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[Realmfighter]

Most of the time, it's just attack versus attack based on the game's extensive Elemental Rock Paper Scissors. Just about any directed attack can be intercepted with another attack, it's the strength that matters, and strength is adjusted by affinity. However, move combinations also matter, and I don't think I ever saw even two pokemon combine moves, let alone one pokemon doing two moves as one as seen in the anime. I also think that the Pokemon games would greatly benefit from Final Fantasy-style combat, simply because that's how it looks in the anime. Just taking turns is too simplified.

A few years ago i actually planed out a game were you use the Pokemon on a grid, in real time.

This, of course never materialized as i had never even seen a program, but it would have been AWSOME.

[userpay]

Okay just saw avatar, and as far as I'm conserned it was good. The plot might have been "generic" or "unoriginal" but few movies seem to be truely original these days to my thinking. The plot was implemented well enough and the excellent effects helped make the movie itself good. More than $70 million made in two weeks with no sign of slowing down (much) can't be to wrong can it? Though I would be worried if they attempted a sequel, that probably wouldn't turn out well.

[Askot Bokbondeler]

blue ninja pocahontas in space! looks like a plasticine manga, i'm glad i didn't pay to watch it...well, not exactlly glad, i believe i should be paid for watching it, so, until i get paid, no constructive criticism from me

also, i've seen games with better looking intros

[Solifuge]

I have an absolute reverence for men who have a sense of duty, courage, but I’m also a child of the ’60s. There’s a part of me who wants to put a daisy in the end of the gun barrel. I believe in peace through superior firepower, but on the other hand I abhor the abuse of power and creeping imperialism disguised as patriotism. Some of these things you can’t raise without being called unpatriotic, but I think it’s very patriotic to question a system that needs to be corralled, or it becomes Rome.

I really enjoyed Avatar, and would definitely say it is worth seeing, especially in 3D if you can swing it. Though the story was somewhat predictable at times (it wasn't exactly a "What a Twist!" plot) I found the story very enjoyable, and as with many good Sci-Fi stories, found myself longing to learn more about the story world, and hoping that it continues to do well enough to allow for a sequel.

1) The world-building was solid, and painted an image of a vibrant and complex alien world, as good as many fine SciFi novels. It was really fun for me to unveil more about the story world, and its peoples, and it wasn't until the end that many things started to make sense. There was also obvious reference to hard scientific thought going into the alien critters (though there were assumptions galore about DNA, hominids, etc.)... and once you start getting a feel for the planet as a whole toward the end, there was some beautiful synergy going on.

2) The characters had depth and development, and the aliens were very well fleshed out from cultural idioms to language, etc. There were blatant allegories to "Cowboys versus Indians" but I think that was part of the point. The characters and their stories, though definitely carrying tones of the evils of imperialism, resonated with me a great deal, and I really felt drawn into the conflict.

3) The special effects were absolutely stunning. From lush phosphorescent alien jungles, to floating mountain-islands, the scenes were beautifully rendered, and frankly gorgeous. This is where I would especially recommend seeing it in 3D; I actually found myself flinching, and having an involuntary "dodge" reflex when a chunk of debris hurtled in the direction of my seat from the screen... the sense of depth and scale is fantastic, especially in the aerial scenes. The VTOL aircraft and armored infantry suits seemed both very sci-fi, but very plausible, and added to the realistic feel of the movie.

For a Sci-Fi epic, I'd rate Avatar an easy 9.0/10. Definitely one of my favorite movies of 2009.

[kilakan]

good, expected Sigorny Weaver, to be a little more violent... was all like HEY SHE"s FROM THE ALIEN MOVIES YA!!   then was all like... she dies without killing anybody, WTF XD.

Solid graphics, great creativity on wildlife and plants, very unoriginal story-line, not the best main actor.....  8/10

[Muz]

I watched it last night. Didn't read any reviews, forum posts, whatever about it. Barely saw a trailer. No expectations, except about people telling me that they want to watch it again. Never watched Aliens either, didn't know any of the actors.

I'd say it's the best movie I've ever seen. I love sci-fi worlds. I love things with a lot of detail. I love mechanical things, bots, and complicated weapon stuff that don't look tacky. Graphically.. awesome. Not in the sense of "cool because it's hard to do" like with FF Movie or Shrek, but "cool because the artwork is awesome".

It's got a very well-developed world. Yes, there's a "gunmen vs natives" allegory, but I love how it was played out. I dunno, maybe I'm just fond of those things. It certainly turned out well on screen, with the futuristic thing being very nicely implemented.

Suspension of disbelief was also very nice. It's not just 200 bullets and no hits. I found everything nicely believable. Being a gamer and action movie fan, there's very few movies that kept me at the edge of my seat, and this is one of them.

And IMHO, I didn't find the moral message to be at all annoying. The environmentalist/anti-colonial message was nicely done. I certainly wouldn't call the storyline unoriginal, not when you compare to 90% of other (action/sci-fi) movies. It's got, a nice balance between a turn-off-your-brain movie and a movie that has too much thinking/politics/etc.

So, it's the only movie I'd give a 10/10. Maybe you just have to go into the cinema without ever knowing anything about it beforehand.

