin for the universe in 2009, and Into Darkness was a decent rehash of Wrath of Khan that established this new timeline, an...

The Long Dark was a surprising hit for me.  I don't normally like survival games but this one set such an amazing atmosphere and truly made me feel like I was in the Canadian wilderness. I do wish it had a story mode and also a tutorial but I suppose it is still in early access.  Being thrown into the wild with no real instructions was also fascinating in it's own way, although I really do think a tutorial is called for. Anyway, the goal as far as I can tell it is to survive as long as possible while exploring the surrounding around.  They have a bunch of different sandbox areas set up and you can pick which one you want to start in.  Like many survival games you have a bunch of meters, in this case hunger, temperature, tiredness, and thirst.  You have to make sure none of them fall too low for too long, otherwise you lose. I'm not sure why this survival game held my attention for awhile when most of them I bounce right off of.  I'm really excited...

This is one of the games I grabbed in the summer steam sale for less than five bucks. In Catlateral Damage you are a cat and you have to knock things onto the floor.  That's it, that's the game. It's a first person viewpoint and you just get to be a jerk of a cat.  It's fun enough for what it has to offer.  It does exactly what you would think it would do. If being a jerk cat sounds like fun for you check this one out.

I had never played a Rhythm Heaven game before and when Nintendo stealth launched this one on the eShop I heard a bunch of people I trust say that it's a great jumping on point for the series. It's essentially a "best of" from the Rhythm Heaven series and the gameplay itself is made up of a ton of different mini rhythm games.  As someone who likes music games I thought this one might be for me. It kind of is and kind of isn't.  I like the rhythm games and have fun with them but each one individually is way too short for my taste.  I'm used to music games where you play through an entire song, not a minigame that takes less than 30 seconds.  I feel like I haven't really been able to sink my teeth into any of the minigames enough to enjoy them because of their short length. That being said, what is there is really fun.  I played this game pretty solidly for a few days and then put it on the backburner for 3DS games.  I think I'll dip back into ...

Final Fantasy Brave Exvius is another Final Fantasy mobile title that I really wanted to like.  I love the series and I keep waiting for them to release a good mobile game in the spirit of Final Fantasy. Instead, they keep releasing these BS F2P games that are designed to prey on our nostalgia and get us to pay money for random heroes or items or whatever it is this time. I hate it.  I hate that they keep doing this. I want to pay them for a Final Fantasy mobile game and play that game on my phone.  I don't ever want it to ask me or prod me into paying again.  I want it to be a complete game that I can buy once with interesting mechanics not designed to extract as much money as possible from me. *sigh* This game was super disappointing.

Best of First-half of 2016 In this episode: It’s   #JRPGJuly , and you guys know by now that we are both huge fans of roleplaying games! But more than just any RPG, we adore JRPGs. In this episode, we discuss our history of why we prefer the unique genre to the more traditional Western RPG. We discuss what a JRPG is (literally “Japanese Roleplaying Game”) Common mechanics Both of us cut our teeth on the genre with early Final Fantasy games, Pokemon games, and Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars on SNES. Additionally, we discuss our current favorites, the standouts from the past we just can’t get go of, and the ones we are most looking forward to in the future! We even go on tangents about how JRPGs influenced our belief systems and personal philosophies! How’s that for geeky? Plus, we talk about two upcoming spiritual successors to Chrono Trigger, and Beej gets so excited he preorders one of them while still recording. (pre-order link) Weekly Geekery Be s...

I finally got around to watching this movie now that it's out of theaters and wow, I'm super glad I didn't spend the money and time on a theater trip for it. I can't believe this is the movie they came up with from the Batman v Superman source material.  I see why everyone railed against it while it was in theaters. I actually spent a solid two days after watching it sending texts to my friend as I deconstructed it in my mind and found more and more things wrong with the movie. At this point I could either dive into all those points or just warn you away from this one.  I think I'll do the later since this movie doesn't deserve any more of my time than it's already gotten.  Be warned, Batman v Superman is bad.

I've been meaning to write this since the Game of Thrones season wrapped up a few weeks ago. I loved Season 6 of this show.  I think it's the best season so far. Finally everything is paying off.  All these disparate plots, characters, and threads are finally starting to come together again after so much time pulling apart. Episode nine had some of the best cinematography of any battle I've ever seen in TV or film. And the season finale had so much payoff that it's unbelievable that was all in one episode. I absolutely loved this season.  I don't want to write too much more because I would start to get into serious spoiler territory.  But, if you're a lapsed fan and you still haven't watched this season you really should.  It's totally worth it.

I'm still catching up on movies that are on my list to be watched.  Bridge of Spies made it's way to the top so I gave it a shot. It's a cold war drama that actually turned out to be pretty good.  It's a Spielberg movie starring Tom Hanks, so you basically know what you're getting in for before you even start.  But it's a cool period piece that looks at the early days of the Cold War. It starts as a courtroom drama but turns into a movie about negotiation between world powers during the Cold War.  I feel like I learned more about the time and place thanks to this movie.  It was entertaining enough and held my attention throughout. I can recommend it as a movie you should probably see once if the premise sounds interesting to you.  But it's not going to be one I come back to over and over again.

