The past two days I've been writing now and then on a short horror story that I call "Dark Rooms". Check I'll post it here, and also a link to my deviantart where you can fav it if you have a dA :)
DARK ROOMS
It was a single room, too dark to know if anything was in it due to the lack of anything to shed light. The darkness was so deep that it seemed that the walls and ceiling were too scared to stand there and seemed to cling to each other for comfort.
A noise came from the room, a small rustling noise as if someone moved. It seized, then started again but this time it was more intense. It went on for a while and seized again, only to be followed by a big thud and a yelp.
Cursing echoed through the room, the thing that had created the thud had hurt itself in the fall. It moved and knocked over something metallic that rolled around for a few seconds, echoing slightly. The thing moving around seemed not to know where it was and no idea how to orientate through the room. It was fumbling through the thick darkness trying in desperation to find something to illuminate this darkness, to reveal this location that was a mystery to it.
Moving against the wall due to being scared of getting lost in the darkness, a door handle was finally found. As it was pressed down, the door it was connected to moved slightly. No light came from the area beyond the door, nothing to help the lost being.
Stepping out from the room it quickly felt some strange texture on the floor, if there even was any floor there at all. The thing was some kind of liquid, that thing was certain unless the senses were playing tricks. The being bent down to touch the liquid, it was slightly thick and stuck to the finger. Put the finger in the mouth, since it figured it was the only possible way to figure out what kind of liquid it was in this darkness. It had a faint taste of iron.
Without really knowing what it might be, the being continued to walk against the wall of what seemed to be a small hallway. There was soon a doorway, the door slightly open so it invited itself into this new room. The being started to feel around on the wall for anything that might turn on some kind of light, but in vain since the wall was completely blank. Strangely enough the surface was really smooth, as if the wall had never been touched before or if it was cleaned and smoothened constantly.
It moved around in the room for a few steps before walking straight into something hard, hitting the shinbone that was hard as rock. There was a silence, but the kind of silence where there was supposed to be a sound but it never came. The being clutched to its leg and was cursing with no voice. It was as if the darkness sucked up sound itself.
The being was confused about this, since noises were heard in the other room, but in this one they didn’t seem to exist at all. It opened its mouth to scream but it was a silent scream. No sound came out, not even the usual sound of breathing.
Making its way through the room to the hallway it came from, it stepped out and stood there for a while, hearing the sound of breathing, which was a comforting in this empty place, almost like an old friend keeping you company.
The smell of the liquid was filling the corridor the being was standing in, the smell was familiar but hard to place. Not wanting to go into the room with the suffocating darkness, it decided to go past that door and continued down the corridor, which felt like falling down an endless hole screaming but no one would hear.
“To escape…”
The being heard a voice but not a sound, instead it felt like it came from the darkness itself. The pressure of the voice was intense, almost crushing the being.
“To escape…”
It repeated as an echo, it was low and slithered its way into the soul wanting to crush it slowly, but not until it got what it wanted.
“…the darkness…”
More words were added by the same voice but the pressure was more intense than before, as if testing the being if it dared to listen to the whole sentence.
“…darkness…”
Only one word echoed this time but it wasn’t an echo in the corridor, rather an echo in the darkness itself, as if it moved with the words that were spoken by something non-existent.
“…give up…”
Now it seemed as if the darkness itself tried to crush everything in the corridor, it was so intense and horrifying. The being fell to its knees and hit the liquid that was on the floor, something in the liquid touched its knee, but was quickly gone.
“…your…”
It seemed the voice was coming to the end of the sentence, but so did the being feel about its own life too. Now it felt like the whole ocean was packed into this corridor of unknown size and was crushing the being under its pressure.
“…light”
The last word was spoken so low it wasn’t heard, rather the being felt the word. Just as the word had disappeared all the pressure disappeared and the ocean passed. It didn’t know what this sentence meant, ‘To escape the darkness give up your light’? What could that mean? It didn’t make sense. The only thing the being knew was that it wanted, was to escape this wretched darkness.
Even after the pressure of the voice had disappeared the words it had spoken were heavy, not on the body but on the soul. They were the salvation to the crushing darkness if they only could be understood, “To escape the darkness give up your light…” the being said as if seeking comfort from its own voice.
As a reaction to the words the liquid got warmed under the feet of the being, it also felt as if it was starting to move slightly. The being tried to move but noticed that the liquid had a grip of the feet. The liquid started to make its way up the feet and the leg as if it was a stream going upwards and against nature itself.
Panic spread through the being’s body now as the liquid started to make its way further up the body reaching the stomach, it tried to get the liquid off itself but it had a strong grip even though it was completely liquid at the same time. It reached the chest and started to spread to the arms, making it impossible to move at all.
As the liquid reached the throat all the blood in the being’s body reached the brain, thoughts rushing through the head, words coming to mind again. For some reason they made sense but all too late, the liquid had reached the face and filled the mouth, making it impossible to form words.
The liquid reached the nose and made its way up over the eyes, air was something of a luxury now but the being was poor.
‘I don’t need the light!’
Was the only thought going through the being’s mind,
‘I don’t need the light…’
The thought fading as the liquid was filling every empty space in the body, twisting the darkness into something even worse than before.
‘I don’t…’
Thoughts came slowly and it was like running up a muddy road in harsh rain.
‘…need…’
By now it had been completely covered by the liquid.
‘…the…light…’
It was making its way into every pore, every opening in the body. The body couldn’t hold it anymore, it felt like everything was about to burst…
“TAKE MY LIGHT!”
He shouted as he sat up in his bed that was soft and dry. The darkness was still there but it had no pressure and didn’t crush him at all. It had all just been a nightmare, just a nightmare. No light hit his eyes due to the eye protection he wore every night to be able to sleep, but now he longed for that light to hit his eyes and light his world.
Yawning and scratching his head, as he always did after he had woken up, then he proceeded to pull the eye protection off so the light could illuminate his world as it had always done every morning.
The eye protection hit the floor, his eyes widened in terror but they took in no light. The regular streetlight outside the window wasn’t there, neither were the outlines of the furniture. Nothing was there at all. The same darkness he had walked through was back again, the pressure was back and was crushing his soul.
Only one word came to mind, it was an echo that got louder all the time:
‘Light’
I hope you enjoyed the read, and here's the link to the deviation on dA
Dark Rooms
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
What's going on~
Just recently got home from school and I'm just feeling all lazy now x'D
I got two tests back these past two days, and on both of them I got nice grades, not as good as I wanted but it will have to do for now x'D
I've also replanted my woodland strawberry(smultron för oss svenskar) plants today since we got some free soil from the ones that own the apartment complexes we're living in, I really hope they will bear fruit this year since I got no strawberries last year =(
I'm also having a big test in match next week, have to do five chapters until then, around 200 pages, but there's some tests in the end of each chapter and I will concentrate on them mostly. I hope it will go well :)
I also have an assignment for my Computer Communication class where I'm to write how online game works, mostly how it's possible to play online against others and how the servers handle the data and such. Atleast it is within a subject I like, gaming.
