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Both of these internet icons are known for comical reviews of nostalgic entertainment that happens to suck. They become enraged by either frustratingly bad games or horrible movies. But who is the better reviewer (or really, who's more funny)? Let's see what we can come up with by looking at these criteria:
Production Values
Nostalgia Factor
Humor
The Angry Videogame Nerd vs Nostalgia Critic Round 1. Fight!
Production Values
While internet videos typically aren't going to match even most of what's on G4 in terms of production, when compared to Nostalgia Critic, AVGN looks like a well-done popcorn flick to NC's 1980s just-for-TV Movie of the week... most of the time.
First of all, where Nostalgia Critic opens every show literally just telling you his name and saying hello, Angry Videogame Nerd has an actual theme song which has been covered by plenty of fans on the internet. It's a catchy, simple tune that has some of AVGN's rants as lyrics to boot
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(I don't know who edited this, but it's the closest to the real thing I found.)
Secondly, in "canonical" episodes of the Nostalgia Critic, there may be a cartoon talking to him or floating above his head on occassion, but mostly it's just him in a white room yelling at movie clips. AVGN, on the other hand, has somewhat drawn out plots with fully costumed characters he interacts with, and his episodes tend to have far more in the way of editing tricks.
I will admit, the Casper = the martian from Flinstones effect is clever and hilarious, but it's rarely used by the Critic and AVGN's Street Fighter 2010 trailer alone did about as much in way of production value.
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Finally, however, when it comes to specials outside of the actual review videos, AVGN still has an edge in this category but it gets quite a bit closer. I'd have to give the AVGN vs. NC series itself to AVGN since it takes place in his house, but the costumes, music, sets and 2D Lee animations of Nostalgia Critic's (really the thatguywiththeglasses.com team but he's the star) Kickassia series are pretty fun to watch as well.
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Still, though Kickassia is a long and entertaining series, overall this category is firmly deserved by The Angry Videogame Nerd because he's just generally a better produced show. Plus, Nostalgia Critic really needs a theme song.
Angry Videogame Nerd Vs. Nostalgia Critic Round 2: Fight!
Nostalgia Factor
This is a bit of a weird category, I'll admit, since both critics are obviously banking on people's 80s and 90s nostalgia. It's also hard for me to critique AVGN considering I was born in 1990, and usually only had good NES and SNES games to play; Nostalgia Critic has an edge for me personally in this category, but that's because he reviews a lot of children's films and cartoons from the 90s where AVGN usually sticks to NES titles from the 80s. It's unfair for me to judge how much more relevant AVGN is to most fans and their nostalgia because I don't remember jack about half the stuff he reviews.
For my money, Nostalgia Critic wins this category by default for my memory, but since a lot of fans were born in the 80s I'll have to call it a wash. Plus, I like AVGN's reviews of entire systems and the video on Nintendo Power.
Actually, I also love Nostalgia Critic's Top 11 and Old vs. New Specials. So we'll just make this section a comparison on specials... only it's still a wash. Oh well.
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DOUBLE K.O.
Angry Videogame Nerd vs. Nostalgia Critic Round 3: Fight!
Humor
Ultimately though, much like the Nostalgia Critic makes story his #1 priority in his Old vs. New series, I have to make humor my #1 priority here. And in that regard, I just flat out laught a LOT more at Nostalgia Critic's videos.
I like The Angry Videogame Nerd, and their foul-mouthed, angry styles are very similar in many ways but Nostalgia Critic just adds a lot more. For the most part, AVGN's humor really is just coming up with strings of swear words and literally shitting on games he doesn't like. He weaves pop culture references and other humor in there as well, but much of the time I feel a bit juvenile just watching his videos. That said, just watching someone else as frustrated with a bad game as you were feels vindicating and it often does make me laugh out loud, but then we have to compare.
The Nostalgia Critic may have an annoyingly high-pitched voice at times, but his style is just more appealing to me. He weaves in pop culture, current (and not-so-current) event and political humor a lot more, and he just seems more witty because while he's very foul mouthed, that's not his entire shtick.
What seals the deal for me is how much more I laughed at his videogame review than I did at AVGN's movie review.
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NOSTALGIA CRITIC WINS
That being said, Nostalgia Critic may make me laugh more than Angry Videogame Nerd does but they're both great at what they do and I look forward to all the videos they post. And really the point of this blog was to show any 1uppers out there something worth checking out they might have been missing.
Maybe you'll all like AVGN more, I wouldn't be surprised.
I'm thinking of doing my next blog with a video of some Mega Man guitar magic (if I can fix my D string soon) and answers to any questions you want to ask me in the comments below. Ask me anything and I'll respond in the next blog, video of my bad guitar playing or no.
By the way, I'd like to get AVGN reviewing more SNES games, especially since today discovering snessy.com reminded me of it.
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