Sunday, June 30, 2013

Don't hate the bosses, hate the boss anterooms

Ganon's Tower is ready to be ascended. Link's got his Hero's Charm, and all four of the previous bosses have been beaten.

Go figure that game's most fun boss battle becomes the hardest when replayed. Not to mention that its lead up is also the most frustrating. It's one thing to perfectly land on a moving platform after gently wafting over with the Deku Leaf, but it's quite another to inch your way down a hallway, reluctant to wake any sleeping Redeads. Unless we get to see them in glorious HD once Zelda U's released, The Wind Waker's Redeads are still the series' creepiest.

Re-fighting the bosses is a nice call back to Majora's Mask's optional boss rush. Doing so in black and white, rather than The Wind Waker's full colour is neat too. It's as if Link were fighting the memories of these bosses, or perhaps Ganon's reconstructions of them. They are, after all, all his creatures.

What's left unclear, though, is whether defeating them merely opens the door to Ganon or if it causes a break in whatever power he had to actively exert to maintain the four part lock on the door to the stairs. The latter makes Ganon seem all the more fierce an opponent, and an enemy truly able to don three forms to battle with the Hero of Winds.

Lay Away Book Special: At risk of melting into Eyre

It's disappointing that the apparent time travel at the end of chapter 27 was just a ruse. Using that to end a chapter and then starting the next with a blurb about the ChronoGuard's sense of humour and such smacks of Fforde writing himself into a corner and using a brutish method to escape, passing it all off as comedy.

At the least that moment at the start of chapter 28 (as of chapter 31) marks off the decline of the book.

The action sequences that follow, wherein Thursday and Bowden face Hades and Schitt, are fine. But the dialogue surrounding them and the scene where Thursday asks a Welsh bookseller to drive her into Merthyr are downright painful. As an English writer whose work obviously relies heavily on nineteenth century fiction, Fforde's no stranger to the pun (practically every character name in the book is one), but between chapters 28 and 31 he shows that he's no stranger to the cliché, either.

From sequences such as 'it's too dangerous, I'll never do it! - but I, the young eccentric assistant, will!' to motivations like 'I'm in it just for greed, nyah!' and replies along the lines of 'how dare you double cross me!' this section of the book is a pantomime shadow of what has come before.

True, The Eyre Affair is Fforde's first novel, but the shift in quality over these three chapters suggests that the book was rushed out before being truly completed.

Saturday, June 29, 2013

A slow squashing

Is a battle that can be won with poison and alternating revivals be considered a hard one, or just busy work?

This is the question that you're likely to be left with after fighting the Mist Spider in Cygnus' tournament sequence in Radiant Historia.

This spider's an enemy you face with Stocke and Aht, one that fills up the field thereby disabling most of Aht's techniques, and one that K.O.s a member of your party each turn it deigns to attack rather than cast "Fear" or "Speed Down." Aside from levelling up Stocke and Aht to the max, the poison/revive strategy seems the best - and sanest - strategy.

Of course, for beating the beast, you don't just complete the "Road to Victory" quest, but also get Stocke's best cloak. Certainly, it is no small prize.

Lay Away Book Special: Late timing

As if a villain who could be just about anywhere and who seems capable of just about anything wasn't enough already. Fforde just had to throw in time travel. As a plot device it seems strange, since there are less than 100 pages left of the book. But as a piece of world building, it says a lot.

First off, the reaction of the officers that Thursday and Bowden meet at the scene of the tear in time is what you'd expect the reaction to an animal having walked into the middle of the road where it was hit. They don't know quite what to do, but they do know what it is they're dealing with, and don't seem very phased by it.

In her narration, Thursday mentions a few times that these disruptions occur spontaneously. This detail suggests that something has happened to time in her world to make it less stable. Given the existence of the "Chrono Guard," experiments with and in time are likely what's destabilized it. So time travel is possible and practiced.

Further, if not because of both the existence of the Chrono Guard and the spontaneity of the appearance of such disruptions in time, this phenomenon must be wide spread. Maybe in Thursday's world England is literature crazy, but disruptions in time could not be so localized.

Thus, in including the time disruption and having his main character travel through time, Fforde is revealing that Thursday's world is truly damaged. Though, in first book fashion, any such revelation comes with more questions than answers.

Friday, June 28, 2013

Comparing gauntlets

The lead up to Ganon's Tower in The Wind Waker seems like it's a prototype for the lead up to Skyward Sword's final boss sequence. Both are gauntlets in the form of continuous battles with a variety of enemies, though Skyward Sword's feels much much more like Link is being pitted against the army of evil.

Compared to the trials you have to go through to get the Triforce Shards, it's quite literally a walk through a field. Though the fight against two Darknuts in a ring of fire is an exciting - though not very challenging - one. Since The Wind Waker's enemy walk is so underwhelming on the Gamecube, since you just march right through (and can even just run past most of them), it'll be very interesting to see what's done with it in the HD remake. The hardware differences should make whatever change the Zelda team makes stand out.

Hopefully they don't change the reward for the Gold Membership at the Beedle Shop Ships. It comes late in the game, and might seem useless, but the "Fill-Up Coupon" is the perfect way to re-fill everything before you go down to sunken Hyrule for the final time.

Lay Away Book Special: The character building Beowulf entry

Thursday's reflection that if she's not married in the next five years she'll probably spend the rest of her life alone is a striking thing. Not because it's outlandish or strange or out of place in any book,  but because it's exactly what much of my writing's missing: Character exposition for the sake of character exposition. Her thinking about her relationships kind of relates to her subplot with Landen, but that plot itself is secondary to the hunt for Acheron.

In the context of reading Infinite Jest, this moment of character building also stands out. Infinite Jest is, if nothing else, almost entirely character development with only the slightest whiffs of plot until the books final 200 pages or so (as I've heard it told). Thus, for all of its typical English-ness and standard style, The Eyre Affair beats a nice middle path between writing that's almost entirely plot driven, and writing that's almost entirely character driven.

As the 2/3 mark is hit, the action in The Eyre Affair's definitely heating up. Though, once again I really wish Beowulf would be given a fair shake.

After Mycroft burns the original Chuzzlewit manuscript, Acheron just moves onto another. His go to is Shakespeare, but since no original manuscripts exist he defaults back to 19th century works. Because in English literature there's the Bard and the Victorians. That's it. Everything in between and before isn't worth the vellum/paper it's written/printed on.

You wouldn't even need to go back as far as Beowulf, you could go with Chaucer. The Beowulf manuscript might not be an original, and neither may the surviving Chaucer manuscripts, but that mystery would only add to the suspense.

Or, hey, since they're both works that are over 500 years old, why not just speculate and say "yeah, that Beowulf/Canterbury Tales (use as desired) manuscript is the original"?

Thursday, June 27, 2013

Balancing books and brawls

The introduction of a quest to teach Gafka his best techniques makes it clear that Radiant Historia is winding down. Not to mention that the stores of late have had incredible equipment available, only the smallest amount of which has been within range of Stocke and co's gold, though.

Radiant Historia's been pretty good about keeping an even keel on the cost-to-winnings ratio. If you fight most of the battles offered you'll always have enough gold to equip your party (at least your main party) upon arrival in a new town. The game does tempt you away from this model, though, when you gain the ability to make Stocke invisible. When this ability's enabled enemies can't see you and you can slip through whole areas without getting into a single fight. Doing so gets you through the game a little bit faster, but also costs you gold and experience.

Yet, in a way, in costing you gold and experience for running through chunks of the game invisible, it does something interesting. It plays on your laziness by allowing you to fight strategically even late in the game. Depending on your party of choice of course. But with Raynie, Marco, and Stocke, for example, there's enough balance between techniques to do damage and techniques to cause status effects to open every fight by poisoning the enemy and lowering their stats or raising your own.

Rather interestingly, then, the game's chief mechanic of allowing you to shuffle through time is also present in the way you play the game, since you can shuffle through play styles to adapt to it throughout.