When we're talking about games, I really need some new games to play. I have for example Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Majoras Mask and Wind Waker. Also have Final Fantasy X and XII, but I'm way to lazy for a roleplaying game now (not that Zelda is). I also have some other games on the GC, but maybe I should finish Mega Man 10, it is fun and I'm in the end. But it is really hard and I keep dying on the last boss, so frustrating!!
Oh well, only about three weeks left of school and only about two weeks until my girlfriend will be visiting me again! It will be so awesome since she's staying for two months this time, more or less the whole summer (26:th of May to 28:th of July). We will do a lot of fun, like going to Then There Was Light exibision, try to go to museums, swim in the lake and other fun things. But now school, it is important! So is taking it easy!
Next post will be about Mass Effect 2, maybe it will be up between thursday and friday, and it will really long!
So until next time!
"Tell us about your immunesystem!"
"I have a shotgun."
"Maybe we talk another time..."
I got two tests back these past two days, and on both of them I got nice grades, not as good as I wanted but it will have to do for now x'D
I've also replanted my woodland strawberry(smultron för oss svenskar) plants today since we got some free soil from the ones that own the apartment complexes we're living in, I really hope they will bear fruit this year since I got no strawberries last year =(
I'm also having a big test in match next week, have to do five chapters until then, around 200 pages, but there's some tests in the end of each chapter and I will concentrate on them mostly. I hope it will go well :)
I also have an assignment for my Computer Communication class where I'm to write how online game works, mostly how it's possible to play online against others and how the servers handle the data and such. Atleast it is within a subject I like, gaming.
When we're talking about games, I really need some new games to play. I have for example Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Majoras Mask and Wind Waker. Also have Final Fantasy X and XII, but I'm way to lazy for a roleplaying game now (not that Zelda is). I also have some other games on the GC, but maybe I should finish Mega Man 10, it is fun and I'm in the end. But it is really hard and I keep dying on the last boss, so frustrating!!
Oh well, only about three weeks left of school and only about two weeks until my girlfriend will be visiting me again! It will be so awesome since she's staying for two months this time, more or less the whole summer (26:th of May to 28:th of July). We will do a lot of fun, like going to Then There Was Light exibision, try to go to museums, swim in the lake and other fun things. But now school, it is important! So is taking it easy!
Next post will be about Mass Effect 2, maybe it will be up between thursday and friday, and it will really long!
So until next time!
"Tell us about your immunesystem!"
"I have a shotgun."
"Maybe we talk another time..."
Monday, May 10, 2010
Clash of the Titans Review
I saw this movie a few weeks ago with a friend, it had looked promosing in the trailers and the summary of it had sounded nice.
When I went out from the cinema I was really dissapointed, it had been nothing what I thought it would be.
To start of, the adaption to the original story. It mostly only got the characters names right and that Perseus was Zeus' son. But that was kind of it. I hadn't read the whole story about Perseus but after the movie I did a quick research about it, where I found out that they had more or less butchered the story of Perseus.
Let us begin with the movie then.
Movie:
The first that happens is that we get a backstory of the story, yes, that logical! That a king had stoped carring about the gods, which made Zeus seek revenge upon him by comming in the form of a bird, transformed to the king himself and impregnated the queen.
When he found out, he killed the queen and places her in a wooden chest along with the kid. He then proceeded to throw them into the ocean.
A fisherman and his wife find the wooden chest and then fishes it out only to find Perseus and his dead mother. They adopt him and take him in as their own, raised him into manhood where he will start his adventure to fight the gods.
Original:
In the original the King never got a son so he consulted the oracles which told him he would be killed by his daughters son. To prevent that he locked her into a bronze chamber open to the sky. Then Zeus appeared as a golden shower and impregnated the daughter and she would later give birth to Perseus.
The king didn't want to kill Perseus and the daughter in case it would anger the gods, so he threw them into the ocean in a wooden chest.
Perseus mother prayed in the darkness of the chest as it floated in the sea, thanks to it they got washed up on a shore of Seriphos. It was here they met a fisherman who took them in and raised the boy to manhood. The fisherman also had a brother who later fell in love with Perseus mother.
Comment:
Oh boy, only such a short thing and so many wrongs. How could they change it so much that went wrong. How could they just change it to that it was the queen that gave birth to Perseus instead of the kings daughter? It wouldn't be THAT hard to make it happen, even if the golden shower would be a little wierd, atleast for me. But non the less, a really stupid and uncessecary change.
Then that he killed the queen and not the child (atleast the kid was alive when the movie started, so yeah), it was really wierd. And if they killed the kid, how the heck was he alive when they found the chest? Makes not sense what so ever!
The change with the fisherman and lack of wife in the movie was most likely only due to the change that the queen died before, so it was a natural change even if it was also a really stupid change. Because of that change, they took out a part of the movie and changed the story.
Not to keep you waiting, I will write the original so you can see what we missed.
Original:
The fishermans brother eventually fell in love with Perseus mother, but wanted Perseus gone from the island so he could have her for himself.
To do so, he held a large banquet where every guest had to bring a horse because he was pretending to make a contribution to the Hippodamia, the tamers of horses.
The fishermen's protegé didn't have any horse to give the brother, so they asked him to name a gift which they wouldn't turn down to get him. It was here the brother made Perseus start a journey to leave the island, he demanded the head of the only mortal Gorgon, Medusa. So he set out for the journey to get the head of the Medusa for him.
Comment:
We stop here for now, since this didn't take place in the movie at ALL! There were no brother, no banquet, no nothing. The Medusa didn't appear until much, much, MUCH later in the movie, almost in the end of the whole movie. Such a fuck idiocy to remove that, it would be better and would have made a longer movie.
The movie hold similar thing to the original, but they've switched places, so I will bring them up as they appear in the movie. Let us go on with the movie then!
Movie:
Perseus and his familiy is out fishing, it has not gone well at all with the catch for a long while and they suffer from it. They come close to the Island where King Cepheus rule, and they're trying to provoke the gods and start a full scale ware against them.
To get their attention, they've started to destroy the statues of the gods, also by burning the tempels. This of course angers the gods and they strike back, atleast Hades does. During the assault of the troops Hades sees Perseus and his family and attack the boat. It starts to sink and the family (except Perseus) is traped in a small area with air. So Perseus tries to save them, but they're beyond saving and he saves himself instead and then get washed up on the island.
There he get captures by the troops after the assault of Hades has seized and brought to the room where the king and queen is.
There they start talking about why they're provoking and anger the Gods, because the Gods doesn't show them love anymore and therefore the humans want revenge. They also proclame that the daughter of the king and queen is more beautiful than Aphrodite herself.
Then Hades appears agian and starts to kill all the troops in the room, but he also notices Perseus and proclame him son of Zeus, a demi-god. He also says that they would have to sacrifice the princess to his monster Kraken, or it would destroy the whole island and everyone on it. He also kill the king and queen if I'm not wrong. After Hades is gone, Perseus get in trouble and everyone more or less hate him, and Perseus just want to take revenge on Hades for what he did to his mom and dad.
