Posts Tagged ‘Resident Evil’

Will you look at that, I miscounted (lazy and innumerate always a good combination) and this is the final Gamescom catch up post which has been delayed from sometime in October. After this the plan is some up to date content for the site, and maybe doing some of that audio work that I have been threatening. Thanks for sticking with me, I promise to try and make it all worthwhile. 

It is nice to have a business area. Having a space to sit and write, take notes or just having people with enough time to answer your questions, is not vital to providing prompt coverage but it certainly helps. Experiencing it for the first time, after years of writing on my lap or in a dingy pressroom, I was especially appreciative.

There comes a moment however, when being surrounded by all of the business people and jaded (or at least analytical) press starts to have a negative affect. Sure, being shoulder to shoulder with thousands of other sweaty gamers in a two-hour queue does not sound like fun, but it has an excitement and energy that the business area lacks. Hit the halls and everyone is there to see the game they love. They aren’t waiting for hours because they have to; they do it because they are so excited for their favourite game that they want to.

This was just the corridor between halls, all of which heaved with sweaty bodies of excited gamer.

At my first TGS, when I covered the show just for DoFuss, I was the same. I waited for hours to see Resident Evil 5, and still have the bandana to prove it. There was no schedule and everyone was as excited as me to be in waiting patiently, talking to other fans of the series.

It only takes half a day surrounded by people who have to be at an event for work to forget the intangible excitement and energy that is ever present in the main halls. When everyone you talk to is able to list of the next four games they are going to see (complaining about how they aren’t really interested in three of them), it is easy to forget the passion that got us all in to writing in the first place.

For the right game everyone gets that same gleam back in their eye (as I am sure the Warner Bros. PR rep noticed as I begged to see Lollypop Chainsaw) and the energy that that produces is almost intoxicating. But to really feel that pulsing excitement getting out into the crowds is needed, and that’s what the games below are. Titles I was interested in and went out to find on the show floor, partly because I had no appointment for them, but mainly because they were games I wanted to experience with other series fans rather than annalists.

Dark Souls

Perhaps my disappointment in the short demo of “Dark Souls” is for the best. After all my expectations when I first played the PS3 exclusive Demon’s Souls (one of my favourite games this generation), were low. Maybe my hopes needed to be tempered before the games launch this October. Yet I cant help but feel that some of the changes being made to the format will diminish this new title.

I am now very happy to report that Dark Souls turns out to have been far better than I feared at the time.

Ridge Racer Unbounded

Ridge Racer Unbounded does not feel like a Ridge Racer game, it keeps the speed and excitement but brings element from games like Split/Second to make it something new. Arcade racing is not currently an overcrowded genre, so maybe there is space for it, but in the short time I played I found myself at odds with the handling which seemed an uncomfortable mix of real and arcade, at least with the car I chose.

Ridge Racer's release is now on the horizon so it will be interesting to see if all the changes being made will work.

Resident Evil: Revelations

Resident Evil: Revelations is one of the reasons I was so gung-ho about purchasing my 3DS, and my short time with the demo went along way to reconfirming my faith. Now my fears are squarely focused on story and an overly linear path letting the game down. It certainly looks the part, now all I can do is wait for its release early next year.

FInally the game I bought my 3DS for is out, now I just have to get my hands on it.

Silent Hill: Downpour

“Silent Hill Downpour” seemed intent on pulling me in with one hand while pushing me away with the other. Phrases like ‘this will have no ties to the earlier Silent Hills’ worried me as I got the feeling they were trying to distance themselves from the superb psychological horror series, while ‘we are drawing inspiration from Silent Hill 2′ dragged my attention back fast enough to give me whiplash.

It will be fun to see if the new European developer can capture the vibe of this classic Japanese series.

Skullgirls

One unexpected treat at Gamescom was Skullgirls, an upcoming one-on-one fighter from American developer Reverge Labs. Sat in Konami’s area you could be forgiven for thinking the game originated in Japan, with it loose grip on reality and huge beautifully animated sprites. But on closer inspection reveals a style that draws as much on the silver age of Disney as it does on Dragon Ball Z.

Skullgirls is getting a lot of well deserved attention at the moment, keep an eye out for this exciting downloadable title.

Back on one of my favorite topics thanks to the free rein I have been given on my column on Videogame-Reviews. While I know I am going to have to start aiming my work at a broader audience than my DoFuss articles the owner of the site has at let me indulge myself on my first few entries, including this article on the evolution of horror games.

Touching on many of my favorite games, the article looks at why games may suffer with the move to HD and the quest to appeal to a wider audience. Below is an extract and a link, please go and have a look if you feel inclined and leave a comment on VGR.

“In many ways the first “game worlds” would have been terrifying places, with no end to the oncoming alien ships, asteroids or ghosts and death being your only release. Games back then though were, of course, about the game mechanic; simply playing. Yet still the designers felt the need to infuse some familiar symbolism to their tiny sprites to help people understand the world presented to them. I guess these games were scary in the same way books are, leaving so much up to the readers/players imagination that what is experienced varies wildly from person to person.”

Read the full article here.

As games become more mainstream and various media audiences intertwine it comes as no surprise that both the game and movie industries are trying to cash in on the other. Since the early days games have drawn on other pop cultural licenses to bolster sales, but only in the last ten years has the technology existed to make these titles able to expand a franchise beyond the ubiquitous side scrolling action games of old. Now a video game can be used to make stories that tie into the movie’s own mythos, either as a compliment or even as a true sequel. With increasing regularity though it seems the flow of titles is going the other way as more and more movies try and make use of gaming licenses.

