25 Years of NES, Part 10: Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest
Author: skoce
Rambley Bits
Rambley Bits 1-07-11: Video Games and NFL Playoffs
- I hope for Rambley Bits to become my end of week random thoughts update, for ideas too small for their own posts. The NFL Playoffs start tomorrow. I am feeling the need to predict.
- Saints over Seahawks. Because the Seahawks kind of suck, and the Saints, depleted as they are with no Pierre Thomas or Chris Ivory, are the better team.
- Ravens over Chiefs. The Chiefs are a good young team. But they got to the playoffs on the easiest schedule in football and the Ravens are better. It will be close, but the Ravens win.
- Colts over Jets. The Colts are even more depleted than the Saints, but they’ve been stopping the run and running the ball well lately and the Jets faded down the stretch. Plus, the Colts were my pre-season Super Bowl pick from the AFC and I’m not ready to let them go.
- Packers over Eagles. I have no faith in this pick. I like both teams, but I think the Packers have been more consistent. Plus, just like the Colts, they were my pre-season NFC Super Bowl pick and I think they’ll get out of the first round.
- I’m going to beat Lunar Silver Star Story pretty soon. Expect a final review next week.
- Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor for DS is equally infuriating and terrific. It’s a SRPG and the actual strategy parts are pretty great, but the open story paths, while laudable in their intent, do nothing but frustrate me. This I consider my failing and not the game’s, but the endless escort missions are definitely the games fault. This one is going back on the shelf for a few months.
- I was reading Sense and Sensibility, and had a halfway through thoughts post ready to go, but I lost my copy of the book. Now I’m hesitant to post it until I secure another copy and know I can finish. Meanwhile, the hunt for the lost book continues
- I’m reading King Solomon’s Mines in the absence of Austen. I’m not far in, but I’ve read H. Rider Haggard before (She) and enjoyed him, despite the casual racism and sexism.
- I’ve been reading through my old JSA trades. I hope to start reviewing them soon. I loves me some Wildcat.
- Having Netflix has not exactly been the boon to my video watching I hoped. Because apparently I can’t get enough of mediocre TV. Why, with all of the Netflix on demand library at my fingertips am I watching Lois & Clark.
- I really like Lois & Clark
- Quick Comic Reviews: Green Lantern 61: goodish
- Flash 8: great
- JSA All-Stars 14: fun as hell
- Freedom Fighters 5: see JSA All-Stars
- Brightest Day 17: ask me again in 2 weeks
Not Ghaleon, dear Quark
And just like that young Alex’s happy adventures with his friends ends. But Lunar: Silver Star Story is just beginning. As is my love affair with this game.
A Graveyard Smash
We Are Finally Cowboys
So the first year of me having a blog is coming to a close. Well, I’ve only had it about 10 months, but it is the end of the year in which I started it. I have not done such a good job of updating it regularly. I hope to do a better job next year.
I have learned a whole lot this year. I’ve learned I was a bit too ambitious with my plan to do episode-by-episode reviews of 4 or 5 television shows. Even at a pace of an episode a day, it would take me more than a year to finish. So I am not planning to continue my planned Watch This project for the time being. Consider it on hiatus. I will finish Futurama Season 1, hopefully by the end of January, but no more. At least not until I can figure out a way to do it that I’m happier with.
I was also a little too ambitious with the 25 years of NES, as well. Apparently, between work and my other hobbies I was not able to write 25,000 words about NES games. Still I have about a third of them done and another third written and ready to go. So I will finish that project. And as long as I get it done before October next year it is still 25 years of NES, so it’s all good.
I also did not get around to writing much about sports or books. I was going to post my thoughts about each weekend of football, but I ended working every weekend, so I did not get to watch enough football to feel comfortable putting out any observations or analysis. Rare was the opportunity I had to watch a full game. As for books, it is not that I did not read any. I read more than 20 new books this year, along with rereading about another 20 or so. The reason I did not manage to post more than once about them is that I try to make my writing about books more . . . substantial, and I simply failed to allocate enough writing time to get anything good done.
Moving away from making feeble excuses for my lack of output, I am happy with my movie reviews. I am a little disappointed that I did not manage to write reviews for Red or Scott Pilgrim, but I’m not changing much about how I do movie reviews. Other than, hopefully, doing more of them.
So this year has not been great, but it was a start. “What am I going to do next year?” you probably did not ask. For one thing, I hope to post with greater frequency and regularity. I intend 3-4 posts a week. To facilitate this, I will not do any big projects, like 25 Years of NES or Watch This, though that kind of thing may return later, but I think I would be better able to get into a writing and posting rhythm if I allow myself to write about whatever I want. I will try for variety, but more important to me right now is quantity.
