Castlevania 64: The Castle of Hell

Castlevania for the Nintendo 64 (commonly known as "Castlevania 64") has in recent times gained the reputation as being somewhat of a black sheep in the Castlevania series. Even official sources flip-flop on whether it still counts as part of the official Castlevania timeline (when Konami still cared about Castlevania anyway). Nevertheless it's one of my favorite games. Yes, it suffers a bit from being an early Nintendo 64 title, and the Nintendo 64 controller doesn't help the game much, but still (a lot of control issues would have been solved if it were just rereleased for Virtual Console).

Important note: this is supposed to be an analysis, not a review. Therefore I will not mind bringing up spoilers if they are relevant. Proceed with caution if you have yet to play this game and do not want to be spoiled.

The Castle of Hell
Castlevania 64 (1999)

0. Personal History

1. Story and Setting 

2. Main Characters

3. Level Select: Stage 3 Villa

4. Castlevania, Vampires and Dualism

5. Links & References

0. Personal History

Back in 1999 I didn't know anything about Castlevania, but it looked interesting and I was convinced to buy it after the store clerk mentioned it was "like Zelda" (which confused me after playing it, but in retrospect he probably just meant that the franchise has been around for about as long and has been similarly acclaimed). At first I didn't like it all that much, mainly because I was 11 and I had just bought my first horror title, but very soon I came to adore the creepy atmosphere, the interesting characters, the epic music that typifies Castlevania and yes, even the gameplay (although as I said, playing it on the actual N64 makes it a struggle against the controller).

I also chose it as the subject for a Nintendo 64 retexture project, which is unfinished but still available at http://c64project.blogspot.be/

1. Story and Setting

The story takes place in Wallachia, Transylvania in 1852. Dracula has awoken after a century of being locked away (later releases such as Order of Ecclesia (18??) and Circle of the Moon (1830) would reduce it to mere decades). Two heroes descended from the legendary Belmont and Belnades clans take it on themselves to once again rid the world of Dracula's influence.

The Castlevania series functions as an extended universe to Bram Stoker's novel Dracula ¹, which makes its 1852 setting especially interesting as it is a mere 40 years before the count's return in the novel. Unfortunately there's very little to connect this particular game to the novel, except perhaps the Belmont clan having a reduced presence this century due to being split up into clans with different surnames. In that way Reinhardt Schneider might make it more digestible to have the novel's Quincy Morris be part of the Belmont lineage.

Some anachronisms exist within the setting, the most goofy of which is the giant skeleton boss of the first stage being accompanied by two smaller skeletons riding on motorcycles. Certain areas of the Castle Center and the Tower of Science itself reveal Dracula to have access to advanced science for the time period, which doesn't seem all that out of place considering his vast powers and connection to demonic forces.

Also there must be something odd in Wallachia's water anyway because four of the major characters, including Dracula himself, have blue hair.

2. Main Characters

The Character Select screen

We have the option of 2 playable protagonists: Reinhardt Schneider, a descendant of the Belmont clan who dedicated themselves to defeating Dracula, and Carrie Fernandez, a descendant of the witch Sypha Belnades (In Japan they have the same surname) from Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse.
Most of the game is the same no matter which character you pick, except they'll interact differently with certain characters, they'll have a different personal nemesis and 3 of the 10 stages will differ (Reinhardt will visit Tunnel, Duel Tower and Tower of Execution, while Carrie visits Underground Waterway, Tower of Science and Tower of Sorcery).

On the gameplay front I found Reinhardt and his whip rather boring and I never got too far with him. Carrie and her homing magic bullet make combat more manageable, as you can properly focus on evading enemy attacks rather than struggle to aim your whip. Because of that my perspective of the game is heavily skewed towards it being Carrie's game rather than Reinhardt's.

An interesting difference between these two heroes are their attitudes in how they go about their quest. Reinhardt, despite being the classic hero archetype, has clear doubts about his ability to live up to the legacy of his Belmont ancestors. Meanwhile 12-year old Carrie storms Dracula's castle with the full conviction that she has the power to destroy Dracula. This is even reflected in their quotes as the game starts up (and their only pieces of voiced dialogue):  

"Courage, don't leave me."

- Reinhardt Schneider

"Whatever awaits, I have no regrets!"

- Carrie Fernandez

Only a few simple words, but they nevertheless reveal a great deal about their respective speaker. Reinhardt is clearly having doubts about himself, which are feelings Carrie doesn't share. In Carrie's quest it becomes a recurring theme in her dialogue to reflect her absolute conviction that she's powerful enough to defeat Dracula. She even mocks her nemesis for being a mere pawn to delay Carrie from reaching the Count.

Their difference in personality is also reflected in the challenges they face. On top of merely having to deal with the general quest of having to kill the resurrected Dracula, at the various points where their respective storylines differ, the villains start playing on our protagonists' personal doubts and fears. Reinhardt, doubting his ability to live up to his ancestors' legacy, is presented with a damsel in distress whom he can't possibly save. His personal demon is presented in the form of Dracula's right hand and series regular Death. Carrie, having had to deal with losing her family, is forced to put a vampirized relative out of her misery (a cousin, but originally supposed to be Sypha Belnades herself). And while Carrie has lost her loving stepmother who died protecting her, her personal demon comes in the form Actrise, a woman who sacrificed her own child for eternal beauty.

