Super Smash Bros. Melee Official Nintendo Player's Guide (Amazon)
Starting things off with my Christmas money pick-ups, the first item in question was pretty much an impulse buy because I was trying to think of cheap stuff to spend the last bit of my holiday cash on that wasn't already being put towards pre-orders of two other items in this post.
Y'see, in my youth, I was HUUUUGE into the Player's Guides put out by Nintendo Power. Their presentation combined with having basically a roadmap of each game to browse at any time (this WAS before let's plays and video walkthroughs, y'know) made me pick up quite a few of them, regardless of whether or not I owned the game! (I believe it was actually the Double Dash guide that convinced me to make the game the first Mario Kart I ever owned, for example.)
One of my all-time favorites of those Guides was the one for Super Smash Bros. Melee, as that one not only clued me into secrets that I was not in the know of at the time (like my favorite Pokemon being a secret playable character with an insane-for-a-grade-schooler unlock requirement), but it also just had some awesome little unnecessary touches. (One of the earliest pages has a list of all of Kirby's Melee copy abilities tied into a fun little game, for instance.) I loved that guide so much that I made it a semi-tradition that I'd pick up the official guide for EVERY Smash game, despite the future guides not quite stacking up to a combination of my nostalgia and the wow factor of finding out about new Smash characters before you were on the internet every day.
Anyway, I still own my original copy of that Guide, however the last few pages and the back cover were lost to the ages due to years of improper book storage. (My poor, poor weathered Nintendo Power collection.) Due to the hype of Smash Ultimate, I decided to pick up a used copy of that guide for like six bucks to replace that old damaged one on my bookshelf. It's still a bit weathered, but I can finally read the last page of the Stages section as well as that weird little page at the end for the first time in years, so I'd say it was worth the six bucks.
(Can ya tell I was originally planning to write a full post on these Nintendo Power Guides? I can't think of many other six dollar purchases that made me blab on for THIS long.)
Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story + Bowser Jr.'s Journey (Amazon)
My second arrival from the Christmas money purchases was something I was debating on whether to pre-order or wait to get later. Mario & Luigi is one of my favorite game series in general, but the combination of my 3DS gathering dust and the fact that this particular game was a remake of one that I didn't play that long ago had it fluctuating in priority in my mind.
However, when more stuff about the brand new Bowser Jr.'s Journey mode was revealed, I knew I HAD to experience this on release and I'm SOOOOOO glad that I did. If you're a fan of Bowser and his crew, Bowser Jr.'s Journey was MADE for you. While the gameplay is the same kinda thing as the Minion Quest mode from the last remake, the story is one of my new absolute favorites in a Mario RPG. It has the same hilarious writing you'd expect from one of these games, but with three brand new villains, a surprising number of emotional scenes, and CHARACTER GROWTH. This game somehow made me cry over Morton Koopa Jr., my least favorite Koopaling. It's that good. Don't let this one pass you by if you love this series.
Funko POP! Comics Lord Drakkon Vinyl Figure (Nerdy Collectibles)
This guy I pre-ordered last year from some online toy shop because getting merch of an exclusive character from a particular extension of a franchise always tickles me, despite the fact that the only other PR POP I own is Alpha 5.
Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars Official Nintendo Player's Guide (Ebay)
Yep, another of these guides and MAN OH MAN, do I have a bizarre story to share with you guys!
Alright, so picking up the Melee Guide set the wheels in motion for me to think about doing that previously-alluded-to-but-aborted post all about the Nintendo Guides and Bowser Jr.'s Journey being so freaking good put me on a bit of a Mario RPG nostalgia kick. When those thoughts came together, I started thinking about another excellent Guide full of rare art that I also had back in the day, but didn't survive the trip to the present in any form unlike SSBM. That Guide was the one for Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars, my favorite game of all time.
After ruminating a bit, I wondered why I never got around to picking THAT Guide back up despite loving both it and the game it was for, so I looked around a couple places for a decent price. After a few looks, I stumbled across an UNBELIEVABLE price on Amazon: like fifteen bucks IN NEW CONDITION from a third-party seller. I couldn't pass it up, but as I was awaiting it, I couldn't help but wonder if it was too good to be true.
It was.
Yep, you're reading that right. Because of THE STRANGEST listing snafu on a website I've ever seen, I was sent, not a $16 Super Mario RPG Player's Guide from '96, but THE CRAPPIEST $7 thoroughly unlicensed Celebrity Big Brother Crossword Puzzle Book, despite still paying the $16. Needless to say, I was equal parts livid and confused.
