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Post by edmonddantes on Jan 12, 2018 21:27:45 GMT -5
Just like the sun, when my day is done, sometimes I don't like the person I've become... .....
So, recently I've been watching Stop Skeletons From Fighting (formerly the Happy Video Game Nerd). His videos are awesome and come highly recommended.
Recently he did a video about Castlevania SOTN, which was awesome... except for two points where he described the ending theme as "headscratching." More recently in a Silent Hill video, he used "I Am the Wind" as a joke during a fake credits sequence.
This reignited my interest in something.
For me, I Am the Wind is suffering from Deceptive Scrappy-Doo Popularity... okay I have to explain that: According to Mark Evanier (the guy who created Scrappy Doo), Scrappy was actually a very popular character who pretty much saved Scooby-Doo from cancellation, so it came as a shock to him when the internet happened and suddenly he was hearing all these people talking as if Scrappy had always been hated. A similar case of this is actually Castlevania II: Simon's Quest. Before James Rolfe took up reviewing, NOBODY considered it a bad game, but now it's common to see people calling it crap.
Likewise, before Youtube I never heard anyone say a bad word about "I Am the Wind." Now? Apparently it's considered so bad that at least one re-release of SOTN actually replaced it! I won't lie... I scream "betrayal" at that.
....
There's more tho. See, the most common argument I hear is that it "doesn't fit the mood of the game."
When I hear that, I... well, I kinda get what people mean, but I think they're missing part of the picture. I'm reminded of people who think Metal Gear is all about being manly and macho and thus hate Raiden for being too feminine (at least until he became a dark, edgy ninja).
To be blunt, I think there's culture clash going on, and I'd be interested to know how "I Am the Wind" was received in Japan, because the trend I've noticed is:
People who are anime fans like "I Am the Wind" and/or think it fits. People who aren't into anime are the ones who tend to dislike it or think it doesn't fit.
Because see, I notice this trend in gaming where people think action-heavy game must end with something hard rockin' or something like that, but Japan has never quite agreed with that. Look at Hayao Miyazaki's The Castle of Cagliostro - the movie can be best described as "wacky action," and yet its theme song certainly does NOT scream "wacky" or "action." If this movie had been made in America, I think it would've had secondhand James Bond music.
Another thing is... I just played thru Castlevania Legends, and Spoiler, but the ending describes the Belmont's history as "a legend and tragedy." Now that's distinctly Japan right there--seeing the dark side of being a born vampire hunter. Most westerners, in my experience, tend to find that stuff dumb, like "why would anyone hate kicking ass?" Even when I was in my teens I thought it was stupid that Sailor Moon would always say she doesn't want to be a sailor warrior anymore, but as an adult, I get it--it kinda sucks to be forced into horrific situations and battles all by dent of who you happen to be related to.
Now, back to I Am the Wind, I always thought the song was about Alucard. It's sad, because it talks about not liking change witnessed in oneself and having to separate from friends, but at the same time maaaybe it's all working out for the best.
I mean, think about it: you're playing a game where a half-vampire who already doesn't fit in with normal society (and he knows it) succeeds in killing his own father all to carry out the last wishes of his mother (who was burned at the stake for being a witch), and he watches the only home he's ever known crumble to the ground. And in four of the five endings, the implication is Alucard is now alone, with only Maria and Richter even knowing about him.
Don't forget the part where Alucard is made to fight phantoms of Trevor, Sylpha and Grant... that couldn't have been good.
But I feel like most gamers miss this more tragic element and just see a game where you play a kick-ass vampire, and those are the players who go "oh this song doesn't fit at all!"
Admittedly, its all subjective. I remember my friend Geo being horrified when he heard the Japanese theme song to Sonic CD, thinking it didn't fit in with a Sonic game at all, but then, Sonic had always been pushed with a different image on our side of the pond. Castlevania has always been this somewhat somber series with the occasional kick-ass elements.
Anyway, that's my thoughts on it. My apologies if I'm not clear as I'm writing this under something of a time limit. Anyway, tell me what you think.
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Post by GamerL on Jan 12, 2018 21:37:13 GMT -5
I like I Am the Wind a lot, but I do think it's a little out of place, it feels like unrelated pop song they put into the game because they wanted a flashy vocal track but didn't have the time/money to record one specifically for the game.
