Movies Inspired by the Gaming World (Pt.3)

Hello my friends and welcome back for the 3rd part of the "Movies Inspired by the Gaming World" article. If u thought thats i was pretty strict or mean judging the movies in the parts that preceded, u are totally right and im gonna be even meaner in those parts that are about to follow. So pay attention while i rub my hands laughing malevolently!

BloodRayne

There are only a few adaptation attempts worth watching and unfortunately Bloodrayne isnt one of them! Actually is quite a laughable one! Kristanna Loken as the Dhampyr BloodRayne (half-human, half vampire) sets out to find her father Kagan (Ben Kingsley) to get revenge for raping her mother. Along the way she meets and joins with the leaders of the fortress of the vampire hunters, Vladimir (Michael Madsen) and Sebastian (Matthew Davis), who train her to fight Kagan. Meanwhile her human side falls in love with Sebastian etc. Well i remember that the first time i laid my eyes on the Bloodrayne game cover i was convinced that it was a killing combo. a fast tempo arcade action gameplay with a gothic leather dressed hot chick. Such a combo hardly fails especially if its nicely represented. I wish i could say the same about the movie. Uwe Boll once more proves how good he is in taking gems and turning them into stinky shit! Kristanna Loken's costumes were poorly made and they look quite fake and the same goes for almost everyone's clothes. The film set was so lame that only in low budget movies u can find. A weak twisted scenario, lame acting, low budget and Uwe Boll is th secret recipe for an awful movie and this one had all the ingredients.

Doom

Well, now about Doom. Something is wrong at the space research facility on Mars. Researching was ceased communication is failed and the few messages that manage to get through are quite disturbing. Space marines are sent to investigate the incident and they just cant imagine the horrific terror they are to face! With Karl Urban as John Grimm and Dwayne Johnson as Sarge and a bunch of interesting casting as well, Doom succeeds where other game-movies have failed! To be honest when i first rented the movie i wasnt sure about what i was gonna watch. U see there are not many good examples of games that became movies so i was a bit reluctant. But in the end Doom movie surpassed my expectations. And the reason is quite simple! It had all those features that a good game-movie have: 1) loyalty to the prototype source 2) a decent direction 3) very good action and even horror scenes 4) and FPS directed scenes!!! What else is there to ask?! Even though  Dwayne Johnson  was awarded as the worst actor nevertheless in general u wouldnt even notice his acting sipmly because that was not the point of the movie!

Silent Hill

Movie success. Or else Silent Hill!! Yes Silent Hill is one of the few attempts that managed to be one of the scariest movies ever staying true to the game that's based on, having an amazing direction and scenario and a very promising cast! Silent Hill is about a couple whose daughter suffers from sleepwalking. Her mother, Radha Mitchell, takes the decision to visit the town that her daughter dreams about (without telling her husband, Sean Bean). But there they find out that that town, SIlent Hill, is nothing but an ordinary welcoming place. An accident that happened in the netrance of town causes her daughter to dissappear. So Rose, her mother, begins desperately searching for her only to discover the cruelites that once took place there involving in a repulsive manner her daughter! Silent Hill's director did a terrifc job won 8 nomination awards! So, any wannabes directors out there u should take some really serious lessons from masters like Christophe Gans .

Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess Review (Nintendo Gamecube)

Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess is an action RPG (with real time battles) developed by Nintendo and designed orginally for the Nintendo Gamecube. Every Legend of Zelda game has to do with Link who despite being a young lad doesn’t hesitate to go against every evil force that most of the time wants dominion over the world. Princess Zelda is always involved in some manner and Link sets to completing his tasks after being equipped with his trusty sword and shield. 

PLOT: 8/10

Well, now about LoZTP.  Its begins with link waking up in his room on his tree house (another reappearing situation in LoZ games) and sets out to begin just another phenomenically ordinary day In Ordon Village. After strolling around in the beautiful Ordonian fields, some kids are abducted by an evil force and Link begins searching for clues in order to rescue them.  After rescuing them, Link meets the twilight side of the world and because of a curse he turns into a beast of the shadows while having Midna (a really peculiar character) in his aid. You play along his journey to get rid of the curse and to save the world (once more) of the malice Zant.

