Game C2 : Soul Reaver - Dazed and Confused

Time played : 3h

Well, the Legacy of Kain series sure hold its share of surprises! Soul Reaver is another weird game, but another fascinating one as well, even if, as its older sibling, it's crippled with defaults making one wonders once again what it could have been.

But first things first : the story. It builds up on Blood Omen's story in an interesting way. Instead of witnessing Kain's rise to power, the game takes place a long time after the first one, showing Kain as a twisted god-like vampire, who has taken over Nosgoth and reigns from the remains of the Pillars. The first cinematic of the game introduces Raziel, his first lieutenant and protagonist of the game.

Kain sure has aged since the first game. He looks like an even nicer fellow...

Kain and his six lieutenant have total power over the world and just wait for their powers to grow and gain new abilities every now and then (which is apparently what vampires do). However, this little family won't be united for long because Raziel suddenly has wings sprouting out of his back. These little mutations don't seem to be surprising for his friends. The only problem is that, usually, Kain develops these mutations before his sons. Seeing Raziel getting a new power before him kind of bothers him, and he shows it by tearing his wings apart and throwing Raziel into a neverending abyss.

The game then starts a few hundred years later, where Raziel awakens to consciousness once again, in a twisted form, apparently resurrected by an unknown power. The new Raziel has a an emaciated figure, lacks the bottom of his jaw and has moth-like wing remains dropping from his back. Even with all that, he manages to be one of the classiest character in video game memory.

You *might* want to change sidewalks if you run into him at night, though.

And he is out for vengeance! So, with that out of the way, what does the game itself look like? As I've mentioned before, the whole presentation looks like a Tomb Raider ripoff. It's a third-person action game, with an emphasis on exploration. You wander around dark corridors of Nosgoth, now apparently almost entirely underground (for now) and try to figure out where to go next. The battle system in itself is quite interesting. At first, and before gaining access to the very classy Soul Reaver, Raziel has only his claws to fight, quite clumsily I might add. Where it becomes interesting is that the majority of the enemies are vampires (or affiliated) and cannot be killed by just mashing their heads with fists. Once you've hit the foe a few times, it becomes dazed. You have to grab them and throw them into fire, water, sunlight or ram them into spikes in order to really kill them. The soul of the foe then starts to fly away and you have to quickly "drink" it to avoid it to reintegrate the body.

This is a nice change with more basic battle systems, because you have to constantly observe your surroundings, in order to find where to send your enemies ad patres. You can also grab a lot of weapons and decorations from the walls to make for an improvised spear with which you can pierce their bodies, making dispatching them easier. Once you gain the Soul Reaver, though, which happens around two hours into the game, combat is much easier because you can impale your foes really quickly. However, get hit once and the blade is gone, leaving you with your fists and back to the pick them/throw them into fire motto until you've recovered full health.

One vampire shish-kabob, one!

The other major twist behind Soul Reaver is that you progress between the physical realm and the spirit realm. When you're in the physical realm, you lose health constantly (except when you still yield the Soul Reaver) and battles are harder. Get killed into the physical realm (or fall in water) and you're back in the spirit realm. The trick is that you can't interact with anything when you're in the spirit realm, and you have to find a spawn point (thankfully pretty numerous) in order to regain your physical body. You can also voluntarily abandon your body, which is quite useful considering a few different paths can only be taken while in the spirit form.

And a few different paths there are. That's where my major problem with Soul Reaver lies : This game is confusing. And I mean really confusing. First of all, all the places kinda look the same. A few spots like a cemetery or the entrance to a cathedral stand apart but otherwise, it's difficult to be sure what your entry point was when you've just finished fighting in a room. Every once in a while, you unlock a teleporter (much like in the first game) that allows you to go instantly from one place to another, but they use a symbol system which is confusing as well. You better have quite a memory to remember what symbol refers to what place. Add to this that the path you're supposed to take is never clearly defined, nor is your current objective. Of course, no map, as it would be too easy.

I don't remember if this leads to underground random place #1, or to underground random place #2....

Sometimes, it's fun to search all around the place to find the next path, but when you arrive at the end of what was obvious (and obvious is a strong term for this game), you usually can't remember where to go next, and the cryptic clues at your disposal are not what I'd call helpful. For example, my last achievement was to defeat Kain (who will obviously come back soon) and get the Soul Reaver. Then my "invisible mentor" tells me to go east to find my next battle, and that the blade should allow me to reach places I haven't found yet. First of all, I don't know where east is (no map and no compass), and the blade don't seem to unlock anything (except new ways to eviscerate enemies). I've been running around since, trying to find something I overlooked.

Add to this the fact that the mandatory path is sometimes as hard to find as a secret path in a "classic" game (involving complicated combinations of pushing blocks or stacking them in order to gain access to a high corridor you can't really see if you're not thorough in your investigation) and you have a confusing game, for sure. I usually have no problem directing myself in a 3D world (I've finished Descent and Descent 2, damnit!) but this one is really challenging...

You sometimes feel like in a Dali landscape.