I've never read a Dungeons & Dragons novel before in my life but after watching a bunch of the D&D episodes of Acquisitions Incorporated they had a guest appearance of Drizzt and they all freaked out.  Since they're all people who's opinions I tend to like I thought I should check out the source material. That brought me to the first Drizzt book, and there are many.  This one is called Homeland and it's set in the Underdark in the city where Dark Elves live that starts with the letter M but I'll never be able to spell it from memory. It was a good fantasy book, but not a great one.  Nothing crazy or unpredictable happened but it also wasn't so formulaic that I was bored the whole time.  It really was a middle of the road fantasy novel. But, it got me interested enough in the character of Drizzt that I'll pick up the next book.  I just hope that he gets out of the Underdark setting and gets to go explore more of the world.  I would love to ...

Pokemon GO! In this episode: Pokemon Go launched this week, and like everyone else in the world, we  went crazy for it. However, despite our nerdlove for the app, there is a decided lack of documentation and tutorials, so we want to help other people make sense of what we’ve learned this week. We discuss how the game works We also take on the role of armchair developers and discuss what we think will make the app much more robust and likely to keep our attention. Weekly Geekery Be sure to subscribe to the Geek to Geek Podcast your favorite podcast app,   drop a review   so we know how we’re doing, and feel free contact us via email at   geektogeekcast@gmail.com   or   @geektogeekcast   on Twitter with any comments, questions, or suggestions for the show. Thanks for listening, and we can’t wait to hear from you! Subscribe: iTunes Overcast Pocket Casts Google Play Music RSS Feed Geek to Geek Podcast Network: Geek to Geek Geek...

A friend recommended Lumberjanes to me and it was cheap to pick up the first issue digitally so I gave it a shot. I like the premise enough.  A bunch of girls are at a summer camp and they seem to be involved in some paranormal goings on that no one else is aware of.  It's a cool premise. The problem I had is that not enough actually happened in the first issue to get me invested.  They took the entire issue just to state the premise and then it ended.  There was no hook that made me go pick up the next one. I'm always looking for more comic recommendations but this one just wasn't for me.  Maybe someday I'll give it another shot and dig in a few issues deep.

I saw Pacific Rim once in theaters and I remembered liking it the first time but it didn't leave a huge impact on me. Ever since then I've heard so many rave reviews from people about the movie like it was one of the best things ever.  So, I decided to give it a re-watch since that's what I've been working through in my movie list anyway. And this time I actually liked it a lot more.  Knowing what to expect from it as a movie before watching it meant I could just enjoy it for the pure giant robot vs monster action it provided.  The story, plot, and characters don't need to be much when the story is actually about excuses to have cool battles between these goliaths. I find myself much more interested in Pacific Rim 2 now and also much more likely to watch Pacific Rim again on a whim in the future.  It set out to be a certain type of movie and it achieved it perfectly.

Apparently I've been on a movie kick lately.  My movie list of things to watch had built up so I'm swatting them down one by one. Anyway, Zootopia is a fantastic movie.  I sat down to watch it by myself and by the 15 minute mark both my wife and my son had wandered by and got sucked in.  We all loved it! The premise is that animals have evolved to live together peacefully and basically all act like humans do in real life.  It deals with themes of stereotyping in interesting ways but mostly it's a good movie because the main characters are really interesting and the world is a marvel to find out about. I think Disney is just killing it lately with their movies.  It seems like Disney CG animated movies are actually a lot better than Pixar these days.  And I'm actually super happy with the way they're handling their big franchises like Star Wars and Marvel as well. So... yeah.  I would basically recommend Zootopia to anyone.  It's a great...

I was talking to some friends about the newest X-Men movie that came out and in having the discussion I realized that there was an X-Men movie I never watched.  So, I thought I'd fix that. The Wolverine is actually more of a character piece than an X-Men movie.  I think there were only 2 mutants in the whole thing.  But, I actually liked it more than the last few X-Men movies. By focusing on Wolverine it gets to actually dive into his character and give him real decisions and growth.  It's great to see Hugh Jackman get a full movie playing this character as the main protagonist. Basically, Wolverine goes to Japan and then things quickly get more interesting.  If you like X-Men or Wolverine you should definitely see it. For me, it's just made me more excited for the Old Man Logan movie they have in development.  It could turn out really good.

