Angry Video Game Nerd

A look at the making of the AVGN I & II Deluxe game:

Taito games.

A moment of silence for the Honey Nut Cheerios Bee.

Violence Fight was the best part of this one, no doubt.

The Nerd is right, the sound effects in Zoo Keeper are awesome. I especially like the noise (which I guess is supposed to represent an animal roar) when you reach a checkpoint.

Edited by speedyboris on Nov 30th 2020 at 4:10:17 AM

Taito Legends bears similarity to Action 52. Except Action 52 was built from the ground up, while Taito Legends was just a compilation of games published by Taito. Cheating comparison, I know. But when you look at these two games, which one do you pick?

Speaking of the section about Kiki Kaikai, anyone willing to bet on the nerd having a special mentioning to Touhou?

That’s not entirely a fair comparison. Action 52 has 0 good games, while this collection had quite a few he didn’t hate.

I do like these compilations though. Lot of value vs. say, a downloadable release, and fun extras.

Huh, I'm kinda surprised that James wasn't familiar with Operation Wolf. It was pretty popular back in the day, and even got a NES port, so it seemed like a game he'd know by name at least.

Looks like we're getting one more AVGN by the end of the year, based on the intro to this video: Why Batman Returns is a Christmas Movie

Also, one more thing about the previous AVGN episode: I popped in Taito Legends 1 for Xbox after the Nerd said that Operation Wolf contains Epileptic Flashing Lights, and... I think that particular port had those flashing blue lights removed, because I didn't experience anything like the PS2 version has (which is the version the Nerd played). Weird that feature would be present in one version and not the other, but there you are. If you have sensitivity to this kind of thing, go for the Xbox version.

Edited by speedyboris on Dec 12th 2020 at 3:53:20 AM

The new Nerd is...The Simpsons. Not the arcade game, Bartman meets Radioactive Man, a prime example of The Problem with Licensed Games.

Edited by Beatman1 on Dec 15th 2020 at 9:06:06 AM

I loved his Hypocrisy Nod when talking about how The Simpsons has gone on too long, followed by moving onto AVGN episode 180-something.

Yeah hard to believe he's been doing this for 16 years...

I found it interesting that his copy of Barts Vs. The Space Mutants still has the illustration lable peeled off a bit.

So now that this is (presumably) the last AVGN of the year, what were your favorites?

My favorites: -Mortal Kombat Ports, Mortal Kombat Rip-offs - great choices for videos, since MK is one of his favorite series so he could really go in-depth.
-The Incredible Crash Dummies - mainly for the non-video game commentary; the video game section was business as usual.
-Dennis the Menace - 'cause I can relate to all the criticisms he lobbed at it.
-Taito Legends 2 - lots of games burned through, plus the Violence Fight section

The year definitely had a "back to basics" feel to it, "thanks" to COVID. Hopefully we'll get some more ambitious ones in 2021 again. Maybe we'll see that casino games one eventually.

Edited by speedyboris on Dec 15th 2020 at 2:07:52 AM

I could genuinely see a Casino Games episode being filmed in Vegas or Atlantic City...when that’s safe to do so again.

He's getting close to episode 200. Perhaps he'll save it for that. Unless he has some other Episode 200 plan.

Mission Impossible and Ecco the Dolphin were probably the funniest two this year (the ending to the Ecco episode still kills me).

James definitely isn’t afraid to experiment with his videos and his format. I’m sure whatever it is will be worth talking about.

It's insane to think that some kids who weren't born yet when he started making AVGN videos are now old enough to go to high school.

James mentioned once in an interview about how weird it felt meeting fans at cons, who were adults, and being told they've been a fan of his since they were a kid, or that they grew up on his videos.

I was in my early 20's when I discovered AVGN, the first review I watched was Double Dragon III, followed by his TMNT 3 movie review.

Any you didn't like this year? Weakest of the year for me was probably Final Fight Streetwise. Which is strange, because the original Final Fight is one of my all-time favorite games so the subject matter alone kept my interest, but it just wasn't that funny of a review. Oh well, they can't all be winners.

I only seriously got into AVGN with the debut of the episode of Big Rigs in 2014.

For me Countdown Vampires seemed to be the weakest of the season, and not because of the usual expectations for Halloween episodes due to the you-know-what, but because the review on Resident Evil: Survivor more or less fit the bill of "weak survivor horror game" episode a bit more thoroughly.

@speedyboris: Yeah, Countdown Vampires didn't seem like it offered enough material to comment on.

The latest Bartman episode also didn't have much to it, aside from the opening cartoon intro, the Hypocrisy Nod joke, and the "having a cow" bit at the end.

Forgot about Countdown Vampires, that was kind of a so-so review as well.

Edited by speedyboris on Dec 16th 2020 at 11:30:00 AM

Mike Matei is leaving Cinnemassacre

I can't say I'm upset about this; it gives me a reason to finally resub.

Mike, in the comments section: "James is the best. We are still friends. I just want to focus on streaming. We're good. 😊"

That said, definitely surprising news. I'm disappointed J&MM won't return.

Edited by speedyboris on Dec 18th 2020 at 3:24:28 AM

Hm. Something I never noticed until now. While looking at an episode guide in Wkipedia, the Ninja Turtles 3 movie review counts as an AVGN episode.

That's... Weird to me. I've never considered it an AVGN episode myself. I mean doesn't he call himself the Angry Movie Nerd in it?