The Legendary Hochu Otsuka

 

Recently I've been playing Triangle Strategy on my Switch and by default the English voices are turned on.  Upon hearing them, I cringed myself inside out at the awful performances and then promptly went to the options menu to change the voice over language to Japanese and not only were the voices across the board MUCH better but I was greeted with a little suprise of a bandit being voiced by this dude in one of the first scenes. 

Born in 1954 and active as a voice actor from 1976 (according to wikipedia) Hochu is one of those big-bad motherfuckers in Japanese voice acting.  He's so prolific that I can almost GUARANTEE that if you're some kind of weeb that watches a lot of anime or the kind of person that enjoys JRPGs to a large degree and plays them with JP voice over like a sane person, you have heard this man at least once or twice in your life.  

I first discovered him when I was quite young, I forget how old exactly but it would have been primary school with his role as Skid Ops Gash in Panzer Dragoon Saga.  He appears shortly after the opening valley section in disc 1 so him, along with Akira Ishida, Masato Ibu and Toru Okawa were some of the first examples of spoken Japanese I ever heard in my life and considering how big of an influence that game was on me wanting to learn Japanese, these guys are kind of a big deal.  

But I'll be honest though, Akira, Masato and Toru, while talented voice actors, are not the kind of people I could pick out of any given production.  For example I googled Akira Ishida and he's been in TONS of shit that I've watched and played but I had no idea it was him at any point.  That's not a weakness of him as an actor, that's more me not paying attention to the credits but I think it says a lot, then, that someone like me who spent a lot of my life not paying attention to credits was able to pick this guy out, Otsuka puts in some really stand out performances.

His performances are all quite similar sounding and for some that can be a really bad thing.  Take Amanda Winn Lee for example, it doesn't matter if she's playing Yukiko Amagi, Jinana (Digital Devil Saga) or Heather Mason, she sounds basically the same every time.  Otsuka on the other hand is a master of injecting a great deal of the characters personality into each individual performance.  Gash, Jiraiya (Naruto) and the Kurata Dealer (Akagi) for example all have the same sounding voice but even just hearing snippits of their dialogue you can tell just how different each character is, he's a dude that really manages to encapsulate a characters personality.

The dude is 68 years old so I was surprised to hear, and this was the inspiration for this post actually, his voice doing some kind of advert in a Family Mart a couple of days ago.  According to wiki the last video game he did was Nioh 2 in 2020 but he's still going in the anime scene with a role in something called A Herbivorous Dragon Get's Unfairly Villainized (? what the fuck) and it warms my dried up little heart to know he's still chugging along.

Next time you're playing or watching something maybe you'll be able to pick him out, it's really not hard to do.  I found out while glancing at the wiki page that he's done dubs of English actors like Jeanne Claude Van Damme and Kurt Russel and that's something I just GOTTA go experience.  What an absolute legend

Speedrun Goals For 2020

After watching AGDQ I've been sort of inspired to get back into speedrunning in a big way, so this will be a short post outlining what you can expect to see on the stream for speedrun nights and off schedule screwing around

There are 3 games that I currently speedrun that I want to improve the times on

Megaman 4
Megaman X
Silent Hill

Silent Hill especially because when I was new to running and didn't know what I was doing, my time for Good+ on Normal was very kindly added to the leaderboard by other Silent Hill speedrunners.  For a while it was technically a world record (in a misc category) but some other guys turned up and got faster times.  I'll probably be doing Bad+ on easy since it's the main category but it'd be nice to get back to a competitive time for that game.

I will also be adding two new games to my efforts.  The first being Panzer Dragoon Saga which is probably the longest run I've ever done considering an RPG but at time of writing the world record sits at around 4 hours and 44 minutes  so it's not SO bad.  With it being one of my favorite games ever I'd like to get a good time in this one.  The other game I'd like to add to my repertoire is Aladdin on the Super Nintendo.  The games short and the runs I've seen are pretty interesting and it's a really fun little platformer.  It's also short as hell, I finished it in just a couple of hours for the first time in a bar a while back.  It won't be a focus but it'll be cool to give it a go.

I might be stretching myself a bit thin running five games at once but I tend to burn out easy after a pretty short time so keeping a nice rotation going will stop me getting too bored too quickly.  Plus my copy of Panzer Dragoon Saga is sitting in the aforementioned bar so I'll probably be able to do ACTUAL runs of that game once a week since emulator isn't allowed.

