Por Girls of War

Desde o início da produção de jogos, os games sempre estiveram em um universo masculinizado, totalmente cinza-Metal Gear, às vezes com um toque de alguma mulher, mas que infelizmente não tinham tanto reconhecimento. Com o passar dos anos, e principalmente nos dias atuais, as mulheres dominam mais a produção de games e se destacam cada vez mais com trabalhos notáveis.

Mulheres, sejam ocidentais ou orientais, estão por trás de grandes produções de games. E não são joguinhos fofinhos e meigos, como muitos preconceituosos pensam, e sim, jogos como Assassin’s Creed, Phoenix Wright, Altered Beast, Mirror’s Edge e muitos outros.

Para provar a força da feminilidade nos games, a revista inglesa Edge publicou, no ano de 2006, uma lista com as 100 mulheres mais influentes na indústria dos games. São figuras que vão desde escritoras de histórias e designers até produtoras. Separamos algumas que estão presentes na listagem, e outras que ficaram conhecidas nos anos seguintes.

Conheça um pouco das mulheres que trabalham nos bastidores das empresas de games:

Rieko Kodama – Saúdem a Primeira Dama do RPG!

Esta grande designer é conhecida no mundo gamer como a “Primeira dama do RPG”. A japonesa, nascida no dia 23 de maio de 1963 e natural da cidade de Kanagawa, já atuou na produção de games do “alto escalão” da Sega, como: Phantasy Star, Sonic e Alex Kidd. Mas é claro que ela não parou por aí! Rieko também é famosa por muitos outros jogos como Shinobi, Altered Beast, SpellCaster, Ninja Pincess, Deep Fear e muitos outros. A designer já atuou como diretora no game Magic Knight Rayearth, para o falecido Sega Saturn. Um fato interessante na vida dessa designer de games foi ela ter começado a carreira com a arte e a arqueologia.

E, para provar que todo conhecimento adquirido é válido, muito sabiamente a japinha poderosa tratou de adaptar seus estudos – bem ao estilo Tomb Raider de ser – ao seu trabalho com games, quando, em 1984, um amigo a convidou para trabalhar na Sega (amigo bom!!!). As influências arqueológicas de Reiko podem ser percebidas em games como Phantasy Star e Skies Of Arcadia, por exemplo. Neles, os jogadores quase sempre têm que viajar e descobrir civilizações antigas.

Já trabalhando diretamente com games, Kodama começou como designer de personagens em títulos como Champion Boxing (1984) e Ninja Princess (1984). Ela também arrasou no saudoso Master System com jogos como: Alex Kidd in Miracle World (1986) e Quartet (1987). Como ela teve a sorte de ser uma das poucas designers da companhia, naquela época, ela passou a trabalhar em vários títulos ao mesmo tempo, o que a fez ficar conhecida e ter seu trabalho respeitado muito rápido. No entanto, o grande “boom” na carreira de Reiko aconteceu quando a artista teve a oportunidade de trabalhar em grandes projetos, como Phantasy Star, que foi lançado para concorrer com o também famoso Dragon Quest. Como a designer principal do games, Kodama foi a responsável pela criação do desenho de todos os personagens, dos mapas em 2D, das cenas de guerra em background, das pessoas da cidade, dentre outras coisas.

Agora vocês devem estar se perguntando. O que essa japinha genial está fazendo agora? Bom, rumores dizem que Reiko Overpower Kodama estaria desenvolvendo um RPG, 7th Dragon – para Nintendo DS, em parceria com Kazuya Niinou (Trauma Center, Etrian Odyssey) e o lendário compositor Yuzo Koshiro. 7th Dragon foi lançado em março de 2009. O boato se confirmou!

Jade Raymond – A caloura mais bonita dos games

No meio de um grande império de produtores orientais e ocidentais e suas obras-primas nos games, eis que começam a surgir os primeiros vestígios femininos, mesmo que eles não sejam notados em suas obras em si.

Assassin’s Creed não deixa nem um pouco à mostra que a novata – mesmo com 10 anos de carreira e um curto currículo, mas já invejável – Jade Raymond, uma mulher determinada e com uma personalidade cativante, está por trás desse novo game que foi lançado para PS3 e X360.

Jade Raymond, nascida em 28/08/1975 no Canadá, começou no mundo dos games aos seis anos de idade quando jogou Pong pela primeira vez no computador de seu primo. A partir daí seu gosto por games só foi crescendo, especialmente com a ajuda de tio que comprava games para a pequena Jade e a enfrentava, tentando fazer com que ela o derrotasse nos jogos.

Após longos anos, uma das novas “musas gamers” tornou-se bacharel em Ciência da Computação e seu primeiro emprego na área foi na IBM como programadora de jogos educacionais, e logo depois foi consultora no Grupo de Pesquisas Avançadas da Microsoft.

Seu primeiro trabalho na indústria dos games foi na Sony, cujos jogos Jeopardy! e Trivial Pursuit tiveram Jade na equipe de programação. Nesse período, ela começou a produzir um game do filme As Panteras (Charlie’s Angels), mas não deslanchou. Após esse período na Sony, Jade foi para a EA Games e tornou-se produtora, desenvolvendo aplicativos de recursos online e acabou produzindo The Sims Online. Um ano depois foi para There Inc e foi Produtora/Arte do game “There”, um mundo virtual em 3D, concorrente do famoso Simple Life.

Quatro anos depois de trabalhar na There Inc, Jade Raymond aparece nos créditos de Assassin’s Creed – um de seus trabalhos mais reconhecidos pelo enredo, gráficos e jogabilidade, e lançado para dois consoles de última geração – ganhando um reconhecimento merecido e a surpresa dos gamers por se tratar de uma mulher produzindo um game de tamanha grandiosidade. Dizem que Jade é responsável pela roupa de Altair presente em Metal Gear Solid 4.

Claro que, mesmo com a falta de tempo, ela não deixou de ser gamer. Resident Evil 4 é o seu game preferido e no lançamento de Everquest ela passou 10 horas por dia durante 3 meses só jogando esse game. Ela também adora games que têm macacos, tanto que seu personagem favorito é o Donkey Kong. Além de produtora de games, Jade também é co-apresentadora do programa The Eletric Playground, do canal G4.

Minae Matsukawa – A feminilidade da Capcom

No Japão é raro ver uma mulher trabalhando em desenvolvedoras de games, especialmente na produção de um game, e pode-se dizer que Matsukawa é uma das japonesas mais bem sucedidas na área. Ela é responsável pela série Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney para Nintendo DS.

Essa japonesinha tímida é a única mulher desenvolvedora presente na Capcom. As outras são artistas e designers. Antes de entrar para o time da Capcom, Minae Matsukawa trabalhou em uma empresa de segurança. Logo depois esteve nos escritórios da Nintendo, onde conheceu Shigeru Miyamoto, e tempos depois trabalhou na IT, em departamentos de distribuição de jogos online até que em 2001, foi para a Capcom.

Miane está presente na Capcom há seis anos, onde começou com Breath of Fire V. Logo em seguida ela produziu a série Magical Quest da Disney, Disney Aladdin, Capcom Classics Collection, Mega Man X, participou nos Street Fighter, e por fim, em The Darkstalkers para PSP e a série Phoenix Wright, onde ficou conhecida.  Na verdade, Minae sempre foi uma assistente de produção. Ela só se realizou como produtora com esses dois últimos jogos citados.

Rhianna Pratchett – A autora de Mirror’s Edge

Nascida em 1976, na Inglaterra, Rhianna Pratchett é uma escritora de roteiros de jogos, designer e jornalista. O pai dela, Terry Prachett é um dos maiores autores de histórias de fantasia e ficção infantil. Rhianna se especializou em desenvolver histórias, humor e caracterização dos games.

Pratchett é bastante conhecida por ser escritora da história de Heavenly Sword, Overlord e Dungeon Hero. Mas agora ela é responsável pelo enredo do jogo Mirror’s Edge. Rhianna buscou semelhanças em um seriado da TV, o Prison Break. Em ambos os casos, tanto o jogo quanto o seriado, o objetivo principal é resgatar o irmão/irmã, através de qualquer meio necessário. A história que gira em torno da cidade também tem bastantes similaridades, onde os governantes querem o melhor para a população, conquistando-a, também, custe o que custar.