Lay Away Book Special: Clues amidst action

The Eyre Affair, once the tyre hits the kerb (if you'll excuse the overextension), really boils. It proved very difficult to keep aloof from it during the kidnapping of Thursday's Uncle Mycroft, her shoot-out in Archer's studio, and, particularly, her meeting with Landen wherein old wounds burst open. But, I'm still left wondering about the world it all happens in.

On page 145, Bowden Cable tells Thursday about a posting he'd applied for at "the equivalent of a LiteraTec office in Ohio." This suggests that, although literature might not be an internationally valued commodity, other media are so in other parts of the world. Being in Ohio, my guess is that the medium in question is film, or television, but that's just a guess. As it's described, the posting could really just be a library or archive position, the major concern of which being the rooting out of forgeries.

Likewise, on page 183, a reference to a Swindon troupe of audience members-cum-actors going to Sauvignon to repay a French troupe for their performance in Swindon could be taken to mean that Shakespeare is highly valued in France as well as England. But, again, that value could just be the sort of value that many people in the real world ascribe to the Bard and his works.

The mystery of Thursday Next's world persists.

Wednesday, June 26, 2013

Away Game Special: A recanting and a ranting

So it seems that each previous entry about Super Mario Galaxy 2 was wrong. Not entirely so, but major points of them. Not only can you do the air-getting jump from Yoshi's back while jumping, the game also still features the wildly swinging camera of the first game. That camera's just not so fully featured as it was.

The game's lack of the broader exploration of the first one is something to dwell on though. Since Mario's not jumping from planetoid to planetoid as he was in Super Mario Galaxy, the game feels flatter, and more linear. The level design feels more like that of Super Mario 64, where there was freedom to wander around large levels as there is in Super Mario Galaxy 2, but in a much more restricted way. This change makes it seem like Super Mario Galaxy  is going backwards, rather than forwards.

Mainline Super Mario games are hearkening back to the 2D platforming days of the NES and Super NES with each new iteration. With some three years between Super Mario Galaxy 2's release and this entry, each mainline Super Mario game released in between has been a tweaked version of the classic platformer. Some might complain about the similarity between the New Super Mario Bros. games or the DS and 3DS releases. But, the biggest change in those three years (and really, in something more like the last 15) is that Mario has branched out.

Super Mario RPG begot the Paper Marios and the handheld Super Mario RPGs; Mario Kart begot the subsequent iterations of the same, and, arguably, the other Super Mario sport titles. The straight-up adventure/platforming Super Mario games are their own thing as well now, and since this categorization's in place, none of them seem particularly innovative.

However, as Super Mario Galaxy 2 has shown so far, each Super Mario game does what its type and title suggest, and do it well.

Lay Away Book Special: Very superstitious?

The Eyre Affair has no chapter 13. Despite one being listed in the table of contents, it's not present. The pages nonetheless tick on, and it seems as though it was just a one page chapter. Undoubtedly this means something - but what?

Fforde continues to throw down puns with shocking regularity. I enjoy a good pun myself, even better if there's a run of them. But what bothers me about them in The Eyre Affair is that they're too specifically literary. On more than one occasion I've been anticipating literary puns that don't appear (when Thursday's been asked to meet two Gentlemen, I expected them to be from the "Verona Company" or some other concern named for that Italian city). As fun as it is to find pun inspiration in what you read, it detracts from it as well. Slowly, and bit by bit, sure, but nonetheless.

On the matter of literary self-sabotage, it's difficult not to wonder why literature is so valuable in The Eyre Affair's universe. The world Fforde has set up is definitely very appealing, but a little more explanation of what caused the world to center so much on literature (and if it's only so in England) would be much appreciated. The Eyre Affair being the first in the series, though, such an explanation is not likely to come up.

Tuesday, June 25, 2013

Away Game Special: Flattened space

So, the double jump from Yoshi's back is possible. A lack of experimentation and Super Mario Galaxy 2's weird fixed camera are my excuses for not realizing this sooner.

Writing of which, the game's camera is a major problem. In Super Mario Galaxy, the camera seemed more willing to swing around as you wandered over planetoids. Instead, in Super Mario Galaxy 2, the camera only flips with you if you use a pipe to move from one side of a planet to another. This discrepancy in the camera could be explained away with the presence of Yoshi or the second player's luma, having the extra player-controlled character on screen may've created problems with a more free-flowing camera.

In any case, with the camera being so much more fixed, Super Mario Galaxy 2 has a much more side-scrolling, isometric feel to it. It just isn't as a free and open as Super Mario Galaxy was, and thus doesn't have the 3D feel of its predecessor. 

Lay Away Book Special: The English way

Aside from a few moments where I couldn't help but roll my eyes (a character named "Jack Schitt" being one of them and gene splicer's licenses being "splicenses" being another), the Eyre Affair continues to be interesting. Fforde is very English in his style, and so some of the puns and turns of phrase are inevitable, but another thing has made itself apparent. There is a great deal of description.

As each room is entered, or every new scene begun, we get a quick rundown of what's in it. This grounds you as a reader, and helps to add some colour to the world, but often comes off as unnecessary. Its extraneous quality may well be why I noticed it in the first place. It's a pleasant enough thing to notice, but these descriptions are coming close to pulling me from the story. Too close.

The werewolf that Staker (or should it be "Stoker," as it is on page 84?) had arrested before he picked up Thursday is a nice touch, but I'm sure his bit part will later expand. Thursday shared her belief that Acheron Hades isn't dead with Staker after all, and only because she thought no one else was present to hear it. Inevitably that werewolf will return, English writing demands it. Though, with any luck, he won't return as a mere informant.

Monday, June 24, 2013

Away Game Special: Feverishly arhythmic

On the DS, the flicks and taps threw me for countless loops. But on the Wii, Rhythm Heaven (Rhythm Heaven Fever, to be precise) is strangely easy. I've only worked through three games so far, but each completion that's moved me forward has been far from perfect. Rhythm Heaven on the DS, comparitively, seems bent on making its players rhythm machines.

This leniency in the Wii version is welcome, though. Especially since my sense of rhythm is far from excellent. I'm sure I'm improving, but as the games have gotten more complex, I've fell to more of a reliance on the game's visuals and its music together. Following this mix of cues has served me fairly well, but I wonder how long it'll go on before rhythm becomes more second nature and the visual cues can be put aside.

There's something mystical about getting a good flow in any Rhythm Heaven game, and this is strangely helped by the very Japanese-styled, goofy, and bizarre imagery and characters on display throughout them. Perhaps they might even become distracting.

Lay Away Book Special: A return to the Affair

Being sucked into a show/movie/book/video game/board game is a trope. As such, it's difficult to do well and to really add anything new to the idea. Jasper Fforde manages to do so, though.

Fforde's description of the world within Jane Eyre stands alone. As Fforde has it what happens in the scene into which Thursday Next is drawn is limited to what's on the page, but the things happening on the border of that are up for alteration. This is a point nicely illustrated by her not being seen or not having anyone pay her any attention except for the dog Pilot, a character mentioned only in passing.

Throughout the scene in which Thursday describes her first dive into literature, such limits and rules are given. They aren't firmed up just yet, but Fforde gives his readers a sense of those rules and limits - enough to leave them with an idea of what to expect later in the book and enough to leave them wondering how far those limits and rules can be pushed.

Of course, equipped with such a teased out set of rules,  the explanation for the book's premise needs to be that much better. From what I've read so far, it looks like Fforde may be up for the task, but might not make the explanation as clear as some would like it to be.

Sunday, June 23, 2013

Away Game Special: Getting started in a new galaxy

Super Mario Galaxy 2 has a remarkably improved two player mode. Bringing the second player out from being nothing more than a star-shaped reticle of sorts to a small luma side-kick really expands what a second player can do. The second player can't give Mario a boost in his jumps anymore, but that's a relatively minor sacrifice.

