Shoot Them in The Head

Let me just go back to when i was close to finishing Darkside Chronicles that day and tell you how it ended. Sure enough the very next day when i played Darkside Chronicles, the chapter happens to be the last chapter of the Operation Javier as well as the end of the game. In short, i love the new storyline of the game and how the writers were able to practise some restrain with these characters especially the ones infected with the virus. I believe having Suga-san come onboard fresh off his scenario work on Degeneration has helped the new storyline tremendously, some of the goals he set out to achieve with Degeneration were realised more effectively with these new characters in Darkside. There are several endings to the game depending on how you play and i look forward to seeing the other endings in my subsequent play.

As for krauser, his story doesn't end here in Darkside Chronicles and it looks like his descend into the darkside is only just beginning so hopefully it will eventually be revealed in future Chronicles

Friday the 13th Weekend

Had some friends over for the weekend to help me dust off some RE games in preparation for Darkside Chronicles out this week. First up was Degeneration which I manage to watch for a bit on Friday evening while waiting for my dualshock 3 to charge. I enable the enhanced viewing mode to view the storyboards alongside with the movie and much to my surprise, almost every scene from the opening zombie attack on the airport was storyboarded. I really have to see if these storyboards made it onto the Degeneration book I bought a while back.

On Saturday, we played a bit of RE4 Wii edition just to check out the Wii controls and since I had a save file with everything unlocked, we could practically try everything the game had to offer. I was pretty clumsy getting a feel of the Wii controls again on mercenaries mode so needless to say, I didn't survive very far on that one. I did try the story campaign with the Chicago typewriter and the game was a lot of fun, having an automatic weapon with unlimited ammunition. I often forget how you never really get a powerful automatic weapon on RE4 to play with so much so that I'm considering to speedrun through the whole game using the typewriter.

The highlight of the evening of trying to view the Jill sandwich scene in REmake with her unlocked RE3 costume which I assume should be pretty obvious why if you are a RE fan. Since I haven't really speed-run through REmake before, it was pretty hard figuring what I essentially had to do in order to get to the closet room and later to trigger the scene. Disappointment was in the air when I realised that by meeting Barry in the hallway, he subsequently wouldn't come to your rescue later at the shotgun room. Definitely something to come back to later which shouldn't be too difficult now that I remember how.

Got some nice presents too at the end of the day so I have to think of something for Christmas now.

The Ultimate Shame

A couple of stuff came in before the end of this week, the last two of my Organic zombie diorama and Ninja Gaiden Sigma. I ran into a bit of problem when placing this order last week as i didn't have any coupon codes with me anymore and had to look everywhere for one. Luckily i find a kind soul who posted some on his blog, wished i could remember his blog now so i can quote him but if you are reading this, you have my thanks.

Looking back maybe i should have ordered Dragon Sword on the DS instead as it was only USD16.90 right about that time and quickly reverted back to its original price. The Greatest Hits red casing for Sigma is a lot worse than i expected, as it wasn't the slightly transparent case shown on that page but completely shiny red which you can't see through. It looks pretty cheap to be honest, perhaps befitting for a Greatest Hits label as it's the ultimate shame for not picking up the title initially.

Regeneration of Degeneration

The new TV has a nice little notice appearing on the screen whenever it changes from its native resolution so while watching Degeneration blu-ray again on the new setup, i happened to noticed not everything on the disc is full HD as i would have thought. The main feature is of course full HD however the Generation of Degeneration making-of is output at 1080i, not such a major issue considering it's just a making-of. Some of the Degeneration trailers are also output at 1080i but thankfully all the wonderfully-recorded voice bloopers are in full HD. The interview with leon motion-actor along with some other odd film trailers are output at standard definition (480p) probably due to the source material itself. However the real highlight of watching the blu-ray on the new setup is i can finally view the picture-in-picture (PIP) feature which i had a really hard time on standard definition as the smaller frame was simply impossible to see anymore on SD.

Face Off

Playing RE5 and the first Silent Hill back to back, i realised there are some things better left without motion-capture such as the facial expression. As you may have known Capcom applied facial motion-capture for all the cinematics in RE5, a trend they also did with the CGI production, RE: Degeneration. This gives the characters a certain degree of realism with their expression but sadly i find it distracting and not as impressive as what konami was able to achieve earlier with Silent Hill 2. Not to discredit the motion actors but expressions are something very difficult to capture as actor will have the tendency to exaggerate their expression knowing they are being captured with cameras and rubber dots on their face. The results are character expressions looking a little unnatural and over-exaggerated, even more so for the simplest gesture though i find it a little more distracting in Degeneration than i did in RE5.

Comparing with what CGI director Takayoshi Sato did in Silent Hill and 2, characters had much more subtle expression but with enough realism to make it look eerie and convincing. This was all achieved by Sato studying his own and other actors expression over the mirror and applying it to the characters as seen in the making of silent hill 2. Sadly Sato left after silent hill 2 and the series was never quite the same without key members like Sato and Toyama. RE5 had what i thought was a bit too much emphasis on cinematics, they are certainly fun to watch but i kind of expected more, considering how much time and effort were invested if you watch the making of re5.

