Professor Layton vs Ace Attorney was released a few months ago in Japan. As per the norm, an art book was released which revealed that early in development, Phoenix and Layton were to have an evil counterpart. This was apparently scrapped,
It's interesting to think about their evil counterparts. What would they be like? How would they be adapted into the story?
Phoenix already a bit of an evil counterpart in "Furio Tigre" and Layton had one on "Don Paolo" but neither of these were quite a counterpart. Don Paolo was shown to have some good in him several times while Furio Tigre was more intimidating then a portent of what Phoenix could be.
The idea of an evil counterpart, especially one towards Professor Layton, is rather interesting. Phoenix has very few faults (to the point he is noted in a few supplementary materials as bland) and Level-5 stated that Layton is just like Phoenix, but with no faults.
Admittedly, it may be why the designs were scrapped, but it's interesting to think what they could be. Would Evil Layton be a jerk obsessed with coffee? (Though that does sound a lot like Godot) Would Evil Phoenix be motivated for himself rather than his client? Or would he be a prosecutor?
Shadow archetypes are always a tricky game to play. Silent Hill tends to play it pretty well, you often have to face your Shadows to move on in the game. Other times, they tend to fall flat. I can't name any off the top of my head, but everyone has dealt with a fictional work with their own take on Shadow Archetypes.
So, sadly, these sketches are what can not be. Which really is a pity, they look gorgeous. As are the attempts at Miles and Larry, Labyrinth City style, below.
For example, the "X" that pops up all over the place? Actually very critical to the story.
As in, the plot could very well hinge on which people wear an "X".
Which led me to think about one of my favorite Organization members, Lexaeus.
There is something REALLY odd about Lexaeus. No, nothing obvious but.... there's just all these little things there.
This scene for starters. Vexen is number IV, Lexaeus is V, Zexion is VI. Vexen claims he ranks higher than Zexion, but shuts up when Lexaeus tells him to stop talking.
There's quite a few little moments like this scattered throughout the series.
When facing Riku, Lexaeus seemed honestly worried about Riku and wanted him to embrace Darkness NOT for power, but for Riku's on sanity and balance. At the end of the game, Riku ends up doing exactly that. As the games move forward, Riku continues to use his dark power in order to serve and help others, something Lexaeus said he should do from the beginning.
After Riku and Lexaeus meet for the first time and battle, Ansem:Seeker of Darkness takes over Riku to kill Lexaeus.
In every form of Ansem, (Ansem:SoD, MX, Xemnas, etc) only two people have been killed by him onscreen. One is Lexaeus, the other is Master Eraqus. This is especially interesting for four reasons. First, Lexaeus started to just walk away. Ansem:SoD actively sought out the chance to kill him. At that point, Lexaeus became actively aware of what the Darkness inside Riku WAS, or rather who the darkness was. The second is that MX killed ME as part of a plan to turn Terra to darkness. There appears to be not apart of any immediate plan. Thirdly, SE added this scene in the updated rerelease. Originally Riku beat Lexaeus, who then released his remaining darkness to overwhelm Riku. This caused Riku to turn into Ansem:SoD. So not only was this change one of the largest in the updated rerelease, but is very deliberate.
Back to the battle, while Riku wins, he looks utterly exhausted. He's on the verge of collapsing. Lexaeus? Lexaeus is simply winded and reveals he has enough power left to swing his heavy axe and knock Riku into the ceiling. Which leads to the last part about Ansem killing Lexaeus. Lexaeus was stabbed in either the chest or the stomach. Something like this defies the previous uses of the keyblade (a channel for magic or as a blunt weapon) but also shows that Ansem:SoD REALLY wanted to kill him for as yet unknown reasons.
In Birth By Sleep, we meet Aeleus for the first time.
Unlike every other person there, Aeleus was actively interested in keeping Ven safe. He was more interested in stopping some random UnVersed then guarding the castle (his job)
Finally in Kingdom Hearts 3D, we see him twice.
In the first example, he says nothing but he's the second person conscious after he reforms into a person. You can't really tell from the picture, but in the scene he's trying to push himself back up.
Aeleus spends most of this time, watching, thinking, and being very well aware that if Isa and Braig HAD shown up, they would have been found. Something Lea and possibly not Ienzo was aware of at that point in time.
I have honestly no idea where I'm going with this. You can dismiss these little bits individually, something to fill time, to explain, whatever.
But if you ad them up, it's every single time he's appeared on screen, something slightly odd has happened to him/about him/around him. And Slightly odd things in Kingdom Hearts end up in two categories. Either they are just something odd, or they become critically important down the line. (See the X's I mentioned earlier. Also, costume changes and the constant visits to Traverse Town)
I'm putting Lexaeus into the critically important part. Especially as his death scene was changed between the GBA and the PS2 release.