MORTAL KOMBAT!!!! One of the few good examples of game movies.

The initial batch of these game movie adaptations made it painfully apparent that for the most part (at the time at least) game stories were not ideal for the medium of cinema. To accommodate this shortcoming, the original plots were butchered beyond recognition in adapting them for the silver screen. During the early 90s this produced examples such as the Super Mario Bros. and Street Fighter movies. They took games that centered on play mechanics and tried to shoehorn in ridiculous stories in a shameless attempt to attract young gamers to theaters. Perhaps the highlight of this initial batch of game movies was Mortal Kombat. The game was about a martial arts tournament with the fate of the world at stake and the film delivered just that: a tournament. Transcending the need for any further explanation the movie consisted of a string of fantastically choreographed fights. Thus MK retained the feel of the game and created a movie that was entertaining in its own right.

While MK was shallow the fan service it paid was at least faithful to the source material. But why for so many movies does this seem such a difficult goal to achieve? The last ten years have seen a glut of movies being produced with their origins in gaming. As games have become more rounded in their storytelling it seems like the move to film should have become less perilous. Entire plots need only be lifted and fleshed out. Unfortunately the process of fleshing out the idea into a full screenplay is where the troubles in adaptation arise. The main problem is that games usually focus on a single protagonist against unimaginable odds. This is a dynamic seen in numerous action movies over the years, but movies also place some focus on the antagonists. Look at Die Hard, a movie that focused on the relationship between the hero and villain with equal time spent exploring both. Games, though, spend the majority of their time with the hero/player character. Thus the writers adapting the game to the screen are left with the difficulty of having to try to keep the feel of a license that is unsuited to the medium of film.

Resident Evil. Trampling my dreams, even in Japanese.

The writer’s dilemma is exacerbated by the fact that the anticipated audience is a fan of the game, and thus the most critical of anything that soils their beloved franchises memory. It is a lose-lose situation with the original plot being unsuited to the medium and any liberties being taken resulting in fan uproar. I am just as guilty of such an outcry. The treatment of the Resident Evil series on its trip to celluloid infuriated me. The writers shunned the original game plot in favor of a story based in the same fiction. In retrospect the original was a reasonable zombie action movie. It made use of a few monsters and locations from the game that enabled it to exist along side the original fiction as a side story. But RE had one of the more fleshed out fictions of mainstream games at that time, indeed the plot its self was drawn from and American horror movie template. It begged the question why bother with the license when all it does is restrict you creatively and attract people predisposed to be critical. Perversely the proceeding RE movies took a different approach. In the same way a monkey with oven gloves may try to tread a needle, the second movie tried to pull the plot back into that of the games. Liberties with character and plot alienated fans, but more importantly the poor acting and story failed to make it stand up even in isolation, unlike the original.

No, I won’t talk about the third RE movie, or my opinions on the planned new trilogy.

Recently I had my first experience with a game movie license where I had little knowledge of the source material. Hitman was a game I played for a few months at university on my PC before abandoning the series and never returning. I kept up on the games to a point, the concept and style of the games appealing greatly to me but never enough to tempt me back in. Thus when the movie was announced I was indifferent about it as a product, but its existence peaked my interest. Hitman was a popular game but in no way reached the popularity of the other games that received a movie crossover (forgetting Postal and Blood Rayne which I think we all should) so it being chosen as a movie crossover was unexpected.

Hitman, not bad.

Sometime after the movies release I saw it at my local rental store and picked it up. For me with my limited knowledge of the games I found it relatively faithful (excluding a ludicrous knife fight). I had some idea of the character and style, but little else beyond that. Hence I was able to allow for some poor characterization, filling in the gaps with my limited knowledge but had few other preconceptions. The mission based structure of the titles lent flexibility to the plot around the protagonist, and the situation the movie placed him in seemed at least plausible. More surprising to me was the fact I enjoyed it. It wasn’t amazing, but the performances and plot were solid enough to forgive the ill judged twists.

Online reviews of Hitman tend to be less than favorable which leads me to wander if there is an optimal amount of knowledge to be able to enjoy a film like this? Perhaps having just enough understanding of the character and concepts, but without the hypercritical fanaticism? Or maybe my expectations were just lowered by conversation around the movie and years of game movie disappointment.

Good or bad Hitman is one of a new breed of game movies. With producers seemingly starting to look more to what the game license offers in terms of setting and plot rather than just the fan base attached to it. A refreshing shift in some respects if producers are going to continue to insist on mining the world of gaming for inspiration, but one that seems unnecessary. After all there seem to be few unique elements to any game that are protected to the point that a movie would really require the license to create its own similar fiction. The dream would be that these crossovers only occur when the creators of a property see some true value in it. Unfortunately we know that they happen for more cynical reasons, exploiting fans of the source material, but its good to want something more for the franchises we love.

Like my art home work back at high school just getting this one in just in time. After the last rather light podcast we have hit back with a content packed but somewhat undirected episode. So a full month of gaming and news fill the majority of the show.

News is sprinkled through out. We touch on a number of topics that have been affecting gaming in the UK recently. Then we bitch about Nintendo. Because they deserve it sometimes. We wrap up with the usual Darren’s old games with is a breathless summation of the wonderful Sensible Software.

The DoFuss Podcast [ 1:03:04 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download