There's a lot going on out there with this whole Wuhan Flu/COVID-19 business. So, I just want to make sure that to those of you reading this I say the following:
Stay safe. Keep practicing good hygiene also follow best practices regarding being out in public, if you're still allowed to go. If you are stuck at home due to quarantine, then make good use of your time. Tidy up your home, find some exercises that you can do to stay active while indoors. Also, of course, get in some quality gaming.
So long as we play it smart and take this seriously, then we'll be okay. Panic and melodrama are rampant, out there. Just keep a cool head, protect yourself and your loved ones. We'll make it out the other side of this crisis. Together.
~ Stay Good, Neighborhood
Monday, March 16, 2020
Monday, March 9, 2020
The Dialog Box: Muscle Memories Redux
Over the past week, I was pleasantly surprised by having the chance to revisit one of the most important games of my formative teenage years in the form of the demo for Final Fantasy 7 - Remake. Oh boy, did that hit me harder than I anticipated. Not only was this another of those games that has a combat system that feels fantastic to play, but it was more of my actual memories that were drawn forth from playing it.
What I haven't had the real breadth of platform to express, though, is just how central Final Fantasy 7 truly is to who I am as a creator/storyteller. Allow me to share that with you now.
As with the rest of my current personal projects, "Fated Edge" began as a fanfiction take on the world of FF7. The early concepts of the majority of the characters being directly referenced from FF7's cast. As my own sensibilities evolved and I grew to find more of my own identity as a person, the characters and the world evolved. Here's some examples:
The lead protagonist of Fated Edge, Daniel Sage, was my "Cloud Strife proxy." Messy blond hair, green eyes, swordsman. To differentiate him from Cloud, however, I went to great lengths to rework his personality. Funny enough, the closer approximation would be Zack during the later events of FF7 - Crisis Core.
The martial artist/brawler character that joins Daniel on his adventure is a plucky, young goofball by the name of Damian Ramirez. Right off the bat, swapped gender to separate him from Tifa. I made him more of the comic relief when outside of combat and as time goes on, he and Daniel will forge a friendship akin to brotherhood.
The healer/mage, my "Aerith proxy," Crystal Ellis. Firstly, don't expect her to die. Secondly, she still has elements of a playful personality combined with the outlook of a sheltered girl running away from home to see the world. Hence, how she meets Daniel and Damian.
I could go on and on about the specifics, but the main deal is that this is a project I always revisit to gauge how far I've come in both my character design and my storytelling. There's also the fact that this project wouldn't really exist if not for the time I spent playing JRPGs in the 90s and Final Fantasy 7, in particular.
To sum up, when that flood of nostalgia washed over me at the end of my first playthrough of the FF7 - Remake demo, it was more than just the time spent with my friends IRL. It was the time I spent creating and honing a whole cast of characters, the post-apocalyptic world they inhabit, and the ever-evolving story that I will, one day, finally get to tell.
Until that day arrives, I'll keep gaming, working, and evolving. Here's to hoping you'll stick with me. In the meantime...
~Stay Good, Neighborhood
What I haven't had the real breadth of platform to express, though, is just how central Final Fantasy 7 truly is to who I am as a creator/storyteller. Allow me to share that with you now.
As with the rest of my current personal projects, "Fated Edge" began as a fanfiction take on the world of FF7. The early concepts of the majority of the characters being directly referenced from FF7's cast. As my own sensibilities evolved and I grew to find more of my own identity as a person, the characters and the world evolved. Here's some examples:
The lead protagonist of Fated Edge, Daniel Sage, was my "Cloud Strife proxy." Messy blond hair, green eyes, swordsman. To differentiate him from Cloud, however, I went to great lengths to rework his personality. Funny enough, the closer approximation would be Zack during the later events of FF7 - Crisis Core.
The martial artist/brawler character that joins Daniel on his adventure is a plucky, young goofball by the name of Damian Ramirez. Right off the bat, swapped gender to separate him from Tifa. I made him more of the comic relief when outside of combat and as time goes on, he and Daniel will forge a friendship akin to brotherhood.
The healer/mage, my "Aerith proxy," Crystal Ellis. Firstly, don't expect her to die. Secondly, she still has elements of a playful personality combined with the outlook of a sheltered girl running away from home to see the world. Hence, how she meets Daniel and Damian.
I could go on and on about the specifics, but the main deal is that this is a project I always revisit to gauge how far I've come in both my character design and my storytelling. There's also the fact that this project wouldn't really exist if not for the time I spent playing JRPGs in the 90s and Final Fantasy 7, in particular.
To sum up, when that flood of nostalgia washed over me at the end of my first playthrough of the FF7 - Remake demo, it was more than just the time spent with my friends IRL. It was the time I spent creating and honing a whole cast of characters, the post-apocalyptic world they inhabit, and the ever-evolving story that I will, one day, finally get to tell.
Until that day arrives, I'll keep gaming, working, and evolving. Here's to hoping you'll stick with me. In the meantime...
~Stay Good, Neighborhood
Sunday, March 1, 2020
The Dialog Box: Muscle Memories
You start up your favorite game, right? You might watch the intro cinematic to get yourself hype, or because it's just a visual treat that draws you in even further. Once you press Start, load your file and double-check your settings, you're off and running. Once you're in-game, there's just something about the mechanics or the responsiveness of the controls that just makes it feel like you're going on instinct, but not necessarily going through the motions.
