VIDEO GAME: Baseball (1985)

BaseballYear: 1985Rating: ETime Played: 30 minutes / 0.5 hours Recently, I've been filling out my collection of NES games and added the classic Baseball for a few bucks from a used game shop. I hadn't actually played this specific game growing up, having instead experienced the Baseball game Nintendo released for the Game Boy. Having a free evening one night, I got the cartridge cleaned up and running on my NES so I could play a round. While not considered one of the "standards" of the system, Baseball still shows the quality content Nintendo released with their first home console. Even with the limited graphical quality of the NES, Baseball uses what it needs to convey the game simply and efficiently. I'm sure Baseball plays differently in 2-player mode against another human, but the brief nine innings I experienced against the AI were enjoyable. Never did I feel the computer player was unfair in its fielding or batting. Similarly, I enjoyed the...
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MOVIE: The Goonies (1985)

The Goonies Year: 1985 Rating: PG Length: 114 minutes / 1.90 hours Cult classics are intriguing films. I feel there is a lot of nostalgia tied to a movie that hits a generation of individuals at just the right time for them to be memorable to these people. Sometimes, these cult classics are movies that I didn't get around to seeing—especially when they were relevant to my friends. For whatever reason, The Goonies (1985) has eluded me for 35 years. I can certainly see its appeal, but I mostly just watched it and wondered why people thought it was so great. I will say that this film is a trip down memory lane in the sense that I don't think I've ever seen a movie with either Sean Astin or Josh Brolin as young as they were in this one. The fact that many meme-able moments from this film have lasted in the popular culture zeitgeist for so long is a testament to its powerful...
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BOOK: Nightflyers (1985)

Nightflyers Year: 1985 Author: George R.R. Martin Length: 247 minutes / 4.12 hours Those who are familiar with George R.R. Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire fantasy series may be lamenting the end of the semi-faithful Game of Thrones television show. In the time we’ll all have to wait until the next Song of Ice and Fire book comes out, there are other little stories from this author to satiate our appetite. Nightflyers is a short novella by Martin that also seems to be hinging itself on the success of Game of Thrones, albeit in the science fiction genre instead of high fantasy. Considering how verbose Martin can get with his works, it was almost refreshing to read a story that was so focused and short. Granted, even though Nightflyers is science fiction, all of the notable George R.R. Martin elements were present: mainly, sex and violence. Depending on your tolerance of these elements, I can say that they’re at least naturally integrated with this...
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BOOK: The Wishsong of Shannara (1985)

The Wishsong of Shannara Year: 1985 Author: Terry Brooks Length: 1,253 minutes / 20.88 hours One thing that was made clear to me when I read The Elfstones of Shannara was that this trilogy (that started with The Sword of Shannara) didn’t follow the same characters from book to book, per se. Sure, there were characters like Allanon the Druid who managed to span all three volumes, but overall I didn’t find that I needed to have read the previous book in the trilogy to understand what was going on in the story. This was quite beneficial when I started reading The Wishsong of Shannara, as it quickly grew to be my favorite in the series so far. While I had high hopes for the “main quest” of this book, the fact that it’s put into side-story status almost from the beginning was a little frustrating. Don’t make me follow the journey of the character who needs to grow the most! Show me the thrilling adventures...
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BOOK: Ender’s Game (1985)

Ender’s Game Year: 1985 Author: Orson Scott Card Length: 380 pages In another “lapse” of my reading habits, I didn’t manage to read Ender’s Game until the movie of the same name came out in 2013. At the time, all the sci-fi fans were eagerly anticipating a film that had taken over 25 years to finally become a reality. While I thought the movie was quite well done and engaging, after I read the book, I can understand why some of the diehard fans of the series were disappointed. As is usually the case with book-to-movie transitions, sub-plots often find themselves on the cutting room floor. Of course, I don’t blame them for cutting what they did; after all, it is called Ender’s Game. Even though watching the movie first spoiled the exciting twist of the ending when I read the book, I almost read the book differently knowing how it would turn out. I could see the signs leading up to the shocking reveal,...
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