Before starting the rant proper, let me just say that I've written a lot of this while in the grips of a rather overbearing fever, so...cut me some slack if my prose isn't up to its usual standards here.
Whenever I finish playing an RPG, I have a certain process of stuff I do before I move on to the next one. Among other things, I check to see if there are any desktop wallpapers out there about the game that I'd like, I listen to any remixes that OCR or VG Mix have for the game, I check to see if there are any videos available for download of the game's FMVs if I happened to like any (and incidentally, do any of you know a good site for this beyond Blue Laguna and Youtube? I can't find quite a lot of stuff that I'd like to have), and I look on Youtube and AMV.org for any and all AMVs that have been made for the game. Since I typically play RPGs at least a year after their release, and usually much later than that, there's usually a fair bit to sort through.
When I finished the Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga series last year and began this little post-game rite, I wasn't expecting to find many AMVs for the obscure mini-series, and certainly none that would particularly interest me. I was half right--there are very few AMVs for the SMTDDS games out there. But I was also half wrong--an AMV-making individual going by Veccachan did manage to get my attention.
Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga 1 + 2: Sera's Holding Out for a Hero: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3bCVcyJgpVc
Poetry in Motion: Visuals are admittedly the weak link to this AMV. There are parts of the AMV that look a bit blurry, and while the rest is fairly decent, it's not what I'd call sharp quality. Also, there's a discolored band right in the middle of the screen at the scenes beginning at 0:27 and 1:46 (which is particularly distracting; anyone not familiar with that scene of the game is going to have additional trouble getting an idea of what's happening), which just ain't good. There's also not much in the way of visual artistry on the part of the AMV's maker; the fades and camera work and so on are just the FMVs' own, with the only touch added by Veccachan beyond scene arrangement being pixel-blurs* for a few scene changes.
So yeah. Really can't say much for the visual aspect of this AMV. I can look past it to an extent, because I strongly suspect that an (unfortunately) obscure mini-series like SMT: Digital Devil Saga probably doesn't have dozens of fans lining up to throw high-quality FMVs up onto the web, so the AMV's maker probably didn't have many/any quality alternatives for the games' FMVs. Hell, it's actually surprising to me that she got'em at all. Nonetheless, it IS a bit of a strike against the AMV.
I Gotta Have More Cowbell: As is the case with most AMVs I really like, this one combines the games' visuals and events with the music to convey its message. This AMV uses the song "Holding Out for a Hero," originally an 80s tune sung by Bonnie Tyler. The version this AMV uses, however, is a more recent version sung done by Jennifer Saunders, featured in the largely pointless movie Shrek 2.
The musical component to this AMV is where it really shines and earns its place in my collection. That's actually a surprise from my perspective, because I frankly find this song really annoying in every version I've ever heard, with this variation annoying me the most. But what can I say? Every single moment of this AMV matches up almost flawlessly to the tone, beat, and lyrics of the song. Remember the last AMV rant I did, the Fallout 3 Land of Confusion one, where I extolled how well-constructed its timing and scene selection was, where everything fit into the song and its words excellently? Well, while lacking perhaps some of the spirit of the last AMV, SMTDDS 1 + 2 Sera's Holding Out for a Hero does it even BETTER. It's like SMTDDS 1 + 2's Full Motion Video was made specifically to fit this song. I sincerely doubt one could possibly match an RPG's FMV scenes to this tune in a better way than here. Hell, the paid professionals who orchestrated the part of Shrek 2 featuring this song didn't even do half as good a job!
Alright, some examples of what I mean. At 0:28, the song talks about the "white knight" hero the rest of the song will refer to, and the AMV gives us a zoom-in shot focusing on Serph, the SMTDDS 1 + 2 protagonist who's the "hero" the song sings about. 0:34 talks about tossing and turning late at night, and shows Sera (the damsel in distress for whom Serph is a hero) curled up asleep. At 0:43, the tone of the song changes from quiet and piano-driven, which was shown well in the AMV by simple and quiet scenes, to a more fast-paced style, which the AMV's scenes match with flashy events and action-oriented FMVs, while focusing still on Serph to keep the focus on him being the hero sung about. At 1:15, the tone becomes more tense, and the scene once again matches the song's change. It hits a crescendo at 1:21, with a scene of a demon emerging, and then immediately has the emphasized beats at 1:22 and 1:23 almost perfectly synchronized with the striking moments in the visual part. The part at 1:43, when the song talks about "rising with the heat," is matched well twice over, as you see a scene of one character changing into a demon, which kind of works with that lyric, and as the character doing this is actually named Heat. The tone of the music at 1:55 once again is reflected by the scene shown, with the music's tone suggesting marching into something unknown or epic, and the scene showing the part of SMTDDS2 in which Serph and Sera's souls are flying into the heart of the sun. At 2:13, the lyrics talk about "someone, somewhere watching me," as the AMV shows Schroedinger, the mysterious cat entity that watches Serph's progress throughout the game. 2:21 has the lyrics talking about a "storm" while focusing on a character named Gale. The part at 2:28 is particularly well done--the rising tension in the music is mirrored by the running attack of the character Heat, ending with Heat gouging his claw into Serph as the lyrics hit a climax of "there's a fire in my blood" (which is also another double-meaning scene for the AMV, given that Heat, known for his fire affinity, is putting his fist through Serph quite bloodily, hence the "fire" in "blood"). And it goes on like this--more or less every part of the song has a scene to it to match its tone and direction, and often even its lyrics. Heck, the AMV even manages to find the perfect scene and timing for the part of this Holding Out for a Hero where it gets momentarily and weirdly quiet and sweet, at 3:38. While I haven't seen any other AMVs using this song yet, I would imagine that moment in the song must be particularly confounding to an AMV-maker, as it just seems completely and totally separate both from the song itself and likely from whatever intended message an AMV to that song would have.
But what does it all mean, Basil?: The theme of the AMV is pretty simple to grasp (maybe "blatantly obvious" would be more accurate): to emphasize Serph as a hero, and more specifically, a hero to Sera. In this, the AMV does its job quite competently, focusing on Serph during his action-related FMVs from the game most of the time, and including several scenes that emphasize his heroism with regards to Sera. Nice theme, explored and portrayed pretty well.
This AMV does not have the spiritually gripping power as the As the Warlock Said AMV I looked at for Shadow Hearts 1 + 2 did, the very effective portrayal of a strong and relevant message that the Fallout 3 If You Tolerate This Your Children Will be Next AMV, or the insightful symbolism and summation of the game that the Fallout 3 Land of Confusion AMV did. It's got a decent basis and message, but not as epic or significant as the AMVs I've ranted on in the past. Nonetheless, I feel it definitely deserves attention and praise for how exceptionally well-made it is. Disregarding the lesser visual quality, this AMV's video component is nigh-flawlessly matched to the music's lyrics, tone, and message from start to finish. You don't have to have played the SMT Digital Devil Saga series to recognize the perfect timing this AMV has, and those that have played the games can appreciate the several clever extras that Veccachan has put into the video (the little things like matching the lyrics about heat and fire to the character Heat, and such). Skill and craftsmanship go a long way in the process of making a truly noteworthy RPG AMV, and Veccachan definitely demonstrates that with Sera's Holding Out for a Hero.
* This is probably not the technical term for them. Have I mentioned that I don't actually know the technical aspects of film and such? Because I don't. Hell, the little research I've done for some of these AMV rants alone has increased my knowledge of cinematography by at least 300%, and I still don't know jack shit.
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Friday, February 12, 2010
General RPGs' Voice Acting
Thanks a hell of a lot to Ecclesiastes for his idea for this rant.
In the past, I resisted the idea of voice acting in RPGs. Well, not really resisted it, persay--more like I opposed the notion that it should be considered a significant factor in their quality. I thought that it was going to always be unimportant in enjoying a game for the reasons that I do find important: its plot and characters, the creativity and skill of the writing behind them. I insisted that a voice actor was unimportant to a character's portrayal and development, and that it would always solely be, as it had in the past, the character's dialog and actions that developed him, her, or it.
Now, I wasn't entirely off--the above two aspects of a character are still the greatest defining parts of that character in an RPG. And, as a plethora of RPGs from the NES, Genesis, SNES, Gameboy/Gameboy Advance, and even PS1, PS2, Game Cube, and PC prove, you can have fantastic characters without any voice acting at all.
Plus, further in my defense, the time period during which I formed this opinion on RPG voice acting was back in the days of Playstation 1 and N64. Back then, RPGs' strides into voice acting were both small (due to, I imagine, budget and space constraints, voiced parts of the game were usually restricted to a few important scenes and FMVs) and, well, just not very good. There were occasions where I liked the voices and the acting okay in the game--Lunar 2 and Grandia 1 come to mind--but "adequate" was about the highest praise you could give to that era's voice actors, and they usually didn't even warrant that much of a compliment. The situation wasn't helped by the fact that the RPG genre was still working out some last but very stubborn and noticeable vestiges of bad translation. The speech between Belmont and Dracula in Castlevania: Symphony of the Night may not be acted well to begin with, for example, but the fact that half of it doesn't really make much sense (even if it's memorable) worsens the problem.
So you clearly don't NEED voice acting to get a great character, and I think I had fair reason to think voice acting wasn't a big deal when it came onto the scene. But I've since had to relent in the face of many modern RPGs, and reform my opinion. Voice acting CAN make a significant difference to a character's quality and appeal. I still stand by the idea that it isn't a factor that can make or break a character, mind--Final Fantasy 10's Yuna sounds like she was voiced by an illiterate who hadn't slept in at least 2 days, but anyone who frequents these rants will know that I think very highly of her character. Conversely, I thought that Fran in Final Fantasy 12 had quite a competent voice actress, who affected an accent that was noticeable and distinguished the character, but did not distract from or become an obstacle to her dialogue...yet that doesn't stop me from seeing Fran as yet another boring automaton lacking any strong personality trait, like most of the other characters in FF12.
But if a voice actor, no matter how good or bad, can't change whether or not someone is actually a decent character or not, they CAN, at least, enhance that character's personality and quality through their performance. Makai Kingdom's Zetta's power-driven egomania is clear from his actions and dialogue, but his voice actor really drives that personality home with loud, commanding tones and challenging, boasting bursts of laughter. Tales of the Abyss makes it clear time and time again through his dialogue just what a snarky bastard Jade Curtiss is, but his voice acting just seals the deal entirely, enhancing every dry, witty line he says. And Kreia from Knights of the Old Republic 2...man, she would be a fascinating character without a single spoken word to match her dialogue, but the actress behind Kreia reaches vocal acting perfection with the role, flawlessly enhancing fantastic lines with an emphasis on Kreia's mix of age, wisdom, cunning, and darkness.
Now, I've gone over the subject, offered up an opinion about its importance, and thrown in a few examples here and there to illustrate my thoughts. It's usually at this point in the rant that I would state how the RPG industry should improve on this matter, and why.
Thing is, I can't really do that. With regards to voice acting, RPG companies have been more or less consistently going in the right direction from the Playstation 2 generation onward. Major RPGs generally include voice acting to a significant degree nowadays, making most or even nearly all their main dialogue voice acted. The voice acting quality is generally improved, too--games are more and more often hiring experienced professionals to do their voice acting, and even those RPG voice actors who don't have a long history of voice work seem to be being encouraged to do a better job, because it's uncommon to hear a character now whose voice actor isn't at the very least competent.* And it helps a good bit that the translations for the acted dialogue are, as a rule, much better than they used to be.
Game companies continue to put an emphasis on voice acting and take it seriously, and the effort shows in the good results it yields. Western RPGs like Mass Effect 1, Fallout 3, and Dragon Age Origins all have the kind of excellent voice acting which betters the characters and story-telling that you would expect--but more and more often, Japanese RPGs with entire casts of talented voice actors are popping up and rivaling the Western RPGs' voice acting quality on their own home turf. Japanese developer Nippon Ichi gets just the right voices to portray its games' characters just as often as Western developer Bioware does, it seems, and the localization team for Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 and 4 might have made their Japanese RPG that actually takes place in Japan seem more accessible and natural in its voice acting to the average American than even Fallout 3 was.
Voice acting may not be critical, but it is important. Luckily, RPG companies, with few exceptions,** have come to recognize this, and continue a trend of improving quality--and I'm pleased to see it happening.
* Uncommon, but not unknown--Suikoden Tierkreis is a recent game that I'm playing through now, and there are several characters who just aren't voiced well, most notably the protagonist. Non-named Suikoden heroes typically have an accepted "canon" name that fans dub them with (Riou in Suikoden 2, Faroush in Suikoden 5 (what a stupid name), etc), but Suikoden Tierkreis seems to have fans split between the names "Sieg" and "MotorMouth," and I throw my lot in with the latter. I swear the actor is racing against the text being printed on the screen as he blurts out his lines, and he's winning that race by a long shot. Still, my point on the general quality of voice acting improving stands; Suikoden Tierkreis is one of the only non-SquareEnix RPGs I've played in the last 5 years or so to have noticeably bad voice acting.
** Unfortunately, one of those exceptions is a rather prominent one: SquareEnix. I'm not sure what the deal is, but SquareEnix just seems to be 2 steps behind everyone else in the field of voice acting. From the very beginning, they were behind the ball--sure, they stuck some voice acting into Xenogears, but look at the Playstation 1 installments of their iconic Final Fantasy series. Of Final Fantasies 7, 8, 9, and Tactics, not a single one had any voice acting whatsoever, not to mention the same being true of Chrono Cross and Parasite Eve 1. They finally got with the program with FF10, and put in a crapload of voice acting there, but all of it ranged from Average to Just Outright Bad. Who DIDN'T want to slap Tidus and Yuna in the face several times after listening to that godforsaken laugh scene? Then came Grandia 3--listening to Alfina in that game is like letting molten candy seep into your ears right to your brain, where it cools into crystals that tear your mind to shreds. And what about Final Fantasy 12? I can see FF10 having a bad time with voice acting when it's the first major venture into spoken lines SquareEnix took, but with the exception of Balthier and somewhat Fran, the only distinguishing characteristic to any of FF12's voice acting is the occasion obnoxious whine of Vaan. And what about the bland and lackluster vocal talents of Valkyrie Profile 2? These are recent games; it's not like they don't have examples of games with consistently excellent voice acting, like Tales of Legendia or Makai Kingdom. SquareEnix just seems shockingly backwards on this matter.***
*** Though, to be fair, they're not ALWAYS a miss--the Kingdom Hearts series's voice acting is good enough, and Star Ocean 3's was decent. But in general SquareEnix seems pretty out of it.
In the past, I resisted the idea of voice acting in RPGs. Well, not really resisted it, persay--more like I opposed the notion that it should be considered a significant factor in their quality. I thought that it was going to always be unimportant in enjoying a game for the reasons that I do find important: its plot and characters, the creativity and skill of the writing behind them. I insisted that a voice actor was unimportant to a character's portrayal and development, and that it would always solely be, as it had in the past, the character's dialog and actions that developed him, her, or it.
Now, I wasn't entirely off--the above two aspects of a character are still the greatest defining parts of that character in an RPG. And, as a plethora of RPGs from the NES, Genesis, SNES, Gameboy/Gameboy Advance, and even PS1, PS2, Game Cube, and PC prove, you can have fantastic characters without any voice acting at all.
Plus, further in my defense, the time period during which I formed this opinion on RPG voice acting was back in the days of Playstation 1 and N64. Back then, RPGs' strides into voice acting were both small (due to, I imagine, budget and space constraints, voiced parts of the game were usually restricted to a few important scenes and FMVs) and, well, just not very good. There were occasions where I liked the voices and the acting okay in the game--Lunar 2 and Grandia 1 come to mind--but "adequate" was about the highest praise you could give to that era's voice actors, and they usually didn't even warrant that much of a compliment. The situation wasn't helped by the fact that the RPG genre was still working out some last but very stubborn and noticeable vestiges of bad translation. The speech between Belmont and Dracula in Castlevania: Symphony of the Night may not be acted well to begin with, for example, but the fact that half of it doesn't really make much sense (even if it's memorable) worsens the problem.
So you clearly don't NEED voice acting to get a great character, and I think I had fair reason to think voice acting wasn't a big deal when it came onto the scene. But I've since had to relent in the face of many modern RPGs, and reform my opinion. Voice acting CAN make a significant difference to a character's quality and appeal. I still stand by the idea that it isn't a factor that can make or break a character, mind--Final Fantasy 10's Yuna sounds like she was voiced by an illiterate who hadn't slept in at least 2 days, but anyone who frequents these rants will know that I think very highly of her character. Conversely, I thought that Fran in Final Fantasy 12 had quite a competent voice actress, who affected an accent that was noticeable and distinguished the character, but did not distract from or become an obstacle to her dialogue...yet that doesn't stop me from seeing Fran as yet another boring automaton lacking any strong personality trait, like most of the other characters in FF12.
But if a voice actor, no matter how good or bad, can't change whether or not someone is actually a decent character or not, they CAN, at least, enhance that character's personality and quality through their performance. Makai Kingdom's Zetta's power-driven egomania is clear from his actions and dialogue, but his voice actor really drives that personality home with loud, commanding tones and challenging, boasting bursts of laughter. Tales of the Abyss makes it clear time and time again through his dialogue just what a snarky bastard Jade Curtiss is, but his voice acting just seals the deal entirely, enhancing every dry, witty line he says. And Kreia from Knights of the Old Republic 2...man, she would be a fascinating character without a single spoken word to match her dialogue, but the actress behind Kreia reaches vocal acting perfection with the role, flawlessly enhancing fantastic lines with an emphasis on Kreia's mix of age, wisdom, cunning, and darkness.
Now, I've gone over the subject, offered up an opinion about its importance, and thrown in a few examples here and there to illustrate my thoughts. It's usually at this point in the rant that I would state how the RPG industry should improve on this matter, and why.
Thing is, I can't really do that. With regards to voice acting, RPG companies have been more or less consistently going in the right direction from the Playstation 2 generation onward. Major RPGs generally include voice acting to a significant degree nowadays, making most or even nearly all their main dialogue voice acted. The voice acting quality is generally improved, too--games are more and more often hiring experienced professionals to do their voice acting, and even those RPG voice actors who don't have a long history of voice work seem to be being encouraged to do a better job, because it's uncommon to hear a character now whose voice actor isn't at the very least competent.* And it helps a good bit that the translations for the acted dialogue are, as a rule, much better than they used to be.