E o que a inglesa está fazendo atualmente? A Electronic Arts fechou parceria com a DC Comics, responsável pelas histórias do Batman e Super Homem. Por esta razão, Rhianna Pratchett está ultimamente se dedicando aos quadrinhos sobre Mirror’s Edge. A coleção de HQ será composta por seis edições que prometem contar detalhes da história da protagonista Faith.

É o que sempre falamos: Por trás de um grande game, sempre existe uma grande mulher!

J’ai bien débuté Prince of Persia et a première vu je le trouve très répétitif… En tout cas le Self Shading, comme sur Ocarina of Time et Jet set Radio m’éclate toujours autant ! Et puis Heavenly Sword.. Ben.. C’est un Beat Them All Mais avec une fille

Je n’ai pas pu joué beaucoup par manque de temps… Prince of Persia… Collège… Et une petite surprise que je vous prépare depuis deux semaines environt . Gettez le blog de temps en temps pour la découvrir, car elle peut arrivé d’une minute a l’autre

J’ai joué a Bad Company 1 heure, Il est vraiment Géant et je pèse mes mots ! J’ai joué (pour le moment) seulement en ligne et je suis déjà conquit. Le mode Solo est Super d’après les critiques de mon vendeur préféré d’Espace 3G  (d’ailleurs il n’y a qu’un seul vendeur >.< on dira mon vendeur préféré tout court ) eT puis assassin’s Creed je l’ai acheté parceque j’ai vendu les 3/4 de mes jeux PC (dont COD 4 et Battlefield Vietnam/ et 1942) .. je me suis fait 51€ et j’ai donc pu acheté ces 4 jeux (au début 3 mais il me resté assès pour assassin’s Creed )

Et puis sinon j’ai un truc marrant a vous dire dans la suite de l’article

La game&Watch Zelda : La première console de jeux vidéo que j’ai eu dans ma petite vie de Geek

J’ai frimé en la sortant de son petit carton, le vendeur était tout émerveillé… et je lui ai demandé combien il voulais m’en reprendre… (bien sûr je n’allais pas la lui vendre même a 50€… mais si elle était a vraiment chère peut être que je lui aurais vendu )

Bref, il rentre le nom “Game And Watch Zelda” sur son logiciel de côte de jeux vidéo, et il m’annonce qu’il m’en reprends 12€..  WTF ?

A Nariko figure has finally been made, I’m not pleased with the fact they’ve altered her face. I may still buy her simply because she is the only Nariko figure available. No word yet if they’ll make a Kai one too.

A rumor dropped about a CoOp mode being added to God of War 3. Examiner.com reported in this post they contacted Sony and received and answer from Eric Levine “This news is false.” The rumor gave me plenty of ideas of Kratos destroying enemies while teaming up with a bow-and -arrow using Athena, Hercules teaming with Kratos while beating down opponents with his bare hands, and Nariko from Heavenly Sword combined with Kratos creating a dream team and becoming a nightmare for any god. The rumor sparked my imagination, how about you guys post in the comments what ideas that came to you.

Looking back through some old articles I came across this list of the best single player games on PS3: Linkage.

This list was only written in April and yet the time since has probably been the best 6 months of my gaming ‘career.’

Not only have some fantastic solo player campaigns been released but I have also caught up on some single player epics I missed when they came out.

I knew the list needed to be extended and improved, as too many great single player games were missing.

So here you go – the top 10 is now a top 20 and any game from the initial list has it’s original chart position in brackets. You can also check out my full reviews (where possible) by clicking the title of each game:

20. PROTOTYPE

In Prototype you take on the role of Alex Mercer as he awakens during his autopsy ,wondering what the hell is going on. He quickly escapes, realising he now has various superpowers.

Mercer needs to find out what the hell has happened to him and why New York is infected with a virus that has turned half the population into zombies.

Prototype is definitely a game worth playing despite it’s various faults – it was a blast to play through if a little frustrating at times.

19. RESISTANCE 2

After saving England in the previous installment Hale is back in business to rescue the U S of A – since his incapacitation the Chimera have launched a full attack on America and Hale, as part of the Sentinal squad (made up of soldiers injected with the Chimera virus but kept under control), have to step in and stop them in their tracks.

A hard hitting but fun first person shooter.

18. MIRROR’S EDGE (10)

Mirror’s Edge wowed everyone with it’s crisp, clean graphics and it’s unique first person perspective.

The view takes a while to get used to and it had a few really annoying parts where it was difficult to time jumps etc because of the view but Mirror’s Edge is certainly worth playing through as it offers a style of gameplay that is totally unique in the current games market.

17. RAINBOW SIX VEGAS (9)

If you like your first person shooters with a bit of brain behind the brawn then Rainbow Six Vegas may be the game for you.

With a good old fashioned SAS vs Terrorists style plot and lots of fun set pieces Rainbow Six Vegas is definitely worth a shot.

16. RESIDENT EVIL 5

For all it’s faults Resident Evil 5, taken as a whole, is a brilliant game and one that I would recommend. Graphically it’s stunning and while it isn’t a hugely difficult game you’ll enjoy playing through and unravelling the story.

It survives the huge expectation of following Resident Evil 4… just. This is a game that everyone should play as Resi comes to the new generation of consoles.

15. KANE AND LYNCH (8) 

You take control of Adam ‘Kane’ Marcus, a criminal on his way to death row for crimes committed in Venezeula. Kane is busted out of his prison van by a mysterious group called The7 who he worked with previously. They think Kane stole the money from their last job and stashed it somewhere.

If he doesn’t get them the money back in three weeks his wife and daughter will be killed. Kane claims he doesn’t know where it is but he does know who took the cash and will hunt them down. And so begins a thoroughly enjoyable ride into the desperate life of Kane…

14. BATTLEFIELD: BAD COMPANY

Chock full of explosions and with some really impressive destruction of buildings etc, Battlefield: Bad Company is like a huge big budget Hollywood blockbuster.

It’s a great, mindless blast of a game. Add some memorable characters into the mix and you’ve got yourself a very enjoyable, and playable, package.

13. HEAVENLY SWORD (7)

Another game that didn’t garner the respect it deserves, primarily because it didn’t live up to the pre-release hype.

If you like God Of War you will like this game as it’s similar in style but it looks gorgeous in HD and I believe did a few bits (combos/blocking etc) better than the first two God Of War games.

12. ASSASSIN’S CREED (6)

In Assassin’s Creed you play through Desmond Mile’s repressed ancestrial memories as Altair in the Medieval Holy Land (with brief interludes as Desmond struggling to find out what is going on in the present day).

You will need to research targets and carry out assassinations using a variety of options – sword, hidden blade, knife etc.

This game is great fun and I’m looking forward to the sequel which is on it’s way shortly.

11. GHOSTBUSTERS: THE VIDEO GAME

Ghostbusters: The Video Game’s plot is essentially the third movie – set in 1991 you’re a rookie who’s been drafted in to help with the ever increasing ghost workload. A huge paranormal blast sets off a chain of events that only one group of guys can deal with…

For me Ghostbusters was a short (5 hour) game that had me chuckling and geeking out despite it’s flaws – it won’t be to everyone’s tastes but it has a good single player storyline.

10. KILLZONE 2 (5)

Killzone 2’s biggest achievement is, possibly because of the brilliant graphics, sound and AI, that you feel involved and become embedded in the Killzone universal whenever you pick up the pad.

It’s not perfect by any means but it’s easily the best first person shooter I’ve played and I recommend anyone with a remote interest in this genre to check this out immediately!

9. BATMAN: ARKHAM ASYLUM

With some wonderful voice acting from the cast of the animated series, Batman: Arkham Asylum’s story moves at a good pace and familiar enemies are used to good effect throughout.

With such a vivid setting and a memorable selection of bad guys from Batman’s career it’s no surprise that Arkham Asylum is such a great game.

Despite the odds being stacked against it, Batman: Arkham Asylum is a quality title that has had a lot of care put into making it. I’d recommend this to anyone.

8. INFAMOUS

So good it’s the only game this generation I’ve played through twice (seeing it’s rating bumped from 8/10 to 9/10), Infamous is a great game.

You control Cole McGrath, a courier who just happens to be carrying a package containing an electronic bomb when it goes off, devasting the city. Somehow Cole survives and, after coming out of a coma, realises the explosion has given him electrical superpowers.

