Old School Lane Casual Chats Episode 7: Manic Expression's 1 Year Anniversary

In this special episode of Casual Chats, Patricia and Kevin celebrate their associated website Manic Expression by interviewing the founder James Walsh. Learn about how Manic Expression got started, how he came up with his original content, and his upcoming projects.

To know more about the site, head over to manic-expression.com. 

Old School Lane Casual Chats Episode 5: Old School Lane's 1st Year Anniversary

In this episode, Patricia and Kevin celebrate their 1st year anniversary of their blog. They answer questions from their friends at Manic Expression and Kevin asks the age ol' question: Is Patricia the next Frank Welker? Answer: not really! :P

Old School Lane celebrates its 1 year anniversary

1 year ago today, two skeptical best friends wanted to talk about their favorite old and new movies, video games, TV shows, and everything else in between. They didn’t know how far they would go or if they would even get recognized. Nonetheless, they decided to try it anyway and the little blog Old School Lane was born.  It started off as a tiny blog on tumblr posting simple things like “The Top 5 Video Games that made a Comeback” and our first interview from Kevin talking about an upcoming movie project called The Collector. But then one post gave Patricia the assurance and confidence that she and Kevin were going to do great things: around New Year’s Eve in 2011, Patricia posted “The 10 Pee-wee Herman Moments of 2011” and it was garnered by a small group of fans. Even Paul Reubens himself liked it so much that he posted it on his Twitter and Facebook page with a big thanks. 4 months later, one of the people who worked for Reubens posted a reply to Patricia saying that he thought it was very thoughtful and that he was smiling while reading it. That boosted her confidence long enough to know that she wanted to continue blogging.

While Kevin was having struggles with getting his movie made, Patricia signed on the TGWTG forums in late January to bring out her work for more people. While the members enjoyed their First Impressions and Kevin’s Top 100 Animated Shows of All Time, it was a book review of Inside Pee-wee’s Playhouse: The Untold, Unauthorized, and Unpredictable Story of a Pop Phenomenon that had gotten some recognition. One person in particular changed her life forever: Positive Troll. One month later, he invited her to this unknown website called Manic Expression and became the 50^th member of the site. At that point, Positive Troll became simply known as Les. In this new site, Patricia and Kevin met wonderful people at the site such as James Walsh, Moviefan12, SOJA*88, BigBlackHatMan,  Jason on the House, Timdiana, Decker Shado, the guys at Comic Book Cast, The Fanfic Critic, jashykins, James Bevan, Whyboy, Brekclub85, and so much more. While posting on Manic Expression, they came up with an idea to make summer a very special time: dedicate a few months to Nickelodeon. Six months later, the Nickelodeon tribute started and it was bigger than they ever anticipated. Not only did they review the shows and movies, but they had gotten interviews from their childhood icons such as Marc Summers, Moira Quirk, Marc Weiner, Fred Seibert, Cheryl Blaylock, Noel MacNeal, D.J. McHale, and more. It brought in a sense of nostalgia and closure to the people who read it and it gave Patricia and Kevin a warmth that make them feel satisfied.

Their newest podcast Casual Chats has started off well with talks of Nickelodeon, Wreck-It-Ralph, the Sly Cooper series, and the Sandy Hook shooting. There will be many more to come such as TMNT, the Tony Hawk franchise, Weinerville, and their first year anniversary. Also look out for more upcoming projects such as a new podcast play, a new Manic Expression variety show, a new music podcast called Nick Jukebox, and much more. They want to thank you so much for all the love and support from the past year and we hope to grow and prosper for your enjoyment. Let us have many more years. Take care!

Old School Lane celebrates the 33rd anniversary of...

Alright, this is it. This is really it! The moment you have been waiting for. The reveal for Old School Lane’s summer project. What is it? Well, before we tell you what it is, here’s a little history lesson.



On December 1, 1977, a brand new children’s television program was created on QUBE, the first two-way interactive TV cable system. It was called The Pinwheel Network. It was a network that went pretty much nowhere. The shows that were airing there didn’t catch the attention of a lot of viewers and it was at the point of failure. However, on this day, April 1, 1979, The Pinwheel Network did a huge overall by changing the shows and its name. It will forever be known as…



To this day, Nickelodeon is the #1 children’s program in cable TV. Now, you may be thinking to yourselves, “Hey, didn’t the Nostalgia Critic dedicate a whole month to Nickelodeon?” Well, yes. That’s true. However, he only covered a couple of the cartoons, SNICK shows, one game show, and one Nickelodeon movie. Kevin and I are going the whole 9 yards and dedicating three months to covering almost EVERY single Nicktoon, SNICK shows, TeenNick, movies, video games, and so much more that Nickelodeon has created. Also, expect a few other big surprises in between!



