You Dare to Have an Opinion?!

It is how I feel sometimes wandering in the Internet jungle. That people today hate to see someone stating an opinion. It seems that they don't want to have the trouble to counter-point said opinion, or that they want to not be remembered that people can have different opinions than they. Like if they make all their best to make everyone else too afraid to say their opinion, they can see the world as a world where everyone agrees with them by default. And them they walk blinded by their own ignorance, sometimes right into the abyss.

But maybe ignorance is really a bliss in disguise.

PS: Drunken 'opinions' and offenses toward individuals don't count as valid opinions. Avoid doing it.

Someone Have to Say It!

Some times someone need to tell people not what they want to hear, but what they need to. It is harder than it seems, as saying the wrong thing can completely deny the effect intended and instead make the person close itself even more about what the person need to realize. We live in a world where people fear to say some truths in fear of making those people angry. Many times, they will be in a minority and fear that this dissenting opinion will make people hate the dissenter.

Well, as I said, sometimes people really need to hear what they need, even if that will make them angry. The option of letting the status quo persist can be even more damaging than saying something. Sometimes we need to say it, despite the consequences. Or else  a bad situation will only get worse by letting it be.

Why Setting Persona 5 on College Would Be a Great Idea

I have no doubts that Atlus is already working over Persona 5. Of course, the question is when they will see fit to announce it. The Persona series have achieved a lot of praise in recent years and also have achieved some great sales numbers, so I see no reason to not make it. Of course, at the moment, we can only speculate how the game will be. And I want it to be set on college. Why?

First, a change of setting would do great to make Persona 5 not feel like a rehearse of their previous games, all with high school settings. A fresh environment would attract the attention of the players and also allow for new possibilities in story telling and social links. People are older, are more independent in relation to their families and have worries that teenagers don't quite have.

But also, if my experience on college is to go by, college students are not that different from high school students, with their classes, their parties, their immaturity. basically, we just drank more, there were more sex and such. So, moving to college would allow a sense of novelty but also allow some familiarity at the same time. It would open new possibilities on story and character development but also keep the younger players in a familiar environment.

Moving to college also would allow the use of some of the old characters from previous games, either as teachers or as fellow students. Fan service of this kind would speak high for the game, but also would allow interactions between the old, experienced cast with the new one. It would be a nice experience to see the older characters sharing their experiences with the new ones and open up to explore new social links.

Probably not this way.

Moving to college would be a very smart move for Atlus commercially. Many people who complaint about the Persona games in Western markets is about the fact that the main characters are all high school kids, so putting an older cast would help people to identify themselves with them. But also, the cast would not be too old so the younger players would not identify themselves within the cast. Since Catherine was successful with its older cast and situations, I not see any reason to not do it again.

Also, by dealing with college students instead of high school, the characters gain a lot more freedom to do their thing. The characters would be adults, therefore less susceptible to be restrained by adults in any way, but yet they would have a normal life to attend too. So you would still need to balance your normal life with the life of the occult fighters.

I don't now what Atlus is planning, but since they have striking good games after good games, specially in the Shin Megami Tensei universe, I am very hopeful they will pull out a great game, even if they keep the high school setting. But changing the settings would be great, a welcome change of pace for me.

The Good Side of Any Polemic

In a weird day in Twitter yesterday, people was discussing something about gay Oreos. Being too late to understand what the fuck people was talking about, I just commented how all that talk made me want to eat some cookies and thinking about Poison from Final Fight. If you are not aware, Poison is a character that gender and sexuality is kinda nebulous, with various statements made by Capcom that vary from her always being a woman to her being a transgender.

Surprising, people in my feed and I started to discuss if she is or not transgender, then we started to discuss  transgenders must be addressed(with respect, we all agreed) and how transgenders and gays should be represented in games. It was all very civilized, funny and respectful of everyone involved. It is a polemic theme and we discussed it as reasonable people in disposition to hear each other points.

This leading to transgender discussion. Internet.

This being the Internet and all, it is in fact surprising to have those kind of good discussion over polemic themes without derailing to name calling and stupidity. This is the reason many people hate those polemics and shy away of discussing it. The difficulty to have intelligent and meaningful talks because there is so many people who enter in those talks with no clue about the topic, no intelligent insight to input or just to be an utter asshole all the way because this person have nothing better to do.

