scanlineangel
2 reviews liked by scanlineangel
Drakengard
2003
This game got me in a fucking chokehold, because oh my god this is the fifth log and I really hope it will be the last one.
Drakengard is, first and foremost, an experience. Every single aspect of it is a cog in the machine that works tirelessly to create the feeling of pure madness in a rapidly crumbling world, whether it is gameplay, narrative, music or art design. Judging those elements by themselves is pointless, if you analyse this game critically it easily falls apart and you lose a track of what it makes Drakengard truly special. Not to say that those elements are BAD, hell even gameplay is nowhere near "the worst game I played" or "intentionally bad" and is completely serviceable, they are just not really THAT interesting in vacuum, like e.g. Automata's story or Replicant's characters.
Drakengard is hardly enjoyable, not even in cathartic sense. I found it unengaging and straight up frustrating at times, but you know... It is fine that way. Yeah, gameplay is insanely repetitive and clunky, but it is fine that way. Music is pure cacophony to your ears, but it is fine that way. Characters might not develop past their horrible traits, but it is fine that way. Story might be just a constant steam of the unfortunate events with barely any satisfaction, but it is fine that way.
Because the moment you process it all and put everything together in your head is the moment the thought like "JESUS FUCKING CHRIST WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT" strucks into your head and you finally realize how masterfully Drakengard portrays the whole sense of dread, terror, insanity and hopelessness in such a surreal horrifying story, is practically irreplaceable. Every single part of it works just right for its cause and it's absolutely fantastic.
This conclusion might not come immediately, it might take few days, a week, a month(or two, in my case), a year or who knows, maybe never.
But that's the thing that elevates Drakengard above other games, it is art in its rawest, crazy and pain-in-the-ass-to-engage-with form. An absolute must-play whether you will love it or hate it.
Drakengard is, first and foremost, an experience. Every single aspect of it is a cog in the machine that works tirelessly to create the feeling of pure madness in a rapidly crumbling world, whether it is gameplay, narrative, music or art design. Judging those elements by themselves is pointless, if you analyse this game critically it easily falls apart and you lose a track of what it makes Drakengard truly special. Not to say that those elements are BAD, hell even gameplay is nowhere near "the worst game I played" or "intentionally bad" and is completely serviceable, they are just not really THAT interesting in vacuum, like e.g. Automata's story or Replicant's characters.
Drakengard is hardly enjoyable, not even in cathartic sense. I found it unengaging and straight up frustrating at times, but you know... It is fine that way. Yeah, gameplay is insanely repetitive and clunky, but it is fine that way. Music is pure cacophony to your ears, but it is fine that way. Characters might not develop past their horrible traits, but it is fine that way. Story might be just a constant steam of the unfortunate events with barely any satisfaction, but it is fine that way.
Because the moment you process it all and put everything together in your head is the moment the thought like "JESUS FUCKING CHRIST WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT" strucks into your head and you finally realize how masterfully Drakengard portrays the whole sense of dread, terror, insanity and hopelessness in such a surreal horrifying story, is practically irreplaceable. Every single part of it works just right for its cause and it's absolutely fantastic.
This conclusion might not come immediately, it might take few days, a week, a month(or two, in my case), a year or who knows, maybe never.
But that's the thing that elevates Drakengard above other games, it is art in its rawest, crazy and pain-in-the-ass-to-engage-with form. An absolute must-play whether you will love it or hate it.
Katamari Damacy
2004
The first time I played Katamari Damacy was with Reroll in 2018. I had gotten a copy for Christmas after thinking it seemed interesting. I played it a bit throughout my week trip with my ex-girlfriend and thought it was somewhat fun and nothing else. Fast forward to 2022, I was going through my games deciding what to play next. I see Reroll and remembered I didn't actually beat it. Since I knew it was short, I decided to finish it this time. Coming out of it, I thought it was great and a lot better than I initially thought. Fast forward again to the end of 2022, I get the PS2 version. I already really enjoyed Reroll but this replay of the OG version made me truly love Katamari and got me to eventually play We Love Katamari. And yet again, with this most recent playthrough, I still love this game.
The story of Damacy is wacky and lighthearted. The King of Cosmos (this giant flying handsome guy like fella) flies into all the stars in the sky as well as the moon because he was drunk. You the prince, must now roll up objects in levels and create new stars (and the moon) to fix your dad's mistake. That's the entire story but it works because of this games weird and quirky humor.
