Seagull Reviews
I know April is a month many look forward to for new birds and I’ve had the pleasure of sampling the most anticipated gulls of the year.
—Licensed Gull Connoisseur Elite_Soba
The Gull:
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Order: Charadriiformes
Family: Laridae
Genus: Larus
Species: pacificus
ESRB Rating: E
Developer: John Latham
Release Date: 30,000,000 B.C.E.
The Pacific Gull is a fine bird for those with more selective, niche tastes – those who have grown tired of the Silver Gulls and Call of Duties that have been mass-produced for the common man. While I generally find myself bored with this genre, I was immediately captured by just how massive the wingspan of the gull was. Very few other birds can offer as much unique content as I found was provided by the Pacific Gull. The sheer dichotomy of the colors of the wings and body were enough for me to question every truth I had once previously accepted as dogma. But it doesn’t stop there, for there are not one but six gulls featured. Just one gull was enough to leave me satisfied, but six is just astonishing while still managing to not be overbearing.
I feel the glory of the Pacific Gull cannot be highlighted unless it is compared with other birds for one to truly understand what other birds are lacking.
The Gull:
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Order: Charadriiformes
Family: Laridae
Genus: Pagophila
Species: eburnea
ESRB Rating: E
Developer: Constantine Phipps, 2nd Baron Mulgrave
Release Date: 30,000,000 B.C.E.
The Ivory Gull is what many refer to as the “hipster gull,” being the only species in the Pagophila genus. Uniquely identifiable by its fully white mantle, a lesser connoisseur might even mistake the Ivory Gull for a dove! And yet, I could not find myself fully satisfied by the Ivory Gull. Nowhere is the beautiful opposition of light and dark, and I couldn’t help but feel disappointed by just how short the wings were.
It’s fairly clear that the Ivory Gull could not survive five additional iterations that so naturally flowed from the Pacific Gull, and so other specimen were introduced in a last-ditch effort to introduce variety into an otherwise bland and one-dimensional bird. The Chroicocephalus scopulinus is clearly not the main focus as it adopts a subordinate position to the Ivory Gull, and one more gull was clearly thrown in as an afterthought. All this left me was a desire to return to the Pacific Gull to perhaps explore one of the six gulls I may not have explored to its fullest.
tl;dr
The Good:
The wings of the Pacific Gull
The mantle of the Pacific Gull
There are six whole Pacific Gulls
The Bad:
The Ivory Gull
The afterthought birds
Verdict:
Is there any question in anyone’s mind that the Pacific Gull is deserving of a 10/10? While not being as mainstream as some like the Silver Gull, the Pacific Gull still maintains accessibility to all audiences while not trying to focus solely on its uniquity like the Ivory Gull.
The Ivory Gull is more of a disappointment. I don’t hate it, but there just could’ve been so much more that was not explored. I’m hard-pressed to give this gull higher than a 6/10.
I want to sample these kind of seagulls too.
What?