u/mightyasterisk

No wrong answers here, just be creative & have fun.

This is something that’s obviously unlikely to happen: the show’s been dead for years, Jessica Walters has sadly passed, and it’s never really been a hugely popular IP, much less one that warrants itself to a video game adaptation. But I think given the right concept it could be something really special, plus this fanbase is amazing and hilarious so I’d kill to hear some of your concepts.

Just to maybe spark your imagination, here’s a half baked pitch:

A point & click adventure game where you play as Buster, who has somehow stumbled upon a Time Machine (or something that he thinks is a Time Machine). With this, he must travel to different eras from the past & future, meeting each generation of the Bluth family in order to solve an ongoing mystery that involves the entirety of the Bluth genealogy.

Of course one era may be going to the 70s to meet young versions of the show’s cast, but I think it would be more fun to go Back to the Future 3 with it and have him meet Bluths from historical eras, ex. Caveman Bluths, Wild West Bluths, 20s Gangster Bluths, then going into the future and meeting Jetsons Bluths or Mad Max Bluths.

I would title the game Buster Quest or, and I’m a little proud of this one, Time Buster.

Early one morning, for no immediately discernible reason, Eric Cartman wakes up with his mind inside the reclusive but insanely ripped billionaire body of Bruce Wayne, greeted with a hearty breakfast by his butler, Alfred who is none the wiser.

Meanwhile, that same morning, Batman finds his mind has been mysteriously swapped into the body of a severely overweight fifth grader s surrounded in his bed by piles of Cheesy Poof dust and stuffed animals, being dotingly woken by his seemingly kind-hearted mother.

How would either approach this scenario? Would Batman decide to attempt an impersonation of this boy until he could reach and communicate to his allies? Would this impersonation fool anyone?

How long would it take Cartman to realize he’s in the body of Batman? Would he even figure it out in the first place? Could he fool any of the Bat-Family or even the Justice League for a second?

How would this affect either physically? Would Batman’s training still even slightly function using Cartman’s body? Could Cartman actually utilize Bruce’s physique in any way?

Because why not and I’m pumped about it, here’s my quick early rough pitch for a Star Wars/Star Trek crossover comic book for the SW 50th anniversary next year. It’s real REAL dumb but it’s fun.

TWO MINISERIES

Vol. 1

(Presented in the style of a “lost episode” of TNG)

Four distinct factions each send a ship to investigate a mysterious rift in space time that bridges realities, and each ship end up encountering and confronting each other:

\\- The Federation sends The USS Enterprise-D, captained by Jean-Luc Picard and his loyal crew to investigate the anomaly

\\- The Galactic Empire sends a Super Star Destroyer, commanded by the Sith Lord Darth Vader to research utilizing or even weaponizing the rift

\\- The Rebel Alliance sends out the Millennium Falcon, piloted by Captain Han Solo and Chewbacca the Wookie, overseen by General Leia Organa (also onboard are Jedi Knight Luke Skywalker, and the droids C-3P0 and R2-D2) to warn any bridged reality about the arrival of the Empire

\\- A Borg Cube mysteriously monitors the rift

Plot point ideas:

The Enterprise at first mistakes the Empire for being peaceful like the Federation, and the Rebel Alliance for being lawless pirates. The Falcons crew docks into the Enterprise to try to warn Picard about Vader, but Picard is immediately offput by Solos ragtag attitude and locks he and Chewie (seemingly a ferocious monster) in the brig.

An understanding between the Rebels and the Enterprise is only made after a peaceful negotiation between Leia and Picard, and a friendship is sparked between Worf and Chewbacca (possibly Riker and Han as well? Though Han may try to romance Troi)

Data and R2 team up to save a Borg-assimilated C-3P0

Luke (in a Starfleet uniform) and a Borg-infected Vader have a lightsaber duel on the bridge of the Enterprise

Picard briefly has to take command of the Falcon (with a ragtag crew of Data, Geordi, Worf, and Troi) to distract the Super Star Destroyer from attacking a disabled Enterprise, which is temporarily captained by Han Solo

VOL 2

(Presented as a “lost episode” of TOS)

Many years prior to Vol. 1, on her five year mission, the original Starship Enterprise captained by James T. Kirk encounters the same anomaly and alternate reality as Picard’s Enterprise, itself at a time prior to the formation of the Empire and Rebellion.

The Enterprise finds herself suddenly caught in a massive space-to-planetary battle between the Galactic Republic and the Confederacy of Independent Systems, in the midst of a years long, deadly conflict they call the Clone Wars.