But, of course, I'll stick to this one! So far, I've beaten one of my brothers, and had the upper hand on Kain for the first time, allowing me the power to walk through grids (T-1000 style) and to use the Soul Reaver. The sub menu shows that there is at least four other powers to unlock, probably giving me new possibilities for exploring, so I'm eager to see what the game is still hiding from me. This is a really intriguing game (much like its older brother), but it sure is a tough nut to crack!

Game C2 : Soul Reaver - Introduction

Usually, in the videogame industry (or in any industry for that matter), when two companies ally to create an Intellectual property, and that it becomes successful, it's not long before they throw at each other's throats in order to gain full control over said IP. It's exactly what happened about The Legacy of Kain. The first game was created by Silicon Knights (who would later create Eternal Darkness or the Metal Gear Solid Remake, Twin Snakes, for the Gamecube) and published by Crystal Dynamics (makers of Gex, Pandemonium and all the last Tomb Raider games). After a chaotic release, Blood Omen proved to be quite successful, and the two companies started a battle to see who would keep the rights. What happened next is usually what happens in this situation : the big one won. Crystal Dynamics would retain the rights to the Legacy of Kain franchise, as long as they let the "Legacy of Kain created by Silicon Knights" line in subsequent games of the series.

Pictured : Crystal Dynamics CEO about to seal the deal.

Silicon Knights scrapped their own sequel to Blood Omen, who was supposed to evolve directly from the first game appearance, and Crystal Dynamics then worked on their own sequel, Soul Reaver, where Kain was supposed to be the bad guy, and where the hero was Raziel, one of Kain's lieutenants, seeking revenge from his former master. The whole top-down view was scrapped as well, going for a full-3D Tomb Raider lookalike, with fangs instead of boobs. It would be released on Playstation and Windows in 1999, then ported to Dreamcast in 2000.

So it's funny the developers chose to give the life bar the form of the Dreamcast logo.

The development of this game was chaotic as well, and it meant the last parts of the game have been cut short due to delays. This would not refrain the game from being insanely successful, appearing in a lot of "Best Playstation games of all time" lists, and selling a lot of copies. The success to the game was supposedly helped by the release of a lot of horror-themed movies around the same time, namely The Sixth Sense, The Blair Witch Project or The Mummy. Crystal Dynamics put a lot of money in advertising campaigns as well, and the game had its own comic tie-in. 

So it's time to go back to the grim lands of Nosgoth. I'm really excited about this one, because it's the first game of my list that I have never played before. I just hope I won't experience the same problems I had with Legacy of Kain. If I do have another problem with the PSN version, I swear to all that is sacred that I won't ever buy another Playstation Classic on the PSN. I sure hope this one works correctly! I'll keep you posted.

Come-back and introducing the PICASO system

Hello everybody,

so I've said in my last post, I've been drowning quite a bit in "real life" work and personal mess. I've been out of town for a while for my job, which means no Wii for the time being. I'll get back to Resident Evil 2 eventually, but in the meantime, I'll try to get working on a few posts I have to tackle for a while.

The first one, and probably the most important one, is the COWARD system modification. Considering Trick's advices, I'll try something which is a bit more obvious concerning the categories. I'll drop the Originality grade too, which doesn't hold a lot of interest considering I'm playing game series, and I'll introduce another grade based on Side Missions and Optional Stuff, which is quite important for me. I always like a game rewarding exploration and personal path instead of a long corridor (FFXIII, I'm still looking at you).

So here goes my new notation scale, the PICASO System :

P goes for Pleasure/Enjoyment, replacing the Delicacy grade.
I goes for Intelligence, replacing the Cleverness grade.
C goes for Controls/Inventory, replacing the Reactivity grade.
A goes for Appeal, stays as it is.
S goes for Storytelling, replacing the Writing grade.
O goes for Optional Stuff, a new category replacing the Originality grade.

Considering this new scale, I've used it on the three first games I've explored so far in this blog :

-Resident Evil gets a 4 in Optional Stuff. The possibility to explore the game as two different characters is interesting and adds to the replay value. However, there is not a lot of optional things to reward exploration and the "new costumes" you unlock for your characters when finishing the game is, IMHO, not a huge incentive to play through it again.
Resident Evil PICASO Rating : 40 (instead of 42)

Yep, red is better, but it still doesn't make you an interesting character...

-The Legend of Zelda grabs a 8 in Optional Stuff. This is a game that definitely rewards exploration, with a lot of secret places to find (especially when you consider how old the game is), and Nintendo really went the extra mile with the "second quest" idea. Granted, the new layout of dungeons is simpler and difficulty mainly comes from extra enemies everywhere, but it's a great way to extend game length. They could have gotten away with the same dungeon layouts, and just make enemies harder to kill, but they didn't, so it's definitely a thing I have to reward.
The Legend of Zelda PICASO Rating : 57 (same score)

Wow... really?

-It still hurts to think about my Blood Omen experience, but I'll do it for you, guys. This game has a lot Optional Stuff to search for, especially if you want to max out your character's stats. There is always a new item to find, or even new and interesting powers to get that are not mandatory to finish the game. I'll go for a 7, because backtracking is rewarding and it's great to search every nook and cranny giving the whole experience a "Metroidania" feeling when you constantly unlock new areas to explore with your new powers.

