Why Do We Call It “The Evil Art Of Emulation?”

Every so often, someone will invariably ask why I refer to “the evil art of emulation.”

Because it is the work of pure evil… and so it must be addressed as such.

In actuality, it started off as a gag of sorts from ages ago… when emulation was a relatively new thing and people were questioning the ethical and moral implications of such a deed. In fairness, that’s something being questioned today, but that has more to do with context. Emulation is something that is more widely adopted thanks to various compilations and services offered by the people who make these consoles in the first place.

I’ve dabbled in emulation back in the day. I dabble in emulation today. I will continue to dabble in it tomorrow in some form or fashion. I’m not going to tell you whether it’s good or bad. I’m not going to tell you whether you should embrace it or not. If you don’t care for emulation or think it’s as evil as they say, I won’t argue otherwise.

I just call it “the evil art of emulation” because it’s just fun to say.

Braun Strowman Released From WWE… Again

Source: https://www.f4wonline.com/news/wwe/shayna-baszler-cora-jade-braun-strowman-dakota-kai-among-wwe-nxt-releases/

Yeah, it’s that time of year where WWE drops a whole bunch of people from their employ and one of them happens to include Braun Strowman… again.

So now he gets to team up with EC3 again so they can control the narrative, right? Right?

In all seriousness, I almost feel sorry for the guy because they brought him back a couple years ago and really didn’t do much with him. I don’t know; it seems like they just wanted another big guy and now that they got some younger big guys, Strowman’s time was pretty much done. Anyway, I wish him (and all other releases) all the best in whatever they do next.

Hopefully, Miro/Rusev gets a good run before he eventually gets dropped in favor of whatever NIL-ID prospect they fish out of the Soviet Union in five years or so.

“Johnny, the Soviet Union doesn’t even…”

“QUIET!”

-_-

My Gripe With The Old Video Reviews

How about some fun behind the scenes stories or something? Because I’ve honestly got nothing else to talk about at the moment and if I do, I’m saving it for a later date.

I make no qualms about the fact that I tend to not like my earlier video stuff. Granted, I was just starting off, I was learning what I can, and I was trying to be cute at times… which took a few years for me to get out of that particular habit. So I have no real issue in getting to a point where I want to revisit a game that I covered ages ago and give a fresh new look with a fresh new perspective based on a little more insight.

The other side of that equation is that a lot of those earlier video reviews were basically video versions of what I had written on GameFAQs, only slightly tweaked so that there’s no arbitrary scoring system. Those GameFAQs reviews, written years earlier and with even less quality or care, have not aged well. A lot of those reviews are also not very relevant; if you were to go back and read those reviews, especially those posted in the early 2000s, they do not reflect my feelings on said games today. Something to bare in mind is that those reviews were written quickly and briefly – usually to satisfy some word limit imposed. And during those early days of video posting, YouTube usually imposed a 10-15 minute on how much video you can actually post until said limits were eventually removed. Since those written reviews were short enough to cover the bases, I just used those.

In hindsight, not the smartest idea, but I worked with what I have.

In some strange way, I miss the days when you were only allowed a certain amount of time to upload video. I know people prefer the more longform videos that let you people go into every nook and cranny about stuff, but the video limits often forced you to be creative in how to present your material. It’s easy to run off and talk about a game for hours on end, going into the history of this, this, and that… but to me, a review has always been and quite frankly, should always be about “What’s the product, what are the good points, what are the bad points, and who does this appeal to?”

In terms of that particular scope, it should not take you more than ten to fifteen minutes tops to get those points across. You don’t need an two hour essay to determine whether Mega Man 2 is a good game; that’s being overly superfluous. Hell, even in terms of covering something bigger like an RPG, a straightforward review does not need to be hours on end. Context can be helpful, but all I care about is whether something is worth my investment or not and why. When you had a runtime limit, that forced you to be creative and more cohesive in your thoughts. It forced you to determine what the key points were that people needed to know about something.

That’s something I try to maintain. I don’t dwell into every detail. I try to hit the points that seem relevant, I keep my thoughts as brief as possible – or at least, try to – and I try to keep it short. That’s always been my thing.

