Skyward Sword

By the title people can probably guess what I've been up to during the last week. Yes, I've been playing The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword. And I completed it 100 % in one week. Compared that to the me in 2003 that had taken five years with a guide to finish Ocarina of Time. So now I can say once again that I finished every Zelda game published by Nintendo. And what do I think about it? It was OK, the story was interesting in its way to try having a new archenemy than Ganon and the series as a whole seems to go that way (this is gonna contain spoilers for those who haven't finished the game just so that anyone stumbling upon this knows). What I mean is that this games end boss is a demon lord, Spirit Tracks had the end bosses as a Demon Train and a Demon King, you have lovecraftian horrors like Bellum and Vaati so the series seems to go with ancient demon horrors as the main enemies of the series where Ganon is, as explained in the end of Skyward Sword, the eternal curse put upon the, by the Goddesses appointed, Hero and Princess. So instead of the manifestation of his inner-self, Ganondorf must have somewhere before Ocarina of Time made a pact with the series actual devil to gain his power and his Ganon form being the price for it (giving up his humanity and so on) which looks a lot like the actual devil himself.

Other aspects of the game is the music, not bad, I really liked the song when you followed the path to the Goddess Sword, but I miss familiar tracks from the older games. I only recognized one and that is the Zelda-theme. The graphics are nice and atmospheric and I have nothing against the cel-shaded look, it actually make it look lively (the more realistic look from Twilight Princes mostly went in colors of brown, red and grey which is not the prettiest colors to look at). Then again it's hard to tell due to the condition of my TV which I still haven't fixed so the colorful graphics make it at least easy to see what's going on. Then we have the controls, motion based making you theoretically swing with the sword yourself pulling you into the combat... in theory. I don't know, but sometimes I've had a hard time making a forward thrust with the sword (often crops up during a certain boss-battle against a Scorpion) and sometimes it feels like the most reoccurring boss is cheating since he blocked my every move (which he is supposed to do, but it doesn't feel like I could create a pattern on how to strike so it usually ends with me swinging all I got until he decides to use a sword instead). Mind you, they aren't horrible or hard to understand, there is just some flaws.

An enjoyable experience overall during the 50 hours it took me to finish the game and then they top it of with a hard mode as well (or "Hero's Mode" as they call it), don't know if I'm gonna finish that, but I now regret that I didn't make a double save post before the final battle so that I could have some proof of my 100 % cause I feel that the hard mode probably will kill me a lot more than the normal one (I think I died twice and one time was during the boss-rush game to get the best shield which was really good to have in the final battle). The biggest complaint though is that it feels short, the world itself feels small in comparison to the open plains of Ocarina of Time and Twilight Princess or the vast ocean of Wind Waker. Now it's just an open sky with small rocks thrown around and three larger ground areas to explore, I miss the feeling of the epic scale the 3D Zelda games just have when you leave the forest area for the first time and can see the mountains in the north with the Castle just below standing as a monument over civilization in a world plagued by evil and the wild. You felt small in the world, in awe of nature, in this game it just feels... empty in the sky while the ground areas feel cramped together. All in all there is 6-7 temples that for a console Zelda is pretty standard so it shouldn't feel smaller. Maybe it has to do with me getting older and actually multitasking the game to find all secrets, heart pieces and so on compared to me as a child spending time just walking around avoiding the temples and dungeons cause I was scared. Talk about personal character development. Now it's just waiting another five years for the next home console release of the series to see where they are going with this with some handheld games in-between. 

Black Sabbath 11-11-11

Next years gonna be interesting, we will once again get a new Black Sabbath studio album, first official one since 1995 when Forbidden come out, not counting Heaven & Hell's The Devil You know (since, well... it's Heaven & Hell). That is 16 years (17 when it comes out) and 33 years since Ozzy Osbourne was the singer on a Black Sabbath-album (not counting the live album Reunion which contained two newly written songs for that, that was 1998). What would then be a good name for this new album (if it get of the ground that is, it could still be derailed)? Just at the top of my head I would say something like Rebirth or Resurrection would be fitting names, they could also do like Asia and name the album Phoenix like they did when the original line-up reunited for new albums and tours. Unfortunately they've already used up other good names like Never Say Die!, Born Again and Reunion in earlier albums. 