These two factions are completely unfamiliar with the Federation, Starfleet, or even Earth, yet soon Captain Kirk and his crew become aligned with the Republic Generals, Jedi Knights Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi, in the conflict against the evil Separatists, who have begun using new guerrilla tactics unknown to the Jedi.

However, these brutal tactics are recognized by Kirk, Spock and McCoy as the unmistakable handiwork of one of their deadliest adversaries: the time displaced super soldier KHAN NOONIEN SINGH, who had already encountered the anomaly previously and now (very reluctantly) works for the evil Count Dooku as a new Major General of the Separatist Army!

Because why not and I’m pumped about it, here’s my quick early rough pitch for a Star Wars/Star Trek crossover comic book for the SW 50th anniversary next year. It’s real REAL dumb but it’s fun.

TWO MINISERIES

Vol. 1

(Presented in the style of a “lost episode” of TNG)

Four distinct factions each send a ship to investigate a mysterious rift in space time that bridges realities, and each ship end up encountering and confronting each other:

\- The Federation sends The USS Enterprise-D, captained by Jean-Luc Picard and his loyal crew to investigate the anomaly

\- The Galactic Empire sends a Super Star Destroyer, commanded by the Sith Lord Darth Vader to research utilizing or even weaponizing the rift

\- The Rebel Alliance sends out the Millennium Falcon, piloted by Captain Han Solo and Chewbacca the Wookie, overseen by General Leia Organa (also onboard are Jedi Knight Luke Skywalker, and the droids C-3P0 and R2-D2) to warn any bridged reality about the arrival of the Empire

\- A Borg Cube mysteriously monitors the rift

Plot point ideas:

The Enterprise at first mistakes the Empire for being peaceful like the Federation, and the Rebel Alliance for being lawless pirates. The Falcons crew docks into the Enterprise to try to warn Picard about Vader, but Picard is immediately offput by Solos ragtag attitude and locks he and Chewie (seemingly a ferocious monster) in the brig.

An understanding between the Rebels and the Enterprise is only made after a peaceful negotiation between Leia and Picard, and a friendship is sparked between Worf and Chewbacca (possibly Riker and Han as well? Though Han may try to romance Troi)

Data and R2 team up to save a Borg-assimilated C-3P0

Luke (in a Starfleet uniform) and a Borg-infected Vader have a lightsaber duel on the bridge of the Enterprise

Picard briefly has to take command of the Falcon (with a ragtag crew of Data, Geordi, Worf, and Troi) to distract the Super Star Destroyer from attacking a disabled Enterprise, which is temporarily captained by Han Solo

VOL 2

(Presented as a “lost episode” of TOS)

Many years prior to Vol. 1, on her five year mission, the original Starship Enterprise captained by James T. Kirk encounters the same anomaly and alternate reality as Picard’s Enterprise, itself at a time prior to the formation of the Empire and Rebellion.

The Enterprise finds herself suddenly caught in a massive space-to-planetary battle between the Galactic Republic and the Confederacy of Independent Systems, in the midst of a years long, deadly conflict they call the Clone Wars.

These two factions are completely unfamiliar with the Federation, Starfleet, or even Earth, yet soon Captain Kirk and his crew become aligned with the Republic Generals, Jedi Knights Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi, in the conflict against the evil Separatists, who have begun using new guerrilla tactics unknown to the Jedi.

However, these brutal tactics are recognized by Kirk, Spock and McCoy as the unmistakable handiwork of one of their deadliest adversaries: the time displaced super soldier KHAN NOONIEN SINGH, who had already encountered the anomaly previously and now (very reluctantly) works for the evil Count Dooku as a new Major General of the Separatist Army!

I’ve really fallen for this show due to its dark humor and experimentation with format, and this episode was the perfect storm of both. I thought the concept of “reparations as a horror movie” was brilliant and I laughed my ass off from beginning to end, the lead actor was perfectly cast I found myself just laughing at his constant horrified expression.

I’m not exactly surprised to see it’s a divisive one. I said after the episode was finished “that was like the darkest Chappelle’s Show skit of all time” and I’m sure that will play to everyone who watches it a little different. However I’m interested in just talking about the episode and other people’s interpretations and I’m beyond excited to see where the show goes next because it truly feels like it could be anywhere

I see this exact take allllll the time, over and over, whenever Nolan’s Batman films are being discussed and it always makes me feel like I’m going insane. I just don’t get it.

To each their own of course, and I do really love Batman Begins, but TDK is imho pretty obviously the stronger film on every possible level over the previous, and represents a bold singular landmark of the genre.

What really puzzles me is this repeated at-nauseam viewpoint is positioned as if The Dark Knight is somehow a weaker or less accurate adaptation of its comic book source material than Begins. None of the Nolan films are exactly pure translations by any means, but none of the arguments I see for Begins somehow adapting the comics “better” ever holds up.