Let’s be honest: Nickelodeon has been a huge part in our lives at one point or another. Some of our favorite programs from our childhood came from this network from Rugrats and Ren and Stimpy to SpongeBob SquarePants and Avatar: The Legend of Korra. We have so much fond memories on watching our favorite cartoons or watching SNICK on Saturday nights. In fact, one of the reasons Kevin and I became best friends when we first met was our love for Nickelodeon shows. He even dressed up as Doug Funnie when he was in the 4th grade! That’s how much our love for Nickelodeon mean to us. What about you? What are your fondest memories of Nickelodeon? Post it in the comments below and let us know. We’ll be starting around June and ending it in September, so stay tuned as we cover the many great and many terrible shows, movies, video games, products, and more that came out of the “The First Kids Network”.

Here’s a song that I know will bring you back.

That’s all for now. Tune in this summer as well as real soon as we wrap up Kevin’s Top 100 Animated Shows, more First Impressions, and who knows what. Hope to see you around Old School Lane real soon. Take care.

-Patricia and Kevin

Old School Lane celebrates the 25th anniversary of Contra

On September 26, 2011, Konami 's adventure game Castlevania celebrated its 25th anniversary. The stories involving Simon Belmont taking down the vampire Dracula has captivated many hours of dedication of my childhood and teen hood going through many hours trying to go through the frustrating levels and bosses. However, everytime I passed a stage, I had a moment of satisfaction and kept playing. On that day, I played a couple of levels of the Castlevania, as well as Super Castlevania IV on the SNES, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night on the PS1, and the recent Castlevania: Lords of Shadow on the PS3. I'm sure that everyone did the same thing when they celebrated its anniversary. Oh wait, another important video game was celebrating its 25th anniversary last year that everyone paid attention more than Castlevania, didn't they? What game was it again?



Oh yeah, Zelda. Don't get me wrong, I love Zelda, but it overshadowed a bunch of other games that were celebrating their anniversary that deserved as much attention. But not today, Old School Lane is going to celebrate a game that is still loved by retro gamers, massicists, and shoot-em-up fans.



On February 20, 1987, Konami released Contra on the arcades in Japan. The basic story of the futuristic year of 2633 in which two commandos named Bill "Mad Dog" Rizer and Lance "Scorpion" Bean are sent on a mission to neutralize a terrorist group called the Red Falcon Organization that is planning to take over the Earth. With over 4 different gun power-ups to pick up along the way, over 10 levels of run and gun shooting action, and co-op play, this arcade game was very popular. So Konami decided to release the game in other video game consoles and home PC computers, but the one that people know about the most is the NES port of Contra that was released on February 2, 1988 in America. Japan would receive it a week later and Europe wouldn't get it until almost 2 years later.



The story is pretty much the same as compared to the arcade, with only a few slight differences. Instead of the game taking place near an archipelago in New Zealand, it takes place in an unknown island near South America. Also, instead of the Red Falcon being a terrorist group, they were the name of an alien entity. The aliens were reminising of the ones designed by H.R. Giger for the Alien movies. In this picture, you can see that they kind of look like the Facehuggers from Alien.



But what everyone remembers about Contra the most is the Konami code. For those who don't know it, you're either not a retro gamer, a Konami fan, or a hardcore gamer. Here's the code right here:



Most people think that the code originated in Contra, but it actually came from Gradius, a scrolling shooter game that was also made by Konami. The code gives you 30 lives instead of 3 lives and trust me, you're going to need it when playing this game. It's one of the most difficult games that ever came out on the NES, but not as hard as Ninja Gaiden or Battletoads. At least I beat Contra, which was not easy, even with the code. Remember this boss? Yeah, frustrating as hell, wasn't it?



Another thing that makes this game memorable are the weapons. All 4 gun power-ups from the arcade were brought to the home ports. You have the machine gun, the laser gun, the fire gun, and of course, the spread gun.



The spread gun is the stuff of legends. It's the most powerful gun in the game as it spreads the bullets everywhere and makes killing enemies easier and faster. It has been called one of the best power-ups in video game history and has been in every Contra game ever since. The spread gun is so popular to gamers that the logo has been put on t-shirts, tattoos, and other merchandise.



But what has made this game so great is its co-op play. During the time when NES games were limited to one player or the second player had to play after the first player dies. Playing this game makes it more easier and fun with a friend, unless that person sucks.



Critics and gamers loved Contra, calling it one of the best multiplayer games on the NES and the #7 greatest game on the NES by Nintendo Power. Still to this day, Contra has been loved and remembered as one of the greatest games to ever came out on the NES. The Contra series has had many sequels and spinoffs over the years, some better than others. My favorites in the series are Contra, Super C, Contra III, Contra: Shattered Soldier, and Contra 4. What are your favorite games in the series? Post it in the comments below and talk about your favorite memories of playing Contra.

 

Until then, celebrate Presidents Day with two shirtless commandoes taking down terrorists or aliens with awesome, overpowered guns. Happy 25th anniversary, Contra. May you have many more difficult, yet fun games in the future
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Thanks for hanging out with us at Old School Lane. Catch you guys later.

-Patricia