Comment:
Let us stop here, because well, in the original, this doesn't really happen, not at all. The only thing that is correct is that they claim that the princess is more beautful than any human, but not the gods but the sea nymphs. Which causes the anger of Poseidon, not Hades. He also just sends a big sea serpent that destroys land and man alike. Oh man, they just LOVE to fuck it big time. But wait, I'm not done with this yet.
Compared to the original, this was after the whole thing with the Medusa, and it is much later they get to know about the Medusa in the movie. Because in the original Perseus arrives in the kingdom Ethiopia(don't remember if it was called the same in the movie, but it is supposed to reprisent the same place) on his way back after have slain Medusa.
.... What? They've just switched place of everything... Just awful...
Back to the movie and let us see where it takes us.
Movie:
The city want the princess to be sacrificed for the saftey of the city, but Perseus and the troops of the dead king and queen doesn't want that to happen so they set out to find a way to kill the unkillable Kraken.
On their way Perseus get trained by one of the seniors of the troops and find out he's a natural with the sword. They also find a sword that has been forged on Olympus, but Perseus doesn't want it because he want to do this mission as a man, not a god.
They also come across Pegasi and later Perseus late mothers husband, the king. They fight him and lose about two of the troopers, the king run away and they chase after him into a desert.
In the desert they get attacked by giant scorpions and even more troopers die due to Perseus lust for vengence. As they're almost killed the scorpions are stoped by a mysterious people who live in the desert and tame the scorpions.
They tell Perseus and the group about the Norns who can give them the answer they seek, so they set out to find them which proves not to be a hard time at all.
The norns tell them they would need Medusa's head that can turn everything of flesh and blood to stone.
Now they have to get to the underworld where Medusa is held prisioner and kill her.
They're also now accompanied by the half-god Io whom decided to join them.
Comment:
Just wow so much that's wrong here, just wow. The only thing that's right is that they want to sacrifice the princess to the moster. But that's about it!
The biggerst what the heck for me is that they called the three old hags norns... NORNS? That's F-ING NORSE MYTHOLOGY, COMPLETELY WRONG MYTHOLOGY HOLLYWOOD!
Those old women were called Graeae and otherwise they were correctly potrayed, but that they were called norns where so wrong.
Also this thing about Perseus wanting to be man and not god is so wierd, because in the original he get a lot of gifts from the Gods and he uses them all. Like the helm of invisibility, his flying shoes and such.
Also that Medusa is along in a prision is wrong. She is the only mortal of three sisters living together in a cave. Also, the Kraken never appeares in the original, it is only the sea serpent by Poseidon, not any moster by Hades. Oh man, this is just getting out of hand. Also, they never crossed any desert like that. And the sword forged on Olympus didn't exist either. Just so you know.
But on with the movie then, we're almost done, wierd, eh?
Movie:
Perseus and the remaining troopers plus one of the wierd sand people(why do I think of Star Wars when I say that?) head towards the only place where they can get to Medusa, through hell. But they don't know how to get across Styx unless dying, luckily Perseus had gottena coing from Zeus before and could bribe their way across.
When they arrived to the prision of Medusa only Io stayed behind and everyone else went in with Perseus to kill her. The fight ended with everyone but Perseus dying and he managed to cut of her head and then put it in a bag as he returned to the mortal world.
As he got back he met up with Io, but she got killed from behind by the king he had been chasing,. They fought for a long while, then Perseus decided he would use the Gods gift and power so he managed to kill the king. Then out to his aid came the black pegasus he had encountered earlier in the movie.
Comment:
I was to say there is no word for this, but no, there's a lof of words for this.
Medusa didn't live in the underworld, she lived in a cave hidden away and she was living with her two sisters who where immortals. There weren't even any fight in the original story, Perseus suck in alone with his adamantine sword and a polished shield Athena had given him. He also used the helm of invisibility to sneak in, but of Medusas head by looking in the reflection of the shield and then sneak out when the sister awoke.
Aslo this is where the the pegasus appears, because as Perseus kills Medusa a pegasus leaps out from her neck along with Chrysaor, pegasus brother.
Just so many things that are wrong. One thing that just made me wonder, is that Perseus doesn't have any bag for the head when he goes to Medusa, but when you see him go out from Medusa's lair he is carrying the head in a bag.
One of the things that annoyed me a lot was that in that scen when he fought the king, that he embraced his godhood and decided to be half-god and half-human. So the arrogance and selfish desires got all of the troopers killed only to be thrown away after Io died. Then Io had the nerve to call him he best of a god and best of men. He's neither, almost the worst of both! SRSLY! NO, DOESN'T WORK LIKE THAT, TAKE RESPONSABILITY!
They just can't keep it consistant and keep skipping things. What the heck was it with getting everyone killed in the fight against Medusa? Just so Perseus could fly back on the pegasus alone? Did Io die because of that too? I don't know, I'm not sure the writer knew themselves. Oh well, onwards we go to the last part of the story.
Movie:
Perseus travels back to the princess and to stop the Kraken from killing her and the rest of the city. As he arrives the Kraken has already started to attack the city along with harpies who were sent by Hades.
The head get stolen by a harpie that Perseus chases to get it back since it is the only chance to kill the Kraken.
After a long and persistant chase Perseus finally get the head back and just in time manages to turn the Kraken into stone before he devoured the princess. Perseus then ask Zeus to help him to defeat Hades, he does so by striking Perseus sword with lightning and then he throws it at Hades so he get sealed up in the underworld.
Unfortunately the princess falls into the water below the city and the Kraken collapses and falls over where she landed. Perseus jumps in after her and saves her from drowning.
When he get her up from the water, he let her walk away to her kingdom to rule it. Zeus appears and offers Perseus a place on Olympus but he refuses the offer and want to live with the mortals, being kind as Zeus are he revives Io so they can live together and wouldn't be alone ever again. Here the movie ends.
Comment:
I mean... Kraken wasn't even a part of the original, he wasn't even there! Why did they persist to change it like this? I mean, protecting that city and princess was only a part of Perseus story, not the only story. They probobly didn't know what they were doing.
Also, Io wasn't even really there in the original, he was just with a small band and got the help from gods, no Io or anything. Also, how the FUCK do you survive after falling like 20 meter into the water, getting big chunks of a moster on you? Apparently if Perseus touches you, you'll revive instantly and everything will be okay, except if your name is Io that is.
Apart from just butching the story, it wasn't even good as just a movie. It was extremelly rushed all the time, they just jumped from one fight to another, Perseus learned how to fight with a sword in about two minutes and he had never in his life held a sword. Even if he's a god, I doubt it's all "Wow, sword! I'm a master swordsman now! Let us banish Hades! :D". The characters wasn't even that interesting all together, the most interesting character was the sand person, and he said about two words in the movie and blew himself up(awesome, right?). That says A LOT about the movie, don't you think? Plus I saw it in 3D and it had minimal 3D effects, I took off the glasses many times and it was no difference at all.
And yeah, the "fight" with hades was ridicilus. Perseus held up his sword, Zeus struck if with lightning and he threw the sword at Hades and he got sealed away in the underworld. Just WOW, that's a way to make a climatic fight short, same with the Kraken. It was such an immense build up how awesome and evil it was and then it just dies without doing much. Crush a building, hittan a human then dying. Slowes fucking most dangerous monster in the world ever.
