@exodus#12843 People always mention Die Hard, but Lethal Weapon (which came out the year prior) is even more Christmas-y. It actually opens with Jingle Bells on the soundtrack iirc.
@exodus#12843 Canāt be sure about Raw Danger because havenāt played it yet but in the case of The Firemen I always thought it was very obvious! Not only because the whole Christmas/action shtick but because of other similarities like both taking place on a single building with a lot of architectural singularities, radio communications being a big part of the story, the whole āagainst all oddsā vibes and the protagonists being forced to improvise and be smart on how to tackle problems.
Although now @bodydouble#12854 has mentioned Lethal Weapon maybe there is some influence there with the protagonist duo too.
lethal weapon doesnāt hold up as a movie though, where die hard does! lethal weaponās racism/homophobia etc is way more on the surface than in die hard.
@exodus#12979 To be honest I hadn't watched Lethal Weapon from beginning to end, it was the kind of movie I watched for like half an hour when I saw it on TV (and when I used to watch TV, been without doing that for like 10 years), but good to know I can avoid it lol
Anyway! I decided to check Raw Danger/Disaster Report 2 because everyone's comments of it being a great Christmas game and speaking from just the first hour or so I would say it gave me more disaster movie vibes. Although I realize now that The Firemen definitely has that thing going on too so what I would maybe say is that the Firemen is something like The Towering Inferno + Die Hard, while Disaster Report leans towards The Perfect Storm/Titanic?
With these two games talking about cinematographic references and comparisons feel extremely relevant because it is obviously a thing they are trying to channel and evoke, but at the same time feel so fundamentally different to other (mostly western) attempts at doing the same thing, like The Last of Us or Red Dead Redemption and I wonder why it feels that way! Maybe because in the case of The Firemen and Raw Danger they seem to be more about finding inspiration while also trying to translate those movies into proper mechanical and game designs, while Naughty Dog's or Rockstar stuff end up feeling more like copycats.
Also, kind of fun to think about what The Firemen and Raw Danger have in common while at the same time they have opposing elemental forces, fire vs water! lol
bringing this thread back up to the top.
It's [The Santa Claus Parade tonight (starting at 7EST on CTV)](https://thesantaclausparade.com/). I'm restarting to measures to watching it outside of Canada, but Retrontario is currently running a livestream of past parades. It's a good time.
Okay. Back on my grind to find more animated Xmas material. Gonna start building a proper archive. But here is a nice new find (A Czech animated short from the 70's)
https://archive.org/details/moleandthechristmastree
Thought about putting this in the Music That Nobody Knows About Thread because I have never heard this mentioned anywhere on the internet, but this thread ultimately seems to be a better fit.
Xmas Movie Soundtrack (seems to be the name of both the album and the artist) is a bedroom pop project made almost entirely by one guy who I've never met but is a friend of a friend of a friend. Tonally, I'd label it somewhere between "solemnly joyous" and "nostalgia-haunted." Christmas music is usually overproduced, sentimental garbage, but this is one of the exceptions. I put it up there with _A Christmas Gift for You from Phil Spector_, _Mark Kozelek Sings Christmas Carols_, and Sufjan Stevens' Christmas stuff.
It's a hidden favorite of mine, but you all have cool taste and I hope some of you like it.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5ZNOxnTEb8&list=OLAK5uy_mRuu85Qg92-5M9JHQsjUSad8I-dF022cw&index=1](https://)
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night is a Christmas game. Thatās because there are a buncha minuets in the soundtrack and I always associate chamber music with the holidays. I played in several bands and orchestras when I was in school and those were always the kind of pieces that Iād play that time of year.
I mean, the music and also how my friends and I all played _Symphony of the Night_ several times between Thanksgiving and New Years in my dorm room after I picked it up as a Greatest Hits disc fall of 1998. It got to the point where my roommate (who didn't especially care for the game) was able to provide assistance to whichever visitor was lost on where to go next.
@hellomrkearns I had to āLikeā your post so I can get the āUnlikeā button to pop up because I'm pretty tired of Fred and Barney up in my brain space.
Also, I remember Santa having a deeper voice.
There were two versions! I only just learned this
@hellomrkearns Still āunlikableā but wow, that voice is much closer to what my brain claims is correct.
I was rewatching Home Alone tonight (one of my favorite Xmasy movies) and it occured to me that most folks outside of the dedicated Nights community from years ago might not know that Nights into Dreams contains some audio samples from Home Alone:
1 Like
@Nemoide Jaw on floor
Not sure if this was posted here, but I love this Tatsuro Yamashita song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pYP_1MZyWBM
This isn't even my favorite Christmas song (that would be Wonderful Christmastime #1, Christmas Wrapping #2, and the entirety of the nsync Christmas album at #3) but this video makes me really emotional for some reason
Over the past few years, this has become my favourite Christmastime song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_49GET5QGEE
I like it mostly because it is about a winter fairy melting a snowman.
For the first time in 3 years by best friend and I are going to hang out INDOORS on Xmas day. So definitely in the mood for some crappy Christmas cartoon recommends. I already have the centerpiece holiday themed media locked down.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60N-WM_DR4c
The least of Zach Clarke's 4 films, but one I am eager to re-evaluate.
Mrs. Chopemon and I alternate watching Tokyo Godfathers one year then something different the next before going back to Tokyo Godfathers the next year. This year we are going to watch Violent Night because we love stupid action movies and I always enjoy watching John Leguizamo.
https://youtu.be/HWSkF36McgA
One year we watched A Very Murray Christmas on Netflix. We had a lot to drink and if you're in that state of mind, it is a total fever dream. I don't know if I'd have enjoyed it sober. Also, now that I know what a POS Murray is, any enjoyment would be substantially lowered.