Game companies continue to put an emphasis on voice acting and take it seriously, and the effort shows in the good results it yields. Western RPGs like Mass Effect 1, Fallout 3, and Dragon Age Origins all have the kind of excellent voice acting which betters the characters and story-telling that you would expect--but more and more often, Japanese RPGs with entire casts of talented voice actors are popping up and rivaling the Western RPGs' voice acting quality on their own home turf. Japanese developer Nippon Ichi gets just the right voices to portray its games' characters just as often as Western developer Bioware does, it seems, and the localization team for Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 and 4 might have made their Japanese RPG that actually takes place in Japan seem more accessible and natural in its voice acting to the average American than even Fallout 3 was.
Voice acting may not be critical, but it is important. Luckily, RPG companies, with few exceptions,** have come to recognize this, and continue a trend of improving quality--and I'm pleased to see it happening.
* Uncommon, but not unknown--Suikoden Tierkreis is a recent game that I'm playing through now, and there are several characters who just aren't voiced well, most notably the protagonist. Non-named Suikoden heroes typically have an accepted "canon" name that fans dub them with (Riou in Suikoden 2, Faroush in Suikoden 5 (what a stupid name), etc), but Suikoden Tierkreis seems to have fans split between the names "Sieg" and "MotorMouth," and I throw my lot in with the latter. I swear the actor is racing against the text being printed on the screen as he blurts out his lines, and he's winning that race by a long shot. Still, my point on the general quality of voice acting improving stands; Suikoden Tierkreis is one of the only non-SquareEnix RPGs I've played in the last 5 years or so to have noticeably bad voice acting.
** Unfortunately, one of those exceptions is a rather prominent one: SquareEnix. I'm not sure what the deal is, but SquareEnix just seems to be 2 steps behind everyone else in the field of voice acting. From the very beginning, they were behind the ball--sure, they stuck some voice acting into Xenogears, but look at the Playstation 1 installments of their iconic Final Fantasy series. Of Final Fantasies 7, 8, 9, and Tactics, not a single one had any voice acting whatsoever, not to mention the same being true of Chrono Cross and Parasite Eve 1. They finally got with the program with FF10, and put in a crapload of voice acting there, but all of it ranged from Average to Just Outright Bad. Who DIDN'T want to slap Tidus and Yuna in the face several times after listening to that godforsaken laugh scene? Then came Grandia 3--listening to Alfina in that game is like letting molten candy seep into your ears right to your brain, where it cools into crystals that tear your mind to shreds. And what about Final Fantasy 12? I can see FF10 having a bad time with voice acting when it's the first major venture into spoken lines SquareEnix took, but with the exception of Balthier and somewhat Fran, the only distinguishing characteristic to any of FF12's voice acting is the occasion obnoxious whine of Vaan. And what about the bland and lackluster vocal talents of Valkyrie Profile 2? These are recent games; it's not like they don't have examples of games with consistently excellent voice acting, like Tales of Legendia or Makai Kingdom. SquareEnix just seems shockingly backwards on this matter.***
*** Though, to be fair, they're not ALWAYS a miss--the Kingdom Hearts series's voice acting is good enough, and Star Ocean 3's was decent. But in general SquareEnix seems pretty out of it.
Friday, February 5, 2010
Mass Effect 1's Saren: A Better Villain Before the Book "Revelation"
In honor of the recently released Mass Effect 2 (which I HIGHLY recommend you obtain right this second if you've played ME1, and if you haven't played ME1, I HIGHLY recommend you obtain ME2 right the second that you finish playing ME1, which is even MORE highly recommended that you get right this second. Wrap your mind around that if you can), I thought I'd do a rant on ME1. Of course, this is an odd honor, for this rant is going to be about an aspect that I didn't like about it, but, y'know, whatever.
Mass Effect 1 was a terrific RPG. New, different, and exceptionally created, it had good characters and a terrific plot that took place in an epic sci-fi setting, that wonderful kind of science fiction creation that not only gives you a great story immediately, but has the heart, the creativity, the imagination, the depth, and the scope that just begs to be expanded on. I hadn't gotten so fired up and interested in the vast creative potential of a science fiction setting since seeing the original Star Wars movies.
Bioware, the company that created Mass Effect, seemed to have a good idea of the potential of their creation. In addition to the game, two books were published about events occurring before and after ME1--the first book, Revelation, by Drew Karpyshyn, who is also one of the major writers behind the Mass Effect games, set several of the plot elements of ME1 into motion, while the second book, Ascension, by the same author, set up a side-story after ME1's events that (so far) has only minimal ties to the games' main plots. Now that ME2 is out, Bioware's got some more stuff hitting the markets to further expand its sci-fi thriller's depth--a comic book series, I think, along with another book or 2. I'm not sure, but I know I'll be checking them all out later, being the fanboy who is commercially easily-led that I am.
In general, a good idea--the Star Wars universe is at its very best, after all, in many of the published fanfiction by authors like Timothy Zahn, who expand the ideas and concepts of the Star Wars movies until a universe of exceeding depth and complexity has been formed from their contributions to it over the past few decades.* And in practice, a lot of the expanding that the Mass Effect books do is good stuff--gives you some more perspective on the Cerberus group from the games, a more detailed look on the past history of David Anderson (important bloke from the game), and so on. Aside from the stupid final part of the Revelation book which drops all the subtle foreshadowing of the game's events that the book had been doing so well until then and bonking you on the noggin clumsily with its plot set-ups ("OKAY IN CASE YOU DIDN'T GET IT SOMEHOW THIS IS THE BIG IMPORTANT THING HERE DO YOU SEE IT HERE HERE HERE LOOK"), I think the books accomplish what they're trying to do quite adequately.
Save for one significant problem: Saren. The antagonist (though not main villain) of Mass Effect 1, Saren in the game is a fairly good villain--I wouldn't call him great, but he's a cut above the standard RPG villain fair. Spoilers ahead, although I can't imagine many people who haven't played ME1 are going to bother to read this.
1. Saren has depth--as a Specter, Saren's goal ultimately is to protect galactic peace. When he encounters Sovereign and learns of the threat of the Reapers, Saren concludes that there is simply no possible way for the united people of the galaxy to resist the Reapers and win--a reasonable conclusion, given that the Reapers have systematically destroyed cultures in the past of equitable size and better technology in the past. He hopes that by serving the Reaper vanguard Sovereign, he can prove that the people of the galaxy can be useful to the Reapers if kept alive, thus preventing galaxy-wide genocide and saving trillions, maybe quadrillions of lives. He's weighed his options, and against such hopeless odds of victory, he feels that the way to protect the galaxy's people is to sacrifice their physical and mental freedom to save their lives.
2. Saren is a good opposite to the protagonist, Shepard--at least, if we assume that Shepard is a Paragon, and not a Renegade.*** Saren is willing to give up freedom to preserve life; Shepard will fight to the death to protect self-determination. Saren wants to play it safe and appease the superior force to save life; Shepard understands that the life without freedom is meaningless to have and will risk it all to protect its worth. Saren's morality can only see the big picture; Shepard's morality sees the small acts of heroism, courage, generosity, and unity that the big picture must be made from.
Basically, Saren in Mass Effect 1 is clearly the game's villain, but as that obvious villain, Saren has a good deal of depth and subtlety to make him both interesting and a good contrast to the game's protagonist.
The thing is, though, the book Revelation, which chronicles an adventure a couple decades before ME1 begins that prominently involves Saren, paints a very different picture of this character. Book-Saren has absolutely none of the elegant depth that made him more than just a sci-fi Snidely Whiplash. He's brutal, relentless, and without a conscience--he'll not only sacrifice innocents to meet his objectives without a second thought, he'll go out of his way to do so. Saren in the books is a deadly jerk who kills civilians indiscriminately and often. His job as a Spectre just gives him the excuse and the authority to murder anyone and everyone.
Saren from the game and Saren from the book both have an "ends justify the means" philosophy in what they do, but that's more or less where the similarity between them ends. Game-Saren pursues his twisted goal of saving the galaxy with unwavering purpose, taking whatever steps are necessary to achieve that goal--killing those who pose a threat, lying to those he can manipulate, and generally being a jerk--but a jerk with a plan. Book-Saren just goes out of his way to kill, his actions and demeanor suggesting that his work and goals take second place to his desire to end lives.
I mean, take this one scene from the book. To try to track down his quarry for his mission, Saren interrogates a hospitalized woman who may have information he needs. She's in a real bad way, having barely survived a building's exploding right next to her, so to get his information, Saren forces her awake--a dick thing to do, given that she's in excruciating pain from her injuries. This much rings true for the game's Saren--he'd have no qualms about doing such a thing in order to accomplish his goals. But then, when Saren's gotten all he can out of her, he doesn't give her the injection that can put her back to sleep and potentially save her life. He actually takes a moment to personally watch her die from his inaction, and then, when she dies, gives her the injection to cover up what he's done. There's no reason given for this, nothing he can possibly gain from it; he just does it because he's that much of a bastard.
This clumsily evil, spiteful, and murderous villain does not fit the image at all that the game gives us--that of a misguided villain who, although contemptible, at least has a purpose he strives for that he believes is noble. Book-Saren, in fact, actually creates a semi-plot hole--not only does he lessen the worth of the overall character of Saren, but he also creates the question of how such a brutish fiend wound up becoming a misguided villain. I mean, it just seems unlikely that a cruel, psychotic murderer who found Sovereign and found out about the Reapers' threat to the galaxy would say to himself, "Gee, up until now I've given every indication of having no interest in anything beyond killing people...but now that I've found something that could kill everyone everywhere, I think I'll attempt to save as many lives as possible from it!"
I suppose there are ways to explain it away--Sovereign's Indoctrination affecting Saren and causing him to change his mind, perhaps, but I can't see what Sovereign's motive would be in that, and the game implies that Sovereign's influence over Saren is minimal since Saren remains strong and efficient--but overall, Mass Effect 1's Saren was a far better villain before Revelation further developed (or perhaps "devolved" is a better term) him.
* Well, actually, the Star Wars universe is also at its best in the Knights of the Old Republic RPG series, too, but that distracts from the point I'm trying to make.**
** The small KotOR series, incidentally, got its start from Bioware--the Mass Effect folks. These people kick ASS!
*** Although it would still work fairly well--Renegade Shepard values power and dominion over all races, so Saren's still the logical antagonist, because the dominion over all life that he wants to give to the Reapers is the same dominion that Shepard wants for him/herself.
Mass Effect 1 was a terrific RPG. New, different, and exceptionally created, it had good characters and a terrific plot that took place in an epic sci-fi setting, that wonderful kind of science fiction creation that not only gives you a great story immediately, but has the heart, the creativity, the imagination, the depth, and the scope that just begs to be expanded on. I hadn't gotten so fired up and interested in the vast creative potential of a science fiction setting since seeing the original Star Wars movies.
Bioware, the company that created Mass Effect, seemed to have a good idea of the potential of their creation. In addition to the game, two books were published about events occurring before and after ME1--the first book, Revelation, by Drew Karpyshyn, who is also one of the major writers behind the Mass Effect games, set several of the plot elements of ME1 into motion, while the second book, Ascension, by the same author, set up a side-story after ME1's events that (so far) has only minimal ties to the games' main plots. Now that ME2 is out, Bioware's got some more stuff hitting the markets to further expand its sci-fi thriller's depth--a comic book series, I think, along with another book or 2. I'm not sure, but I know I'll be checking them all out later, being the fanboy who is commercially easily-led that I am.
In general, a good idea--the Star Wars universe is at its very best, after all, in many of the published fanfiction by authors like Timothy Zahn, who expand the ideas and concepts of the Star Wars movies until a universe of exceeding depth and complexity has been formed from their contributions to it over the past few decades.* And in practice, a lot of the expanding that the Mass Effect books do is good stuff--gives you some more perspective on the Cerberus group from the games, a more detailed look on the past history of David Anderson (important bloke from the game), and so on. Aside from the stupid final part of the Revelation book which drops all the subtle foreshadowing of the game's events that the book had been doing so well until then and bonking you on the noggin clumsily with its plot set-ups ("OKAY IN CASE YOU DIDN'T GET IT SOMEHOW THIS IS THE BIG IMPORTANT THING HERE DO YOU SEE IT HERE HERE HERE LOOK"), I think the books accomplish what they're trying to do quite adequately.
Save for one significant problem: Saren. The antagonist (though not main villain) of Mass Effect 1, Saren in the game is a fairly good villain--I wouldn't call him great, but he's a cut above the standard RPG villain fair. Spoilers ahead, although I can't imagine many people who haven't played ME1 are going to bother to read this.
1. Saren has depth--as a Specter, Saren's goal ultimately is to protect galactic peace. When he encounters Sovereign and learns of the threat of the Reapers, Saren concludes that there is simply no possible way for the united people of the galaxy to resist the Reapers and win--a reasonable conclusion, given that the Reapers have systematically destroyed cultures in the past of equitable size and better technology in the past. He hopes that by serving the Reaper vanguard Sovereign, he can prove that the people of the galaxy can be useful to the Reapers if kept alive, thus preventing galaxy-wide genocide and saving trillions, maybe quadrillions of lives. He's weighed his options, and against such hopeless odds of victory, he feels that the way to protect the galaxy's people is to sacrifice their physical and mental freedom to save their lives.
2. Saren is a good opposite to the protagonist, Shepard--at least, if we assume that Shepard is a Paragon, and not a Renegade.*** Saren is willing to give up freedom to preserve life; Shepard will fight to the death to protect self-determination. Saren wants to play it safe and appease the superior force to save life; Shepard understands that the life without freedom is meaningless to have and will risk it all to protect its worth. Saren's morality can only see the big picture; Shepard's morality sees the small acts of heroism, courage, generosity, and unity that the big picture must be made from.
Basically, Saren in Mass Effect 1 is clearly the game's villain, but as that obvious villain, Saren has a good deal of depth and subtlety to make him both interesting and a good contrast to the game's protagonist.
The thing is, though, the book Revelation, which chronicles an adventure a couple decades before ME1 begins that prominently involves Saren, paints a very different picture of this character. Book-Saren has absolutely none of the elegant depth that made him more than just a sci-fi Snidely Whiplash. He's brutal, relentless, and without a conscience--he'll not only sacrifice innocents to meet his objectives without a second thought, he'll go out of his way to do so. Saren in the books is a deadly jerk who kills civilians indiscriminately and often. His job as a Spectre just gives him the excuse and the authority to murder anyone and everyone.
Saren from the game and Saren from the book both have an "ends justify the means" philosophy in what they do, but that's more or less where the similarity between them ends. Game-Saren pursues his twisted goal of saving the galaxy with unwavering purpose, taking whatever steps are necessary to achieve that goal--killing those who pose a threat, lying to those he can manipulate, and generally being a jerk--but a jerk with a plan. Book-Saren just goes out of his way to kill, his actions and demeanor suggesting that his work and goals take second place to his desire to end lives.
I mean, take this one scene from the book. To try to track down his quarry for his mission, Saren interrogates a hospitalized woman who may have information he needs. She's in a real bad way, having barely survived a building's exploding right next to her, so to get his information, Saren forces her awake--a dick thing to do, given that she's in excruciating pain from her injuries. This much rings true for the game's Saren--he'd have no qualms about doing such a thing in order to accomplish his goals. But then, when Saren's gotten all he can out of her, he doesn't give her the injection that can put her back to sleep and potentially save her life. He actually takes a moment to personally watch her die from his inaction, and then, when she dies, gives her the injection to cover up what he's done. There's no reason given for this, nothing he can possibly gain from it; he just does it because he's that much of a bastard.
This clumsily evil, spiteful, and murderous villain does not fit the image at all that the game gives us--that of a misguided villain who, although contemptible, at least has a purpose he strives for that he believes is noble. Book-Saren, in fact, actually creates a semi-plot hole--not only does he lessen the worth of the overall character of Saren, but he also creates the question of how such a brutish fiend wound up becoming a misguided villain. I mean, it just seems unlikely that a cruel, psychotic murderer who found Sovereign and found out about the Reapers' threat to the galaxy would say to himself, "Gee, up until now I've given every indication of having no interest in anything beyond killing people...but now that I've found something that could kill everyone everywhere, I think I'll attempt to save as many lives as possible from it!"
I suppose there are ways to explain it away--Sovereign's Indoctrination affecting Saren and causing him to change his mind, perhaps, but I can't see what Sovereign's motive would be in that, and the game implies that Sovereign's influence over Saren is minimal since Saren remains strong and efficient--but overall, Mass Effect 1's Saren was a far better villain before Revelation further developed (or perhaps "devolved" is a better term) him.
* Well, actually, the Star Wars universe is also at its best in the Knights of the Old Republic RPG series, too, but that distracts from the point I'm trying to make.**
** The small KotOR series, incidentally, got its start from Bioware--the Mass Effect folks. These people kick ASS!
*** Although it would still work fairly well--Renegade Shepard values power and dominion over all races, so Saren's still the logical antagonist, because the dominion over all life that he wants to give to the Reapers is the same dominion that Shepard wants for him/herself.
Sunday, January 24, 2010
The Final Fantasy Series's Old School Vs. New School Arguments
Thanks to good sir Jolt for giving this a look-over to resolve some concerns I had with it.
Old Vs. New, the eternal debate. Which was better, the original Batman movie by Tim Burton or the new ones? Which did you prefer, The Real Ghostbusters cartoon from the 80s, or the 90s Extreme Ghostbusters? Which is more annoying, a heavy-handed dose of guilt ineptly dumped on you by a rapping, psychotic bat, or by a blue cat alien thing?*
The question of whether things were better in the old days or are better now is one which even the relatively new video game industry is besieged with, and that definitely includes the RPG genre. Although there are plenty of examples of this, the RPG Old Vs. New argument I hear most often is about the Final Fantasy series. And good God, it is getting tiring.