Legacy of Kain Blood Omen PICASO Rating : 47 (same score)

Not a great use when you can't finish the game, though...

Well it didn't change a lot, but I hope you find the new system clearer than the first one. Please let me know in the comments!

Game C1 : Blood Omen - Final Rating

So after a night of screaming and weeping about the fact that I couldn't complete this game because of what will now be known as "The Door Glitch", I've come to my senses, listened the advices of my fellow bloggers, and went on to watch a long series of "Let's Play" to see how everything unfolds at the end of the game.

I have to admit it was a bit boring, and it didn't do much to lighten my frustration, but I am now able to put on a COWARD rating on this, and finally move on to more zombie-killing.

Before the rating in itself, I wanted you to know that I'll forget about the dreaded game-breaking glitch while giving the grades. It's a simple choice : If I don't, the COWARD rating goes down to 0, because the game is simply not winnable in this state. So here we go :

C for Cleverness
It's simply amazing how much gameplay content the creators of this game managed to cram into it. You gain new powers on a regular basis, and with them, new ways of dispatching your foes. This is clearly the highlight of the game, and definitely what kept me going after so many problems, glitches, doubts and issues. You can take control of your foes, make them kill each other, turn to mist to avoid contacts, disguise as a human to trick guards, slow time, turn into a werewolf to run around and avoid battles, make enemies explode, shrink, rot or drained from their blood. There is a weapon that can stun them, making them easier to drink their blood, another that burn them to ashes to avoid respawning undeads, barriers that return magic projectiles to senders... You have access to a few armors as well, which are much more varied than the "more and more solid" template : one makes you invisible to low-intelligence foes, one deals back damage, one dispatch damage taken between health and mana, there is even an armor that drinks the blood of your enemies by itself. The amount of variety here is simply staggering, to the level of "real" CRPGS, and way above your average action-adventure game. On the down side, the puzzles are not that varied, and it's more than often a simple way of pushing a rock or finding a switch to gain access to other areas. However, Boss battles are interesting, there are 100 secrets to find, so a lot of backtracking is in order, and the constant upgrades of your abilities really makes the game fascinating. And there is time travel involved too! In order to kill a really powerful foe, Kain travels 50 years in the past to slay him when he is still feeble... I'll be generous here and put my first 8 in this area.
Rating : 8

Twin axes : a butcher's dream.

O for Originality

The setting of the game is quite original. You play as a real anti-hero at a time where it was far from the norm in video games. There is a real sense of desperation going on everywhere, and the hope won't certainly come from this hero. More than saving the world, Kain's story revolves around his rise to power. His quest is effectively to restore balance to the world of Nosgoth, but his motivations are purely selfish. The "real" ending is dark enough, and contradicts everything we had learned about video game morale so far... As for the game itself, it simply doesn't resemble any other (for better or for worse) : what points will be lost in appeal or reactivity categories are gained for originality. There are a lot of risks taken here. Some of them were worth it, some really weren't. The rest of the franchise will take a safer road, but this game is definitely an unique one.

Rating : 7

"A waste of good blood" is something that saddens our hero.

W for Writing

Definitely a mixed bag here. On one hand, the writing is sometimes nothing short of stellar. The evolution of Kain is fascinating. At first, he considers vampirism as a curse, and ends his adventure calling himself a dark god. His humanity disappears during the course of the game, and a few lines are really memorable. There is few games where the main character rejoices himself when he discovers a new particularly gruesome way to dispose of his foes... On the other hand, two main problems arise. First of all, there is nothing much to see aside from the main quest. Disguising yourself as a human gives you the ability to speak with men instead of simply killing them, but it's never of any use. There is no dialogue whatsoever, and the majority of townspeople ramble on the same things (with nearly all the women having whore-like endeavors, once again showing that developers in 1996 were probably all frustrated virgins). The other major problem lies in the development of the story itself. The beginning is fascinating, with the tragic love story of Nupraptor and Ariel, the descent into madness or the Circle, the vow of the now cursed paladin Malek, and so forth. You spend the majority of the game with only one pillar cleansed, but at one point, you just feel like the developers simply stopped to care, or just rushed to the end. The 8 others members of the circle fall really fast (with one example of a battle where three of them fight at once), and even with the Time Traveling twist at the end (a really good one, though), the last half of the adventure just feels rushed. I can't imagine how fabulous the story would have been should the developers have more time to develop it...

Rating : 6

You can always try to shout "have mercy", but I'm pretty sure it won't work with this guy...

A for Appeal

Aaaaand that's where everything starts to fall apart. The graphics themselves are pretty decent, animation is nice, and so forth, but nothing exceptional for a 1996 2D game. The art style is nothing special, with 3D cutscenes typical of first generation PSX games, with character models a bit on the ugly side. The problem is how dark the whole thing is. I understand that's a game about a vampire and that bright daylight would be stupid. However, you just can't play the game with a window open in your living-room, and even at night you pretty much have to squint your eyes to see anything. Moreover, the walls and textures are so complex at times that you can barely see doors, switches, enemies or sometimes even your character! With a few notable exceptions (Vorador's Mansion, or the Heaven Cathedral) you mainly travel through dark caves, shrines, forests, marshes and desecrated towns, and it tends to repeat itself pretty fast. In a few hours, you have a strong feeling of déjà vu every new screen. The music works nice and the voice acting is mainly good, but Kain has an urge to scream "Vae Victis" or laugh hysterically when he battles an enemy, which can be really tiresome fast.