“The Dark Knight is a great movie, but Begins is a BETTER Batman movie”

Okay, but how? What exactly is a Batman movie by your equation and what makes one more Batman than the other? Presumably a Batman movie has Batman in it…which both films accomplish. In what specific ways does Begins feel more like it represents the character/world of Batman than The Dark Knight?

“Bruce is more of the central focus of Batman Begins”

While this is sort of true, the vast majority of major Batman storylines (most importantly the ones that directly inspired Nolan’s trilogy, ex. Year One and The Long Halloween) are crime epics that follow an ensemble of characters that view Gotham from a variety of different perspectives, with Batman at the center as the glue holding it all together. In this respect, The Dark Knight feels much closer to a story from an actual Batman graphic novel with the narrative often shifting POVs to Gordon, Dent or even The Joker.

“Gotham looks less like Gotham should (as it did in Begins) and more just like Chicago”/“Many of the familiar trappings of a Batman story are absent (no Wayne Manor or traditional Batcave, the Batmobile gets destroyed, etc)”

part of what makes The Dark Knight so interesting in the first place is the many ways it explores the massive impact Batman has had on the city and how Gotham has evolved in response. The first half of the film centers almost entirely on how Gotham has been transformed and turned inside out by both Batman’s war on crime and Dent coming into office as DA.

The whole idea behind this is to narratively subvert the status quo set up by Begins, which displayed Gotham at its lowest, eaten away by its own corruption. The Dark Knight now conversely depicts a Gotham that is trying to heal and pick itself back up. This is where the Joker comes in, the yin to Batman’s yang who begins tearing Gotham back down again in contrast to Batman’s initial goal.

The choice to depict Gotham as a more architecturally modern and sleek metropolis is no accident or result of laziness/rejection of its source material: it’s a major aesthetic choice driven by the story to visually explore these themes.

Bruce’s high rise penthouse and warehouse Bat-Cave are also heavily tied into this thematic design choice. Keep in mind, this is the SIXTH major live action Batman film, and it follows five others that all depict Gotham in its static traditional Gothic appearance (though things did briefly get drenched in gaudy neon for a couple movies there). Part of the brilliant subtext of the film is how it subverts these traditional elements of the character to further explore, here through visuals alone, Batman’s actual impact on Gotham.

“Batman feels more like a high tech soldier and less like a shadowy/demonic presence”

Batman is a very fluid character in how he’s been depicted over the years, he’s been so many different things that this take imo is purely subjective and can’t be a legitimate measure of Begins having a more accurate representation of the character by any means. He’s not a demonic entity, he’s Batman.

Each of Nolan’s Batman films depict him slightly differently, but like my earlier points in The Dark Knight the interpretation here is all about subversion: though here it’s against the Joker. Batman in the film uses increasingly more high tech, almost sci-fi like technology in his crusades culminating in a digital network that watches the entire city at once. In contrast, the Joker is defined by his stripped down, minimal and almost homebrew approach to spreading chaos.

“Look what I did to this city with a few drums of gas and a couple of bullets.”

I know these could seem like strawman arguments but they’re consistently the points I see brought up which seem to miss the point of the movie if I’m honest and what makes it a great, if subversive, adaptation of the comic books. It genuinely feels to me at this point like people say Begins is a “better Batman movie” just because the lighting is darker and/or the villains are less interesting which I guess makes Batman more compelling by default.

However I’m truly open to hearing a compelling argument for Begins being a better film/adaptation, it’s such a common take I imagine I must be missing something here.

I’d somewhat understand, I suppose, if they don’t know Bethany is the Last Scion because the Metatron somehow hid her from their sight while he was courting her to kill them, but they don’t seem to know who she is (or Jay & Silent Bob for that matter) whatsoever when they all meet on the train and never seem to want to try.

Angels have been established multiple times previously in the film to have omnipresent knowledge of seemingly every human being on Earth, even their innermost thoughts. Though Bartleby and Loki were banished from Heaven, they still clearly have this ability, constantly using it to manipulate and psychologically torture people (they don’t use this ability on the bus towards the cheating husband either, though likely that was purposeful so Loki could prove his point). Am I just misunderstanding this ability?

We all know Abed Is Batman Now, but what about the rest of Greendale?

My choices so far:

Jeff as Superman/Pierce as Luthor seems like a match made in heaven. The Dean clearly is Mr. Mxyzptlk. Annie would have to be Lois.

Troy is Robin then Nightwing. Chang imo is obviously the Joker. The thought of Leonard as Mister Freeze makes me laugh. The thought of Britta as Green Arrow also makes me laugh.

