Demon's Souls - Review

Starting this review off I would like to mention that I'm someone who has never been a fan of Action-RPGs, repetition, and extremely difficult games. So when I finally bought Demon's Souls I thought it would only hold my interest for a short while before I'd give up and move on to my other gaming comfort zones. However I was wrong because the hype and the word of mouth for this game has been so wrong and misleading. Yes, it is an Action-RPG but it is unlike any other Action-RPG I have ever played, yes, it is trial and error but it is also a game that abides by it's own set of rules and rarely ever breaks them, and yes, it can be a challenging and difficult game but that is only before you learn how to play it or if you play it wrong without adapting your strategies to the different situations. It has been called a niche game but that to has been misleading because it is a game for anyone willing to put in the necessary hours to learn its deep gameplay.

I was wrong because the game is simply amazing and manages to transcend the nuisances I usually hate and it got a grip on me that I have not felt from a game since Baldur's Gate 2. The atmosphere that embodies the game world is incredible, this is a dark and bleak world that oppresses you until you basically get a panic attack. The Kingdom of Boletaria is minimalistic and shrouded in mystery and you will only ever get hints at the larger picture going on in the setting, but it is so well crafted that you will literally feel it more than anything else. It is also a game that does not compromise on it's difficulty and while the game can be unforgiving, in the end its challenge is there for a reason and a huge part of what makes the game so great is the sense of progress and reward that comes from actually becoming good at playing it. Not in recent memory has a game created such a sense of loss and accomplishment, and I can't remember the last game that has engrossed me in it's world and setting to this extent.

The Prisoner

Today I finally got around to watching the first two episode of AMC's recent miniseries titled The Prisoner. It's apparently a remake of a series dating back to the 1960s with the same name. This new series however goes the typical route of a remake in casting supposedly serious actors such as James Caviezel (The Passion, Thin Red Line) and Ian McKellen (Lord of the Rings) which turn out to be a good thing since the acting so far has been really rad. The production value of this series seem to be very high and I really like the setting in the desert with the Village looking just a bit too pleasant and familiar to actually be pleasant.

The plot so far has been intentionally confusing in that 6 (James Caviezel) wakes up in the desert where he sees an old man, 93, being shot at and chased. 6 helps the wounded old man to a cave where the old man tells him to "Go to 554." before dying. 6 buries the old man and wanders into the Village where he finds himself grilled over the location of the old man he encountered by the mysterious leader of the Village 2 (Ian McKellen). The rest of the first double episode is spent mainly on 6 trying to escape the Village and find his way back to what he considers the real world while being opposed by 2 who is trying to convince him that his ideas of escape and freedom are delusions of an ill mind.

While I'm not really hooked into this series after merely two episodes I do feel that there is a lot of potential here. The main appeal to me comes from the fact that I'm a huge Kafka fan and I really love sci-fi mystery shows like Lost. The Prisoner really feels like a combination of these two with some 1984 thrown in there for good measure, which results in a cocktail that consists of three things that I appreciate. The most specific thing the show reminds me of is The Castle by Franz Kafka but reversed with the main character trying to get out. I'm not fully hooked yet but I do feel an incentive to continue watching and that's always a good sign.

JOKER by Brian Azzarello

This comic is number one on my wish list this coming Xmas, so a certain forest troll can start gathering their coins to buy it for me as a gift. *cough* Sarah! *cough* ♥

It was basically a tie between this and The Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller but this just ended up peaking my interest more when I found out that the author Brian Azzarello did my favourite short segment in the animated movie Batman: Gotham Knight. His segment titled Working Through Pain was not only the best animated one in my opinion but also had the darkest message about Batman; a theme about pain-management as well as how unhealthy Bruce Wayne's quest for revenge is and how it doesn't come from a healthy and good mental state. It also got a lot of plus points with me due to a wounded Batman, because there is nothing I love more than wounded, gritty and pissed off Batman. In either case I would suggest anyone even remotely interested in the awesomeness of Batman to check out Batman: Gotham Knight.

Still it's not the only appeal of this comic to me, it is also obviously the beautiful art direction by Lee Bermejo that you can observe above. I simply adore the gritty style and how uncomfortable it makes me feel about the Joker just by looking at it. When I was a kid I used to be terrified of the Joker and even recently I found Alan Moore's Joker in The Killing Joke to be scary but this new comic seems to take my unease with the character to a whole new level. I also love the obvious nod to Christopher Nolan's interpretation of the character since it is to date what I consider to be the finest Joker, largely due to the impressive performance by Heath Ledger last year. In short I want this in my Batman collection so I can learn more about my greatest adversary - The Joker.