GAMEPLAY: 7.5/10

If it is a section of the game that is weak or at least annoying (at some points) that is its gameplay.  Well firstly its not a free roaming rpg which is quite restricting itself. Ur root across  the world map is predefined with narrow paths or wide valleys which steals away the sensation of the vastness of the world and also the desire of the player to explore. Secondly, the number of enemies u meet especially in the world map (not in dungeons) is so small and when  u eventually meet them  the battle is really easy and not challenging at all! But even though there are those flaws on the gameplay there is the bright side as well. Link’s movements are really natural and even cool I could say! His attacking moves are pretty well made too and quite plenty. Nintendo has been innovative adding the wolf transformation feature! Link at certain points of the game, when he enters in the twillight zone. He transforms into a fearsome wolf with a bunch of new skills. So, there are some places that u can go with Link, and some places that u can go with the Wolf-Link. On the one hand that's something totally new for the Legend of Zelda series but on the other hand im not quite sure if its a feature that actually fits or blends in with the rest of the gameplay. When i turned into the wolf for the first time I had the curiosity of exploring him as a character but i wanted the real classic green-hooded Link back and really quick!!! One more thing that i liked is that it is designed in a way that even if u clear a quest in an area, there will still be something there for u to take, or do, later in the game, when u have the appropriate equipment! Thats a very clever way for the game not to be boring after some hours of gameplay!

U walk around with the left stick n u turn the camera with the "C stick" (right one). U draw ur sword with "A button" while u strike with "B". "X" n "Y" are used for equipping secondary weapons that u select in the menu by pressing the "UP button" of the cursor. The "left directional button" of the the cursor is for the map, while the "L" and "R" buttons are for targeting and defending. The "Z" one is used for calling Midna when u need her help. What u have to do throughout the game is more or less like every else in the series. U finish it by defeating the final boss of every dungeon, u enter dungeons by obtaining the necessary key, and u have to use several weapons (in the dungeons) in order to overcome  each obstacle (i really love this kind of gamplay by the way) ! And last but not least what I thought it was trully well done was the horseback battles! Epona gallops like hell when Link swings his sword against the enemy hordes! That was the most adrenaline driven moments in the game. And dont forget that Link can ride even the beasts of the enemies, once he defeats them!........ Oh! and if u excuse me i have one question: Why Link NEVER fucking speaks????????

ATMOSPHERE/MUSIC: 8/10

The atmosphere and the music are really good and nicely given however they are not the game's strongest points. The musical scores dress adequately each scene of the game with the really impressive moments being those when in the dungeons. There is one score piece for almost every region u re gonna visit. This characteristic itself is well thought because each region gains a personality automatically! The atmopshere is at quite satisfying levels as well having really intimidating boss battles! The atmosphere especially in the fiery mountains of the Gorons is breath-taking. Running and fighting ur way through the rooms of the mines is challenging. A really clever plus in the game is the somewhat psychotic and grotesque music when u get attacked by creatures of the shadows in the twillight zone. Its not the conventional heroic type one u can find in the most battle themes. And when i was awkwardly but pleasantly surprised was when i saw the first portal forming in the sky! It was made of pixels! Well surelly it was made of pixels its a game after all but what i mean is large deliberately visible pixels moving one by one towards the sky forming the portals! Well once more Japan proves that know how to make a really good GAMING atmosphere! Even though Link lives in medieval like times, that digital like feature blends in so naturally in those fiendish unearthly creatures that eventually it becomes an intergral part of their nature!

GRAPHICS: 8.5/10

Graphics is what catches the eye when it comes to Twillight Princess. In general terms it is like playing Ocarina of time but with highly enhanced graphics. Very detailed and beautiful they give a pretty and natural feeling of the surroundings. It's objectively the best Legend fo Zelda when it comes to graphics. The best designed version of Link (except for his eyes maybe) . Id like to add here that throught the game i constantly had a feeling of sadness, at first couldnt tell why but i ended up that it was the graphics. Not in a bad way or anything but its something the colors that it's a bit sad about this game.   Maybe because almost in every scene there is so much yellow/brown/light orange/beige or sugar white. There are not lively strong colors such as red. Even the hearts u collect are more like pale pink (if u ve seen the hearts in Windwaker u could know what i mean. The hearts there are so sweetly made that they look like candies. I know... the Windwakers style is totally different but still...). But thats not necessarily bad. Maybe thats the way Nintendo wanted to be. More serious, doleful or even bleak and if thats the case, they made their point and they pretty well!