3. Level Select: Stage 3 Villa

It would take far too much effort to analyze all the stages in detail, so for now I'll stick to just one. By far the  best remembered level for most people (including me) is the Villa. After the approach through the Forest of Silence and breaching the Castle Wall, players are immediately attacked by a series of Cerberus enemies (3 headed dogs, some of which can breathe fire) that guard the gates to the Villa. Once inside those gates, you are greeted with nothing but the serene sound of the fountain in the middle of the front garden with the face of the villa behind it  (the outside is supposedly based on the château of Azay-le-Rideau). Before a moment of peace can set in however, you'll soon realize the garden is in fact a graveyard holding the former inhabitants: the Oldrey family. Though a minor nuisance, it turns out their ghosts aren't particularly fond of intruders.

11-year old me says 'eeep'

Once inside you find yourself inside a hall that looks suspiciously similar to the Spencer Mansion from Resident Evil 1. Before you manage to explore anything, a man-sized creature crawls across the walls and jumps right in front of you, revealing the first of the game's many vampires (Castlevania: Legacy of Darkness reveals this one to be Master J.A. Oldrey himself, who has been haunting his residence for 8 years). This was my first experience with a horror game as a child, and this scene left the biggest impression. Every time I played the game after, I dreaded this particular moment. The vampires in this game just look absolutely terrifying.

The previous stages weren't entirely linear, but this one changes things up by requiring exploration and figuring things out based on characters giving clues. Combined with the setting itself, I think it's fairly safe to say the game designers did indeed take notes from Resident Evil. On top of that there's a surprising amount of detail spent on making this place actually feel like a luxurious, though haunted by vampires and demons, villa. The walls are lined with art, including portraits of previous residents and the furniture is surprisingly elaborate for a Nintendo 64 game

This stage introduces us to most of the game's important characters: fellow vampire hunter Charlie Vincent, the noble vampire Rosa, the village child Malus and the demon salesman Renon. All of whom are interesting in their own right.

Charlie Vincent is likely the first non-enemy character you encounter in the entire game (outside of being briefly taunted by Dracula himself at the Castle Wall). He appears unexpectedly when you open a door in the bedroom, waving a cross ² in your face to determine whether you are one of Dracula's henchmen or not.
He is presented as the self-professed expert vampire hunter who to us comes across as being in way over his head. We are the descendants of the Belmont/Belnades clan after all while this guy is an unknown. He carries around a stake and multiple crosses (including a giant one on his back), so while obviously being prepared, he comes across as rather foolish. This image is not helped by his general look (although with an added mustache) and name 'Charlie Vincent' calling to mind Peter Vincent (Roddy McDowall's character) from Fright Night, who is an actor who plays a fictional legendary vampire hunter but freaks out when confronted with actual vampires. It thus comes as a surprise when later it turns out he is in fact instrumental in revealing the true identity of Dracula (in the good ending at least, which can be triggered by spending less than 4 in-game days reaching the Castle Keep).

Following Vincent's clue of spotting a young woman at dawn, you can, at dawn, encounter Rosa who has allegedly come to water the garden's "white" roses. Something is clearly wrong here because the roses are obviously red. Then it turns out the water from her watering pot is actually blood, and there was apparently so much of it that it stained all the white roses red.

Surprise! Rosa is one of the villa's vampires. Unlike any of the other vampires however, she's not at all hostile to the player character and surprisingly compassionate. She urges the player character to leave the castle, but decides to help out when they declare they can't do so until Dracula has been stopped. In Carrie's story, this is the only time we ever encounter her. In Reinhardt's story however, she's a recurring character and becomes his love interest. There we learn that Rosa has managed to maintain her human soul despite being turned. Nevertheless Death uses her as a pawn against Reinhardt and thus she turns into a tragic villain we have to fight as a boss at the end of the Castle Center (the aforementioned damsel in distress Reinhardt can't save).

I mean their similarity is too uncanny
to be a coincidence, right?

Descending down the stair that lead to the maze garden, you find a mysterious scroll on the ground. A man who introduces himself as a demon named Renon (who for some reason bears a striking resemblance to French actor Jean Reno) appears and explains to us that he sells useful items to adventurers such as us because "one needs gold even in hell these days". He's the game's store who can be summoned from scrolls such as the one you've just found.
The one detail he neglects to mention however is that the small print in the contract specifies that spending more than 30,000 gold in his store means he gets to claim your soul as well, meaning abuse of his services punishes you by adding an extra boss in the Castle Keep before you get to face Dracula.

Then comes the maze garden itself, which quickly becomes the most intense part of the game. After wandering around for a bit, you encounter a child abducted from the village named Malus.