But I think polemics are always good (yes, I am aware there is fabricated polemics, but I will get on that), because it allow to people to express their opinions on problematic themes. If everyone tries to avoid polemic topics, humanity would always live in a status quo and not progress as a society. Remember that, for example, interracial marriage was forbidden. If people decided to not discuss this because they feared creating a polemic, people of different races would still be forbidden to marry.

I am not saying that you should just jump in any polemic. First, you must analyze it, see if it is a real polemic who affects your life in any way. Many people make polemics out of themes who don't are polemic for attention. To avoid it, you need to be fully aware of the issue at hand and if there really is two sides in the discussion or just one side with someone trying to make it look there is two sides.

'Look, I am saying that there is people who think that being healthy is a problem! It is a polemic theme!'

A polemic could be a great way to listen and learn why there is two sides of the discussion. It should be not a competition where one side wants to win over the other. Participating in those polemics, in those discussions, may be a great way to improve one self by getting to know better both sides of the discussion and trying to understand why each side have a different opinion.

Ignoring a polemic will not make it go away. Saying that you just want to be left alone will not make a problem solve itself up. A real polemic, one who have real effects in people's lives demand everyone affected to think about it carefully. of course, I understand that it may be a long discussion, and many times we are dealing with two sides who don't want to listen to each other.

But if you left others dealing with it, you may be caught surprised in discovering that they reached an agreement you may not like about. Making yourself heard is important. So, do not shy away of a polemic because you hate them. Listen to every side of it, make your own opinion and make it be known. That way, all polemics can be solved, in a satisfactory way for everyone.

7 Reasons Why the Villains Always lose in Old Children's Shows (Despite the Heroes Being Dumb)

Yesterday I stated how the good guys in old TV shows are able to make the most retarded decisions ever and put themselves (and more important, innocent bystanders) in unnecessary danger by making really bad calls. So, if they are so stupid, how they can defeat the bad guys over and over again? First, they have a lot of dumb luck. Second, the villains is like said luck. Dumb.

7. They Have No Standards when Hiring Henchmen

Let's suppose you decided to go full evil. You will need henchmen to do all the evilness you are too busy to do yourself. So, what are the criteria you need to use to hire them? Reliable? Intelligent? Fast thinking? No, that is completely unnecessary. All your henchmen need to be is evil.

See, the villains seem to hire people who only need to want to be evil than actually being good to do evil. It is very common to the villains to have henchmen who are so stupid that they would need to be under strictly supervision and far from any sharp things than being tasked with getting rid of the good guys or protecting the super weapons.

Apparently, the henchmen market is filled with people who are too incompetent to work at Burger King flipping burgers, and since villains runs on a very tight budget, they seem to get whatever they can to do the job, no matter how poorly they do said job.

That is not counting the family members. Apparently, family is very important to villains, because they keep around their relatives, no matter how many times they screw over. In fact, the villain-boss is very forgiving, considering that they never, ever fire a henchmen, despite their continuous failures.

6. They Don't Have Their Priorities Straight

So, what is the villain's main objective? Conquer the world? Get rid of the heroes? Wins lots of riches? Well, that would be all good, but apparently the villains have no idea what they wand, and better yet, how they will get that. They will try to conquer the world one week, than next week a get-rich scheme and next week after they will try a convoluted plan to get rid of the heroes, just to get back to world conquering next.

See, focus is very important, as is priorities. If the villains where smart, they would always make their priority to get rid of the pesky good guys first. But no, they need to try to conquer the world by changing the oil reserves in marshmallow. Or they really want to steel that beauty Egyptian exposition. Or doing all that at the same time while trying to put a mummy to kill the heroes.

'Fuck the Police'

If they concentrated in one task at a time, they would have a way better chance to succeed. Also, all their resources would be concentrated in one task, instead of spread thin trying to do too much things at once. But who am I kidding? Considering your entire workforce is composed of special needs people, no task can be easy.

5. Their Right-Hand Have a Dagger Pointed to Your Back

Since hiring good henchmen is hard, because they are all brain-damaged, at least your right-hand must be a dedicated, reliable and smart dude, right? Well, it seems that they also are treacherous and always looking for ways to get in the place of the big evil boss.