So when could we possibly see the release of the album? Earliest would be Friday the 13th January 2012 which would be a nod back toward their first album that also was released Friday the 13th  although February 1970. So by going by the Friday the 13th logic it could also happen in April or July. Other possible date if you want to appeal to an occult imagery is Wednesday the 12th December 2012 or 12-12-12 which is the same idea to this date (11-11-11) when they released the news. Last date I would think of would be the solstice Friday the 21st December 2012 or also known as the 2012 phenomenon (apparently). The end of the world as we know it, what better date to release a new Black Sabbath-album?

The Silver Lining

After playing Diablo it was time to play something happier. Coincidentally episode 4 of The Silver Lining came out during the Sunday. Unfortunately my internet seemed to screw up so I had to wait until yesterday to get it. Then I played it until the end. Yes, I finished it in one day... or at least till 2 AM this morning so technically it would be two days. Well, it wasn't that much happier story, people seemed really depressed and who would blame them. There is some serious business going on in that game. And yet for some reason I was able to finish it. I don't know how I was able to finish that game (well, I do since I know what to do now). I ended up having a lot of luck when it came to playing this game. First I just stumbled through the castle in the beginning and just happened to touch items from the earlier parts that I now was able to take. Pure coincidence. Then the game float on like normal and I picked up some small hints here and there and could guess fairly well what they was supposed to do. It might have to be my King's Quest marathon earlier this year so I had trained my brain to recognize those small hints and solutions. One puzzle in particular was the same as in the ADG Interactive King's Quest II: Romancing the Stones. Then I get stuck trying to get an instrument to get the first ingredient, so I just stands near it since I know that it's that thing I need, but I don't know how to get it. So I look in my inventory and look on those things I haven't used (everyone knows that if an item is picked up it gotta be used). I have no clue on what to do, but then my mind turns into a raging torrent, flooded with rivulets of thought cascading into a waterfall of creative alternatives. This is gonna be spoilers so here goes. I needed a horn, it existed in a 3D-picture, but the game wouldn't allow me to take it. I had found a gold baton and some beast hair and my mind just said, "what if we make it look like a horn and switch them around?". You see how ridicules that is? It didn't work, how could it? Although it wasn't completely wrong, the game told me I was missing some thing to glue (subtle is it not?) it together so I went where I knew it was and suddenly I had a painters brush. No idea what that was for, it was actually an answer to another puzzle which I hadn't found yet, so I basically found the answer before I knew what it was for so I figured the puzzles out backwards just by mistake. Wish life would be that easy, having all the solution, you just need to find the problems to solve them.

Either this was a much easier than the earlier episodes or my luck was just fantastic... it ended pretty much with the second to last puzzle. Not because it was hard to figure out what to do (took me 5 seconds), no, because they decided to make the puzzle harder and harder. The puzzle is to solve 12  combinations with 4 spinning wheels with different images that together form one of the zodiacs. After solving the first ones the wheels spin faster, then they blink in and out, then they change places (you start to see the problem?) and after combining 10 they start moving around the screen, still spinning and phasing in and out. This was on the normal difficulty and it was after 1 AM so I decided to chicken (tired as hell with a headache is not the best mood to play a game of patience and memorization) out after an hour so I could finish it before I went to bed so I quit and restored my earlier game. Somehow I glitch it, always present was the spinning wheel of the Pandoras Box and my clue in the Druid's parchment was the Druid himself instead of Shamir the Genie that I was supposed to see at that point. Anyway, I played the puzzle again, but on easy this time (meaning they cut of the changing places and swirling all around the screen) and thus beating it... and the next puzzle following: Magic Duel with the Big Bad of the game. Oh Yeah, it was epic. Unfortunately it will probably be another half year or something before the conclusion is payable. Oh well.