From there on out the city is your oyster and there is plenty to do as you try to track down the people behind the explosion.

7. BIOSHOCK

Bioshock has a great story to tell and it does it well with some interesting objectives and brilliantly designed levels.

There are several twists and turns in the plot, most of which are not obvious and it’s no surprise to me that a film version is in the works (although I believe currently suspended due to budget concerns).

Dark worlds like Rapture aren’t to everyone’s tastes but you really would be missing out on an awesome story if you decided not to book a trip to the underwater city.

6. GRAND THEFT AUTO IV  (4)

One the biggest selling games of this generation GTA IV features the fortunes (and lack therof) of Niko Bellic – an immigrant arriving in the US at Liberty City to find empty promises and broken dreams from his cousin Roman.

As you work your way up the criminal ladder you’ll encounter all sort of dodgy characters and befriend even more.

Liberty City is a wonderful, if run down, place and Niko Bellic’s story is one you will enjoy playing through so make sure you pick this game up as soon as possible.

5. FALLOUT 3

After a tough few hours at the start you will find yourself rewarded greatly for sticking with this awesome FPS / RPG.

The story line sprawls across the world depending on your actions and you’ll find yourself taking a break from main missions to explore the wasteland or help out other characters.

I could go on and on about various things that happened and how cool it was, how great the story was or whatever.

But Fallout 3 is a game that needs to be experienced first hand and your story will no doubt play out differently to mine.

4. METAL GEAR SOLID 4  (3)

Hideo Kojima’s tale of Solid Snake’s final mission is a brilliant showcase of the Playstation 3’s power.

This is a game that often gives you three or four different ways of approaching things – whether you realise it or not.

Metal Gear Solid 4 rewards those patient enough to stick with it by giving them a great gaming experience, with some memorable boss battles, that they won’t forget.

3. DEAD SPACE (2)

Coming on somewhere between Event Horizon and Aliens, Dead Space is a third person survival horror game.

You take on the role of Isaac Clarke, a ship engineer who finds himself trapped onboard a stricken spaceship infested with an alien outbreak which is threatening to take over the ship.

This was one of the best games I played last year, it’s use of sound is immense and the fear of the unexpected they create is awesome.

I am not a big fan of horror movies or being made to jump all the time but Dead Space kept on the right side of all that by being unpredictable enough to be enjoyable as a ‘horror’ experience.

2. UNCHARTED: DRAKE’S FORTUNE (1)

Uncharted maps the  journey of Nathan Drake as he tries to find the lost treasure of El Dorado encountering, among other things, rival treasure hunters and mercenaries.

The graphics are unbelievable and the gameplay is well paced and well thought out. The characters and story and really well conceived and Nolan North, who voices Drake, is absolutely spot on with his irreverent humour and wisecracks.

At its heart Uncharted is an action adventure game much in the vein of Indiana Jones or Tomb Raider but, and I say this as a fan of both of these, it is better than either of them.

1. UNCHARTED 2: AMONG THIEVES

Uncharted 2 is a complete gaming package. There is plenty of taking out bad guys, lots of puzzles and some wonderful dialogue.

Naughty Dog really have done a great job on the voice acting and the expressiveness of the character models. It is easily the best I’ve come across (though Heavenly Sword was a close second).

I won’t spoil the story but for those who don’t know, Nathan Drake gets pulled back into that murky world of treasure hunting for hire. I loved the story of this game – with a few twists I saw coming and a few I didn’t.

If you own a PS3 there is no reason not to own this game – if you only have an XBox 360 or Wii then get yourself a PS3 Slim and enjoy one of the most finely crafted games I’ve ever experienced.

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So it’s a double for Nathan Drake as he takes the top two spots with his exploration adventures.

With 5 new games in the top ten it’s great to see the wide variety of game styles on offer to PS3 owners these days.

Hopefully people out there will find this list helpful – feel free to drop me some comments below on the games or if you’d have put anything else in the list?

I recently bought a PS3 and have been muddling my way through the unimpressive library of PS3 exclusive titles.  Having had an XB360 since early 2006 and a Wii for nearly as long, the PS3 and I have a lot of time to make up together.

Just recently I rented and beat Heavenly Sword, a “first generation” (meaning one of the first releases) title for the PS3.  As mentioned here and elsewhere on this blog, I have gotten to run through a few titles on the console that heavily use the Wiimote sensor.  When Sony announced the Sixaxis controller, critics immediately saw the feature as a gimmick that would try to rival the Wiimote, and pitifully at that.  But now that this faithful critic and all around observer has had a chance to lay hands on both, what’s the verdict?

To emphasize the point, I am only comparing one PS3 game to every Wii game I’ve ever played.  Very unfair odds on either account, but I’ve noticed some very interesting things that have led me to believe there may be a clearer winner than someone may think.

There are two main factors (that I have made up, along with most of the other terms in this article, in my benevolence and wise observance – any resemblance to terms or arguments in existence was unintended or accidental)  in the success of unusual game mechanics.  The first and foremost is the talent, skill, and imagination of the developers, or at least what appears to be the talent, skill, and imagination.  When Assassin’s Creed, a game that hyped the cloak and dagger aspect of the player’s character, allowed only three ways to execute cloak and dagger techniques, otherwise forcing the character to fight enemies rather than evade them, the gimmick actually broke the game’s promise and doomed it to $60 worth of mediocrity.  At first glance, one might see this as evidence of the lack of imagination on the game designer’s part, but Ubisoft claimed that time restraints kept them from building the game they wanted to build, which forced them to put in shoddy achievements/trophies to artificially extend gameplay.  Whether it was the skill of the designers or the interference of other factors, the designers failed to execute the game mechanic well (though I know plenty who would disagree – at least accept this as an example).

The other main factor in the success of unusual game mechanics is fit.  “Does this game mechanic actually fit into the context of the game?” This is where the Wii successfully fails a lot.  Though the most recent game I played on the Wii was Super Smash Brothers Brawl, which smartly made the Wiimote optional and Wiimote gestures even more optional, there are plenty of examples to be found of the Wiimote motion sensor being shoehorned into a game.  Wii games like Raving Rabbids, a party-style title made up of small mini-games, are perfect for Wii controls.  Yet other games, especially third party multi-console releases like Tomb Raider: Underworld, suffer due to the requirement of having the Wiimote gestures featured in games where it doesn’t belong.

Now that I’ve defined what I see as the two factors influencing unusual game mechanics, it’s time to apply them to the PS3 Sixaxis controller and the Wii Wiimote.  Let’s pretend that we’re in a gaming utopia where these two factors have been executed well.  Full of creativity and fit for combat, when put in a ring, which of the two survives?

As I said earlier, the only game that I have played that used the Sixaxis controls extensively was Heavenly Sword.  Because of this and the fact that I beat it yesterday afternoon, it will be the point from which all of my Wiimote comparisons are drawn.  To start, let’s go beyond fit and into the realm of integration.

Integration, or making a mechanic an essential and even desirable facet of gameplay, is something that the Wii usually does fairly well.  In The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, Link’s bow and arrow are easily used by pointing the Wiimote at the screen and pressing a button.  Granted, it looked nothing at all like shooting a bow, but that is completely beside the point.  The controls had been integrated to a point where their implementation was usually easy and mostly effortless.

In Heavenly Sword, a button mashing beat-em-up that sometimes puts on a flight simulator’s jet pilot’s jumpsuit and runs around the room screaming “raawrrwaeerreeer rat-tat-tat-tat-tat!“, the sixaxis controls are integrated in one instance surprisingly well and in another surprisingly poorly.  In the former pressing and holding square or “x” (depending on context) while handling a long-range weapon will zoom the camera in behind the projectile (this varies among rockets, cannonballs, and arrows, along with a few other extraneous objects thrown in).  While in this zoomed-in state, the player can start tilting the controller, gently driving the projectile (thus the flight sim reference) to the desired destination…sometimes.  This mechanic increasingly becomes more of a skill rather than a cool addition as the game progresses, and this helps with the mechanic’s integration into gameplay.  If the mechanic is mostly optional, then it becomes unnecessary and becomes a forgettable option.  While Heavenly Sword’s projectile-driving, so to speak, is technically optional, the game is nearly impossible without it, as there is no reticule to aim at very small, very far away targets.  The other instance in which the Sixaxis is used but is integrated very poorly is in actual combat.  Some of the combos require shaking the controller at the right moment as part of the combo button chain.  In the heat of battle, it seems silly to try and shake the controller a certain way to pull off a small number of moves that require it.

