Change Your Image
keith-janski
Reviews
The Irate Gamer (2007)
Technical wise, not a terrible effort, but we all know Chris Bores is not a gamer.
Chris Bores is obviously the wannabe James Rolfe. Although in recent years James Rolfe's acting and writing have come a little closer to Chris Bores', James Rolfe is still not only far superior in every way to him but also far more original with his material too. The only episode I think Chris Bores did a better job covering than James Rolfe was the Rob the Robot episode. Asalieri did a hilarious comparison video of the two on youtube.
Despite that little mishap James, his material has been consistently original, well written, and well produced. Chris on the other hand has consistently been terrible in every way except the production department. His videos do not have the same level of production quality as James' but he's not far off. He has proved to be proficient in technical abilities of video making, but that's about it. I will admit his "I rate the '80s" is a little better, but his coverage of games is usually downright inaccurate and terrible. His "History of Video Games" has proved to be full of inaccuracies and flaws and yet even after remaking them in HD he didn't even bother to correct his mistakes or bad jokes even though numerous people have pointed them out to him on youtube.
"The Irate Gainer" made a hilarious parody video of his History of Videos Games series on youtube. I give Chris credit for continuing to push forward with his Irate character and other video series despite the huge backlash and hate he has been getting and I give him credit for trying to move away from James Rolfe's style and trying to develop more of his own, but it's too little too late. He burned his reputation by copying James' lines and video series styles without giving him credit, getting any kind of permission from him beforehand and then trying to lie about it claiming it was a "mistake" later. You can see proof of this on the "Irate Gamer Sucks Blog" from July 2009.
Angry Video Game Nerd: The Movie (2014)
Too many forced moments
Looking at the reviews here on IMDb.com, it seems that a lot of people don't understand James Rolfe's direction he took with this film. It is meant to be a parody of every movie cliché basically. Even on those merits though I am not sure if the movie still works.
If you have followed James Rolfe's work on his website cinemaccarcre.com you will know that he is not just a video game buff, but also a movie buff of the horror genre in particular. I think he is actually more of a monster/horror movie fan more than a video game fan. The reason why he came off as mostly a video game buff is because he realized that his "Angry Video Game Nerd" character was the most popular of his video series so he directed his attention on that character the most.
When he got a chance to make his AVGN movie, he didn't just want it to be a video game movie but more of a "Cinemassacre" movie incorporating all of the elements of his videos into the movie well as putting every movie cliché in the film for humor.
It's hard for me to critique this movie because it doesn't take itself seriously. In some ways I like it and in some ways I don't. I think the biggest problem with it is that James has scenes and ideas shoehorned in rather than bridged in a coherent manner. There is also too much forced humor. If you watch earlier episodes of the Angry Video Game Nerd pre-2010/2011 you will find he is much more subtle in his role. At some point he became too self aware of the character and his acting became forced.
He said in one of his videos that he had been writing the script since he started the Nerd character, I was hoping it would be more of the pre-2010 nerd writing and not the post 2010 writing. Unfortunately it sounds awfully like his post 2010 writing.
The funnest part of the film I thought was the campy effects. The soundtrack for the movie by Bear McCreary is also excellent. I suggest you check that out if you haven't already.