Review of “Bonk.io” 5 out of 5 stars!
By Cassandra Clermont 5/22 “Bonk.io” is a game that not many people know about, however it was very popular at my middle school when I went there. That popularity was warranted. Bonk is a skill-focused multiplayer game where you control a ball and try to bump others off a wide selection of maps. The chat feature allows players to interact, making it less dull than other io games where the players can start to feel like CPUs. It is an action-packed game that never gets boring because of the variety of maps and game modes. The developers are constantly working to make the game more enjoyable for its players and it shows. My favorite aspect of the game is the quick play feature. Quick play allows players to join a game without waiting for the host of a room to choose a map and start. Instead, the computer chooses the map and rounds automatically begin. I use this feature more often than playing the original custom game because it is faster to set up when I have short breaks. An issue that I have with the game is that maps are unregulated. Anyone can make a map, meaning that some maps are worse than others. There are many bad maps that I have come across; however, in a custom game you could easily change that. A problem rises once those bad maps get pushed in quick play. A pushed map is a map that shows up regularly in the quick play feature. A handful of recurring bad maps can be found in quick play, forcing players to leave the room and join again if it is unplayable. Map pushing in quick play also forces participants to play the same maps over and over again, making the game seem repetitive even if that is far from the truth. Bad maps can be blocked by admins; however, there is an influx of these maps put in every day, making it difficult to block every single one of them. Still, I find myself drawn to “Bonk.io”. It is one of the only games that I used to play in middle school that I still play currently. Other io games are repetitive in nature. Because they have one premise and larger servers, they can feel boring after only a couple of weeks, which is where Bonk differs. Interacting with people make games more enjoyable for me, so naturally I would like a game that allows you to communicate and make new online friends. I would recommend this game to anyone who is looking for a fun activity to pass their breaks with. Even if you are looking for a game that you can have longer, uninterrupted sessions on I would still recommend it, but in the custom play feature. There are many modes for you to try out and master, making it the most enjoyable game that I have played so far. You might get frustrated when you are first learning how to play, but my advice is to take it slow. There are a chunk of players learning right with you, so don’t feel discouraged. My final rating is five out of five stars. The flaws of this game are present but are overshadowed by the more positive aspects. |
REVIEW: "The Social Dilemma”
By Ezra Nierenberg 4/22 The film The Social Dilemma is a documentary about how people are slowly getting addicted to their phones. Firstly, I want to talk about the idea of using people as sources of money without their knowledge. Even though I don't believe everything I saw in the film, using people as sources of money without their knowledge is wrong in multiple ways. First, when somebody gets on their phone, they are distracted from what they are doing. Advertisers like to use this state of zombie-like distraction to broadcast their product and keep the user distracted. Today, companies are making millions of dollars by distracting users and keeping them distracted so they can make more money. Now, I myself do tend to get distracted on my phone, usually by looking at the news, or playing a game. Sometimes when I play a game, advertisements will pop up out of nowhere and ruin the game. There have been times when I will get so many advertisements, I end up deleting the game. I don't just remove the icons from the home screen, I actually delete the app and erase its data. I find it frustrating that technology giants use people like you and me to make money. Another part of The Social Dilemma I want to talk about is social media, and how it has affected our daily lives. My first experience with trying social media was back when I was 11 or 12. I was at a theater rehearsal, and downloaded Snapchat. After two hours, I got frustrated and deleted the app. I was frustrated at the fact that starting off was difficult. Back when I was 11, I didn't really think into the future. I didn't stop and think about what would happen if I was to become popular, and what would happen to my personality and general mental health. Now years in the future, I am grateful that I never got into social media. Moving on from personal experience, social media has changed people in my generation. Most days when I walk into school, 9 out of 10 people I see are on their phones, looking at social media. I find it dumbfounding how they can stand around and stare at their phones. I personally believe that most of the students in our school would get better grades or receive higher test scores if they put their phones down and paid attention to what the teacher has to say. Social media is starting to act as a virus, spreading from one person to another, and before you know it, everyone is either depressed, angry, or regretful. People need to learn that social media should be used as a reward for doing well, not a thing they check every 3 seconds to see if a post was popular. The last thing I want to talk about is how social media has affected the world in general. To say that social media has affected the world is broad, too broad. I, for the sake of reference, will only focus on its polarization of American politics. As we have seen over the past 2 presidential elections, social media had a big impact. Firstly, we had the entire “Russian hacking scam” of the 2016 presidential election. Supposedly, the Russian government hacked into the electronic voting machines and changed the vote in Trump's (the candidate at the time) favor. Social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook went crazy, spawning propaganda that the Russians rigged the election. Secondly, let's go to a quite recent event. The January 6th riot. I watched in horror as people stormed the Capitol building. That event was the first time in over 53 years that firearms had to be drawn to protect the House of Representatives. Even now, people are becoming more and more polarized thanks to what social media has done. Actually, it's the people's fault because social media allows them to view their own opinions and get thousands of people to agree with them. Polarization will continue to change the shape of our country. All I am saying is that social media, even though it brought us together in a time of need, has also split us apart. The film shows very clearly how social media has changed the way that companies make money, changed the structure of our daily lives, and polarized America’s political landscape forever. I just want you to put your phone down for 24 hours or more to realize how much it's changed our lives. Just imagine that putting the phone down would save your life. How would you feel if your life depended on someone who never puts their phone down. How would you feel? |