Square Enix has made a point of making Lexaeus/Aeleus be consistently odd, but also in the background. The most up front bit of oddness is him being one of the two people any form of Xehanort has killed, let alone by stabbing.
I have no idea what Aeleus' role will be in the future. Quite frankly, no one thought too much of the brown robed guy in KH1 until KH3D turned everything on it's head. I'm not going to predict anything about Lexaeus.
Except one bit. Lexaeus will probably end up being somehow vital to the series. And we won't see it coming.
Video game based movies tend to be more miss then hit. While I'll fully admit to loving the Prince of Persia movie (It was honestly pretty good!) Other ones like Mario fell flat.
It's so bad I can't find a simple clip on youtube. The whole movie is up there, but I just want a clip.
(This should give you a hint on the movie quality)
However, movies like Tron and Wreck it Ralph have done pretty well. Possibly because they invoke the tropes and well known genres with other aspects going on instead of telling the game.
(This may be why PoP worked well too. While it drew a lot from the game, it wasn't a remake of the game. Tron also falls into this category, it uses some tropes and data in order to tell another story entirely.)
Wreck it Ralph succeeds by invoking three well known genres of gaming that would appear in an arcade.
Platforming:
90's Kart style racing
And competitive Shooters:
The concepts in these games are well known, and they concepts are also easy grasp by watching the brief gameplay in the movie.
As a result, the actual game parts are limited to cameos. Zangeif in Street Fighter, Pacman appearing at the party, Tapper is it's own scene, etc. (More examples here ) By making sure they are cameos, they keep from having the nods from overwhelming the plot which runs on a mix of video game conventions and traditional storytelling of sacrifice and character redemption. (Actually, they had to put a sacrifice play in place because most games have a respawning attribute.) As a result, we get a movie that USES games to tell a story of treachery and redemption; therefore embraces a wider audience instead of getting bogged down in condensing a 60 hour plot or risking alienating a non gamer audience.
Besides, everyone's played 2 of the 3 styles of games at some point.
Lost Odyssey is the unofficial sequel to Final Fantasy. It's filled with Magitek, family, love, and villains you just want to smash as they attempt to destroy the world.
In other words, it's a very good (and very long) game. So, I'm slowly working my way through the game. I'm on disk 3.
This will take a while.
But, I encourage YOU to play it! It's a great game that has held up well, and is one of the few RPG's on the Xbox. So, if you have one and want to expand your collection, pick it up.
I don't know why, but games shy away from using crosses in games. I can see if someone was using to use a cross to impale people... yes. That's offensive. But using it in it's proper context or as an easy way to mark a grave isn't offensive at all. (And I'm saying that as a Catholic)
Now, in Kingdom Hearts 3D, one of the worlds you can visit is "Les Cities de Cloches" aka "City of the Bells" or Hunchback of Notre Dame.
This world:
For various (and should be understandable) reasons, Disney modified the original novel into the movie. (Such as making Frollo a judge instead of a priest, and having a lot of people live at the end, along with various edits for time since the novel is massive and animating is a very time intensive process)
But they did keep most of the religious imagery in, it's called "Hunchback of NOtre Dame" for a reason.
Now, Kingdom Hearts 3D takes the story and... shortens it even more. Almost all of the religious imagery was stripped, characters vanished, and Frollo became much less conflicted (Okay, Okay, I know it's space reasons and Kingdom Hearts always does the abreviated versions... but the movie and book are very complex and deserve a bit more discussion!)
Which means I was very happy when I noticed this: (yes, I took the picture myself)
It's not the best picture, but it's a carved picture of "Jesus' Ascension into Heaven" which, while not a cross, is a very important theologically. It's also behind a wooden altar in the Cathedral... and you can't step on the altar (I tried in order to get a better picture. It made me quite happy when I couldn't.)
Okay, Okay, theology time.
At the end of the Gospel of Mark and the Gospel of Luke, they both spend a bit of time talking about what happened AFTER Jesus rose from the dead. After 40 days past, Jesus took the disciples up to a hill, gave one final speech, the rose up into the clouds and disappeared. After the Apostles spent some time looking up after him, Angels showed up and basically told them to leave.
I'm horribly simplifying it, but the main part is, this is a KEY part of Christianity.
And while there is no cross in the game, there is a Nave, and in that Nave, right where the Crucifix and the Monstrance should be, there is a wooden Altar and a carving of Jesus being assumed into Heaven.
All this Catholic Symbolism, without it being actually said. It's brilliant.
