SpikyCactus
Criticker Newbie - 4 Game Ratings
Member Since: Jul 31, 2011
Location: Reading, Berkshire, UK
Age: 60
Bio:
A failure in almost every way modern science has found to measure it, I spend my hours digging gardens, mindlessly delivering delivery vans and trying to keep The Man at bay. At other times I listen to music, watch films, play games and go to mostly punk and ska gigs, to try and hide the fact that I've got no friends. I live in a place I call Cactus World. Like most concepts that outlive their original purpose, Cactus World is an ill thought-out but increasingly complex muddle of canonical contradictions, fuelled by a mixture of decent alcohol (vegan cider, 'interesting' beer and Guinness), movies, games and music, which encapsulates the sneaking suspicion that basically I'm a talentless nobody, living as a parasitic observer of life rather than as a participant in it.
I learnt everything I need to know about life from watching Tom & Jerry, Laurel & Hardy and Star Trek, growing cacti (and other succulents), reading Thomas Hardy, going hiking/camping, playing Traveller (it's a role-playing game), listening to punk and owning a guitar I will never learn to play.
On a more technical note, I'm on a mission to write up to 600 characters of mostly irrelevant, superficial, ill-informed, uninteresting and unamusing rubbish about each film I own as I watch it, with a special (management speak alert) laser-like focus, on cats, cacti (and other succulents), chainsaws, decapitations and general badassness. (You know what I mean, the sort of low grade, background noise that the Internet allows people with no talent, understanding or considered thoughts to publish). I imagine this probably infuriates many real movie buffs who take these things seriously and actually know something about their interest; but please, just try and roll with it.
I have noticed that some people (probably accidentally) press the 'star' button by what I've written. To them I say thank you for giving my life meaning, substance and direction, plus the courage and fortitude to sit through some pretty terrible films all the way to the end, just so I can then share this pain with others here.
My scoring system. I score in multiples of 10; anything more granular hurts my head. However, if a film has something intrinsically special about it I add an extra five. 70 is my base score for a decent film that I enjoyed but probably wouldn't miss much if it vanished from existence tomorrow. This is quite high, but I mostly watch things that, for better or for worse, I've bought a copy of; and I try not to buy things I don't think I'd like much. Anything that gets less than 60 is terminated by me in an exceedingly cruel and heartless fashion, unless I've a specific reason for keeping it. (And I do seem to be very good at finding excuses for doing the latter, which isn't helping at all to make my living room look less like a forgotten branch of Blockbusters.) Anything that gets 90 or more I upgrade to the highest definition disc or digital copy possible if I don't already own it. Simples!
TV Series. I don't rate these. This is partly because I'm just not capable of condensing several seasons into one paragraph of flippant comments. Also, it's a big commitment to watch a TV series all the way though. This means I only do so if they're really good, which then unbalances my scores here with too much TV near the top of my list. TV should have its own section, like games do.
A failure in almost every way modern science has found to measure it, I spend my hours digging gardens, mindlessly delivering delivery vans and trying to keep The Man at bay. At other times I listen to music, watch films, play games and go to mostly punk and ska gigs, to try and hide the fact that I've got no friends. I live in a place I call Cactus World. Like most concepts that outlive their original purpose, Cactus World is an ill thought-out but increasingly complex muddle of canonical contradictions, fuelled by a mixture of decent alcohol (vegan cider, 'interesting' beer and Guinness), movies, games and music, which encapsulates the sneaking suspicion that basically I'm a talentless nobody, living as a parasitic observer of life rather than as a participant in it.
I learnt everything I need to know about life from watching Tom & Jerry, Laurel & Hardy and Star Trek, growing cacti (and other succulents), reading Thomas Hardy, going hiking/camping, playing Traveller (it's a role-playing game), listening to punk and owning a guitar I will never learn to play.
On a more technical note, I'm on a mission to write up to 600 characters of mostly irrelevant, superficial, ill-informed, uninteresting and unamusing rubbish about each film I own as I watch it, with a special (management speak alert) laser-like focus, on cats, cacti (and other succulents), chainsaws, decapitations and general badassness. (You know what I mean, the sort of low grade, background noise that the Internet allows people with no talent, understanding or considered thoughts to publish). I imagine this probably infuriates many real movie buffs who take these things seriously and actually know something about their interest; but please, just try and roll with it.
I have noticed that some people (probably accidentally) press the 'star' button by what I've written. To them I say thank you for giving my life meaning, substance and direction, plus the courage and fortitude to sit through some pretty terrible films all the way to the end, just so I can then share this pain with others here.
My scoring system. I score in multiples of 10; anything more granular hurts my head. However, if a film has something intrinsically special about it I add an extra five. 70 is my base score for a decent film that I enjoyed but probably wouldn't miss much if it vanished from existence tomorrow. This is quite high, but I mostly watch things that, for better or for worse, I've bought a copy of; and I try not to buy things I don't think I'd like much. Anything that gets less than 60 is terminated by me in an exceedingly cruel and heartless fashion, unless I've a specific reason for keeping it. (And I do seem to be very good at finding excuses for doing the latter, which isn't helping at all to make my living room look less like a forgotten branch of Blockbusters.) Anything that gets 90 or more I upgrade to the highest definition disc or digital copy possible if I don't already own it. Simples!
TV Series. I don't rate these. This is partly because I'm just not capable of condensing several seasons into one paragraph of flippant comments. Also, it's a big commitment to watch a TV series all the way though. This means I only do so if they're really good, which then unbalances my scores here with too much TV near the top of my list. TV should have its own section, like games do.
Recent Ratings
Check out SpikyCactus's...
| 75 0% | The Longest Journey (1999) - Jan 14, 2023
"Top badass moment? Taking nearly four years to complete it - I cheated a lot too. A sex-mad bird, a lot of waffle about The Balance and an underwhelming ‘handbags at dawn’ final confrontation. I grew quite fond of myself as the drainpipe-thin April (eat some cake for God's sake), although by the end I was beginning to feel our relationship had run its course. Luckily, as the game goes on there are less and less puzzles to solve and more cut scenes to watch. No cats, chainsaws or decapitations."
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| 80 0% | Syberia (2002) - Apr 19, 2019
"Top badass moment? The chance to explore my feminine side. I think I did pretty well, dealing with so many people who could easily have a second career as the annoying 'nutter on the bus'. I also seemed to be surrounded by incredibly self-centred people; my mother, best friend, boss and that needy, narcissistic asshole of a boyfriend, Dan. Even Oscar, the driver of the most unreliable train this side of South Western Railways, was a bit too full of himself. No cats, chainsaws or decapitations."
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| 85 0% | Star Trek: Elite Force II (2003) - Dec 06, 2018
"Top badass moment? Finally getting a snog with Telsia. I liked her more than Kleeya, the bikini babe scientist. Yes love, that's such a practical outfit to wear when you're fighting Exomorphs. And Korban really needs to get out of the armoury occasionally. The guy's always in there; it's not normal, even for a Klingon. I found Picard's gushing complements at the end a bit hard to take too. I think he'd been in the Ready Room, sampling his wine again. No cats, chainsaws or decapitations."
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| 80 0% | Star Trek: Voyager - Elite Force (2000) - Oct 23, 2018
"Top badass moment? Never mind all the shooting and stuff, the Vorsoth are clearly a race that tries to talk its enemies to death by spouting endless propaganda to depress them. By the time I killed the Vohrsoth Leader I actually was starting to believe that I really am just a puny and insignificant human. I guess that's the trouble with alien scum, it just doesn't know its place. At least I impressed Telsia, not that it seemed to get me anywhere with her. No cats, chainsaws or decapitations."
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