The addition of Yoshi, though, seems like it's just a gimmick so far. A very cool on, definitely, but not quite as cool as it was in Super Mario World; the boost Mario'd get from jumping off of Yoshi's back mid-jump doesn't look like it's matched by hopping out of Yoshi's plush 3D saddle.

Using Yoshi's tongue as a grappling hook definitely opens up some interesting possibilities. Hopefully it doesn't just wind up replace the sling stars from Super Mario Galaxy.

Saturday, June 22, 2013

Away Game Special: the Demise of Skyward Sword

They finally got it right. It took the whole game, but the Zelda team got it. Yes, the final boss fight against Demise itself is the definition of epic. Link gets teleported to what must be the Sacred Realm (or at least the realm from which Zelda sends Adult Link back through time at the end of Ocarina of Time), your opponent looks to be twice your size, you fight in the middle of a lightning storm.

And, oh yeah, the sword fighting is pretty much like actual sword fighting.

Link swings, Demise defends, and in defending leaves you an opening to exploit. Plus, it doesn't leave its sword just hanging in its block, waiting for your counter attack, but actually withdraws and defends again seconds later.

Though, the second part of Skyward Sword's final boss does fall prey to having an attack elaborate enough to just wait out. Demise's electrified sword does massive damage to the Goddess Sheild and, unfortunately can't be countered directly.

Nonetheless, the fire-ringed final fight with Ganondorf from Twilight Princess has been topped, and now it's really anyone's guess as to how Zelda Wii U's boss will carry on with this upward trend in awesomeness.

Friday, June 21, 2013

A new challenge

Radiant Historia ticks on. The Alternate History challenge that the Gutrals bring forth is interesting. It's different from that of the Standard History, unsurprisingly, but perhaps without reason.

The Beast Mark that Stocke showed Gafka to move the story on is supposed to show that the Gutral's jungle temple has been braved. All the same, Stocke and co. are doubted. Thus, it would be interesting to have them go back to the temple but encounter something uproariously different there. Perhaps a bunch of Gutrals who are accepting of humans, or some greater challenge in the temple's depths could be found there.

As it stands, fighting further against Alistel as they go on their genocidal march is the order of the day. It's increasingly obvious that the Alternate History's winding down since the cutscenes are coming thick and fast.

Parting after the Dance

Speed reading the last half of A Dance with Dragons made it a much more break-neck experience. Not that the book's pace is ever that quick, mind. Just that the book's latter half is mostly scheming and plotting and set-up for the last 100 or so pages. And what a last 100!

Up until Quentyn tries to tame a dragon, the book was getting kind of dull, and everyone seemed way too safe for a Martin book. After that, and after the sequel of that scene, it became clear once more that no one - no one - was truly safe. And the epilogue's revelation of what Varys means by his "for the good of the realm" was a great thing to end with.

It's quite a bit better than the freeing of the slaves of Yunkai in the HBO show.

Thursday, June 20, 2013

Away Game Special: More Yarn

Kirby's Epic Yarn is definitely an easy game. But it does use that easiness to its advantage. In the Treat Land area (the third area), for example, there are a few levels with bottomless pits. These pits don't lead to a restarted level or a loss of a life, but they make a dent in your bead collection.

Since bead collection is a pretty big part of completing levels successfully (read: at 100%), this penalty can be quite severe. Especially since there are already a few levels with a paucity of beads to collect.

The loss of beads doesn't lead to a forced restart of a level, but it's just as annoying to fall to your "doom" after having amassed a hoard of them. Just as annoying, in fact, as if you were to lose a life and have to restart if you're intent on getting the gold rating on each level.

Running down the track

A strange question occurred to me while running through the world of Radiant Historia. On the overworld map, towns and explorable areas are joined by tracks that you must follow. Each time you jump around in time, certain of these tracks will be available, while others remain dark. However, at certain points in time, it's possible to travel further down certain tracks. 

So, could there be a way to see places off the beaten path at different times during the game's timelines? Could you go to Alistel after it had been turned against the Beastkind, while you were on your way to Forgia, for instance? Unfortunately, the answer to both of those questions is no. You can exit the explorable areas just about any way, but that won't let you veer from where you need to go in service to the game's story.
It's an unfortunate discovery, but if you could go anywhere at any time there would hardly be any need for tracks between towns and explorable areas. At least Stocke's cloaking ability lets you jet along those tracks and through every point along them.

A change of character

N.B.: My copy of A Dance with Dragons is due back at 8 p.m. tonight, and so tomorrow's entry will be based on the same book. Infinite Jest will return, though. And a new book will find its way into the line up as well.

The Wildling town Hardhome is surprisingly like the early American colony of Roanoke. Not in that the Wildlings were there to settle a brand new land, or sent by any queen to do so, but in that it disappeared under quite mysterious circumstances. Hardhome's vanishing was a great deal more destructive, but both stand as settlements that for some strange twist in fate floundered and failed.

The other thing to grab my attention is Martin's restoration of Theon. It happens, of course, through the actual meat of each of his chapters, but more so through his shifting chapter headings. It's nothing major to change these headings, but that they do change is novel. Up to this point, the chapter headings have seemed to be hard and fast. Also, coupled with the increase in the glimpses we get into characters' heads, these different headings don't just signal change of role and social place, but they also shift the story a bit more into the internal.

More than ever, snippets of past conversations and remembered questions are being repeated to great effect - from Tywin's "Where do whores go?" to Reek's various rhymes with his name. They're not ground breaking literary devices, but their presence adds greater depth to Martin's story. The only danger is that through repetitive use his characters become flat.

Wednesday, June 19, 2013

A fractured cap for the Triforce quest

If the lack of a sense of accomplishment plagues you at the end of the Triforce quest in The Wind Waker, I think I know why.

The Triforce is an item of such grand legend in the Zelda series that its alleged existence in former games stirred the internet to a fever pitch. Whenever Ocarina of Time's remade, and when the Master Quest was released, there were all sorts of rumours that the Triforce would be obtainable. It's the same thing in Ocarina's Beta Quest, and undeniably one of the coolest things about any Zelda 64 reconstruction project is the possibility that you would be able to get the Triforce.

The one game in which you do get the Triforce, A Link to the Past, has a supremely satisfying ending - and actually getting the Triforce is a major reason for that.

In The Wind Waker, quite obviously, you also get a piece of the Triforce. It's a quest that takes about two to three hours to complete, but the pay-off doesn't match the effort. Yes, you need to get the Triforce of Courage to progress in the game, but the immediate reward is just a cheap little animation. The game jumps to the inventory screen and shows the Triforce of Courage glow while all of its cracks and fissures disappear. This is, plainly and simply, just not enough.

The game's designers went to the trouble to make each piece unique, and yet the joining of them together gets a level of attention dwarfed by even the cinematic of the Triforce of Wisdom reforming:



Suffice to say, a more satisfying joining sequence can be added to the list of improvements I hope to see in The Wind Waker HD.

A game is afoot!

Eschaton sounds like a LARP. Without the usual medieval garb or fantasy apparel accompaniments, but like a LARP all the same. At the very least, it's a role-playing experience where players get to act as world leaders, in a world that reflects current events and figures.

And, as part of the RP of real, diplomatic people and events, each player has a certain number of nukes at their disposal. Though, it seems that they can't just be fired whenever a player might have need of one - there's a whole endnote about some of the calculations at work in the game. And it's a substantial note at that.

But Eschaton does have some tennis in it, as well, otherwise, why even include it in the book? Though, on that point, I never did wonder what the students do when they've got time off.

Tuesday, June 18, 2013

Trials and top choices

A game with a linear storyline that lets you freely travel to any major, revealed point on said storyline makes it hard to tell when you're overpowered.