The first problem I have with it is the way people argue it. Regardless of what camp they're on, they seem to believe that ALL games that fit into their school must be good simply because of the time they were made. They're always making blanket statements, like "The old games were better because they didn't let graphics distract them from characters and plot!" and "The new games look better and are more creative!" The problem here is that the blanket statements are just never entirely true. You can't say that the old school games had superior plot and character focus when the old school of Final Fantasy features the bland and generic Final Fantasy Mystic Quest, and the boring and outright stupid Final Fantasy 5. Nor can you say that the new games necessarily look better--the sprites and backgrounds may be slightly more advanced in Final Fantasy Tactics and Tactics Advance 1 than in the SNES titles, but it's not by much, and in the end it's still super-deformed little blocks marching around on a simplistic background--or are more creative, given the insanely dull Final Fantasy 12, whose few plot twists are just old devices taken from other rubbish (really, Basch? You're going to pull the soap opera "My Evil Twin Did It" thing?).
It's not that I don't think some installments in the series shouldn't be compared and contrasted with others (or even RPGs outside the FF series). It's just that the people who make these Old vs. New arguments about Final Fantasy never seem to be interested in actually debating the merits of the games, nearly always make the stupid generalizations I mentioned above, and just appear to want to find something to be negative about without actually thinking about whether the negativity is justified.
The next problem I have is how the devil you even qualify what constitutes Final Fantasy Old School from New School. Traditionally, Old School is everything made before Final Fantasy 7, and Final Fantasy 7 begins the New School. Well, this might have been a fair distinction to make back in 2002 when FF10 was brand new, but at this point in time, Final Fantasy 7 is over 10 years old. Not only that, but it was the first game on the Playstation 1, a console from 2 system generations ago. You can say that FF7 took the series in a totally different direction, but most FFs are departed from the rest of the series in their styles, and that original FF style has returned for several titles since FF7's release--FFT, FFTA1, FF Crystal Chronicles, FF9, and so on. Hell, I'd say that FF12 took the series in a new direction far more drastically than FF7, creating a strongly different hybrid of fantasy and technology that was totally different from all previous games' mild mixes of the two--not just that, but FF12 also added a heavy dose of MMORPG style with its battle system, a greater step beyond previous installments in the series (save FF11, which IS an MMORPG) than FF7 was from FFs 1-6.
So if it's not accurate to judge a game over a decade old as being the turning point between old and new, where DOES the line fall with the series? FFT, a distinctly medieval-style game akin to the traditional idea of "old school," came out soon after FF7. FF8, another of the traditional "new school," is also over 10 years old. FF9 can't possibly count because it deliberately molded itself to fit the old Final Fantasy style. So is FF10, first Playstation 2 Final Fantasy, the turning point now? Because then things seem really off--the Old School will include FF7 and 8, which are radically different from the rest of the Old School, the New School will be composed of only 3 (soon to be 4) all-important numbered titles to the Old School's 9, and practically half of the New School's Final Fantasies are spin-offs of Old School titles (FF7, most notably). Not only that, but with FF11 being an online RPG, and FF12 being a mix of Star Wars, online RPGs, and Final Fantasy Tactics, making it, as I mentioned, more drastically different from practically every other FF than even FF7 was from its predecessors, the entirety of New School is a confused jumble of dissimilar styles and directions.
So the School arguments don't work because their respective games don't have enough in common regarding quality to qualify for blanket statements, and because there's no logical spot to draw the line between Old and New. But that's not even the most important reason this heated debate makes no sense! The biggest reason is that the quality of games on each side is all over the place. Seriously, how can anyone say that New School is better than Old School when newer FF games include the lethally boring Final Fantasy 12 and the unspeakably repulsive FF10-2? How can you seriously say that Old School is boring when you have the imaginative, brisk storytelling of Final Fantasy 6? How can you say that the writing for the New School always sucks when it has the deep and dynamic characters of Tidus and Yuna, and the great themes of FF9?
I mean, I know I've said SquareEnix sucks lately, and I'll stick by that statement, but I'm not saying that the games are bad because they're new or all conform to certain new trends--they're bad because they're bad on an individual basis. Being new or old has no bearing on whether the game is good or not. When (or maybe I should say if) SquareEnix makes a good new Final Fantasy, I'll be happy to remark upon it as such--hell, I actually quite enjoyed the recent Valkyrie Profile: Covenant of the Plume, so there must be SOMEONE in the company still who has some talent. But dismissing a Final Fantasy (or any other RPG) because of the year it was made? That's ridiculous.
Old School Vs. New School with the Final Fantasy series is stupid, or at least the people debating it are, along with their rationales. I've got a visual aid here that, I feel, properly and mathematically describes this situation, borrowed courtesy of good lady Iris Amergin, or Hezul, or Zionga, or whatever she calls herself (woman changes screen names way too often), and altered just a bit. I feel that it is as proper a close to this rant as is possible.
* And while we're at it, which is a more evolutionarily unsound creature: a lizard that sings loudly to all its potential prey within hearing distance about how it's hungry, or a bug whose escape mechanism is to jump up and spin around while glowing neon pink against a predominantly dark blue forest background?**
** Yeah, yeah, I know. You've probably heard about a million jabs at Avatar for being Ferngully meets Disney's Pocahontas meets a million other times you've seen the same story played out. So sue me; I don't feel bad. Millions and MILLIONS of dollars were spent on Avatar that could have gone to worthy causes--at the very least, better movies--and what's the finished product? A movie with a plot so unoriginal and hackneyed, characters so shallow and stereotypical, and a romance so generic and unexamined, that comparing Avatar to Ferngully and Pocahontas is an insult to THEM, not it.
Old Vs. New, the eternal debate. Which was better, the original Batman movie by Tim Burton or the new ones? Which did you prefer, The Real Ghostbusters cartoon from the 80s, or the 90s Extreme Ghostbusters? Which is more annoying, a heavy-handed dose of guilt ineptly dumped on you by a rapping, psychotic bat, or by a blue cat alien thing?*
The question of whether things were better in the old days or are better now is one which even the relatively new video game industry is besieged with, and that definitely includes the RPG genre. Although there are plenty of examples of this, the RPG Old Vs. New argument I hear most often is about the Final Fantasy series. And good God, it is getting tiring.
The first problem I have with it is the way people argue it. Regardless of what camp they're on, they seem to believe that ALL games that fit into their school must be good simply because of the time they were made. They're always making blanket statements, like "The old games were better because they didn't let graphics distract them from characters and plot!" and "The new games look better and are more creative!" The problem here is that the blanket statements are just never entirely true. You can't say that the old school games had superior plot and character focus when the old school of Final Fantasy features the bland and generic Final Fantasy Mystic Quest, and the boring and outright stupid Final Fantasy 5. Nor can you say that the new games necessarily look better--the sprites and backgrounds may be slightly more advanced in Final Fantasy Tactics and Tactics Advance 1 than in the SNES titles, but it's not by much, and in the end it's still super-deformed little blocks marching around on a simplistic background--or are more creative, given the insanely dull Final Fantasy 12, whose few plot twists are just old devices taken from other rubbish (really, Basch? You're going to pull the soap opera "My Evil Twin Did It" thing?).
It's not that I don't think some installments in the series shouldn't be compared and contrasted with others (or even RPGs outside the FF series). It's just that the people who make these Old vs. New arguments about Final Fantasy never seem to be interested in actually debating the merits of the games, nearly always make the stupid generalizations I mentioned above, and just appear to want to find something to be negative about without actually thinking about whether the negativity is justified.
The next problem I have is how the devil you even qualify what constitutes Final Fantasy Old School from New School. Traditionally, Old School is everything made before Final Fantasy 7, and Final Fantasy 7 begins the New School. Well, this might have been a fair distinction to make back in 2002 when FF10 was brand new, but at this point in time, Final Fantasy 7 is over 10 years old. Not only that, but it was the first game on the Playstation 1, a console from 2 system generations ago. You can say that FF7 took the series in a totally different direction, but most FFs are departed from the rest of the series in their styles, and that original FF style has returned for several titles since FF7's release--FFT, FFTA1, FF Crystal Chronicles, FF9, and so on. Hell, I'd say that FF12 took the series in a new direction far more drastically than FF7, creating a strongly different hybrid of fantasy and technology that was totally different from all previous games' mild mixes of the two--not just that, but FF12 also added a heavy dose of MMORPG style with its battle system, a greater step beyond previous installments in the series (save FF11, which IS an MMORPG) than FF7 was from FFs 1-6.
So if it's not accurate to judge a game over a decade old as being the turning point between old and new, where DOES the line fall with the series? FFT, a distinctly medieval-style game akin to the traditional idea of "old school," came out soon after FF7. FF8, another of the traditional "new school," is also over 10 years old. FF9 can't possibly count because it deliberately molded itself to fit the old Final Fantasy style. So is FF10, first Playstation 2 Final Fantasy, the turning point now? Because then things seem really off--the Old School will include FF7 and 8, which are radically different from the rest of the Old School, the New School will be composed of only 3 (soon to be 4) all-important numbered titles to the Old School's 9, and practically half of the New School's Final Fantasies are spin-offs of Old School titles (FF7, most notably). Not only that, but with FF11 being an online RPG, and FF12 being a mix of Star Wars, online RPGs, and Final Fantasy Tactics, making it, as I mentioned, more drastically different from practically every other FF than even FF7 was from its predecessors, the entirety of New School is a confused jumble of dissimilar styles and directions.
So the School arguments don't work because their respective games don't have enough in common regarding quality to qualify for blanket statements, and because there's no logical spot to draw the line between Old and New. But that's not even the most important reason this heated debate makes no sense! The biggest reason is that the quality of games on each side is all over the place. Seriously, how can anyone say that New School is better than Old School when newer FF games include the lethally boring Final Fantasy 12 and the unspeakably repulsive FF10-2? How can you seriously say that Old School is boring when you have the imaginative, brisk storytelling of Final Fantasy 6? How can you say that the writing for the New School always sucks when it has the deep and dynamic characters of Tidus and Yuna, and the great themes of FF9?
I mean, I know I've said SquareEnix sucks lately, and I'll stick by that statement, but I'm not saying that the games are bad because they're new or all conform to certain new trends--they're bad because they're bad on an individual basis. Being new or old has no bearing on whether the game is good or not. When (or maybe I should say if) SquareEnix makes a good new Final Fantasy, I'll be happy to remark upon it as such--hell, I actually quite enjoyed the recent Valkyrie Profile: Covenant of the Plume, so there must be SOMEONE in the company still who has some talent. But dismissing a Final Fantasy (or any other RPG) because of the year it was made? That's ridiculous.
Old School Vs. New School with the Final Fantasy series is stupid, or at least the people debating it are, along with their rationales. I've got a visual aid here that, I feel, properly and mathematically describes this situation, borrowed courtesy of good lady Iris Amergin, or Hezul, or Zionga, or whatever she calls herself (woman changes screen names way too often), and altered just a bit. I feel that it is as proper a close to this rant as is possible.
* And while we're at it, which is a more evolutionarily unsound creature: a lizard that sings loudly to all its potential prey within hearing distance about how it's hungry, or a bug whose escape mechanism is to jump up and spin around while glowing neon pink against a predominantly dark blue forest background?**
** Yeah, yeah, I know. You've probably heard about a million jabs at Avatar for being Ferngully meets Disney's Pocahontas meets a million other times you've seen the same story played out. So sue me; I don't feel bad. Millions and MILLIONS of dollars were spent on Avatar that could have gone to worthy causes--at the very least, better movies--and what's the finished product? A movie with a plot so unoriginal and hackneyed, characters so shallow and stereotypical, and a romance so generic and unexamined, that comparing Avatar to Ferngully and Pocahontas is an insult to THEM, not it.
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Fallout 3 AMV: Land of Confusion
I've mentioned before that Fallout 3 makes for a good AMV subject. It's got lots of strong visuals, lots of good, varied content in its plot and characters, a ton of freedom since you can get an editor program for it for free that lets you tinker with it as you please, and the general feel of the game is dark, gritty, and powerful, which makes it work well with songs of the same style--something most RPGs, which come from Japan, don't share the spirit of as well. So expect quite a few of these AMV rants to be about offerings for Fallout 3--I've had one before, today's is another, and I've got a third on standby for a later rant, too.
Today's AMV is actually 2 in 1. Basically, a creative bloke by the name of Joylock made an AMV for Fallout 3 to the song Land of Confusion, by Genesis, a mid-1980s rock song. Joylock also, however, copied the visual sequence of the AMV he'd made and put it to the recent remake of Land of Confusion, redone by Disturbed. While the general tone of the music is much different for the Disturbed version, turning the song to a louder, heavier rock, the lyrics and pace of it is identical to the original Genesis version, so each AMV is virtually identical. So I figured, why not just post'em both and review them together?
And be warned twice over (or is it 4 times over, given that I'm giving 2 warnings for 2 videos?): 1. The content of this AMV requires some discussion of minor bits of the plot of Fallout 3, so Spoilers, and 2. Fallout 3's a pretty gory game, and although the AMVs don't really emphasize it one way or another, there IS some blood-and-guts content in there.
Fallout 3: Land of Confusion (Genesis): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HGrOErmPvY8 (Kept on my channel due to its disappearance on Joylock's)
Fallout 3: Land of Confusion (Disturbed): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KRPKghuKPus
Poetry in Motion: The visual component to this AMV is...well, it's pretty great. I mean, yes, the zooms and general movement of the camera is at times slightly jerky, but it's in-game footage. It's forgivable, and so small that it's barely worth even mentioning.
Other than that negligible flaw? Terrific. This visuals do everything they should, everything they're meant to, and do so in good quality. The video pretty much looks as good as the game itself does, and the various post-apocalyptic settings and characters of Fallout harmonize quite well with tone and ideas of the song playing. There are also many visual bells and whistles thrown in here that grab one's attention. Joylock multiple times fades from one scene to another using a central image to connect the scenes--as an example, early on you see this happen at 0:11, where a scene of the US flag changes to a view of a wall poster that has a soldier holding the flag aloft, then changes again to a different poster that has the flag in the background. This sort of thing is neat, and it's shown up in previous AMVs I've shown you all, but Joylock seems to do it with extra skill--using the example I just cited, the scenes go from showing the object (the flag) live and proud, then just proudly depicted, and finally only depicted in the background and in poor shape. Joylock's not only doing the connecting-scenes trick, but he's also using that trick to show the focused object (and all it symbolizes) decomposing. Quite neat, ties in well with the song (as I'll get into below)...and all within the first 15 seconds of the AMV. Other examples of this focal-point-scene-change-thingy: 0:32, where the Eyebot of the Enclave becomes the scene of the Enclave's computer president, 2:17, where you see avenues of various locations in Fallout 3's world, and particularly 2:24, where you see a montage of almost all of the characters who can follow you,* and each is centered and zoomed in on so that their faces are all occupying about the same spot on the screen. There's also the scene-change effect at 2:37 that goes to 2:46, which is a continually spinning shot of a playground where a person is standing on one of those turning playground things (dunno what they're called, actually) that changes from seeing an adult on it to seeing a kid on it, and goes from color to black and white to color again, which is neat, and leads to 2:49, which has some hokey little non-Fallout footage of a family dinner setting from the 50s, that shifts into a scene from the game so that the speaker in the 1950s clip becomes the Fallout 3 main character's father. And there are plenty more in there, but if I go over EVERY neat detail of this video, this rant will seriously just never end.
My favorite visual effect, though, has to be 2:58, where a side-scrolling scene of an idyllic neighborhood goes by a Speed Limit sign, which obscures the rest of the scene as it passes and, halfway through its passing by, changes to the dirty, washed-out Speed Limit sign of some ruins of the regular Fallout 3 setting, giving you a great before-and-after shot that transitions flawlessly. Damn cool.
The Hills are Alive with the Sound of Music: This is an AMV that is mostly centered around its song. The last AMV I reviewed, the Shadow Hearts 1 + 2 As the Warlock Said one, basically had a story to tell that it used its song for, but here, the opposite's true--the AMV is set up around the music, made to tell the story the song relates rather than have the song emphasize the video's purpose. And it works extremely well--Fallout 3 matches the tone of each version of Land of Confusion near perfectly, having both the disjointed, askew mysticism of the 80s rock in the Genesis version while also epitomizing the harsh, relentless chaos of the heavier Disturbed remake.
In addition to picking a great game for the song's mood, Joylock also matches the scenes shown to the music's lyrics and pitch masterfully. Almost every, if not just every single, lyric line has a scene that coordinates with it--showing various blackened skeletons to the words, "Been haunted by a million screams," showing the characters Gob and Nova listening to the news radio to the words "Did you read the news today," a scene of a far-off nuclear explosion to the words "Burning into the night," a zooming-out shot of one of the many desolate parts of the wasteland to the words "This is the world we live in," a scene of the defaced Lincoln monument to the words, "Superman, where are you now"...all of those are just in the first minute and a half, and I didn't even mention half of the examples from that opening period of the video that I could have. It all still has the feeling of the one component (Fallout 3) being made to work with the other part (the song), without feeling completely meshed and synchronized the way the last AMV I reviewed did, but the scenes and music are nonetheless perfectly coordinated from beginning to end.
But what does it all mean, Basil?: As I said, the feeling of this AMV is that the game was taken and matched to the music's ideas, rather than the other way around. This is usually a bad idea with AMVs, because it often results in a video that's just throwing a game's visuals in there without having them really tied to the message being conveyed in any particular way. Usually--but definitely not here. The ideas expressed in Land of Confusion are a perfect match to Fallout 3, the story of struggle to make the world a good place to live in, against overwhelming adversity. The very core of Fallout 3's plot is that of a few good people going to outstanding lengths to better their hellhole of a world for all who live in it, proactively trying to fix it rather than simply accept and be corrupted by it, even though it's filled from one end to the other with the evils of humanity that made it this way. And Joylock just...completely and utterly ties the song and game together by their shared theme and really gives the viewer something neat.
The major theme in this AMV, from what I gather, is to show the struggle between those whose evil ways perpetuate the hell of Fallout 3's world, and those individuals who throw themselves into their work to better the world, to make it, as the song says, "a world worth fighting for." The AMV starts by speaking of the fallen dreams of the past, showing us symbols of the United States of America, and then drops us into the reality that those dreams are nothing more than dreams with scenes of armed soldiers running through a town's street firing. The chorus, though, is where the real heart of the song and of the AMV lies. "Too many men, too many people," is accompanied each time it plays by the greatest villains of Fallout 3's wastelands--Tenpenny, a rich, deluded asshole who only offers protection in his tower from a world of horrific danger and violence to those who pay him and who is willing to nuke a nearby settlement of people because it obstructs his view, Eulogy Jones, the leader of the huge slaver operation in Fallout 3's area of the wastelands, the Vault 101 Overseeer, who shows that even a man with only a small amount of power can still be a tyrant if put in the proper setting, Ashur, whose good intentions paved the way to a hell of his own creation, a tyrannical society built off the brutalized backs of hundreds of slaves, and of course, the leaders of the Enclave, who want to kill all the people of the wastes to claim the land for themselves in their deluded attempt to resurrect a twisted form of the United States, among others. These villains are powerful symbols of human vice, the evils that caused the Fallout world's ruin in the first place.