Rating : 3

And the "repel" spell looks like a snow globe, which is pretty dumb.

R for Reaction

I think that, if you've read my previous posts about this game, you know what's coming here. This game is basically a lesson on how to turn excellent ideas into a huge pile of crap. The emphasis on battle is stained by the impossibility to properly touch your enemies because of bad hit recognition. You have really different weapons, and everyone of them is useful? Great idea, but you have fifteen seconds of loading time every time you want to change. A lot of spells are at your disposal? Great idea, but you only have room for five of them, and if you want to change, it's back to the menu with another fifteen seconds of loading! When an enemy hits you, you take a few steps backwards, and if you have spikes behind you, you can bounce toward the enemy, that hits you again, and so forth. Every stupid foe is a deadly danger or a cakewalk, depending on the moments. It works both ways too, so it's not rare to see a fearsome enemy stuck behind the scenery or stupidly waving its sword at thin air, incapable of hitting you (Malek, supposedly one of the most dangerous bosses of the game, can easily be dispatched this way). The examples are limitless! And you can as easily exploit a few of the game weaknesses as well, with a "repel" spell or a mist form way too powerful by the end of the game, changing a few dungeons into long and boring chores. And did I mention the loading times?

Rating : 1

Wow, this boss looks tough? Just cast "repel" and he's history...

D for Delicacy

It all sums up to one simple question : is this game pleasant? In short, no. Everything is here to hinder your pleasure. When you start to enjoy the story or a new way of killing people, there is always something that brings you to the harsh reality that this game is a mess. It's heart-breaking to see what this game is and what it could have been. I've always been one to overlook game design flaws in order to enjoy the story, but rarely has a game proven this hard to enjoy. It's an unique game all right, but even if you forget about the glitch that killed my game, I'm not sure it's worth the effort. Really saddening, but Kain deserves better. Well, we'll see about that in the sequels...

Rating : 3

FINAL COWARD RATING : 47

Well, okay, I'll leave it at that. I understand why this game gained a cult following, and I hope the fascinating story of Kain, now Dark God of the Vampires, will find a proper continuation in the upcoming sequels. I really am frustrated to have been forbidden to complete this game, though. Who knows? Maybe one day, I'll find a PC version and have the will to go back to it. When this happens, I'll let you know if my COWARD rating changes...

Now for more zombies! After that experience, Resident Evil 2 will be a breeze!

Game C1 : Blood Omen - Lord knows I've tried...

Ok, that's it. I'm done with that game. I started everything again from the beginning, pumping 5 more hours into it. I really enjoyed my second playthrough. I've searched every nook and cranny, taking notes on whatever seemed suspicious, and I realized I had missed a few nice things on my first try, including a whole new power! (and a great one at that, which could make the enemies go fight against each other).

I had secured a few other power-ups, and considering I was much more at ease with the battle system, I arrived at the same spot where I was stuck in half the time, and with a lot more items in my inventory.

And then, the same glitch happened.

It happens when you enter a dungeon called "Dark Eden". When you enter you have three doors, one on the front, one on your right and one on the left. The front and right doors are already opened. What I did in my first playthrough is that I went for the right door, found a switch there, which closed the front door... basically doing the reverse of every other switch since the beginning of the game who usually OPEN doors... Then I saved my game, thinking it was normal for the course of the game. After a few hours wandering around, I realized there was no other way around it, and considering two of the targets of my main quest were in this dungeon, I was basically fucked... (pardon my french, but I'm really pissed right now)

So I went for my second playthrough, really enjoying the game, really looking forward for the following of the adventure, understanding more and more of the fascinating story and lore that makes The Legacy of Kain. Then it's "Dark Eden" again. I won't go for the same mistake (I have a few backup saves too, this time). I go through the front door, battle a few foes, find a few items... then end up in another room, completely stuck.

Then I did what I swore I wouldn't do : I went for a walkthrough.

I've looked a few walkthroughs on the internet. They all say that the front door is locked at first. You're supposed to go through the right door, pull the switch, that's supposed to open the LEFT door (and not close the front one), then find another switch that finally opens the front door. I can only assume that, when you do that in this order, the rest of the dungeon works fine and you can proceed...

But I've tried and tried again, there is no way for me to open the left door.

Considering I seem to be the only one with this problem, I'm wondering why it happens. I can only think of one explanation : someone at Sony messed up big time when emulating the game for the PSN. It happened to me once with another product of the PSN : Silent Hill Origins. I bought the game, for 40 bucks, played it on my PSP, and the cutscenes simply didn't work... I contacted Sony, they told me thanks for the information, that nobody had told them about this problem, and that they were looking into it... and no, they wouldn't give me a refund, because it was against PSN policy... great.

I had to wait for three months for the correcting patch to appear. If I had been to my local used games stores, I could have fetched Silent Hill Origins on UMD for half the price, and it would have been in perfect working order.