The trials in the Holff Ruins were easily overcome. The second boss battle had me a little concerned, since the last giant pale blue arachnid I'd faced handed my head to me, but even that was easily dealt with. The strategy of "poison 'em, bludgeon 'em, heal yourselves, then bludgeon and magic 'em" worked as well on it as it did on the Shadow Gutral faced before it.

Cleaning out the ruins' treasure stores was pretty easy too, since Stocke can disappear. It may force me to grind later on, but for now having a party whose average level is 43 is working just fine.

Interestingly, the top choices, when it comes to forks in a timeline, continue to be the right ones. Choosing the lower option invariably leads to one of the game's many bad endings. It's kind of disappointing, since in the decision to stay or to go ahead of King Garland to fight off Dias in the Itolia Wasteland, the lower option is actually the one to pick.  Being a binary choice, though, a pattern's emerging is inevitable.

Dabbling in Dorne

Amidst the chapters with familiar characters who seem fairly immediate, Martin drops one from the perspective of Areo Hotah, the loyal protector of Doran Martell. Yes, it's back to Dorne, briefly, in book five.

Dorne still has Myrcella, it's true. There's also the Dornish plot to join the house of Martell to that of Targaryen. But Jon Connington and Varys have a similar plot to join Targaryen to Targaryen. And then there's everything happening back in Westeros itself. Dorne seems far away for even a place of pure fancy amidst all of those other plots. Why bring it up again?

Being epic fantasy, the best reason I can fathom is simply: why not? Martin's got a lot of threads to account for, so what's one more to weave in with the rest?

Monday, June 17, 2013

Charts and Challenges

I set out on the last leg of the Triforce Chart hunt, thinking I'd only find that chart. Instead, I came away with a chart that shows where all of The Wind Waker's hidden caves are, where all of the heart containers are, and where all of the sea platforms are. These could be useful, sure, but much earlier in the game. At this point, things are wrapping up and I doubt that anyone would remember all of the things that they've already gone through and/or gotten.

Also, after having fought four Darknuts simultaneously for the second time, I've got to say that their bunching up is irksome. It's a great defense, which draws out the fight, but it's also a sure way to knock off helmets while leaving their armour on. And since they're practically impervious to everything except a sharp sword point, an exposed head is little help.

Still, despite the problems of the four-on-one Darknut vs. Link match ups,  such battles are just plain fun.


Why I love this chic albatross necklace

Although appreciated, I didn't need the details of Mario's birth and physical appearance. He's already my favourite Incandenza. The section that describes how he looks in detail, though, does evoke a lot of empathy. A little bit of pity, too, but only because some of his current physical shortcomings are the result of Orin's being too rough with him when they were young. Anyone with a brother or two can probably relate.

Nonetheless, it did finally clear up what exactly Mario's police lock was all about. It's basically his kickstand, unless amidst all of the section's endnotes part of my understanding successfully made a break for it.

Following this section directly with more of the mountaintop conversation of Marathe (the Quebecois wheelchair assassin) and Steeply (U.S.A. secret agent) is a genius move. Their dialogue is clearly the theme engine of the book, but we hear so little from them (thus far) that said themes never have the chance to be overwhelming.

In fact, this combination reminds me of what I've enjoyed about Infinite Jest so far: the continually broadening glimpses of the book's plot (endnote 114 refers to the company that sponsored the last year of subsidized time), its absurd society, and surrealist treatment of things strange and fantastical as everyday and quotidian.

Sunday, June 16, 2013

Pact with sidequests

Well. It seems that Radiant Historia isn't just like Chrono Trigger because of its time travel. The mysterious, unbeaten-in-all-styles master of martial arts is a kind of Goblin. Just as Spekkio was (at least as far as Crono and co. could see him) a monster, so too, the master of special abilities in Radiant Historia is. 


Though the techniques learned from Master Vainqueur aren't all magic-based. And it seems that the "Pact" items needed to learn them are the rewards for late-game sidequests. I'm left wondering why a chef-in-training would have one, but I suppose to all of the uninitiated they just look like paper charms.

As of now, the sidequesting is over, and the game's end is coming into view. Despite that, just how and where the best weapons can be found remains mysterious. Hopefully they can just be bought in the Gutral town of Forgia - there've already been sidequests enough.

Repetition

Unsurprisingly the theatricality of the priests of R'hllor is a mix of charlatanism and actual spell weaving. Though, as was the case with the Undying of Qarth, it seems that the magic of Martin's world relies on tremendous stores of power to be effective.

The Undying grew stronger around Dany's dragons (a point which will hopefully come up again, since they're getting bigger, and therefore should have a larger field of effect), and Melisandre has noted how her powers are increased in the presence of the Wall. Though everything learned about her powders and such (early chemical weapons, in a sense) was learned from her perspective. Indeed there are many new voices in this Dance.

But aside from the increasing presence of magic at the Wall and beyond it (in Bran's) story arc, there's a strange increasing of repetition. Repetition of a single phrase: "The moon was a crescent, thin and sharp as the blade of a knife."

This phrase is repeated most often in the Bran chapter where he learns about being a greenseer, and always kicks off a section where he's wearing a different skin, but its repetition is grating, jarring. Given that it's used to signal a shift in Bran's state, this jarring quality of the repetition could be a good thing. But each time it was repeated, I flipped back to its last occurrence; it pulled me out of the story.

Saturday, June 15, 2013

Idle sailing

The hunt for the Triforce Charts continues, and what I've pulled from it is that seagull piloting is tough.

On Bird's Peak Island, I must've wheeled around that second-to-last switch at least three times. Thankfully, the last one was handily dealt with by bow and arrow. After such a challenge, though, just going below and conducting the Wind's Requiem made getting that chart seem quick. Strangely so, considering the lag in this part of the game.

But it's not a bad lag.

What better way to make a game based on the ocean replicate the feel of sailing and of grandeur than of making a sailing-heavy part of it slow. It would definitely be going too far into realism if there were certain days when you couldn't leave port because of storms, but the slow sailing times aren't terrible. It forces you to take the end of the game more slowly, and really, why is it necessary to rush through a game, something that's supposed to fill your leisure time?

A relevant pseudo sub-note

What began as an endnote of examples of the communication between Orin and The Moms quickly degraded into a full-length telephone conversation with Hal. However, it seems that since it hijacked an endnote with relevance, it's actually another tantalizing taste of the plot pie Wallace has cooling on the over-large window sill that is the introductory matter of Infinite Jest.

Up to now, things like O.N.A.N. (One North American Nation) and the Great Concavity/Convexity (a shift in the US/Canada border) have been bandied about, but Orin's questions nail down their importance. Quebec is rife with separatist extremists in the world of the novel, and what can be drawn from the phone call in this endnote is that these extremists are making the rest of Canada look like it doesn't want to be a part of O.N.A.N.

Apparently, or so the theory goes, this is just a ruse by said separatists so that they can later blackmail Ottawa into letting them separate and take the Great Convexity with them. Said convexity currently being a large garbage dump, essentially. But since this ruse is fuelled by extremist action, it's necessary for it to continue. It doesn't get mentioned, but again, it can be deduced that the unfinished TP cartridge James O. Incandenza left the world is one means of these extremist attacks.

At this point, all that's really left, is some main text confirmation. And then, things can finally get under way.

Friday, June 14, 2013

With some questing on the side

Though now some two chapters behind, Radiant Historia's Alternate History is now one step closer to being brought back up to snuff. However, since the two creatures you fight in the Cygnus tournament after having beaten your human opponents are from the Abyssia Forest, and that's where Stocke and co. must go to earn their right to treat with the Gutral, I'm making every preparation possible.

So, I've just been running through sidequests. It's definitely very helpful to be able to do them at any time, since too often - even in games involving time travel like Chrono Trigger - it's easy to miss your chance to set them off. Travelling around in the game's quite linear storyline, though, always keeps sidequests - those found, and those yet to be found - ready for picking up.

