(08/05/2024) The Day the Music Died
I just heard about Steve Albini's passing, he was one of my favorites. I didn't want his death to go by without saying anything, but I really have not much to say other than the guy was a genius and his music is great, and you should probably listen to Big Black or Shellac, regardless of your taste in music. In fact, if you have any kids or nephews or younger siblings, you should probably show it to them also.
I wish I could make some sort of tribute, but I am out of ideas and awfully preoccupied. I could add a quote of his to the "quotes" page, I'm sure he has lots of good quotes besides the one about the toddler's puny hole or the one about dutch kids shoving glass bottles up their asses.
(20/02/2024) The most important day of the year
Today is is the day I reach 18 years of age. The only consolation I had for having lived an empty life was that I was still a-youngin'. Not anymore, I am now an old man. Old enough to marry, reproduce, get a job and be a respectable cog of society.
I have not had any cake, but mom bought me a sneakers bar and that's enough for a humble man such as myself.
(06/02/2024) [Review] Koudelka (1999)
Prologue: The problem with emulating Playstation games on the PS2 is that only about a third of the library actually runs. This means I'll frequently have a list of games I want to play and, when I check the compatibility list, I see none of them work; so I end up having to pick another one on the spot. That's how I ended up playing Koudelka, a lesser known title developed by Sacnoth and released by SNK in 1999. This game had already caught my attention for being a JRPG with a western "gothic" setting. I always enjoy japanese games with an european setting when it's not done poorly. In the case of Koudelka, the writer (Hiroki Kikuta) was very passionate about it and did not disappoint.
Japanese cover art
Plot and characters: The game is set entirely inside a medieval monastery in victorian Wales, where the three main characters - Koudelka Iasant, Edward Plunkett and James O'Flaherty - meet, each of them with different reasons for being there. The story is unveiled slowly as we crawl along the complex. We're kept totally in the dark about our purpose there until approximately the middle of the game. Most of the plot is told through voiced cutscenes and CGI videos. Sometimes you will have the option to read a letter or diary that reveals more about the story of the monastery.
I will refrain from revealing anything about the plot itself here, since it's relatively simple and not worth spoiling, but very mature and riddled with historical references.
You might've realized how small our cast of heroes is. In fact, this game has very few characters overrall - except for only two occasions, all of the enemies have no dialogue nor personality whatsoever. The lack of other conscious beings makes this desolate monastery seem even more barren, which is fitting, but at the same time, I can't help but miss the usual NPCs.
The three main characters, however, are very enjoyable and realistic. Their contrasting personalities and worldviews make for very interesting interactions. Here, unlike most JRPGs, our heroes hardly ever get along and keep arguing and needling each other until near the end of the game.
The voice acting is great. I can only remember two instances of it being mediocre, and even then, this game is an example in that regard, even more so compared to other titles in the PS1 library (take Silent Hill for example, released in the same year). My only complaint is the lack of subtitles. Many times I could not make out exactly what the characters were saying and had to review the scene later on my computer.
The heroes
Graphics: The graphics are good. I know some people (pussies) dislike this early style of CGI, but I personally enjoy it a lot, and here specially I think it was extremely well done.
I really enjoyed the design of the final boss, it might even be one of my favorites of the genre.
Music: This game has only four tracks, two of which play only during the final boss, and they aren't even good.
But hey, they were composed by the same guy who directed and wrote the game and I respect that.
Gameplay: The gameplay is flawed in many ways and definitely the weakest aspect of the game. I got stuck frequently and had to refer to guides and walkthroughs, because the game is never clear enough on what it wants you to do nor where it wants you to go. The exploration is confusing, the map doesn't make sense and key items don't really stand out over the pre-rendered enviroments. The game isn't even consistent on what is supposed to be interactive, like I will pass through dozens of rooms with closets, drawers and all sorts of storage furniture, but on one specific room I have to open the closet to find a key item and be able to proceed with the game. If I could take my time inspecting the scenario, it would be harder for me to miss stuff and suffer later on, but the high encounter rate makes it so that I'll want to move on as fast as possible, because, on top of all that, the battle system stinks!
The combat is excruciatingly tedious, every animation takes forever and is not very balanced at all, for instance, magic is almost always better than physical attacks and is not very costly. The elemental mechanic, which is supposed to play a role in the combat, is never properly explained (like why do "light" weapons heal the enemy instead of hurting it? What could possibly be the purpose of such an addition???)
According to Wikipe-tan, it wasn't Kikuta's decision to have the game utilize a turn-based combat, but other Sacnoth staff, who previously worked at Square, thought it would be better to play it safe. A "survivor horror" style of combat would've worked best I believe, and is probably what he was going for. I guess they tried to incorporate the resource management aspect of survival horror games into the turn-based combat of traditional RPGs, but it didn't work out. Since bullets are very abundant and it's impossible to run out of MP, all the strategy you might've had with this sort of design is thrown out the window.
If I can say one good thing about the combat in this game is that I somewhat enjoyed the levelling system, even if I'd always upgrade the same three or four stats... I wish more JRPGs would let me build my own characters in a similar fashion.
What combat looks like
Epilogue: Overrall I had pretty good time. Even though I had my problems with certain design choices, the narrative and the setting far outweight the negatives. Definitely a very unique game.
Koudelka is a prequel to Shadow Hearts, a more well-known and commercially successfull game responsible for spawning the Shadow Hearts franchise, consisting of three games (four if you count Koudelka) that I'll definitely be playing.
(03/02/2024) [Urban Exploration] Deactivated Slaughterhouse
In early january, right after the holidays, my great friend Pedro came to stay at my house for a couple of days and one day we decided to venture inside the ruins of an old slaughterhouse: an imense decrepit building located inside an even bigger plot of land on the outskirts of the city.
The place wasn't completely abandoned; a bit of the open field near the building was fenced and there were some animals inside; pigs, cows, chickens. It seems somebody had been using these grounds as a kind of clandestine animal farming; very weird. Specially considering no homeless person in the word can afford a cow; but the structures were very make-shift, built of scrap metal and such, so I doubt it's leagal.
A caged pig
We got there in the evening, so we only stayed a bit before going home. We returned the afternoon of the next day.
There's not much else to say about this building. Below are the rest of the photos I took using the camera pedro gave me.
An ominous hole in the wall
A view of the surrounding field. Notice the fence
A successfull escape
(01/17/2024) Highschool Ends
I didn't have a very interesting adolescence; in fact, I feel like I slept through most of these past four years.
I haven't made anything I'm proud of, I haven't loved nor been loved by anyone, I never got into a fight, I never learned to play the guitar, I never felt any strong emotions; no achievements, no gained knowledge or acquired skills, It's one big gap. And the worst part is that I have no one but myself to blame. Even though I know... if I had been born in a different time and in a different place, things would've been different.
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