Plus, when Perseus saved the princess he clamed marrige to her, but that was not even any hint of in the movie, they just wrote it out from the movie.
Also, why do they keep potraying Hades as the evil guy? They even say it in the beginning of the movie, he got tricked by the "good" gods to rule in the worst place ever. So yes, he is the evil guy that is ruling the underworld. NO WONDER HE IS PISSED AT ZEUS! I don't blame him for being mean to Zeus and being all dark, I would be that too.
There are more to the original, but it doesn't have any more connection to the movie, so I'm not going to mention it.
So to conclude this all, Clash of the Titans isn't something you should see, not even when it comes out on DVD/Bluray or anything. Not even worth downloading. Just warning you guys, and sorry about my long rant about the movie, but I payed 150kr(about 18$ or something like that.) and I felt it was my right to tell you all how bad it was.
So, until next time!
"I fart in your general direction!"
When I went out from the cinema I was really dissapointed, it had been nothing what I thought it would be.
To start of, the adaption to the original story. It mostly only got the characters names right and that Perseus was Zeus' son. But that was kind of it. I hadn't read the whole story about Perseus but after the movie I did a quick research about it, where I found out that they had more or less butchered the story of Perseus.
Let us begin with the movie then.
Movie:
The first that happens is that we get a backstory of the story, yes, that logical! That a king had stoped carring about the gods, which made Zeus seek revenge upon him by comming in the form of a bird, transformed to the king himself and impregnated the queen.
When he found out, he killed the queen and places her in a wooden chest along with the kid. He then proceeded to throw them into the ocean.
A fisherman and his wife find the wooden chest and then fishes it out only to find Perseus and his dead mother. They adopt him and take him in as their own, raised him into manhood where he will start his adventure to fight the gods.
Original:
In the original the King never got a son so he consulted the oracles which told him he would be killed by his daughters son. To prevent that he locked her into a bronze chamber open to the sky. Then Zeus appeared as a golden shower and impregnated the daughter and she would later give birth to Perseus.
The king didn't want to kill Perseus and the daughter in case it would anger the gods, so he threw them into the ocean in a wooden chest.
Perseus mother prayed in the darkness of the chest as it floated in the sea, thanks to it they got washed up on a shore of Seriphos. It was here they met a fisherman who took them in and raised the boy to manhood. The fisherman also had a brother who later fell in love with Perseus mother.
Comment:
Oh boy, only such a short thing and so many wrongs. How could they change it so much that went wrong. How could they just change it to that it was the queen that gave birth to Perseus instead of the kings daughter? It wouldn't be THAT hard to make it happen, even if the golden shower would be a little wierd, atleast for me. But non the less, a really stupid and uncessecary change.
Then that he killed the queen and not the child (atleast the kid was alive when the movie started, so yeah), it was really wierd. And if they killed the kid, how the heck was he alive when they found the chest? Makes not sense what so ever!
The change with the fisherman and lack of wife in the movie was most likely only due to the change that the queen died before, so it was a natural change even if it was also a really stupid change. Because of that change, they took out a part of the movie and changed the story.
Not to keep you waiting, I will write the original so you can see what we missed.
Original:
The fishermans brother eventually fell in love with Perseus mother, but wanted Perseus gone from the island so he could have her for himself.
To do so, he held a large banquet where every guest had to bring a horse because he was pretending to make a contribution to the Hippodamia, the tamers of horses.
The fishermen's protegé didn't have any horse to give the brother, so they asked him to name a gift which they wouldn't turn down to get him. It was here the brother made Perseus start a journey to leave the island, he demanded the head of the only mortal Gorgon, Medusa. So he set out for the journey to get the head of the Medusa for him.
Comment:
We stop here for now, since this didn't take place in the movie at ALL! There were no brother, no banquet, no nothing. The Medusa didn't appear until much, much, MUCH later in the movie, almost in the end of the whole movie. Such a fuck idiocy to remove that, it would be better and would have made a longer movie.
The movie hold similar thing to the original, but they've switched places, so I will bring them up as they appear in the movie. Let us go on with the movie then!
Movie:
Perseus and his familiy is out fishing, it has not gone well at all with the catch for a long while and they suffer from it. They come close to the Island where King Cepheus rule, and they're trying to provoke the gods and start a full scale ware against them.
To get their attention, they've started to destroy the statues of the gods, also by burning the tempels. This of course angers the gods and they strike back, atleast Hades does. During the assault of the troops Hades sees Perseus and his family and attack the boat. It starts to sink and the family (except Perseus) is traped in a small area with air. So Perseus tries to save them, but they're beyond saving and he saves himself instead and then get washed up on the island.
There he get captures by the troops after the assault of Hades has seized and brought to the room where the king and queen is.
There they start talking about why they're provoking and anger the Gods, because the Gods doesn't show them love anymore and therefore the humans want revenge. They also proclame that the daughter of the king and queen is more beautiful than Aphrodite herself.
Then Hades appears agian and starts to kill all the troops in the room, but he also notices Perseus and proclame him son of Zeus, a demi-god. He also says that they would have to sacrifice the princess to his monster Kraken, or it would destroy the whole island and everyone on it. He also kill the king and queen if I'm not wrong. After Hades is gone, Perseus get in trouble and everyone more or less hate him, and Perseus just want to take revenge on Hades for what he did to his mom and dad.
Comment:
Let us stop here, because well, in the original, this doesn't really happen, not at all. The only thing that is correct is that they claim that the princess is more beautful than any human, but not the gods but the sea nymphs. Which causes the anger of Poseidon, not Hades. He also just sends a big sea serpent that destroys land and man alike. Oh man, they just LOVE to fuck it big time. But wait, I'm not done with this yet.
Compared to the original, this was after the whole thing with the Medusa, and it is much later they get to know about the Medusa in the movie. Because in the original Perseus arrives in the kingdom Ethiopia(don't remember if it was called the same in the movie, but it is supposed to reprisent the same place) on his way back after have slain Medusa.
.... What? They've just switched place of everything... Just awful...
Back to the movie and let us see where it takes us.
Movie:
The city want the princess to be sacrificed for the saftey of the city, but Perseus and the troops of the dead king and queen doesn't want that to happen so they set out to find a way to kill the unkillable Kraken.
On their way Perseus get trained by one of the seniors of the troops and find out he's a natural with the sword. They also find a sword that has been forged on Olympus, but Perseus doesn't want it because he want to do this mission as a man, not a god.
They also come across Pegasi and later Perseus late mothers husband, the king. They fight him and lose about two of the troopers, the king run away and they chase after him into a desert.
In the desert they get attacked by giant scorpions and even more troopers die due to Perseus lust for vengence. As they're almost killed the scorpions are stoped by a mysterious people who live in the desert and tame the scorpions.
They tell Perseus and the group about the Norns who can give them the answer they seek, so they set out to find them which proves not to be a hard time at all.