Demon's Souls - Impressions

The reason for my absence these past few weeks from this blog has been very simple, I've just had too many great games to play to bother writing anything of relevance. I had great plans of writing some thoughts on the season finale of Mad Men, an Uncharted 2 review as well as reviewing the Pixar movie Up but all of that went down the drain when I got my paws on Dragon Age for the PC; a foolish obsession that cost me about two weeks of my life not to mention that I think it killed a large part of my old PC. I'll try to write more about Dragon Age soonish but knowing how I treat new Bioware games I'll only do that once I've run through it multiple times with different characters.

Well, if that wasn't bad enough I ended up jumping from Dragon Age straight into Demon's Souls and now I'm obsessing over that instead. Since I have no qualms about admitting my loser-level I'll just say it outright that it's gotten so bad that I dreamt about Demon's Souls last night. It's the toughest game I've put my skill against in memory and I think I suck extra hard at it since my progression feels like it's going slower than what it normally should considering the hours put in. However this is probably the most unique, creative and immersive game that I've played this whole year and is my personal surprise hit of the year as well as being one of my personal Game of the Year contenders.

The game has punished me over and over yet I keep on re-trying despite knowing that I'll probably get brutalized all over again. This is one of the most immersive games I have ever played, you really feel the hatred for these abominations that are refereed to as demons and the atmosphere is sometimes so oppressive and tense that I have to take a break from the game to calm my nerves. There is not much narrative at all this far in the game but the few pieces of story that have emerged have been excellent with amazing concept art being shown while a narrator speaks. Still, this game thrives on its rich gameplay mechanics and I think that is the reason it's such a success because as soon as you die you don't get to feel the frustration too long before you're off once again to try to kill some demons and collect their souls.

I started the game and I died alot and it's only now after killing two major demons that I'm starting to feel like I'm getting the hang of this. I stopped reading the strategy guide and just focused on playing like I how I would like to play the game. In short, I got my hands on a two-handed Claymore sword and am going full-retard with what my pal Gatts has taught me about killing demon scum. This philosophy can be summed into; you need BIG swords to kill BIG demons. In many ways this game is the closes I've ever played to a Berserk game because of the general bleakness and darkness found in both. Not only is this dark fantasy game one of the best of this year but I think in years ahead it will be considered one of the hidden gems of this generation.

Mad Men - S03E11 & S03E12

Mad Men season three is coming to an end next Monday and I still feel that it has been the weakest season so far for the series, it's especially apparent since I re-watched season one two weeks ago and that season is television perfection. I think this shift in quality is mostly due to the more stand alone nature to the episodes this season which made the show feel like it was drifting around without a clear plot for most of the season. I also felt a lack of truly outstanding episodes like The Wheel, Meditations in an Emergency, Babylon and Smoke Gets in Your Eyes which stood out from seasons past as the best god damn television I have ever seen. However I should point out that at least the show has been consistently good despite this and there was no episode that felt truly out of place like in season two when Don went to Los Angeles. Basically this is still the best show on television right now despite having a weaker season than usual and when I think about it I can't really blame the creators for not being able to recreate the sheer perfection of season one.

However today I finally caught up with the show with the latest two episodes that I had missed The Gypsy and the Hobo (S03E11) and The Grown Ups (S03E12). I must say that the show finally seems to be tying up all the small plots throughout the season and is returning to form in an incredible way. Sure this season still had great episodes like Love Among the Ruins (S03E02) and Seven Twenty Three (S03E07) but these latest two episodes leading up to the finale next week have been absolutely superb. In The Gypsy and the Hobo (S03E11) we finally get the confrontation between Don and Betty about his fake identity that we've been waiting for and it was more intense than I could ever have imagined and you could really see the power shift happening in front of your eyes between these two characters. The Grown Ups (S03E12) deals with the death of Kennedy, how shocking it must have been to everyone back then and how it almost marks an end of an era. This horrible event in American history really seems to reflect how Don's manufactured life is crumbling around him, right in front of his eyes. I am now impatiently waiting for the season finale and judging by seasons past it ought to be the best episode of the season.