My central hub so to speak. I'll post video game related musings (maybe other stuff too if I feel inclined) and news related to any of my projects as they come along.
I've had an impromptu hiatus this past two weeks spurred by: finals, flying back from Japan, changing time zones, celebrating Christmas, etc.... I sincerely apologize for that, but let me assure you guys the wait has not been for naught. I've decided to spice things up from now on, so apart from the regular weekly post on sunday/monday, I'll be having at least one other post that same week with the same level of depth characteristic of the Fool in the Cave. Also, I'll be making up for the missing posts from this past two weeks before the end of the year, so expect 4 posts this week starting now. Today's topic: Let's Play.
The following two weeks are going to be a little busier than usual since these are my final weeks of the semester, and therefore my final weeks in Japan. With that mind, I'll be keeping the blog posts for these two weeks on the simple side. This week I want to introduce people to gaming criticism.
I realized a couple of days ago that my four month stay in Japan has almost come to an end. I've discovered a lot about this country these past three months, whether it be how much anime mirror real-life Japan or how little the average Japanese person knows about how Japan is perceived among the western masses. Today, however, I want to talk about one man in particular whose work I've come to fully appreciate in one of my classes here: Satoshi Kon (今敏, Kon Satoshi).
For anyone living under the proverbial rock of the gaming world, The Legend of Zelda Skyward Sword, the latest title in the 25 year old Legend of Zelda franchise, was just released. So, of course, we're going to talk about it.
This week's topic has me shaking hands with the stereotypical caricature feminist, for taking on a subject that is rarely understood as masculine (no idea why), while also apparently spitting on her face, since next to beauty pageants and millennial patriarchy, she's not really a fan of fashion.
Still not a big fan of the new haircut, but
any excuse to put a headliner of Emma Watson is a good one
I've spent most of my free time this past week trying to come up with something interesting to talk about today. That didn't really work out as expected, so instead I'll be ranting for a bit about one of those nags that's been on the back of my head for a while.
(Warning: rants done by the Fool in the Cave may go completely off subject, you have been warned)
Here we are on November 1, and a good bunch of you are probably disappointed that I failed to provide my Halloween post on actual Halloween; and for that I'm really sorry. But enough about that, lets talk about Resident Evil 4.
As bad excuses for a late post go (and this one isn't even on the topic promised last week), having been busy with midterms is about as run of the mill as you can get, but here I am telling you exactly that. Next week happens to be Halloween and I feel a blog post on why Resident Evil 4 is so great would be better suited to that date. I also haven't done any good amount of research for that one yet (midterms) and being on the other side of the world isn't helping either.
Instead, today I plan to overcompensate by sharing as many interesting things I've noticed as of late that I want you guys to notice too.
Considering we're in the middle of October, now is as good a time as any to talk about one of my favorite franchises in videogames, Resident Evil (Japanese people know it more appropriately as Biohazard), and why it doesn't really work under the catalogue of "Survival Horror".
Some people mentioned that my last post regarding my thoughts on feminism ended rather abruptly, and I agree; so allow me to expand my thoughts on the subject a bit more before jumping to next weeks topic.
So in an attempt to both shoot myself in the foot and artificially increase traffic to this blog, I think I'll give my thoughts on feminism this week and why I think it makes absolutely no sense to be a feminist today after the break.
Hooray!!! New post in only a week's time; that's a new record for this blog!
Anyway, like I said last time, I've been having a little nostalgia trip these past few weeks while watching Dragon Ball Kai, and now that I've finished it I have to say I have mixed feelings. On the one hand, the decisions to keep this new version faithful to the material in the original manga (meaning there is absolutely no filler whatsoever) and condensing the fights so that they're aren't obnoxiously long to the point of boredom is great. On the other hand, the decision to omit the Buu Saga completely and the extreme editing of episodes to make the series shorter (compare 98 episodes against the originals whopping 291) makes the series feel rushed and the ending lacking.
Why no love for the pink fatty?
Nitpicking aside, I can actually understand why they would rather end the story after the cell games and ignore the official end of the story all together. For better or worse, the Buu Saga marks the point where a lot of things start to go wrong for Dragon Ball Z.
"SAY WHAT!!!"
The first problem is that by this point our main characters are WAAAAAY too powerful. Except for Krillin, Yamucha and Tien, everyone has the capacity to blow up the entire world if they wanted to by the end of the Cell Saga. Because of this, any enemy that comes after this point that is supposed to represent some kind of serious threat to our heroes becomes kind of joke. Majin Buu definitely is very powerful, especially when he becomes Kid Buu; but it's hard to find him as memorably threatening as Freiza because his power is so great that it becomes ridiculous. To this day Frieza remains Dragon Ball Z's most memorable villain simply because he could blow up planets if he felt like it and the main characters were nowhere near that level (Although it might also have to do with the original fight lasting almost 20 episodes).