Since the game's nearing its end, many of those side-quests involve secret techniques for characters, or best equipment. The set of tasks tied to the even "Living Legend" has already yielded a few "Pacts" that purport to teach special techniques, but it seems that they all need to be found before they can be learned.

In keeping with the game's fairly free-flowing time travel mechanic, most quests can't be completed as soon as you find them. Or, later in the game, they require a lot more jumping around. My hope is that the Living Legend won't prove to be one of the latter, since if it does then I may find it necessary to gather all of the spear and sword techniques from a sidequest started much earlier in the game. And such would put the "ech" in fetch quest.

More spins and dips - and a toss

More and more, different characters are taking on different genres. Davos is still very much reading like he's in a story of deep intrigue, especially as he's lead to a secret meeting with Lord Wyman. Dany's reading more and more as something more political. And Jon's chapters are still very much about the vigours of his office - with a bit of Melisandre thrown in for good measure.

What else can I really say? Tyrion's chapters are the ones that seem to be the most dynamic, but which Queen he was being taken to was never much of a mystery. His captor has too much loyalty to the one much closer, and who's likely to be much more benign towards Tyrion. And who wouldn't want to be loyal to someone with dragons?

It's definitely awesome to see Rickon pulled back into the story, as well. Though whether or not that will actually play out before the end of the book has yet to be seen. 400 pages out of 959 have been read, and yet it looks like there are still a few more new perspective characters in the last 559.

Thursday, June 13, 2013

Triforce wrangling, part one

When Link falls down a hole in the ground does he scream because the length of the fall surprises him?
Or is it because he reaches the bottom and is terrified by what he sees? Why does he even scream when he falls down holes? Without a formal count, a solid guess as to how many he's dove down so far would be 30. Maybe Link's just always optimistic about his fall, but then ultimately disappointed and his scream is an expression of the inescapable loop in which he has found himself.

As you might've guessed, I'm in the thick of the Triforce wrangling section of The Wind Waker.

In a Developer Direct with Eiji Aonuma (posted as part of the E3 blitz), he pointed out that this part of the game ruined the experience's pacing and is something that many players complained about. I can see why, because it's unlike anything we've ever had to do in a Zelda game before.

But, it also suits the game very well.

The Wind Waker is supposed to be a game about an adventure in a flooded version of Hyrule, making sea travel essential. Plus, there's no shortage of treasure (and other) charts that show you where treasure (or subs, or Big Octos, or the Triforce Charts) are. Exploration via sailing is a huge, and necessary, part of the game. Sailing around Hyrule to find the Triforce charts, and the things themselves, is then a logical way to wrap the game up.

However, if the Zelda team does make a change to the Triforce hunt in Wind Waker HD, hopefully they give us direct access to the sunken surface of old Hyrule for it.

Prelude to an endnote

The continuing adventures of Poor Tony, his entrance into the long hallway of the cold, Thanksgiving Day-related bird, is suitably sobering. The sections involving the member of the former trio of transvestite junkies always are. Reading them as a drug P.S.A., even silently, is, I think, the equivalent of throwing a hefty 1000+ page book in the general direction of dependency. It's the sort of thing to scare even the thing itself away.

The parts about E.T.A. and the wild extracurricular courses offered by the pro-rectors are a ridiculous counterpoint. Though the note about the one staff member filling the room with the stench of it does make me wonder just what vitamin B itself smells like.

Wednesday, June 12, 2013

A paling villainy

Thanks to my referring to a guide a few entries ago, I now know that I've entered into the penultimate chapter of Radiant Historia's Standard History. The plot runs rather simply: it's back to Granorg to deal with Eruca's stepmother Queen Protea, Selvan, and Dias.

Over the course of the game, you really do come to know these figures, but that they're evil? Not quite. General Hugo is very plainly a vile person with no redeeming motivations whatsoever. He is a true villain. Dias, Selvan, and Protea? Well, not so much somehow.

They're shown to be scheming, and at one point it's made clear that Dias and Selvan are in fact using Protea as a figurehead. The politics of Granorg are demonstrably broken, but not quite so much evil.

Alistel's General Hugo might resonate more with me because he either manipulates or is manipulated by something far more mysterious than himself: the as yet unseen Prophet Noah. Thus, like Darth Vader and Saruman before him, Hugo has some shadowy association with something greater than himself. Plus, there's the strong possibility that Hugo is wielding the powerful Black Chronicle.

The lack of this same shadowy something on the Granorg side of the game's expansive story makes them lack any real villainy. It seems as though none of them have any sense of the power of Eruca's bloodline or the ritual they must perform to maintain the balance of mana in the world. Thus, their only motivation is political, and in a game where the stakes are as high as the fate of the world, politics are hardly as interesting as otherworldly powers.

Differences between Feasts and Dances

There's a pretty even share of female characters between the settings featured in A Dance with Dragons and A Feast for Crows. However, there's way more sex in A Dance with Dragons - both implicit and explicit. But it isn't overblown nor does it come across as cheesy. It's written with a straightforward and minimalist description, touching on only the essentials of such encounters.

It's quite accurate the way that Martin has his female characters getting into arrangements that are politically or socially beneficial, but much less so for love. Insofar as the world of A Song of Ice and Fire is a reproduction of medieval Europe. Dany's turning Daario away, for example. Or Asha's being wedded to Erik Ironmaker. Both actions are strategic in some way or other, but certainly not done out of love.

Setting A Dance with Dragons apart, though is the number of characters going by nicknames or epithets, even perspective characters. For some such measures make sense, Sansa for example, or Theon, are so much changed from what they were, a new name is fitting. But some come across as merely stirring up intrigue.

"The Wayward Bride" (Asha), for instance, at first intrigued. But, once it was clear that it was just Asha, the nature of my interest changed. It went from the desire to solve a mystery to curiousity. I'd like to say that not presenting such chapters with characters' given names suggests that they're immune to harm, that they aren't on Martin's kill list. But by that logic Syrio Forel must be alive and well, since he was but a side character, and not even the face of his own chapter.

Tuesday, June 11, 2013

Savage from room to room to reward

It's a little known fact that Twilight Princess was originally going to be a sequel to The Wind Waker. Though the final versions of both games are quite different, some things in Twilight Princess are the stuff of a The Wind Waker sequel. The Wind Waker's Hookshot, though not clawed, feels quite a bit like the prototype of Twilight Princess' Clawshot and Double Clawshots. It might be an obvious connection (the case could be made for them just being the same item, merely redrawn), but there's another that's more substantial.

The quest for the Triforce Charts in The Wind Waker, takes Link back to his home of Outset Island. On the isle, the chart is found in the "Savage Labyrinth," a series of rooms infested with enemies from throughout the game. Any players of Twilight Princess will recognize this idea's being reused for that game's "Cave of Ordeals." But it wasn't just the idea that was carried over. The ultimate reward - even the final room - is similar.

As mentioned, these areas involve 51 and 50 rooms respectively, each holding a group of enemies to be handily dispatched. The final room of each involves a mad melee with four Darknuts, and the final reward of each is particularly underwhelming.

In Twilight Princess, the various Light Spirit fountains across the land become populated with fairies. In The Wind Waker, you get a piece of heart. Twilight Princess' reward is slightly more substantial, but considering that both involve a solid 40+ minutes of battling and neither can be completed until the final leg of each game, their rewards fall far short of the effort required.

At least the in-game rewards are rather thin. Hardcore Zelda players will take each area's completion as a point of pride, but it would be much more incredible if there was something grander at the bottom of each. Maybe a scroll that teaches Link the sword beam technique.

Maybe that's one of the things added to The Wind Waker HD (along with a higher gear for the boat), or at least such is hoped.

More pre-plot (P.P.) Infinite Jest (I.J.)

So now I know the story of Orin Incandenza. I know just how he fared as a junior tennis player, why he made the switch to football, and what became of him while his lady love was intercepted by his dad's obsession with film. It feels like I've just ingested a chunk of information broken off of an underground vein, like I've just taken in an entire pink salt sheet's worth of information.