However, that said it does still kinda work, like you said it fits the anime vibe of the game, I think Japan thinks of masculinity different than westerners, in Japan being touch with your emotions is seen as masculine (it's why Ken from Fist of The North Star is known for his "manly tears" or stuff like Crying Freeman), so keeping that in mind the song is not as out of place as it may seem at first, however I don't see any connection with the actual lyrics and the events in the game though.
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Post by wyrdwad on Jan 12, 2018 22:04:31 GMT -5
I was one of those people who always made fun of "I Am the Wind" even back in the day. It may be somewhat appropriate thematically, but tonally, it just feels very out-of-place to me. That was kind of a common theme in a lot of anime-based things back then, though, that I've gotten a lot more used to over time -- my brother and I also always used to make fun of "Io Sono Prigioniera," the opening theme to Record of Lodoss War, for similarly being tonally bizarre in a high fantasy series (even though I actually like that song, whereas I'll be honest: I've never liked "I Am the Wind," even just to listen to). I do think it's possible to make a "soft" song fit in with something where it feels tonally at odds with the game/show's atmosphere, but it takes a certain skill to pick just the right song for just the right occasion. Xenosaga Episode I is a great example of something that got it right, though, as I find both "Pain" and "Kokoro" to be excellent fits for the game. The ending credits theme to the first Devil May Cry, too, is an absolutely BEAUTIFUL example of this being done 100% perfectly -- probably the best fit I've ever heard, as far as the whole "soft song in a hardcore setting" goes. I couldn't even begin to tell you WHY I feel the way I do about those songs, however, and don't feel that way about Io Sono Prigioniera or I Am the Wind. My grasp of music theory just isn't strong enough. -Tom
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Post by backgroundnoise on Jan 12, 2018 22:37:09 GMT -5
To state the obvious, the internet has allowed for a broader exchange of wildly differing opinions, hence why it seems as though things that were once liked are now disliked, all of a sudden. Negative statements tend to have more "reach" than positive ones. Admittedly, I was one of those people that disliked I Am the Wind when I first heard it, due to my general distaste for pop music, pop ballads especially. I think my younger self was expecting a melancholy theme in a similar style to either the Alchemy Lab or the Library theme (blame my obsession with classical music). I even found Tragic Prince unfitting for the game in the past. In hindsight, considering the genre variance in the OST, the ending theme isn't nearly as unfitting as I initially assumed. Nowadays, I find the song unintentionally funny.
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Post by toei on Jan 12, 2018 22:42:05 GMT -5
There used to be tradition of beginning action shows (whether anime or live) with an energetic, upbeat song, and ending it with a melancholy theme. Fist of the North Star is a good example of this. I'm sure this influenced those soft vocal songs in video games. Nonetheless, most of those songs are just incredibly corny and difficult to listen to, and I Am the Wind is a typically awful example, a cheeseball Adult Contemporary song with a bunch of easy rhymes and a weak melody that sounds like a Celine Dion reject. It doesn't fit into Symphony of the Wind not just because it's got nothing to do with the game, but also because it's a bad song in a good game.
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Post by GamerL on Jan 12, 2018 22:56:43 GMT -5
By the way, wasn't it sung by the same woman who sang the "what a thrill" theme song for Snake Eater?
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Post by dsparil on Jan 13, 2018 7:35:30 GMT -5
"I Am the Wind" should have been the music during the final boss battle instead of the credits. The lyrics are thematically appropriate, but it does stick out a whole lot as just the credits music. It simply hasn't aged well and has a very mid-90s quality to it.
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Post by ommadawnyawn2 on Jan 13, 2018 8:46:24 GMT -5
I started reading the OP and a few paragraphs in got a sense of deja vu, thinking I had read a thread just like this over at digital press a while back. I thought it was funny that someone would care that much about a song probably not even meant to be taken seriously, but I guess what made it stick in my memory was the self important tone, generalizations and the abandoning of the thread without replying to anyone. Apparently it was over a year ago now: forum.digitpress.com/forum/showthread.php?175065-Anyone-else-actually-LIKE-quot-I-Am-the-Wind-quot-(Castlevania-SOTN-spoilers)You're still making the same kind of generalizing arguments, presented as a more mature way of looking at things that one would have to reflect on the subject to arrive at. I gotta ask, is this some sort of crusade you're on where you'll keep making this thread until the common consensus changes for that song? Are there more threads? Will the baka gaijin ever learn to appreciate the superior nippon culture? I am making fun but also find this kind of fascinating. I mean, SotN could have told a more serious story with some emotional and intellectual depth to it and that would've been cool, but it clearly didn't (and that's also cool). Also, I'll have you know that I never liked Simon's Quest and that AVGN has nothing to do with that, though it is a review with some good points in it that probably helped people who remembered the game fondly without really thinking about it or ever revisiting it since childhood realize how bad it is. Even with a nice romhack added to it, which I played through it with relatively recently to give it another chance, it's still a mediocre game at best.