At the same time, though, the AMV shows the people of the Fallout world who devote themselves utterly to making their world a place worth living in--Moira, who aims to write and distribute a book on how to survive in the wasteland, Dr. Lee, who works to improve the food and more importantly water of the wastes, Three Dog, who relentlessly spreads the truth across the wastes via his radio station, the guardians of the secret grove of trees to the north of the wasteland, who hope that the forest could one day spread far enough to cover the wastes with greenery and life, Sarah Lyons, the greatest warrior of the one group brave and good enough to take an open stand against the Enclave and Super Mutants that imperil every innocent inhabitant of the wastes, and various other individuals whose list of worthwhile causes range from simply defending a tiny town all by themselves to relentlessly protection of the Declaration of Independence, one of the greatest symbols of freedom and self-determination in history, to an old adventurer whose idealistic explorations in his youth provide a heroic example for next generation. Just as the villains of Fallout 3 embody our greatest vices, the people shown on the other side, working in their own ways to improve their world, embody our greatest virtues--truth, duty, honor, hope, selflessness, heroism, and so on.
The video shows these contrasting groups of people, and also shows the conflict between them, the battle for the future of this desolate world. You see the Joylock's version of the main character, the Lone Wanderer, defeating several of the purveyors of vice that are shown,** while also watching scenes of the battles between the evil Enclave and the virtuous Brotherhood of Steel, along with general fighting among the wastelands against mutants, the residents of Big Town learning how to defend themselves, and so on. You also see the conflict between evil and good in a less tangible sense, with the video contrasting the good and hopeful past with the desolate present, and then finally ending with a glimpse of what could be--a world where pure, non-radiated water flows plentiful, where the wastelands are being covered once again by grass and trees (all with the help of the Fallout 3 editor program; such scenes certainly don't exist normally within the game). The song is both dark and inspiring, speaking of a world full of vices while acknowledging the possibility that it could be turned around people working to make it better, and the AMV shows this perfectly, portraying Fallout 3's world and the conflicts within it that make it seem hopeless, but nonetheless showing the spark of hope that exists within it and ending with a hopeful vision of the future, and a shot of the 2 greatest heroes for the Capital Wasteland's future, Sarah Lyons and the Lone Wanderer, along with the Bible passage that started the game's major quest and struggle.
In all honesty, this is one of the greatest AMVs I've ever seen. Every time I watch it over again, I'm filled anew with respect for how well it's put together. Not a full 10 seconds go by at any part of it where the AMV's story isn't being perfectly told, and for anyone who's played Fallout 3, the AMV's relation to the actual events and people of the game are more than just accurate--they're insightful, making you look back on those aspects of the game with a new appreciation and/or interest in just how symbolic they actually are. It has a message, it portrays its message through unity of sight and sound excellently, it has serious skill in its execution, and it even gives new perspective to old content. I am genuinely impressed by this AMV.
(Oh yes, and as far as which version is better...I personally like the Genesis version of the song better, the Disturbed one being too loud and annoying for my tastes, but I think the Disturbed version might be a slightly better fit for Fallout 3. Like I said before, each has its merits and ties in with the game's world and events, but the harsher tone of the Disturbed version of Land of Confusion just harmonizes better with Fallout 3's chaotic, destructive world, and also better emphasizes the conflict between good and evil shown in the AMV).
* WHERE THE HELL IS DOGMEAT?
** Including one where the Lone Wanderer punches Tenpenny's goon right off the tower. Now that is awesome.
Today's AMV is actually 2 in 1. Basically, a creative bloke by the name of Joylock made an AMV for Fallout 3 to the song Land of Confusion, by Genesis, a mid-1980s rock song. Joylock also, however, copied the visual sequence of the AMV he'd made and put it to the recent remake of Land of Confusion, redone by Disturbed. While the general tone of the music is much different for the Disturbed version, turning the song to a louder, heavier rock, the lyrics and pace of it is identical to the original Genesis version, so each AMV is virtually identical. So I figured, why not just post'em both and review them together?
And be warned twice over (or is it 4 times over, given that I'm giving 2 warnings for 2 videos?): 1. The content of this AMV requires some discussion of minor bits of the plot of Fallout 3, so Spoilers, and 2. Fallout 3's a pretty gory game, and although the AMVs don't really emphasize it one way or another, there IS some blood-and-guts content in there.
Fallout 3: Land of Confusion (Genesis): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HGrOErmPvY8 (Kept on my channel due to its disappearance on Joylock's)
Fallout 3: Land of Confusion (Disturbed): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KRPKghuKPus
Poetry in Motion: The visual component to this AMV is...well, it's pretty great. I mean, yes, the zooms and general movement of the camera is at times slightly jerky, but it's in-game footage. It's forgivable, and so small that it's barely worth even mentioning.
Other than that negligible flaw? Terrific. This visuals do everything they should, everything they're meant to, and do so in good quality. The video pretty much looks as good as the game itself does, and the various post-apocalyptic settings and characters of Fallout harmonize quite well with tone and ideas of the song playing. There are also many visual bells and whistles thrown in here that grab one's attention. Joylock multiple times fades from one scene to another using a central image to connect the scenes--as an example, early on you see this happen at 0:11, where a scene of the US flag changes to a view of a wall poster that has a soldier holding the flag aloft, then changes again to a different poster that has the flag in the background. This sort of thing is neat, and it's shown up in previous AMVs I've shown you all, but Joylock seems to do it with extra skill--using the example I just cited, the scenes go from showing the object (the flag) live and proud, then just proudly depicted, and finally only depicted in the background and in poor shape. Joylock's not only doing the connecting-scenes trick, but he's also using that trick to show the focused object (and all it symbolizes) decomposing. Quite neat, ties in well with the song (as I'll get into below)...and all within the first 15 seconds of the AMV. Other examples of this focal-point-scene-change-thingy: 0:32, where the Eyebot of the Enclave becomes the scene of the Enclave's computer president, 2:17, where you see avenues of various locations in Fallout 3's world, and particularly 2:24, where you see a montage of almost all of the characters who can follow you,* and each is centered and zoomed in on so that their faces are all occupying about the same spot on the screen. There's also the scene-change effect at 2:37 that goes to 2:46, which is a continually spinning shot of a playground where a person is standing on one of those turning playground things (dunno what they're called, actually) that changes from seeing an adult on it to seeing a kid on it, and goes from color to black and white to color again, which is neat, and leads to 2:49, which has some hokey little non-Fallout footage of a family dinner setting from the 50s, that shifts into a scene from the game so that the speaker in the 1950s clip becomes the Fallout 3 main character's father. And there are plenty more in there, but if I go over EVERY neat detail of this video, this rant will seriously just never end.
My favorite visual effect, though, has to be 2:58, where a side-scrolling scene of an idyllic neighborhood goes by a Speed Limit sign, which obscures the rest of the scene as it passes and, halfway through its passing by, changes to the dirty, washed-out Speed Limit sign of some ruins of the regular Fallout 3 setting, giving you a great before-and-after shot that transitions flawlessly. Damn cool.
The Hills are Alive with the Sound of Music: This is an AMV that is mostly centered around its song. The last AMV I reviewed, the Shadow Hearts 1 + 2 As the Warlock Said one, basically had a story to tell that it used its song for, but here, the opposite's true--the AMV is set up around the music, made to tell the story the song relates rather than have the song emphasize the video's purpose. And it works extremely well--Fallout 3 matches the tone of each version of Land of Confusion near perfectly, having both the disjointed, askew mysticism of the 80s rock in the Genesis version while also epitomizing the harsh, relentless chaos of the heavier Disturbed remake.
In addition to picking a great game for the song's mood, Joylock also matches the scenes shown to the music's lyrics and pitch masterfully. Almost every, if not just every single, lyric line has a scene that coordinates with it--showing various blackened skeletons to the words, "Been haunted by a million screams," showing the characters Gob and Nova listening to the news radio to the words "Did you read the news today," a scene of a far-off nuclear explosion to the words "Burning into the night," a zooming-out shot of one of the many desolate parts of the wasteland to the words "This is the world we live in," a scene of the defaced Lincoln monument to the words, "Superman, where are you now"...all of those are just in the first minute and a half, and I didn't even mention half of the examples from that opening period of the video that I could have. It all still has the feeling of the one component (Fallout 3) being made to work with the other part (the song), without feeling completely meshed and synchronized the way the last AMV I reviewed did, but the scenes and music are nonetheless perfectly coordinated from beginning to end.
But what does it all mean, Basil?: As I said, the feeling of this AMV is that the game was taken and matched to the music's ideas, rather than the other way around. This is usually a bad idea with AMVs, because it often results in a video that's just throwing a game's visuals in there without having them really tied to the message being conveyed in any particular way. Usually--but definitely not here. The ideas expressed in Land of Confusion are a perfect match to Fallout 3, the story of struggle to make the world a good place to live in, against overwhelming adversity. The very core of Fallout 3's plot is that of a few good people going to outstanding lengths to better their hellhole of a world for all who live in it, proactively trying to fix it rather than simply accept and be corrupted by it, even though it's filled from one end to the other with the evils of humanity that made it this way. And Joylock just...completely and utterly ties the song and game together by their shared theme and really gives the viewer something neat.
The major theme in this AMV, from what I gather, is to show the struggle between those whose evil ways perpetuate the hell of Fallout 3's world, and those individuals who throw themselves into their work to better the world, to make it, as the song says, "a world worth fighting for." The AMV starts by speaking of the fallen dreams of the past, showing us symbols of the United States of America, and then drops us into the reality that those dreams are nothing more than dreams with scenes of armed soldiers running through a town's street firing. The chorus, though, is where the real heart of the song and of the AMV lies. "Too many men, too many people," is accompanied each time it plays by the greatest villains of Fallout 3's wastelands--Tenpenny, a rich, deluded asshole who only offers protection in his tower from a world of horrific danger and violence to those who pay him and who is willing to nuke a nearby settlement of people because it obstructs his view, Eulogy Jones, the leader of the huge slaver operation in Fallout 3's area of the wastelands, the Vault 101 Overseeer, who shows that even a man with only a small amount of power can still be a tyrant if put in the proper setting, Ashur, whose good intentions paved the way to a hell of his own creation, a tyrannical society built off the brutalized backs of hundreds of slaves, and of course, the leaders of the Enclave, who want to kill all the people of the wastes to claim the land for themselves in their deluded attempt to resurrect a twisted form of the United States, among others. These villains are powerful symbols of human vice, the evils that caused the Fallout world's ruin in the first place.
At the same time, though, the AMV shows the people of the Fallout world who devote themselves utterly to making their world a place worth living in--Moira, who aims to write and distribute a book on how to survive in the wasteland, Dr. Lee, who works to improve the food and more importantly water of the wastes, Three Dog, who relentlessly spreads the truth across the wastes via his radio station, the guardians of the secret grove of trees to the north of the wasteland, who hope that the forest could one day spread far enough to cover the wastes with greenery and life, Sarah Lyons, the greatest warrior of the one group brave and good enough to take an open stand against the Enclave and Super Mutants that imperil every innocent inhabitant of the wastes, and various other individuals whose list of worthwhile causes range from simply defending a tiny town all by themselves to relentlessly protection of the Declaration of Independence, one of the greatest symbols of freedom and self-determination in history, to an old adventurer whose idealistic explorations in his youth provide a heroic example for next generation. Just as the villains of Fallout 3 embody our greatest vices, the people shown on the other side, working in their own ways to improve their world, embody our greatest virtues--truth, duty, honor, hope, selflessness, heroism, and so on.
The video shows these contrasting groups of people, and also shows the conflict between them, the battle for the future of this desolate world. You see the Joylock's version of the main character, the Lone Wanderer, defeating several of the purveyors of vice that are shown,** while also watching scenes of the battles between the evil Enclave and the virtuous Brotherhood of Steel, along with general fighting among the wastelands against mutants, the residents of Big Town learning how to defend themselves, and so on. You also see the conflict between evil and good in a less tangible sense, with the video contrasting the good and hopeful past with the desolate present, and then finally ending with a glimpse of what could be--a world where pure, non-radiated water flows plentiful, where the wastelands are being covered once again by grass and trees (all with the help of the Fallout 3 editor program; such scenes certainly don't exist normally within the game). The song is both dark and inspiring, speaking of a world full of vices while acknowledging the possibility that it could be turned around people working to make it better, and the AMV shows this perfectly, portraying Fallout 3's world and the conflicts within it that make it seem hopeless, but nonetheless showing the spark of hope that exists within it and ending with a hopeful vision of the future, and a shot of the 2 greatest heroes for the Capital Wasteland's future, Sarah Lyons and the Lone Wanderer, along with the Bible passage that started the game's major quest and struggle.
In all honesty, this is one of the greatest AMVs I've ever seen. Every time I watch it over again, I'm filled anew with respect for how well it's put together. Not a full 10 seconds go by at any part of it where the AMV's story isn't being perfectly told, and for anyone who's played Fallout 3, the AMV's relation to the actual events and people of the game are more than just accurate--they're insightful, making you look back on those aspects of the game with a new appreciation and/or interest in just how symbolic they actually are. It has a message, it portrays its message through unity of sight and sound excellently, it has serious skill in its execution, and it even gives new perspective to old content. I am genuinely impressed by this AMV.
(Oh yes, and as far as which version is better...I personally like the Genesis version of the song better, the Disturbed one being too loud and annoying for my tastes, but I think the Disturbed version might be a slightly better fit for Fallout 3. Like I said before, each has its merits and ties in with the game's world and events, but the harsher tone of the Disturbed version of Land of Confusion just harmonizes better with Fallout 3's chaotic, destructive world, and also better emphasizes the conflict between good and evil shown in the AMV).
* WHERE THE HELL IS DOGMEAT?
** Including one where the Lone Wanderer punches Tenpenny's goon right off the tower. Now that is awesome.
Friday, January 1, 2010
Dragon Age 1's Sex Scene's Equality
Remember a little while back, say, a year ago to this day, when I made a rant about Mass Effect 1's sex scene's inequality, complaining about the fact that the game gives you the option to pursue a heterosexual or lesbian romance for main character Shepard, but does not allow for a gay male relationship? My statement, which I continue to stand behind, more or less was that it cheapens the entire thing to have one homosexual option but not the other, when the one you do include is the one that will be considered "hot" by more of your intended audience than the other option. Now, I ain't a squealing yaoi fangirl, and I preferred in ME1 to play as a female and liked Liara (the female character who will romance your protagonist regardless of gender) the best as a character out of the potential romancers, so I wouldn't really have taken advantage of a guy-guy romance option anyway. But there WERE a lot of people who would have and wanted it, and either way, not having the less marketable one for no reason save the obvious implication that it's not a selling point cheapens what options ARE there. Instead of being a step forward in RPGs for same-sex relationships, it just becomes stupid fanservice.
I fucking hate fanservice, particularly the crude, sexual kind, which it usually is. It cheapens everything around it that might have been worthwhile. It's a fucking blight on the gaming industry, and every other form of the entertainment industry.*
Mass Effect 1's creators, Bioware, must have taken some note of the many protests like mine, however, when making up the romantic possibilities for their newest RPG, Dragon Age Origins. For any given protagonist you make in DAO, you've got two heterosexual options and one homosexual one for initiating a romance, whether you're a girl OR a guy. Not only does this game give you 3 potential love stories for your protagonist over ME1's 2, but it also has made a REAL step forward for equality in love instead of ME1's careless half-step. A big thumbs-up to Bioware for correcting themselves in a worthwhile way, going for story-telling integrity over simple marketability.**
Of course, it does bear mentioning that the sex scenes in DAO are a bit...off. ME1's PG-13-ish scene used nice camera work and lighting and whatnot to make the implied act and implied nudity believable and even tasteful, while DAO's approach to the whole thing is more direct--the participants are shown more clearly, and they avoid nudity not by implying-but-not-actually-showing it as in ME1, but rather by just having the characters wearing their underwear in each shot during the sex scene. This...well, it just seems awkward and less engaging in most cases, rather than smooth and elegant as ME1's scene was. And there's always the fact that the male character who can fall in love with your male protagonist is Zevran the Tolkien-esque elf...gay elf jokes are already easy enough ever since Legolas hit the big screen; now they'll practically write themselves. I'm just saying, the game's bisexual girl character is a human who just comes off as a regular (albeit very cool, deep, and interesting) person...why did the bisexual guy have to be a pretty elf?
Regardless of these largely trivial quibbles, though, I'm very, very pleased by this development.*** Bioware's really done good by me on this issue with Dragon Age Origins, and I can only hope that the upcoming Mass Effect 2, should it continue Bioware's tradition of giving gamers varied romantic possibilities, will follow DAO's example of equality.
* With the exception, I guess, being outright porn. Kinda hard to cut fanservice out of the marketing decisions there.
** Not to say that I don't think they had some thought of what the fans wanted when they decided to give the option for a guy-guy love story, since, as I mentioned, there were many people who did complain. But that vocal minority wouldn't affect sales figures in a significant way; all Bioware would have needed for that was the girl-girl option. So I do think it's safe to say that this is an action involving some integrity.
*** Hell, I'd even have to say, having pursued all 4 possible love stories, that the sex scene seems at its most natural and believable when both the participants are guys. Not sure why (although I'd guess it's because the guys have fewer undergarments to wear during it and thus fewer articles of clothing that are there for the whole time, which is a bit odd and distracting), but that's how it seems.