The big change I am planning, and enacting very soon, is a new blog title. Critical Ramblings sounds like a lame placeholder name, but I couldn’t not come up with anything better, But now I’ve decided on one: We are Finally Cowboys. It is the title of a song from the soundtrack of one of the greatest video games of the last 5 years: No More Heroes. It doesn’t really mean anything, other than being somewhat childishly fanciful, which is exactly what I’m going for with this blog. I will also try to come up with “catchy” names for posts on every category. Something like “Scott tells you what to watch” for TV, but actually good.
I guess that’s it for my year in review. Now a picture of Wildcat on his cat-o-cycle.
To the Cinema: Harry Potter 7, Part 1
With the release of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1, the dominant pop culture franchise of the last decade begins its end. Sure, the last book has been out for more than 3 years, which has lessened the excitement around the series, but the two-part last movie is Harry’s final send-off. Fortunately, the first part of it is the best movie in the series to date.
For the record, I mostly did not like the last book. I had been a fan of the series since the first book came out, and I was on line at midnight to buy The Deathly Hallows. I had the book read by 9:30 that morning and I have not touched the book since. Partially this is because I’ve had the book loaned to friends and relatives for much of the intervening three years, but mostly because I just did not care to read it again. The book does away with Hogwarts and its various intrigues to focus on the much less interesting battle between good and evil. That was to be expected and is understandable, but the school stuff was replaced with interminable camping scenes. While I did not hate the book, I did enjoy it much less than the other books in the series.
The movie, however, is better than the others are for some of the same reasons the book was worse. The lack of Hogwarts is to the movies advantage. Those parts never really worked in the movies and Deathly Hallows benefits from their absence. The camping scenes, which drag in the book, actually help the movie maintain its tension. Combined with the captivating landscapes in some of those shots help make Harry and his companions feel isolated and lost.
Another thing that helps the film is the decision to split the book into two movies. While this seems like, and probably is, a blatant cash grab, cutting the book in half allows the movie to slow the pace down. Most of the previous movies tried to be so faithful to the source material that they felt more like filmed summaries moving at a breakneck pace in an attempt to include every possible scene from the book. To be fair, I am not sure there was a better way to handle the adaptations, but it did occasionally kill the movies’ pacing. Covering only half of a book in this movie, though, allows the director to construct scenes that are not always rushing to their end. This pace that occasionally stops to take a breath is the biggest improvement over the previous movies.
It is also apparent how much better the principle actors are than they were in the first couple of movies. This movie relies on the trio of Harry, Ron, and Hermione, and the three performers do a good job. The movie feels more like a thriller or horror movie rather than the straight magical adventure of the previous ones. This is something from the books that had been lost in the previous films. However, Deathly Hallows sticks more successfully to the book’s tone.
Even though I liked Deathly Hallows, all is not peaches and gravy. It ends on a cliffhanger and really feels like very little was accomplished. It is hard to shake the feeling that you just watched a two and a half hour prelude to Part 2. Moreover, for what is ostensibly a children’s movie there is quite a bit of gore and sexual content. Even with my praise of the slower pacing, outside of the escape scene at the beginning and the infiltration of the magical Nazi headquarters, there is not a ton of action.
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1 is a flawed but entertaining movie. Even with those flaws, it is the best Harry Potter film. It is sad to see Harry go, but I’m glad he gets to leave in such a satisfactory manner.
***1/2
Grass skirts and Dinosaurs
Thou Hast discovered …
25 Years of NES Part 7: Wizards and Warriors
Wizards and Warriors is not a game often mentioned in best on the NES discussions. With good reason, the game is kind of a mess. Players assume the role of Kuros the warrior as he fights literally through hell to save a Princess from the evil wizard Malkil. Published by Acclaim in 1987 and made by Rare, makers of Donkey Kong Country and Banjo-Kazooie, Wizards and Warriors is a standard NES action/adventure game. It is an unexciting but enjoyable mix of Metroid and Ghost and Goblins. There are, however, a few things that make Wizards and Warriors stand out a bit from the crowd.
The game controls rather well. There is nothing exciting about the way Kuros moves, but it is better than many games on the system. It avoids the wonkiness of NES trash like Might Bomb Jack or Legend of Kage, where the jump button sends the player flying all the way across the screen. It takes its jump physics from Mario, with the ability to alter the trajectory of the jump after you hit he button. The jump is especially important considering how pathetic Kuros sword is. Pushing the B button swings his sword, but it has no range or reach. Luckily, he holds the sword out as he jumps and runs it into enemies. He can also hit enemies with his feet, making the jump a superior weapon than the sword swing. That alone creates an interesting game play dynamic.
The levels are not flat plains like the Mario, more like mini Metroid maps. Each level is a small area that the player is free to traverse, with the objective not reaching the end, but finding the gems needed to bribe the door guard into letting you pass. Yes, Rare fondness for collectathon bullshit was prevalent even back in the NES days. Not that this example is particularly egregious. While the exploration elements of the levels are fun, that fact that you cannot progress with enough gems is annoying.