So, the PS4 was officially announced, after weeks of rumors.
The system seems to focus more on social network and immediacy (aside from a more PC structure)
There were a few games announced, but they are probably saving the big guns for E3. They need enough information to tease the reviewers.
Honestly... some of it seems really creepy to me. the whole streaming and instant share will probably be used a lot by other people, but having someone else take over your controller to help long distance? Honestly creepy. Also Creepy? Having the PS4 analyze your game purchases and then predownload games for you to play. (They did not mention if you or the PS4 would actively purchase them)
And then they did imply they might do away with disks which is a problem for some people. On the other hand, they will allow used games so probably not.
Information is still trickling out, so I don't actually have much to say. Share looks like an interesting feature, depending on how it's used, I'll need to feel the controller before I decide on that, graphics are nice, but they've never been a selling point for me, I wasn't really sold on any of the games they had but they have to be holding back the big guns for later.
I guess, over all, it was kind of Meh. And with no actual PS4 or Price point, I'm really not sure where to go from here.
I'll keep on ruminating as information comes out. E3 will have more information.
Which does hint to being on a Next Gen system. (While Beyond Good and Evil 2 has also been confirmed for a Next Gen system, Ubisoft has talked about it in that way for a while. This is the first time something like this has been said about TLG and only a week before the PlayStation event.)
With that being said, I don't really want there to be a new system right now. The PS3 still more than does it's job, it looks amazing, and I really don't get the need to share every game achievement. In addition, some rumors state that the PS4 will keep you from playing second hand games and to use online features you'll have to have a paying account. ((AKA, if you want to play CoD multiplayer, you may need a PlayStation Plus account)
I REALLY hate those ideas. Movies can be shared and sold with no one complaining, and you don't need to pay Penguin Books to host a book club.
But we won't know what is happening until tonight at 6PM Eastern.
So, let's spend the day preparing and drinking tea. I wonder what will be announced? (And if it IS the PS4, which games?)
Welcome to what is easily one of the most controversial ideas in "Gender Politics in Fridging."
Let's define some terms.
"Fridging" (Short for "Women in Refrigerators") Refers to an act where the villain kills, maims, depowers, or rapes someone close to the hero in order to break the hero's spirit and attempt to make the hero chase him.
It comes from a "Green Lantern" comic (1994) where Hal Jordan comes home to find his girlfriend killed by one of his villains, possibly dismembered, and stuffed into a fridge.
Gail Simone, a well respected writer for DC comics, read it and realized there was a very large pattern here, so she began to pull together a list of women in comics who are killed/maimed, etc by the villains in order to manipulate the male heroes. (While it can happen to male heroes, they tend to come back with stronger powers. Females tend to stay dead)
One of the earliest examples in Comics is...
Gwen Stacy.
And there is really a long list, and it happens in all media, including video games.
Aerith?
Fridged:
Her death serves no purpose in the over game narrative OTHER then to motivate the characters (especially Cloud) in addition, it was not a self sacrifice (even if she did know that she would probably die) and she did not put up a fight. It... happened.
And why is this problematic? It turns a female character (who - as a character- should be fully fleshed out with her own ideas, dreams, skills, and emotional and character arc) into someone who exists solely for the male character's arc. They exist only to propel the main character forward. We don't know if Aerith wanted to be a teacher or a scientist, or a mom. And even if we did find (Like we probably did with Gwen, I haven't read her comics) the simple act that she was killed off to promote Spider-man's arc NEGATES any dreams she may have had because she did not die on her own terms or for her own arc. It was all for Spider-man's.
Start looking over your old games. See who dies and why. Is it to promote their own story? Or someone else's?
Ah, Space marines. What would the Sci Fi genre be without you.
Well, Warhammer 40K wants to find out!
Warhammer 40K recently filed a motion to say that they have copywrited the term "Space Marine" which has massive ramifications for the Science Fiction universe, IF it goes through. They tried to take down a book called "Spots the Space Marine" and had the e-book version removed from Amazon, It has since been returned
A space marine is a staple of the Sci Fi Genre. They are highly qualified military units who work on planets. They've been around since at least the 1930's.
However, Warhammer 40K is claiming they own at the very least the word.The word in question has been in existence since at least the 1930's with the story "Captain Brink of the Space Marine." and it's become a generalized term throughout time, which exempts it from copyright.
On the other hand, Warhammer 40K DOES own a copyright, but it's only for the pieces and other times related to how to play Warhammer 40K Not for the generic term itself.
IF Warhammer believed that "Spots the Space Marine" was used as an infringement they are perfectly valid in their attempt to go after it.