Catch these runs and all the other streams at www.twitch.tv/taurinensis

My Top 3 Games of Heisei

If you're a piece of weaboo trash like me then you'll know that on May 1st the era of Heisei is coming to an end and it will change to Reiwa.  If you aren't a piece of weaboo trash and don't know what that is the name of the era in Japan changes when the emperor changes.  This effects the Japanese calendar so right now the year is Heisei 31 but as of May 1st the date will change to Reiwa 1.

I saw a tweet that said that Japanese gaming magazine, Famitsu, asked 7000 people what their top 3 games of the Heisei period were.  Heisei started in 1989 so that's a huge pool of games to choose from.  The top 3 for them was Chrono Trigger, Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Nier: Automata.  So of course like the self important little shit that I am, I'm going to tell you my top 3 games of the Heisei period.

#3 Hotline Miami

This entry could have been one of so many things.  It could have been Undertale, it could have been ANY Shin Megami Tensei game, it could have been Dragon Quest 11.  Ask me tomorrow what my number 3 would have been and I promise you it will change, I just can't really pick with great certainty.  The game that sticks out in the front of my mind right now though is Hotline Miami.  Released in 2012 (Heisei 24) it was a violent, retro style half action half puzzle game that had you don an animal mask and mow down men in white suits.  It was fast, frantic, fun as hell and became one of my core speedrun games for a long while

If you've not played it then please give it ago.  Great gameplay, great soundtrack and great style.  It's cheap on Steam so don't dilly dally, go buy it NOW

#2 Shadow Hearts

Shadow Hearts is a sort of unique JRPG released in 2001 (Heisei 13) on PS2.  It follows the adventures of half Japanese, half Russian protagonist Yuri Hyuga as he travels across Asia and Europe in an attempt to stop all manner of nightmare creatures and an English gentleman from doing all manner of unspeakable things.  The games most interesting point was its "Judgement Ring" battle system, every time you did ANYTHING in a fight you had to play a sort of little timing mini game that would decide the outcome of your action.  Miss the ring and you'd fail your attempt but get right near the edge of the hit zone and you'd be awarded bonus damage/healing or, lets say if you were using a stat-up item, a greater increase to that stat.  The game also had a sanity system where if your characters fought for too long the stress of battle would cause them to go berserk and you would lose control of them.

Yuri also had an ability to fuse into one of about 21 demons to aid you in battle, all with really cool abilities.  If you REALLY knew what you were doing you could get some secret demons too that would essentially break the game and make you an unstoppable power house.  Getting them was a challenge but when you pulled it off the reward was very much worth it.

It also has a sequel, Shadow Hearts 2: Covenant which is also worth playing but nothing quite beats the charm that the first game had.

#1 Panzer Dragoon Saga 

I mean, I gush about this game a lot, did you really think it could be anything else for me?  Released in 1998 (Heisei 10) for the Sega Saturn, Panzer Dragoon Saga is easily one of the best RPGs I've ever played in my damn life and almost nothing has come close to besting it.

I could go at LONG length about why this game is so good but instead I'll just link my playthrough of it and you can see it for yourself

I'm also learning how to speedrun it currently so drop in the stream to see my progress with that.

If you can play it for yourself you ABSOLUTELY should.  Don't question me, just do it.

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Of course, 1989 to 2019 is an extremely long time so I'm sure almost everybody will have a different set of 3 games that mean a lot to them.  If you feel like telling me your top 3 then let me know, maybe you'll really love something that I've not heard of and I can find a hidden gem that I missed during my youth

Identity Gaming 2019

Well holy shit it's already nearly the end of 2018.  It's been a bit of a shit year for the Identity Gaming blog and YouTube channel mainly due to a lot of personal shit happening involving me changing jobs twice but at least the Twitch stream is still going strong (www.twitch.tv/taurinensis, follow plz)

Anyway instead of dwelling on that negative nonsense let's just look forward to the coming year.  Here is some content that you can expect  to see throughout 2019.

More YouTube Stuff

The YouTube side of things has been a bit neglected so I'm going to put a bit more effort into that side of things.  I've actually had a Shovel Knight playthrough in the can for MONTHS but put off uploading it so I could do that stupid Lone Survivor playthrough in October.