"I eat baby seals for breakfast"
The other problem is Gohan.
"Who me?"
You see, originally, Akira Toriyama had intended for Gohan to become Dragon Ball's main character. However, the fans didn't take too fondly to this idea and Toriyama found himself having to once again concoct some far fetched method for Goku to return despite having set-up the story to continue without Goku in it. This just helps to make the Buu saga all the more ridiculous. Because Gohan doesn't take up the mantle as main character and because he's already the strongest person in the universe the Buu Saga ultimately ends the Dragon Ball story with an awkward chuckle. An awkward chuckle after a great joke filled with many amazing and memorable moments, but a chuckle none the less.
With all that said, Dragon Ball Kai was a nice romp through nostalgia. Dragon Ball Z was never the best series but it was a very important part of my childhood and many other kids around the world. If anyone wants to bring back those good memories without having to watch 291 episodes, Dragon Ball Kai is a great option. All it's missing is the original's kickass theme song. En ESPANIOL!
As a final note before ending today's post, I highly recommend the Hetalia series to all you history buffs out there, especially if your inner geek has a special place for all things WW2.
Alright; so now that I'm all settled in with my Homestay in Japan it's time to resurrect this blog and maybe try and keep it alive this time.
I've got a lot of different projects brewing at the moment but due to university work I've been unable to properly pursue them. Specifically, it's my duties as writer for a panamanian manga I'm making with some friends that I've neglected the most; partly because of Uni work but also partly because I've gotten stuck with the script and I'm not quite sure how to continue the story. Hopefully I'll have that out the way before the end of the month. In the meantime I'll leave you guys with a small tease of our artwork. If you like it maybe I'll post some more later.
On a different topic, I've never been that good at strategy games (I'm terrible at micro-managing, especially when it's in real-time) but I recently got really into a tower defense game by the name of Kingdom Rush.
It's extremely fun and well crafted with a simple menu interface akin to the extremely successful Plants vs Zombies but with the more classic, labyrinth ridden, tower defense gameplay. The game isn't all that difficult (although it's not a walk in the park either) with a well integrated difficulty curve that is hardly noticeable as you go about learning the basics f the game. Of special note is the games cartoonish charm, with the towers and units chattering off one liners that are all references to geek culture in general.
Here's the game's trailer if any of you are interested:
As a last note before ending today's post, I recently started watching Dragon Ball Z's 20th anniversary abridged version, Dragon Ball Kai, seeing as it ended earlier this year and I can now sit down and watch it all the way through. I usually don't mind watching my anime on a weekly basis but when it comes to shonen anime and their tendency to be ire inducingly long I prefer to wait until I can marathon through it all. Expect my next post to be on my impressions on this abridging of one of my childhood series.
Until then I'll leave you guys with the opening theme so it can get stuck in your heads as well.
So much for trying to maintain an active blog. If it even counts as an excuse I just recently completed a 100% run of Metroid Fusion.
I was already playing the game for one of those "works in progress" I mentioned before and I figured I should try and see how many items I could get without succumbing to the temptation of using the internet. To my surprise I found that the more items I found the more adept I became at finding the others, no matter how ridiculous the game designers got with some of them(I'm looking at you shinespark puzzles). By the time I was finished I felt a sense of accomplishment quite unlike anything I had felt in recent memory after completing any game.
Why is this important you ask? Ever since the internet became the omnipresent entity that connects our lives sites like gamefaqs and what not have spoiled the average gamer with the knowledge that the answer to any difficult challenge a game might present is only a click-away. Now I'm not about to suggest that walkthroughs are the worst idea since sun drying fruit(don't ask) but it has taken away a big part of the experience of one too many games. Unlike cliffnotes with books or reading a movie plot, a real part of the experience is completely lost whenever we succumb to a walkthrough to get that 100% completion.
Some of you will probably argue that Metroid Fusion makes things really easy by indicating which squares on the map, that the player has visited, have items but I disagree. I think it is meant more as a balancing mechanic and it really doesn't take anything away from figuring out where exactly in the room some of these items are.
Hopefully I'll be updating this blog more often from now on.
I've been meaning to start a blog for some time now that could interconnect all the different projects that I'm brewing at the moment. I tend to become very irresponsible with my writing if I don't have a set topic to come back to so I've decided I'll post musings related to my favorite artistic field: video games.
Hopefully I'll manage to keep this blog alive that way until I have something to show from one of my projects.