Playing Games the Way You Want In this episode: We talk about the different ways people play games! Speedrunning Difficulty Settings Modding Handy Links Stephen Colbert Speedrunning Summer Games Done Quick Aggrochat Podcast Weekly Geekery Beej - Be sure to subscribe to the Geek to Geek Podcast your favorite podcast app,   drop a review   so we know how we’re doing, and feel free contact us via email at   geektogeekcast@gmail.com   or   @geektogeekcast   on Twitter with any comments, questions, or suggestions for the show. Thanks for listening, and we can’t wait to hear from you! Subscribe: iTunes Overcast Pocket Casts Google Play Music RSS Feed Geek to Geek Podcast Network: Geek to Geek Geek Fitness Health Hacks The Comic Box Video Game News Now Music by   CarboHydroM

I never wrote up my thoughts about the Warcraft movie!  Although I did talk about it on the Geek to Geek podcast. I really liked the Warcraft movie.  I went in with super low expectations and walked away pleasantly surprised. I think that anyone who likes fantasy could go see the movie and enjoy it, even though fans of Warcraft will feel more familiar with the world and setting.  Think of it like Lord of the Rings, if you were a book reader and went to see the movies when they came out you would get more out of them.  Same idea here if you've ever been a Warcraft player. It seems like it's broken records in China for ticket sales so I'm hoping we'll actually get to see a sequel or two.  I bet this could be better as a series than as a stand alone movie.

Incredible Hulk is the MCU movie I've seen the least, as I've only seen it once.  I actually didn't realize it was part of the MCU since it was a different actor and feels different from the rest of the MCU movies. This is the first time I've watched it since seeing it in theaters when it originally came out. It doesn't really hold up compared to everything that has come since.  It's slow with a very predictable plot. Honestly, huge portions of the movie consist of shots of Edward Norton's face reacting to things.  It got old fast. I guess I learned that I really like Mark Ruffalo as the Hulk instead.  I've loved him in the two Avengers movie and I'm really excited to see how he'll tie into Thor Ragnarok.

I've never actually been able to get through Iron Man 3 before, but as part of my re-watch of my least watched parts of the MCU I thought I should power through it. It wasn't as horrible as Thor Dark World but it was pretty bad.  It's definitely in the bottom half of quality in the MCU and it really seems like Iron Man as a solo character has reached the limits of interesting. I'm glad I got a little more context for the character but I can't see myself watching this one again for a really long time. All that being said, I still think Iron Man is a great character in the multi-character movies and I love seeing him interact with other super heroes.  I'm excited for more of that!

Doom offered a free demo during E3 week and I jumped on it since I was planning on picking up Doom eventually when it was on super sale. I'm so glad I did, because it didn't click with me at all. I don't know why I thought I would like it.  It feels like Doom.  It feels super generic shootery.  I mean, Doom kinda defined the genre, so everything that came after has been more refined and more complicated.  Going back to this style of shooter just feels... ugh.  I dunno. I didn't like it. If you were a huge Doom fan or loved 90s shooters and want a return to form you will probably love this game.  But if you want a modern feeling shooter stay away from this one.

As I've mentioned a bunch on the podcast I did a challenge run of Final Fantasy V called the Four Job Fiesta .  It's still going on if you want to participate or donate for charity. You can see above that I achieved victory!  I'm so happy to have done the challenge run and finished it. If you aren't familiar with the setup, basically you register via twitter and every time you get to a new crystal that unlocks jobs in the game you tweet at the bot and it sends you the one and only job from that crystal you're allowed to use. So, after your first crystal you have 4 characters as one job.  After the second and third crystal you start mixing it up, but you must always have the previous jobs assigned too.  And then after the fourth crystal your party of jobs is set for the rest of the game. This year I got Black Mage, Summoner, Beastmaster, and Samurai.  It felt very much like a DPS race group of jobs since I had no healing except for items and at the ...

Best of the First Half of 2016 In this episode: We discuss the top picks across all media that really stood out to us. We want to make sure that the truly phenomenal work that impressed us this year doesn’t go unnoticed by you folks. We break down the topics into categories like movies, books, tv, comics, and games. Not all of the stuff we talk about is necessarily released in 2016, but it was new to us in 2016, which is way better than the stuff going unnoticed at all, right? And don’t miss   this week’s GEEK OUT episode   with Beej and Kenny from   Dumbbells and Dragons , where they talk about Pokemon Go. We’re still not sure if he’s supposed to give out the details yet, but he sure does! Be sure to subscribe to the Geek to Geek Podcast your favorite podcast app,   drop a review   so we know how we’re doing, and feel free contact us via email at   geektogeekcast@gmail.com   or   @geektogeekcast   on Twitter with any comments, ...

So... I picked up an HBO Now subscription this year since they've finally gotten their shit together and are offering Game of Thrones streaming at the same second it goes live on air.  I'm happy to give them a little bit of money for the show I love. I figured I would play around with it and see if there are any other shows, movies, or specials I wanted to see.  I mean, HBO has been around since like the 80s, there must be a ton of good content, right!? No. I tried a bunch of pilots or watched the beginning of specials and just wasn't interested in any of it.  The only movies or TV series that looked good were the ones I'd already seen or ones I already own.  In this category is stuff like Band of Brothers. But I guess I'm just spoiled by how much content is on other streaming platforms.  In comparison HBO Now feels just so empty.  So, I'll be canceling my subscription now that the season is done. I'm actually really surprised by how little co...