Speaking of that, the 3 episodes of Lone Survivor have been deleted from the channel.  I wasn't happy with them and the glitched difficulty really fucked me off and made me not want to play it.  One day I'll do it again but for now I'm just fucking it off and focusing on other things. 

Still though, I have many a game that I can make a play through for that isn't a glitchy piece of shit AND there are plans for all sorts of fancy new series to upload.  I do want to expand on some of my previous, untouched things such as the thing where I talked about Japan exclusive arcade games or my series highlighting free shit for you to enjoy.  I'm also going to start a hall of fame/hall of shame so when people ask me questions like "Hey what's your favorite game" or "what do you think of X" I can just link them a video instead of having to tell people for the 95 billionth time that my favorite game is Panzer Dragoon Sa......I mean Bad Rats.

I'm also going to try my hand at some semi serious vlogging as I try to document my entire year in a weekly video that I'll upload every Sunday.  I'll talk about shit I'm playing, give site updates if there are any and if I come across and video game news that I feel is worth touching on I'll comment on that too.  I'm doing this 50% because I'm a self important little prick that craves that e-attention and 50% because when I think back to 2018 I can't seem to remember anything that I played other than Dragon Quest 11.  That either means that 2018 was a shit year for games (not true) or I'm just a forgetful idiot (more than likely true) so please join me through my 2019 journey. 

The Wheel of NES

I fucking love Wheel Decide, it's like my favorite website.  My other favorite thing ever is to set myself stupid challenges that I'll probably never finish but I like to think that maybe one day I won't be such a quitter so here I go doing something publicly so maybe the potential jeering and disrespect at my failure will make me not just give up as soon as I get bored.

So I've made a wheel on Wheel Decide of 100 NES games.  I'm going to play them all on stream (link above, don't forget to follow) and see how long it takes me to finish all of them.  I built the list by googling "best 100 NES games", using most of those and then taking some titles from the Angry Video Game Nerd playlist and throwing them in there so that maybe I can entertain some of you with my suffering.  Although Silver Surfer is in there and despite what that guy said about it, that game is awesome and if you think it's bad then you're just wrong. 

The Year Of Spookyness

So my favorite holiday season is Halloween.  I'm in love the the genre of horror as a whole and every year I plan all these great things to do for IG for Halloween and then I get busy or I go to Halloween parties and get drunk and subsequently hungover and none of this stuff ever happens.  So because I'm absolutely sick of that shit I'm just dedicating the entirety of 2019 to the horror genre. 

Expect to see a lot of horror related content in the coming 12 months be it about books, movies, games, whatever, if it's horror, I'm blogging about it.

Finally, despite all these cool plans for streams, videos, posts etc. don't forget that I'm still doing this all for charity so if you enjoy the content please throw a donation or two to the Alzheimer's Society charity.  It would be awesome if we could hit the current goal this year and maybe get a nice ways into the next one.  I'm planning to overhaul the incentives page so sit tight and some cool things might happen with that soon too.

Happy new year!

The Sega Saturn Chalenge Is Coming

One thing you may not know about me is that I LOVE the Sega Saturn, it's easily one of my favorite systems.  Hell, the first few playthroughs for YouTube I did were of 3 Dirty Dwarfs and Panzer Dragoon Saga

So I'm currently amassing a large collection of Saturn games with the intention to stream ALL of them, or at least all the games in the Saturn library that aren't sports games.  The point of all this being 1. I get to explore a library of games from a system that had a TON of Japanese exclusives and 2. To try and introduce more people to the absolute magic that is the Sega Saturn.  A lot of the games on the system are RPGs so if I actually ever finish or not before I die is another story but I'm sure as hell going to try

If you are familiar with the Sega Saturn and are interested to see a game, feel free to donate to charity to have it bumped up the priority list although I'm only going to finish each game once so don't just donate for NiGHTS 20 times and expect me to play nothing but that.

It's still going to take a while to set up but I'm hoping to get the ball rolling on this by September so go subscribe to the Twitch channel in the meantime or check out the two Saturn game playthroughs I did on the YouTube channel

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. 

The Turning Point

So a few days ago I was emailed by a website called Man Crates asking me to write a post for them.  At first I was a little skeptical because spam emails aren't exactly uncommon to my inbox but after a quick Google search it turned out these guys were on the level.