That last bit about poor integration also hits on another area that is intrinsically tied with the idea of integration – and this is implementation, be it awkward or convenient.  The awkwardness factor of shaking a controller in mid-combat is high, but it is rather small potatoes compared to some of the ways Wii games have integrated Wiimote controls.  I’m not sure if Nintendo forces Wii developers to include Wiimote specific gestures, but if they do, they are certainly the reason for the awkward implementation of the controls within Wii games.  As I mentioned before, this awkwardness is almost a given when it comes to multi-platform releases.

There is a lot to be said for all of these factors, but at its base, it’s all about design.  Depending on the strength of designs, whatever is built on top of it could be as stable as bunker or a house of cards.  Though the Wiimote is no card table, it certainly doesn’t have the foundation for a bunker either.  Because most games require the Wiimote to be held in one hand and its companion nunchuck in the other, the probability that the player’s hand won’t be in the proper starting position is very high, and the Wiimote depends on starting in a certain position, otherwise the controls are off (thus why it’s possible to golf in WiiSports while holding the controller in a number of positions varying from a “ping-pong champion” position to a “holy water flick of the wrist” position).  The Wiimote, while brilliant in its concept and marketability, leaves a lot to be desired.  And woe betide the designer who doesn’t tighten up the controls enough when dealing with the Wiimote – with the combination of card table + cards, the whole thing comes tumbling down.

Yet here, exactly where I thought the Sixaxis would fail, is where the it shines.  I’m going to go out on a limb and say that the reason the Sixaxis controller is closer to a bunker than a card table is because it’s held with two hands. It’s a shame that it might be that simple, but, to put it mathematically, the Wiimote in one hand is to a line through one point as the Sixaxis in two hands is to a line through two points.  A line through one point has infinitely possibilities for its direction, and that causes a lot of unpredictability and instability.  A line through two points has a defined course and has built in stability from those two points.  Or to put it non-mathematical terms, that s*** won’t work unless you’re holding it with two hands.

The Sixaxis integration and implementation in Heavenly Sword isn’t perfect, but not once did I have to “reset” my hands to regain control of the mechanic, where as I have not had a casual gaming experience with the Wiimote that I didn’t have to. I don’t necessarily expect these mechanics to be perfect, and I still think the Wiimote was the best innovation to come out of this generation of console gaming.  But when you’re first to do something, that means that you’ve given people a goal to shoot for and surpass.  The Sixaxis is certainly no Wiimote, not by a long shot, but it offers a few crucial things that the Wiimote, if it had come out a few years later, probably would have had in the bag.

So for now, off of the basis of one PS3 game vs. ten or so Wii games , I have to say that the Sixaxis was the most fun I’ve had with a motion sensing controller so far in this console generation.  There are surely Wii games that integrate these controls far better than I have given them credit for (in fact, if you know of any, please suggest them in the comments – I’m completely willing to revisit this later on), but Heavenly Sword’s use of the Sixaxis mechanic wins this round.

We’ll see how long that lasts.

1) Nariko: Heavenly Sword

No prizes for guessing that she’s number one. No matter how you feel about Heavenly Sword, it can’t be denied that Nariko’s ability to take on an entire regimet of men by herself is amazing. Nariko is not afraid to do all sorts of crazy stunts and take on every enemy thrown her way. I also find her loyalty and love for her family and clansmen to be inspirational. And you gotta love that hair!

Audio Team:
For Ninja Theory: Tom Colvin (lead audio); Nitin Sawhney (original music score); Dave Sullivan (senior sound designer); Play It By Ear (foley and cut scene sound design); Harvey Cotton (audio programming)

For SCEE Cambridge: Garry Taylor (audio management and cut scene mixing); Lee Banyard, Jeremy Taylor, Andrew Riley (additional sound design); Ed Colyer, Shepperton Studios (additional foley); Dan Bardino, John Broomhall, Kenneth Young, Dave Ranyard (additional audio production); Chip Bell (audio programming)

The Numbers:
10GB of sound FX, approximately three and a half hours of music, 4,500 lines of dialogue

With an epic story, epic game and an epic audio production, Heavenly Sword oozes high production values. Even before audio lead Tom Colvin’s personal two and a half year labour of love began, a belief in the power of sound had already been demonstrated by the team’s calling for potential signature sound designers to pitch – a practice more commonly associated with composers.

Colvin explains: “Al Zaleski’s demo work (at audio team Play It By Ear) stood head and shoulders above the others and his movie pedigree speaks for itself. To top that, he was great to work with. I’m really happy with the foley and combat sounds – all vitally important for a game so focused on graceful, agile, martial arts-style sword fighting.

“For me, sound is very ‘immediate’ to the player. Music has a well-established cultural language; sound is much less clearly delineated – but you can get straight to someone’s emotional responses with it – there’s little time for the brain to analyse. Sound is key in making this awesome weapon – the Heavenly Sword – come to life so you can sense its brooding power and almost hear it feeding off each kill.”

The game features a strong narrative exploring the interplay between heroine Nariko, her father, their clan subjugated by an evil king, and their guardianship of the Heavenly Sword, an historical weapon with the power to change their fate. Cut scenes play a vital role but with visual finessing continuing late into the project, the sheer scope of work was a challenge.

SCEE’s Garry Taylor elaborates: “There’s an hour and a half’s worth of cut scenes in eleven languages, so mixing alone was a massive undertaking. That’s why we ‘in-sourced’ all the dialogue mixing to our colleagues in Foster City, USA whilst I focused on the music and effects mix at our new Cambridge-based recording studio. I kept a close eye on continuity issues to avoid any jarring between in-game and cut scene sound – whether ambiences or relative levels or even matching FMOD’s surround positioning. Some cut scenes are very small segments replayed within complex branching structures so we ended up using three-frame audio overhangs at the top and tail to cross-fade on – it works a treat.”

According to Colvin respected music artist Nitin Sawhney was a clear choice as composer: “We wanted someone with a genuine grounding in Eastern culture who was equally at home with contemporary or classical forms, as well as being completely comfortable with the project’s technological setting. With his eclectic talents, Nitin was perfect and enjoyed the opportunity to create for a wide-ranging and diverse set of requirements.

“In-game, we work a lot with his mix stems (e.g. perc, strings, woodwind) bringing them together in response to game events and status. Several factors (e.g. threat level) are weighted and combined to determine the exact music replay – but it isn’t just a universal ‘cross-fade, catch-all’ approach. We make the engine observe the music forms to allow (say) long emotionally-charged vocal phrases to play out properly, rather than being faded out just because the game state’s changed. This allows the music flow to be maintained – it keeps the connection to the action, without compromising musical sense.”

Taylor and Colvin undertook an overall mixing phase during the development’s final stages, again deploying SCEE’s studio as the objective listening environment and using Ninja’s powerful run-time mixing tools. Explains Colvin: “We have the virtual equivalent of a ‘flying faders’ film mixing console with extensive hierarchical grouping and scene snapshots. ‘Live’ editing of audio at this stage is absolutely essential – not just volumes, but proximities, frequency fall-off – even the listener position…”

Taylor continues: “…and also not being afraid to strip things back if necessary. Sometimes when you stand back and take in the overall sound picture, you think – does that really need to be there? Never distract the player’s focus! The machine’s so powerful now – capable of handling so much audio, which is great – but as we all know when you’re mixing, sometimes ‘less is more’.”

Heavenly Sword (2007) PS3
Tom Colvin, audio director, Ninja Theory

“Heavenly Sword also used FMOD. FMOD provides the ability to create a hierarchical bus structure as described in the section above. Each bus can have its own volume and pitch values, which can be modified in real-time. At the time, FMOD had some performance constraints related to the number of sub-buses within the bus structure, so we tried to keep the hierarchy as simple as possible.

The Ninja Theory tools team built our own proprietary GUI, which allowed us to configure mix snapshots, and adjust the mix in real-time. We were able to prevent the game from updating the mix if desired, so we could play with a mix template without the game suddenly changing the mix on us while we were working. We also had an in-game onscreen debug UI that showed us what mix templates were active, their priorities and so on.