Lord of Terror

Guess what? After having Diablo for 15 years I finally finished it for the first time, took me 3 days of just playing. About does cheating Balrogs? I outsmarted them by doing a fast maneuver they didn't see coming... I ran. I went down a level, leveled once and then teleported back to town and then descended through the short cut into hell where they did once again run toward me and I was able to take down the first two after using all my potions and then fled up to the surface again, restock and reenter to give the final strike toward the last ones. Deader then dead. It felt so good. Then of course it was going even deeper, but who's your enemies? F***ing Succubus who only fires from a distance and when you get closer runs away. Some I was chasing over the whole damn floor before I was able to strike them down. And then it's f***ing Mages. Same MO, but this time they teleport. More annoying then ever, just stand still so I can cleave you with my sword. Finally, after hunting the damn Archbishop Lazarus around for 10 minutes I finally corners him and hack him to death and it's time to duke it out with Diablo... after fighting even more mages to open up his room. And then the Lord of Terror himself hides together with his Knights and mages waiting to kill me, but I got him, I finally got him. Take that demons of my past nightmares.

Yeah, it was fun and spooky, pretty fitting for the week we remember the dead. And it is really a good looking game for an almost 20 year old game, even the cinematics are pretty decent, the people's faces looks a little blocky and the raven in the beginning seems to have scales instead of feathers (compared to the opening cinematic for Blizzard's Warcraft 3), but overall really nice. Overall game graphics fill its parts, but it is a little bit devoid of color, and then we have the problem with that I can't see behind the walls or a hard time seeing what's on the floor from my fallen enemies. Sometimes they pile up so much that there's seems to be nothing else than a pool of blood and body parts, but it hides an armory. Music fits the mood as well, but it can be repetitive when it loops around and around, what are there, five tracks overall? Finally we have the awesome backstory which just fills me with awe. The war between angels and demons are a really interesting read in the manual that don't appear that detailed in the game, but it's almost makes it better. It's just small tidbits here and there, for example one creature log in the manual describe the arrogance and vanity of the angel Inarius (apparently they changed the backstory later on) that sees himself above all others and attacks the demons alone with only his followers. The demons retribution is how they capture him and pull his wings and eyelids of, mutilates him and throw him to a prison with only mirrors so he always will see what he have become. No pictures, nothing, instead my imagination sets in and probably creates to me the most awesome (although horrible) picture of that event. Really, by being that scared when I was younger I only reached level 2 or 3 before I chickened out (and not knowing about the restart option) I spent much more time reading the manual and instead imagining the story... Hmm, might have been all those scary images I created that stopped me.

Talking about terrifying, or just an interesting thought. This video is from a pension agency (or whatever it is called) trying to campaigning so that people decides for more ethical pension collective investment schemes (that is, they are campaigning for not as profitable, but more easier for you conscious or if you are a religious time, your afterlife) so that we all strive for a better world. It means no companies associated with weapons, oil, dictatorship and so on. All that altruistic goodness for a better world so that the future generation will grow up in a better tomorrow. My question is, why would we want that when the children attacks a random person dressed in a polar suit? F***ing bastards, why should we help them if they act like that? Let them burn, I will gladly call upon Diablo himself if I don't have to deal with children that annoying. It probably would be a much quicker destruction then what will happen when they take over.

Children of Mana/Diablo

 

Someone (probably none) wondering what I meant by last posts cliffhanger? Children of Mana is a game for the DS that I must say is one of the more boring games I ever played. And I usually like RPG:s, although they can lean to be the most cliché-filled plots ever (Skies of Arcadia for some example) and can play them over and over again. Although that is probably not a fair comparison since it's actually an action-RPG Dungeon Crawler, and the only other game that comes close that I've played in that genre is Diablo... and I never finished that game. So I'm probably not terrible fond of that genre since I prefer a whole world with lots of villages to visit and people to talk to. Feels like it's worth exploring and further the plot to see a new place and visit new people to save (without hoping to get paid). These two games are just looked in the same village with either a change of dungeon location (Children of Mana) or the dungeon itself changes depending on how further down you get in it (Diablo). All in all, it just feels boring. The things that balance it up on the other hand is the atmosphere in Diablo, it really feels scary, dark colors and sounds making you want to play it (it's just that I suck at leveling up my character in a good way and therefore not prepared to win tougher fights). Children of Mana on the other hand is more beautiful, the colors are fantastic and all... but it isn't enough for me to persuade me to finish it (beyond the fact I have to finish the game). Hmm, now I got a craving to play Diablo... hold on a minute.