The norns tell them they would need Medusa's head that can turn everything of flesh and blood to stone.
Now they have to get to the underworld where Medusa is held prisioner and kill her.
They're also now accompanied by the half-god Io whom decided to join them.
Comment:
Just wow so much that's wrong here, just wow. The only thing that's right is that they want to sacrifice the princess to the moster. But that's about it!
The biggerst what the heck for me is that they called the three old hags norns... NORNS? That's F-ING NORSE MYTHOLOGY, COMPLETELY WRONG MYTHOLOGY HOLLYWOOD!
Those old women were called Graeae and otherwise they were correctly potrayed, but that they were called norns where so wrong.
Also this thing about Perseus wanting to be man and not god is so wierd, because in the original he get a lot of gifts from the Gods and he uses them all. Like the helm of invisibility, his flying shoes and such.
Also that Medusa is along in a prision is wrong. She is the only mortal of three sisters living together in a cave. Also, the Kraken never appeares in the original, it is only the sea serpent by Poseidon, not any moster by Hades. Oh man, this is just getting out of hand. Also, they never crossed any desert like that. And the sword forged on Olympus didn't exist either. Just so you know.
But on with the movie then, we're almost done, wierd, eh?
Movie:
Perseus and the remaining troopers plus one of the wierd sand people(why do I think of Star Wars when I say that?) head towards the only place where they can get to Medusa, through hell. But they don't know how to get across Styx unless dying, luckily Perseus had gottena coing from Zeus before and could bribe their way across.
When they arrived to the prision of Medusa only Io stayed behind and everyone else went in with Perseus to kill her. The fight ended with everyone but Perseus dying and he managed to cut of her head and then put it in a bag as he returned to the mortal world.
As he got back he met up with Io, but she got killed from behind by the king he had been chasing,. They fought for a long while, then Perseus decided he would use the Gods gift and power so he managed to kill the king. Then out to his aid came the black pegasus he had encountered earlier in the movie.
Comment:
I was to say there is no word for this, but no, there's a lof of words for this.
Medusa didn't live in the underworld, she lived in a cave hidden away and she was living with her two sisters who where immortals. There weren't even any fight in the original story, Perseus suck in alone with his adamantine sword and a polished shield Athena had given him. He also used the helm of invisibility to sneak in, but of Medusas head by looking in the reflection of the shield and then sneak out when the sister awoke.
Aslo this is where the the pegasus appears, because as Perseus kills Medusa a pegasus leaps out from her neck along with Chrysaor, pegasus brother.
Just so many things that are wrong. One thing that just made me wonder, is that Perseus doesn't have any bag for the head when he goes to Medusa, but when you see him go out from Medusa's lair he is carrying the head in a bag.
One of the things that annoyed me a lot was that in that scen when he fought the king, that he embraced his godhood and decided to be half-god and half-human. So the arrogance and selfish desires got all of the troopers killed only to be thrown away after Io died. Then Io had the nerve to call him he best of a god and best of men. He's neither, almost the worst of both! SRSLY! NO, DOESN'T WORK LIKE THAT, TAKE RESPONSABILITY!
They just can't keep it consistant and keep skipping things. What the heck was it with getting everyone killed in the fight against Medusa? Just so Perseus could fly back on the pegasus alone? Did Io die because of that too? I don't know, I'm not sure the writer knew themselves. Oh well, onwards we go to the last part of the story.
Movie:
Perseus travels back to the princess and to stop the Kraken from killing her and the rest of the city. As he arrives the Kraken has already started to attack the city along with harpies who were sent by Hades.
The head get stolen by a harpie that Perseus chases to get it back since it is the only chance to kill the Kraken.
After a long and persistant chase Perseus finally get the head back and just in time manages to turn the Kraken into stone before he devoured the princess. Perseus then ask Zeus to help him to defeat Hades, he does so by striking Perseus sword with lightning and then he throws it at Hades so he get sealed up in the underworld.
Unfortunately the princess falls into the water below the city and the Kraken collapses and falls over where she landed. Perseus jumps in after her and saves her from drowning.
When he get her up from the water, he let her walk away to her kingdom to rule it. Zeus appears and offers Perseus a place on Olympus but he refuses the offer and want to live with the mortals, being kind as Zeus are he revives Io so they can live together and wouldn't be alone ever again. Here the movie ends.
Comment:
I mean... Kraken wasn't even a part of the original, he wasn't even there! Why did they persist to change it like this? I mean, protecting that city and princess was only a part of Perseus story, not the only story. They probobly didn't know what they were doing.
Also, Io wasn't even really there in the original, he was just with a small band and got the help from gods, no Io or anything. Also, how the FUCK do you survive after falling like 20 meter into the water, getting big chunks of a moster on you? Apparently if Perseus touches you, you'll revive instantly and everything will be okay, except if your name is Io that is.
Apart from just butching the story, it wasn't even good as just a movie. It was extremelly rushed all the time, they just jumped from one fight to another, Perseus learned how to fight with a sword in about two minutes and he had never in his life held a sword. Even if he's a god, I doubt it's all "Wow, sword! I'm a master swordsman now! Let us banish Hades! :D". The characters wasn't even that interesting all together, the most interesting character was the sand person, and he said about two words in the movie and blew himself up(awesome, right?). That says A LOT about the movie, don't you think? Plus I saw it in 3D and it had minimal 3D effects, I took off the glasses many times and it was no difference at all.
And yeah, the "fight" with hades was ridicilus. Perseus held up his sword, Zeus struck if with lightning and he threw the sword at Hades and he got sealed away in the underworld. Just WOW, that's a way to make a climatic fight short, same with the Kraken. It was such an immense build up how awesome and evil it was and then it just dies without doing much. Crush a building, hittan a human then dying. Slowes fucking most dangerous monster in the world ever.
Plus, when Perseus saved the princess he clamed marrige to her, but that was not even any hint of in the movie, they just wrote it out from the movie.
Also, why do they keep potraying Hades as the evil guy? They even say it in the beginning of the movie, he got tricked by the "good" gods to rule in the worst place ever. So yes, he is the evil guy that is ruling the underworld. NO WONDER HE IS PISSED AT ZEUS! I don't blame him for being mean to Zeus and being all dark, I would be that too.
There are more to the original, but it doesn't have any more connection to the movie, so I'm not going to mention it.
So to conclude this all, Clash of the Titans isn't something you should see, not even when it comes out on DVD/Bluray or anything. Not even worth downloading. Just warning you guys, and sorry about my long rant about the movie, but I payed 150kr(about 18$ or something like that.) and I felt it was my right to tell you all how bad it was.
So, until next time!
"I fart in your general direction!"
Sunday, May 9, 2010
Mass Effect
Here comes my first proper post in the blog!
I just finished Mass Effect 2 for the third time already (finished Mass Effect 1 around four times though), so I thought it would be nice to write my own opinion about it and somewhat of a review about it.
WARNING - MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD
Starting to write about the first game in the series seems most logical, so that I will do.
A summary of the game first then:
Mass Effect takes place in year 2183, you're Commander Shepard(which can be male or female, also have different backstories but is always refeered to as some kind of hero and someone the galaxy needs) and is aboard a ship called the Normandy.