Mixer snapshots were largely activated and deactivated by scripted events. This was one of the weaknesses of the mix system — the game scripts were not the easiest things to work with — they obviously couldn’t be changed while the game was running, and reboot times were long, so it was pretty time consuming getting the mix templates to switch on and off in the right places.

We decided to set up a blanket set of empty templates before the mix session, so we wouldn’t have to spend time actually getting the templates to switch on and off whilst mixing. This constrained the scope of the mix somewhat.

NT’s audio coder (Harvey Cotton) devised a snapshot priority system, which simplified implementation a great deal. The priority system made sure that the snapshot with the highest priority was the one you actually hear. Here’s an example of how this would work. You’re in a combat section of the game, and you perform one of the special moves, and then pause the game during this special move — what would happen with the mix system?

A default low priority mix would always be active. When the special move was initiated, a higher priority “special moves” template would be activated (we used scripted events fired from animations to do this.) When the user pressed pause, the pause mix would activate, and having the highest priority, would then take over from the special move mix.

At this point, three different mix templates are “active”, but only one is audible. The game is un-paused, and we move back to the next lowest priority template, the special move ends, and we move back to the default. The priority system is important because it prevents you from needing to store the game’s previous mix state, in order to return to it once any given scenario has finished.

Throughout development we constantly checked the mix on as many setups as possible — a reasonable spec TV, our own dev-monitors, crappy PC speakers, etc. During mastering, we had a week to set up the final mix templates. The mixing environment was a calibrated mix room. Our one week of mixing didn’t really feel like enough. There were all sorts of content changes we wanted to make at the mix stage, which just weren’t possible due to time constraints.”

Source

Scénario :
Alors là attention, nous avons le droit à un vrai scénario, sincèrement  j’ai vu l’histoire comme j’aurais regardé un film.

Le roi Bohan est bien décidé à mettre la main sur l’épée sacrée que possède le clan de notre héroïne. Étant donné qu’il est prêt à massacrer tout son peuple pour la récupérer, Nariko se voit dans l’obligation de se servir de cette épée divine, mettant par la même occasion sa vie en jeu. Il est dit qu’a compté du jour ou elle utilise cet épée il ne lui reste plus que 5 jours à vivre.

Gameplay :
Dans l’ensemble tout est facile à prendre en main, elle dispose de trois style d’attaque (vitesse, distance et puissance) chaque ennemies à son propre style et ça sera à vous de trouver quel technique adopter pour en venir à bout.

Le jeu intègre plusieurs scène de QTE (Quick Time Event) qui vous seront utile pour atteindre certains endroit mais elles seront essentiellement utilisé lors des finish contre les boss, à vous de ne pas vous louper sous peine de revoir la vie de votre adversaire se remplir.

En plus de notre héroïne “Nariko” vous devrez incarner la petite (folle) Kai qui a pour arme de prédilection une arbalète. Vous aurez la possibilité de contrôler vos tirs en maintenant votre touche enfoncée, ensuite en ce qui concerne  le guidage vous utiliserez le système sixasix de la manette. Vous pourrez diriger plusieurs éléments avec cette méthode (flèches, canon et tout un tas d’objet y compris des corps), au début ça fait un peu peur, c’est franchement pas évidement surtout si vous avez tendance à perdre votre sang froid mais une fois le coup de main pris ça aide dans pas mal de situation. Je ne vais pas vous mentir on préfère largement couper du méchant avec notre épée :D .

Graphismes :
Autre bon point de ce jeu, il a beau déjà avoir deux ans il rivalise aisément avec certain jeux actuel, par endroit il y a une profondeur de champ énorme, à un moment donné vous serez face à plus de 1000 hommes et le tout sera toujours aussi fluide, le décor est vraiment somptueux! Je ne vous parle même pas des cinématiques de folies, j’adhère totalement au style et puis qui osera me dire que Nariko n’a aucun charme ?

Bande Son :
Les musiques sont finement choisies pour collés à merveille avec l’ambiance, le duo graphisme et musique vous fera rêvez.  On notera la présence de la voix qui double Jim Carrey, qui pour le coup se marie bien avec son personnage.

Durée de vie :
C’est sans doute l’un des seuls défauts que rencontre ce jeu, il n’est pas bien long, comptez entre 6h et 8h pour le finir une première fois, attention tout de même car certains passage notamment le boss de fin sont plutôt délicat et vous risquez bien d’y passer un peu de temps. A savoir qu’une fois le jeu terminé en normal vous débloquerez le mode « Enfer », avis au amateur…

Conclusion :
C’est vraiment le jeu à posséder pour le peu qu’on aime se castagner, mais ici on ne fait pas ca n’importe comment, l’histoire très prenante digne d’un film vous captivera tellement que vous risquez de faire le jeu en une journée, un titre très très bon à mes yeux donc. La difficulté est assez bien dosée mis à part un boss de fin plutôt tenace mais une fois la technique assimilée vous en viendrez à bout et il ne vous restera plus qu’a contempler cette magnifique et très émouvante scène finale. Ce titre étant sorti dans les débuts de la console ne coute plus très cher aujourd’hui, si ce n’est pas déjà fait, ruez vous sur ce jeu sans hésiter .

Väldigt många spel har en sista boss att övervinna innan man får se eftertexten rulla och just det momentet verkar jag ha svårast för. Jag suger nämligen på bossfighter eller så är det vid de tillfällena mitt dåliga tålamod visar sig som mest.

Jag spelar just nu Batman Arkham Asylum och har precis nått fram till den sista uppgörelsen med Jokern. Innan man möter Jokern så möter man två stora jättar att slåss mot samtidigt som våg efter våg av vanliga fiender dyker upp. Redan här sattes mitt tålamod på prov och jag svor åt spelet åtskilliga gånger under gårdagen men jag tog mig vidare nu på morgonkvisten efter ytterligare ett par försök men stängde av efter ett fåtal försök på Jokern.

♥Japan
Japaner verkar ha en förkärlek till bossar. Kollar man på Devil May Cry eller Ninja Blade  så är de spelen fulla av bossar och det passar säkert en del spelare men vad gör man om man är bosshandikappad? Jag har spelat igenom Devil May Cry en gång och jag var tvungen att spela på lättaste för att ha en chans att klara mig. Jag spelade även lite på medel svårighetsgrad men då fastnade jag på den andra eller tredje bossen i spelet och jag tyckte inte att det var värt mödan att ta sig vidare.

När jag fastnar på en boss så blir jag sällan motiverad att ta upp spelet igen. Jag vet att jag kommer få spö av bossen så varför ens starta spelet? Jag kan ju lika gärna spela något annat där jag inte blir så frustrerad och där jag framförallt har kul.

Anledning och lösning
Just frustrationen kan vara en anledning till att det sällan går bra mot slutbossar. Jag vet att klarar jag detta så är jag klar med spelet och om jag har tagit mig såhär långt så då borde inte slutbossen vara några problem. Sen så får man till ett halvbra första försök där man kanske lyckas skada honom lite grann och så ger man det en andra chans. Den här gången dör man av något jättesimpelt och frustrationen börjar komma. Tredje gången så har man inte en chans, man trycker på fel knappar och missar vartenda slag som man försöker få in på bossen. Det är vid det här laget jag brukar bli högljud och stänga av för att lunga ner mig.

Det är oftast det som behövs nämligen, att lugna ner sig. Att inte stressa och försöka få sakerna gjorda så fort som möjligt utan att ta sig tid och göra det ordentligt. Då brukar det gå bättre men det gäller att inse det i stridens hetta.

Himmelska svärd och lössläppta krafter
Heavenly Sword på Playstation 3 är ett bra exempel där slutbossen har ställt till det för mig. Vägen fram till slutbossen gick relativt bra men jag spenderade flera dagar på att försöka klara av honom. Det var ofta småmissar från min sida och inte att han var omöjlig att besegra men oj vad irriterande det var. Men när han väl var besegrad så var glädjen ofattbar, jag njöt av att se den sista filmsekvensen och lät eftertexterna rulla färdigt innan jag gjorde något annat.

Ett annat spel som jag har svurit mig åt är Star Wars The Force Unleashed där hela sista banan var ett helvete och där jag till och med sänkte svårighetsgraden för att klara av spelet. Men det är en lösning jag tycker är okej ibland. Om det är för svårt så varför pina sig igenom det och riskera hälsa och teknik istället för att svälja stoltheten och sänka svårighetsgraden.

