It's been a while, I know, but I haven't been able to really think of anything worthwhile to say on the blog. Lately all the writing I've been doing has revolved around a little project that I've been working on for a little while now, using a program called "RPG Maker 2003". As you can probably tell, it's a program for making Role Playing Games on the computer. It's pretty user friendly, though there are newer versions of it out now that seem far better, the only problem is that I've used up my 30 day trial for one of them, and the other... well I can't figure out why, but it stops downloading at around 89% every time I try. So 2003 will have to do for now, and I don't mind, it's still a pretty sweet program.
Personally, I think that Video Games are a great way to portray a story, and some of them do an amazing job of bringing you into it. Allow me to give you a couple examples of games I thought were very well done when it comes to story and bringing the player into the game.
Shenmue I & II (Dreamcast and Xbox, in that order) - I was introduced to the Shenmue games a while ago, when I first bought my Dreamcast. I can't remember why I bought it, when I bought it, or where I bought it (I'm assuming Microplay) but I do remember my "older brother" Justin saying something like "Oh, you won't like that game, you'll probably think it's too boring", but I bought it anyways and never regretted it since. I can't really describe the genre of the game... It's a mix of adventure, puzzle solving, mystery, and a bit of acting and fighting. The story is focuses on a young Japanese man named Ryo Hazuki, who's father (a martial artist who created the Hazuki style of fighting, which Ryo is a student of) is murdered at the beginning of the story by a mysterious martial artist named Lan Di, apparently a past acquaintance of Ryo's father. The rest of the story plays out as Ryo swears to find out who Lan Di is and extract revenge on him, a story which by the second game is still not finished. From what I've heard, a long time ago, it was originally supposed to be about 5 games long... from what I can remember.
The story is really great, but the best parts are this game is the freedom, exploration, and interaction that it gives you, especially in the second game. As you walk around the town, or city, you see people walking up an down the streets doing their daily routines, going on walks, shopping, eating, playing at the arcade... I seem to have it a block write now, so I can't explain everything as well as I want to, but the game does an amazing job at making you feel as if you are living out Ryo's life, you can speak to passers by on the street, work, play games, eat, get into fights, gamble, sleep, buy little miniature Sega toys from those machines you see everywhere, buy pop from a drink machine, examine so many different little objects around you... It's really one of my favorite games, and I supposed how I can understand how people don't like it, or may think that it's slow... While it does have it's action, there are huge spaces where all you do is walk around the city/town, which doesn't bother me at all, with all the things you can do in it.
Perhaps today wasn't a good day to start writing on here again. I'm going to head off now, probably take a nap before I take a bus downtown for rehearsal. My last wisdom tooth is coming in, and it's at the part where it's just about to push through my gum, but it doesn't hurt. All it does is swell my gum so it's very irritating to do basically anything on the left side of my mouth right now. Fun fun, I wonder if I will have to get them removed?
-PlayerOne
"(Insert Shenmue quote in here, as I cannot find a good one)" - Shenmue