And still the plot's obscured. Locked behind not a wall of ice that could easily melt, but a wall of salt that has to be licked away, stroke by stroke.

It's a shame, too, since the end of the last chapter, chronicling the antics and relations had on the bus ride back to E.T.A. from the tournament Hal and co. were attending was genuinely entertaining. Particularly in the same way that Ben Horne is entertained in the second season of Twin Peaks by old home movies; Wallace captures the feel of the teenage field trip bus ride excellently. And he's also not too far off the mark, when writing that grad school is a delay of the real world and an elongation of adolescence in an endnote (#94).

If only there were more references to people doing Pierre Trudeau impressions (pages 282-83), pre-plot Infinite Jest would be a more even read.

Monday, June 10, 2013

Less than a score of striking songs

Radiant Historia doesn't have a huge variety of music. I'm about 2/3 through the game at this point and I've heard a handful of different background songs. There's one for general field traversing, one for towns, one for scenes meant to be touching, one for hardcore boss battles, and one for scenes meant to be action packed.

There have been others (the one playing while Stocke and co. wander Cygnus is pretty catchy), but those are the five that stand out (and are repeated) the most.

But, oh boy, that theme for action scenes can really get you pumped. Particularly when you're navigating your way through an enemy solider-filled desert with ballista bolts and arrows constantly raining down. That theme, however often repeated, has really made the assault on Dias' troops in the Itolia Wasteland an exciting section of the game.

So far there haven't been any hints that this section will end with a battle between Stocke and Dias (it's still leaning more towards King Garland and Dias), but at the least hopefully the section doesn't fizzle into an anticlimax.

The short and the deep

After hearing that George R.R. Martin likes to keep his readers and viewers in constant fear for the characters that they love, I was almost fooled into believing an untruth. The way one chapter of A Dance with Dragons ended, it seemed as if the cast was about to lose its most well-spoken kinslayer.

Of course, it would have been a death treated much too lightly, even for Martin. Even, I'd go so far to say, as the climax of an atmospherically creepy river-boating scene. Though, perhaps this imp's not to be taken off the list of the dead just yet, since he has been taken by a bear.

The other chapters read in this section - another of Jon's, more of Davos, and one from Reek - were all great reads. I'm really enjoying the ways in which Martin's using internal monologues with Reek and Tyrion to create dissonance within characters. It's nothing shockingly new, but it suggests that more might explicitly be made of people's inner struggles. And, as entrancing as reading a well-choreographed fight scene can be, watching characters battle against themselves is that much more satisfying.

Sunday, June 9, 2013

Seas v. Skies

Link is pretty impervious. He takes getting hit by cannon fire quite well, losing only 1/4 of a heart. And the King of Red Lions takes no visible damage whatsoever.

The sea battles in The Wind Waker, as simple as they are, are definitely the game's overworld's saving grace. They make travelling between places more interesting, and add an extra layer to accessing those islands around which ships keep a tight perimeter. It's also hard to deny that it's just plain fun to put on the Magic Shield and barge into a three-on-one bout, cannon blazing.

This built-in distraction from travel is what Skyward Sword's "Above the Clouds" area is missing. There are some enemies flying around up there, but none of them actually engage you. They'll fire off rocks as you pass, or fly in a set pattern bearing rupees, but none give chase or effectively bar your way.

As lush and lovely as Skyward's Sword's environments are, its three dimensionality of movement in flight is what does that mechanic in. Nothing can really bar your way if you can just fly over or under it. Though jumping over sharks on the Great Sea is fine.

Back in the Ennet House

Back to the Ennet House for a section of pure observation. We're treated to the thoughts and interpretations of Don Gately as he observes the residents of the House.

It's not a bad section, and there's even a bit of a laugh at the end. But its realism is just too hysterical. There's just so much detail it's ridiculous. I want to say that the detail's padding, but I don't think that's true.

Instead of padding the book out, touching a little bit on every character in the room, though maybe only two matter is so drawn out that it becomes part of the process of building up to the plot. Scenes like this one aren't just read - they're built upon, even if some of the bricks are only bricks.

Saturday, June 8, 2013

Scenes from the Historia

Now it's just a matter of time. But, along the way there are still some really cool sidequests - especially since some of them fork off into completion and one of Radiant Historia's many bad endings. The most recent of these showed Marco's rage erupting after Stocke sent an old friend of his to her doom. The bundled mercenary kills everyone in your party, save for Stocke, but, since Eruca's dead, the desertification of the world continues unabated.

Awesome "Game Over" (or as the game prefers "Fin") scenes aside, there are some problems with its cutscenes.

In the scenes with Marco's old friend, for example, we're expected to assume that they're close based on their short burst of dialogue. Because Marco's usually played as a comic relief character, getting us to care about him and this character that's interacted with for less than a minute isn't easy to do. The game gets us to recognize their relationship, but it doesn't give it quite enough impact. I'd go so far to say that it's a handheld version of something a console game like Xenoblade Chronicles would probably make utterly expansive.

Just before the scene with Marco and his friend, we're treated to another. This one features Raynie explaining why Cygnus is important to her. As a character that we've seen develop from nearly the start of the game, it's a much more effective scene - even if it's an aspect of her character developed within the last 1/2 hour or so of gameplay.

Could a Collier's encyclopediac epic work?

Davos' chapters are quickly becoming detective stories. Though, it's not that there's some sort of mystery to solve, just that he is currently motivated by information. It's not something that you often see in fantasy novels. 

Likewise, I've not read much fantasy that makes its own world's lore quite so interesting as the bits about dragons we get with Tyrion. It's enough to make me wonder if a story about someone collecting information for an encyclopedia could work. If it's written well, anything could work right?

Speaking of which, the inventory of the Wall's food stores is fairly interesting. The suggestion of the Wall's magic in Jon's thinking it shouldn't be as cold as it is under it nods towards the series' hidden fantastical. However, the rest of the chapter was compelling, but it fell flat at the end. 

Most of Martin's chapters end just as their events feel like they're at or about to reach a climax, Jon's latest was quite a bit less so. Jon's concern about how long their stores will last just doesn't match the introduction of more hill tribes and the intrigues of Stannis' knights.

Friday, June 7, 2013

A sword that radiates light without heat

The fight against Molgera in the Wind Temple is incredible. It's a little weird that anything would leave its weak spot so conveniently exposed, but, well, yeah.

In an ideal world the smaller sand worms that it sends out would actually be bits of its tail. They would curl up when hit them and you would need to toss them into Molgera's gaping maw to shorten it and expose the main body's weak point.

Nonetheless, it was an intense battle, even if it came from a designer on the Zelda team simply acting on the thought: "What if we forced players to beat Twinmold from Majora's Mask as regular sized Link?"

Now, all that's left in the game, aside from the final dungeon and the battle with Ganondorf, is to find all the pieces of the Triforce of Courage. The section of the game that's reviled by as many fans as there are people who dismissed The Wind Waker out of hand because of its graphical style. I think it'll be a good excuse to go through some sidequests and to work my way through all of the treasure charts I've collected.

But, this last part of the game won't be as awesome as it could have been. The Master Sword is fully powered up now, and it creates its own light when drawn. It gives off no heat though. Beam-shaped, projectile heat, I mean. Even when Link's at full hearts.

It's disappointing that Link's swings don't shoot sword beams because it makes the final form of the Master Sword less badass, and because Fierce Deity Link could fire off energy waves in Majora's Mask.

The games' relative sizes aside, isn't the Gamecube more powerful than the Nintendo 64? Where are those sword beams at?

Hypotheses in lieu of plot

Infinite Jest is a proud member of the Hysterical Realism genre. It's also a novel that prominently features a tennis academy. So, twelve pages about the ins and outs of a tournament and of players' prepping for it shouldn't be a surprise. I guess I was just so close to the plot, that there might be something more delivered.