Subway is Booster Gold. Elroy is Mister Terrific.

I’m not looking for the best lines necessarily but the funniest specific delivery or physical performance within the show, something a bit more subtle.

I’m sort of stuck between two:

- how quickly the Dean switches from aggressive gangsta rap to frightened and confused in his peanut bar costume. The way he instantly drops his mic and starts sobbing kills me every time

- when Chang plays Mr. Miyagi on stage, the whole scene is so great but the funniest part is how enraptured the group is in the audience, especially how intently Abed watches it and how invested he is

- 6-10 players, no teams

- somewhat a variation of a battle royale. The players all hunt each other on a huge map until the last man standing

- physics and gunfights are extremely realistic and brutal

- maps are absolutely massive, open world sized and somewhat minimal. Main one is a region of steep mountains covered in a dense forest, sparsely populated with a few villages and camps

- players are not initially given a map of the world and have to piece it together though progression and their own memory

- the game focuses primarily on stealth as players are tracking others in this world while trying not to be discovered themselves and all the mechanics focus around that

- survival mechanics while out in the open world to keep your status up (hunting animals, making camp) and hide your tracks

- occasionally while exploring the open world the player may run into NPCs, both friendly (villages may have shops or places to rest, and villagers may give out side objectives in exchange for items) and enemy (camps may be populated with dangerous rogue militias that the player can attack to take their supplies (weapons/items))

-all players can interact with these NPCs however they want leading to players possibly competing with each other to reach a village/wipe out a militia

- groups of NPCs may have reputation meters set with each player based on how they interact with them which could lead to one players reputation affecting another’s (example: one player with high reputation with this group of villagers is given a bigger bounty for another player with low reputation)

- the pace of matches is determined entirely by the players. Depending on their survival fortitude, matches could potentially last hours though as it drags on the world will become harsher (villages become hostile, militias bring loads of reinforcements that start sweeping the map for all the players) naturally pushing remaining players more and more

- inspirations: MGS3 (especially the sniper duel against The End), Shadow of the Colossus, MGSV, Death Stranding, RDR2, Fortnite

This would be a comic book (or video game? Or cartoon? Could be any of these) set about 100 years after the original Ghostbusters films. Basically Venkman got ridiculously successful in franchising the absolute piss out of busting business model, but in the future ghosts have wildly spread like vermin so Ghostbusters Inc. is now an international conglomerate with a firehouse basically on every corner in every major city on the planet just to combat the mass spectral infestation.

The rapidly increasing scale and danger of ecto-activity has caused each squad to become heavily militarized, with extremely advanced ghost hunting tech, and decked out in big, anti-spectral suits of armor.

Basically the humor and tone of the movies would be preserved but with a new status quo set in a cyberpunk-ish sci-fi setting, with lots of opportunities for big ridiculous action sequences of new scarier paranormal entities versus these big Mech-suit wearing Ghostbusters. It’s sort of like Ghostbusters meets Judge Dredd or Robocop with a bit of Hellboy and Pacific Rim.

Reading and listening to debates over the merits of these movies the same exact way over and over at this point feels like slamming my head against pure concrete.

It’s one thing to not like a movie, that’s completely understandable. I really like the prequels but if someone told me they thought it was fucking boring, I couldn’t really argue with that.

But for some reason (I know the reason but I’m trying to avoid the Plinkett in the room. I mean elephant) the most common criticisms I see of the prequel trilogy focus on either bizarrely trite details or ‘discrepancies’ from the original trilogy based entirely on assumption alone.

Simply put I just think these are typically very weak arguments based solely on emotion and don’t really hold up upon breaking them down. Yet the same hyper specific points are always always always dredged up.

I’ll give a few examples each followed by a rebuttal:

“The training ball and face shield in Episode IV just felt like some game Obi-Wan devised, but in the prequels now it's "official jedi training" so I guess Obi-Wan just brought the blaster ball with him”

- Obi-Wan did bring the training device with him, he has already been shown in the film to have kept items to train Luke. It was always Obi-Wan’s plan to do that eventually, during the first act he’s very insistent on getting Luke started asap. Why purpose would Han have of that thing?

“⁠I thought everyone wore robes on Tatooine because it was a desert, even Uncle Owen, but now every Jedi wears robes”

⁠**-** Everybody wears robes in Star Wars and that’s exactly why the Jedi do as well, it’s meant to keep them lowkey so they can maintain anonymity. What should they be wearing? Suits of armor?