I fucking hate fanservice, particularly the crude, sexual kind, which it usually is. It cheapens everything around it that might have been worthwhile. It's a fucking blight on the gaming industry, and every other form of the entertainment industry.*
Mass Effect 1's creators, Bioware, must have taken some note of the many protests like mine, however, when making up the romantic possibilities for their newest RPG, Dragon Age Origins. For any given protagonist you make in DAO, you've got two heterosexual options and one homosexual one for initiating a romance, whether you're a girl OR a guy. Not only does this game give you 3 potential love stories for your protagonist over ME1's 2, but it also has made a REAL step forward for equality in love instead of ME1's careless half-step. A big thumbs-up to Bioware for correcting themselves in a worthwhile way, going for story-telling integrity over simple marketability.**
Of course, it does bear mentioning that the sex scenes in DAO are a bit...off. ME1's PG-13-ish scene used nice camera work and lighting and whatnot to make the implied act and implied nudity believable and even tasteful, while DAO's approach to the whole thing is more direct--the participants are shown more clearly, and they avoid nudity not by implying-but-not-actually-showing it as in ME1, but rather by just having the characters wearing their underwear in each shot during the sex scene. This...well, it just seems awkward and less engaging in most cases, rather than smooth and elegant as ME1's scene was. And there's always the fact that the male character who can fall in love with your male protagonist is Zevran the Tolkien-esque elf...gay elf jokes are already easy enough ever since Legolas hit the big screen; now they'll practically write themselves. I'm just saying, the game's bisexual girl character is a human who just comes off as a regular (albeit very cool, deep, and interesting) person...why did the bisexual guy have to be a pretty elf?
Regardless of these largely trivial quibbles, though, I'm very, very pleased by this development.*** Bioware's really done good by me on this issue with Dragon Age Origins, and I can only hope that the upcoming Mass Effect 2, should it continue Bioware's tradition of giving gamers varied romantic possibilities, will follow DAO's example of equality.
* With the exception, I guess, being outright porn. Kinda hard to cut fanservice out of the marketing decisions there.
** Not to say that I don't think they had some thought of what the fans wanted when they decided to give the option for a guy-guy love story, since, as I mentioned, there were many people who did complain. But that vocal minority wouldn't affect sales figures in a significant way; all Bioware would have needed for that was the girl-girl option. So I do think it's safe to say that this is an action involving some integrity.
*** Hell, I'd even have to say, having pursued all 4 possible love stories, that the sex scene seems at its most natural and believable when both the participants are guys. Not sure why (although I'd guess it's because the guys have fewer undergarments to wear during it and thus fewer articles of clothing that are there for the whole time, which is a bit odd and distracting), but that's how it seems.
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
Annual Summary: 2009
Phew! 2009's just about over and done with! Never thought I'd actually be ranting this long; hell, I thought my material would peter out within a year. Of course, I probably would have been RIGHT if I actually kept to a regular rant schedule, instead of updating twice a month or so, but...
Anyway. 2009 was a pretty good year for me with RPGs. I didn't have too many really amazing ones, but I also didn't have many that were actually bad, either, which is the first year in too long where that's been the case--hell, it's been the first year since 2005 in which I didn't play at least 1 game that made it to the list of Worst RPGs ever. And I managed to really keep myself on the ball, unlike last year, and stick to a steady schedule that allowed me to play many more than in 2008. Which were they? Well, in alphabetical order:
Arc the Lad 1
Arc the Lad 2
Arc the Lad 3
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
Dragon Age Origins
Eternal Poison
Evolution Worlds
Mother 3
Paper Mario 2
Parasite Eve 1
Pokemon Platinum
Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga 1
Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga 2
Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne
Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4
Valkyrie Profile 1
Valkyrie Profile 2
Vandal Hearts 2
I've still got several sitting on my desk that I would have liked to add to that list, like Legend of Legaia and Dragon Quest 4, but 2 full-time jobs, House M.D., 30 Rock, Glee, Justice League Heroes, Fallout 3's Downloadable Content, the discovery of That Guy With The Glasses's site, and watching the entire run of Law and Order: CI from the first episode on tends to eat your time a little. Not to mention keeping up with the rants here. Those AMV rants I've been doing seem to take 3 times longer than normal ones, too, which doesn't help.
Still and all, a good year. It started well with great games like Mother 3 and Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne, and ended just as well with Dragon Age Origins and the Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga series, with plenty of quality games in between. I began catching up on a bunch of legendary RPG classics I missed back in the day, such as Parasite Eve 1 and the first Castlevania RPG, kept plowing through the Shin Megami Tensei series, and found another RPG series to become familiar with, Arc the Lad. Overall, I think I did very well--managed to keep up with some of the recent popular RPGs out there (Dragon Age Origins, Pokemon Platinum), the recent obscure RPGs out there (Mother 3, Eternal Poison), the older classics (Parasite Eve 1, Valkyrie Profile 1), the obscure oldies (Evolution Worlds, Vandal Hearts 2), and of course the obscure-but-popular-at-the-same-time Shin Megami Tensei games. So this year was pretty nicely diverse, RPG-wise, with the exception being that barely any of them were actually bad (which is a lack of variety I'm okay with). In fact, it was so diverse that I really can't do the usual thing here where I mention running themes that arose over the year's course with my gaming, because, well, there weren't really any to speak of. So I guess it's on to the usual bulletin-style finish for this year's summary rant.
RPG Moments of Interest in 2009:
1. Valkyrie Profile 1 (recently rereleased as VP Lenneth on the PSP). This old PS1 RPG is a legend for the genre, and it's one of those rare games like Suikoden 2 that is ridiculously expensive to acquire.
Does it live up to the hype? Is it truly one of the greatest RPGs of all time, old Enix's one and only non-SNES RPG not to suck ass? Well...no. It's great, to be sure, and quite innovative, but like many cult classics, it's not quite up to the hype its fans worship it with. Still, I was pleased overall, and glad I finally did get around to it after years of being unable to obtain it.
2. After finally obtaining and playing the mystical Valkyrie Profile 1, the game that's eluded my meager budget for years, I played Valkyrie Profile Silmeria, henceforth to always be referred to as Valkyrie Profile 2 here, and watched this prequel completely undo the entirety of VP1's plot and essence. Wow, SquareEnix. Simply wow. You've got what can only be called a legend in your pocket, whose copies are still treated like electronic gold by RPG enthusiasts all over, and what do you do the instant you make a prequel? You whiz your legend right down the leg of your pants and out of existence.
My greatest disgust in this matter is that this isn't even close to the worst ideas and decisions SquareEnix has had and made.
3. Finally experiencing Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. I'm familiar with Castlevania's old action games, but, stupidly enough for a guy calling himself The RPGenius, I'd never delved into its RPG side at all. Now that I've seen its first serious RPG offering, though, the door is open to the rest.
4. Pokemon Platinum: What the HELL, Nintendo? Did I seriously just play a Pokemon game that had a halfway okay plot and an actual--hell, a GOOD--villain? At this time last year, if you had asked me whether I thought it more likely that a standard Pokemon game would have a decent villain and a plot with an occasional strong point, or that the next time I sneezed an octopus would come out my nose while a green hamster wearing a wizard hat materialized in my pocket and said "Bless you!", I would probably have gone with the octopus-magic-hamster sneeze. I'm sure not complaining, though.
5. Watching Leliana's serenade scene in Dragon Age Origins. While DAO almost counts as a moment of interest in itself, being an ultra-hyped offering by supreme game-smiths Bioware, the scene where Leliana sings to the main character is really something else. It comes out of nowhere, which makes it seem odd at first, but it's lovely to listen to once you're in the moment, and the simple scene it shows has an elegant presentation of emotion.
6. Getting romantic options in Dragon Age Origins for a guy-girl, girl-girl, OR guy-GUY relationship. I'll be making a quick rant on this later, but for now, I'll just say a very pleased "It's about time."
Best Sequel/Prequel of 2009:
Winner: Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga 2
Really, it's hard for me to even consider SMTDDS1 and 2 as separate games. SMTDDS2 builds off the first game completely, continuing the adventure that SMTDDS1 really only began. Everything is connected because it's one flowing story, and SMTDDS2 offering certain rewards and unlocked scenes during its course that depend on your actions in the first game only cements its total feel of continuation.
Runners-Up: Arc the Lad 2, Arc the Lad 3, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
Honestly, any other year, any of these games might have won 1st place. Each continues its previous installment excellently--CSotN creates a new story to take place immediately after one of the previous Castlevanias, using characters and references from multiple installments of the series, which helps to pull them all together nicely. Arc the Lad 3 uses the final events of AtL2 to make a story that stars new characters, but includes the old ones. And AtL2 is almost up there with SMTDDS2--it, too, is a continuation of the plot of the first game, which ended on a cliffhanger, using the same characters and world while introducing new characters and new elements to the world. SMTDDS2 just has a slightly better feeling of fluid continuation, and has themes that carry over from one game to the next, while AtL1 and 2 kind of switch horses in the middle about what they want to say. Still, strong contenders as sequels, all.
Biggest Disappointment of 2009:
Loser: Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4
After experiencing the monumentally excellent SMT Persona 3 FES last year, and being amazed not only at some of its characters (I do so love Aigis), but also impressed and touched by even its minor side-characters during many of its Social Links, I was all set for SMTP4 to be AWESOME. And it just...wasn't. I'm not saying it's a bad game, now; perish the thought. It's decent enough, and it has a couple moments that are emotionally strong--although, like Suikoden 5, I feel like the most powerful part of the game is the scene you see if you make the WRONG decisions, in this case the Bad Ending. But overall, it just didn't have the heart and soul of the previous game. The party members were more appealing overall, but no one had the shining emotional journey that SMTP3FES's Aigis did, the party didn't develop the same kind of bonds that Yukari and Mitsuru did, and SMTP4's Teddy is just an annoying fucktard from the moment he starts hitting on girls till the end of the game. The Social Links ranged from okay to pretty good, but there was nothing so powerful and gripping in this one as SMTP3FES's Sun Link, and by general comparison I found much more truth and emotion in the people and struggles of SMTP3FES's Social Links than in those of SMTP4's. And while the plot of SMTP3FES was fairly constant and had a scope of importance that you could appreciate, I feel like a lot of the time spent in SMTP4 is just kind of filler. So...pretty good game, but disappointing considering its predecessor.
Almost as Bad: Valkyrie Profile 2
Honestly, only these 2 games disappointed me this year (a couple others weren't that great, but I hadn't expected much from them), which ain't bad, especially when one of them wasn't even bad anyway. I mentioned earlier that I'm not a fan of VP2 basically rewriting canon so that VP1 never occurred, but I'd also like to stress that it still would have been on this list even without that crap. While VP2 isn't a BAD game (when you don't count the finale, I mean), it really lacks the kind of heart and emphasis that VP1 had, and even when the plot does have direction, it's not all that impressive. Decent, perhaps, but not especially noteworthy, and VP1 really was.
Worst RPG of 2009:
Loser: Valkyrie Profile 2
Yeah, pretty much already mentioned this. Just THINKING about this game's ending, which (Spoiler alert) kills off almost every decent character in the game while saying that the far superior VP1's events will never occur, gets me annoyed. What in the world POSSESSES a writing staff to do something like that? It's like a team of master chefs got together and carefully planned out the greatest cake ever created, then spent hours and hours preparing it, making sure all the details were just right...and then the night shift chefs come in, look at the cake, and come to the collective conclusion that this will serve as the prettiest group urinal ever.
Almost as Bad: NA
I'm pleased as punch to say that there really wasn't a single other bad RPG I played this year. Oh, sure, Evolution Worlds is slightly stupid and very generic, and Arc the Lad 1 was pretty simplistic, but they weren't BAD persay. After encountering exactly half of the games on my list of Worst RPGs Ever in the past 3 years, it's really, really nice to have a year off from catastrophes like Grandia 3 or Wild Arms 4.
Most Improved of its Series of 2009:
Winner: Pokemon Platinum
Okay, so, Pokemon Platinum's plot is not exactly stellar, but it DOES have some genuinely neat moments, it does seem to be trying to be coherent and cohesive, the game DOES manage to rekindle the Pokemon interests you left behind a decade ago, and the game DOES have a decent character (Cynthia's totally the best champion ever) and a villain which isn't just acceptable, but actually pretty good--which is an uncommon enough occurrence for a NORMAL RPG. Given how silly, stupid, and utterly pointless the other Pokemon generation games were in the past, the fact that this one has good qualities as an RPG at all rockets it to the top in this category.
Runners-Up: Arc the Lad 2, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, Mother 3
Arc the Lad 2 really improves on AtL1 by better developing most of its characters, introducing new ones (several of which are seriously good characters), and improving its storytelling methods. CSotN is also a big step up from its predecessors, putting a significant element of plot into its game and giving both its hero and villain some development, which previous Castlevanias just don't have. And Mother 3...man, I thought for sure that it would win this category until I played the Pokemon game. Mother 3 takes the wacky, wonderful, colorful insanity of Earthbound and adds depth and poignant emotion to it, making a quality RPG that really touches the player--even while amusing him/her with its quirky antics. Light and dark, silly and brooding, upbeat and saddening, Mother 3 somehow manages to combine these opposites and give you a fantastic step up from Earthbound.
Most Creative of 2009:
Winner...s: Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga 1 + 2
Sorry, but I'm going to have to regard these 2 games as 1 for the sake of most lists, because they're really just 2 installments of the same story. The Digital Devil Saga part of the the Shin Megami Tensei series is basically SMT making an incredibly involved, insightful, and creative story meant to involve and examine the essence and beliefs of Hinduism and Buddhism, much as SMT1 + 2 did with Christianity, and the SMT Persona games do with Tarot Cards. Unfortunately, a lot of SMTDDS's brilliance is wasted on me, because I don't understand much more than the basics of Hinduism and Buddhism, but I can nonetheless see the creative genius laced into every aspect of these games' story. These games' events and ideas would be crazily creative even if they weren't at the same time exploring and tying in with the Hindu and Buddhist religions.
Runners-Up: Dragon Age Origins, Parasite Eve 1, Valkyrie Profile 1
I really, REALLY wanted to give top spot to Parasite Eve 1. What a truly cool foray into creative modern science-fiction it is, filled with interesting ideas. VP1's theme is that of a Norse goddess collecting the souls of the dead, both good and evil, to fight as warriors of the gods in the approaching Ragnarok--can't tell me that's not a creative idea for an RPG's basis. And as for Dragon Age Origins, as seems usual for Bioware, the creative effort that went into creating their world's culture and history is extremely impressive, particularly the ideas behind their world's main, like-Christianity-but-significantly-different religion and the ways you can see it influence their society in general. Quite cool.
Stupidest Weapon of 2009:
Loser: Yukiko's Fan (Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4)
My fears last year that there might not be enough material for this category to stick were unfounded. Fans? Seriously? I don't care if they're bladed or whatever, which they aren't always anyway, you can't seriously tell me that a high school girl tossing a flat, flimsy fan at titanic monsters should actually cause any damage to them. Hell, it's really quite unlikely that the damn things would fly straight when thrown several feet to begin with.
Almost as Bad: Chongara's Pot (Arc the Lad 1), Poco's Cymbals (Arc the Lad 1 + 2), Sania's Cards (Arc the Lad 2)
Musical instruments, a deck of cards, and a goddamn pot. Gee, I wonder why none of these characters are good physical attackers.
Best Romance of 2009:
Winner: Leliana and Protagonist (Dragon Age Origins)
Of the four romantic options in Dragon Age Origins, the courtship between the main character and Leliana seems the most genuine to me, and gives me warm and fuzzy feelings more than the others. She's a neat character with more depth than you'd expect, and more of her dialogue in general seems to be aimed at the possible romance you can have with her. Plus, what makes her and Zevran (another of the 4 possible romances) different from Alistair and Morrigan is that Leliana and Zevran can fall in love with the protagonist regardless of the protagonist's gender--and I feel that this works to make the romance seem more valid, in the sense that Leliana and Zevran's general growth in their feelings for the protagonist will always have the potential feeling of love behind them, while with Morrigan and, though admittedly to a much smaller extent, Alistair, their character development doesn't change so much overall save for some small specific bits for the love story. This makes me feel like the development that Alistair and especially Morrigan have that can lead up to romance with a protagonist of opposite gender is less romantically compelling, because it's all more or less the same as it would be if it were leading up to friendship with a same-sex protagonist. Admittedly, once you're actually IN the relationship, Alistair has about as much romantic development as Leliana and more than Zevran, but still, the lead-up to it is largely the same. With Leliana and Zevran, you can pretty much take their growing appreciation for the protagonist as steps toward love because that's what they're always going to be (unless you specifically push the "Let's just be friends" agenda, which, probably due to some bad code, doesn't always halt Leliana's amorous intentions anyway), and of the two of them, I like Leliana's love story far better.
Runners-Up: Ai and Seta (Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4), Alistair and Protagonist (Dragon Age Origins), Lenneth and Lucian (Valkyrie Profile 1)
Kind of a lame year for romance, honestly, even considering that RPG romances are usually generic. I mean, I saw plenty of them, but I only barely had enough to fill this category. At any rate...Ai and Seta's romance is a sweet one that's nonetheless worldly and realistic, which I like, and she's the only romantic option in the whole game for whom the love aspect of her Social Link actually seems to make a difference. I mean, with Ai, the course of her Social Link events change depending on Seta's approach, whether he cares enough about her as a person not to push her and so on--you can mess up early on by paying attention to what you want instead of what Ai as a person needs, and end up just as her friend, missing out on the romance. With all the other romantic Social Links, everything's exactly the same for the first 8 or 9 out of 10 events whether you're going for romance or friendship. It's like what I mentioned above with the Dragon Age Origins romantic options--if the relationship between the characters is going to be mostly the same whether it's friendly or romantic, then I'm not really convinced that there's much of a love story. Ai's really the only option you have that's convincing. Now, while Alistair and the DAO Protagonist's romance DOES have the problem of being largely similar in its beginnings as the normal friendship would be, it DOES really take off once Alistair's genuinely interested and has a lot of development unique to the love and not the friendship angle--development which is, I should note, very sweet and cute. Lenneth and Lucian's love is very convincing and epic, so it deserves mentioning, but the plot demands that it pretty much only be realized and acknowledged at the very end part of the game, so by the point that it's anything more than one-sided, it's sadly very brief.
Best Voice Acting of 2009:
Winner: Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4
While not absolutely perfect, as there are a few characters whose voices are a bit annoying to me, SMTP4 overall has a spectacularly talented crew voicing its characters, more so even than SMTP3FES did. Everyone fits their character well, and in nearly all cases the actors do a superb job of enhancing the characters' personalities through effective delivery of lines.
