Album Review: Starbomb

Starbomb is something quite special. And not for everybody. It's a band that consists of two of my personal favorite internet personalities, cartoonist Arin "Egoraptor" Hanson and Ninja Sex Party. Ninja Sex Party is a two-man band, with Danny Sexbang (or Leigh Daniel Avidan for you sophisticated folk) and Ninja Brian (or
Brian Wecht, a theoretical physicist working at Queen Mary, University of London, studying string theory and supersymmetry). Arin and Danny co-host Game Grumps on Youtube together, so you can already tell even on the album's intro track that they have incredible chemistry. Arin is usually the rapper on these tracks, while Danny delivers the hooks with his incredibly unique voice and Ninja Brian does an amazing job on the production of each track.

The album itself contains 11 video game themed songs, featuring tons of popular Nintendo characters. This is obviously a comedy album, but it is put together extremely well. The tracks are usually parodying a specific
part of a game, placing the characters in strangely adult situations with a crazy amount of dick jokes. But it works. Oh boy, does it work.

I Choose You to Die (9/10)-Arin's rapping is a little bit clunky on this, but that's mostly due to the awesome Pokemon puns in this song. The track tells the story of how Ash Ketchum had nothing in life after beating the Elite Four, so he turned to beating his Pokemon and got arrested for domestic violence. The song is good enough, but is made fantastic by Danny's hooks. His ability to make jokes while keeping with beat and tune of the song really stands out here.

Luigi's Ballad (8/10)-Danny plays the part of Luigi on this song, with Arin as Mario and Rachel Bloom guest appearing as Princess Peach. This is essentially a fight between the Mario Bros. about which one of them Peach should love more. Danny plays a sincere Luigi, trying to make Peach fall for him, while Mario is much more aggressive an obnoxious. Again, Danny's vocals top Arin's rapping, but there's not enough of Danny on this song, in my opinion. Arin also did an animated music video for the song, which you can check out here:

It's Dangerous to Go Alone (7/10)-This one is about that old man in the cave in the original Zelda games that gives Link his first sword. But in Starbomb's version, the old man (Danny) is trying to give Link (Arin) a penis sword. It's such a strange song, with a few too many dick jokes, but I liked how Liberty City and Raccoon City were tossed into the song, just for more references. Dan's vocals are great again, Arin's rapping is actually better than the previous songs, and the "chilled out groove" on this song is one of Ninja Brian's best.

Meet Arin

Mega Marital Problems (8/10)-Mega Man (Arin) and his wife (Dan) are arguing about their monotonous sex life on this one, with Dr. Wily (Dan again) is acting as their therapist. The premise seems weird, but it actually ends up being pretty funny, especially when Zero (more Danny) shows up at the end, trying to steal Mega Man's wife. As Zero, Danny shows off his crazy vocal range and it's amazing. The song flows great and the majority of it is about Mega Man fighting robot masters to gain better sex skills, which is silly enough to work.

Rap Battle: Ryu vs. Ken (10/10)-This song is a quick one, but it features Ryu and Ken from Street Fighter duking it out with rhymes rather than fists. Ryu (Arin) tries really hard and Arin does it really well, while Ken (Danny) can't rhyme on beat and doesn't care as much about it as Ryu. Obviously Ryu wins with some ridiculous rhymes and kicks Ken in "his scrotums".

Crasher-Vania (10/10)-This is probably my favorite song on the album. It's extremely catchy and Danny's hooks are incredible. His hooks are accompanied with harmonies done by himself, which makes them even better. This is also the song with the lowest amount of dick jokes, which was refreshing after being bombarded by them early on. Arin does a great Dracula accent and tells the true story of Castlevania: Simon is mad that Dracula never invites him to his monster mashes. Here's a clip from the song (also Arin kisses Ninja Brian):

The Book of Nook (7/10)-Arin is Tom Nook on this track, portraying him as the ruthless mayor of Animal Crossing. He cleverly works in the other non-residents in the game, but this track only features a short hook from Danny, which is not enough.

Sonic's Best Pal (9/10)-Another great job by Ninja Brian, as Danny raps over a high-tempo beat, telling the story of Sonic and his pals having a good time and enjoying life. The beat then transitions to a heavy metal track, as Arin screams as a PCP-addicted Tails the Fox. The song is hilarious, the beats and transitions are great, and Danny's happiness works so well with Arin and Tails' rage and craziness.

Regretroid (9/10)-Arin tells the story of Samus Aran on this track and how enemies get a lot softer when they find out she's a girl. Danny does a great job as Kraid, with a great mixture of rapping and singing. Emily

And meet Danny

Valentine guests as Samus and works really well off of Danny's reluctant Kraid.

Kirby's Adventure in Reamland (2/10)-This song is terrible. Plain and simple. Kirby is probably my favorite video game character (and my main in Smash Bros), but this song was just plain disturbing. I couldn't enjoy it, it didn't make me laugh, it just gave me an uncomfortable feeling. Danny's vocals are the only redeeming quality.