So you have to roll up objects in levels and make them big enough to satisfy the king before he turns them into stars. Sounds simple enough right? Well besides there being some levels that aren't just that, the way you collect objects in this game is interesting. You start with a ball at a specific size and must gradually make it bigger over time. The thing with that is, you can't roll just anything at the start. You have a size limit depending on how large your ball is and as it gets bigger, so does the size of possible things you can roll up. It can be a bit tricky to gauge what things you can and can't collect at your ball size, and if you run into something you can't it can knock things out of your ball. It's actually not too hard to do that, because along with knocking into large objects, if you get stuck somehow that can make you drop objects as well. It's actually not hard to get stuck in this game, and while it can be somewhat frustrating, you can usually escape. A large part of the reason this game is so fun to play, besides the general gameplay being solid, is how wacky collecting everything is. What you can collect ranges from small stuff like erasers or thumbtacks to literal whole landmasses and clouds in the sky. Besides the King occasionally cracking jokes or reprimanding you in levels, a lot of the character comes the humans. Like halfway into the game, you start getting to levels where you can collect humans. There are all types of them and they all have hilarious or even somewhat-terrifying reactions to being rolled up. But this is the fun of the game, going from level to level and seeing what types of craziness will ensue.
Something I think I prefer in We Love are the level settings. In this game it's a lot more basic and is someone's home, a little town, an area by a lake and then a whole city. It's not bad in the slightest, and I do really like how the levels evolve over the time..I just prefer We Love's more varied level themes now. I will say though, while I do at the very least like every level, the final one where you must make the moon is so peak. It's a city level but you're given 25 minutes to complete it and you eventually get big enough to collect full cities and clouds in the sky and a literal thunder god. It's insane and by far the wackiest level in the game and I love it. I gave a couple very minor things I wish were better in this game but the thing I actually don't like are some of the side levels. Besides the usual ones I described, there are levels where you must create constellations. These range from levels where you have to collect as many of an object as you can to one where you must collect as many paired objects as you can. These are all fine and dandy but then there are some where you have to collect the biggest of an object you can. These two levels are make Ursa Major and Make Taurus. With these, you have to collect the biggest bear and cow in each respective level. Only issue is there are bears and cows all over the level and if you collect just one it ends the level. They want you to memorize the stage so you can make your ball big enough and find the bear/cow. Idk, I never had the patience for these and just don't find them fun so I always just collect the first one I see and skip it basically. Another level I'm not as keen on but still try with is the one where you must make a 10M ball but you can't see your progress so you must guess. I do find it a little fun to see how close I can get but it's pretty difficult for me to gauge where I'm at just by guessing. That's my biggest issue with the game, these three side levels and they're only like a 10th of the game so it's not the biggest deal in the world.
The games visuals and artstyle is fantastic. It goes for cel-shading I believe and it makes every level so vibrant and colorful. The levels are already cool enough as it is but the little planets you go on in the hub, atmospherically are great as well. It's literally just your means of going to each level or the options in the game but it has a ton of personality that just makes it super memorable. The entire game is like that tbh, even the title screen with the three game files has you rolling up parts of the word Namco to start..each file in the game is literally a couple letters of the publisher! It's just incredibly quirky and charming which I love a lot.
Besides the game's weird and quirky nature, the soundtrack is kind of what sells this game. It's honestly a very impressive and out there OST, with songs from all different music genres. You have swing, techno, salsa, J-pop etc. This game is bound to have a song you'll like. Some of my favorites are Que Sera Sera, Katamari on the Rocks, Lovely Angel and plenty more. There are actually a couple of stage songs I'm not like a huge fan on, namely Wanda Wanda and You Am Smart. They aren't bad, they just pale in comparison to a lot of the other songs I feel. I honestly don't think I like love love any song in this game, but like the collective majority of great and experimental songs just makes me appreciate the soundtrack a ton. That is...besides Lonely Rolling Star which is not only my favorite song between both Katamari games I've played, it's one of my favorite videogame songs ever now and is probably in my top 5 VGM of all time. The levels it's in could be total shit and I wouldn't care because the song is so good, so every level it was in (only 2 apparently which is kinda sadge) was pure bliss. The final level was also pure bliss because on top of being the most fun, it played Katamari on the Rocks which is a banger. Either way, great OST which is even more peak because it has Lonely Rolling Star.
Had a couple of little gripes that might be fixed by We Love when I replay it. Doesn't change the fact this game is peak though. Was thinking about bumping this to a 10, still might in the future, but for now I'll just keep it at a 9. Still a blast to play and just artistically it's amazing (both conceptually and it's music/art style) which I appreciate a TON. Anyways, next review will be Majora's Mask and then I'll probably join everyone in playing Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance so look forward to those reviews in the future!
Edit: I decided to finally bump this to a 10/10. It has a couple things I think We Love did better, but this is still an incredible work of art I gotta give it the 10.
The story of Damacy is wacky and lighthearted. The King of Cosmos (this giant flying handsome guy like fella) flies into all the stars in the sky as well as the moon because he was drunk. You the prince, must now roll up objects in levels and create new stars (and the moon) to fix your dad's mistake. That's the entire story but it works because of this games weird and quirky humor.
