Sonic Heroes (Xbox)

Note: This review contains spoilers for Sonic Adventure 2 and Sonic Heroes.

Following the release of Sonic Adventure 2 (SA2), the previously unthinkable happened when Sega went third-party and started developing titles for non-Sega consoles and handhelds, including Sonic Advance, which officially ended the long-standing rivalry with Nintendo. When Sega showed interest in developing a multi-platform Sonic game, Sonic Team USA landed on a team-based concept to take advantage of the capabilities of newer hardware. Since the new title, Sonic Heroes (Heroes), would celebrate the series’ twelfth anniversary, they also decided that they would create a standalone experience closer to the Genesis games instead of a third Adventure entry, both due to the number of numbered sequels hitting the market and out of a desire for accessibility. The final game would launch in 2003 to mixed reception, but still sold very well and led to the development of 2005’s Shadow the Hedgehog.

Unlike some of the other Sonic games I’ve reviewed recently, I actually have more of a personal history with this one. When it first came out, it was one of the first Sonic console games I owned, so I played it obsessively, yet I couldn’t ever finish the game. At some point, I didn’t have my PS2 copy anymore, though an original Xbox that I bought still had a copy in the disc drive, so I ended up playing that copy for the purpose of this review (the disc had seen better days, but the data layer still looked fine). Fortunately, the disc held up well as I finally completed Heroes over twenty years later and concluded that it’s built around a neat idea with a tedious and frustrating execution.

Stubs - Armored Car Robbery

Armored Car Robbery (1950) Starring Charles McGraw, Adele Jergens, William Talman Directed by Richard Fleischer. Screenplay by Earl Felton, Gerald Drayson Adams. Produced by Herman Schlom. Run Time: 67 minutes. Black and White. USA Film Noir, Crime, Drama, Police, Heist

Many films that get categorized as film noirs fit into another group of titles called B pictures. Armored Car Robbery is such a film. An RKO Pictures production, Armored Car Robbery, according to film professor Bob Porfirio, possesses the "film noir visual style" of the many RKO crime and suspense films of the early 1950s, such as: high-contrast photography integrating studio and location shooting, expressionistic lighting, deep focus, and haunting music (by Roy Webb).

Dispatch (PC)

During the 2000s and especially the 2010s, Telltale games made a name for themselves with classic point-and-click adventure games, as well as choice-driven narratives. Unfortunately, they wouldn’t last forever and eventually went bankrupt in 2018. Although the studio would come back soon after, some of their former talent rose from the ashes and formed their own studios, one of which was the LA-based AdHoc Studio, specifically formed with those who had worked on Telltale’s The Walking Dead, The Wolf Among Us, and Tales from the Borderlands. Early on, AdHoc were hired to work on a live-action superhero workplace comedy, which got scrapped due to the COVID-19 pandemic. They didn’t want their work to go to waste, however, so they repurposed the idea into the choice-based narrative game known as Dispatch.

When I had first heard of the game at the 2024 Game Awards, the concept grabbed my attention enough that I played the demo when it released in early 2025. I loved it enough that I bought the game Day 1 on Steam, but couldn’t get around to it immediately thanks to my focus on Silent Hill f, so I didn’t get to really experience the episodic release schedule, two episodes a week for four weeks, in real time. When I did get to Dispatch, however, I thought that AdHoc had made a very strong first impression, one that can only improve from here.

Thus Spoke Kishibe Rohan: At a Confessional

Following the release of Rohan at the Louvre, I continued to keep up with the live-action Thus Spoke Kishibe Rohan (TSKR) drama as it became available in English, and remain a big fan of it for how well it translates the world of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure to live-action. When another film based on the series, Thus Spoke Kishibe Rohan: At a Confessional (At a Confessional) (JP: Kishibe Rohan wa Ugokanai Zange-shitsu), was announced, this time based on the original At a Confessional manga one-shot that started the spin-off manga, I was instantly hyped for it, both as someone who read the one-shot and watched the OVA adaptation, and based on how well Rohan at the Louvre turned out. This hype was instantly all but completely shattered as soon as I heard about how the music was handled (more on that later), but I still wanted to see it anyway once it became available in the US. Now that I’ve finally seen it through Amazon Prime Video, while I did think it was worth the wait to see it in English, it overall falls just shy of Rohan at the Louvre.

Stubs - The Big Steal

 The Big Steal (1949) Starring Robert Mitchum, Jane Greer, William Bendix, Patric Knowles, Ramon Novarro Directed by Don Siegel Screenplay by Daniel Mainwaring, Gerald Drayson Adams Based on the short story "The Road to Carmichael's" by Richard Wormser in The Saturday Evening Post (19 Sep 1942). Produced by Jack J. Gross Run time: 71 minutes. USA Drama, Crime, Film Noir

Robert Mitchum and Jane Greer starred together in Out of the Past (1947), which is considered by many to be one of the best film noirs ever made. The film was a hit at the time, so a silver screen reunion with the two of them wouldn’t seem out of the question. However, their pairing in The Big Steal almost didn’t happen.

Shantae Advance: Risky Revolution (GBA)

Before the original Shantae had a sequel in the form of 2010’s Risky’s Revenge, WayForward started development on a demo for an alternate sequel for the Game Boy Advance (GBA). Due to Shantae’s low sales, however, prospective publishers wouldn’t pick it up and the project went on hold, with different story and gameplay elements recycled for other entries. In 2023, however, WayForward announced that development on the original demo would resume and they would release the finished game as Shantae Advance: Risky Revolution on physical Game Boy Advance cartridges, with modern console ports to follow, as part of their partnership with Limited Run Games. The long-awaited final game would receive mixed reviews from critics, though that’s par for the course with the series.

As a Shantae fan who loves physical media, I bought a copy of the GBA version and later a copy of the modern console port (pre-order still unfulfilled as of this writing). Although I received my GBA copy in a timely fashion, I wouldn’t get to it as quickly as I would have liked for different reasons, but when I did, I locked in and made steady progress in short bursts whenever I could. By the time I got to the end, I enjoyed myself and felt glad that Risky Revolution finally saw the light of day. However, either due to its prolonged development or other limitations, it’s sadly not without some jank.

Stubs - I Wake Up Screaming

I Wake Up Screaming (1941) starring Betty Grable, Victor Mature, Carole Landis. Directed by Bruce Humberstone. Screenplay by Dwight Taylor. Based on the novel I Wake Up Screaming by Steve Fisher (New York, 1941). Produced by Milton Sperling Run time: 82 minutes. Black and White. USA. Film Noir

In 1941, the first major studio film noir, The Maltese Falcon, was released, on October 3rd, followed later that same year by I Wake Up Screaming, released by 20^th Century Fox, on November 14th. Filming took place between July 21, 1941 and late August with re-shoots on September 4, under the working title Hot Spot and was originally released under that title. However, fans of Betty Grable, the star and main attraction, were not expecting her in a mystery thriller. Retitled back to I Wake Up Screaming, the film did better and actually earned $574,100 profit on a budget of $462,500, taking in $1,491,500 at the box office.