Without Shepards knowledge, they're evaluating him/her to become a spectre for the Citadel (a common area for all aliens in the galaxy to gather).
When they reach the planet they were heading for, it is under attack by a massive ship and many synthetic lifeforms called Geth, which haven't been beyond the Veil in centuries. They encounter another Spectre, Saren, that killed the Spectre that evaluating Shepard, Nihlus. He was then suspected of being a traitor since he was seen leading the Geth.
On the planet they find a beacon that was left behind by the Protheans, a race that was wiped out over 50,000 years ago. Shepard get in contact with it and get visions, which s/he can't sort out at first.
They return to the Citadel to tell about about Saren being a traitor, but the council didn't belive them because Shepard didn't have any evidence to prove the claims.
Not wanting to stop there, Shepard explored the Citadel and came across three people(Garrus Vakarian, Urdnot Wrex and Tali'Zorah nar Rayya, Tali for short) that ended up joining him/her to stop Saren. Tali had evidence that proved that Saren was in fact a traitor.
When proving this, the council decided to make Shepard a Spectre to be able to stop Saren from starting wars and attacking the Citadel.
After Shepard was made Spectre, s/he set out to explore different worlds that held clues about where Saren might be and what he was planing to do. On one of the planets, they rescued an Asari woman named Liara T'Soni, a Prothean expert. She became a big asset to the team, both in combat and knowledge.
One of the planets held a lifeform that was belive to be extinct, the Rachni. They also encountered Benezia, Liaras mother that worked for Saren. After defeating her, Shepard get a choice to kill the Rachni Queen or set her free.
On Feros, yet another important planet they visited, they came across yet another ancient lifeform called Thorian. It held knowledge Saren had aquired but after being betrayed by him, it refused to give Shepard the same information. The Thorian couldn't be saved due to being to hostile and the knowledge went lost forever.
The team got a distress signal from a planet called Virmire. When they arrived and explored it, they found a group of Salarians in dire need of help, but thought an army was comming to help. They later found that Saren had a research facility there that had cured the Genophage, a mutation the Salarians had created to stop them from breeding to much and expant to fast.
Shepards team and the Salarians set out to blow up the facility, but during the exploration of it they came across another Prothean beacon. They also talked with the big ship they had seen on the planet with the first beacon, which was called Sovereign, a so call Reaperd that was only a myth. It was there revealed it controlled Saren to an extent and it was Sovereign that wanted to call in a whole army of Reapers to wipe out all intelligent life in the galaxy. Also that Saren have left for a plannet called Ilos.
When they were about to blow up the facility, Shepard had to make a tough choice, to leave one of his/her teammates behind and die in the blast. It was either Ashley or Kaidan, one helping the Salarian strike team, the other arming the nuke.
After that is done, they get called back to the Citadel for a meeting with the council. That meeting end up in the Normandy getting grounded and can't go to Ilos. The council also refuses to belive that the Reapers exist and disgard the threat.
Shepard get help from and old friend, Andresson, to get Normandy back in space and off to Ilos to stop Saren.
They found out many vital things on Ilos, what happend to the Protheans, more about the Reapers and what the Conduit was, a thing that Saren was chasing. When they got to the Conduit, it was a Mass Relay that sent them to the Citadel, that was revealed to be a giant Mass Relay that would take the Reapers in from Dark Space.
When they got sent back to the Citadel, they found it completely under attack by Geth and Sovereign. They caught up to Saren eventually and had a talk with him about why he was doing all this. That talk could end in several different ways, all from Saren comming to senses and killing himself since it was the best way, or ending up fighting him.
When Saren got defeated, Sovereign controlled his body, which was possible due to a lot of implants that was made on Sarens body. During this fight, the Alliance and the rest of the Citadel fleet is fighting the Geth and Sovereign, which is very hard to kill. When Sarens possessed body get defeated, Sovereign lose power and get vunerable, which end in him getting himself killed.
Depending on what choices Shepard made regarding to save or sacrifice the Council, the Council is either rebuilt by humans or humanity just getting a seat in the Council.
The story end this time by Shepard setting out in space to stop the uppcomming Reaper attack.
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Phew, that was a long summary. Or maybe it was short? I don't really now, never really done it before. But now it is time for the review, which will be easier to write than the summary.
I guess the first thing to review is the plot.
The plot in Mass Effect is relativly original and very interesting. You first wonder what those Geth is, why Saren is doing what he is doing and what the FUCK is that big ship?
Of course much of that is explained during the course of the game, but also a lot of questions are asked wich is to be answered in the next game.
When playing Mass Effect, the story never get boring, you always want more of it and continue playing until the game is over and then want even more because it is simply so damn interesting!
It is well done and nicely executed.
Second, the characters in the game, both main and supporting characters.
First off we have Kaidan Alenko, a human aboard the Normandy. He is trained to use Biotics, a power which is similar to the force, or even simplet, telekensis but more awesome. He will be with you all the time, unless you decide to leave him on Virmire.
He's not my favorite character in the game, a little plain for me. Most of the humans are. He is also a possible romance for the female Shepard.
The second team-member you get is Ashley Williams, which you meet on Eden Prime during the attack. She a tough and very skilled soldier in the game, also a deep believer in god.
She was my least favorite character, well on the squard atleast. The thing that really rubbed my the wrong way was that she was really racist and considered aliens lower than humans instead of viewing them as induvidials. She also stays the whole time, unless she is left behind on Virmire (which I've always done during my 4 playthroughs).
The only good thing about her, is that she changes her mind before she dies and start to like aliens better. She is a possible romance for the male shepard.
Garrus Vakarian is the third squad member you meet, but he is optional to reqruit, but who wouldn't reqruit Garrus? He's a C-Sec officer that feel that he can't do his job to take down the bad guys in his current job. He's also the first alien possible to reqruit to the team. He's a Turian, a insect like creatures.
For me Garrus was the one I brought along the most when being out on missions, both because he was an awesome combatant, but also because he was awesome and funny. Garrus stays with the Normandy the whole time after you've recruited him, which of course made me happy. Especially that he didn't die since he is one of the most awesome characters in Mass Effect, especially the first one.
The fourth squard member and the second aliend to be on your squard is Urdnot Wrex, but called Wrex. He is of the Krogan race, a reptile like race that has a really sturdy body and a long lifespan and can live up to 1000 years. Wrex love combant and never say no to a battle to the death, which he always comes out from.
He was really memorable, because he was so cold but carring at the same time. Especially since he cares about the Krogan race while mostly no one else cares that they're slowly dying out.
Wrex was also one of those I brought with me the most, because he was an awesome tank in the game, and like all the aliens in the game, he were more interesting when you interacted with him.
It is possible to lose Wrex on Virmire if you don't have enough charm or intimidate. If you don't succed to convince him to help you, since he is starting to have doubts about fighting Saren when he find out he had cured the genophage, Ashley will kill him since he starts to become a threat (which was a big reason I killed Ashley the first time, since I lacked the charm skill x'D).
If he survives, he will be with you through out the rest of the game.