Runners-Up: Dragon Age Origins, Eternal Poison, Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga 1 + 2
DAO also has terrific voice acting all around, and very nearly won this category--hell, Oghren alone would've earned the game a place here. EP is very good overall, and has a few characters whose voice talents are just great (Thage, Olifan, and Dufaston) to listen to. As for SMTDDS1 + 2, everyone's voices are spot-on in that one, and while a few characters' voices are annoying (Sera's standard anime-girl voice makes me sigh, and I'm not too big on Cielo, either), overall the voice acting helps quite a lot to sell the characters to you.
Best Villain of 2009:
Winner: Hikawa (Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne)*
While I didn't see any villains that I could honestly call great this year (unsurprising, given their rarity in general), there were several good ones. I would have to say that the calm, yet sinister vision of a man willing to cause the end of the world for the chance to remake it into one of silent, cold, logical order devoid of the emotion that brings about the worst of human nature is probably the best of what I saw this year. Hikawa is, to be sure, another misguided villain who grasps part of the truth yet not the whole (not realizing that the emotions and chaos he seeks to eradicate are also what give a person any semblance of satisfaction and happiness in life, and ergo are more or less the entire point of existing at all) and carries out diabolical schemes according to this incomplete vision, but he does so with calm flourish, and while his philosophy can be summed up as simply the rest of SMTN's villains' can, it is nonetheless a strong one and worthy of consideration, perhaps even agreement with. He and his ideas could have been fleshed out a LOT more, and deserve to be, but he's still a solidly good villain.
Runners-Up: Cyrus (Pokemon Platinum), Isamu (Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne)*, Loghain (Dragon Age Origins)
I did want to put Eve from Parasite Eve 1 up here, but Loghain just manages to edge her out. And yes, I know--a POKEMON game's villain is one of the tops for this year. As crazy as it seems, though, Cyrus earns his place. It's actually really weird--he's JUST like the villain of the year, Hikawa. He, too, is cold, valuing logic and order over emotion and chaos, things that are simply inexplicable to him, and seeks to use Legendary Pokemon to create a world without spirit. Honestly, if he had his plan explained as well and presented as philosophically as Hikawa's was, Cyrus would have been the best villain of the year instead, because he sells his lack of emotion even better than Hikawa does. I can't believe a POKEMON game villain almost upstaged a Shin Megami Tensei one. Isamu's a good villain, to be sure--you see how and why he comes to his conclusion about how and why the world needs to change, and can understand it to an extent (even though his vision is far more incomplete and fundamentally flawed, not to mention hypocritical, than Hikawa's...although you could say that just makes him a more interesting character and villain). And Loghain from Dragon Age Origins is, like Cyrus, a villain who definitely could have been this year's winner instead of Hikawa--his reasons for his villainy are simple, yet very realistic and understandable, he's a character with depth, and the game gives you an opportunity to learn about him and his motives in reasonable depth. The only problem with Loghain is that most of your understanding of him as a villain only comes when you speak to him after his defeat--which is only an option if you make a plot choice that drives the character Alistair out of your party. Since Alistair is a generally appealing guy and a good character, and having him leave on a sour note kind of has this "Wrong Decision!" feeling to it, not many people are going to have an opportunity to get to know Loghain until subsequent playthroughs of DAO. This means that the average, initial playing of DAO isn't going to have Loghain presented as much more than an "Asshole for the sake of being an Asshole" villain. So he's a good villain, but people aren't going to KNOW he is.
Best Character of 2009:
Winner: Leliana (Dragon Age Origins)
Leliana has both superior depth and a dynamic nature; while almost all of the party members can have differing attitudes toward the main character depending on how he/she acts toward them and in general, Leliana's growth as a character outshines theirs, to me. Her personality is almost fascinating when you consider her inner fears and conflicts about who she was as a Bard, who she was as a Chantry Sister, and who she wants to be, who she thinks she CAN be. Her development is well-executed, deep, and believable, and her personality is likable. Most interestingly, though, is that you can choose what kind of person she ultimately will develop into--you'll see her at a moral crossroads about who she really, truly is, unsure of which life she's led was the one true to herself, and through the main character you can help determine the answer she comes to. And one's not really any more or less "right" than the other--I know which life's personality and joys I think were truly Leliana's, but you can convincingly argue either one. Definitely a good character.
Runners-Up: Alistair (Dragon Age Origins), Gruga (Arc the Lad 2 + 3 (but mostly 2)), Lenneth (Valkyrie Profile 1)
Alistair is a good character with a lot of depth that makes him stand out, which is something given that DAO's has a cast where even the drunk, crude, hilarious joke character has significant complexity if you're watching for it. In addition to his very good character development, he, too, is somewhat dynamic, like Leliana, in that his attitude can change a little bit after the culmination of his personality's progression, depending, as with Leliana, on how he is treated by the protagonist. I really liked Gruga, and felt that his conflicts were not only well-executed, but fairly uncommon and interesting. And Lenneth's growth into her humanity was very convincing and special; if nearly all of it just hadn't been so crammed into the last little segment of the game, she'd probably have topped Leliana.
Best Game of 2009:
Winner...s: Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga 1 + 2
What can I say? These games are absolutely brilliant. They can give an audience with even just the most rudimentary understanding of the religion of Hindu and Buddhism things to think about and consider on and on for hours, days, weeks. I'll probably be considering these games and their ideas, events, characters, stories, insights, and so on for years to come, finding new insights on both them and the religion they examine all the while. And unlike many great works that are meant to describe ideas, philosophies, and systems of belief to an audience to ponder over, these games have a genuinely interesting, engaging story to go with them. It's not JUST a ton of fascinating concepts to think about bundled up together--it's also a really cool, creative, and gripping adventure, too. Bravo to Atlus on these 2, to be sure.
Runners-Up: Arc the Lad 2, Dragon Age Origins, Mother 3
Dragon Age Origins is great and has great care given to all its aspects, some of which I've mentioned already. Its characters are great, having strong personalities and depth (except for the dog, I guess, but dogs are generally screwed over with character development...the unfortunate inevitable result of having no dialogue options, I suppose), and its plot is simple in premise (bad guys are coming, raise an army to stop them, kill their leader) but is comprised of many complex events, people, and ideas. Arc the Lad 2 is good to a surprising degree, with a strong plot that throws some neat twists here and there, several poignant emotional scenes, quite a few very good characters, a message to convey, and a satisfactory, yet surprising ending--and each one of these good qualities I've mentioned is built off Arc the Lad 1, taken from that nice but lackluster title and evolved into something really cool. And Mother 3? Damn, man, the madcap fun of Earthbound is no longer the entirety of the game, but rather the vehicle for a touching and intriguing plot of love and loss, complex pettiness and simple heroism. I played a lot of good games this year that deserve recognition--hell, in a different year, I'm sure Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne, Valkyrie Profile 1, and possibly even Arc the Lad 3 would've made the Best Game list--but these ones are the cream of the crop.
List Changes of 2009:
Greatest RPGs: I've changed the list of Greatest RPGs to include Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga 1 + 2. It may kind of be cheating, but I basically condensed SMT1 + 2 into a single part of the list (6th place) and put SMTDDS1 + 2 into 7th place. These two sets of games really do both comprise single plot entities, though, and everything that puts each game on the great list is the same for its sequel/predecessor, so I figure it's okay.
And we're done with this year! Good year, it was, to be sure...which probably means 2010 is going to suck all kinds of hard, and the fact that I'm going to start it with a recent SquareEnix game (Valkyrie Profile 3) doesn't reassure me otherwise. Still, I've got an Arc the Lad game to follow it, which should be decent, at least, and Mass Effect 2 does come out this approaching year, so we shall see how things go. Thanks again for reading and especially commenting, all; it's gratifying to know that somebody's listening. See you in 2010!
* Yeah, I know that Isamu, Chiaki, and Hikawa could be considered just characters in SMTN, since you're given the opportunity to side with any of them and thus not have to oppose that one, but I think they're still closer to villains than anything else--no reason a hero can't join a villain in a story, and whatever your choice you'll still have to contend with at LEAST 2 as your foes, possibly all 3.
Anyway. 2009 was a pretty good year for me with RPGs. I didn't have too many really amazing ones, but I also didn't have many that were actually bad, either, which is the first year in too long where that's been the case--hell, it's been the first year since 2005 in which I didn't play at least 1 game that made it to the list of Worst RPGs ever. And I managed to really keep myself on the ball, unlike last year, and stick to a steady schedule that allowed me to play many more than in 2008. Which were they? Well, in alphabetical order:
Arc the Lad 1
Arc the Lad 2
Arc the Lad 3
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
Dragon Age Origins
Eternal Poison
Evolution Worlds
Mother 3
Paper Mario 2
Parasite Eve 1
Pokemon Platinum
Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga 1
Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga 2
Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne
Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4
Valkyrie Profile 1
Valkyrie Profile 2
Vandal Hearts 2
I've still got several sitting on my desk that I would have liked to add to that list, like Legend of Legaia and Dragon Quest 4, but 2 full-time jobs, House M.D., 30 Rock, Glee, Justice League Heroes, Fallout 3's Downloadable Content, the discovery of That Guy With The Glasses's site, and watching the entire run of Law and Order: CI from the first episode on tends to eat your time a little. Not to mention keeping up with the rants here. Those AMV rants I've been doing seem to take 3 times longer than normal ones, too, which doesn't help.
Still and all, a good year. It started well with great games like Mother 3 and Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne, and ended just as well with Dragon Age Origins and the Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga series, with plenty of quality games in between. I began catching up on a bunch of legendary RPG classics I missed back in the day, such as Parasite Eve 1 and the first Castlevania RPG, kept plowing through the Shin Megami Tensei series, and found another RPG series to become familiar with, Arc the Lad. Overall, I think I did very well--managed to keep up with some of the recent popular RPGs out there (Dragon Age Origins, Pokemon Platinum), the recent obscure RPGs out there (Mother 3, Eternal Poison), the older classics (Parasite Eve 1, Valkyrie Profile 1), the obscure oldies (Evolution Worlds, Vandal Hearts 2), and of course the obscure-but-popular-at-the-same-time Shin Megami Tensei games. So this year was pretty nicely diverse, RPG-wise, with the exception being that barely any of them were actually bad (which is a lack of variety I'm okay with). In fact, it was so diverse that I really can't do the usual thing here where I mention running themes that arose over the year's course with my gaming, because, well, there weren't really any to speak of. So I guess it's on to the usual bulletin-style finish for this year's summary rant.
RPG Moments of Interest in 2009:
1. Valkyrie Profile 1 (recently rereleased as VP Lenneth on the PSP). This old PS1 RPG is a legend for the genre, and it's one of those rare games like Suikoden 2 that is ridiculously expensive to acquire.
Does it live up to the hype? Is it truly one of the greatest RPGs of all time, old Enix's one and only non-SNES RPG not to suck ass? Well...no. It's great, to be sure, and quite innovative, but like many cult classics, it's not quite up to the hype its fans worship it with. Still, I was pleased overall, and glad I finally did get around to it after years of being unable to obtain it.
2. After finally obtaining and playing the mystical Valkyrie Profile 1, the game that's eluded my meager budget for years, I played Valkyrie Profile Silmeria, henceforth to always be referred to as Valkyrie Profile 2 here, and watched this prequel completely undo the entirety of VP1's plot and essence. Wow, SquareEnix. Simply wow. You've got what can only be called a legend in your pocket, whose copies are still treated like electronic gold by RPG enthusiasts all over, and what do you do the instant you make a prequel? You whiz your legend right down the leg of your pants and out of existence.
My greatest disgust in this matter is that this isn't even close to the worst ideas and decisions SquareEnix has had and made.
3. Finally experiencing Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. I'm familiar with Castlevania's old action games, but, stupidly enough for a guy calling himself The RPGenius, I'd never delved into its RPG side at all. Now that I've seen its first serious RPG offering, though, the door is open to the rest.
4. Pokemon Platinum: What the HELL, Nintendo? Did I seriously just play a Pokemon game that had a halfway okay plot and an actual--hell, a GOOD--villain? At this time last year, if you had asked me whether I thought it more likely that a standard Pokemon game would have a decent villain and a plot with an occasional strong point, or that the next time I sneezed an octopus would come out my nose while a green hamster wearing a wizard hat materialized in my pocket and said "Bless you!", I would probably have gone with the octopus-magic-hamster sneeze. I'm sure not complaining, though.
5. Watching Leliana's serenade scene in Dragon Age Origins. While DAO almost counts as a moment of interest in itself, being an ultra-hyped offering by supreme game-smiths Bioware, the scene where Leliana sings to the main character is really something else. It comes out of nowhere, which makes it seem odd at first, but it's lovely to listen to once you're in the moment, and the simple scene it shows has an elegant presentation of emotion.
6. Getting romantic options in Dragon Age Origins for a guy-girl, girl-girl, OR guy-GUY relationship. I'll be making a quick rant on this later, but for now, I'll just say a very pleased "It's about time."
Best Sequel/Prequel of 2009:
Winner: Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga 2
Really, it's hard for me to even consider SMTDDS1 and 2 as separate games. SMTDDS2 builds off the first game completely, continuing the adventure that SMTDDS1 really only began. Everything is connected because it's one flowing story, and SMTDDS2 offering certain rewards and unlocked scenes during its course that depend on your actions in the first game only cements its total feel of continuation.
Runners-Up: Arc the Lad 2, Arc the Lad 3, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
Honestly, any other year, any of these games might have won 1st place. Each continues its previous installment excellently--CSotN creates a new story to take place immediately after one of the previous Castlevanias, using characters and references from multiple installments of the series, which helps to pull them all together nicely. Arc the Lad 3 uses the final events of AtL2 to make a story that stars new characters, but includes the old ones. And AtL2 is almost up there with SMTDDS2--it, too, is a continuation of the plot of the first game, which ended on a cliffhanger, using the same characters and world while introducing new characters and new elements to the world. SMTDDS2 just has a slightly better feeling of fluid continuation, and has themes that carry over from one game to the next, while AtL1 and 2 kind of switch horses in the middle about what they want to say. Still, strong contenders as sequels, all.
Biggest Disappointment of 2009:
Loser: Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4
After experiencing the monumentally excellent SMT Persona 3 FES last year, and being amazed not only at some of its characters (I do so love Aigis), but also impressed and touched by even its minor side-characters during many of its Social Links, I was all set for SMTP4 to be AWESOME. And it just...wasn't. I'm not saying it's a bad game, now; perish the thought. It's decent enough, and it has a couple moments that are emotionally strong--although, like Suikoden 5, I feel like the most powerful part of the game is the scene you see if you make the WRONG decisions, in this case the Bad Ending. But overall, it just didn't have the heart and soul of the previous game. The party members were more appealing overall, but no one had the shining emotional journey that SMTP3FES's Aigis did, the party didn't develop the same kind of bonds that Yukari and Mitsuru did, and SMTP4's Teddy is just an annoying fucktard from the moment he starts hitting on girls till the end of the game. The Social Links ranged from okay to pretty good, but there was nothing so powerful and gripping in this one as SMTP3FES's Sun Link, and by general comparison I found much more truth and emotion in the people and struggles of SMTP3FES's Social Links than in those of SMTP4's. And while the plot of SMTP3FES was fairly constant and had a scope of importance that you could appreciate, I feel like a lot of the time spent in SMTP4 is just kind of filler. So...pretty good game, but disappointing considering its predecessor.
Almost as Bad: Valkyrie Profile 2
Honestly, only these 2 games disappointed me this year (a couple others weren't that great, but I hadn't expected much from them), which ain't bad, especially when one of them wasn't even bad anyway. I mentioned earlier that I'm not a fan of VP2 basically rewriting canon so that VP1 never occurred, but I'd also like to stress that it still would have been on this list even without that crap. While VP2 isn't a BAD game (when you don't count the finale, I mean), it really lacks the kind of heart and emphasis that VP1 had, and even when the plot does have direction, it's not all that impressive. Decent, perhaps, but not especially noteworthy, and VP1 really was.
Worst RPG of 2009:
Loser: Valkyrie Profile 2
Yeah, pretty much already mentioned this. Just THINKING about this game's ending, which (Spoiler alert) kills off almost every decent character in the game while saying that the far superior VP1's events will never occur, gets me annoyed. What in the world POSSESSES a writing staff to do something like that? It's like a team of master chefs got together and carefully planned out the greatest cake ever created, then spent hours and hours preparing it, making sure all the details were just right...and then the night shift chefs come in, look at the cake, and come to the collective conclusion that this will serve as the prettiest group urinal ever.
Almost as Bad: NA
I'm pleased as punch to say that there really wasn't a single other bad RPG I played this year. Oh, sure, Evolution Worlds is slightly stupid and very generic, and Arc the Lad 1 was pretty simplistic, but they weren't BAD persay. After encountering exactly half of the games on my list of Worst RPGs Ever in the past 3 years, it's really, really nice to have a year off from catastrophes like Grandia 3 or Wild Arms 4.
Most Improved of its Series of 2009:
Winner: Pokemon Platinum
Okay, so, Pokemon Platinum's plot is not exactly stellar, but it DOES have some genuinely neat moments, it does seem to be trying to be coherent and cohesive, the game DOES manage to rekindle the Pokemon interests you left behind a decade ago, and the game DOES have a decent character (Cynthia's totally the best champion ever) and a villain which isn't just acceptable, but actually pretty good--which is an uncommon enough occurrence for a NORMAL RPG. Given how silly, stupid, and utterly pointless the other Pokemon generation games were in the past, the fact that this one has good qualities as an RPG at all rockets it to the top in this category.
Runners-Up: Arc the Lad 2, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, Mother 3
Arc the Lad 2 really improves on AtL1 by better developing most of its characters, introducing new ones (several of which are seriously good characters), and improving its storytelling methods. CSotN is also a big step up from its predecessors, putting a significant element of plot into its game and giving both its hero and villain some development, which previous Castlevanias just don't have. And Mother 3...man, I thought for sure that it would win this category until I played the Pokemon game. Mother 3 takes the wacky, wonderful, colorful insanity of Earthbound and adds depth and poignant emotion to it, making a quality RPG that really touches the player--even while amusing him/her with its quirky antics. Light and dark, silly and brooding, upbeat and saddening, Mother 3 somehow manages to combine these opposites and give you a fantastic step up from Earthbound.