Then again, maybe I'm wrong, maybe my Legacy of Kain glitch has another explanation, but anyway, I can't complete this game, and what's worse is that I had really really started enjoying it.

So thanks Sony, once again, you make a great advertisement for piracy!

I'm sorry about the bitter post, I'm sorry I didn't have any screenshot to put in it, and I'm sorry about the fact that I'm not sure I'll be able to put a COWARD rating on this game, considering I don't feel like I've had the chance to see how everything unfolds at the end.

Maybe I'll go through it again one day (on PC for sure), because even with all the glitches and poor combat controls, it was really a fascinating game.

Thanks again Sony. I want a refund for the last fifteen hours of my life.

Game C1 : Blood Omen - Crushing my Soul

First of all, sorry about the slow posting. I've been away from my keyboard for a few days for health matters which are solved right now. So I'm back in the game!

Being in the hospital didn't delay my Blood Omen playthrough, though. I switched the game on my PSP, and kept on playing. However, I'm really starting to doubt of my ability to finish this game...

I'm utterly stuck right now. I've been to a lot of places, gaining new powers, securing access to the Soul Reaver, which I can only imagine is the best sword of the game, considering it's the name of the direct sequel (and considering it's a badass sword). I have really gained in experience, life and magic bars and so forth (and finally changing my status from "Whelp" to "Gimp"... way to make me feel better, thanks)

My major problem is that I think I experienced some kind of a bug that prevents me from going any further. I've seen a huge graphical glitch after visiting a village, basically turning the whole game into some kind of pixel vomit. I went to save anyway, but curiously all the areas I crossed while the glitch was going on had its doors closed, with (apparently) no way of getting them opened again...

Then again, I'm not sure about it, but the doubt is lurking in the shadow right now : have I made the game unwinnable? It's definitely a possibility when I see the lack of polish the overall experience had shown so far...

So, right now, I'm roughly 10 hours in, and I'm wondering if I should start the whole thing again. My first playthrough is now a total waste, though, considering I'm more familiar with the whole game mechanics, I know where things are, and so forth, but I'm really doubting I want to slog through a few areas another time...

On one side, I'd really like to just put a (harsh) COWARD rating on this game and skip to Resident Evil 2, on the other side, experiencing failure to complete a game so soon in the course of this blog is a bit humiliating... I'll keep you posted.

Game C1 : Blood Omen - Rise to Power

Kain journal entry 3 : Following once more the advice from Ariel the ghost, I gained access to Malek's bastion. The Serafan proved himself to be a dreadful enemy. Rendered invincible by the powers of the Nine, the fiend finally had the upper hand, having me flee for the first time since the beginning of my quest. I knew the only way I had to get to the end of my quest, which was the destruction of the Nine, went through the obliteration of this sorry excuse for a Paladin. I then sought once again the advice from Ariel, which in her turn, oriented me to ask my questions to the Oracle. I kept on eastward after Malek's Bastion, and explored the labyrinth of caves where the Oracle was hiding. After more fierce battles, I gained the information I was looking for. The only vampire ever to have vanquished the Serafan in battle, Vorador, was resting in a mansion hidden in the middle of the Termagent Forest. Strange place for a vampire, the Termagent Forest and its swamp-like ground was a deadly trap for our kind. I had no choice however, and I left the Oracle in order to continue my quest...

If the entries are becoming more and more confusing, I'm sorry but I'm trying my best. I found a Game Script online because I really felt I was missing a lot of things from my difficulties to understand all the informations told to me. And right I was! There is definitely much more story to discover : The love story between Ariel the ghost and Nupraptor, Ariel's passing and Nupraptor descend into madness, which would lead to the corruption of the Nine, and so forth...

Ok now, you have it. I'm still having a lot of troubles with the gameplay, but I definitely want to see this story unfold to the end... It's frustrating to see what this game is and what it could have been... I think the Legacy of Kain series would be much more in the light nowadays if the games had been just a bit more thoroughly tested and tried before release, but then again, it's the case of a lot of IPs...

Drinking blood from a distance is still funny-looking though...

Now my major concern is the difficulty curve. You can cross a long cakewalk where every enemy falls easily and where there is a lot of blood to drink (your main health source), then explore a cavern or a dungeon where you get your ass kicked a lot of times before being able to progress. The graphics complexity is still an issue too, with a few times where I turned around a lot before being able to find where to go next.

I've gained access to a lot of new funny items, including one that make my enemies rot in a few seconds, or another one that stops time, allowing me to feast on them while they're powerless. Every new item is introduced in a sadistic way by the voice over, and a few of the descriptions are really fun to hear (always in a dark way of course). I have gained the Mist form too, which is great because it makes you impossible to hit with physical attacks, while consuming a great deal of magic.

I have secured a new weapon too, which is a pair of axes. It's a great weapon as it allows you to slash your way through the enemies ranks. However, it forbids you to use magic while using them. With the choices of weapons comes another problem. You have to switch from the axes to the mace really often (the mace is useless in battles, except against humans, but it allows you to break walls and pillars where you can find useful items). And when you switch, you have to go to the inventory menu (4 seconds loading), switch weapons (1 second when you know where it is) and go back to the game (another 4 seconds). 9 seconds don't seem like a lot, but when you have to switch weapons 12 times on the same screen to be efficient in battle (and if you're not efficient, your health meter drops fast), it can be REALLY bothersome...