After a short introduction where he fails to remember what exactly happened to him to end up in this horrible place, you are suddenly attacked by two stone dogs you may remember as the statues in front of the maze. As Malus runs away in panic and the dogs give chase, you come face to face with the gardener: a giant Frankenstein's monster with a chainsaw for a right arm. Worse of all, he's invincible and can only be temporarily delayed, never defeated. The only thing you can do is try to keep up with Malus while you have to dodge all three enemies at once. Then the little bugger crawls under a hedge too low for us, forcing us to backtrack to find a way around and likely having to directly dodge the gardener coming right for us.

Malus having escaped, there's only one thing left to do: head towards the stage's dual bosses in the crypt. At first the crypt seems empty. Once you investigate the empty coffin at its opposite side, suddenly a corpse drops from the ceiling. Master Oldrey, the vampire we encountered at the start of the stage, was enjoying his meal and has now decided to make you his main dish. He's not all that much harder than previous vampires, he just has more health, dodges a lot quicker and can fire projectiles at you. Once you defeat him however, his previous victim has had enough time to turn herself.

Master Oldrey and his most recent victim

4. Castlevania, Vampires and Dualism

Castlevania as a series based on Bram Stoker's vampire Dracula inherently introduces Christian elements and imagery into the game world, superficial as they may be. Traditionally it is thought vampires do not cast a reflection because they lack a soul. Indeed in the Villa stage we have a cutscene where a seemingly ordinary, though clearly deranged, villager is revealed to be a vampire in disguise because he doesn't appear in a nearby mirror. It's even a rather effective jump-scare, even though we can see it coming from miles away.

We also have several characters, especially demonic villains who are likely authorities on the subject, who comment on souls and the harvesting thereof. Like a lot of vampire fiction, Castlevania thus maintains a view of the mind-body that is dualistic in nature.
Dualism is essentially the idea that there's a difference between the mind and the brain, or the soul and our bodies. It is an idea closely associated with René Descartes (1596-1650), who believed the mind has a two-way relationship with the body through the pineal gland in the brain, but has since fallen out of style, largely because it is essentially the 'God did it' of neurobiology and thus a scientific stopping point of investigation. Finding an explanation of what consciousness is and how it came about is to this day an enormous mindscrew (excuse the pun), but it is a fairly safe assumption that 'we' aren't a metaphorical homunculus operating a body from inside the brain (or, a metaphysical player operating a real world player character).

Phineas Gage

An often-cited example that cast doubt over dualism is the case of Phineas Gage (1823-1860), an American railroad construction foreman who because of an accident in 1848 had a large iron rod driven through his skull, destroying parts of his brain. Gage amazingly survived but his personality and behavior saw drastic changes. This is of course odd if the self is immaterial to the brain. It should be noted however that the body of facts regarding the "American Crowbar Case" is surprisingly slim for one so noteworthy in neurology. Later evidence (such as the pictures of him discovered in 2009 and 2010) revealed that Gage's sudden personality change did in fact level out and he recovered his social abilities later in life (which on the surface to me sounds like he makes an amazing example of neuroplasticity in action).

Back to Castlevania. The existence of Rosa makes things interesting. Here we have a vampire who has somehow maintained her human soul despite having been turned. This raises a couple of questions. Would she appear in a mirror despite being a vampire? What gives the other scheming and articulate vampires their intelligence? Perhaps the lesser enemies are simply driven by basal desires while Dracula's inner circle consists of turned humans who like Rosa have their souls intact but who simply were just that evil. Carrie's nemesis Actrise murdering 100 children, including her own, to attain his favor certainly makes a case for that possibility. Where this doesn't hold up is with Master J.A. Oldrey in the Legacy of Darkness version of the game, who was described by his wife as a good man before he was turned into a decidedly evil vampire but who retains his intelligence.
What then of the count himself? In the usual Castlevania game, he is merely resurrected after having been slain by the previous Belmont. This game however has it as an actual plot twist that he hasn't been resurrected, but has been outright reincarnated ³. On the duality scale, clearly he must still have his soul intact (though warped due to the events of Lament of Innocence and Symphony of the Night) if he is subjected to reincarnation.

In this game it is actually possible for the player characters themselves to be turned into vampires. One of the tactics enemy vampires will employ is that they will try to get close in order to suck Reinhardt or Carrie's blood. If not fought off rapidly enough, their status will change from 'Good' to 'Vamp'. This status effect will disable the character's main attack and unless cured by an item known as 'Purifying', at the stroke of midnight the character will turn into a vampire themselves (unless bitten less than an hour before midnight, then you are afforded an extra day). At this point the screen goes black and the player is booted to the Game Over screen. In a meta sense, you could argue this means the player is the character's "soul" and the process of turning into a vampire severs that connection. Without our moral guidance, Reinhardt or Carrie are now just mindless monsters themselves.

But that's getting a bit too deep into a goofy horror game about blue-haired anime vampires. 

1. Quincy Morris from Bram Stoker's Dracula is stated in the Castlevania games to be a relative of the Belmont clan. His son (John Morris) and grandson (Jonathan Morris) are playable characters in Bloodlines and Portrait of Ruin respectively.
2. I wrote this entire paragraph with "crucifix" in place of "cross" before I learned it's technically only a crucifix when it consists of a cross and a corpus (the body of Jesus Christ). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crucifix)
3. He is reincarnated again as Soma Cruz in the games Aria of Sorrow (2003) and Dawn of Sorrow (2005), perhaps one of the reasons why Castlevania 64 has a dubious place in the timeline, as it rather conflicts with the nature of reincarnation in those games.