Apparently, no matter how powerful the villains are, they really don't know how to do a job screening and remove of the hire pool the guys who will betray them every two episodes. maybe because they are surrounded for such incompetence, finding someone who can tie their shoe laces seems like a gift.

It would be not that bad if the villain got rid of the Judas in the first betrayal, But no, they keep the guy no matter how many times they show that they cannot be relied upon. Again, villains seem less like bad guys and more like a charity entity, always trying to correct peoples bad ways. Maybe is the puppy eyes the traitor make when imploring forgiveness.

'Aww, I can't get angry at you...' 

So, not only the villainous boss have to keep track of its henchmen incompetence, the heroes and the evil plot, he also have to keep an eye open for daggers in the dark. That is why he is sop angry all the time and do...

4. Pointless Acts of Evilness

So, the secret base under the mountain is producing the giant robot army that will conquer the world. The henchmen haven't blow up anything, the right-hand is not in the mood for betrayal and no signs of the heroes nearby. All you need is be prepared to act. Oh, look at that forest. It is bothering you, you evil big guy. So, of course you order to your henchmen to get rid of the forest. Which of course draw attention of the good guys (we all know hoe much hippie they are) and now they discovered your secret base! And all your plans goes under.

The thing is, why bother? If your plan is working, don't do anything that is not utterly related to the plan. Don't kidnap some lousy kids, don't go blowing up stuff or hurting elderly people because it is funny seem them screaming with a broken hip. All you do with that is attracting unwanted attention to your plan, who would go smoothly if you didn't feel like applying your rage in random stuff.

'Fast, get me that candy!' 

It must be because they have a lot of steam to vent, having to deal with failure in a weekly base, but it is better do that with something more constructive, like hitting sand bags, playing videogames or something like that. No they have to kick puppies in the street. But I may be too hard on them, because...

3. Villains don't Learn of their Mistakes

The villain captured the heroes. Total victory is near. But them the cute mascot steal the cell keys, get the heroes free and they foil the bad guys plan. Again. It is acceptable when for the very first time the cute mascot steal the keys and release the heroes, but it is unacceptable that they do it once a month and the villains still insist in not killing the damn critter right away.

Making a mistake for the first time is an important lesson, but not learning from it just show how the villains are more crazy than genius. If the heroes are successful for the 10th time because the villain's henchmen keep blabbing about the evil secret plans to them, rip their voice cords off. that will show them to stop giving away the master weapon weakness.

'Damn! How this damn unicorn saved those kids again!' 

2. The Villains Get Side Tracked Easily

The villains master plan is working greatly. Then the evil boss see that beautiful princess and decide he must have her. she may have some damn good boobies or lovely ass, and the boss villain want a piece of that. So, instead of worrying about the plan, he uses important resources and time to make the princess his wife. And that is when the heroes start meddling.

Or worse, the damn princess decide to medley herself, sabotaging the otherwise perfect plan. All because the evil boss cannot think with the upper head. Maybe his henchmen and even the treacherous right-hand warned the boss to let her go, but he couldn't.

'I've came here to still your mines, but now I in love with a comatose girl!'   

It is not just love who distract the villains. it may be a piece of treasure they heard off, deciding to go after it instead of completing the evil machine or the invading tunnel. Or some competition is happening nearby and they decided to participate because they wish to prove evil can win too. Either way, this just prove that the villains either lack focus or are not that much into evil. If they were, they would just...

1. Kill the Good Guys on Sight

Let's look at the Power Rangers' first series. Why the evil space witch never bothered to straight up kill the Power Rangers? See, she knew their identities all along, the only people who couldn't know off was the Rangers family and friends (which make you wonder if Zordon secretly wasn't planning their dismiss all along). The only point of secret identities would be to protect the Rangers civilian life of any attempt of the villains to use it against them.

But again, they knew their identities from the beginning. they could just have created a sniper monster, or even trained one of the henchmen to use a sniper rifle, and just blow up their heads when they were at school laughing at the comic relief characters. They would never saw it coming and would be too scared to go outside because they now know they can be killed at any moment.

Not only that, instead of capturing the good guys, why not just beheading them, instead of creating a complex trap who will kill them after a long time, time enough to some henchmen screw up or the cute mascot to save them?