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Post by dsparil on Jan 13, 2018 11:33:15 GMT -5
I was mostly kidding when I said it should be the final boss music; although imagine if it were. Celine Dion's most popular album came out in early '96 so "Celine Dion reject" is apt. I personally find the song forgettable more than anything. I wouldn't defend it strictly based on content.
I mainly take issue with "headscratching". It isn't uncommon for an action movie to end with a moody song. This is Lethal Weapon's theme song and it plays during the credits:
SOTN's plot is high melodrama, so it should be especially unsurprising to end with that kind of song. The main issue is how much it clashes with the rest of the soundtrack. This is also Konami we're taking about. They could have been trying to get a hit single out of it.
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Post by wyrdwad on Jan 13, 2018 13:28:51 GMT -5
Also, I'll have you know that I never liked Simon's Quest and that AVGN has nothing to do with that, though it is a review with some good points in it that probably helped people who remembered the game fondly without really thinking about it or ever revisiting it since childhood realize how bad it is. Even with a nice romhack added to it, which I played through it with relatively recently to give it another chance, it's still a mediocre game at best. Off-topic, but Simon's Quest is one of my favorite Castlevania games, and easily my #1 favorite on the NES. That was true when I was a kid, and it's just as true now -- even replaying the game now, I absolutely love it, and prefer its style to that of Castlevanias 1 or 3. I do wish the villagers didn't outright lie to you, as the game would be even better if it could be played without a guide -- but frankly, as "guide games" go, it's not even the most BS. And the whole thing with fake blocks that you can fall through isn't an issue for me at all -- I rather love that as a design choice, as it forces you to watch enemy behavior and take note of where they are and aren't walking. ...Or you can just throw holy water like a maniac. But that's not how you're SUPPOSED to figure out which blocks are fake and which are real. That's kind of cheating, IMHO, and is something I never did when playing the game. Not because I didn't think to do it, but because it always felt unnecessary to me. I also absolutely ADORE the empty castle at the end, as it mixes with the music to create an uncannily eerie atmosphere. Entering Castlevania for the first time may be one of the most memorably atmospheric moments in any NES game I've ever played, and actually helped cement the game as one of the Castlevania greats for me. Anyway, I just felt the need to comment, because unlike "I Am the Wind" (which I never liked), Simon's Quest is a game I've ALWAYS liked, and which I've ALWAYS felt got a bad rap since the dawn of the AVGN episode about it. And whenever I see someone saying they've "come to realize how bad it is," I feel the need to respond, because IMHO, it is objectively not bad at all. It makes some design decisions that are controversial, and others that are a product of their time which have admittedly not aged all that well, but as an overall gameplay experience, it's just as fun and rewarding to play today as it was back in the '80s. You just have to know what you're getting into before you fire it up. ...Also, it helps to play MSX Castlevania, as Simon's Quest was 100% designed as a sequel to that version of the first game, not the NES version. Like, it's completely apparent once you've played the MSX version of CV1. It's rather odd, but because of my love of CV2, the first game on MSX was even more of a treat to play once I finally got my hands on it, and also ranks as one of my favorite Castlevania games of all time, easily topping the NES version and CV3 in my book. -Tom
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Post by mainpatr on Jan 13, 2018 14:24:29 GMT -5
Metal Gear Rising's credits theme is a soft song that actually fits the game it's in, even though the game has a lot of intense boss themes.
