Favorite Character Designs Pt.I

Character: Raidou Kuzunoha
from: Devil Summoner: Raidou Kuzunoha vs. the Soulless army and Devil Summoner 2: Raidou Kuzunoha vs. King Abadon
Designer: Kazuma Kaneko



Raidou is an old school RPG frontman, like all of the megaten protagonists he doesn't have dialogue visible to the player, and is a destiny chosen badass who looks like a faggot (see:funniest word ever). Since Raidou conducts his demonic detective agency in 1920's Tokyo his costume naturally takes cues from early 20th century japanese military outfits, but it also seems to draw inspiration from the Italian polizia [furthering my theory of Japan's secret obsession with Italy], and the awesomeness of capes paired with katanas. I guess I like it so much because it is very typical of Kazuma's design and is a character that I immediatly wanted to play as upon seeing him on boxart for the first time.

Kazuma Kaneko is one of my favorite video game artists evar. Kaneko's designs are easily identifiable by his trademark porcelain skinned anime-esque characters and smooth contoured clothing that looks like it jumped to life from a fashion student's sketchpad perfectly vibrant and ironed [wrinkles resisted whilst demon battling]. His designs were featured in the not very popular Dreamcast title Maken X (not quite sure how i just remembered that) and also did character designs for Devil May Cry 3. He's more popular for his work in the Shin Megami Tensei series (MegaTen for short) and their spin-offs, including the second persona title for the ps1 [the sequels 3 and 4 for the ps2 feature a new content artist,Shigenori Soejima, who is growing on me] and the intensely named titles [above] featuring Raidou. He also designed this guy and his giant robot for Zone of the Enders 2, easily distinguishable from the designs of Yoji Shinkawa [another favorite designer of mine, known for his work on the Metal Gear Solid franchise]

One of my secret goals in life is to have a suit designed by Kaneko-sama.

and this.

Freddy

watch in HD.

makes me really want to paint a portrait of Freddy Mercury, I can't think of a popularly recognized image of him.

thawt.

It comes to light that a game establishes its narrative in its design, visual and aural, first and foremost. Dialogue helps flesh out characters(although this is a relatively new feature in games other than rpgs and still some games like Ico see no need for it), but the transportative, escapist core of video game pleasure lies completely in the games interface and how one takes it in and puts the narrative together slowly and unknowingly until it becomes a familiar if not disturbing or intriguing environment. I think this accounts for why a games box art is incredibly important for me, and why I need content design to be quite excellent in order to really get into a game.

I don't wanna be a (multi)player no more.

Complaint: Why is it that the growth in online multiplayer for console games has made it so much more difficult for console games to be enjoyed with multiple players who are all playing together, in the same room, on the same console?

Not that there really are any console multiplayer titles anymore, with the exception of fighting, party, and racing titles but even those seem to becoming weened into purely online experiences. For example, in order to play castle crashers on (my friend's) xbox 360, each of us had to first create our own seperate accounts on his xbox. Not that it was a backbreaking process, it takes about 3 seconds, but its one of those things that kind of jab at you like 'well why are you playing on my xbox?'

this new psp mgs looks pretty exciting however, besides demostrating Kojima's relentless sense of humor, it actually looks like a ton of fun (love the new boxes and their new uses).

I dunno, i still think that beat'em ups should come back in style [see my post on why a sequel to the bouncer should be made].

I just miss the days of sitting in my friends' basements playing any iteration of sonic or streets of rage for hours. We were much less cogniscent of what titles were being released back then, we just knew what was awesome and they were instantly timeless, sonic, sonic 2, and sonic 3 could and would be played back to back in the same afternoon, each enjoyed for their seperate qualities (the same could be said of mario bros. 1,2,&3, or streets of rage 1,2, and 3)

[side note: during conversation, my girlfriend hummed the first few notes of the first level song for super mario bros. 2, and i called her out on it, she was impressed, then i explained how its not a real super mario bros. title but a reskinned game called Doki Doki Panic that was localized in America as Super Mario Bros. 2 and this did not impress her as much]

here's some awesome in thanks for reading this shitty post.

i think i'm going to try and list all the games i used to play for the genesis era consoles one of these days.

Skate 2

Skate 2, the sequel to Skate (or "Skate it"?), is a surprising marvel of a game.

I never played the original despite my own wishes, but I recently played Skate 2 (many many times) on the 360. There are a few things that it accomplishes so well, let me tell you about them:

1.Level Design- shit's amazing, its so fluid and connected that it feels like you're skating through a Girl Talk album. I mean making an entire city (San Vanelona) is one thing that's already difficult to pull off, but to also make the whole thing skatable, with foresight on where amazing potential lies to land sweet lines, is a feat of genius.

2.Sound Track -you should have noticed E.L.O. - Showdown, yea the sound track is pretty beast

3.Didn't fail on promises - Unlike certain developers, EA managed to pull off exactly what it said it would; landing tricks are harder and take many tries, but when you land it you're gonna wanna save the replay and show it off to friends. The controls, by the way, are pretty sweet. Similar to Fight Night, you operate the left and right thumb sticks in different patterns to achieve your moves. The left thumbstick is what controls the positioning and turning of your body while the right thumbstick is used for tricks; holding the right thumb stick down and then flicking it up results in an ollie, for example.

My only complaint is that the beautiful world is only scarred by the difficulty of fast traveling. The map is not very descriptive and trying to teleport to locations that you enjoyed become a guessing game. A few hints from gta or oblivion could have helped.