Most Creative of 2009:
Winner...s: Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga 1 + 2
Sorry, but I'm going to have to regard these 2 games as 1 for the sake of most lists, because they're really just 2 installments of the same story. The Digital Devil Saga part of the the Shin Megami Tensei series is basically SMT making an incredibly involved, insightful, and creative story meant to involve and examine the essence and beliefs of Hinduism and Buddhism, much as SMT1 + 2 did with Christianity, and the SMT Persona games do with Tarot Cards. Unfortunately, a lot of SMTDDS's brilliance is wasted on me, because I don't understand much more than the basics of Hinduism and Buddhism, but I can nonetheless see the creative genius laced into every aspect of these games' story. These games' events and ideas would be crazily creative even if they weren't at the same time exploring and tying in with the Hindu and Buddhist religions.
Runners-Up: Dragon Age Origins, Parasite Eve 1, Valkyrie Profile 1
I really, REALLY wanted to give top spot to Parasite Eve 1. What a truly cool foray into creative modern science-fiction it is, filled with interesting ideas. VP1's theme is that of a Norse goddess collecting the souls of the dead, both good and evil, to fight as warriors of the gods in the approaching Ragnarok--can't tell me that's not a creative idea for an RPG's basis. And as for Dragon Age Origins, as seems usual for Bioware, the creative effort that went into creating their world's culture and history is extremely impressive, particularly the ideas behind their world's main, like-Christianity-but-significantly-different religion and the ways you can see it influence their society in general. Quite cool.
Stupidest Weapon of 2009:
Loser: Yukiko's Fan (Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4)
My fears last year that there might not be enough material for this category to stick were unfounded. Fans? Seriously? I don't care if they're bladed or whatever, which they aren't always anyway, you can't seriously tell me that a high school girl tossing a flat, flimsy fan at titanic monsters should actually cause any damage to them. Hell, it's really quite unlikely that the damn things would fly straight when thrown several feet to begin with.
Almost as Bad: Chongara's Pot (Arc the Lad 1), Poco's Cymbals (Arc the Lad 1 + 2), Sania's Cards (Arc the Lad 2)
Musical instruments, a deck of cards, and a goddamn pot. Gee, I wonder why none of these characters are good physical attackers.
Best Romance of 2009:
Winner: Leliana and Protagonist (Dragon Age Origins)
Of the four romantic options in Dragon Age Origins, the courtship between the main character and Leliana seems the most genuine to me, and gives me warm and fuzzy feelings more than the others. She's a neat character with more depth than you'd expect, and more of her dialogue in general seems to be aimed at the possible romance you can have with her. Plus, what makes her and Zevran (another of the 4 possible romances) different from Alistair and Morrigan is that Leliana and Zevran can fall in love with the protagonist regardless of the protagonist's gender--and I feel that this works to make the romance seem more valid, in the sense that Leliana and Zevran's general growth in their feelings for the protagonist will always have the potential feeling of love behind them, while with Morrigan and, though admittedly to a much smaller extent, Alistair, their character development doesn't change so much overall save for some small specific bits for the love story. This makes me feel like the development that Alistair and especially Morrigan have that can lead up to romance with a protagonist of opposite gender is less romantically compelling, because it's all more or less the same as it would be if it were leading up to friendship with a same-sex protagonist. Admittedly, once you're actually IN the relationship, Alistair has about as much romantic development as Leliana and more than Zevran, but still, the lead-up to it is largely the same. With Leliana and Zevran, you can pretty much take their growing appreciation for the protagonist as steps toward love because that's what they're always going to be (unless you specifically push the "Let's just be friends" agenda, which, probably due to some bad code, doesn't always halt Leliana's amorous intentions anyway), and of the two of them, I like Leliana's love story far better.
Runners-Up: Ai and Seta (Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4), Alistair and Protagonist (Dragon Age Origins), Lenneth and Lucian (Valkyrie Profile 1)
Kind of a lame year for romance, honestly, even considering that RPG romances are usually generic. I mean, I saw plenty of them, but I only barely had enough to fill this category. At any rate...Ai and Seta's romance is a sweet one that's nonetheless worldly and realistic, which I like, and she's the only romantic option in the whole game for whom the love aspect of her Social Link actually seems to make a difference. I mean, with Ai, the course of her Social Link events change depending on Seta's approach, whether he cares enough about her as a person not to push her and so on--you can mess up early on by paying attention to what you want instead of what Ai as a person needs, and end up just as her friend, missing out on the romance. With all the other romantic Social Links, everything's exactly the same for the first 8 or 9 out of 10 events whether you're going for romance or friendship. It's like what I mentioned above with the Dragon Age Origins romantic options--if the relationship between the characters is going to be mostly the same whether it's friendly or romantic, then I'm not really convinced that there's much of a love story. Ai's really the only option you have that's convincing. Now, while Alistair and the DAO Protagonist's romance DOES have the problem of being largely similar in its beginnings as the normal friendship would be, it DOES really take off once Alistair's genuinely interested and has a lot of development unique to the love and not the friendship angle--development which is, I should note, very sweet and cute. Lenneth and Lucian's love is very convincing and epic, so it deserves mentioning, but the plot demands that it pretty much only be realized and acknowledged at the very end part of the game, so by the point that it's anything more than one-sided, it's sadly very brief.
Best Voice Acting of 2009:
Winner: Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4
While not absolutely perfect, as there are a few characters whose voices are a bit annoying to me, SMTP4 overall has a spectacularly talented crew voicing its characters, more so even than SMTP3FES did. Everyone fits their character well, and in nearly all cases the actors do a superb job of enhancing the characters' personalities through effective delivery of lines.
Runners-Up: Dragon Age Origins, Eternal Poison, Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga 1 + 2
DAO also has terrific voice acting all around, and very nearly won this category--hell, Oghren alone would've earned the game a place here. EP is very good overall, and has a few characters whose voice talents are just great (Thage, Olifan, and Dufaston) to listen to. As for SMTDDS1 + 2, everyone's voices are spot-on in that one, and while a few characters' voices are annoying (Sera's standard anime-girl voice makes me sigh, and I'm not too big on Cielo, either), overall the voice acting helps quite a lot to sell the characters to you.
Best Villain of 2009:
Winner: Hikawa (Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne)*
While I didn't see any villains that I could honestly call great this year (unsurprising, given their rarity in general), there were several good ones. I would have to say that the calm, yet sinister vision of a man willing to cause the end of the world for the chance to remake it into one of silent, cold, logical order devoid of the emotion that brings about the worst of human nature is probably the best of what I saw this year. Hikawa is, to be sure, another misguided villain who grasps part of the truth yet not the whole (not realizing that the emotions and chaos he seeks to eradicate are also what give a person any semblance of satisfaction and happiness in life, and ergo are more or less the entire point of existing at all) and carries out diabolical schemes according to this incomplete vision, but he does so with calm flourish, and while his philosophy can be summed up as simply the rest of SMTN's villains' can, it is nonetheless a strong one and worthy of consideration, perhaps even agreement with. He and his ideas could have been fleshed out a LOT more, and deserve to be, but he's still a solidly good villain.
Runners-Up: Cyrus (Pokemon Platinum), Isamu (Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne)*, Loghain (Dragon Age Origins)
I did want to put Eve from Parasite Eve 1 up here, but Loghain just manages to edge her out. And yes, I know--a POKEMON game's villain is one of the tops for this year. As crazy as it seems, though, Cyrus earns his place. It's actually really weird--he's JUST like the villain of the year, Hikawa. He, too, is cold, valuing logic and order over emotion and chaos, things that are simply inexplicable to him, and seeks to use Legendary Pokemon to create a world without spirit. Honestly, if he had his plan explained as well and presented as philosophically as Hikawa's was, Cyrus would have been the best villain of the year instead, because he sells his lack of emotion even better than Hikawa does. I can't believe a POKEMON game villain almost upstaged a Shin Megami Tensei one. Isamu's a good villain, to be sure--you see how and why he comes to his conclusion about how and why the world needs to change, and can understand it to an extent (even though his vision is far more incomplete and fundamentally flawed, not to mention hypocritical, than Hikawa's...although you could say that just makes him a more interesting character and villain). And Loghain from Dragon Age Origins is, like Cyrus, a villain who definitely could have been this year's winner instead of Hikawa--his reasons for his villainy are simple, yet very realistic and understandable, he's a character with depth, and the game gives you an opportunity to learn about him and his motives in reasonable depth. The only problem with Loghain is that most of your understanding of him as a villain only comes when you speak to him after his defeat--which is only an option if you make a plot choice that drives the character Alistair out of your party. Since Alistair is a generally appealing guy and a good character, and having him leave on a sour note kind of has this "Wrong Decision!" feeling to it, not many people are going to have an opportunity to get to know Loghain until subsequent playthroughs of DAO. This means that the average, initial playing of DAO isn't going to have Loghain presented as much more than an "Asshole for the sake of being an Asshole" villain. So he's a good villain, but people aren't going to KNOW he is.
Best Character of 2009:
Winner: Leliana (Dragon Age Origins)
Leliana has both superior depth and a dynamic nature; while almost all of the party members can have differing attitudes toward the main character depending on how he/she acts toward them and in general, Leliana's growth as a character outshines theirs, to me. Her personality is almost fascinating when you consider her inner fears and conflicts about who she was as a Bard, who she was as a Chantry Sister, and who she wants to be, who she thinks she CAN be. Her development is well-executed, deep, and believable, and her personality is likable. Most interestingly, though, is that you can choose what kind of person she ultimately will develop into--you'll see her at a moral crossroads about who she really, truly is, unsure of which life she's led was the one true to herself, and through the main character you can help determine the answer she comes to. And one's not really any more or less "right" than the other--I know which life's personality and joys I think were truly Leliana's, but you can convincingly argue either one. Definitely a good character.
Runners-Up: Alistair (Dragon Age Origins), Gruga (Arc the Lad 2 + 3 (but mostly 2)), Lenneth (Valkyrie Profile 1)
Alistair is a good character with a lot of depth that makes him stand out, which is something given that DAO's has a cast where even the drunk, crude, hilarious joke character has significant complexity if you're watching for it. In addition to his very good character development, he, too, is somewhat dynamic, like Leliana, in that his attitude can change a little bit after the culmination of his personality's progression, depending, as with Leliana, on how he is treated by the protagonist. I really liked Gruga, and felt that his conflicts were not only well-executed, but fairly uncommon and interesting. And Lenneth's growth into her humanity was very convincing and special; if nearly all of it just hadn't been so crammed into the last little segment of the game, she'd probably have topped Leliana.
Best Game of 2009:
Winner...s: Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga 1 + 2
What can I say? These games are absolutely brilliant. They can give an audience with even just the most rudimentary understanding of the religion of Hindu and Buddhism things to think about and consider on and on for hours, days, weeks. I'll probably be considering these games and their ideas, events, characters, stories, insights, and so on for years to come, finding new insights on both them and the religion they examine all the while. And unlike many great works that are meant to describe ideas, philosophies, and systems of belief to an audience to ponder over, these games have a genuinely interesting, engaging story to go with them. It's not JUST a ton of fascinating concepts to think about bundled up together--it's also a really cool, creative, and gripping adventure, too. Bravo to Atlus on these 2, to be sure.
Runners-Up: Arc the Lad 2, Dragon Age Origins, Mother 3
Dragon Age Origins is great and has great care given to all its aspects, some of which I've mentioned already. Its characters are great, having strong personalities and depth (except for the dog, I guess, but dogs are generally screwed over with character development...the unfortunate inevitable result of having no dialogue options, I suppose), and its plot is simple in premise (bad guys are coming, raise an army to stop them, kill their leader) but is comprised of many complex events, people, and ideas. Arc the Lad 2 is good to a surprising degree, with a strong plot that throws some neat twists here and there, several poignant emotional scenes, quite a few very good characters, a message to convey, and a satisfactory, yet surprising ending--and each one of these good qualities I've mentioned is built off Arc the Lad 1, taken from that nice but lackluster title and evolved into something really cool. And Mother 3? Damn, man, the madcap fun of Earthbound is no longer the entirety of the game, but rather the vehicle for a touching and intriguing plot of love and loss, complex pettiness and simple heroism. I played a lot of good games this year that deserve recognition--hell, in a different year, I'm sure Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne, Valkyrie Profile 1, and possibly even Arc the Lad 3 would've made the Best Game list--but these ones are the cream of the crop.
List Changes of 2009:
Greatest RPGs: I've changed the list of Greatest RPGs to include Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga 1 + 2. It may kind of be cheating, but I basically condensed SMT1 + 2 into a single part of the list (6th place) and put SMTDDS1 + 2 into 7th place. These two sets of games really do both comprise single plot entities, though, and everything that puts each game on the great list is the same for its sequel/predecessor, so I figure it's okay.
And we're done with this year! Good year, it was, to be sure...which probably means 2010 is going to suck all kinds of hard, and the fact that I'm going to start it with a recent SquareEnix game (Valkyrie Profile 3) doesn't reassure me otherwise. Still, I've got an Arc the Lad game to follow it, which should be decent, at least, and Mass Effect 2 does come out this approaching year, so we shall see how things go. Thanks again for reading and especially commenting, all; it's gratifying to know that somebody's listening. See you in 2010!
* Yeah, I know that Isamu, Chiaki, and Hikawa could be considered just characters in SMTN, since you're given the opportunity to side with any of them and thus not have to oppose that one, but I think they're still closer to villains than anything else--no reason a hero can't join a villain in a story, and whatever your choice you'll still have to contend with at LEAST 2 as your foes, possibly all 3.
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
General RPGs' Unnecessary Paternal Ties Syndrome
This is going to be another one of those trends in story telling that exist significantly in more than just the RPG media. Today's subject, however, IS nonetheless a worse problem in RPGs than I think it is in any other media form I've seen.
Unnecessary Paternal Ties Syndrome. Like Love Hina Syndrome, it's a little phrase I've coined for RPG discussion that you'll probably see me use now and then. Basically, it refers to instances in RPGs (or anything else) in which the father of the protagonist (and, to a lesser extent, other major characters) is thrown into a prominent position in the plot for no special reason beyond just the sake of having him there because his son* happens to be the main character.
It happens all the time. I mean, granted, you do get one or two really great father-child stories in RPGs, to be sure--Tidus and Jecht's connection was interesting and mostly well done in FF10, for example. And I can't pretend that there aren't many occasions where the father-son connection truly is legitimately necessary to the plot--Fallout 3, for example, has the game's entire central plot's purpose as the protagonist following his/her father's lead, and then completing the father's work and enacting (or corrupting) his/her father's life's goal. And then there are the plots where the protagonist's position in life, which is determined by his heritage, is a core part of the game's focus, making the father's being an important part of the plot unavoidable--Suikoden 5's events, as an example, rely heavily on the protagonist being the prince of the queendom he's trying to save. Since a story about a struggle for control over a country is kinda hard to tell without all the major players who would be involved in that struggle, one of whom would be the husband of the queen, the protagonist's dad's importance to some of the plot's events isn't coming out of nowhere.
But overall, this idea has been used to death since the first Star Wars movies. I've mentioned the pointlessness of the paternal connection in Chrono Cross in the last rant, but it certainly doesn't stop with just that game. Unnecessary Paternal Ties Syndrome happens quite often:
Does it really HAVE to be Arc's father who guides him behind the scenes in Arc the Lad 1 and 2? No. You could have had any random behind-the-scenes guide do it, and Arc's father dies so quickly after finally showing up in person that the character development Arc gets from it is quick and minimal--I mean, it's decent while it's happening, to be sure, but it just doesn't go for very long, and doesn't leave much in the way of lasting impact.
Did Kratos really HAVE to be Lloyd's dad in Tales of Symphonia? Not especially, since not a lot of character development for either of them came out of it and the tie between them served no particular purpose to the plot in general.
Did it really HAVE to be Dart's dad in Legend of Dragoon who was mistakenly thought to be the villain but later found out to be pretty okay? Nope. Really, the plot would only need slight tweaking to take Zieg out, or at least put him somewhere that's not the pointless spotlighted potential villain for daddy's boy to have to fight against. His entire presence in the game actually seems, in the end, to have been a lazy attempt by the writers to appease the players of the game by providing Rose with a romantic consolation prize after Dart inexplicably chooses to return the affections of Shana (number 2 on my list of Most Annoying Characters in RPGs) instead of the infinitely more appealing Rose. I mean, Zieg's just violently inserted into the plot and becomes a huge part of it after previously being little more than a vague memory late in the game, right around the time Dart's starting to take Shana seriously as a love interest. Coincidence? Or already bad writing compounding its inadequacies by adding Unnecessary Paternal Ties Syndrome at the last minute to unsuccessfully try to solve another of its problems? You be the judge.
And finally, seriously, did the main villain of Wild Arms 4 really HAVE to be Jude's father? Hell no. Jude doesn't even ever find out; what the hell's the point?
And the list just goes on. Here's an idea. Maybe, if there's no significant reason for the father to be involved in the plot, he could...not be involved. The only superfluous plot element that RPGs incorporate more often than Unnecessary Paternal Ties is the unexplained, poorly developed, there-just-for-the-sake-of-being-there romance, and frankly, those have a slightly better chance of being interesting to watch. Writers should try to find something ELSE to include. Hell, why not set up some issues with the protagonist's MOTHER for once? We get plenty of stories where the father's important and the mother's never/barely seen, but on the off chance that a protagonist's mom is important in any way, the father's still nearly always also important--more important, for that matter. If you've got to add in some familial issues for nearly no reason, how about some gender equality?
* I say "son" because this is almost always an event exclusive to fathers and sons. If female protagonists have family issues, it's usually, from what I've seen, with both parents--although there ARE some cases with female protagonists whose major family connections are with their dad, I suppose, like Final Fantasy 6's Terra, and Wild Arms 3's Virginia. Still, they don't exactly apply here, because Terra's heritage of human and Esper is a major part of the plot in general, particularly the Esper side of her family tree, so her relationship to her Esper parent IS necessary. And with Virginia, well, while I suppose Werner could have been anyone, not just her father, and still have been effective, her relationship with him and the character development she gets from it are excellently established and explored. About the only female protagonist I can think of with legitimate Unnecessary Paternal Ties Syndrome would be Chris from Suikoden 3, and her dad really wasn't too excessively plot-important even then.