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Post by ommadawnyawn2 on Jan 13, 2018 16:47:00 GMT -5
Also, I'll have you know that I never liked Simon's Quest and that AVGN has nothing to do with that, though it is a review with some good points in it that probably helped people who remembered the game fondly without really thinking about it or ever revisiting it since childhood realize how bad it is. Even with a nice romhack added to it, which I played through it with relatively recently to give it another chance, it's still a mediocre game at best. but frankly, as "guide games" go, it's not even the most BS. And the whole thing with fake blocks that you can fall through isn't an issue for me at all -- I rather love that as a design choice, as it forces you to watch enemy behavior and take note of where they are and aren't walking. ...Or you can just throw holy water like a maniac. But that's not how you're SUPPOSED to figure out which blocks are fake and which are real. That's kind of cheating, IMHO, and is something I never did when playing the game. Not because I didn't think to do it, but because it always felt unnecessary to me. I also absolutely ADORE the empty castle at the end, as it mixes with the music to create an uncannily eerie atmosphere. Entering Castlevania for the first time may be one of the most memorably atmospheric moments in any NES game I've ever played, and actually helped cement the game as one of the Castlevania greats for me. ...and which I've ALWAYS felt got a bad rap since the dawn of the AVGN episode about it. And whenever I see someone saying they've "come to realize how bad it is," I feel the need to respond, because IMHO, it is objectively not bad at all. It makes some design decisions that are controversial, and others that are a product of their time which have admittedly not aged all that well, but as an overall gameplay experience, it's just as fun and rewarding to play today as it was back in the '80s. You just have to know what you're getting into before you fire it up. ...Also, it helps to play MSX Castlevania, as Simon's Quest was 100% designed as a sequel to that version of the first game, not the NES version. Like, it's completely apparent once you've played the MSX version of CV1. It's rather odd, but because of my love of CV2, the first game on MSX was even more of a treat to play once I finally got my hands on it, and also ranks as one of my favorite Castlevania games of all time, easily topping the NES version and CV3 in my book. -Tom Ok, well there's no article discussion thread for CV anymore nor could I find a general thread so I guess I'll have to reply here (not all of this is aligned to when you said it). I don't think you read and are responding to my personal criticism of the game now? But how you list a bunch of problems to try and excuse them when arguing why it's a great game does say a lot about its quality I think. I'm sure there are people who just follow this behaviour: AVGN is popular and/or I like James, he didn't like game X, so now I don't like game X. Some people are this way. But like I said, there are good points in that one, so it's a strawman to just dismiss people citing that review as an argument in such a way. Is it a humble opinion to say that a game is objectively good? I'll ask what you mean by the word objective here then. I don't think any game requiring a guide can be considered great. Now since I played bisqwit's hack the dialogue is more helpful overall (without outright telling you what to do unlike another hack that's more well known I think), so I only got stuck a couple of times, but without it I wouldn't have played through the game. Getting stuck is only OK in my book if I was the one at fault in the end - there were clues and I just ignored them or had a brain fart. Using the tools available to you isn't cheating. Throwing water everywhere is tedious, but this particular thing also wasn't that big of a problem to me besides in berkeley mansion (according to my old mini review anyway, it's been a while now). The empty castle thing was kind of cool as an idea, but would've worked better if it was a longer segment with some traps or puzzles I think, or even better they could've had you resurrect dracula, then he throws you out or traps you in some way and starts terrorizing the surrounding area with a summoned army, and you then have to battle your way through a shorter version of the castle for a nice buildup towards the battle with him. The way it is I didn't find it that interesting, and the battle wasn't great either. Playing the prequels to get the whole context is a decent argument, sure. But a game should also be able to stand on its own.
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Post by GamerL on Jan 13, 2018 17:01:14 GMT -5
James never really said CVII was bad, he just said it was flawed, which it certainly is.
Personally I like the atmosphere of the game and just wandering around killings things is fun, but it seems too tedious to try and finish, games shouldn't require a guide to finish, that's cheap.
But one of these days I'd like to play the whole thing for completist sake and maybe my opinion will be more positive.