5. Links & References

http://castlevania.wikia.com
Dennett, Daniel - Consciousness Explained (1991)
Doidge, Norman - The Brain That Changes Itself (2007)
Kaku, Michio - The Future of the Mind (2014)

Images from:
Castlevania, Konami (1999)
Wikimedia Commons

The Abduction of Zelda

I start off most of these with a restatement of my stance on the subject and I still think it's worth repeating: I want more and 'stronger' female protagonists. Where I differ from the vast majority of modern critics arguing for the same thing is that I think their methods are counterproductive and hostile. By always focusing on the negative, you can accidentally end up exacerbating it. They'll defend this by saying they're just highlighting sexism. Exactly, one highlights something because one considers it most important and that's not always a good thing. Furthermore this causes confusion with the artists on what the public really wants (since they only get feedback on what they don't want while all the good stuff is ignored) and hostility from the fans who do like certain things that are being argued against (and this being art and entertainment, the morality of anything done to fictional characters is largely irrelevant anyway).

Therefore I think we should be focusing on the positives. Highlight what we think should be in the public zeitgeist so we as a collective start thinking positively about these characters rather than just keeping them locked into a cycle of stereotypes and negativity. Current media critics do little more than make the entire conversation an annoying bore while they actively train themselves to be offended at everything (and then they suddenly wonder why they never noticed how everything was so offensive before).
This post can also serve as an addendum to my earlier post The Ordeal of Queen Zelda, which attempts to look at Princess Zelda, as portrayed in Ocarina of Time, in function of the monomyth.

The Abduction of Zelda
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time

One thing I see brought up occasionally is people scratching their heads at the kidnapping of Princess Zelda in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and how the scene supposedly makes no sense. Worse are the weird ones who imply (if not outright state) that Zelda, after years of masquerading as Sheik, only gets kidnapped because she revealed herself as a woman, rather than the blatantly obvious fact that she revealed herself to be the princess (at that moment probably even the uncrowned queen) of the land Ganondorf is trying to take over, as well as the wielder of a part of the ancient 3 Goddess'-powered artifact he spent the entire game and the rest of the series assembling.

Tvtropes is just weird about it.

"Badass Decay: Zelda was hit with this the moment she was kidnapped by Ganondorf after revealing herself to Link, for no explained reason; especially if you take account that she spent seven years as a Sheikah warrior."

- Tvtropes TheLegendOfZeldaOcarinaOfTime YMMV

That just doesn't make any sense. What do you mean, no explained reason? She was blindsided and got magically locked in crystal by one of the most powerful sorcerers in the land. It doesn't seem all that unreasonable for her to require a bit of help at that point.

There's one thing to keep in mind. Zelda's kidnapping is overstated (as it usually is). The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time is a roughly 30 hour game going by my last playthrough (likely a lot longer for a new player. How Long To Beat has it between 26.5 to 38.5 hours depending on playstyle).

Princess Zelda is the mastermind behind everything happening on the good side for about 29 hours of those, which is also a full 7 years in-game, and only gets kidnapped right before the final battle with Ganondorf, after which she's also the one to imprison him for 100's of years until the events of Wind Waker (Link only weakens Ganondorf enough so Zelda's magic can overpower him). For the remainder of the game she's both the one guiding Link (first as Hyrule's princess, then from the shadows as the mysterious Sheikah warrior unimaginatively named 'Sheik') and being a hero behind the scenes in her own right (as mentioned by the Zora princess Ruto, who was helped by Sheik when Zora's Domain froze over).

Firstly, the reason why Zelda gets kidnapped so sudden is very simple. It's established early on that Ganondorf was watching Link as he progressed through the game (merely implied by the nightmare Link has when he first pulls the Master Sword from its pedestal, if indeed a nightmare at all, and outright stated when Link defeats Ganondorf's phantom in the Forest Temple). Since Ganondorf needs both Link and Zelda to complete the Triforce, we can fairly safely assume he didn't intervene directly with Link's quest because he wanted to lure Zelda out in the open, heck he explicitly says this when he finally captures Zelda. Losing the temples is only a minor setback if it means gaining the entire Triforce. 

Secondly, why did he capture Zelda instead of Link, or why only Zelda and not both of them? Well he is still underestimating Link and says as much by claiming everything he did was merely the result of Link somehow having the Triforce of Courage. He simply doesn't take this kid from the forest seriously. Furthermore, by virtue of being Courage he knows Link will immediately come to face him anyway.

Heck, had Sheik not intercepted Link when he first walked out of the Temple of Time during his adult years, he might have gone to face Ganon right then and there and likely lost (maybe that's where the Failed Hero timeline according to Hyrule Historia came from: Zelda herself might have gone back in time to prevent Link from facing Ganon too early, thus causing the second split).
Zelda on the other hand is Wisdom. She knows better than to foolishly run into danger head-on and instead calculates her approach. Indeed when she knew she couldn't go up against Ganondorf, she hid for 7 years and undermined his rule from the shadows. This attitude is symbolically reflected in Zelda's frequent use of bows, especially later in the series: She prefers to strike from a distance. Unfortunately she slipped up by revealing herself to Link.