The fifth character to join your cause is Tali'Zorah nar Rayya, Tali for short. She is a Quarian and is on her pilgrimage(something all Quarians do when they're comming to age). She helped Shepard to prove that Saren was a traitor and then joined the crew.
She is on the same level as Garrus, but more funny and adorable than him. Also very interesting due to her race as Quarian, which was the race who created the Geth and that they have to live in suits their whole live. As with Garrus and Wrex, I took her along a lot on the team, and usually replaced Wrex since I like her more than him.
Luckily, she is a must and doesn't die at any point in the game. Unfortunately, she is not a possible romance in Mass Effect 1.
The last crew member is Liara T'Soni, an Asari researcher who is an expert on Protheans. She's very cute and adorable, mostly due to being kind of clumsy with her words and easily get embarrased when talking. I also find their race very interesting, since they don't mate like others. They mate through a Joining, where their mind and sould mends together and through that they get the genes for their kids and get pregnant. They're the only known spieces that can have interspieces sex, and they also only give birth to Asari children.
They only have female bodies but are monogendered, which is a really many disslike the race, since they think they're herms as in having both kind of equipment or likewise. I don't think they're disgausting or anything though, rather the opposite.
She is a possible romance for both male and female Shepard and the one I always ended up with since Kaidan and Ashley are so plain.
Another character worth mentioning is Joke, the pilot on Normandy. He is a male human, with brittle bone syndrome and easily break a bone. But what makes him so nice is his sarcasm, teasing and messing with everyone.
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Now when I'm done with that, let us proceed to gameplay.
First to mention, the game is a TPS-RPG (Third Person Shooter - Role Playing Game), which is a really nice mix of genres of a game, makes is so much more dynamic and regualar roleplaying games which is either turnbased or similar.
You don't have any ammo but to compensate for that the weapons overheat and you can't shoot until they've cooled down. There's also a cover system that makes it nicer, that you can hide and take over from enemy fire. It is not just staning behind a wall or whatever, but the character leans against it and cover itself, also possible to shoot from the corner from walls or over craters.
Characters also have either biotic powers or tech abilites. Biotic as explained before, is a special kind of power and most strong in Asari, but other races also possess them. The power can do different things, lift the enemies, throw them away, stun them or likewise.
Tech is more technology based abilites, where you disrupt shields, overload the weapons and other things that will make the life for the enemy a living hell.
It is really fun to use biotics or tech, it creates a wider possability to kill and destroy your enemies. Since otherwise you would only shoot them, which would be limited.
A fun thing in Mass Effect was to explore remote worlds with Mako, a small tank that can get across more or less all terain. It was always really fun to drive around in it, all awesome tricks you could do. Sometimes I ended up doing a lot of wierd shit instead of exploring the worlds, so it was really entertaining.
Another thing that you could do was to encrypt things you found, like debris, artifacts and lockers. You had to press a sequence of buttons to unlock it and get the item(s). Which was nice something to strive for, especially to find hidden items and such.
What was so nice about it, was that you wasn't forced to go in one direction, had to take one planet after the other. You could explore the galaxies, remote planets, level up and get better equipment. Also do the sidequests for your characters. But it was never forced in one direction, but was more open, which was for the better and give a more uniqe gameplay, since you could do it differently every time.
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Another big thing that I think deserves a seperet section, is interaction with characters.
The thing I like the most and which made special was the interaction with the characters aboard the ship. You could talk and create relationship with all the characters aboard, and depending on how you did, they would think different about you.
With three out of those six, you could get a more intimate relationship and eventually get together with them. But all depended on how you did when interacted with them.
This is a funtion I find that most RPG games lack, and which makes this one more RPG and most ones out there. Because you have to do your part to get close to your team-mates instead of having it on auto.
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The worlds shouldn't be neglected, they played a big role in the game after all.
All the major worlds were uniqe and really interesting to explore. You could talk with character to find out more about the place, shop to aquirre better equipment.
All from Edem Prime, a former and supposedly really beautiful planet, to the Citadel, an artifcial enviroment to host a lot of people and different alien races, to Noveria, a planet that is constantly snowy, icy and sterile, to Feros who is run down and people is trying to establish a colony there.
They're all fun to explore and it's nice that they've taken their time to make them different. The only bad thing is the small worlds you explore in the Mako, because they're mostly the same places but with different textures. That could have done better, not that it ruined the gameplay.
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Graphics and sound is also something worth mentioning.
Mass Effect has really nice graphics, but for someone like me, I always find flaws and think most things could easily have made to look better. Some models looks a little pointy and could have had more work, also some textures could have have more time. Luckily the major things, like the main character, the Normandy and such have nice modeling and texturing and looks really nice.
The music in Mass Effect is really something, it sets the mood and get you into the game even more than before. Every music fit their setting and every event. It is there, you don't really concentrate to listen to it, but it play a big role to make the game even better.
Something I must compliment Mass Effect for is the Voice Acting. It is really, really, REALLY well done. Most english voice acting is average and uninteresting, but Mass Effects voice acting is everything but average. They've really bothered to sound belivable, to get the characters personality in the voices too.
For example, Kaidan have almost constant headaces and migranes, so he wispers a lot. Just such a thing is really good. And when the characters are angry, they sound genuily angry, same goes for when they get sad or upset. You're not only seeing it, you're hearing it to.
That makes the game so much better.
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There, I think I've covered everything important about the game and DAMN, it took me a long while to write this all x'D
Now you all better read this shit!
I will do a post about Mass Effect 2, but that's for another day when I find more time to write such a long post.
I also hope this was an interesting read about Mass Effect, both for those who have played it and those who want to play it or is just interested about it.
So, Vincent out for this time and I hope everyone else has a nice day/night or whatever! x'D
I just finished Mass Effect 2 for the third time already (finished Mass Effect 1 around four times though), so I thought it would be nice to write my own opinion about it and somewhat of a review about it.
WARNING - MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD
Starting to write about the first game in the series seems most logical, so that I will do.
A summary of the game first then:
Mass Effect takes place in year 2183, you're Commander Shepard(which can be male or female, also have different backstories but is always refeered to as some kind of hero and someone the galaxy needs) and is aboard a ship called the Normandy.
Without Shepards knowledge, they're evaluating him/her to become a spectre for the Citadel (a common area for all aliens in the galaxy to gather).
When they reach the planet they were heading for, it is under attack by a massive ship and many synthetic lifeforms called Geth, which haven't been beyond the Veil in centuries. They encounter another Spectre, Saren, that killed the Spectre that evaluating Shepard, Nihlus. He was then suspected of being a traitor since he was seen leading the Geth.
On the planet they find a beacon that was left behind by the Protheans, a race that was wiped out over 50,000 years ago. Shepard get in contact with it and get visions, which s/he can't sort out at first.
They return to the Citadel to tell about about Saren being a traitor, but the council didn't belive them because Shepard didn't have any evidence to prove the claims.
Not wanting to stop there, Shepard explored the Citadel and came across three people(Garrus Vakarian, Urdnot Wrex and Tali'Zorah nar Rayya, Tali for short) that ended up joining him/her to stop Saren. Tali had evidence that proved that Saren was in fact a traitor.