OVERALL: 8/10

The last Legend of Zelda title at least for the Nintendo Gamecube was really innovative and surely something that made a lot of fans waiting for its arrival, back then. There is no better thing for a gamer than to anticipate to see how his favorite hero will look like in a new console with enhanced graphics and sounds, remaining at the same time loyal to all those characteristics that made him so famous success! So, maybe it has some flaws ( i actually can name just a few flawless games) but u really overcome them because u can simply take Epona ride into the sunset and save the world for one more time!

Top 10 Most Horrifying Video Games

As the author, of the cult of "weird" fiction, H.P. Lovecraft, once wrote "The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear". Even if we don't want to see things that will probably give us the chills, something inside us indicates otherwise. It's the very same thing that causes andrenaline to reach red limits, and it's the same thing that makes hair stand up like nails. Fear, no matter how blood freezing, will always be tempting and intriguing and its adventurerers feel like treading on unknown facets of the most untold terrors.

And of course, that is a thing that video game designers realized quite early, and adapted it in a genre known as Survival Horror. This particular genre has quite a lot of fans for the reasons i already mentioned. Even if its allusive terror like the one we find in Scratches, or raw gory disturbing violence of Condemned, Survival Horror its a genre thats has developed in a way that would satisfy even the most demanding gamers. In 2012 the titlesare so many and the sub-genres even more, so im gonna present to you the 10 most fearsome of them. 

10. Dead Space (PS3, Xbox 360, PC)

Created with the latest means of technology, Dead Space is quite a chaotic spectacle, being Isaac Clarke literally alone in the vastness of space trapped inside a rescue ship confronting "Necromorphs". This name (it could so easily be the name of some black metal band!) belongs to an alien virus that hosts as a parasite into livng humans, turning them into clawing blood thursty android abominations. Maybe the plot isnt really innovative, but the way Dead Space is given (and also dressed with brilliant scores) is quite a temptation for all the horror gamers. Though one of the most successful survival horror titles out there, Dead Space wins merely the 10th position only for the reason that its gameplay gets a bit boring along the way. U ll find urself just wondering around in rooms full of computers and narrow corridors having to literally mutilate numerous Necromorphs. It could be addictive, though i was expecting a more tempting gameplay.

9. Doom 3 (PC. Xbox, Mac)

Remakes most of the time leave me thinking if they`re gonna overcome the success of their predecessors but Doom 3 left me no doubt about it. Dated in 2004 with graphics that even today are remarkably impressive Doom 3 is set in a futuristic space station in Mars which is infested with demons and nightmarish grotesque creatures with the sole purpose of scaring the shit out of and of course destroying Earth. Not a very rare to find scenario again but its a masterpiece to the collection of a horror gamer fan.

8. Project Zero 2: Crimson Butterfly (Playstation 2, Xbox)

With Japan being into the horror industry for good we have enjoyed and scared to death many times thanks to their non-stoping imagination and creativity. Project Zero 2 beats what they say that the first of the series is always the better. I think that the 2nd attempt of Ubisoft is even better than the 1st having the gamers to follow 2 little girls chasing around a butterfly, only to find themselves lost in a village were the souls of the dead never rest. And the exciting thing of this tittle is that u dont have any shotguns, axes, steel pipes or any other badass weapon (who would like anything like that when confronting an immaterial spooky threat?) just a camera that u try to annihilate the ghosts by taking pictures of them! It may sound gay but it actually needs  BIG balls to encounter those spiritual threats with such a "weapon". I'd like to see how a movie version of this title would look like, but now that i am thinking about it there is a movie with similar plot called "Shutter".