Before I get into the post itself let me just tell you a little bit about Man Crates because the idea behind what they do is pretty cool.  Man Crates sells wooden crates of various goods that range from video games to stuff in order to prepare yourself for a zombie outbreak.  However when you order from Man Crates they don't just send you a wooden box with the stuff in it, oh no.  They send you an actual wooden crate and a crowbar so that you can go Gordon Freeman when you break that shit open.  It's a cool concept and I think they would make a really good present for someone.

What Man Crates asked me to write was the gaming experience that hooked me into the hobby and made me a life long enthusiast.  This was easy for me, I've kind of already done it once a long LONG time ago back when Identity Gaming first started.  The game that really grabbed me and turned me into an enthusiast is Panzer Dragoon Saga for the Sega Saturn.

Before I received my Sega Saturn I enjoyed playing video games quite a lot.  However almost every game I played during my early youth was some kind of side scrolling platform game.  I had experimented with other genres such as adventure games but I accidentally picked shitty ones like Super Hydlide and it left a bad taste in my mouth.  I don't remember if Super Hydlide was actually all that shitty but I was too young and stupid at the time to have ANY idea what the hell was going on with that game.

Then my father goes and buys me a Sega Saturn and the thing blew my goddamn mind.  The games being in 3D was pretty cool but the thing that really excited me about the system was the number of arcade ports that were available.  I used to love playing games like Fighting Vipers and The House of the Dead at the arcade and now I had this chance to play those titles as much as I wanted and I didn't have to beg my mother for £1 coins all the damn time, it was great.

Then on one birthday I received Panzer Dragoon Saga and my god this game changed my view on EVERYTHING.  Before this, gaming was always something I did for an hour or two at a time before going to find something else to do but Panzer Dragoon had me locked in front of the TV for god knows how long.  This game not only affected my opinion on gaming but had some pretty drastic effects on my life too.

In terms of how it influenced my gaming, Panzer Dragoon Saga was the point in which I realised that games could be so much more than just a little side attraction for me.  They could have interesting stories and immersive worlds and characters that you become genuinely attached to sometimes.  Hell, I remember my first time playing where the main character gets kidnapped and tortured and I had to leave the room because that scene upset me so damn much.

Not only did it have a good story and interesting characters but it also had really fun game play.  It's an RPG with an active time battle system but it was also very strategic and fast paced.  I wasn't just mashing an attack button in order to win, I actually had to stop and think about my gauges, what kind of attack I was going to use, positioning, my dragon type, location of weak spots and all sorts of stuff.  There was so much depth and I loved it.

Thanks to Panzer Dragoon Saga I started exploring other games and other genres looking for equally challenging titles with the same or similar amounts of depth as that and luckily there was a lot on offer.  I was always looking for something to challenge myself after that point.  While I never lost interest in the more simple games Panzer Dragoon taught me not to give up so quickly on the harder stuff like I did with Hydlide.

But Panzer Dragoon Saga also had massive effects on my real life.  The whole game is voiced entirely in Japanese with English subtitles and at that young age I thought the voice acting was the coolest thing ever.  It sparked my interest in Japan and thanks to that I am where I am today.  At school I was never sure what I wanted to study but thinking back to those times in front of my Saturn made me think I wanted to pursue a degree in Japanese language.  I came to realise that there were so many games that never came to the UK and I really wanted to be able to play them.  Of course, I was interested in other stuff like the language itself and the culture of the country but without that initial inspiration from my favourite video game I might have done something very different.

So there you have it, that was the turning point for me however I'm not quite done there. I was also asked to write about what kind of stuff I'd like in a personalized nostalgia crate from the aforementioned Man Crates.

Well considering that I live in Japan some kind of import game crate would be a pretty good idea I think.  A few Famicom/Super Famicom titles mixed along side pot noodles, microwave curry rice and a few cans of melon soda.  For me that sounds like a pretty good night in and if I got to start that off by opening that stuff up with a goddamn crowbar would be the icing on the cake.   

Let's wrap things up with some links.  Don't forget to check out Man Crates

http://www.mancrates.com/

and the second YouTube play through for YouTube I ever did was of Panzer Dragoon Saga, so if you wanna watch me play the game that changed my life forever, you can see that here.

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL6Wc5_JYKZyO-ajcpFSPAHUVp1WhX7pwV


Final disclaimer, I wasn't paid for this post, they just very kindly reached out with the idea and it sounded like fun!