[Neruz]

Plus; to be fair, while the implied that it was a bad thing that there was no green on earth and that humans killed 'their mother', there are some animals in the wild that kill their mothers or fathers as they are born. The message i got from that was not 'industry bad, environment good' but rather 'don't go fucking up other people's planets without their permission.'

[Cthulhu]

\The message i got from that was not 'industry bad, environment good' but rather 'don't go fucking up other people's planets without their permission, unless they're too stupid or weak to do anything about it.'

Fixed it for you.

[Aqizzar]

Yeah, it tried to tell a very obvious parable of native peoples being foisted off their land by technologically advanced developers, but winning out and driving the developers off with their spiritual majesty.  All I could think through the whole second half of the movie was, "this plan has never worked once in the history of mankind".  I'm baffled as to how the Na'vi convinced the rest of the human settlement to leave, and the only reason I can think that they wouldn't immediately come back in full force is the six year travel-lag and expense.

[Neruz]

Presumably they convinced the rest of the humans to leave because the humans had kind of run out of military assets after Pandora tore them a new one.


Also; i hear there's a sequel in the making, so i fully expect that the Humans will come back in a few years. Unobtainium is pretty valuable, and now the Na'vi have fought back and killed hundreds of humans, so it would be much easier to justify a full military campaign against them.

[Tilla]

I'm surprised how sound most of the science actually is in this movie. Thought largely fictionalized, there is literally nothing in this movie that is impossible by physics standards. Although the obvious question is why the Na'Vi are so primitive if they have a global network interface directly to the brains, they could easily build advanced technology - having a viable source of a room-temperature superconductor certainly wouldn't hurt.

[Aqizzar]

Also; i hear there's a sequel in the making, so i fully expect that the Humans will come back in a few years. Unobtainium is pretty valuable, and now the Na'vi have fought back and killed hundreds of humans, so it would be much easier to justify a full military campaign against them.

Presumably led by more boneheads like Colonel "human version of Sarge from Small Soldiers", who flew out the whole airforce to blow up the Na'vi tree.  I'm not sure why, except that he just really wanted to be a dick.  I mean, the mineral vein is underneath a tree the size of a goddamn mountain.  Blowing it up is irrelevant, because you're never going to move the thing anyway so you may as well just dig around it.

I'm surprised how sound most of the science actually is in this movie. Thought largely fictionalized, there is literally nothing in this movie that is impossible by physics standards.

I still want to know why every other creature on Pandora has four arms and four eyes, while the Na'vi are humanoid.  They're improbable even within the logic of the movie.

[Muz]

It's not exactly cowboys vs indians. It's more like cowboys vs indians who can control dinosaurs. The start of the movie did mention a lot about the military being afraid of the hostile environment, and the native defense team was not even near their full strength. Maybe it's just me, but I actually like the concept of a story around conquering another planet for their stuff. The directing was good enough that for a moment, I actually didn't expect them to win. Which makes me glad I didn't read the synopsis.

Heh, I sort of hope the sequel has some allegory to the Iraq war or Vietnam.

Although the obvious question is why the Na'Vi are so primitive if they have a global network interface directly to the brains, they could easily build advanced technology - having a viable source of a room-temperature superconductor certainly wouldn't hurt.

What I got from the movie is that they didn't want to. They were perfectly happy with what they had and couldn't see why they'd build better technology, before the humans came. But with a proper human scientist's mind among theirs now, I think they might actually do that in the future.

[Neruz]

Presumably led by more boneheads like Colonel "human version of Sarge from Small Soldiers", who flew out the whole airforce to blow up the Na'vi tree.  I'm not sure why, except that he just really wanted to be a dick.  I mean, the mineral vein is underneath a tree the size of a goddamn mountain.  Blowing it up is irrelevant, because you're never going to move the thing anyway so you may as well just dig around it.

The Colonel was a nutjob; they made it clear that he was a bad man with the comment at the start of the movie that the soldiers out here weren't really soldiers and were more like mecenaries (mercs are evil)

The Colonel himself was just plain crazy; paranoid and nuts, with a big stick. The sad truth is that there have been no few number of military commanders throughout history who acted very similar to him.

I still want to know why every other creature on Pandora has four arms and four eyes, while the Na'vi are humanoid.  They're improbable even within the logic of the movie.

It's not improbable; it's impossible. The Na'vi not having 6 limbs and 4 eyes means that they did not evolve from the same base creature that every other animal on Pandora evolved from.

There is no valid scientific reason for this, but there is a very good thematic reason; if the Na'vi had 6 limbs and 4 eyes, they'd be too alien, to difficult to empathise with. By making them blue skinned humans with catlike features they're alien enough to be aliens, but human enough to empathise with. It was a purely thematic choice and it only happened because Avatar is a movie and Humans are the intended audience.

[Il Palazzo]

Also; i hear there's a sequel in the making, so i fully expect that the Humans will come back in a few years. Unobtainium is pretty valuable, and now the Na'vi have fought back and killed hundreds of humans, so it would be much easier to justify a full military campaign against them.

And so the history repeats itself. The sequel should be set another couple of hundred years in the future, with Na'vis living off the welfare and drinking themselves to death in reservations.

I still want to know why every other creature on Pandora has four arms and four eyes, while the Na'vi are humanoid.  They're improbable even within the logic of the movie.

'Cause they're abominable freaks of nature, perhaps?