Motsatsen
Det finns dock en spelserie där motsatsen gäller, där jag både uppskattar och gillar sista ”bossen” nämligen i Haloserien. I slutet av sista banan så får man nämligen köra en Warthog på en snitslad bana som ofta går på tid. Det gäller att köra rätt, att ha rätt med fart och att se upp för hindren på vägen men även om jag dör under tiden jag kör så blir jag sällan frustrerad som i Batman eller Star Wars the Force Unleashed. Detta gäller i Halo 1-3, jag vet inte vad de har hittat på i Halo ODST som släpps senare i veckan och inte heller hur sista banan i Halo Wars ser ut men jag har svårt att tro att det är en bilbana i slutet där. Att jag gillar sluten i Halo spelen kanske beror på att man oftast ser var man gör fel, kör jag på fel platta så att jag faller ner och dör så vet jag det till nästa gång.

Men nu är det ju såhär att slutbossar ska vara svåra, det ska alltid krävas lite extra för att klara av dem då resultatet av det blir att man har klarat spelet. Jag är antagligen inte den ända som har en del problem med slutbossar i spel eller? Har ni några favoriter och/eller nemesis bland slutbossar i spel? Vad brukar du göra då det går dåligt? Skrika och ge dig fan på att det ska gå eller stänga av och återkomma senare när du har lugnat ner dig?

30: CHARACTER: Nariko (Heavenly Sword)

WHAT MAKES HER HOT: Fiery redheads are one thing, fiery redheads with giant swords that they wield effortlessly are another. Heavenly Sword’s Nariko is as beautiful as she is lethal, and we have to imagine we’d risk it all to see how “heavenly” it would be. Even better is that she’s voiced by Fringe’s Anna Torv, so it’s like we have two beauties in one.

Source

Record of Fate is a daily wrap-up of Molotov Cupcake’s adventures in gaming. Be wary of spoilers.

September 14th’s installment covers Heavenly Sword, inFamous, and Space Bust A Move.

Heavenly Sword (PS3)
Stopping Point: “4 Days Later…”

Nariko, after defending her village from advancing baddies, must have inspired her father. After taking out the droves of men with Nariko, I spent time as Kai shooting some rather misguided arrows at advancing troops. 14 got in and 13 fell dead – needless to say, I didn’t aim very well. Nariko met up with Kai. In her recurrent dream, she recounts her father standing over her with a sword – only this time, it’s real. Nariko has now become the guardian of the Heavenly Sword.

inFamous (PS3)
Stopping Point: Finished “The Escape”

Cole escaped the city to meet up again with Zeke, but not after drawing up a contract with agent Moya, who is now pulling his strings. Cole must locate John for her in return for her to clear his name – a lot of good that’s doing, as I am working toward an inFamous rating. As this is a borrowed game I won’t get any more time with it for a while. I’m quite enjoying this sandbox-styled game a bit more than Prototype, I believe.

Space Bust A Move (Nintendo DS)
Stopping Point: Completed Toy World Stage 2

Fond memories, as I grew up playing various incarnations of Bust A Move. The rainbow colored balls always seem to trip me up, as I am never good with planning ahead.

Heavenly Sword is 2 years old today

Thanks to Ninja Theory for this amazing game!

10. King Bohan (Heavenly Sword)

Arguably the best thing about PS3 exclusive slash-’em up Heavenly Sword was the diabolical King Bohan, voiced with maniacal glee by Andy ‘Gollum’ Serkis. Bohan is obsessed with obtaining the titular sword for his own dastardly deeds and never-ending quest for power. Throughout the game his hysterical, high-pitched voice spits forth orders of murder and torture. His lack of compassion extends to his minions and even his own son Roach, whom he mercilessly mocks and sends to do his dirty work. A real sod and no mistake.

Source

HEAVENLY SWORD

There was once a woman called Nariko. Now I know exactly what you are thinking; “A woman? And she isn’t called Lara Croft?” I had to check my sources but apparently she is a woman and she isn’t Lara Croft. Nariko lived back in an age when saying you were going to ‘Google’ something, would have gotten you killed. She was daughter to Shen; a great army general and leader of men (Oh that rhymed!). But Shen, and those that he led, were mortified when Nariko was born. See Nariko was supposed to be a boy. Her father had already bought the football shirts, painted the nursery blue and even arranged a bride for when he would have turned 10, but this was not to be. But what riled people more than anything, was that she was supposed to be the ‘The Chosen One’ who would have the ability to rid them of their foes, and wield ‘The Heavenly Sword’. They had been waiting 100 years for this ‘Chosen One’ to appear and now they get a girl! Shen’s first thoughts were to kill the child, but was swayed by the extra income he would receive in benefits, so he kept Nariko and trained her to be a great warrior. A warrior that would one day fight the hellish armies of King Bohan.

23 years later and Nariko is now..23! She had been trained into a fierce fighter and had hair longer than Ron Jeremy’s anatomy. But her fellow soldiers were still unhappy that she was still around. They saw her as a curse. Needless to say, she still wasn’t allowed to vote.

One day, whilst decapitating the chicken for that night’s dinner, her homestead came under attack from Bohan’s army. Shen threw her the Heavenly Sword.

SHEN: Protect the sword Nariko. Don’t use it though! You can finish dinner when you get back.

NARIKO: Oh, thanks.

Nariko tied the sword to her back. It was huge, although not as big as other Godly weapons such as The Blade of Olympus! The Heavenly Sword was actually 3 weapons-in-one, kind of like a JML product only not available in stores. Weapon 1: Two separate blades for a quick fight. Weapon 2: Blades on the end of chains for range and Weapon 3: One solid blade for strength. The third weapon was even strong enough to remove Jodi Marsh’s fake tan.

Nariko resisted temptation and fought hard using just a knife and fork, although she obviously wasn’t looking where she was swinging because her colleague fighting next to her was now missing an arm. She whistled and moved away so he didn’t suspect anything. Nariko couldn’t help but notice that every soldier she fought looked identical. After an hour or two, Bohan’s men retreated; they were no match for a moody woman with a knife and fork. Despite this, Nariko was still bullied by her fellow fighters. One of them even said she had bad hair! As night fell, the bushes outside began to rustle and it wasn’t due to Paul and Mary this time. Assassins had arrived. Shen went and had a word with a small girl called Kai; Nariko’s sister. Kai was a bit…special. In the sense that she spent most of her time hugging the floor, doing cartwheels and shooting defenceless animals with a humongous crossbow.

SHEN: Kai, do you think you could climb up that tree and start killing people for me?

KAI: Of course daddy, what are children for?

Kai climbed a tall tree where she had a good view. She readied her weapon and began to shoot those she could see creeping around in the woods. She was one hell of a crap shot though. She actually managed to only kill one person, but to be fair, the motion of the bow was difficult to control and she was good enough not to throw the bloody thing at the floor. So Nariko stepped in and made mincemeat out of those who were left. They all cheered and went to bed. But at dawn, Bohan’s army attacked again (persistent if nothing else), only this time they had toys. They had brought Trebuchets, Rams and the second edition Buzz Lightyear where the wings spring out.

SHEN: Bollocks! They realised we had no serious weapons! Run Nariko. Take the sword, head east and keep it protected.

KAI: I want to go with Nariko

NARIKO: Right, well I’ll see you later then. You have to stay here Kai because…well you know…you are annoying!

So Nariko took the burden of the sword onto her back (literally) and headed east, away from Bohan’s approaching minions. But she did not get far (which is no surprise as the sword weighed more than Fern Britton before the stomach staples). She came to a stop at the edge of a huge cliff. There was no way across and Bohan himself appeared. He had Shen.

BOHAN: Nariko, Nariko, Nariko. Did you really think you could escape me?

NARIKO: Actually, yes. Hey aren’t you that guy who played Gollum and King Kong?

BOHAN: I did a bit of acting when I was younger but never mind that, give me the sword and I’ll let your daddy live.

NARIKO: Er…No.

Nariko reached behind her and removed the sword from her back. She grasped the handle with both hands. It had been a while since she had one she had to use both hands for. The crowd gasped. What had she done? The sword fused with Nariko and she could feel its power. But, she had now signed her own death certificate. The price paid for wielding The Heavenly Sword, is the user’s life.

