Zero Punctuation: Wolfenstein

By Shamus Posted Saturday Sep 12, 2009

Filed under: Movies 29 comments

First I did a Dr. Suess-style rhyme from Overlord. Then I made another for Overlord II. Then I wrote what was probably the first videogame-based villanelle.

Yahtzee raises the bar yet again with a chained attack of limericks:

The Escapist is clearly the premiere site for videogame-based poetry.

 


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29 thoughts on “Zero Punctuation: Wolfenstein

  1. mark says:

    Shamus, its SATURDAY. ZP comes out on WEDNESDAY. We’ve all seen it. :P

  2. ehlijen says:

    Also I must say, while impressive poetically, this was his least interesting work in regards to both comedy and game reviewing so far. He even stuck a numerical score at the end :-(

  3. Shamus says:

    mark: True, but I’ve found that no matter how common the movie, there will always be a couple who haven’t seen it.

    Also, I wanted to see if people had any comments on the poetry thing.

  4. Tom says:

    Wow…I’m going to have to say that was one of his better ones. It missteps here and there (though, if you asked me to do better, I’d fail). It certainly had me laughing. Thanks Shamus.

  5. Annon says:

    Well, I hadn’t seen it, so there :P.

    On a related note, why haven’t you linked Experienced Points yet? I had to go through the effort of finding it on my own this week…

  6. The TubStar says:

    I’d say that this rhyming is most awesome,
    But /tg/ sends a message from the chan most foursome:
    “D&D rap battles are here,
    So villians cower in fear,
    Because trolls who can’t rap are passé and tiresome”

  7. Nyaz says:

    I’m not so much into limericks or poetry for that matter, but when a game reviewer who is sadistic and always surprises me, comes out and says “I’m going to review this… in LIMERICK!”… I’m lost for words.
    A-we-so-me.

    (He might have failed here and there, but considering I don’t know what makes a limerick, he fooled me good)

  8. Yar Kramer says:

    The thing that really gets me
    as far as I can seriously see
    is that at no point in time
    did his little rhyme
    diverge much from what he tends to be.

    (Also, for Nyaz)

  9. Trianglehead says:

    I usually just go catch up on ZP once every other month, so I hadn’t seen it yet actually. But that was awesome.

  10. Broggly says:

    Tubstar:
    There was a young man from Japan
    Whose limericks never would scan.
    When asked why this was,
    He replied “It’s because
    I always try to fit as many syllables into the last line as ever possibly I can.

    I checked and the meters used in limericks are the Anapest (da da daa/ da da daa/ da da daa) or the Amphibrach (da daa da/ da daa da/ da daa da). I personally tend to prefer Amphibrachic limerics, but with the final short syllable cut out.

  11. [d20]Teldurn says:

    mark: Add another point for someone who doesn’t scour the web devouring the newest news; I hadn’t seen it yet.

    I liked the ZP treatment on this. The only problem I ever find with it is that afterwards, my brain wants to hear the limerick rhythm in everything else for a while, before it goes back to “normal”.

  12. Jennifer says:

    It’s “Seuss” btw.

  13. Taellosse says:

    How come this one post insists on displaying in the Chaotic Evil color scheme for me? I’ve got the site set to Lawful Good, and it works properly on every other post, as well as the main page. However, when I clicked the link in my RSS reader to come here to read this post, I am greeted with lots of black. And even going to the main page (properly displayed in silver) and clicking the title of this post brings me back to black. It’s weird.

    ETA: Aaaand now that I’ve posted a comment, it’s back to normal. VERY weird.

    Also, as an unrelated aside, isn’t the “Home” link at the top supposed to take one to the main page of the blog? Instead it seems to always be a link to the current post (which strikes me as singularly useless). To get to the main page I’ve got to click the “Twenty-Sided” banner instead.