Nonetheless, given what's known about the book so far, a few guesses can be made. All of these guesses are predicated on the fact that the book's first chapter is, chronologically, its last. In said chapter, Hal is under some sort of duress, or has become unable to speak. Here are my hypotheses.

1) Hal watches the tape that's going around, the one that kills because it's so entertaining. However, he doesn't watch enough of it for it to be fatal, only paralyzing to his vocal chords/tongue. Alternatively, he is given some sort of anti-tape after having watched it, but part of it has been taped over, and that part somehow corresponds to his loss of speech.

2) Hal's loss of speech is the result of his substance use, which, Schacht has recently noted, is quite frequent.

3) Hal's loss of speech is the result of just the one incidence, where he and Pemulis and Axford take their hits of the super powerful chemical Pemulis picked up.

Given the tenor of the book to this point, the first hypothesis seems most likely to me, the others lending themselves to too much of a P.S.A. Since Infinite Jest is supposed to be at least slightly parodic, drug P.S.A.'s don't seem like they'd fit. At least not as actual attempts to move drugs out of youth culture.

Thursday, June 6, 2013

Spiders big enough to have HP bars

The tournament in Cygnus' square offers a true challenge. The first of the non-human opponents is just a giant bear, something that can be dealt with if you have the patience to grin and push forward. But the Mist Spider that follows it is all levels of peach pit crazy.

It does 120-150 HP of damage per hit and always seems to hit twice. It takes up the whole field and then some, so Aht's "Bomb" techniques cannot be used. Overall it's something that simply overwhelmed level 41 Stocke and level 35 Aht. So, the game's regular story was picked up.

Not that doing so was enough to escape field-filling spiders.

After you find Eruca in the dungeons, Marco and Raynie appear, having simply walked in since the guard was gone.

Gone to help fend off four fully grown Hell Spiders!

Likely a diminutive cousin of the Mist Spider, this beast is all orange and brown, and packs a wallop. With Raynie's magic and Marco's miscellaneous skills, though, bringing it down was no cause for concern. Especially since it had the nerve to waste turns with a move that reduced the party's speed - a strategy that seems utterly pointless since the game's major battle mechanic is the ability to shuffle around the turn order.

So, needless to say, the spider was put in its place, and a new chapter of the Standard History was opened up. When Radiant Historia moves, it moves fast.

Assurance through Displacement

Game of Thrones, the HBO show, and the books in A Song of Ice and Fire are rife with differences. I never imagined that one thing in particular would be quite so different, though.

Having only just started reading A Dance with Dragons, I had thought that the Theon torture scenes in the show were added merely because of the popularity of his character or of Alfie Allen. Now that Reek's been encountered, though, it's clear that those scenes were not at all added. Sort of.

In the book, Reek's only introduced after the torture that we see Theon undergo in the show. Knowing that he's still going to be in the show, that he won't perish whilst under Ramsay Bolton's knife, ruins the surprise and suspense somewhat, just as having seen the show made it obvious who Reek really was from page one. Though I doubt that this new found knowledge will make watching Theon's torture scenes any easier.

Wednesday, June 5, 2013

An eventful dungeon crawl

The Wind Temple is well suited to all of its dirt and trees. It's a low down place that takes advantage of your progressing through it. When Makar had sprouted all the requisite trees and the door into the main chamber opened, I balked at the brief scene in which he's surrounded by Floormasters, fearing the need to back track to the first room. I went ahead anyway, convinced that I could get the hookshot without him.

However, as it happened, Makar had just been moved into the main chamber, locked behind a giant stone statue. So I went on, and had my conviction confirmed. The hookshot was handily found and won, and Makar was as good as freed.

But this in-dungeon event is a solid example of what the Zelda team claims to be trying to do with the series. When we first had word of the game that would become Skyward Sword, making the overworld and dungeons more seamless was one of the major things that they were trying to achieve. In some small way, they did it here.

Dungeons are, after all, a space in a video game where players get to try their skills against the game's challenges. They have to use what they have with/around them to solve puzzles, defeat enemies, and move forward. More often than not, these are solitary affairs, any accompanying characters basically becoming an advanced sort of box. You can drop them on switches, move them about, maybe use their special ability to solve puzzles, but they don't necessarily get much personality outside of their dialogue and appearance.

However, putting events, actual things that happen because x, y, and/or z have happened (or are "True," or are present), in dungeons changes their feel all together. It allows the other characters in the dungeon (traditionally populated only with monsters) to actually interact with the player as characters and not just another tool to be used.

In the briefest terms, it takes the dungeon experience (where the usual interaction is with enemies and involves putting your weapons through them) and adds a more nuanced interaction. Adding this interaction is what can make the dungeon/overworld split more seamless because it makes the two areas seem more alike, rather than each being especially set aside for different purposes. Dungeons thus have the potential to become bustling places of character and story development rather than being the thing that players work through to get to the next social area where story and plot can develop.

Hopefully we see this sort of seamlessness fully implemented in Zelda Wii U.

Plot and Endnotes

It's still supposed to be hundreds of pages away, but the plot keeps appearing. As if the section where Orin calls Hal to tell him he thinks he's being followed wasn't so much a grab bag as a smorgasbord. It gave some insight into both characters, filled in some of the Incandenzas' family history, and made it possible for a teenage tennis player to take 10 pages to clip the toenails of one foot.

As much as learning about Wallace's characters is fun, there's still quite a bit left out of the experience. I'd rather a deluge of plot compared to its current trickle. Though, I wonder if the endnotes would inspire as much excitement/anxiety if the plot were already humming along.

As it is, each endnote is like a call into the boss' office. You never know what's up until the meeting's practically ended.

Tuesday, June 4, 2013

The time travelling party

I must've been too liberal with my cutscene skipping since I completely missed Gafka's showing Stocke  how to control chi. If it wasn't for the "Story" option under the "Camp" menu, I probably would've written this about an apparent glitch in the game.

Anyway, having learned the chi technique, the fight with the gladiator is a breeze. A breeze! The fights that he offers after he's been beaten are a fair deal more difficult, though, particularly because Aht is a traditional magic user character. Her spells are useful strategically, and can be powerful, but she's as sturdy as the fringes on her poncho.

In any other game based on time travel, the solution would be simple, come back to this point when I have more party members I can swap in. But Radiant Historia doesn't work like that. It keeps time travel much more straightforward, giving you the party you had at whatever node you go to. Thankfully, they keep their latest equipment and levels.

In that sense, and I wonder if it will be addressed, Stocke's not really the only one time travelling. Everyone in the party must have themselves spread out over the timeline so that levels gained and equipment held in Chapter Four show up in Chapter One.

A Shifting of Favour

Though his chapters were rarely anything special before (aside from, well, the one kissed by fire being extinguished), Jon's chapters are quickly becoming my favourite. I'm still very keen to see what becomes of Bran, but right now that plot arc is all about the journey rather than the destination. Though, reading of him so shortly before this week's episode really hit home how succinctly the HBO show is able to portray things.

What did it for me in the most recent Jon chapter, though, was a witty kind of device that underlines the continuing relevance of written stories. In said chapter, Jon approaches Janos Slynt with the order to take command of the wall castle Greyguard. Slynt refuses, since he doesn't regard Jon as a proper Lord Commander.

The conflict escalates until Jon and Slynt cross paths in the mess hall. It's here that we're given Jon's internal debate regarding what he should do with Slynt. But rather than making it a straight monologue, Martin shows Jon going through two options in his head, by listing each and then narrating the consequences that Jon perceives.

This method paces the moment perfectly, and holds the illusion of watching events from Jon's perspective. Plus, he allows the suspense of what Jon's third and penultimate decision is to linger for the space of a thought, which is just long enough to make the pay off all the more shocking and riveting.

Add to this the allusion to Ned's own philosophy regarding judgement and who should swing the executioner's sword. It's this reference that slams home the fact that Jon is transformed as a character. As Maester Aemon advised him, he has killed the boy within.