NARIKO: How do you like them apples?

Nariko leapt off of the cliff with skill. She managed a double somersault, exiting into a full pike and finished with a 2 ½ Twist rotation before hitting the ground and knocking herself out cold. GBR: 10, USA: 10, CHA: 10, RUS: 10, ITA: 9.

BOHAN: Well, I did not see that coming.

Bohan took Shen and the rest of the clan as his hostages and headed back to his kingdom. Meanwhile, Nariko was regaining consciousness only to be confronted by Kai force-feeding her worms and dead birds. The freak!

NARIKO: Kai, what happened?

KAI: You jumped off the cliff, Shen was taken by Bohan and I completed my colouring book without going outside the lines.

NARIKO: Where is Shen now?

KAI: I don’t know I wasn’t really paying attention.

NARIKO: If you tell me where they are, you might be able to get to play ‘Twing Twang’.

‘Twing Twang’ is what normal people like to call ‘Murder’. But if you sugar coat it, you get away with it. So Kai guided Nariko through beautiful landscapes to Bohan’s kingdom. She ran through the land slicing, dicing and sautéing. Bohan’s inept army were no match for 16 tonnes of solid steel. Nariko finally came to a watery clearing. It was calm and peaceful, except for Shen hanging dead above her and a rather fishy looking woman called Whiptail. That doesn’t mean she was suspicious looking, Whiptail was actually part fish!

WHIPTAIL: Hahaha Look who it is…

Nariko had no time for cliché speeches so she let Whiptail ramble on whilst she cut Shen down. She laid him on the floor and placed both her hands on his chest.

NARIKO: I need 10cc’s of Nitroglycistratehdnohfjsknadn stat. Clear!

She zapped Shen with magical powers that the sword had bestowed upon her and he came back to life with a kick.

NARIKO: Run. I need to take care of this talking Salmon!

Shen fled the area.

WHIPTAIL: Oh, what did you do that for?

NARIKO: Because he is my dad. I didn’t do it for the halibut!!

Nariko was creased up with laughter at her own joke. Whiptail was not amused. The pair began to fight. Whiptail was formidable but had a repetitious attack pattern and Nariko quickly worked out the next move, allowing her to plant the sword right through Whiptail’s scaly torso. But for some bizarre reason Nariko ran off without taking the sword.

Whilst the fight was going on, Shen had made his way out of the clearing and was now facing death at the hands of some oncoming minions. But Kai was well hidden and began ‘Twing Twang’. The arrows flew and glided through the air piercing one soldier after another. She had certainly improved. Shen was saved (again). But there was no time for reunions. Kai ran off to find Nariko. But that would not be easy. For some reason, not explained anywhere, Nariko had been captured by Bohan’s son; Roach. Roach was about 7ft tall, 8ft in diameter and with a crusty face. So Nariko now resided in Bohan’s jail, and The Heavenly Sword now rested in Bohan’s armoury. This was not going well.

But, after serving nearly 3 days in jail, Nariko was found by Kai and she ordered her to find the sword before it was too late. A couple of hours later, Nariko was summoned to ‘The Pit’. Think Gladiator but with less tigers. Here the crowds cheered, all baying for blood. Bohan first ordered her to fight the clan she had saved on several occasions. She did not hesitate in killing her former colleagues, and secretly she quite enjoyed teaching them all a lesson; don’t mess with moody redheads.

NARIKO: Is that it Bohan? That was easy.

BOHAN: Oh, well if you want more, I can supply more.

NARIKO: Bugger! Note to self; Keep quiet.

Gates to ‘The Pit’ opened and out crawled a clawed beast. He bounced and rolled all over the place and Nariko struggled without The Heavenly Sword. But, luckily for her, Kai had done her job. She threw Nariko the powerful sword and the battle was over quicker than Usain Bolt running 100m. So Bohan released four more into the arena. Easy.

BOHAN: Damn it! You are good. Um…Roach, go and fight her.

ROACH: Okay then!

Roach wasn’t the sharpest tool in the shed.

NARIKO: Roach, wait. What is 47 multiplied by 249?

ROACH: Um…er…oh…My head hurts.

NARIKO: Do you want some cake?

Nariko gave Roach a piece of Colossal Blue’s cheesecake. He sat down on the floor and had no interest in continuing the fight. Bohan was not best pleased. Nariko and Kai fled the arena and were on the run again. But, unbeknownst to them, they were being followed by Flying Fox. Flying Fox was another of Bohan’s top warriors. He had several knives attached to his back. These performed no real function other than to attract a mate, like a peacock. That never worked though on account of the fact that he was emaciated, ugly, weird and most importantly of all, had a pony tail! But Flying Fox was fast. Very, very Fast. He snatched Kai and disappeared. Now normally Nariko would have been grateful for the peace and quiet, but it was only fair that she rescue her sister like Kai rescued her. So onwards she fought. The enemies seemed to be getting more and more plentiful, still all identical, so Nariko naturally suspected cloning. It was the only logical explanation. She finally found Kai, hanging by the neck over a massive canyon. On the platform next to Kai, Flying Fox stood there laughing. Nariko raged forward, swung left, swung right, swung down the middle, but all attacks were dodged. This was one quick Fox. Much faster than Megan. Nariko couldn’t do it. She couldn’t kill Flying Fox. So Kai, who was now fed up with having to wait, mustered the energy to lift her crossbow and shot an arrow right through Flying Fox’s head. William Tell eat your heart out. Nariko rescued Kai and carried her all the way home.

Nariko reached the safety of her clan’s fort where she was greeted by Shen and a few other soldiers.

SHEN: What happened to Kai?

NARIKO: Flying Fox hung her.

SHEN: Get her inside. She should recover.

NARIKO: I’m fine by the way; I have had a whale of a time.

Just then a Raven flew over their heads. It was Bohan’s pet.

NARIKO: It followed me all the way home

SHEN: Which means the enemy will be here soon.

NARIKO: Go away Raven. Tell Bohan we are here and we are ready to fight.

RAVEN: Squark!

The raven flew back in the direction from which they had come. The final battle was upon them and it wasn’t long before hundreds of thousands of clones and catapults appeared from the distance. They were outnumbered 1200:1. Steve The Bookmaker was watching with interest. The catapults fired, the soldiers raised ladders to the walls and good old fashioned Hell broke loose. Nariko was virtually all alone. None of the rest of her clan appeared to be doing anything and Shen was about as much use an inflatable dart board. So Nariko ran from one position to the next. She took charge of cannons and destroyed the catapults, she ran around killing those who had breached the fort and finally, she ventured outside. She was pissed. She now faced insurmountable odds. But she then began to convulse and spasm. The sword was taking over. She hit the floor quicker than Ronaldo. The sword lit up and began to burn ancient writing all over Nariko’s body. She was dead. The crowds began to gather around her, when all of a sudden a burst of blinding light radiated from Nariko. She rose to her feet as a Goddess. She swung the sword left, then right. Dozens of men went flying with each swing. This was fun. Bohan, who was watching from the mountains, couldn’t believe it. He turned to his pet Raven.

BOHAN: Oh wise Raven. Grant me your powers and I will rid this land of that sword wielding, voodoo using, beautiful pain in the arse.

The Raven turned into a thick black smoke which Bohan keenly ingested. Sure he was strong and sure, he had raven wings but he had now been given a face that had more veins than an 80 year old’s leg. This is obviously because he was a bad guy. Nariko gets beauty, Bohan gets veins. It’s the oldest story the book.

Bohan descended onto the battlefield. He and Nariko engaged in a truly epic, if not slightly annoyingly hard, battle. He had the upper hand with the ability of flight, but Nariko defended well and fought hard. Bohan rushed in for attack but Nariko dodged like a pro and as he passed her, she ‘pistol whipped’ with the handle of the sword…so technically she ‘Sword Whipped’ him. He was dazed and she took the opportunity to pluck his eyebrows. Angry at his latest cosmetic feature, he grabbed her by the shoulders and flew upwards at astonishing speed. Nariko lunged forward and grabbed Bohan by the throat. The two exited the flight and landed somewhere different. It was not clear as to where they now were but Nariko was pretty sure it was the piece of land that Tescos had earmarked for their newest store. They fought again. This time Bohan focused mainly on staying airborne, using magic to thrust fireballs and lightning bolts in her direction. Nariko had to use The Heavenly Sword to deflect the attacks back in Bohan’s direction but was confused by which block deflected which attack and it took her some time to achieve this goal. But eventually she did and the pair plummeted back down to the battlefield below. It was not over however. A third fight ensued. By this time Nariko was not amused at the repetitiveness of the offence Bohan was presenting. She wasn’t enjoying it as much as she had hoped. But Nariko had one last trick up her sleeve.