 

*Three days later* OK, there isn't any competition, Diablo is so much better. It felt pretty good playing it this week with All Saint's Day and Halloween. And guess what, I made it to level 13, which means HELL. And it really are. Ambushed and killed by four Balrogs who had nothing better too do than wait at the entrance and await my decent into hell. Those bastards, I have waded through hordes of monster, but those four corners me and then kill me every single time. Being just a mere Warrior I'm now seriously looking into using my limited spell power to at least get some advantage... No, those demons are immune to my level 12 fireball which is the most leveled up spell I got. The only one that seemed to turn the tide was Stone Curse, but I don't have enough mana in order to stop more than one, which means the other three keeps bashing on me until the cursed one awakens and I'm lucky if I'm able to kill at least one, but then my potions are all out and I'm dead. Cheating bastards. If I'm not able to turn the tide and keeps getting killed the other option would be to start a new game again, and I didn't know that, and I have had this game for 15 years. A new game plus feature without even needing to complete the game. Only bother is to wade through the first 8-9 levels without being able to pick up any XP, but if that what it takes to survive the first level of hell so be it, at least I got some really nice armor and equipment fighting the first bosses. 

Point of No Return

Been replaying the Golden Sun-series again, and it is as fun as ever, although it can be frustratingly slow at some portions when you almost know the speeches by heart after playing the oldest one for 10 years. Also you learn something new every time you play it, just look at the second game where you can transfer the data from the first game to the second. If you don't the bonus dungeon can't be reached and certain cutscenes with special items don't happen. Combine this with the ability to play the game over with the same level and stats at the end of a cleared game. Now, I replayed the game maybe 3 times, usually starting with putting in the password needed to transfer all equipments, djinni and so on. The thing is... it's 260 characters long for everything. So this time around, since I didn't do any adjustment to the final equipment of my characters in game one so I thought it was just to start the game over with everything remembered without having to use the password since, well, my old save must have memorized it right? Apparently not, cutscenes I expected didn't show up so I had to go back a little bit and then input the password... all 260 characters. I put them in and everything seems back to normal so I continue to play the game. I reach the point when the old cast joins your group after clearing 75 % of the game and what do I see? They have almost half the level they had at the save. Apparently the game interpreted my input that level 56 was alright compared to my level 90. It thought wrong so I pretty much rage quit and started up the old save and did some level grinding before beating the soul out of the end-boss. Irritating to say the least, but I at least know that till next time.

So after that I started up the third game and it has grown on me. After the mediocre first playthrough it begins to feel interesting. Maybe it has to do with much better controls since the DS Lite has almost no A-button left which makes it nice to just move around with the stylus. But their is still times when it feels like inferior to the original two games. First is the points of no returns. There is three of them, first after you traveled through the first ruin, second one after you reach the "lost city in the sky" (although you can travel back to everything in between those two points after the third point, but you can't revisit the city itself) and the third one happens when you set sail for the first time. These are kinda annoying since it makes the game feel rushed and makes one wonder if they didn't have time to fill the game with content. And this is a game series that had the quirkiness to let the NPC at the end of the second game have minds to read even though no one in your party at that time couldn't read them. The first one is the most annoying since it makes it impossible to travel back to the first area. The only reason why that would be the case is that would make it possible for the party to travel to Bilibin through an alternative route. How do they do it? The enemy sets a trap with boulders that block your path backwards. It would have been fine and all if it weren't for the thing that 5 second earlier the Scholar Kraden mentions that the psynergy vortex you encountered would block your path itself so you wouldn't be able to follow him when he went north and you south to rescue Rief. So what was the point of the enemy cave in? By avoiding that and just using the psynergy vortex would have made it possible to travel back to the first area and at the same time remind people about the threat of the vortexes instead of the almost out of the blue ending. 