  14. EMK555 says:

    Wow. Just wow. Unknowinglyl, i was reading the comments in the limericks rhythm! :D

  15. SoldierHawk says:

    Ah, I saw this when it came out, but it was so great I have zero problem watching it again. ZP is always wonderful, and this was one of my favorite eps. I’m rather glad Yahzee is doing some things to shake up his review style–the Irish accent, the limericks. Its a great way of keeping the overall formula without putting out the exact same sort of video every week. The man knows what he’s doing.

  16. JKjoker says:

    i didnt like the limericks (or his previous “Irish” accent for that matter) he is already pretty difficult to understand when he speaks normally

  17. Chris says:

    Wow, I’m really not a fan of Zero Punctuation. Definitely the low point of Escapist. Needs more Stolen Pixels.

  18. Veloxyll says:

    I have indulged in monor language fun on essays. But I am thoroughly trumped by Limmerick Review I must say
    Trumped by AWESOME.

    also the comments on the Escapist about how Yahtzee has sold out by giving a score are hillarious =D

  19. Evan says:

    I loved the limerick review, if only due to the WTF factor.

    I’m actually pretty impressed that the two of you are able to write competent video game poetry, considering I can hardly string two rhyming sentences together even if I don’t have to have any kind of coherence.

  20. SoldierHawk says:

    Veloxyll – Are you kidding me? I don’t usually read the comments on ZP, and stuff like that is *exactly* why. How you can claim to be a fan of Yahzee’s sense of humor, and completely miss the point there, is…wow.

  21. UtopiaV1 says:

    Just thank god he didn’t do it in haiku… *groan*

    Only after hearing that review, i keep imagining that everyone talking to me is speaking in iambic pentameter as well :P

  22. The TubStar says:

    Broggly:
    I know I’m not skilled
    With limericks and rhyming,
    I prefer haikus.

  23. Alastair says:

    Haikus are easy
    Because all you need to do
    Is count syllables

  24. Neil Polenske says:

    I must heartily disagree with Yahtzee on this one…IN SONG!!!

    Ooooh!
    Nothing could be finer than to play some Wolfenstein in the…
    Mooooornin!

    Nothing could be sweeter than to headshot Shultz and Deiter in the…
    MooooOrnin!

    When I toss a gernade
    through the crack in the door
    hear the screaming and ‘schnell’ing
    ‘fore the blood paints the floor!

    Oh nothing could be finer than to play some Wolfenstein in the…

    MOOOOOOOOOOoooooooorrnin!

  25. LintMan says:

    @ehlijen: I agree – making the whole thing in limerick style was an achievement of sorts, but it really didn’t have much of anything to say as an actual review, and wasn’t even particularly funny – neither by Zero Punctuation standards, or even limerick standards.

    I guess that was his point – that the game was so generic the review would be boring, so he added the limericks. But it just didn’t work for me – I’d have prefered a regular review with a little more insight about why he thought it was so generic, etc.

  26. justaguy says:

    I always feel a bit left out, cause I don’t really get the appeal of Yahtzee. Of course the first thing I ever saw from him was a Halo review that I was told was awesome, but imo boiled down to “This game has a large multiplayer aspect. And I hate multiplayer, so I’m going to ignore it. And anything that doesn’t make sense since I’m ignoring half the game I’m going to bitch about.” And his other reviews always feel like hes trying to hard to be… “cleverly grumpy”, or whatever it is he is in the reviews.

    Basically, I don’t get 90% of his stuff… so I avoid them as much as I can…

  27. RichVR says:

    Am I the only one that watches his reviews twice? Once to get the feel of it, and once with my cursor on the pause button to read the text or check out the in jokes?

  28. Josh says:

    I really liked the Limericks schtik, only if it helped me understand what he says. The content of the review was as good as usual, IMO.

  29. Zaghadka says:

    Well, it was big on the WTF factor.

    Unfortunately, we very much know TF, and this isn’t it.

    This is the first ZP where I just closed the window up 30 seconds in. It’s like he’s getting bored with the job, and the limerick meter totally killed his rhythm and comic delivery for me.

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