So nowadays, I write this stuff on the side. I have a lot of things written and sometimes, I give it space and leave it laying for a bit before going back to it and seeing if there’s anything that needs to be updated. I’ve had reviews that started one way and turned into another. The Symphony Of The Night review – which languished for years – became a thing that was different from its original inception, which was much simpler and much shorter… but apparently, I had a lot to say about that one.

And so, as we dive deeper into this review recycle, there may come a point where earlier reviews are revisited and we might give some of these things another look… sometimes, you revisit things that you thought were bad and years later, you’re like “Maybe I was too hard on this.” Or maybe it’s vice-versa.

Yeah, it’s usually vice-versa.

There’s an idea I’ve been toying with for the October set of reviews – a possible revisit of the Castlevania games, with some added perspective and experience tossed in for good measure. If it doesn’t happen this year, it might be next year. I’m using the time off that isn’t spent dealing with healing and family stuff to get some stuff together for the sake of having stuff ready to go in the event that another episode happens, so at least, there’s SOMETHING going on.

But on a whole… yeah, I’ve been feeling a bit better these days. The struggle continues, but one step at a time.

And on a final note… happy birthday, Dwayne. Go fuck yourself.

Later.

State Of The Blog – May 2025

Hey, yo…

So this is where I normally do a thing talking about stuff happening on the blog for the next month or stuff that’s been in the works in the background, but last month has been a challenge of sorts. And if you’ve been following this blog over the past few weeks, you know why. But for those who don’t, here’s a brief summary of things.

A couple weeks ago, I was admitted into the hospital after a weekend of experiencing sudden shortness of breath and accelerated heart rates. It became difficult to climb steps, form cohesive sentences, or do anything remotely… whatever. It was discovered that I had suffered an pulmonary embolism. Basically, I had blood clots in my lungs that needed to be cleared out and after a couple days, they had cleared out the lungs and kept me in check for a few days to see if everything was stable. At the same time, I also had a Crohn’s flare up… fierce abdominal pains, very intense, became very difficult to sleep at night, went to a private doctor to get meds and tests for that. Doctor figured I had a Crohn’s flare up, we need to get that treated, but the public health system of le gouvenerment du Quebec decided they needed more tests and… well, this happened.

So after a week or so’s stay, I came home with a relatively clean bill of health. I’m starting regular treatments to take care of the Crohn’s and hopefully, that’s something that can be brought down to a controllable level with medications and things of that nature. For what it’s worth, I’m slowly on the mend. I’m feeling okay for the most part. I’m still not at the level where I need to be, but I’m getting there. I’m going to try and be patient for the most part.

Since I’ve been home for the past couple weeks, I’ve been keeping busy with stuff around the house. Tending to the dog, dealing with family stuff and other things that needed my attention. That sort of thing. At the same time, I found myself at a point where I could get back into the groove of things as far material for my little part of the webzone is concerned. Turns out there was a lot of stuff that was ready to go and just needed fixing… and so that stuff is up and ready to be published on the scheduled days.

You’re still get PPV Musings every Wednesdays, though they’ll be covering old WCW and WWF PPVs from decades ago. Video reviews will slowly but surely be back in full form and there’s even a plan to try and get a marathon going at some point to play catch up. Sunday Gimmick Tables are slowly but surely making their return, starting with stuff that I started on a year ago and never got around to finishing, along with some new stuff that’s been in the works for a while and never got around to fixing.

So the good news is that things are progressing to a point where stuff is moving forward. Of course, my main concern is trying to get better and follow up on treatments… but at the very least, I can safely say that I’m slowly getting back to the point where I can get things done. And as it relates to my little part of the web, there is a LOT of stuff being done… and hopefully, this is just the beginning.

On a side note, I’ve also been doing some behind the scene fixes for older stuff – most notably the process of replacing the Dailymotion embeds with the Youtube ones for video reviews and such. Sure, the Youtube stuff is missing some of the fun details of the Dailymotion ones due to certain content situations, but those are small losses for otherwise more convenient viewing measures on the blog… which, at this point, is all I care about. There’s also the continued quest of restoring old material from years past and I’m hoping that by the time the year is done, almost everything worth keeping will be up and we can just focus on new shit going forward… either that or the new video remaster project.

