Don’t worry, there are no spoilers in this review. Just lots of gushing, because The Avengers was freaking awesome. This is one of the most ambitious blockbuster projects in decades, because it’s the culmination of several years’ worth of planting seeds in Iron Man, Thor, Captain America, and even The Incredible Hulk. This isn’t a catch-all superhero movie for everyone. This is a catch-all superhero movie who’s caught the last several big superhero movies, or at least knows enough about them. Worse yet, every superhero or villain you add to a movie makes it more risky and more likely to it becoming a nonsensical morass of origin stories and contrivances.

The Avengers pays off several movies’ teases with a superhero group film that actually works. It’s action-packed, exciting, and engaging, and still smart and subtle enough to not be considered a mindless popcorn movie. This isn’t The Dark Knight, but it isn’t Transformers, either. It’s a long, complex superhero movie that embraces its source material (which includes both Earth 616 original and Ultimate Marvel universes) and is accessible enough to be enjoyed even if you’re not a comic book nerd. There is a little bit of homework to do before you see the movie, though.

I can honestly say I wasn’t expecting this. We’re working on getting more details from Bethesda Softworks, but according to Game Informer they’re making an Elder Scrolls MMO. Yes, Elder Scrolls Online is a real thing, and it will finally make exploring Tamriel a multiplayer experience.

According to Game Informer, Elder Scrolls Online will take place a millennium before Skyrim (and about 700 years before Oblivion). The story will focus on the Daedric prince Molag Bal trying to conquer Tamriel. The time means it’s the first Elder Scrolls game to take place in the Second Age (the first four Elder Scrolls games took place in the Third Age, and Skyrim takes place in the Fourth Age), before the Empire was formed under Tiber Septim. It’s still after the Dwemer disappeared, so there should be plenty of steampunk ruins to explore, but before the dragons disappeared from Tamriel in the beginning of the Third Age, so they should be around and ready for killing. The game will come out in 2013 for PC and Mac.

Well, my PlayStation Vita purchase has officially reached “worth it” status, and not just because I’m still playing Disgaea 3: Absence of Detention. Atlus has just confirmed that Persona 4 The Golden is coming to the US.

This isn’t that surprising, because Persona 4 Arena, the fighting game based on Persona 4, has been confirmed for North American release for a few months. Still, it’s great news for JRPG fans. Like Persona 3, Persona 4 was an excellent RPG on the PS2, and it’s been needing a portable re-release. The new Vita version will have a new character, new personas, new events, and 1.5 times the voice acting. Persona 4 The Golden will come to the US this Fall (strangely, after Persona 4 Arena’s launch this summer).

Video game universes tend to be weird, but you can usually go along with them. Super Mario Bros.’ worlds are surreal, but there’s a generally happy logic to them. The police in the Mega Man universe are useless (and the future becomes horribly depressing the further off you go), but it’s still kept under control. Dracula keeps coming back every century in the Castlevania universe, but at least you can take a breather between those times, and he usually stays put in his castle. Then there are the truly boned video game universes.

Some game series have truly messed up cosmologies. Gods, origins, and rules all come together to make a truly bleak and screwed world. These universes didn’t have the chance because of a simple villain or natural disaster. They’re boned because the laws of nature and everything that controls them hate you and want you to die. They might even seem fine on the surface, but once you get past the friendly parts to how the world works, you see some warped, dark things that make Sartre look like an optimist. Read on for the six most boned video game universes.

Since this looks at the nature of game worlds, and most games have you saving game worlds, spoilers ahoy.

Mortal Kombat was fun when it got a much-needed reboot to sweep away the several titles’ worth of insane mythos (and get it refilled with about a quarter as much insane mythos in one game). Solid controls, accessible, lots of content, good graphics, super bloody, the works. It wasn’t a fighting game fan’s fighting game, but Mortal Kombat never has been that type of fighting game. It’s a novelty fighter, a gorefest, a friendly game of violence. Frame-counting and obsessing with the smallest details of every every character’s move have never been a big part of Mortal Kombat.