I've learned to hate this word with my whole soul.

On the plus side, I have to correct one of the fears I had when starting the game. It is not a corridor. You have sufficient opportunities to get back on your tracks in order to find new areas as soon as you have access to a new power. The game opens up quite fast and it's fun to backtrack and see what I've missed. I can find more life and more magic this way, which makes the continuation of the main quests easier. It's really a good thing and makes the whole experience feel more like a RPG than in the beginning of the game where it felt more like a (poorly executed) action game. Some places are really dark and pleasant to explore, too.

Malek, I simply loooove what you did with your interior, you should come to redecorate my place!

So I'll keep going. My rise to power is more and more exhilarating, and the (soon-to-be) great vampire Kain is getting more powerful by the minute. With more than 700 kills and 200 mutilations, the game still calls me a "Whelp", though, so it's beginning to be a little insulting. Masses will fear me I tell you! If I can get pass the loading screens, that is...

Game C1 : Blood Omen - Vampiric gameplay

Kain journal entry 2 : The first of my enemies has fallen. The Mentalist Nupraptor, former lover of the ghost Ariel, was well hidden in his skull-shaped retreat far above the city of Vasserbunde. I bested his traps and took his head after a fierce battle. Seeing the severed head of her beloved, Ariel acknowledged that my first mission was a success. In order to proceed, however, I had to take down Malek, ghost paladin and defender of the Nine. Probably a more fearsome foe than the crippled old man I had faced to restore the first pillar...

This game is weird. I'm still not sure if it's a great game or if the recurring glitches just ruin the experience. My major fear about it being a 40-hours long corridors has proven to be unfounded. There is still room for exploration and you have a bit of backtracking to do when you gain access to a weapon or a power in order to find hidden places and secrets.

The human disguise has proven itself useful and I'm now able to cross villages unharmed and talk to people instead of murdering them. Granted, they seldom have something interesting to say, but it's a relief not to have to fight my way through every screen numerous times (a lot of slain enemies just respawn when you leave the screen, which is always a great thing for immersion...)

The huge game world is slowly revealing itself.

The writing is nice, there is a few cult lines (e.g : "In life, I would not have graced this place with my presence. In death, I was merely adding to the stench") and the voice acting, even if it's a bit on the over-acted side, is pleasant enough. The setting is great too, especially when you come back to Coorhagen, Kain's hometown, to see it ruined by plague.

I consider the "Bring out your dead!" dude a serious Monty Python reference.

The powers are interesting and you gain access to them in a timely manner. I now have some kind of force-field that can send magic back to their casters, which is great because most of the time it's really hard to avoid the seeking projectiles, and is mandatory to cross a lot of screens filled with spell-casting enemies. I have finally found another weapon, which is a mace, and a blessing when dealing with human enemies : I can now stun them and quietly drink their blood, renewing my own health bar. I have items that slow time, burst enemies or cure poison, it's an overall much more solid gameplay now than at the beginning of the game, and every reward makes your character more powerful.

So what's the problem then? Well the game is crippled with little glitches that stain the whole experience. First of all, the graphics are not really clear and more than once I just ended up running in circles because I hadn't seen a door or switch hidden is the complex wall textures. The voice acting is great but there is no subtitles and it happens to sometimes be a challenge, considering I'm not a natural-english speaker. The writing is verbose enough and I sometimes simply don't get what it's told, even if my english understanding is usually pretty good. Another example of these times where game developers were so proud of their full-voiced games they didn't thought of putting subtitles (Trick, I understand what you felt through Mortville Manor even if Blood Omen voice synthesis is far better...) The loading screens can be overwhelming, making you wait a few seconds for every screen change, or when you want to access the menu, or when you change shape, or when you switch weapon, or when you pick your nose.

Ow come on!!! I had this screen half a second ago!

And I wanted to insist on the fact that I'm playing the game on my PS3, which the game nicely stored on my hard drive, so I guess the loading times are a bit reduced compared to the original CD version. I think this game destroyed a few CD lenses with constant data access every time you do something...

But the worse glitch concerns the battles and overall action sequences. The hit-recognition has proven itself a real pain. You can easily be trapped between two enemies and a spiked floor and just bouncing stupidly between their hits, incapable of doing anything and going from a full health bar to near-death in a matter of seconds. Granted, it works both ways and you often can easily kill a stupid enemy who just stands there and wave his sword at the air, incapable of hitting you... The first boss battle was a good example of that : the pattern is interesting, you have to make your way through a lot of magical bullets before being able to get close enough to the dude to hit him, and you're supposed to be able to hit the bullets. It's a good idea and nice change of the hack and slash pattern, but it's ruined by hit-recognition making the bullets near impossible to hit and making it harder than it should be...

As I've mentioned before, you can switch shape to a wolf and be faster and more powerful for a period of time. However, the wolf sprite is much larger than your usual form and some narrow paths are just impossible to negotiate without getting hit a few times by traps or spiked floors... I'll stop rambling about it but you got the point that this game is kind of ruined by little things that could have been avoided with a bit more testing before releasing it...