7. Dark Fall: The Journal (PC)

Further down in our list we have Dark Fall: The Journal which is the right successful of the text adventure games if u ask me! You receive a tape recorder from ur brother telling you in a kinda freaked out way to take a train and meet him. But when u arrive, the station is deserted. Spooky and eerie sounds can be heard from every corner no matter how well lit it is and the chances to get chill blooded are uncountable. Its first person aspect of gameplay gives you the angle of looking through the protagonist's eyes and this fact makes the contact with each terror more immediate. It's a game thats highly recommended especially to the old school gamers and to those who know how to enjoy a good classic ghost story (its a classic pattern : 1.lights turned off 2. volume to its limit 3. play only in the night).

6. Penubra: Overture (PC)

Having H.P. Lovecraft to infect, almost any kind of art known these days, games couldn't be immune, especially Penubra: Overure. The Lovecraftian atmosphere is spread throughout the game. The player assumes the role of Phillip who receives a letter from his supposedly  dead father along with a crypted book. The investigation leads him to a bank account that holds a map for Greenland pointing to some old mines. The game is survival horror emphasizing on solving riddles rather killing enemies with brute force. The game uses cutting edge 3D graphics technology and it also has an advanced physic system which allows such an environment interaction like never seen before! Well all those i think are quite enough for Penubra: Overture to be in this list.

5. Call of Cthulu: Dark Corners of the Earth (PC, Playstation 2, Xbox)

Well its needless to say where this title originates from. It comes directly from the haunted pages of Lovecraft's stories along with the Old Ones, Cthulu, and the upcoming, unavoidable madness!  You take the role of detective Jack Walters, six years after the disturbing events in the Massachussets manor that apparently drove you insane. You take up a case of investigating a missing person in a slimy, xenophobic, foggy, town called Innsmouth. There is something... "fishy" about the Innsmouth residents and ur gonna find it out, not with the most tender way! Enough said about that masterpiece, the rest is all up to you to discover...  if u have the guts of course!

4. Scratches (PC)

Approaching even more the number one in the Top 10 Most Horrifying Video Games, 4th comes a not so well-known atmospheric, first person, point n' click, adventure game called Scratches. The famed horror writer Michael Arthate arrives at Blackwood Manor a Victorian style residence located in the ouskirts of a small english market town. Soon enough he finds himself isolated by a destroyed road. With a telephone being the only means of communication with the outer world, he has to overcome his fears but the strange sounds echoing through all the house's walls will make the dusty atmosphere even frightening. Solving several puzzles as he makes his way through the lonely rooms of the manor and some more areas around the house as well such as a mystical chapel, a greenhouse, and a spooky crypt he will find himself wishing..he was alone!

3. Amnesia: The Dark Descent (PC)

Pacing in the steps of Penubra in aspects of gameplay Amnesia: The Dark Descent, is another first person, survival horror, point n click, atmospheric adventure. In the beggining u take control of Daniel after getting conscious being at a loss suffering from amnesia. U just have to make ur way through the hostile chambers, corridors, and rooms of this vast castle trying to find out more about ur identity. The horrors that u are going to come up against are beyond any imagination. The real good thing about this one is that the game feels quite natural as u play using quite an adnvaced physics and interactive system. It gives u the ability to interact with almost anything in every way u can imagine. One more plus of this title is though it doesn't have immediate action, brutal killing or abomination like monsters, u feel constantly terrorized by the spookiness of the castle's corridors and the pitch black darkness, that u wish u had enemies to slaughter in order to wreak the tension. Being one of the most fluently made games of that genre ever i happily freaked out every moment i spent with it!


2. Resident Evil (Playstation, PC, Saturn)

I believe i dont have to say almost anything about Resident Evil being the game that defined the genre like no one else. In the first of the series S.T.A.R.S. Team is running, in panic, towards a mansion in order to find shelter from what it seems a vicious dog. Then, in the Mansion they will get separated n eventually lost and Jill Valentine or Chris Redfield (2 options) will have to find their partners and to solve the infested-with-zombies-mansion mystery. They soon will discover that they have to deal with a deadly virus that their own company manufactured conducting experiments.