After I recovered from this oddity, I quickly sent the Crossword Puzzle Book back, got refunded in full, and bought the right Guide for like three times the price on Ebay. Let this be a lesson to ya'll: DON'T TRUST SUSPICIOUSLY CHEAP PRICES FROM AMAZON THIRD-PARTY SELLERS.
Aqua Teen Hunger Force: Volume 3 (Amazon)
Moving on from bewilderment to just plain disappointment, I had about nine bucks to blow from an Amazon promo code, so I figured, hey, they recently pulled Aqua Teen Hunger Force from Hulu and I don't own any of the DVD sets despite owning all of the Space Ghost and Harvey Birdman ones, so why not start my collection with a cheap set that just so happens to contain some of my favorite ever episodes? Great idea, right? That's what it SEEMED like, as I quickly unwrapped it and started plowing through the discs, but my mood quickly took a sharp turn when I got to the last episode on the disc.
I watched a couple minutes into it, it started stuttering, it froze, and it booted me back to the main menu. It did that every time I retried it on every one of my players. I officially own about 96% of Aqua Teen Hunger Force Volume 3 and that annoys me. However, the saddest thing about it is that this isn't even the first time this exact same crap has happened to me with an ATHF DVD: I got the movie for my Birthday a couple years back directly from Amazon and the exact same thing happens about 3/4ths of the way into the movie! Bonus disc works perfectly, but for whatever reason, the movie itself will NEVER finish playing.
Aqua Teen Hunger Force, I adore your insane little show and your movie makes me howl with laughter every time, but until Warner sees fit to rerelease the entire show and movie on new DVDs or on Blu-ray or something, I am never buying another of your old releases. Either I am ridiculously unlucky with owning this show, I somehow purchased two bootlegs on two separate occasions, or these are the Adult Swim DVDs that received the least quality control of all the sets I've owned that'd have all had zero issues. Even the out-of-print Invader Zim DVDs I picked up used last year worked perfectly! I'm just so, so disappointed. Oh well. At least The Dressing works.
Kingdom Hearts III Deluxe Edition (PS4)
Anyway, on to something that wasn't the least bit disappointing in any way (barring the lack of a Wreck-It Ralph world), it's Kingdom Hearts III! After so many years of waiting, it's FINALLY here and it's a BLAST to play. Already got the Platinum and it lit my fire to play PS4 games again after I was glued to my Switch for so long. I'm finally doing something in Batman Arkham Knight!!
Spider-Man: Maximum Carnage Minimates: Venom and Doppelganger (Luke's Toy Store)
I'm a casual Minimate collector (started a while back when I found the MvC3 set with Deadpool in it at a discount store) and I've always been an admirer of Doppelganger ever since I had his old Toybiz figure back in the day, so when I found out that he was getting the plastic treatment yet again through Minimates, I had to pick him up for my little collection. (Especially since Luke's Toy Store had him for retail!)
Hot Wheels Character Cars - Bowser (Walmart)
Funko POP! Ralph Breaks the Internet Fix-It Felix Vinyl Figure (Walmart)
Picked these up on a grocery run! I picked up the entire first run of Hot Wheels Super Mario cars at the same Walmart a while back just because of the neat box art, but this is a case where I mostly just wanted Bowz because he's mah bro and every die cast car needs a spiky shell.
Also, my first ever Fix-It Felix figure! Now Ralph has a workplace associate who isn't Eggman!
King K. Rool amiibo (Best Buy)
Ice Climbers amiibo (Best Buy)
Piranha Plant amiibo (Best Buy)
Pre-ordered these as soon as they went up, as KING K. ROOL MERCHANDISE is a phrase so beautiful that it only deserves to be rendered in all-caps.
Ralph Breaks the Internet Blu-ray Combo (Amazon)
The last of my Christmas cash pre-orders, which also yielded me THESE thanks to Disney Movie Rewards:
Toy Story That Time Forgot Blu-ray (Disney Movie Rewards)
Ralph Breaks the Internet Final Theatrical Poster
I could deck my room out with another Ralph poster and finally start a Toy Story Blu-ray collection and all I had to do was buy a few movies, enter a few codes, and be the sole person in a theater watching Nutcracker last November. Worth it.
COWIN E7 Wireless Headphones (Amazon)
Finally, got a new pair of wireless headphones in yesterday. Only issue I have is audio stuttering when they're connected via Bluetooth. Hopefully I can figure it out and/or live with it.
That's everything I scored this Winter! Hope you had fun reading my semi-coherent ramblings and stay tuned to The Lazy Shell for whatever post I decide to make next!