The Simple Plot of Final Fantasy 7 (10/10)-Arin plays Cloud Strife in this song, which takes place during a talk show interview. Other characters such as Donkey Kong and Pac-Man state the plots of their games, which are never more than a few words, while Cloud constantly interrupts host Danny to relay the "simple" plot of his game. It's a really funny song, with a lot of classic video game references and Arin's verses flow really well.

Overall, this album gets a 8.5/10. I love these two acts and they're great when combined. They teased a next album, which they then confirmed, on the outro track of the album and I cannot wait for it. Maybe a few less dick jokes next time. Just a few. Please.

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Game Review: The Walking Dead: Season 2 (Episode 1: All That Remains)

This post contains spoilers for both The Walking Dead and The Walking Dead: Season 2 games.

Telltale has done it again. After making us all feel like the vulnerable human beings we are in last year's masterpiece of a game, The Walking Dead, the geniuses at Telltale provide us with the next chapter of the epic game series. Season 2 begins a few months after where the first game left off. Clementine is now the playable character, replacing Lee Everett, who met an unfortunate end at the end of the first game. A post-credits scene in that game showed Clem finding two figures in a large field, after abandoning Lee to begin her journey alone. These two figures ended up being Omid and Christa, the only two KNOWN survivors of the season 1 group, other than Clem. Clem, Omid, and Christa appear to wander for a few months, which brings us to where Season 2 begins. And where I started going crazy. And where the spoilers for the new game start.

Right off the bat, you can tell this game is going to be darker than the last. First off, you're playing as a little girl who knows how to kill. Also, the theories about Christa being pregnant are confirmed, as she has a huge stomach and the opening scene contains an argument over whether or not to name the baby Omid. Clem and her two companions stop at an abandoned rest stop, which is actually the one that appears several times in the 400 Days DLC for the first game. Clem heads into the bathroom (which has a nice TV show reference in it; "TBone is da illest" is carved into a stall) to clean up and hides in a stall when another teenage girl walks in. The girl finds Clem and begins to interrogate her at gun point, at which point Omid tries to sneak in, fails, and is shot and killed. This was pretty jarring for me, as it came before the opening credits even rolled and Omid was advertised as a kinda "look who's back" character. Christa comes in, shoots the girl, and her and Clem travel north together for 16 months. When we flash forward, Christa's baby bump is gone obviously, but there is no baby. Hm. Some men then try to attack the two ladies and Clem escapes and floats down a river. She wakes up and walks down a forest trail and meets a dog.The dog and Clem search for food and everything seems fine, until she finds some and the dog attacks her. Clem kicks the dog back and it gets impaled on spikes. This is where you can REALLY tell that this is a darker game. Your first major decision is whether or not you want this little girl to kill the suffering animal. I needed to take a break after this part.

The next part of the game is where you meet your new companions. Pete and Luke find Clem, suffering from hunger and blood loss, about to be got by the getters. They carry her back to their group, but not before Luke freaks out about the dog bite on the way. Pete believes that it was a dog, while Luke is more hesitant and upset that Clem killed the dog. Pete seems to be more understanding so far, but Clem sees a more

Meet Pete!

welcoming friendliness in Luke. Some assholes want to kill Clem, one asshole (Nick) almost shoots her when she wakes up, and then Carlos, the doctor, comes to take a look at her. The group decides to wait until morning to make sure it really is a dog bite, then they'll clean it. So far, the only non-complete assholes in the group are Luke, Pete, and Alvin. The group of jerks lock Clem in a shed, which she promptly breaks out of. She then breaks into the house and you have to find peroxide, a needle, and bandages so she can fix her arm. Clem gets all this stuff, meets Carlos' daughter Sarah, runs back to the shed, and you then have to stitch up the dog bite, step-by-step. I could barely get through this part. The only blood I can deal with is Game of Thrones quick cuts with a sword, but having to look at Clem's cut while she stitches it up, screaming in agony, made me have to take another break.

After this, Clem is attacked by a walker and the group appreciates her toughness. They decide that she's lasted long enough without a fever, so they FINALLY treat her dog bite. Clem then has the choice to accept Nick's apology (Nick being the guy who almost shot her when she woke up originally). You can also choose to tell Luke all about Lee and the old group and then choose to make friends with Rebecca or confront her about who her baby belongs to. She's really mean and I hope she dies soon. Anyway, the next day, Clem, Pete and Nick go out to hunt and find a bunch of corpses, one being Roman from 400 Days. Clem then finds a survivor, who also has her backpack, who she recognizes as someone from the woods at the start of the game. Pete is then attacked and visibly bitten, then attacked again, and you have to choose whether to go with Nick or Pete during the attack. The episode ends with Clem running off with whoever you choose.

I really enjoyed this first episode and believe that this series has the potential to be better than the first game. It's much more difficult to play as a child, when you want people to like you and help you because you know you can't live with no friends, but you also don't want to be nice to some people. It was much easier with Lee because you knew you would always have Clementine and SOMEBODY would be on your side, but with Clem, you need to pick your sides carefully. I loved this new challenge and can't wait for the next episode, which hopefully comes out sometime next month.

My Choices:

• I chose to distract the men in the woods to help Christa
• I chose to kill the dog
• I chose to make friends with Sarah
• I chose to accept Nick's apology
• I chose to save and go with Pete