1. Silent Hill 2 (Playstation 2, PC)

I ll never forget the insanity and the unimaginably terrifying atmosphere that was lurking within the streets of the first Silent Hill of the series, but some flaws that were corrected in the sequel made me write about the 2nd one. But lets face it, it's really difficult to tell which one is better, because even though the first one has that prototype kind of fear, the second one is almost flawless!!! Well no matter how many horror games i have played or gonna play i ll never find such a disturbing title. Konami once again gave gaming legacy a masterpiece that is going to be discussed for many generations! James Sunderland receives a letter from his dead wife that tells him to meet her in Silent Hill. The foggy scenery is largely depressing, the plot is twisted in an authentic Japanese way, the creatures are designed in a manner that can only be described as mentally ill and malicious and the sounds blend in so well that this thing alone can cause a heart attack. I dont think there is any fan of the genre out there who hasnt played Silent Hill 2, and if there is do urself a favor and try it now!

When Music Reigns

Video games have their own history and stories to narrate along the years. Almost 2 decades ago, when games started to take a form that set the basics for what we know today, they were let's say minimalistic. For instance characters and monsters had only a few frames for their movements, they were consisted of very few pixels, as well, which were placed in strategical positions for the resemblance between the pixelated character and the real one to be possible. The same applies for music and  sound  effects too. Back in the days, music in video games were just 8-bit sounds (because the saving format had little capacity) but u could easily tell if each composition was good or matching the scene that it was dressing with.

In my opinion video game designing is just another art or the 8th art if u want. Just think of it, they can be poetic , dramatic, gory, sad, brutal, fun, or even all of those together in the best case scenario. Just like the movies are. Surely games' audience arent so vast but they deal with the same stuff. They are being directed, there are authors to write the scripts, actors are being hired to dub the character's voices and so on. And here comes the music part. A good game scene always gets better in every aspect when is nicely dressed with a musical piece that fits. What Legend of Zelda would be without its classic sound effects of acquiring items, or FF series without the victory battle theme? No matter how good a video game is, when the music part is weak then something is missing. And thats the feeling. When u play a u practically are the character on the screen. U become one struggle with him. In other words u interact. This interaction gets completed when music comes to express the feelings, that graphics and technology cant. I remember how well chosen was the soundtrack of Painkiller. Such an arcade-fps-gory gameplay can only be dressed with fast-paced, heart pumping rock n metal tunes! 

The key to a good VG soundtrack is when the composer feels what the game is all about (and each scene scene as well), and every musical piece is the audio soul of each scene. A grande castle can be dressed with the organ, a chase in the jungle with a groovy beat of bongos, or a death scene with the sad notes of a piano or a cello perhaps.

I simply cant think of a single person that didnt feel joy when was hearing the 8-bit sounds of Kirby, or the battle's anxiety when he was hearing the battle music theme in Pokemon. VG soundtracks is such a vast a legacy itself. Music themes of retro games like Super Mario or Sonic the Hedgehog are being regarded classics these days, existing almost everywhere and in every form. In movies, as ringtones for cell phones, or even they are being covered by varius orchestras around the world. Youtube is full of covers like that and many of them are worth of our attention. Even metal bands, like Powerglove, have been formed with the solely purpose to cover VG music themes in a more heavy metal sound. Many composers have emerged through their work in the audio sectors such as Nobuo Uematsu, Kazuki Muraoka, Rika Muranaka. 

J-RPGs - Repeated Patterns

This post most likely is gonna interest the J-RPG lovers, but i just couldnt resist writing about it. One of my passions, conserning video games, is the J-RPG genre (Japanese Role Playing Game). Having played quite a lot of those during the years, i can say with safety that there are some really classic and standard patterns that are being repeated almost deliberately. Some of them has to do clearly with the plot and some of them with the designing process and the gameplay style. More extensively:

1. Main Character - Swordsman

Cloud Strife

Dart

Almost in every  J-RPG the main hero will be a sword expert even if the game is not placed in a medieval-like age. Maybe the technology around him is growing stronger n stronger but he still uses a blade that he can do nearly every stand that a mind can come up with. So we can see Cloud Strife of FF 7 with his massive Buster Sword, Squall Leonhart of FF 7 with his Gunblades, Dart, Ryudo, and Ryu with their blades  and so on...