"I knew you would appear if I let this kid wander around!"

Conclusion

In short, Ganondorf took Zelda seriously as a threat, unlike Link who he found merely amusing. Zelda had to be removed from the game while he thought he could just toy with this boy from the forest. That is why Ganondorf kidnapped Zelda rather than Link.

Links and References

How Long To Beat: The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
The Legend of Zelda: Hyrule Historia
Vicsor's Opinion - The Ordeal of Queen Zelda

Castlevania Judgment Redux

This is an edited/updated repost of an old blogpost I made over at my Castlevania 64 Hi-Res page (Original). Since I feel the content is pretty much in line with the rest of what I do here, I might as well has it here as well.

My Problem With Castlevania Judgment
A Rant About Maria Renard

But not about this version.
She's cool.

If you followed my progress on my old Castlevania 64 retexture project (which has since more or less stopped due to all the technical difficulties that popped up that I became unwilling to deal with) you might have noticed that I took a fair share of visual influence from Castlevania Judgment (2008) for the Wii. So let's talk about Castlevania Judgment. Mainly the biggest problem I have with the game.

You see, screw complaints about the odd fighting engine, the characters being redesigned by the artist of Death Note (which resulted in Shanoa looking like a nun so they didn't have to render her hair and Dracula somehow sporting udders), the good guys being bigger jerks than the forces of evil, alternate costumes just being palette swaps and the overall game not feeling overly polished. Those things didn't bother me that much and being given the opportunity to play as Cornell from Legacy of Darkness made up for a great deal.  No, for me the greatest evil in this game isn't represented by Dracula, Galamoth or the Time Reaper, but by Maria Renard.

Yes, 12-year old Maria Renard from Rondo of Blood.

Her character design (what's that supposed to be anyway? Pink BDSM loli?) and high-pitched voice acting alone make me want to scratch her entire existence from the disc, but then there's her moveset. Most of the time she's just randomly flying around the screen, being lunged at her opponent by the owl in her staff. Her special attack has her falling to the ground so her owl can do all the work for her. Every hit she makes sprinkles Microsoft Clip Art all over the screen, and she NEVER EVER SHUTS UP.

So it's a fighting game and in fighting game fashion there's a story mode which details the motivation of why each character in question is there. We are introduced to newcomer Aeon who provides the plot device as to why people from different time periods can interact, and from there they just kind of have a go at each other until the most powerful warrior is chosen who will attempt to defeat the Time Reaper, thus saving history itself.

Now Simon Belmont takes the opportunity to test his abilities against the legendary three warriors from Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse. Shanoa just wants to get out of the Time Rift as fast as possible to continue her mission to hunt down Albus. Cornell seeks someone to help him control the werewolf form. A Golem who has gained sentience fights for his right to exist. Dracula obviously seeks revenge for his many defeats (yet because of the greater threat of Galamoth he also seems to be the most reasonable and practical of the playable characters).

Maria Renard's story and motivation? Beating up the other Castlevania girls because they have larger breasts than her. No, really, that's her story mode. We have the most annoying 12-year old on the planet running around seeking fights with both allies and enemies because she is insecure about her body image.

vs. Sypha Belnades

vs. Carmilla

I mean seriously? Who thought this was a great idea for a Castlevania game? Did we really need to ruin a beloved Castlevania character (... even more, YMMV) for this game just so we could have some more extreme close ups of Sypha and Carmilla's boobs? Nothing about having to find Richter or Annette. No tie-in with either Rondo of Blood or Symphony of the Night. Just a 12-year old girl throwing a tantrum over tits.

There's a lot of Castlevania characters that I would have liked to see in this game (Carrie Fernandez being my #1, although I love that her game was at least acknowledged at all by having Cornell) and it didn't have a ton of features anyway, but I would have seriously preferred just not to have Maria Renard at all. At least not like this.

Jack in the Dark

It's Halloween night (yet oddly also Christmas), Grace Saunders is trick or treating dressed as a witch when the lights of a toy shop catch her attention. She knocks on the door, enters, and is subsequently locked inside. Led by a malevolent Jack-in-the-box modeled after Alone in the Dark 2's One-Eyed Jack, the toys have come alive and kidnapped Santa Claus.

Jack in the Dark

Jack in the Dark was a small promotional game (like floppy disk small) distributed Christmas 1993 to advertise the upcoming Alone in the Dark 2. It's also so short you can easily finish it in about 5 minutes if you know what you're doing, the tank controls are rather sluggish and the graphics of the 3D models haven't exactly aged graciously. Also unlike the original Alone in the Dark, it doesn't exactly seem like a tale that could have sprung from the pages of H.P. Lovecraft.

Basically the map of the entire game.