Monday, June 3, 2013

Worthy of the Triforce of Courage?


I'm beginning to wonder about the character of Link in The Wind Waker.

He seems like an upstanding fellow, but at the same time, he never goes in first.

At the entrance of both of the dungeons requiring him to bring along an awakened sage, the pair finds themselves at a well. The first one down this well is never Link, but instead the sage, either Medli or Makar. I want to say that he does the same with Tetra when the two enter the chamber of the Master Sword in sunken Hyrule, but I don't remember if such is the case.

The feel of the wind temple is very, well, festive. The fiddle music is what gives it this atmosphere, though from memory this is the more difficult dungeon.

The puzzles aren't as difficult as those in the Earth Temple, but because Makar's ability is to grow trees from patches of bare earth he sometimes has to venture on ahead, or is left exposed to enemies. Such exposure means there're more chances of resets in here.

What's more, in the Earth Temple, you could get Medli into a shaft of light, which shielded her from most foes. And, of course, you could always drop her by the door, clear the room, and then sally forth together.

Playing it safe with the same strategy that got me through the Earth Temple without difficulty may be as effective here in the Wind Temple, though. Yet, Floormasters could still prove troublesome.

Of a Jest and Dragons

The writing in A Dance with Dragons is good, by fantasy standards, but it doesn't stand up to Infinite Jest. But the characters in Infinite Jest don't match those in A Dance with Dragons.

This disparity is the result of the two books' different genres, at least in part. Genre fiction tends not to bother with stylistic flourish, and instead works on people's emotions with other people. Great works of science fiction, fantasy, and mystery are great works because they acknowledge some part of human nature that resonates with people in a timeless (or near enough) way to make them continually relevant.

The sort of literary fiction of which Infinite Jest is considered a part tends to do this far less. Great literary works are still great because they speak to something fairly timeless within a lot of people, but they tend to have pretty bland, generic characters.

Aside from its torrents of detail, Infinite Jest stands out because its characters are a little bit more interesting. Though they take on this special quality for negative reasons, rather than genre fiction's positive ones.

Now, all characters are flawed that's one of the essential elements of any good character. But in genre fiction, the characters that stand out are more often than not those that are good examples of traits. Tyrion, for example, is a complex character,  but he is a good example of an intelligent person, one who adapts to his situation while holding true to his bitter hatred of his father (and later of his brother and sister).

In literary fiction, however, characters are more often flawed so deeply that part of our interest in them is watching them crash and burn. Or simply watching someone as flawed as we are meander through their situation as well as they can. They're built for literary fiction's plots, which are more apt to meander themselves as allegiances shift and goals change.

There aren't many novels studied in English class that keep to a plot so steadfastly as a fantasy epic where the essential goal is to save the world.

Sunday, June 2, 2013

Sidequests and GameFAQS

After finishing off a few sidequests, I caved. I caved and I looked up where I needed to go to learn to use chi, and the obviousness of the answer was disappointing. Simply go to the opening of Chapter Four in the Alternate History, and you're good to go.

Now, I still have to get to the actual teaching event, but it's just on a little further.

As per the sidequests that I finished, one stands out. A boy is worried about his dad, who went to the frontline at the Sand Fortress without his lucky amulet. Stocke's given the amulet to return to the boy's father, and then the father writes his son a letter. You deliver the letter, and are treated to a brief scene that reflects the familial hardships of war.

Looking at the description of the item the boy gives raises some questions, though. It's something called "Celestial Oil," and it comes from something called the "Boundary Tree." A tree as a boundary in a world with mana immediately brings the idea of a mana tree to mind.

Surely the desertification of a world could be linked back to such a tree, and so my curiosity's piqued. Hopefully not in vain.

A refreshing stir of old embers

Read the warning in this blog's banner before proceeding. Here there be spoilers.

Having made my way through four sections of A Dance with Dragons, a pattern's emerged. Only  Daenerys' chapter had bits intended to refresh the reader. They're the parts of narration that often show up in sequels. A paragraph here to explain this reference to an earlier plot point or device, some explanation of why a character matters that's based on past books' events. That sort of thing.

Since Daenerys didn't show up in A Feast for Crows, it's clear why G.R.R.M. included refreshers in her chapter. Hers was also the preview chapter at the end of A Feast for Crows. Curiously, Cersei's first chapter from that book was the preview chapter from A Storm of Swords.

Of course, that doesn't mean that the women of the series are being touted as anything, Cersei's a major player at King's Landing, the core of A Feast for Crows. Likewise, all plots within the reach of her gravity turn around Daenerys, it seems.

Tyrion's on his way to her, just as Selmy was two books back. Of course, Tyrion's chapters are more wit-based than anything Selmy would have starred in. I didn't get the impression that the dialogue in Tyrion's recent chapter was as forced as it was in his first in A Dance with Dragons, since there's much more interrogation going on.

Though, I have to unabashedly praise where praise is required.

Jon Snow's not my favourite character by far, yet Ygritte is definitely in my top three for secondary characters. Her death forced me to close the book and call it a day as far as reading further went, and all because of her signature line.

When Melisandre repeats this line at the end of Jon's first chapter in Dance, I teared up. Ygritte's character resonated so much with me that that's all it takes, just a sign pointing back to her and her tragic death. So well done with Ygritte's characterization, G.R.R.M., well done indeed.

Saturday, June 1, 2013

A buggy chest?

I know that my The Wind Waker disc has some problems. They aren't game breaking, by any means, but they're there. And they mostly manifest themselves in freezes.

You'll play for a lengthy amount of time, or have discovered a lot since your last save and suddenly Link is no longer responsive. Then it dawns on you like the sun over the Great Sea: The game's gone again.

Now, this hasn't happened yet on my current play through. But something stranger has.

In the south-eastern most part of the Great Sea, there's a submarine. It's surrounded by four platforms, one of which has a treasure chest just sitting on it.

Before going into the sub, I took out all of the bokoblins hanging about (after grappling away their Joy Necklaces), and then went to get said chest. A chest that seemed to have been there all along.

But it wouldn't open.

I'd done everything that you normally need to do in a Zelda game to get a chest to appear. But nothing. The chest would not be budged. So, I went through the sub, came back out and tried again - this time before knocking out any bokoblins. The chest opened and I found something minor enough to be almost immediately forgotten.

Because I'm playing on a pre-ordered copy, chances are this titchy treasure chest is a minor bug that was left in due to time constraints. But what if it wasn't?

To get treasure to appear in a room or area in a Zelda game, you need to solve a puzzle or beat all the baddies in the vicinity. This is how it's been since the beginning. But what if it was different? What if there was a chest that could be opened only if all of the enemies in the area were left alone? It's a possibility that could lead to some excellent puzzling.

A brief glimpse of the plot

I've seen it! There is a plot in Infinite Jest!

As we follow Madame Psychosis through her slum walk, she stops at the end of a row of drug dealers. There, standing before her is a cutout figure of a man in a wheelchair looking like he's been captured in the middle of a tremendous laugh. The cutout holds a TP cartridge which bears no label whatsoever. Just as the cartridge the medical attache received had no label (aside from the mysterious "Happy Anniversary" note).

Further, the cutout is definitely modelled on Marathe, the Quebecois quadruple agent. What's unclear, though, is if it's just his likeness and therefore something set up by the Wheelchair Assassins, or if it's based on a photo of Marathe. In the latter case, it could be that he has viewed the mysterious cartridge and succumbed to its horribly hilarious charms.

In any case, the cartridge's appearing in various places like this and the intrigues involving radical Quebec groups suggest some sort of thriller-type plot. It's in here somewhere.

Also quite mysteriously, in the middle of Madame Psychosis' walk, we're treated to a list of all of the subsidized years involved in the book. It definitely has meaning, but why it is where it is (and not in another endnote) is unclear.