2. Every hero must form a party 

Breath of Fire 4 party

One of my great expectations when i start playing a new turn-based  J-RPG is to start meeting the new members of the upcoming party so to know their strengths n weaknesses and to find out their role and past. Japanese manufacturer companies surely know how to surprise their gaming audience since almost every character is quite different from the others or is just peculiar or unique in their own way (see Quina - FF 9). One of the advantages of this feature is that the game never loses its interest cos u can always chose a different combination of characters to play with and that means new combat styles, spells and eventually a totally new point of view of the gameplay. It is also a really nice trick cos though we see the story of the main character being unraveled in front of us, we also see the stories of the secondary heroes being twisted with each other's at the same time.

3. Every hero can use only one type of weapon

From the early years of the japanese genre each character could use only one type of weapon and that feature, passed down like a tradition to the games till nowdays. For instance we have Vincent Valentine in Final Fantasy 7 who specializes in guns n shotguns, or Shana in Legend of Dragoon who specializes in bows, Spinel (Crimson Gem Saga) in daggers etc.

4. Mysterious/brute-force/low-inteligence character

Kongol - Legend of Dragoon

Almost in every  J-RPG title there must be a least one of the above characters in order to make the contrast usually to the main character. For example, Kongol (Legend of Dragoon) is a kind-hearted giganto with lethal physical strength that none of the rest of the party can match with. He is not so well-known for his brain as he is for his raw strength. The same thing applies for Mareg of Grandia 2. From the other hand Vincent Valentine, Auron and Amarant from the FF series are quite the mysterious type of guys that dont reveal all of their papers but their are with the party to serve their own purposes.

5. Healer/Shaman character

Cecilia - Wild ARMs

Not only in  J-RPGs but in DnD (Dungeons and Dragons) games as well, always there is a healer, shaman, or cleric that provides his comrades with healing and protective spells and always fights from the back row using ranged weapons cos of his physical weakness. Its has become a tradition in gaming, movies or even literature (if it is heroic fantasy) if there is a party being formed along the way, at least one magician/priest/wizard to exist in it. But in  J-RPGs they have something in common. They are ALL women or girls and usually is the character that the main one falls in love with. They all have big-cute-colored-watery manga style eyes. Aeris of FF 7, Garnet of FF 9, Yuna and Lulu of FF 10, Cecilia of Wild ARMs, Shana of Legend of Dragoon, Elena of Grandia 2, Nina of Breath of Fire 4 etc.

6. Main character / main villain = Brothers

Kuja vs. Zidane - FF 9

Each  J-RPG that wants to be a classic has to follow the rules and this one seems quite catchy as it is being used quite frequently simply cos in the final battle the drama grows immensely.  J-RPGs have the ability to absorb the players' minds into their own world and into each character's personality and past, like really not many games can do. You dont just play, you feel for them! So when the ending of the game is near what is more dramatic than putting two men who share the same blood to fight each other?! And trust me japanese people know exactly how to make a dramatic scene like this worth its while!  

7. Each character has his own music theme

The tradition in constructing  J-RPGs, indicates that each character has a distinctive musical piece that defines him. Thats happening just because each character plays an important role in the game's plot and he/she is not there just as a secondary playable character. So whenever something happens and has to do with him most of the times we can hear his/her theme as a background  music. The same thing happens with the different regions throughout the game.

8. 2D J-RPGs nowadays

Atelier Iris - Eternal Mana

Crimson Gem Saga

There are still getting produced nowadays  J-RPGs in total 2D environments and characters even for consoles like PS2, PS3 etc. like they were back in the 90's just because its classic and of course easy and more effortless. Its a tested method know to the public so why should anyone take any risks?

Dont get me wrong! Im a sucker for that kind of similarities in those games. Its what keeping the genre going all those years. Those patterns are its legacy and history. So I just thought that it would worth a while mentioning and listing them. Arigato!