Nevertheless the game has its charm. You get a catchy festive tune and dated though appealing pixelated graphics for backgrounds. Then there's the atmosphere of an old toy shop during Halloween that's about to get ready for the Christmas season, and there's just something about being alone in a toy shop that captures the imagination of our residual inner child.
Jack in the Dark is not a huge landmark in the history of video games (although it achieved a bit more than you'd think, you'll see in just a minute), but it's just a charming little game. If you ever feel like checking out the old Alone in the Dark games, be sure not to skip this one. It's not that long anyway (it usually comes attached to either AitD 1 or 2. AitD 1 in the GoG version).

Grace Saunders as a Protagonist

Though the roots of the survival horror genre itself go much deeper, it is accepted that Alone in the Dark in 1992 was the first survival horror game in 3D, even before Resident Evil named the genre a few years later in 1996 with the iconic words "Enter the survival horror". There's no shortage of female protagonists in the survival horror, with Resident Evil's Jill Valentine, Claire Redfield and Silent Hill's Heather Mason being some of the more well known.

Emily Hartwood

While Alone in the Dark as a series favors Edward Carnby as its protagonist, female options aren't all that rare here either. However Emily Hartwood and Aline Cedrac are merely optional choices next to Carnby, while Grace Saunders is the sole protagonist of Jack in the Dark. Meaning the first female protagonist of the 3D survival horror genre (and first solo protagonist) who stars in her own game ... is little 8-year old Grace Saunders going up against haunted toys. And that's just kinda funny.

Grace Saunders would go on to become an important supporting character (as well as being briefly playable) in Alone in the Dark 2. When she rescued Santa and closed the toy shop doors, she left behind the world of haunted toys, only so Kirsten Dunst could become the scream queen of nineties malicious toy movies.

Jumanji (1995) and Small Soldiers (1998)

... Okay there's probably no actual connection going on here, but a Netflix binge after having finished Jack in the Dark spawned the odd realization that, not only did Kirsten Dunst have a tendency to show up in nineties movies that somehow involved evil toys, Jumanji is also set in a de facto haunted mansion except by way of Edgar Rice Burroughs rather than H.P. Lovecraft (Small Soldiers is just about super-intelligent military hardware carelessly being put into children's toys which predictably goes wrong). 

Maybe that would have been a cool idea for a video game based on Jumanji (rather than the Mario Party clone we got for PlayStation 2): lock the player character(s) inside a Resident Evil-ish mansion with the board game. Each roll of the dice opens a door or spawns a challenge in the form of jungle-themed enemies or hazards to overcome. Maybe Van Pelt as a Nemesis-like boss who steals the game.

But now I'm just thinking out loud...

Couldn't resist.

Loss

My 2016 in Gaming

Right, so I don't have the habit of being all that up-to-date on the most recent games, partially because I feel the "buy on release" attitude is somewhat responsible for the pre-order bonus madness that keeps getting further out of hand, but mostly because being like 2 years behind is simply more friendly on my wallet. Basically doing some "Best of 2016" is out of the question because I haven't played enough from 2016. Instead I'm just going over a couple (I intended 5 but I wanted both Tomb Raiders) of the more memorable stuff I played and actually bloody finished during this horrible, horrible year. In chronological order.

(Allowing myself to recycle some of my Tweets about these games from the previous year and expand on them. Win.)

My 2016 in Gaming
From someone perpetually years behind on pop culture.

1. Resident Evil Zero HD Remaster

Released: Jan 19, 2016
Played: Jan, 2016

Resident Evil Zero (2002) for the GameCube was actually the first Resident Evil game I ever played. As such I have some pretty fond memories of it but I never actually finished it. I decided to remedy that with the HD Remaster that was released early 2016. For a lot of longtime fans Zero was the point when the classic Resident Evil gameplay style was becoming old and tired, a problem I didn't really have since I barely played any of the others (I think I stopped halfway Jill's story in Resident Evil: Deadly Silence and the only other similar game I played was Alone in the Dark: The New Nightmare). Most of my knowledge of Resident Evil's storyline actually comes from the Chronicles games on Wii and spending too much time on the Resident Evil wikia.

The new models are nice but they seem less expressive.

I'd say if you liked Resident Evil Zero (or want to play it at all), the HD Remaster is a good version of it. Plus it has quite a few more costumes (some unfortunately are locked behind DLC) that you can switch at any time, unlike the original where you first had to finish the game and could then only change them during the train segment. They even included an extra mode after the main game where you play the game as Albert Wesker and evil Rebecca Chambers.

Resident Evil Zero's premise always struck me as being just an inch away from being a romance/erotic novel set during the downfall of society. It's like "she's an inexperienced member of an elite police unit trapped in the zombie apocalypse with a dangerous criminal who also happens to be a total hunk". Unfortunately the interesting character dynamic of police member Rebecca Chambers and convicted murderer Billy Coen having to team up is undermined by the fact that after the first 15 minutes it becomes obvious Coen is a decent guy and shown to be innocent long before the game is even halfway done (hence, on top of the game now being 14 years old, I don't consider this much of a spoiler).

2. Final Fantasy X HD Remaster

Released: May 15, 2015
Played: April, 2016

Back in April I bought a PS4 (like a week before the new models would get announced, because of course) with the Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Remaster. I had already finished the story of FFX twice years ago on PS2, but this time I wanted to go in with the purpose of finally beating those Dark Aeons in the post-game that always gave me so much trouble.