So you have to roll up objects in levels and make them big enough to satisfy the king before he turns them into stars. Sounds simple enough right? Well besides there being some levels that aren't just that, the way you collect objects in this game is interesting. You start with a ball at a specific size and must gradually make it bigger over time. The thing with that is, you can't roll just anything at the start. You have a size limit depending on how large your ball is and as it gets bigger, so does the size of possible things you can roll up. It can be a bit tricky to gauge what things you can and can't collect at your ball size, and if you run into something you can't it can knock things out of your ball. It's actually not too hard to do that, because along with knocking into large objects, if you get stuck somehow that can make you drop objects as well. It's actually not hard to get stuck in this game, and while it can be somewhat frustrating, you can usually escape. A large part of the reason this game is so fun to play, besides the general gameplay being solid, is how wacky collecting everything is. What you can collect ranges from small stuff like erasers or thumbtacks to literal whole landmasses and clouds in the sky. Besides the King occasionally cracking jokes or reprimanding you in levels, a lot of the character comes the humans. Like halfway into the game, you start getting to levels where you can collect humans. There are all types of them and they all have hilarious or even somewhat-terrifying reactions to being rolled up. But this is the fun of the game, going from level to level and seeing what types of craziness will ensue.
Something I think I prefer in We Love are the level settings. In this game it's a lot more basic and is someone's home, a little town, an area by a lake and then a whole city. It's not bad in the slightest, and I do really like how the levels evolve over the time..I just prefer We Love's more varied level themes now. I will say though, while I do at the very least like every level, the final one where you must make the moon is so peak. It's a city level but you're given 25 minutes to complete it and you eventually get big enough to collect full cities and clouds in the sky and a literal thunder god. It's insane and by far the wackiest level in the game and I love it. I gave a couple very minor things I wish were better in this game but the thing I actually don't like are some of the side levels. Besides the usual ones I described, there are levels where you must create constellations. These range from levels where you have to collect as many of an object as you can to one where you must collect as many paired objects as you can. These are all fine and dandy but then there are some where you have to collect the biggest of an object you can. These two levels are make Ursa Major and Make Taurus. With these, you have to collect the biggest bear and cow in each respective level. Only issue is there are bears and cows all over the level and if you collect just one it ends the level. They want you to memorize the stage so you can make your ball big enough and find the bear/cow. Idk, I never had the patience for these and just don't find them fun so I always just collect the first one I see and skip it basically. Another level I'm not as keen on but still try with is the one where you must make a 10M ball but you can't see your progress so you must guess. I do find it a little fun to see how close I can get but it's pretty difficult for me to gauge where I'm at just by guessing. That's my biggest issue with the game, these three side levels and they're only like a 10th of the game so it's not the biggest deal in the world.
The games visuals and artstyle is fantastic. It goes for cel-shading I believe and it makes every level so vibrant and colorful. The levels are already cool enough as it is but the little planets you go on in the hub, atmospherically are great as well. It's literally just your means of going to each level or the options in the game but it has a ton of personality that just makes it super memorable. The entire game is like that tbh, even the title screen with the three game files has you rolling up parts of the word Namco to start..each file in the game is literally a couple letters of the publisher! It's just incredibly quirky and charming which I love a lot.
Besides the game's weird and quirky nature, the soundtrack is kind of what sells this game. It's honestly a very impressive and out there OST, with songs from all different music genres. You have swing, techno, salsa, J-pop etc. This game is bound to have a song you'll like. Some of my favorites are Que Sera Sera, Katamari on the Rocks, Lovely Angel and plenty more. There are actually a couple of stage songs I'm not like a huge fan on, namely Wanda Wanda and You Am Smart. They aren't bad, they just pale in comparison to a lot of the other songs I feel. I honestly don't think I like love love any song in this game, but like the collective majority of great and experimental songs just makes me appreciate the soundtrack a ton. That is...besides Lonely Rolling Star which is not only my favorite song between both Katamari games I've played, it's one of my favorite videogame songs ever now and is probably in my top 5 VGM of all time. The levels it's in could be total shit and I wouldn't care because the song is so good, so every level it was in (only 2 apparently which is kinda sadge) was pure bliss. The final level was also pure bliss because on top of being the most fun, it played Katamari on the Rocks which is a banger. Either way, great OST which is even more peak because it has Lonely Rolling Star.
Had a couple of little gripes that might be fixed by We Love when I replay it. Doesn't change the fact this game is peak though. Was thinking about bumping this to a 10, still might in the future, but for now I'll just keep it at a 9. Still a blast to play and just artistically it's amazing (both conceptually and it's music/art style) which I appreciate a TON. Anyways, next review will be Majora's Mask and then I'll probably join everyone in playing Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance so look forward to those reviews in the future!
Edit: I decided to finally bump this to a 10/10. It has a couple things I think We Love did better, but this is still an incredible work of art I gotta give it the 10.