Oh, What A Life: An American Authors Review

I first heard of American Authors almost a year ago. I thought they were really good. I put a note in my phone to remind me to look them up when I got home (because I didn't own a smart phone at the time). But sure enough, I forgot.

For the coming months I still remembered them on occasion and wanted to look them up, because I just really liked their song I had heard on AltNation! The song was Believer, by the way.

I pretty much forgot about them until they started showing up on public radio. Which, by the way made me quite angry. Too many good bands get destroyed because of the radio i.e. Imagine Dragons, Of Monsters & Men, Bastille, etc. But that is hardly the point.

When the end of the year came around and my friends and I were making our end-of-year mix, the song Hit It was suggested. That's one I had never heard but I was familiar with the band and new that the song would be good.

I listened to their EP a few times and really liked it. It has a good alternative/indie feel.

Soon after, I found out that the university I attend would be hosting a festival with American Authors as the main event. This was not hard to convince myself (and others) to go.

Their newest album released just last week, the same week as the concert. The concert was very enjoyable and worth the money. There were a few technical difficulties, but the band handled them well. They told jokes and interacted with the crowd. They also played some covers that were better than the originals. Such as Lights by Ellie Goulding and Cruise by Florida Georgia Line All around a respectful and talented band.

American Authors on stage.

Since then, I have been listening to their album more and it's quite amazing. I feel like the album represents the band perfectly, in the sense that they can party and have fun but can also be solemn and respectful.

For anyone who doesn't know about American Authors and is interested in buying/listening to their album, I recommend it. It's alternative enough for normal people to enjoy it and indie enough for (some) hipsters to still like it as well.


Photo courtesy of @_xoxobrenda via Twitter

Elder Scrolls Online Review

My thoughts for the second beta phase of The Elder Scrolls Online are not very concrete. I only put a few hours into the beta so I wouldn't consider this a critique, more of a personal evaluation.

Background information: I was not impressed by beta phase one. I felt there wasn't anything really special about it, which disappointed me. But again that opinion isn't very concrete either. I never actually play phase one. I only watched closely as a friend played. But I digress.

Phase two: As far as I could tell, It had gotten cleaned up quite a bit! Phase two got me quite excited about the game once again!

Recap of all the Elder Scrolls games.

It was similar enough to it's predecessors to make it feel like a classic Elder Scrolls game. What I really like about ESO is the fact that it is also different from the other Elder Scrolls games. For the first time in Elder Scrolls I actually enjoyed playing in third person rather than first. It actually looks good too! Don't get me wrong, I love the other games. But one cannot deny the fact that the graphics were pretty in the earlier games were subpar to most other games at the time.

Good news? Well I fear you had to try it for yourself. I have a friend you did not enjoy the beta until about seven hours in. If you want my opinion (which I'm sure you do or else you wouldn't be here), he is crazy.

The game is cleverly crafted. It offers you choices that affect how things turn out. This is no ground-breaking aspect but it definitely adds to it's awesomeness.

You are limited to certain alliances depending on what species you choose. It's cool that Bethesda is enforcing what makes sense within the world of Tamriel, but one can just purchase the Collectors Edition, which allows you to choose whichever alliance you'd like.

In fact, that's just what I did. I have ordered it for my PS4 though. PS4 users will have to wait for the game until June but for me it's worth the wait.

ESO Imperial Edition.

The character creation was very cool. The characters look far more amazing than they ever have. Specifically Khajiit and Argonians. The details in these species are phenomenal and surpass their looks in previous games tenfold!

Now for what I didn't really like. The characters, though looked amazing, rarely had interesting things to say. Again, I did not get very far so the speech could have improved as you moved on. I didn't like the fact that depending on your level you wouldn't be able to see other people. That would be cool if it didn't also apply to my party members. But that was a minor detail that bothered me. For the most part the beta was good.

It was sad it only lasted a couple days but that's okay. The game is now going back into testing and will be released in April.

Bravely Default Review

Bravely Default may be the greatest JRPG I've ever played.

Granted, there are many others that I hold high on the list, such as the Chrono series and some early Final Fantasy games. Square Enix has redefined the JRPG genre with this game. Bravely Default is proof the JRPG is NOT dead.

Japanese role-playing games have come a long way since the 1980's. They're not the same turn based games that you uses to love. And let's face, Final Fantasy is just not as good as it used to be. Don't get me wrong--I love Final Fantasy. They are some of my favorite games. They have a more modern specialness to them but they're just not the same. Sometimes you just need a good turn based JRPG.

The fact that Bravely Default has now sold more than 200k copies worldwide says a lot about the game. The game has received so much praise that Square Enix has already stated they've started a Bravely Second. Square has even stated that Bravely Default  may make it to consoles in the future.

Now for a break down of the game.

When I first started the game I was kind of bothered with the characters. Agnes was very annoying in the fact that she wanted no help whatsoever. I even thought the voice acting was rather mediocre but then I realized that it wouldn't be a JRPG without the awkward dialogue. I quickly learned to love the characters. Once Edea joined the gang, I really started loving the banter between characters. They have distinct personalities and have much development. 

The game tends to be rather tough if you aren't used to the job system or many other JRPG  qualities. Plus, playing it on the harder difficulty makes it even tougher. Though it's challenging, it is very easy to spend a lot of time in the game. I had put in over 30 hours before I even got halfway.

The games' awkward title derives from the coolest feature the game has to offer.

Choosing Default over an attack adds to your BP (Brave Points). Once you've chosen Default, you will not attack but your defense is much higher for that turn. Once you have a couple BP then you can choose the Brave option and you can attack that many times within that turn. But be careful! Choosing Brave lowers your defense. It's a high risk high reward system.

The game is worth playing. If you haven't, then there is only one thing to do!

If I had to put a number on it I would give Bravely Default a 9.5 out of 10.