Ultimately I ended up not just beating all the Dark Aeons, but also dodging the 200 lightning bolts required to complete Lulu's Celestial Weapon, completing the Chocobo race challenges, defeating all the post-game bosses, completing the sphere grid for every character and getting the platinum trophy. So that worked out better than I expected.

One thing I liked about Final Fantasy X where a lot of the other more recent Final Fantasies lost me is that Tidus is himself a stranger in the world of Spira. This allows the player to be eased into the world rather than us having to endure a massive plot dump like in XII or XIII.
However doing it like this also opened the story up to a situation where the entire party looks like massive dicks in how they treated Tidus when the big plot twist of Yuna's eventual fate is revealed. "We weren't keeping it a secret, it was just too hard to say"? You mean that at no point during your journey you could just take Tidus aside for a minute and explain to him what was going on? Instead you gave him massive amounts of guilt over what a jerk he unintentionally was. Nice.

I also realized how impossible it is to explain the story of Final Fantasy X to someone not familiar with the series. My best attempt boiled down to: "So this girl has to sacrifice herself to save the world from a huge monster who is the father of a guy who doesn't really exist. So a dude who is actually dead goes to a city that's not real to get the guy because his monster dad no longer wants to destroy stuff".
Alternatively: "A bunch of deities and resurrected dead guys think religion is stupid and poof a guy into existence to prove that point".

I also wrote this guide on how to fill up your Blitzball team with female members if you're into that: Vicsor's Opinion: Guide: Final Fantasy X - A Female Blitzball Team

3. Life Is Strange

Released: Jan 22, 2016
Played: April, 2016

Life Is Strange is a game I didn't expect like, but I bought it anyway because it was fairly cheap and I still wanted to support Dontnod Entertainment (I loved Remember Me despite its rough edges). Turns out I actually did end up liking it once I actually started playing. Unfortunately the final episode being largely cut-and-pasted from the earlier episodes and a limited payoff of all your choices made during the game hinder it somewhat, but it was still a powerful experience with a gameplay style that I hope modern adventure games take notice of (except more puzzles please).

Chloe Price, to whom the concept of self-preservation
is completely alien

Unlike a lot of fans I didn't feel that much of a connection with Chloe Price though. A lot of Chloe's problems just stem from very poor choices on her part. Most of the time the friendship between Max and Chloe seemed toxic at best, at times even abusive towards Max. A lot of choices involving Chloe usually boiled down to a choice between 'Do the right thing and piss off Chloe' or 'Do the wrong thing to appease Chloe'. Instead of this deep connection, it felt more like I was weighing the collective good against the anti-social whims of a troubled teenager who could fly into rage at the drop of a hat. I did feel a strong connection to Max herself though, who I really wanted to hug for going through this hell of a week. Yeah, if you know about the endings, you can guess which one I went with...

No amount of context can save this terrible, terrible line.

Some of the dialogue gets viciously mocked on social media, and true enough there's quite a bit of cringe-worthy slang in the way these people talk. Overall most of it isn't that bad in context though and the characters themselves mock each other for it enough that it becomes a bit of a running joke. Except Max commenting on plasma and the delicacy thereof, that line cannot possibly be salvaged. Second was dropping "I swear to dog" in dead serious conversation in episode 3. 

I also wrote something about Victoria Chase's character: Vicsor's Opinion: Life Is Strange - Victoria Chase

4-1. Tomb Raider 2013 - Definitive Edition

Released: Jan 31, 2014
Played: Aug, 2016

I always had mixed feelings about the most recent Tomb Raider reboot. On its own it was a pretty good game but it never clicked as being worthy of the title "Tomb Raider", which made it jarring for me because the game insisted on flashing a Tomb Raider logo on screen every 5 seconds. However because I had recently picked up archery as a hobby and Not!Lara's main weapon is a bow, I decided to give the game another chance with its Definitive version on PS4.

Turned out I was pleasantly surprised. The game itself was still the same of course, but an update to Not!Lara's character model at least meant she now resembled someone I could buy as being an inexperienced Lara Croft. That actually made a world of difference for me. Also to mitigate the visual effects the torture porn nature of the game has on Lara, I stuck her in the competitive archery suit for the duration of the game which meant all those horrible cuts and bruises she accumulates are gone.

So yes, my experience with the Tomb Raider reboot went from being annoyed with it a few years back to it being massively improved simply because the character model now actually made me believe I was playing as a version of Lara Croft.

4-2. Rise of the Tomb Raider

Released: Oct 11, 2016
Played: Nov, 2016

I liked Rise of the Tomb Raider from the start because, unlike its predecessor, it didn't feel as ashamed to be Tomb Raider and actually made an effort to reintroduce elements from the Tomb Raider lore. The previous game drastically altered Lara Croft's backstory by removing the plane crash in the Himalayas (which I feel would be like removing Bruce Wayne's parents getting shot in the alley from his backstory). In this game it turns out there was a plane crash in the Himalayas, it's just that Lara's mother was on it rather than she herself, which motivated Richard Croft's obsession with myths of eternal life, which in turn motivated Lara.
We learn this information in the reintroduction of Croft Manor, whereas the previous game didn't even want to acknowledge Lara's nobility. Croft Manor is also filled to the brim with references to the previous games, even implying Lara will at some point be searching for Tomb Raider II's Temple of Xian. Now if in the next game it turns out Jacqueline Natla is responsible for Trinity, that would be absolutely fantastic.