The bar on the left shows the number of pillars I have to repair : I think I'm not done with this game yet.

But I want to keep playing it. The setting and writing more than makes up for these problems and I want to know how the story goes. I want to know what powers I'll gain afterwards and what's hidden is the depths of the world map. Kain is a great character and I want to know the next steps in his rise to power. I just wished the gameplay itself would be less of a mess.

Game C1 : Blood Omen - Our darkest hours

Kain journal entry 1 : My journey started where most end : by death. I was brutally slain by robbers in the darkness of the night. My soul couldn't find peace, though, and when the Necromancer Mortanius came to me to offer me my revenge, I didn't think it through and grabbed my chance. Now I'm cursed. Cursed with the gift of a sub-life, constantly relying on drinking blood to survive. The robbers didn't stand a chance against me and it was pretty quick till I killed them all, however it didn't end here. I've met a ghost, Ariel, keeper of the balance at the Nine Pillars of Nosgoth. She told me the Circle of the Nine, guardians of the Pillars, had become corrupted and that their lives must be ended. It will be a long road until the sun rises and I finally find peace.


After my first two hours through the world of Nosgoth, I confess I'm a bit at loss at what to think of the game for now. It obviously has a lot going for it. The setting is interesting, the voice acting is quite good (especially Kain's voice, that comment on a lot of things. I especially like how happy he looks when he discover another way to dismember or make exploding his enemies), and I'm pretty sure the quest's gonna be a long one. However, there is a few little things that really pull me out of the game sometimes.

First of all, the camera-handling is quite weird. The game is viewed from a top-down perspective, similar to A Link to the Past (in the way it shows different levels of elevation, opposite to The Legend of Zelda, which is all on one level), and you can choose between two zoom levels. The first one is really close, and the camera readjust itself each time you turn around, to show a bit more in the direction your character is facing. It makes sense because you couldn't see anything is Kain was centered all the time, but it's not handled well and takes a while to get used to. The other one is just too far away to see anything correctly, even on a large TV set...

Next thing : the game is DARK. And I mean it. Playing the game with your curtains opened while it's only mildly grey outside is really difficult, and while there exists a spell to procure some more light, it can be too much at times. I juggled with the Gamma controls of my TV to see if I could make it clearer (especially when trying to catch screenshots) but it jumps immediately from too dark to too bright. Well, it adds to the overall ambiance so I'll go with it.

Broad daylight. Yes. Makes sense for a vampire game, though...

The biggest of my concerns, though, is that gameplay for now doesn't seem that interesting. Nosgoth seems to be a really huge place, considering the size of the world map, but my experience so far resumed to walking a long path, with very little room for exploration. Sometimes, I stumble on a cave where I can get a new power, or on a village where I can slaughter everybody, and... that's about it, I'm back on my path to the next point of interest. There is very little interaction with the world except pushing switches to open door and killing people.

However, I've just stumbled on a power to disguise me as a human in the last town I went through, and I can now finally talk to people (before sucking their blood). I'm not sure if it's gonna change a lot of things (there is no dialogue options and people just ramble on the same random subjects) but it's a nice touch, especially considering you couldn't do it for the first two hours of playing.

Nothing spells "Dark Gothic" like ominous german-sounding town names...

I think the game is only bound to get more interesting, though. I find new powers often, which give me nice options to move (I can now change into a wolf and jump on places I couldn't reach before) or to kill people (which is great because a lot of basic enemies can take a while to kill with your weapon). I'm just a bit disappointed there is no real interaction with the world, quests per say (except the main "kill the nine bad guys" quest) or puzzles other than finding the right switch.

Well, I'm only two hours in, though, so I'll definitely keep playing to see if it becomes more fulfilling. I think it's a long game, so I just hope I'm not in for a forty-hour ride on the same path (Final Fantasy XIII already made me do that, and it was nicer-looking).

Granted, there is not a lot of games that have a "Mutilations" counter and call you a whelp at the same time.

Finally, before moving on, a word on the setting. I think the developers were trying too hard to get an adult world. It works well with Kain himself, which is a properly tortured anti-hero, and it's always nice to simply slaughter an entire village just because you can. On the other side, including brothels just for the sake of it might have been shocking in 1996, but doesn't really hold well today, especially when there are not so many places you can enter (and considering you can't do a lot of things in these places, slaughtering people in a brothel is not that different than doing it in a tavern or a house, except for the red carpets...)

I'll just settle in this nice-looking inn and... wait... what?

On the same note, having 90% of the female villagers telling you "Nights can be pretty cold around here, stranger, maybe I can do something to help you through it" lacks a bit of finesse... Well, it's not that video games have always been oriented toward female gamers anyway. And 1996 was the year we were all exposed to Lara's polygonal boobs, so maybe this game is not the worst example of video games finesse either...

About my progress in the game, I've found a few powers, including the one to shapeshift into a wolf or a human (the most interesting feature so far), I can throw fireballs, which is great because long-range enemies are becoming more and more common, and I've stocked on a few special weapons for difficult battles. I hope I haven't missed anything to upgrade my weapon because I'm not doing too much damage right now and the more basic enemy can take as much as 10 hits to kill (which is sometimes cumbersome because the hit recognition is not top-notch either). I'm making my way towards the lair of the first Guardian, which is a giant skull on the top of a mountain (discreet castle for a bad guy if I dare say so). I'll keep you posted on my progress!