'Shooting them in the head? What kind of monster you think I am?'  

The more you think about it, the less villainous the bad guys seem. In fact, i am almost convinced that they just like the attention and all the bad stuff they say they want to do is just an excuse to people talk to them.

7 Stupid (and Dangerous) Decisions Made by Heroes of 80s and 90s Children TV Shows

80s cartoons have two weird things about them: the fact that they tried at the same time to be realistic and still be rate E for Everyone; and letting the heroes make some of the weirdest and stupidest calls ever made. This bad decisions not only make the heroes' job harder than should, it potentially put the lives they are trying to protect in danger. Decisions like...

7. Letting the Bad Guys Free

In SilverHawks, an attempt to replicate the success of ThunderCats, the titular characters are a special police force made out of cyborgs and themed with a birds of prey's motif. They are the law enforcement in the Limbo Galaxy, a conjunction of space stations and a few planets and home of several species. Their main mission is to arrest Mon*star and his gang. The question is why they don't do it?

See, Mon*star hideout is not some kind of secret base. it is a goddamned planet. And it is not like the planet is hard to go to. The SilverHawks go there a lot. And it is not like Mon*Star is like Doctor Doom and have diplomatic immunity because he is the planet chief of state. He is in fact an escaped criminal and the SilverHawks have galactic jurisdiction in Limbo. They could go arrest him whatever they really want to.

'We just polished ourselves.'

The same goes for He-Man and Skeletor. The King of Eternia is the king of the whole planet. And Skeletor is the king of nowhere. And his hideout is not secret either. why the king and He-man don't go there and arrest him is a mystery. Maybe they use Skeletor as a scape goat for Eternia's problems that the King don't want his subjects blame on him. And the SilverHawks just don't want to see their payrolls cut because they just become traffic space cops.

6. Trusting in the Bad Guys

Again a typical plot of many 80s cartoon. The bad guy's henchmen goes to the good guys saying they are tired of being bad and want to change to the side of good. The good guys, not being completely morons, arrest the bad guy, judge him fairly for his crimes and after he do his time then they give him a chance to see if he really changed.

Ha, who we are fooling here?

They totally believe in the henchman in case and invite him to be part of the group, going so far as to let him know every secret they may have and giving him full access to the good guys base and weaponry. And when the henchman reveal that it was a trick all along, the good guys are shocked!

How would someone doubt someone like her? It is not like she have Evil in the name!

The easiness with how the good guys can trust someone who they know was a really bad guy in the past is shocking. If it was someone who they met the first time, then I would understand trusting them. But it is people they have met before and that have lied to the good guys before. Speaking of which...

5. Not Having a B-plan in case the Bad Guys Don't Honor their Side of a Deal

So, somehow, the good guys have something the bad guys want and the bad guys have something the good guys want. They make a deal about exchanging whatever they have. Usually it involves the release of prisoners. Everything is going okay, until the bad guys, as they are prone to do, being evil and all, betray the good guys. Shocked, the good guys now have to improvise a way to avoid the bad guys winning this round.

'I lied!'

What is more surprising about it is that the good guys don't even have a plan in the case the bad guys betray them. They are so surprised that they have to come up with a plan on the spot. And them you have the smart guy who will scream how he knew they shouldn't trust the villains, but also didn't have any kind of emergency plan just in case. You start wondering what kind of qualification the good guys have.

4. The Heroes Don't Have Any Qualification to be The Heroes

When Zordon discovered that an evil moon witch was free and wanting to annoy the daily lives of one fictional town in the US,  he knew he needed some highly qualified team of good guys to stop her. Instead, he got lazy and just decide to transport the nearest group of team friends with some knowledge of martial arts to be the first Power Rangers. It does not help that only two of them show to have any real martial skills, the other being a hip-hop dancer who dress up as the Fresh prince of Bel-air, one is a nerd who barely know how to throw a fist and the last one being a cheerleader who is 4-feet tall.

See, he could have choose anyone from anywhere. maybe a soldier with real combat experience, some police officers or Bruce Willis. Instead, he just got a group of people who already are friends and for some coincidence already dress up in the colors of the suits.

'I would call some Marines, but we don't have camouflaged suits.'