March Madness

Here is a collection of my orders for this past month alone, a bit more than usual but hopefully this won't become a trend as i already spent a long more than i've hoped to. Some were bought in a haste some were purchased during this spring sale and finally some were an accumulation of a year long of wait. Overall i'm pretty satisfied with all of them and they will go quite nicely to my RE collection.

Over the years i have accumulated quite a few RE games and books to make a decent collection while it's nothing compared with those guys on the RE forums, it's nice to own almost every game for such a storied and celebrated gaming series.

Take A Walk On the Darkside

I was quite surprised when Capcom announce Darkside Chronicles on the eve of RE5 release, because it promises a return to a generation of art style that i thought we would have all said goodbye to with the arrival of RE5. Capcom may not have given fans what they wanted but it's hard to fault them given the encouraging sales and reception of Umbrella Chronicles on the Wii. From the looks of the initial trailer, most of the key staff from Umbrella Chronicles are back for the ride along with some of the staff from the recent CGI production Degeneration and RE5. This follow-up game is of course, touted to be a semi-remake to the fan-favourite RE2 so naturally expectations are high.

Just like Final Fantasy VII, Capcom seems to be milking Resident Evil 2 in the same way by making various different offshoots with varying result, ignoring the very pleas of the fans for a remake. I enjoyed Resident Evil Degeneration a lot, so much in fact i decided to order the limited edition blu-ray box during this spring sale at Play-asia. A bit unexpected considering how much i already spent on the collector edition earlier this month but when i realised i initially wanted to get it had it not come out within a few months of RE5, i thought this is as good as a time as any seeing it's discounted by more than half its original price.

Bloody Friday

Much to my surprise my Resident Evil 5 Collector Edition arrived a couple of days before today's release date, i just refrain from posting so i don't get my favourite online store in trouble for breaking the street date. The overall package is pretty nice, probably not as desirable as the earlier Street Fighter IV CE but taking into consideration this is my first Resident Evil CE, it will certainly do just fine. The first thing i notice is how hollow the box actually is, i think extra space was allocated because they didn't know how big the tri-cell bag would be. I decide to use the extra space to slip my RE: Degeneration blu-ray in with everything else and there is still a little space left for some more. The bad news is the steelbook had one of the plastic hinge which holds the manual broken off so the manual is sort of just hanging in there in the steelbook. All the other knick-knacks inside the box were actually better than i expected, i especially liked the kikuju pendant and the chris figure is not too shabby either.

Well i'm not going to lament to you guys about how many years i have been waiting for this, i always hate it whenever fans say it because it sounds like they did nothing but wait during those years.

Blu Eye Boy

A couple of weeks ago, i didn't have any good reasons to even turn on my Playstation3. In the span of less than two weeks, i got two good reasons to keep my Playstation3 (i'm kidding of course) until Capcom releases Resident Evil 5, Siren: New Translation to play and Resident Evil: Degeneration Blu-ray to watch.

Resident Evil: Degeneration is my first real blu-ray movie and i know i tend to make a pretty big deal out of this but i assured you it's only because i intend to stay away from these things so that i don't get addicted to collecting them. Thanks to ash, i was able to order it online from amazon instead of paying inflated prices at the video store or buying it from a random stranger at the local forum. Not that i have anything against those but since this is Resident Evil, i decided the whole process of "acquiring" the movie should be extra special too. I may be a little late to the party seeing that it's about a month since the blu-ray debuted but sometimes it's the journey there that matters and not about getting there first.

When Leon Met Claire

Since my copy of Resident Evil: Degeneration has yet to arrive, i decided to go back and play when Leon first met Claire in Resident Evil 2. To be honest, i could never agree with all the praises and accolades bestowed onto RE2 when it first came out. Sure the story was great but the game felt too short on one go and too tiresome to finish four times to experience everything (LeonA/ClaireB and ClaireA/LeonB). I never really like the guns designed for RE2 and the modifications you could do made me loathe them even more as they were virtually too powerful to fire when upgraded.

I did however like the introduction of the lickers in RE2 and thought they were the best thing in the first Resident Evil movie. After facing them again in RE2, I quickly remember how vicious they can be because they certainly weren't anything as vicious in Umbrella Chronicles. In fact there was one sequence in the You Died screen on the RE2 demo included with Resident Evil: Director's Cut which i believed was left out of the final retail game where the licker would repeatedly beat leon head to the ground with its claws. Disturbing stuff indeed.

I wonder happened to the lickers in Umbrella Chronicles where all they can do is just lash out its tongue at you or take a cheap swipe. I remember even Resident Evil: Survivor did a better job of portraying just how vicious the lickers could be. I'm hoping to see the lickers again in Resident Evil 5 or even Degeneration as they are sorely missed.