Game C1 : Blood Omen - Introduction

The development for Blood Omen : The Legacy of Kain was kind of hellish (which suits well the setting for the game). Game developer Silicon Knights (who would later create the cult survival-horror Eternal Darkness for the Gamecube) went through nearly 6 years of work to completion, even working without a destination console before settling for the Playstation and release it in 1996 (and ported to Windows a year later).

The goal was to create "a cerebral role-playing game where you had to use your head as well as your reflexes" (sic) with an adult gothic vampire setting. They talked a lot about the character of Kain, who was supposed to be "the first true anti-hero" of video-games (I haven't verified the claim, but I'm pretty sure it's not true). Maybe not the first, but certainly one of the biggest bad guys you ever had to control in a game. He dreams only of vengeance, sucks the blood of innocents (from three feet away, which is a bit weird) and is overall a pretty big bastard.

I'm not sure about the three pole-dancing skeletons behind him, though.

The game fetched good reviews and made a big success, getting a cult following over the years. It would go on to create a series of four sequels (interestingly enough, the IP went to a following of lawsuits between Silicon Knights and publisher Crystal Dynamics who went on to produce the series), organized in two "trilogies".

The games Blood Omen and Blood Omen 2 would follow Kain in his course of becoming the meaniest baddass around, while Soul Reaver and Soul Reaver 2 would follow antagonist Raziel in his quest to defeat the said Kain. The two trilogies culminate in PS2 title Legacy of Kain : Defiance where I'm pretty sure they end up being pals and walking to the setting sun while eating donuts.

And it's pretty obvious Raziel is the nicer guy.

The intertwining stories and evolved storytelling (as well as the action-RPG gameplay) is what drove me to the series, which I've never really played before, and that's strange. It's got vampires, quest for redemption and as far as I know, pretty solid games overall, even if the Blood Omen subseries is considered a bit of lower quality than the Soul Reaver one. I'm pretty excited by the idea I might stumble on a great series I've missed.

To be honest, though, what I remember most of the first game was jerky camera (which is a first for a top-down perspective), killing loading times and roaming peasants that weren't worried by the vicinity of a blood-sucking vampire. We'll see if it's worth digging through these little things and if the story is really as appealing as it sounds.

Considering I allowed myself the right to Virtual Console, I'll play the PSN version of the game, which is the exact same game that was released for Playstation, hoping the fact the game is on hard drive will lower a bit the loading times.

Let's suck some bloooooood!

Series B and C... a little something for everybody?

I was thinking about it for a few days, but I'm shifting a little the purpose to this blog. Instead of focusing on one series, risking alienating a good part of the potential audience who don't have any interest concerning this particular series, I'll play games from three series at a time.

Of course, I'll concentrate on a game from family A before playing a game from family B, then to C, I won't mix the games in themselves to avoid confusion.

So here it comes :

SERIES B : THE LEGEND OF ZELDA

The Legend of Zelda	1986	NES
Zelda II : The Adventure of Link	1987	NES
The Legend of Zelda : A Link to the Past	1991	SNES
The Legend of Zelda : Link's Awakening	1993	GB
Zelda : The Wand of Gamelon	1993	CDI
Link : The Faces of Evil	1993	CDI
Zelda's Adventure	1995	CDI
The Legend of Zelda : Ocarina of Time	1998	N64
The Legend of Zelda : Majora's Mask	2000	N64
The Legend of Zelda : Oracle of Seasons	2001	GBC
The Legend of Zelda : Oracle of Ages	2001	GBC
The Legend of Zelda : Four Swords	2002	GBA
The Legend of Zelda : The Wind Waker	2002	GC
The Legend of Zelda : Four Sword Adventures	2004	GC
The Legend of Zelda : The Minish Cap	2004	GBA
The Legend of Zelda : Twilight Princess	2006	WII
The Legend of Zelda : Phantom Hourglass	2007	DS
Link's Crossbow Training	2007	WII
Freshly-Picked Tingle's Rosy Rupeeland	2007	DS
The Legend of Zelda : Spirit Tracks	2009	DS
The Legend of Zelda : Skyward Sword	2011	WII

SERIES C : LEGACY OF KAIN

Blood Omen : Legacy of Kain	1996	PSX
Legacy of Kain : Soul Reaver	1999	PSX
Legacy of Kain : Soul Reaver 2	2001	PS2
Blood Omen 2 : Legacy of Kain	2002	PS2
Legacy of Kain : Defiance	2003	PS2

Obviously the Series C is much shorter than the other ones, so I'll figure out another series to play if I ever come to finish Legacy of Kain (in my opinion, considering the time it will take, somewhere around march 2056)

So to be clear on it (my frenchitude might be a little confusing sometimes, sorry about that...)
From RE1, I'll switch to Legend of Zelda, then to Blood Omen, then back to RE2. If it works well, I hope I'll be able to interest a wider audience...

What do you think of my choices? Would you like to read about these games?