Instead, he decided that the best way to deal with aliens with magical powers is calling the help of completely untrained teenagers and hopes for the best. Which only happens because the villains are even more stupid than the heroes.

3. Nobody Have Ever Heard of Backups

The Good Guys' brilliant scientist just developed either a brand new superweapon who will get rid of the villains once and for all or a brand new tech who will revolutionize the world by making the lives of everyone better. He/she even developed a prototype. That of course, the villains will steal in the next shot. The good guys then need to recover the invention before the villains use them for good. There us a chance they will kidnap the scientist too and the good guys need to rescue her/him. Eventually, the good guys will be forced to destroy the brand new invention to avoid the bad guys to use them for evil. And without the prototype, of course, the invention is lost forever. The End.

Because the Heroes are retarded as shit.

See, who the hell make brand new inventions without keeping data? Things like the blue prints of the damned thing, a list of the materials and components of them. Apple will not forget how to do an iPhone if all iPhones decide to destroy themselves in disgust. They will just get the blue prints out of the drawer (or more likely, from the computer they are stored) and make some new ones. Even if the R&D building gets on fire, they will probably have all those precious data stored in somewhere far from there. Damn, most guys on R&D probably have backup of their data in their MacBooks.

Also, even if all those get lost because of reasons, the scientists (who never die in cartoons unless they are utter evil) are still alive. And even if their research is completely destroyed, they will not have to start from scratch. They already make it once, and making again will be way easier the second time around because they now know what works and what not. But since even the most brilliant scientist in cartoons is stricken with retarditis, so...

'What do you mean 'USB Pen Drive'?'

2. Trying to Save the Mind Controlled/Traitor 'Friend' by Letting He/She Free

That one guy who is friends with the good guys decide that Evil pay better. Or it was brainwashed/ hipnotized/charmed/stupedified. Either way, now he is a treat against the good guys and is always making things harder than should be. The good guys, being good guys and all, decide to save him from the mind control/change him back to the side of good, all while doing their best to not hurt the former friend. And making everything unnecessarily more difficulty to everyone.

See, the fact that the former friend is being mind controlled does not mean a free pass to do evil. The good guys need to arrest him and lock him up until they find a way to cure him. They don't have to let the former friend go because they have no clue how to cure him. That way, not only the former friend is in a safe place, he also cannot make evil stuff that surely will hunt him the rest of his life once he is free and realize all he was forced to do.

'Calm down Timmy. It was not your fault burning that kittens' orphanage. It was our fault for not locking you up when we had the chance. Our bad.'

It is even worse if the guy willingly decided to betray the Heroes. This guy have no excuse at all, so he deserve being jailed for any crime he made. letting him roam free until you convince him through the power of long winded speeches is not an option. specially when your former friend is burning orphanages with kittens inside. And since we are in the topic of kittens...

1. Letting the Kids/Pets Come With You in the Dangerous Mission Against Evil

So, you have received a new mission that involves lots of explosions, car chases and life threatening situations. But you have a small, cute pet or a small, annoying relative, usually sibling/cousin/son/daughter. As any good relative/pet owner, you think of your pet/small children well being first and decide that the helpless creature should go with you and be put in the direct line of danger! Because fuck you that is why!

The pet/kid will eventually put itself in dangerous situation, that the irresponsible adults who let them come will need to solve, all while letting the bad guys escape or be successful in at least one step of their evil plan. And instead of sending the pet/kid home, you will talk with him a little and still let them come with you.

It is not like the heroes don't have a place or someone to let the damn pest with while they have crime to fight. It seems that they are eager to get rid of the kid/pet, but want to put the blame in the villains hands. And even if they said to the pet/kid to stay behind in a safe place and they sneak in the car, it is not excuse. After the second time I discover the pet/kid snicked in the trunk, I would always double check it before going.

And no, saying how 'useful' they can be or how they totally saved your ass the last time they came with you don't stick. For each one of those, they have put themselves in dangerous ten other times.

'But I saved your life!' 'When you were at the edge of that window or being held hostage? Also... Shut up!'

Wasted

OK, yesterday's party was not that hard. But I drank some caipirinha, a typical Brazilian drink, made with lemon, ice, sugar and some cachaça (a sugar cane distillation beverage, you can switch with vodka if you want). But man, I am weak with alcohol. At least I did nothing weird. Probably...