My Top 3 Genres

I've been having a pretty shitty week so I'm just going to take a minute to gush about some genres that I really like because maybe posting something overly positive on here will help cheer me up a bit.  I'm sure I'll have something to rage about soon but for now I'm just going to gush.

1. Rhythm Games

One of the best things about living in Japan is the fact I'm surrounded on almost all sides in an arcade by the latest rhythm games.  I fucking love these things and I got my start playing them when I was pretty young and my local bowling alley in the UK got a DDR Euromix machine in.  These games were challenging, fun had sick music and back when I first got hooked the ability to draw a crowd. 

I lost interest a little bit during the peak of things like Guitar Hero and Rock Band because I didn't really like those games and getting hold of the ones I did like such as IIDX required importing shit from Japan and getting special controllers but once I moved here my interest came back HARD.  Admittedly I'm a sucker for shitty J-Pop sometimes and these games feature the catchiest shit J-Pop you've ever heard,  it's like a fucking dream.

The selection for these games out here is also insane, with new games popping up all the damn time and classic ones constantly getting updates.  Personal favorites include Jubeat, Sound Voltex, Chunithm and DDR but I'm always willing to try one of the weirder looking ones like MaiMai if I have some extra during my trip to the game center.

2. RPGs

Pretty much the genre that cemented my interest in gaming back in the Sega Saturn days I fucking love a good RPG.  I tend to not give a shit about all these differentiations like jRPG and wRPG that we make now a days because back when I was playing these things we just called 'em RPGs.  Didn't matter if it was Baldur's Gate or Final Fantasy, that shit was just an RPG.

I like these games for 2 main reasons.  One is the story because if an RPG has a really good plot behind it then it can be almost impossible to put down.  Granted, that a lot of the time finding an RPG with an actual well written story can be kind of hard but when you do it's pretty incredible.  However an RPG for me, especially a jRPG can be just as enjoyable if it has a cool combat system and lots of stuff going on in order to progress your characters.  I love the process of min/maxing characters in order to overcome a secret super boss or whatever, it just feels good to have to know a game that intimately in order to succeed. 

Some of my favorites for this one include Panzer Dragoon Saga, Shadow Hearts and more recently The Banner Saga.  It's a shame that the genre is so overcrowded now with all this moe shit in Japan but they are still pretty fun from a game play stand point.

3. The Horror Game

 

I'm a big fan of horror anything really, but horror games especially are my favorite way to experience the genre.  It's hard to make some general comments about what makes the genre as a whole so great because that kind of varies from series and series and game to game.  The reason why Silent Hill is so damn good is different to the reason why Project Zero is so good. 

Granted, the genre does have a lot of shit in it like that weird The Ring game on Dreamcast and that X Files game on PS2 that I currently forget the name of but the good horror games really are fucking awesome.  There's nothing quite like playing Silent Hill 2 for the first time or the rush of encountering your first ghost with the camera in Project Zero.

While the AAA horror game has kind of died it's luckily being kept alive by a good number of indie developers.  Things like the first Amnesia game, Penumbra, Into the Gloom and Lone Survivor show that there still are a number of game developers out there who know how to produce a good scare every so often and while it's niche as fuck the fan base for the horror genre is pretty dedicated. 

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So there you have it folks, my top 3 genres.  It's cool if you don't give a fuck but writing some positive stuff about some games that I love really helped cheer me up so I'll be back to my usual rage pretty soon. 

Project Zero Movie Hype!

Wow, what the fuck is going on, first Ao Oni and now this!

So if you remember a few days ago I made a post about how I was excited for a movie adaptation of Japanese cult hit indie game Ao Oni.  Well now it's happened again but this time with something a little more mainstream. 

For those that don't know, Project Zero is a long running survival horror series which is also known as Fatal Frame in the US.  The game revolves around walking around creepy places and dealing with ghosts but not in the Ghostbusters way.  Your only method of defence against the evil apparitions that want you dead is a camera and the closer your attacker gets to you then the more damage you do.  It's an interesting mechanic in a genre where you usually want the enemies to be as far away as humanly possible.

To top it all off, the games tend to have pretty interesting plots, solid level design and great sound design so it's right up there with all the best horror games like Silent Hill and old school Resident Evil.

So today I discovered this

This is the trailer for the upcoming movie adaptation.  I'm a little more sceptical about this one since there's a lot you could do wrong with a series like this but I really like Project Zero so I'm going to get hype for it! 

I'll cover this and Ao Oni on here as I see them so watch this space!

Dreadout Demo (With Video)

First of all watch the video of me playing the Demo

Right, now to discuss some of my thoughts.

First of all, I was really impressed by the graphics, it looks real slick considering that we're dealing with an indie developed horror game.  The last indie developed horror game I played was Lone Survivor and that had fucking pixel art, so it's nice to see a small developer going the extra mile with the graphics.

Mechanically it works very well, the controls are nice and slick and easy to figure out without looking at the tutorial.  Basically if you have played a game on the PC ever, you will instantly be able to figure out how to control your character.

The puzzles in this game I both enjoy, but have sort of a problem with.  For example there is a bit near the start of the video where I get stuck for a short while because I wasn't able to figure out right away that I had to walk through the wall.  One thing I am glad about is that the game didn't tell me what to do, it let me work it out for myself.  That said I feel what it should have done is maybe made the hole in the wall pop out a bit, like having vines growing out from around the edges or something to indicate that it's something you can walk through.

The other problem I had, puzzle wise, was the candles.  There is an edit where I wasted a shit ton of time trying to figure out what to do, and this is because I think the objective was badly put forward.  What I was doing was trying to use my camera to light the other candles.  I was clicking around, pressing buttons on my keyboard to try and activate the flash and all sorts of shit.  I was even convinced at one point that there was something in the sky I had to snap in order to make the puzzle work.  At the end of the day it wasn't a puzzle, it was trying to make me go back and fight some enemies.

You see the problem is that a blue border pops up when you get near the candles, which means something important is there, so I was convinced for a long time that the key to those candles was in that area.  You could argue that the music was an indication of something being there that I had to go kill, but I thought the music was playing because of the big hangy dude.  If they had just played a sound of something crawling out of one of the nearby graves or ANYTHING.

Finally, is it scary?  Well to me, no, not really, but the potential is there.  The scene with the ghost facing the wall in the room was quite effective as you can probably tell from my reaction in the video, but I find there is no tension in the combat music when you fight the dudes in the graveyard.  The dudes are slow and crap, probably because they are there to teach you about combat, but the sound design for these encounters is a little weak.  Take Silent Hill for example, where the monsters sound truly horrible and the music that plays does a good job of making you panic. 

It's a good demo worth checking out and there is the potential for something really good here I think,  With it just being a demo and no release date in sight, I'm hoping that they will be able to put out a finish product that will rock our socks and fill our pants with large volumes of wee.