This ties together with the weakest part of the game, there is no sense of urgency for the main characters. The only thing would be the psynergy vortexes since you are hinted about the mourning moon in the beginning and the destruction it causes, which would be a good thing in that it urges the player to continue before it is to late... if the plot thread wasn't dropped after the first ruin where the third vortex is spotted and only returns at the very end. They never mentions it between those two points. Personally this feels like one of the reasons I felt the second game wasn't as good as the first. The first one had you hunting the madmen who wanted to release the destructive force of Alchemy, they kidnapped your love interest and your mentor and possibly killed your parents. You travel across two continents following them as they wreck havoc, destroys merchant roads, kills and hurt soldiers and scholars until you finally corners them at the top of the second lighthouse and a battle to the death were you learn about a whole village of these people and their mantle is picked up by your childhood friend you failed to save at the beginning of the game as he plans to finish their work... and then the game ends. The second game picks up after that, but puts you in the clothes of that childhood friend as he fights to finish what they started. I didn't care that much when I first played this game since I waited two years for this, but now I wondered, what is the motivation for the player to finish this? Especially us who played the first game? Not until you reach Lemuria you get a reason why alchemy is in fact good, the world is being devoured due to lack of energy. Not until the 75 % mark when the other group joins you finally get the reason why it is urgent in a much more personally way, the enemy holds your parents as hostage in their village, a village that is threatened to be the first to fall into the abyss at the ends of the world if you don't ignite the lighthouses. There, a reason, but it felt a bit to late, although small hints are spread all around the game, but not only until I got the whole picture was I clear on what they meant. I miss that in the third game as I'm being pushed around by my enemies without much input on the story. I know it's wrong from the start since they can't be up to something good, but still I'm forced into it against my will. Better had been if I felt it necessary to reach my goals and there was no other way due to the urgency of my quest, but my quest is to gather a feather and the plot around it dropped after 1-2 hours. But it is still better than Children of Mana.

The Curtains are Falling

Yet another dictator has fallen by the people he repressed. Is the world safer? Maybe, we don't know or we can't foresee the consequences of the turmoil. Will the relative stability of a dictatorship evolve toward a democratic stability or will the power vacuum threaten to engulf its people in a longer battle between themselves? Shrouded in mist is the future. The first country to shake of the chains of dictatorship in the North African region was Tunisia and its election time. They stand at a crossroad, and it doesn't seem that good when one of the alternatives is more censorship and a more religious government combined with that if the result doesn't go their way they will hit the streets again. It's not that much of a democratic vibe in these people. Doesn't help that people seems indifferent and would abstain from voting. What can we do if the people themselves don't care about their government or their human rights?

Even if I paint it in the bleakest colors, it's still a very vibrant situation all over the world. Dictatorships are falling by the hands of their people (with one instance of western help) and it could be a new dawn in front of us. Of course this echoes back from the fall of the iron curtain and communism. If I had been interested in politics and world news from an early age my first memories would probably been of the fall of the Soviet Union (the fall of the Berlin Wall I was definitely to young to remember). More interesting events I do actually remember and followed more intensely was the fall of Afghanistan and Iraq and now North Africa. At the same time I've been around to witness the genocide's in Rwanda and the Yugoslavian wars and the after tremors in the above countries. At the same time we see how the western worlds themselves stand on the brink of collapse due to economical failure and even corruption. Are we seeing a steel bath to cleanse the air and bring forward a reigniting of the western hegemony? It's a bit of a stretch since all of the western powerhouses are crumbling at their very foundations. The US economy is at a stand still and the same is for the political leadership who is to weak to bring them out of it. The EU don't have the strong leadership they need either to unify and lead them toward the same goals, they are all to differentiated and when the economical resources they possess are being poured over almost failed states and farming subsidies instead of reforms toward a modern economy there is little hope. This leaves our asian friends in the pacific. Japan is a zombie economy that haven't released itself from the death grip in the 90's which leaves South Korea and Taiwan that are to small and forced to protect themselves from the threat of hostile neighbors. So there is no industrialized countries to go too. A new generation must step forward. South America (I know it's not a country, but there would be to many to name), India and China are the only ones that seems to have a decent position to restart the wheels. Or we could start World War III, war seems to be a good way to build industries on and this time we don't take loans over the roof when it's over.