The game has gotten a Game-of-the-Year-style re-release in Mortal Kombat Komplete Edition for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 and Mortal Kombat for the Vita. All three games include all of the DLC fighters and costumes of Mortal Kombat on the disc. The Vita version also gets a new challenge tower and touchscreen-based minigames. It’s also $20 cheaper and a proper GOTY price of $40, compared to the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions’ $60 prices, making it a better buy. However, there are two things you need to know about these different versions: one, the console versions come with download codes for the Mortal Kombat movie and the soundtrack (the new game soundtrack, not the awesome one from the movie that got us all into industrial music when we were 14), and two, the Vita’s version’s graphics suck.

I’ll be honest, I really don’t get Instagram. You’re taking photos and making them look like film, when the film is basically inferior. You’re reducing the quality of the picture to make it look retro. Of course, then I think about games like Bit.Trip Runner and Cave Story, and I realize arguments can be made that it works. I downloaded Instagram to my phone and started playing with it.

The result is a fusion of Instagram, a Tumblr blog, and my vast, vast collection of nerdy merchandise. Aggrogate presents Instanerd, a simple Tumblr site that takes various geeky things like action figures and video games and puts them through Instagram to make them look weirdly retro.

It’s not art or vanity, just idle curiosity and being glad I can finally do something interesting with all the crap on my shelves and in my closets.

LEGO’s Cuusoo site has been a birthing ground for new and unique LEGO sets. You’ve already heard of the upcoming Minecraft LEGO set, but Cuusoo has also transformed the Japanese Shinkai 6500 deep diver and the Hayabusa asteroid exploration craft to brick form. Now, it might do the same for My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic.

The My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Cuusoo entry is up to 5,200 signatures, and according to LEGO if it hits 10,000 they’ll try to secure a license from Hasbro. This isn’t as much as the Back to the Future Cuusoo (9,200 supporters) or the Legend of Zelda Cuusoo (6,500 supporters), but those Cuusoos were created in August and December of last year. The MLP Cuusoo was created just last February, and jumped from over 2,000 supporters to over 5,000 supporters in the last week.

The Nerf Bow and Arrow was the first Nerf gun, but it wasn’t really a bow and arrow. It was a plunger you pulled back like a bow, but it worked just like any other Nerf gun after it. Same with the Nerf Crossbow and Nerf Big Bad Bow. In fact, there really hasn’t been a real Nerf “bow,” either from Nerf or other companies like Buzz Bee or Air Zone.

Zing Air changes that with its line of bows that are actual bows. You pull back strings to fire arrows and everything. Well, they’re not quite bows, but they come closer than any other cube warfare weapon we’ve reviewed. The Zing Air Zip Bak Bow is one of those sort-of bows, and I got one today at Time to Play’s Spring Showcase.

Great actors don’t always make great movies. While plenty of dignified, talented actors successfully make the jump to more offbeat genre fare, many more end up making piles of crap. It’s not their fault, but they’re a part of it. For every Patrick Stewart who becomes Charles Xavier and Ian McCellan who becomes Gandalf, there’s a Jeremy Irons who becomes… any character in any fantasy movie Jeremy Irons has been in. It’s not pretty to see great actors reach horrible lows, but it is hilarious. Here are five respected actors who ended up in the absolute worst shit.

I have some obvious news and some not so obvious news. The obvious news is that Nintendo is making New Super Mario Bros. 2. Nintendo 3DS sequel to New Super Mario Bros., which was an insanely popular game on the DS. Not really surprising, but should be fun. No word on if it will have the tanuki suit in 2D form, but it’ll probably be a fun play like every other Mario game made by Nintendo.

The not so obvious news is that Nintendo is working on an anniversary compilation like the Super Mario All-Stars disc two years ago. It’s not Legend of Zelda. It’s not Metroid either. Kid Icarus was just two games before the 3DS game. If you just said Earthbound, you’re only making us both depressed.

It’s Kirby. Kirby is getting a compilation disc. Nintendo hasn’t announced what games will be on the disc, but the “fan favorite Kirby games” will probably include Kirby’s Dream Land and Kirby’s Adventure at least. Nintendo is also planning other “Kirby anniversary activities,” but hasn’t announced what they are or when the game will come out.