So here’s to the road of healing… and here’s hoping we get back on track sooner than later.

Regards,
Dave (DTM)

WCW Battlebowl 1993

For some reason, I felt like watch WCW Battlebowl 1993 – a show that I have on DVD-R because I had recorded off the WWE Network back when it was a channel on TV in Canada. I never got around to watching this one and it sort of languished in the archives until recently… and so here we are.

Anyway, WCW Battlebowl was a thing that they did one time and never did again. The idea of Battlebowl had existed previously in prior Starrcade PPVs, but this was the first and only time that WCW had expanded the idea into its own PPV. And there’s a good reason for that.

Continue reading “WCW Battlebowl 1993”

Review #1168 – Gauntlet: Seven Sorrows (PS2)

Sorrow is the word of the day, it seems.

As a sidenote, this review of Seven Sorrows was the last one ready to go before my hospitalization these past couple weeks. I’ve got other stuff in progress and I’m going to attempt some dubs to see if I can get back in the groove of things. If all goes well, there should be “some” review content in the month of May, but I may also push things further to see if I can pick up the slack of some long overdue Gimmick Table videos for the future.

One Last Note On This John Cena Thing Before We Move On

So there has been a lot said about the way that this much-anticipated John Cena heel turn has turned out. How it was supposed to happen at Mania, but was pushed up. We all saw Cena cut one decent heel promo and just repeat it ad naseum. We saw the eventual Wrestlemania main event that saw John Cena win his record-setting 17th World title and not feeling like a big deal. And of course, we saw Dwayne interject himself to push things onwards, only to not show up at the moment where his presence not only would have made sense, but was also necessary to give this limp dick feud between Cody and Cena some substance.

And then of course, we have Dwayne on that McAfee shithead’s show saying that he didn’t show up because he decided that he had to go now because his planet needed him… but made a point to mention that he would have done things differently. There’s a rant from Busted Open radio host Dave LeGreca where he railed on Dwayne for this interview that you can look up. It pretty much sums up some of the issues I have with this thing, but the only thing I could say about Dwayne is… nothing. Just fuck off, Dwayne. Go back to your home planet and hopefully die along the way so that the actual creative people can work on the creative.

There were only two big things to come out of Wrestlemania that I thought were worth a damn; Dominik Mysterios’s IC title and the surprise appearance of Joe Hendry. Both got big pops from the crowd, both produced memorable moments, and at least one of them is going to get a spot on one of those Top whatever RKO videos that WWE likes to produce every so often. Hell, I’ll even give a nod to IYO SKY actually retaining her Women’s title because I actually like IYO SKY more than I let on around here and was happy to see her get her time to shine.

Everything else? The Jey Uso World title win? The 17th John Cena World title win? The 752,089,827,615th New Day tag title win? The return of Becky Lynch for a random tag match?

Meh.

So this John Cena retirement tour that’s going on… I don’t care. Oh goodie, another John Cena vs. Randy Orton WWE title match is on the horizon. Haven’t had one of those in a while, in no hurry to save the date for the Backlash show that this match is going to take place in. Someone please wake me up when we get the nigh impossible match of John Cena vs. Joe Hendry at Slammiversary or something. Then I’ll start to give a fuck because Joe Hendry could potentially get a big rub and raise his stock for his eventual jump to WWE that’s going to eventually happen.

Dude, I was almost tempted to say that this man saved Wrestlemania… but that would be pushing it.

Okay, so that’s all I have to say about this John Cena thing. I’m shitcanning the Netflix subscription for the foreseeable future. I’ll use the last week or so to catch up on a couple PPVs I’ve been wanting to watch, but after that, I’m sticking with the classic WCW content that’s been going up on Youtube. Or I’ll stick with TNA, which has been fine for the most part. I can lay off the WWE viewing experience for the foreseeable… and therefore, I will gladly follow HHH”s advice at the end of that roast and fuck off elsewhere. They don’t need my viewership these days.