That is only annoyance number one. To go along with your sword, you get several sub-weapons to use. First is the most important: the throwing dagger. Much like the boomerang from Zelda, the dagger comes back after you throw it and is definitely your best offensive tool until you get the throwing axe, which is just an upgraded dagger. Then there are the other upgrades. Like the Feather of feather Fall, which is just as useless as it’s name is stupid. Or the boots of Lava walk that do not actually let you walk in lava in the one level that has lava. Or the cloak of darkness, which makes you invisible. Unfortunately the enemies do operate on sight, but the player does. So with the cloak on the player cannot see what he is doing, but the enemies can still get attack him. What’s especially great is that the game seems to know these items are useless and loves to put them at the bottom of climbing areas so if you fall you fall in them.
Significant flaws aside, Wizards and Warriors is a fun game. And unlike most NES games, which are “NES Hard”, Wizards and Warriors is pretty easy. This is not necessarily a bonus, but for an afternoons distraction you could do much worse. Plus the soundtrack is awesome.
But Thou Must
25 Years of NES Part 6: Dragon Warrior
As successful, as the NES undoubtedly was there were also a few failures for Nintendo. Dragon Warrior is probably one of the bigger ones of the era for them. Not that Dragon Warrior is a bad game or that is was overall an unsuccessful one. Known as Dragon Quest in Japan, and everywhere else now, the game started a phenomenon there. Well maybe the sequels were the start of the phenomenon, but the point is that the Dragon Quest series is and has been the most popular game series in Japan for a long time. However, all the Japanese success of was reaped by Enix, its creators. Enix did not have an American arm at the time, so Nintendo handled the American release. And the American release was a failure.
There are some very good reasons why the game failed in America. First, it was three years old by the time Nintendo brought it over. Three years is difference between Super Mario Bros. and Super Mario Bros. 2. While many people rightly prefer SMB to its sequel, graphically there is no comparison. Also, Dragon Warrior was an RPG, a genre not familiar to the NES audience. Sure Nintendo had success with the more exploration driven Legend of Zelda, but most of the NES’s library was action heavy. Introducing new gaming concepts in an ugly and outdated game does not sound like a recipe for success to me. Nintendo, with all their past success blinding them, put a lot of effort into publishing a game that had passed its sell be date. They made some graphical and mechanical tweaks to make the game more playable and look less old. They clearly put a lot of effort into the top-notch translation, probably due to the high amount of text in the game. It also got a full on Nintendo Power, that much celebrated monthly NES commercial, promotion. But it landed with a thud anyway. Before long free copies of the game came with a Nintendo Power subscription. That is how I got my copy.
I do not know that I can actually recommend that anyone go back and play Dragon Warrior today. It is archaic and simple. There is little there other than a history lesson. However, there is enough charm in the translation and the game is short enough that I do not recommend you avoid it either. The game’s hero, Erdrick, must rescue the Princess Gwaelin from the DragonLord. Like the much-loved Legend of Zelda, Dragon Warrior gives a quest and leaves you to your own devices as to how to accomplish them. You can see the DragonLord’s castle from the starting point, but it is quite the ordeal to make it there. The game is as simple as RPGs come. Each fight is the hero one on one with whatever monster you are fighting. While you have some spells, you only useful option most the time it to attack. You can buy new armor and weapons, but it is actually easier to just use the stuff you find in the dungeons.
While the story is that generic save the Princess, defeat the bad guy shtick, there are some things that make it interesting. Like the fact that you rescue the Princess about halfw
ay through. You can talk to her at Tantegel Castle. She just needily demands your affection, but constantly rebuffing her is kind of fun. (Dost thou love me Erdrick? No. But thou must) When you finally reach the DragonLord, he gives you the option to join him. Accepting his offer does not end well for the hero, but it is a nice option. Dragon Warrior is simple and not exactly fun, but it is definitely interesting.
Why I game
Note: This was intended to be more lighthearted, but it became more introspective and whiny as I wrote it. I plan for this blog to be more humorous with some hints of scholarly value, this is merely a blip.
I’ve been thinking lately about why I play video games. The simple answer is I play them because I love them. I love them enough that I started a blog so I could share my poorly written thoughts about them, among other things. I love video games because, along with sports, when I recall my happiest memories almost all of them involve video games or sports. These aren’t lonely memories of me in my basement beating my favorite game. Like sports are a social activity, so are video games for me. To play a team sport, like basketball or football, you have to have other people around. For a video game to be truly memorable to me, I have to share the experience with someone. I do not know why exactly. Maybe it’s because the only way I can relate to other people is through those shared experiences. All my friends I made with sports or video games. Each time I play a game, whether of the video or sporting variety, I am hoping to capture those moments from my youth when I was able to overcome my innate awkwardness and connect with another person. Continue reading
Skociomatic 