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Post by wyrdwad on Jan 13, 2018 17:53:18 GMT -5
Is it a humble opinion to say that a game is objectively good? I'll ask what you mean by the word objective here then. I don't think any game requiring a guide can be considered great. Now since I played bisqwit's hack the dialogue is more helpful overall (without outright telling you what to do unlike another hack that's more well known I think), so I only got stuck a couple of times, but without it I wouldn't have played through the game. Getting stuck is only OK in my book if I was the one at fault in the end - there were clues and I just ignored them or had a brain fart. See, I just kind of disagree on this. A good game is a game you have fun playing, and being able to complete the game without a guide isn't necessary in order to have fun. Hell, even being able to complete a game AT ALL isn't necessary to have fun. If the mechanics are engaging, you can just play the same part of a game forever and ever and never get tired of it... and if you're enjoying yourself, isn't that a good game? With CV2, even before I read a guide and learned that I had to duck at the cliff with the red jewel equipped to summon a tornado (the first spot where I got stuck), I was thoroughly enjoying myself. Simon was a pleasure to control, the game areas were all fun and atmospheric to explore, I thought the day/night mechanic was awesome (it's been done better, sure, but at the time, it was pretty novel and really made the towns in particular feel super-creepy), and the equipment upgrades were amazing -- I really liked the flame pillar, the diamond, and eventually, the flame whip, and had an awesome time playing around with all three -- not to mention using laurels to traverse the swamp, upgrading my knife a couple times, etc. Back then, too, it wasn't considered bad game design to feature puzzles that you absolutely needed outside help to solve. That's what Nintendo Power was for, and there was always something really enjoyable and satisfying about reading a tip in Nintendo Power (like ducking with the red crystal at Deborah Cliff) and then pulling it off in-game -- a review I read of La-Mulana some time ago put it best when it said that using a guide in an obtuse game feels like you're an archaeologist reading notes and journals left behind by other archaeologists who have come before you, and using them to forge ahead farther. It's exciting and fun, and... well, La-Mulana is a perfect basis for comparison, because while every puzzle in that game can TECHNICALLY be solved on one's own, the chances of someone actually doing so before they spend 100 hours whipping at walls and driving themselves crazy is almost nil; yet that game remains one of my favorite gaming experiences of the last decade, and I consider it to be a virtually flawless game... as long as you use a guide (sparingly) while you play. So no, for me, reliance on a guide does not impact a game's objective quality, as that's simply a game design decision in my eyes. The only things that matter, as far as objective quality goes, are whether or not the game plays well and holds itself together, and CV2 certainly qualifies. It's a polished and tightly designed experience that just happens to rely on some rather outdated game design concepts. I'll admit, the battle was disappointing -- one thing I would change about CV2 is Dracula, for sure. But I completely disagree with you on the rest. There's very much something to be said for creating a feeling of TOTAL EMPTINESS in a game -- not just devoid of friends, but devoid of foes, and even devoid of any signs that anyone has been there for a long, long time. And Dracula's castle in CV2 was the first time I've felt that in a video game. Even Metroid never came across as "lonely" to me, like it did for so many others, because Zebes was absolutely TEEMING with life... whereas CV2's Castlevania is 100% empty, and that just creates such a feeling of eerie loneliness that it was kind of... haunting, especially when I was a little kid. It put me in the perfect mood, making me hyper-aware of my surroundings -- if you'd jumped out at me and shouted "BOO!" while I was traversing Dracula's castle, I think I would've screamed bloody murder and crapped my pants. Adding traps, or adding enemies (even after Dracula appears), would've detracted from this IMHO. It would've spoiled the mood. -Tom
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Post by ommadawnyawn2 on Jan 13, 2018 18:52:45 GMT -5
Ok so you have fun wandering aimlessly while stuck on a bad puzzle and don't mind looking up solutions instead of getting a clue to help you figure it out on your own. We have very different taste in games then. If you can't even get through the game due to crappy puzzle design then it doesn't play well. CV2 isn't really meant to be a sandbox game; there's a beginning, an end and you are on a mission throughout towards the "climax" which is the dracula battle (and there's some suspension here in that you're note sure what will happen). As a sandbox game, there isn't enough interesting content to enjoy it for very long and what's there has been done better since, and as an adventure it also kinda fails for a bunch of reasons (again see my mini review). It wasn't considered bad design? Speak for yourself. Me and people around me hated getting stuck in games for bad reasons. The nintendo power thing was only kind of OK as a kid since the games were new and maybe you didn't have any better alternative. I would file it under the same category as quarter muncher design in arcade games as a dick move, and luckily games mostly evolved past it. But if it isn't clear, I can tolerate looking up a thing or two in an old game outside of what's given to me, it's a negative but not a dealbreaker. The only part about objective quality that made sense there is that the game isn't buggy, and even that is debatable to a degree depending on what it is. I don't really see the importance of that aspect in this case, since while there are some bugs and technical issues the major problems are in the game's design. On the castle: Well, speaking of metroid I liked the similar effects near the end of 2 and Super. But it was executed better there, and I had more fun on the way to that point.
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