This is the type of vibe that, I think, games should really strive for. I'll give some examples, in no particular order, of games with great gameplay/combat mechanics that I always return to. Feel free to reply in the comments with some of your own examples.
Xenogears
I'm currently replaying this classic on my PSP and if there's one thing that always makes me keep coming back to this game and keeps me hooked over the course of the narrative, it's the combat. The "Deathblow system" employed in Xenogears turns the standard turn-based fare into a balance between managing your team's stamina (or fuel when piloting your awesome anime mechs) and unleashing relentless combos ranging from piledrivers to "shadowboxing" and all the 90s nonsense in between.
As it stands, there are other JRPGs out there that revolutionized action combat. Yet, even to this day for fans that're trying to build their own games and those that simply wish to see this game make a return (I count in both categories), if there's one artefact from this title that deserves another moment in the sun, it's the Deathblow system. Perhaps, even an evolved/updated take.
Legend of Dragoon
What is there to be said about Legend of Dragoon that hasn't been said elsewhere already. Dart's rise from simple "hometown boy" to divine hero status is 4 discs of nothing-short-of-LEGENDARY. Much like the classic mentioned above, what helps the story sink its hooks even deeper into the hearts and memories of gamers the world over is what the game calls the "Additional Skill" system.
In yet another creative subversion of traditional, turn-based combat, Additions give each character a set of signature combos that require timing and accuracy to perform successfully. Even greater acuity is necessary to get the most damage you can out of each strike. What's more? Enemies have a chance a counterattacking mid-combo, so you have to stay on your toes. There's no simple button-mashing, here. Should the fans receive this dream-come-true remake (ala FF7), then realizing the Additional Skill system in a real-time setting would be, I'd imagine, a walk in the park.
Street Fighter 3
With fighting games reaching massive arcade market saturation, the late 90s was a battleground in multiple senses of the word. It was in the early months of 1997 that Capcom went on to reinvent their flagship title and, in return, fighting games as a whole. With the release of Street Fighter THREE, not only did they mostly stop the "counting to 3" jokes, but they also added a new defensive countermeasure to the martial-arts-chess-game that is Street Fighter: the Parry.
If you were to tap toward your opponent on the joystick with precise timing to meet an incoming attack, you'd successfully parry it, taking no damage and putting yourself in prime attacking position. What's more is that you can do so for multi-hit assaults. With the system being further refined in future iterations of Street Fighter 3, it was 3rd Strike that came onto the scene as the fighting game "Belle of the Ball," but also ingrained this moment into the gaming zeitgeist forever:
There are so many more examples of games out there where the mechanics just feel "right." Games where simply going hands on with them after so many years brings back a flood of memories from the time you first played. Take note, said feeling is quite subjective. So, any game can do the same for others as these three have done for me. Feel free to comment below or hit me up on social media (@BlazinAceNelson on Twitter) and let me know which games evoke awesome "Muscle Memories" for you. Until next time:
~ Stay Good, Neighborhood.
This is the type of vibe that, I think, games should really strive for. I'll give some examples, in no particular order, of games with great gameplay/combat mechanics that I always return to. Feel free to reply in the comments with some of your own examples.
Xenogears
 |
| Fei goes ham with the martial arts |
As it stands, there are other JRPGs out there that revolutionized action combat. Yet, even to this day for fans that're trying to build their own games and those that simply wish to see this game make a return (I count in both categories), if there's one artefact from this title that deserves another moment in the sun, it's the Deathblow system. Perhaps, even an evolved/updated take.
Legend of Dragoon
 |
| Dart wreaks acrobatic havoc |
In yet another creative subversion of traditional, turn-based combat, Additions give each character a set of signature combos that require timing and accuracy to perform successfully. Even greater acuity is necessary to get the most damage you can out of each strike. What's more? Enemies have a chance a counterattacking mid-combo, so you have to stay on your toes. There's no simple button-mashing, here. Should the fans receive this dream-come-true remake (ala FF7), then realizing the Additional Skill system in a real-time setting would be, I'd imagine, a walk in the park.
Street Fighter 3
With fighting games reaching massive arcade market saturation, the late 90s was a battleground in multiple senses of the word. It was in the early months of 1997 that Capcom went on to reinvent their flagship title and, in return, fighting games as a whole. With the release of Street Fighter THREE, not only did they mostly stop the "counting to 3" jokes, but they also added a new defensive countermeasure to the martial-arts-chess-game that is Street Fighter: the Parry.
If you were to tap toward your opponent on the joystick with precise timing to meet an incoming attack, you'd successfully parry it, taking no damage and putting yourself in prime attacking position. What's more is that you can do so for multi-hit assaults. With the system being further refined in future iterations of Street Fighter 3, it was 3rd Strike that came onto the scene as the fighting game "Belle of the Ball," but also ingrained this moment into the gaming zeitgeist forever:
 |
| EVO. MOMENT. 37 |
There are so many more examples of games out there where the mechanics just feel "right." Games where simply going hands on with them after so many years brings back a flood of memories from the time you first played. Take note, said feeling is quite subjective. So, any game can do the same for others as these three have done for me. Feel free to comment below or hit me up on social media (@BlazinAceNelson on Twitter) and let me know which games evoke awesome "Muscle Memories" for you. Until next time:
~ Stay Good, Neighborhood.
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