NARIKO: Bohan, wait. Look over there.

She pointed into the distance and Bohan looked.

NARIKO: Haha, fooled ya.

Bohan turned back around only to feel The Heavenly sword slice his flesh, detach his stomach from his intestines, halve his liver and tickle his spinal cord. He was defeated. He coughed like a chain smoker and out spewed the Raven’s smoke. The bird formed again and pecked out Bohan’s eyes just for good measure. The Raven flew away in a huff and left Bohan crying on the floor. Nariko was contemplating finishing him off but Roach came running over and asked to take his daddy with him. Nariko let him go. She turned to face her clan and father. She stumbled towards them, drained of energy. Kai was still in intensive care, so Nariko bent down next to her sibling and placed both hands on Kai’s chest (don’t get too excited. It’s only fiction and it wasn’t that kind of hand-on-chest action). Nariko used the remaining amount of life she had left, to heal Kai. Not as a gesture of love but because if she was going to die, she at least wanted to leave Shen with something to annoy the hell out of him.

Nariko took a deep breath and managed some final words.

NARIKO: Ow!

THE END

Source

7) Heavenly Sword / Nariko Vs. King Bohan

A frequently overlooked gem, Ninja Theory’s Heavenly Sword nets itself a well-deserved spot in our top ten thanks to the stellar duel against King Bohan (voiced by the utterly brilliant Andy Serkis) at the game’s climax. Accompanied by a sweeping orchestral score, the fight takes place on a sprawling battlefield crammed with dozens of sparing warriors, where flame-haired protagonist Nariko and the Raven King (aka Bohan) duke it out with each other amidst a field of corpses – needless to say, these credentials lend the battle a decidedly epic feel to say the least. Interestingly, the fight is in part evocative of Link’s duel with Phantom Ganon in The Legend of Zelda, requiring you to reflect Bohan’s attacks back at him to stun your enemy, allowing you to get up close and personal to deal out some serious punishment. Given Heavenly Sword’s penchant for QTE’s, it should also come as no surprise that there’s a couple of context sensitive attacks you’re able to pull off providing you’re quick enough. Oh, and did we mention Andy Serkis?

Source

7) Heavenly Sword / Nariko Vs. King Bohan

Playstation Universe:  A frequently overlooked gem, Ninja Theory’s Heavenly Sword nets itself a well-deserved spot in our top ten thanks to the stellar duel against King Bohan (voiced by the utterly brilliant Andy Serkis) at the game’s climax. Accompanied by a sweeping orchestral score, the fight takes place on a sprawling battlefield crammed with dozens of sparing warriors, where flame-haired protagonist Nariko and the Raven King (aka Bohan) duke it out with each other amidst a field of corpses – needless to say, these credentials lend the battle a decidedly epic feel to say the least. Interestingly, the fight is in part evocative of Link’s duel with Phantom Ganon in The Legend of Zelda, requiring you to reflect Bohan’s attacks back at him to stun your enemy, allowing you to get up close and personal to deal out some serious punishment. Given Heavenly Sword’s penchant for QTE’s, it should also come as no surprise that there’s a couple of context sensitive attacks you’re able to pull off providing you’re quick enough. Oh, and did we mention Andy Serkis?

Having just pre-ordered the game ‘Wet’, which stars Eliza Dushku as Rubi Malone – a female assassin – I started thinking about other strong female characters.

In honour of the harder side of the fairer sex I’ve put together twenty of the toughest female characters out there.

No superpowers, I’m talking about hand to hand, gunplay and ninja type skills.

It was supposed to be a Top 10 but the list just grew and grew. So I’ve had to do it in two parts.

Here’s part one.

And no, before we start, Lara Croft is not on this list. Every woman on this list could take her down

20) Lian Xing (Syphon Filter)

A former member of the Chinese Secret Service, Xing teamed up with Gabriel Logan in Soviet occupied Afganistan.

She is a skilled marksman, known for her sniper work. Lian Xing is always on hand to help Gabe out of trouble – whether that’s by his side or over the radio.

19) Faith Connors (Mirror’s Edge)

Faith is a parkour expert with some pretty nifty footwork. She lives in a city where the oppressive government keeps tabs on everybody – spying electronically on them. Faith delivers packages or messages by hand, the only way to safely converse.

She can handle herself with a firearm but it’s her awesome hand to hand combat skills that get her onto this list.

Check out the video below for evidence!

18) Anne Lewis (Robocop)

Ever since I first saw Robocop I’ve always thought his female partner Anne Lewis was underappreciated.

Officer Lewis is shown having a fist fight with a male suspect moments before meeting Murphy/Robocop for the first time – always a good introduction.

Her gun skills are good and she even helps Robocop reallign his targeting system with her accurate aiming.

She is willing to go to extreme lengths to assist her partner, helping him recover when he is seriously injured and then backing him up, with almost fatal consequences, in the last stand against Boddicker’s gang at the steel mill.

A real tough nut with a big heart, Anne Lewis is exactly the kind of partner you’d want if you were a cop, especially in Old Detroit

17) Sonya Blade (Mortal Kombat)

Lieutenant Sonya Blade is a member of the Outer World Investigation Agency, a top United States Special Forces unit.

She is also the first female entrant into the Mortal Kombat tournament. One of her moves includes doing a handstand, grabbing her enemy between her legs and smashing them into the ground.

Using her army training to her advantage Sonya is as tough as any of her male counterparts – she doesn’t even have to actually touch her opponent to finish them off… she simply blows them a deadly kiss (see below)

16) Echo (Dollhouse)

Echo is an ‘active’, someone that has signed a period of their life away in exchange for cash. During this period she has her memory wiped and is regularly imprinted with other people’s memories to carry out various jobs.

We’re talking some serious skills – safe cracking, martial arts, street fighting… the list goes on and on.

And she certainly isn’t afraid to use her skills – the Chinese kitchen/alleyway fight scene was particularly gruelling and incredibly fun to watch.

15) Tyris Flare (Golden Axe)

An Amazonian who is deadly with a sword, Tyris Flare cuts an impressive figure.

Orphaned by Death Adder, the game’s main bad guy, she is out for revenge and doesn’t care who gets hurt on the way.

As well as being adapt with a sword Tyris commands the power of fire magic – but she makes the list based on her swordplay and general toughness.

14) Rubi Malone (Wet)

I haven’t even played the full game yet but having seen the demo in action I have no hesitation in including Rubi on this list.

An acrobatic assassin skilled in dual wielding pistols and deadly with a sword, Rubi always gets the job done – despite increasing numbers of enemies

Having said that her temper may cloud her judgement at times – she often leaves a trail of dead bodies in her wake trying to get to her target, which might not be the kind of hush hush hit you’ve asked for.

13) Trinity (The Matrix)

I know Trinity kind of has superpowers but really she’s just a normal human who has learnt the ability to bend the Matrix. So she’s in the list.

I remember seeing The Matrix in the cinema and being blown away by it. That opening scene where Trinity deals with the group of cops… amazing.

With a mix of martial arts and general Matrix bending merriment Trinity takes care of the bad guys in the best possible way – hard and fast.

12) Nariko (Heavenly Sword)

Nariko’s clan were awaiting a male to fulfill the prophecy of the powerful weapon Heavenly Sword – turns out it was always gonna be a girl who got the best out of the weapon.

When all else around her seems to be falling apart it’s Nariko that steps up to the plate and takes on the bad guys.

With some serious sword combos and plenty of attitude, she is not one to be messed with, as King Bohan and his cohorts found out in Heavenly Sword.

11) Blaze Fielding (Streets Of Rage)

One of three members of a special police task force set up to deal with unrest in the city, Blaze is a Judo expert.

She uses a mixture of her martial arts, slams and throws to clean up the streets.

Hard as nails and willing to risk it all to protect the public, Blaze’s German Suplex move finished off many a bad guy in Streets Of Rage.

So there we have it the frist half of the count down with the Top 10 coming up soon!