There were still quite a few things I didn't like that much though. The writing of the Tomb Raider reboots is kinda odd. Their stories aren't necessarily all that straightforward, but the plot twists they use are cliches themselves, meaning you can easily predict where the story is going whenever a new plot element is introduced.
Then there's the RPG-like upgrade system for both Lara's skillset and her weapons, which doesn't really seem to matter all that much since basic headshots are completely lethal from the beginning and helmets aren't that difficult to overcome anyway. Also I'm still missing some of the more advanced acrobatics that exited the series after Tomb Raider Underworld.
Still, I feel Rise of the Tomb Raider redeemed the reboot series. Especially since the 20th Anniversary Edition included a bunch of costumes from the Core Design games (oddly missing is Legend era Lara though).

I also had way too much fun shooting bottles out of the sky with the bow.

It's technically an achievement but you can easily do it with a shotgun. I just learned to do it with the bow because that way it actually felt like an achievement. That sure was an hour of my life well spent!

5. Year Walk

Released: March 6, 2014
Played: Dec, 2016

I actually played and finished Year Walk just a few days ago on Christmas eve after the family dinner and before going to bed, which seemed appropriate since Christmas was historically one of the times a year when year walking took place. I mainly just got it because I wanted to know what the deal was with the horse in a suit that was featured in the promotional screenshots. Turns out there was actually an interesting experience behind the weird horse.

Yes, this. What is up with this?

Year Walk is a pretty short game that can easily be finished in like a single evening (I'm at 3.6 hours for 100% completion). Now it's already a very atmospheric puzzle game by itself, but the ending and alternate reality game-like post game is what pushes it over the edge into being a memorable experience (since it's also a big deal, I won't spoil it here). Basically while you are playing the game itself, the story takes a backseat and is only given proper context in the secret ending. Just be sure to keep a notebook on hand because the puzzles actually require some thought and expect you to be paying attention.


Anyway, those are some of the more memorable games I actually finished during the last year. Now if you'd like to hear my opinions on games actually released in 2016 that weren't rereleases, I will see you again in about 2 to 5 years!

Life is Strange - Victoria Chase

Life is Strange really caught me by surprise with how much I ended up liking it. I was kinda interested in it because I loved Dontnod Entertainment's first game Remember Me, but the way the game looked invoked a weird sort of uncanny valley for me. Still, when all the episodes were released I bought the game, played it, and it didn't take long for it to suck me in after all.

However, I don't want to talk at length about the game itself here. Rather I want to talk a bit about a particular scene regarding a particular character. Basically just a short insight I had while staring out the bus window. (As such this will be more or less useless to people who haven't played or finished the game)

Warning: SPOILERS for Life is Strange

How Strange Is It?
Victoria Chase - Life is Strange

Victoria Chase is a rich, popular girl who serves as a minor antagonist towards Max. Compared to Nathan Prescott, she's more of an annoyance rather than an actual threat (except when it comes to Kate Marsh's storyline, who she is unwittingly bullying into a suicide attempt). However she is a more personal antagonist than Prescott, which the game neatly illustrates by having her dorm room directly opposing Max'.

A part of Episode 1 plays out in the Blackwell girl's dorm, which is a convenient way for the game to develop some characters by giving us the chance to snoop in their personal lives. One of the puzzles in the dorm requires us to invade Victoria's room (including the rather infamous scene where Max is suddenly commenting on a plasma TV and the apparent delicacy thereof), but before we do that, we see this message on the slate outside of her room.

"Be the change you wish to see" -Gandhi

When we first encounter the message, we're supposed to cringe along with Max at the dissonance of this narcissistic pest quoting Gandhi for all the world to see while at the same time she's bullying Kate to the point of attempting suicide. During the rest of the game however, we slowly learn that beneath the alpha bitch facade she puts up in public, Victoria is actually just really insecure and not all that bad.

In Episode 5 during a rather confusing bunch of time travel sequences, we get to revisit the scene at the very start of the game with Max in Mr. Jefferson's classroom. Due to Max' character development over the course of the game, we now have an option to read one of Victoria's notebooks, whereas at the beginning Max was too timid to even consider invading her privacy like that (At least publicly since, as mentioned, she gleefully inspects Vic's room not long after).

Inside the notebook we find something of a written down (and punctuated) stream of consciousness exclaiming that she herself sucks and ending with the words "I want to hate her, but she wouldn't care. Envy is a sin, Vic. GET OVER YOURSELF!", revealing not only Victoria's insecurity but also a desire to better herself.

This, to me at least, puts that little slate outside Victoria's room in an entirely new, kinda heartwarming light. Victoria doesn't write Gandhi quotes to show off to the world how deep she is, she does it to remind herself that she should at least attempt to be a better person.