The Final Panzer Dragoon Saga Session

It's finished! Hooray! Today marks the end of my second full playthrough as part of this blog effort.  It's been a fun experience despite problems with recording software and editing software, I'm looking forward to doing more even if no one else is.

Don't forget, if you're enjoying the content, hit that link to JustGiving on the side and give a little something to the Alzheimer's Society.  None of the money comes anywhere close to me, it goes straight to them, so you don't have to worry about anything like that.

So kick back, grab a beverage and enjoy the final boss and ending sequence to Panzer Dragoon Saga!

VIDEOS

Yet Another Panzer Dragoon Session

We are getting extremely close to the end of finishing this thing, probably in the next session I'll have it done.  Nothing else to really say about it apart from that, so just enjoy the videos!

VIDS!

Mini Panzer Dragoon Update

Another busy weekend but this time I managed to get a little bit of recording done!  Although it ended up being a return trip to this games equivalent of the sewer level, so it ended up being a bit dull.

Anyway enjoy

Panzer Dragoon Saga Playthrough Session #LostCount

Well, I finally got round to uploading some more parts of the Panzer Dragoon Saga playthrough, but this session is filled mainly with talky bits and getting lost in a forest.  That said there is a cool boss fight right at the end, so if you dont care about the story there is still something for you here.

VIDEOS!

Panzer Dragoon Session 10

Well, I filmed this about a week ago, so anything that I was going to say about it in this post, I've forgotten, so just kick back and enjoy the game! 

Going to Osaka! and some more Panzer Dragoon!

OK! So tomorrow morning I'm going to be getting up bright and early and fucking off to Osaka for a while.  While I'm gone, I don't think I'll have access to an internet connection so I won't be able to make posts for about 2 days, but when I get back you can probably expect pictures and stuff.

While I'm there I'll be hitting up Universal Studios where they are doing their super scary Resident Evil thing

This should be interesting, so even if you give zero fucks about Osaka, there is still going to be something gaming related upon my return!

Also, I have 3 new parts of my Panzer Dragoon Saga Playthrough but there is some audio syncing problems.  Basically,  FFSplit, the recording software, got an update and started recording in MP4 instead of FLV.  This, for some reason, caused everything to fuck up and now it's all out of sync.  I spent a while working on it to re sync it, but I couldn't get it perfect in the end, I'm just not good enough at editing yet.

Well, here they are anyway, it's not THAT bad.

Panzer Dragoon Saga Playthrough Session 8

More Panzer Dragoon!  Although this time there was some weird audio crackle that sort of just fixed itself after a while.  I test my recording stuff every time before I start, and it wasn't there, so I have no idea what caused it or how I fixed it.  Either way, it's not THAT bad, but I'll try to make sure it doesn't happen again.

VIDEOS

Panzer Dragoon Saga Playthrough Session 7

Another session of this run, you all know the drill by now.  Disc 2 has been finished, so next time we'll be all up in disc 3.  Considering how long I thought this game was, I'm making pretty good time!

VIDEO!

Panzer Dragoon Saga Playthrough Session 6

In this part I got a game over, and I was rather sour about it.  I figured it out during my recording session I did this evening, which I will upload tomorrow or something.  I discovered that pressing the B button on the pad makes the enemy fire a shot that does 150 damage.  I've never seen or experienced this before, and it confused the shit out of me.  See how I got around it next time!

VIDEOS FOR NOW!

Panzer Dragoon Saga Session 5

Another session another section.  A little bit of confusion since I managed to forget how to solve the puzzles for a little while, but we pulled through in the end.  Big bosses, lots of gunship killing and a badass dragon dogfight.  Next time, the PDS equivalent of a sewer level

VIDEOS!

Panzer Dragoon Saga Session 4

More parts of the playthrough, I get lost for a while and talk about Total Recall, then I nearly die trying to find some ship parts.

Check that shit out!

Panzer Dragoon Saga Playthrough Session 3

Well, we did it folks, we got to the end of disc 1!  Although things are just getting started, with 3 more discs to go, this adventure is gonna get fucking crazy.  Lot's of cool battles and frustrating segments coming in disc 2, expect some rage

VIDEOS!

Panzer Dragoon Saga Session 2

Making good progress through this game, might even be able to polish off disc 1 by the end of the evening!

This session I went through the Garil Desert and fucked up an acient sleeping....thing, was pretty good

Check that shit out