Also, note to self, cancel Disney+ while you’re at it. Now that you saw Andor and blew through some of the better Home Improvement episodes, you can dump the service and stick with… whatever’s on Prime Video, I guess.

Actually, hold on… there is that Dracula ’79 Blu-Ray that I recently ordered.

Yeah, I’ll go watch that.

Later.

A Personal Request

To anyone who is subscribed to the WWE Youtube channel, I want you to do me a big favor.

If, at any point, WWE decides to upload the entirety of Triple H’s Hall Of Fame induction speech on their Youtube channel, do me a favor and send me a link. That way, if I ever have trouble falling asleep, I’ll know where to look.

Thanks. Much appreciated.

When Did You Sour On Dwayne?

Once upon a time, there was a fellow named Dwayne Johnson, who trained to be a wrestler and would be the most electrifying man in sports entertainment. And then he decided to begin a Hollywood career that would span many hits and misses. Every so often, he’d come back to the place that first gained him his celebrity and do a couple token appearances saying a few token catchphrases… and people were into it because it’s the Rock.

And then something happened…

Dwayne decided he wanted to do a little more and all of a sudden, people weren’t liking him as much. Why was this? How did this happen? I couldn’t begin to tell you because some people still like Dwayne while others have long since soured on him. The question of when did someone sour on Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson over the years really has no answer save for the one that’s relevant to you.

So it’s no secret that I don’t hold Dwayne in such high regard these days, but there used to be a time when I was a fan of his. Rock had charisma, he had a gift for gab, he had limmericks that… good luck trying to get that stuff over in modern times, but the point was I dug what the guy was doing. And even when he was in Hollywood and he would come back for the occasional one-off, the guy still had it.

You can go back and read the old blog posts of back in the day when Rock vs. Cena was going to be a thing and let me tell you – while the story wanted you to root for John Cena because he was the full-timer who wouldn’t ditch WWE for Hollywood aspirations (spoiler: of course, he would), I was on Team Rock because now we’ve got a professional working their magic while everyone else was amateur hour. And when Rock beat Cena at Wrestlemania that year, it made me very happy.

But then something happened along the way… Rock came back and decided that he was going after the WWE Championship. Okay, cool… except said championship was currrently in the hands of one CM Punk, who was riding a wave of popularity that, despite a few hiccups, resulted in him getting a year-plus long reign with the WWE Championship. And the people who have been following this man was hoping that he would hold onto that title until Wrestlemania, where he’d presumably main event by virtue of being the champion.

Alas, it was not to be.

And so, at the Royal Rumble, The Rock defeated CM Punk to win the WWE Championship. And all of this was to set up the rematch between Rock and John Cena – the match that was billed as Once In A Lifetime turned out to be Twice In A Lifetime. While I knew that was going to happen, I was really hoping that someone would see sense and not go this route… but yeah, Rock became champion at the expense of CM Punk and that’s when I soured on  ol’ Dwayne.

Don’t get me wrong. The guy can cut great promos. He still has that gift for gab. But I wasn’t into his schtick anymore. Probably because I prefer Classic Rock, who was more crass and vulgar without having to be more vulgar in his wording.

I’ve only seen a handful of his movies. The last one I watched was probably Black Adam. From what I hear, a lot of his movies aren’t all that great unless it’s Moana or whatever it’s called. His ego has been called into question. Maybe that’s why he bought some stake in TKO, so he can manipulate WWE creative in ways that make no sense, but he can say that we’re twenty steps ahead and just enjoy the ride.

Which usually tells me they have no fucking clue what they’re doing and they’re just making shit up as they go along. Whatever pieces happen to fit is more by chance rather than by design.

So yes, whenever Dwayne shows up on screen at a WWE show, my first question is almost always going to be “What did he fuck up this time?” What was once a highlight on WWE programming has now become a harbinger of dread… okay, maybe not that extreme… but I’m still gonna ask, “What did Dwayne fuck up this time?”

So… yeah… that’s the story of Rock going sour.

On a final note… fuck off, Dwayne.

Later.