Unnecessary Paternal Ties Syndrome. Like Love Hina Syndrome, it's a little phrase I've coined for RPG discussion that you'll probably see me use now and then. Basically, it refers to instances in RPGs (or anything else) in which the father of the protagonist (and, to a lesser extent, other major characters) is thrown into a prominent position in the plot for no special reason beyond just the sake of having him there because his son* happens to be the main character.
It happens all the time. I mean, granted, you do get one or two really great father-child stories in RPGs, to be sure--Tidus and Jecht's connection was interesting and mostly well done in FF10, for example. And I can't pretend that there aren't many occasions where the father-son connection truly is legitimately necessary to the plot--Fallout 3, for example, has the game's entire central plot's purpose as the protagonist following his/her father's lead, and then completing the father's work and enacting (or corrupting) his/her father's life's goal. And then there are the plots where the protagonist's position in life, which is determined by his heritage, is a core part of the game's focus, making the father's being an important part of the plot unavoidable--Suikoden 5's events, as an example, rely heavily on the protagonist being the prince of the queendom he's trying to save. Since a story about a struggle for control over a country is kinda hard to tell without all the major players who would be involved in that struggle, one of whom would be the husband of the queen, the protagonist's dad's importance to some of the plot's events isn't coming out of nowhere.
But overall, this idea has been used to death since the first Star Wars movies. I've mentioned the pointlessness of the paternal connection in Chrono Cross in the last rant, but it certainly doesn't stop with just that game. Unnecessary Paternal Ties Syndrome happens quite often:
Does it really HAVE to be Arc's father who guides him behind the scenes in Arc the Lad 1 and 2? No. You could have had any random behind-the-scenes guide do it, and Arc's father dies so quickly after finally showing up in person that the character development Arc gets from it is quick and minimal--I mean, it's decent while it's happening, to be sure, but it just doesn't go for very long, and doesn't leave much in the way of lasting impact.
Did Kratos really HAVE to be Lloyd's dad in Tales of Symphonia? Not especially, since not a lot of character development for either of them came out of it and the tie between them served no particular purpose to the plot in general.
Did it really HAVE to be Dart's dad in Legend of Dragoon who was mistakenly thought to be the villain but later found out to be pretty okay? Nope. Really, the plot would only need slight tweaking to take Zieg out, or at least put him somewhere that's not the pointless spotlighted potential villain for daddy's boy to have to fight against. His entire presence in the game actually seems, in the end, to have been a lazy attempt by the writers to appease the players of the game by providing Rose with a romantic consolation prize after Dart inexplicably chooses to return the affections of Shana (number 2 on my list of Most Annoying Characters in RPGs) instead of the infinitely more appealing Rose. I mean, Zieg's just violently inserted into the plot and becomes a huge part of it after previously being little more than a vague memory late in the game, right around the time Dart's starting to take Shana seriously as a love interest. Coincidence? Or already bad writing compounding its inadequacies by adding Unnecessary Paternal Ties Syndrome at the last minute to unsuccessfully try to solve another of its problems? You be the judge.
And finally, seriously, did the main villain of Wild Arms 4 really HAVE to be Jude's father? Hell no. Jude doesn't even ever find out; what the hell's the point?
And the list just goes on. Here's an idea. Maybe, if there's no significant reason for the father to be involved in the plot, he could...not be involved. The only superfluous plot element that RPGs incorporate more often than Unnecessary Paternal Ties is the unexplained, poorly developed, there-just-for-the-sake-of-being-there romance, and frankly, those have a slightly better chance of being interesting to watch. Writers should try to find something ELSE to include. Hell, why not set up some issues with the protagonist's MOTHER for once? We get plenty of stories where the father's important and the mother's never/barely seen, but on the off chance that a protagonist's mom is important in any way, the father's still nearly always also important--more important, for that matter. If you've got to add in some familial issues for nearly no reason, how about some gender equality?
* I say "son" because this is almost always an event exclusive to fathers and sons. If female protagonists have family issues, it's usually, from what I've seen, with both parents--although there ARE some cases with female protagonists whose major family connections are with their dad, I suppose, like Final Fantasy 6's Terra, and Wild Arms 3's Virginia. Still, they don't exactly apply here, because Terra's heritage of human and Esper is a major part of the plot in general, particularly the Esper side of her family tree, so her relationship to her Esper parent IS necessary. And with Virginia, well, while I suppose Werner could have been anyone, not just her father, and still have been effective, her relationship with him and the character development she gets from it are excellently established and explored. About the only female protagonist I can think of with legitimate Unnecessary Paternal Ties Syndrome would be Chris from Suikoden 3, and her dad really wasn't too excessively plot-important even then.
Sunday, November 29, 2009
Chrono Cross's Characters
Serge: Serge is a silent protagonist. Normally I complain about this type of hero, because they almost never measure up to a main character who actually defines their personality through action AND speech. But when you've got a hero who travels to an alternate reality where he died when he was 10 and is being sought by a cat furry named Lynx who used to be the hero's father but has now had his brain and body rewritten by an AI program from the future that wants to dominate the events of the present by using mind-control Save Points and needs the hero so that Lynx can switch bodies with him in order to unlock the door to an object of space-time-bending power, all of which is also a part of the plan of 6 dragons (from an alternate reality of lizard people that lost an inter-dimensional war with this dimension's future) so that the dragons can fuse together into Dragon Voltron and destroy humanity, all of which is also the plan of a time-traveling wise man from the past and some unexplained heroic ghosts from another country who want the hero to free a magical princess from the clutches of the remains of an evolution-eating alien that exists outside of time...well, I think at that point you're pretty much FORCED to have a silent protagonist, because there is no way in holy hell that you could actually write dialogue for any single human being engaging in and reacting to all this.*
Kid: Kid's story is only a slightly less ridiculous one than Serge's, but I'm not going to go into it, too (I'll give you a sample: magic, time paradoxes, clones).
Kid is annoying. Now, this is probably just my own prejudice speaking, but it is hard for me to have a character with a laughably exaggerated version of an accent that's already distinctive enough to be mildly amusing under normal circumstances that I am supposed to take seriously. As with Final Fantasy 5's Faris and her pirate lingo, every serious aspect of Kid that I could have recognized (not liked, mind; even when I make an effort to see her serious aspects, they're not very well-done), such as her reactions to her place in destiny, her feelings of loneliness and loss after losing her only home and orphanage family to arson, and her almost completely unexplained and unexplored romantic attachment to Serge...it's all completely made forgettable by that damn, exaggerated Australian accent. All I can manage to see when I read her dialogue is an annoying, loud Aussie thug.** In fact, it's worse than with Faris, because Faris actually had a reason to have her overbearing pirate accent, what with her being, y'know, a pirate. Unless Kid tripped into a dimensional gateway to Australia and spent most of her childhood hunting dingos, kicking cane toads, and taming kangaroos down under before tripping into another gateway that took her back to the game's world, there's really no given reason for her to have this speech pattern.***
Harle: The eventually reluctant catalyst of that 6 Dragon Voltron subplot I mentioned above, Harle's development from shamelessly manipulating those around her into a character who is unwilling to fulfill her role in the planned destruction of humanity because she's grown attached to the people she travels with actually makes her a fairly decent character. Or at least, it would, if that development had really gone anywhere. Unfortunately, what we ultimately get out of Harle is a character who vaguely shows her growing character through subtle indications in dialogue, but never really has her growth as a person actualized because she just completely vanishes once she's fulfilled her destiny. She just disappears forever, leaving you with a character who COULD have been good, who still might be the best in this lousy game, but ultimately just never really had a chance to make her impact before being written out.
Viper: While General Viper has a certain appeal to me because he looks almost exactly like my grandfather (who was also a ranking military man, although not as high as General--almost, though!), I have to say that it's not entirely brilliant to invite a cat of prey that walks like a man who hails from an aggressive foreign nation, has no problems with things like murder and violent kidnapping, and aspires to possess time-space-bending objects of power into your goddamn home.
Fargo: Like Viper, Fargo is barely important enough to include here, but I guess he DOES have enough of a significant impact on the events of the plot that I can't ignore him--or at least, one version of him does. Fargo in one reality is a hardy pirate with little personality beyond being macho, and in the other reality is a wishy-washy captain of a pleasure cruiser who runs a crooked casino and uses demi-humans as slave labor because he's lost his sense of purpose since his beloved Zelbess, a demihuman herself, died, and has had an irrational hatred for her kind ever since. And y'know, as pathetic and annoying as the latter version of Fargo is, I actually wish that it was HIM who joined you instead of the boring pirate captain Fargo. At least pleasure cruise Fargo has some depth and issues he could have worked through. Pirate captain Fargo's big part of the game is slapping sense into pleasure cruise Fargo--why in the world is the character IN the party just a vehicle for the NON-party version's character development? Shouldn't we have gotten the version that was actually dynamic and plot-important to join up, so he could maybe develop further?
Lynx: The semi-sorta villain of the game (I can't really say much about the Devourer of Time, as it, like many of Squaresoft/SquareEnix's villains, only randomly shows up right at the end of the game). I already mentioned the basic back story for Lynx in that jumble of poor plot points I gave for Serge above. I have to say, though, that Lynx is a prime example of what I think I will be calling Unnecessary Paternal Ties Syndrome in RPGs--the totally superfluous act in an RPG of sticking the protagonist's father into the plot in some attention-getting way because God knows no protagonist can possibly be complete without having dad issues. Did Lynx really HAVE to be Serge's mutated pappy? Not really. Neither he nor Serge ever get a lick of character development from the connection, so why have it in the first place?
You could change it around without even having to change the overall story at all; at the time that the transformation from Serge's Dad to Lynx occurred, a friend of the family, Miguel, was present--Square could just as easily have had Miguel become Lynx. In fact, it would have worked out BETTER that way, because Serge and company meet Miguel later in the game, have him explain some of the silly plot, and then they're forced to fight and kill Miguel to continue on with the quest. Given the nature of the scene, the large amount of dialogue, and the unfortunate necessity of the fight, Square could have had Serge's Dad be the one left behind there instead and actually gotten some real conflict out of father and son finally reuniting only to have to fight to the death. Lynx is really just a reconfiguring of the matter that Serge's Dad once was; there's no memories or emotion left in him of Serge to speak of. But hey, he's the semi-sorta main villain, so HE HAS TO BE SERGE'S FATHER NO MATTER WHAT.
Doc, Draggy, Funguy, Glenn, Greco, Grobyc, Guile, Irenes, Janice, Karsh, Korcha, Leah, Leena, Luccia, Macha, Marcy, Mel, Miki, Mojo/Mojoy, NeoFio, Nikki, Norris, Orcha, Orlha, Pierre, Pip, Poshul, Radius, Razzly, Riddel, Skelly, Sneff, Sprigg, Starky, Steena, Turnip, Van, Zappa, and Zoah: Nearly every character in this game just has little or no importance to the plot and has character development--if you can even call it that--that clocks in altogether at 5 minutes or less each and which depends heavily on you discerning some kind of deep insight about each one by their accent. There is an obvious lesson to learn from this, kiddies at Square:
Quantity.
Does not!
OUTWEIGH!
QUALITY!
YOU ASININE, LAZY TURD-CHEWERS!
*I really wish, incidentally, that I had hit on all of the insane, complicated, nonsensical idiocy of this game's plot right there, but what you just got is an extremely simplified version. The actual details and parts I left out make it all significantly more convoluted and crazy.
** Because I have Australian readers (and friends), I'd just like clarify--I don't mean to say Australians sound silly as a rule, or annoying, or anything like that. I want to mention that what I mean here is that the Australian accent is, as a rule, pretty distinctive--and I just personally feel that ANY accent that's distinctive can be mildly amusing. But my POINT in this, I must emphasize, is that Kid's accent is very exaggerated, and it's the exaggeration that I can't get around. If any of you guys/girls are still offended, I apologize.
*** Of course, this IS Chrono Cross, so really, this possibility isn't all that unlikely after all. Hell, it would be more believable than at least half of the rest of the game.
Kid: Kid's story is only a slightly less ridiculous one than Serge's, but I'm not going to go into it, too (I'll give you a sample: magic, time paradoxes, clones).
Kid is annoying. Now, this is probably just my own prejudice speaking, but it is hard for me to have a character with a laughably exaggerated version of an accent that's already distinctive enough to be mildly amusing under normal circumstances that I am supposed to take seriously. As with Final Fantasy 5's Faris and her pirate lingo, every serious aspect of Kid that I could have recognized (not liked, mind; even when I make an effort to see her serious aspects, they're not very well-done), such as her reactions to her place in destiny, her feelings of loneliness and loss after losing her only home and orphanage family to arson, and her almost completely unexplained and unexplored romantic attachment to Serge...it's all completely made forgettable by that damn, exaggerated Australian accent. All I can manage to see when I read her dialogue is an annoying, loud Aussie thug.** In fact, it's worse than with Faris, because Faris actually had a reason to have her overbearing pirate accent, what with her being, y'know, a pirate. Unless Kid tripped into a dimensional gateway to Australia and spent most of her childhood hunting dingos, kicking cane toads, and taming kangaroos down under before tripping into another gateway that took her back to the game's world, there's really no given reason for her to have this speech pattern.***
Harle: The eventually reluctant catalyst of that 6 Dragon Voltron subplot I mentioned above, Harle's development from shamelessly manipulating those around her into a character who is unwilling to fulfill her role in the planned destruction of humanity because she's grown attached to the people she travels with actually makes her a fairly decent character. Or at least, it would, if that development had really gone anywhere. Unfortunately, what we ultimately get out of Harle is a character who vaguely shows her growing character through subtle indications in dialogue, but never really has her growth as a person actualized because she just completely vanishes once she's fulfilled her destiny. She just disappears forever, leaving you with a character who COULD have been good, who still might be the best in this lousy game, but ultimately just never really had a chance to make her impact before being written out.
Viper: While General Viper has a certain appeal to me because he looks almost exactly like my grandfather (who was also a ranking military man, although not as high as General--almost, though!), I have to say that it's not entirely brilliant to invite a cat of prey that walks like a man who hails from an aggressive foreign nation, has no problems with things like murder and violent kidnapping, and aspires to possess time-space-bending objects of power into your goddamn home.
Fargo: Like Viper, Fargo is barely important enough to include here, but I guess he DOES have enough of a significant impact on the events of the plot that I can't ignore him--or at least, one version of him does. Fargo in one reality is a hardy pirate with little personality beyond being macho, and in the other reality is a wishy-washy captain of a pleasure cruiser who runs a crooked casino and uses demi-humans as slave labor because he's lost his sense of purpose since his beloved Zelbess, a demihuman herself, died, and has had an irrational hatred for her kind ever since. And y'know, as pathetic and annoying as the latter version of Fargo is, I actually wish that it was HIM who joined you instead of the boring pirate captain Fargo. At least pleasure cruise Fargo has some depth and issues he could have worked through. Pirate captain Fargo's big part of the game is slapping sense into pleasure cruise Fargo--why in the world is the character IN the party just a vehicle for the NON-party version's character development? Shouldn't we have gotten the version that was actually dynamic and plot-important to join up, so he could maybe develop further?
Lynx: The semi-sorta villain of the game (I can't really say much about the Devourer of Time, as it, like many of Squaresoft/SquareEnix's villains, only randomly shows up right at the end of the game). I already mentioned the basic back story for Lynx in that jumble of poor plot points I gave for Serge above. I have to say, though, that Lynx is a prime example of what I think I will be calling Unnecessary Paternal Ties Syndrome in RPGs--the totally superfluous act in an RPG of sticking the protagonist's father into the plot in some attention-getting way because God knows no protagonist can possibly be complete without having dad issues. Did Lynx really HAVE to be Serge's mutated pappy? Not really. Neither he nor Serge ever get a lick of character development from the connection, so why have it in the first place?
You could change it around without even having to change the overall story at all; at the time that the transformation from Serge's Dad to Lynx occurred, a friend of the family, Miguel, was present--Square could just as easily have had Miguel become Lynx. In fact, it would have worked out BETTER that way, because Serge and company meet Miguel later in the game, have him explain some of the silly plot, and then they're forced to fight and kill Miguel to continue on with the quest. Given the nature of the scene, the large amount of dialogue, and the unfortunate necessity of the fight, Square could have had Serge's Dad be the one left behind there instead and actually gotten some real conflict out of father and son finally reuniting only to have to fight to the death. Lynx is really just a reconfiguring of the matter that Serge's Dad once was; there's no memories or emotion left in him of Serge to speak of. But hey, he's the semi-sorta main villain, so HE HAS TO BE SERGE'S FATHER NO MATTER WHAT.
Doc, Draggy, Funguy, Glenn, Greco, Grobyc, Guile, Irenes, Janice, Karsh, Korcha, Leah, Leena, Luccia, Macha, Marcy, Mel, Miki, Mojo/Mojoy, NeoFio, Nikki, Norris, Orcha, Orlha, Pierre, Pip, Poshul, Radius, Razzly, Riddel, Skelly, Sneff, Sprigg, Starky, Steena, Turnip, Van, Zappa, and Zoah: Nearly every character in this game just has little or no importance to the plot and has character development--if you can even call it that--that clocks in altogether at 5 minutes or less each and which depends heavily on you discerning some kind of deep insight about each one by their accent. There is an obvious lesson to learn from this, kiddies at Square:
Quantity.
Does not!
OUTWEIGH!
QUALITY!
YOU ASININE, LAZY TURD-CHEWERS!
*I really wish, incidentally, that I had hit on all of the insane, complicated, nonsensical idiocy of this game's plot right there, but what you just got is an extremely simplified version. The actual details and parts I left out make it all significantly more convoluted and crazy.
** Because I have Australian readers (and friends), I'd just like clarify--I don't mean to say Australians sound silly as a rule, or annoying, or anything like that. I want to mention that what I mean here is that the Australian accent is, as a rule, pretty distinctive--and I just personally feel that ANY accent that's distinctive can be mildly amusing. But my POINT in this, I must emphasize, is that Kid's accent is very exaggerated, and it's the exaggeration that I can't get around. If any of you guys/girls are still offended, I apologize.
*** Of course, this IS Chrono Cross, so really, this possibility isn't all that unlikely after all. Hell, it would be more believable than at least half of the rest of the game.
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