⁠*“Vader became way too important to the story, originally he felt like just an asshole SS officer but later is revealed to be space jesus”*

- Vader is absolutely not “just an SS officer” in Episode IV, he’s introduced as some kind of mysterious robotic dark wizard who intimates the other officers of the Empire “Don’t try to frighten us with your sorcerer’s ways, Lord Vader” and is explicitly shown to be tied to the events in the grander backstory:

“he betrayed and murdered your father”

“I sense something, a presence I’ve not felt since…”

As for the Cosmic Christ thing, Vader is the only Jesus figure I’m aware of who murders children in masse and chokes out his own pregnant wife. Maybe that stuff indicates there’s a little more going on there rather than a straight forward Christ analogue?

-

Basically, so many criticisms of these movies revolve around not matching what the original films “felt” like they were intending, but that doesn’t really mean anything. George Lucas clearly didn’t feel the same way, but that doesn’t make the choices inherently bad or put in there at random/out of ignorance.

Reading and listening to debates over the merits of these movies the same exact way over and over at this point feels like slamming my head against pure concrete.

It’s one thing to not like a movie, that’s completely understandable. I really like the prequels but if someone told me they thought it was fucking boring, I couldn’t really argue with that.

But for some reason (I know the reason but I’m trying to avoid the Plinkett in the room. I mean elephant) the most common criticisms I see of the prequel trilogy focus on either bizarrely trite details or ‘discrepancies’ from the original trilogy based entirely on assumption alone.

Simply put I just think these are typically very weak arguments based solely on emotion and don’t remotely hold up upon analysis. Yet the same hyper specific points are always always always dredged up.

I’ll give a few examples each followed by a rebuttal:

“The training ball and face shield in Episode IV just felt like some game Obi-Wan devised, but in the prequels now it's "official jedi training" so I guess Obi-Wan just brought the blaster ball with him”

- Obi-Wan did bring the training device with him, he has already been shown in the film to have kept items to train Luke. It was always Obi-Wan’s plan to do that eventually, during the first act he’s very insistent on getting Luke started asap. Why purpose would Han have of that thing?

“⁠I thought everyone wore robes on Tatooine because it was a desert, even Uncle Owen, but now every Jedi wears robes”

⁠- Everybody wears robes in Star Wars and that’s exactly why the Jedi do as well, it’s meant to keep them lowkey so they can maintain anonymity. What should they be wearing? Suits of armor?

⁠“Vader became way too important to the story, originally he felt like just an asshole SS officer but later is revealed to be space jesus”

- Vader is absolutely not “just an SS officer” in Episode IV, he’s introduced as some kind of mysterious robotic dark wizard who intimates the other officers of the Empire “Don’t try to frighten us with your sorcerer’s ways, Lord Vader” and is explicitly shown to be tied to the events in the grander backstory:

“he betrayed and murdered your father”

“I sense something, a presence I’ve not felt since…”

As for the Cosmic Christ thing, Vader is the only Jesus figure I’m aware of who murders children in masse and chokes out his own pregnant wife. Maybe that stuff indicates there’s a little more going on there rather than a straight forward Christ analogue?

-

Basically, so many criticisms of these movies revolve around not matching what the original films “felt” like they were intending, but that doesn’t really mean anything. George Lucas clearly didn’t feel the same way, but that doesn’t make the choices inherently bad or put in there at random/out of ignorance.

Seriously. This dude is the worst. In a story all about morally ambiguous characters, Turpin is unambiguously and cartoonishly evil. Am I missing some hidden depth here or is he just the biggest scumbag in musical history?

Ok I know but hear me out first:

You play as Batman, in an open world Gotham while the city is under attack by an army of Toho Kaiju. The Justice League is off-Earth (typical) so Batman decides to tackle the attacks himself with all his usual confidence.

The different districts of Gotham are each being attacked by a different iconic monster from the Godzilla series. Batman has the freedom to choose which Kaiju to face off in any order, with each one having a unique puzzle-esque strategy to counter and defeat them.

When you first come up against a Kaiju you spend time studying its patterns like movements, behaviors, etc so the player uses detective skills with their actual brain to figure out how to defeat them (non-lethally of course)

The game is an asymmetrical boss run with classic Kaiju, who way overpower you and tower over you for miles. The giant monster encounters are the core focus of the game, you would only go into any kind of combat against them (though there’d be quite a lot of monsters to fight, it’s like a Final Wars situation)

So essentially, this game would essentially be an Arkham-style game at first glance but would be directly structured after Shadow of the Colossus with a similar “David vs Goliath” theme.

Maybe it’s off kilter an idea but I think it could be something truly unique for a Batman game, at least it’s not fighting the fucking Joker again

Cash register noise oh thank god my check from WB just cleared