When proving this, the council decided to make Shepard a Spectre to be able to stop Saren from starting wars and attacking the Citadel.
After Shepard was made Spectre, s/he set out to explore different worlds that held clues about where Saren might be and what he was planing to do. On one of the planets, they rescued an Asari woman named Liara T'Soni, a Prothean expert. She became a big asset to the team, both in combat and knowledge.
One of the planets held a lifeform that was belive to be extinct, the Rachni. They also encountered Benezia, Liaras mother that worked for Saren. After defeating her, Shepard get a choice to kill the Rachni Queen or set her free.
On Feros, yet another important planet they visited, they came across yet another ancient lifeform called Thorian. It held knowledge Saren had aquired but after being betrayed by him, it refused to give Shepard the same information. The Thorian couldn't be saved due to being to hostile and the knowledge went lost forever.
The team got a distress signal from a planet called Virmire. When they arrived and explored it, they found a group of Salarians in dire need of help, but thought an army was comming to help. They later found that Saren had a research facility there that had cured the Genophage, a mutation the Salarians had created to stop them from breeding to much and expant to fast.
Shepards team and the Salarians set out to blow up the facility, but during the exploration of it they came across another Prothean beacon. They also talked with the big ship they had seen on the planet with the first beacon, which was called Sovereign, a so call Reaperd that was only a myth. It was there revealed it controlled Saren to an extent and it was Sovereign that wanted to call in a whole army of Reapers to wipe out all intelligent life in the galaxy. Also that Saren have left for a plannet called Ilos.
When they were about to blow up the facility, Shepard had to make a tough choice, to leave one of his/her teammates behind and die in the blast. It was either Ashley or Kaidan, one helping the Salarian strike team, the other arming the nuke.
After that is done, they get called back to the Citadel for a meeting with the council. That meeting end up in the Normandy getting grounded and can't go to Ilos. The council also refuses to belive that the Reapers exist and disgard the threat.
Shepard get help from and old friend, Andresson, to get Normandy back in space and off to Ilos to stop Saren.
They found out many vital things on Ilos, what happend to the Protheans, more about the Reapers and what the Conduit was, a thing that Saren was chasing. When they got to the Conduit, it was a Mass Relay that sent them to the Citadel, that was revealed to be a giant Mass Relay that would take the Reapers in from Dark Space.
When they got sent back to the Citadel, they found it completely under attack by Geth and Sovereign. They caught up to Saren eventually and had a talk with him about why he was doing all this. That talk could end in several different ways, all from Saren comming to senses and killing himself since it was the best way, or ending up fighting him.
When Saren got defeated, Sovereign controlled his body, which was possible due to a lot of implants that was made on Sarens body. During this fight, the Alliance and the rest of the Citadel fleet is fighting the Geth and Sovereign, which is very hard to kill. When Sarens possessed body get defeated, Sovereign lose power and get vunerable, which end in him getting himself killed.
Depending on what choices Shepard made regarding to save or sacrifice the Council, the Council is either rebuilt by humans or humanity just getting a seat in the Council.
The story end this time by Shepard setting out in space to stop the uppcomming Reaper attack.
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Phew, that was a long summary. Or maybe it was short? I don't really now, never really done it before. But now it is time for the review, which will be easier to write than the summary.
I guess the first thing to review is the plot.
The plot in Mass Effect is relativly original and very interesting. You first wonder what those Geth is, why Saren is doing what he is doing and what the FUCK is that big ship?
Of course much of that is explained during the course of the game, but also a lot of questions are asked wich is to be answered in the next game.
When playing Mass Effect, the story never get boring, you always want more of it and continue playing until the game is over and then want even more because it is simply so damn interesting!
It is well done and nicely executed.
Second, the characters in the game, both main and supporting characters.
First off we have Kaidan Alenko, a human aboard the Normandy. He is trained to use Biotics, a power which is similar to the force, or even simplet, telekensis but more awesome. He will be with you all the time, unless you decide to leave him on Virmire.
He's not my favorite character in the game, a little plain for me. Most of the humans are. He is also a possible romance for the female Shepard.
The second team-member you get is Ashley Williams, which you meet on Eden Prime during the attack. She a tough and very skilled soldier in the game, also a deep believer in god.
She was my least favorite character, well on the squard atleast. The thing that really rubbed my the wrong way was that she was really racist and considered aliens lower than humans instead of viewing them as induvidials. She also stays the whole time, unless she is left behind on Virmire (which I've always done during my 4 playthroughs).
The only good thing about her, is that she changes her mind before she dies and start to like aliens better. She is a possible romance for the male shepard.
Garrus Vakarian is the third squad member you meet, but he is optional to reqruit, but who wouldn't reqruit Garrus? He's a C-Sec officer that feel that he can't do his job to take down the bad guys in his current job. He's also the first alien possible to reqruit to the team. He's a Turian, a insect like creatures.
For me Garrus was the one I brought along the most when being out on missions, both because he was an awesome combatant, but also because he was awesome and funny. Garrus stays with the Normandy the whole time after you've recruited him, which of course made me happy. Especially that he didn't die since he is one of the most awesome characters in Mass Effect, especially the first one.
The fourth squard member and the second aliend to be on your squard is Urdnot Wrex, but called Wrex. He is of the Krogan race, a reptile like race that has a really sturdy body and a long lifespan and can live up to 1000 years. Wrex love combant and never say no to a battle to the death, which he always comes out from.
He was really memorable, because he was so cold but carring at the same time. Especially since he cares about the Krogan race while mostly no one else cares that they're slowly dying out.
Wrex was also one of those I brought with me the most, because he was an awesome tank in the game, and like all the aliens in the game, he were more interesting when you interacted with him.
It is possible to lose Wrex on Virmire if you don't have enough charm or intimidate. If you don't succed to convince him to help you, since he is starting to have doubts about fighting Saren when he find out he had cured the genophage, Ashley will kill him since he starts to become a threat (which was a big reason I killed Ashley the first time, since I lacked the charm skill x'D).
If he survives, he will be with you through out the rest of the game.
The fifth character to join your cause is Tali'Zorah nar Rayya, Tali for short. She is a Quarian and is on her pilgrimage(something all Quarians do when they're comming to age). She helped Shepard to prove that Saren was a traitor and then joined the crew.
She is on the same level as Garrus, but more funny and adorable than him. Also very interesting due to her race as Quarian, which was the race who created the Geth and that they have to live in suits their whole live. As with Garrus and Wrex, I took her along a lot on the team, and usually replaced Wrex since I like her more than him.
Luckily, she is a must and doesn't die at any point in the game. Unfortunately, she is not a possible romance in Mass Effect 1.
The last crew member is Liara T'Soni, an Asari researcher who is an expert on Protheans. She's very cute and adorable, mostly due to being kind of clumsy with her words and easily get embarrased when talking. I also find their race very interesting, since they don't mate like others. They mate through a Joining, where their mind and sould mends together and through that they get the genes for their kids and get pregnant. They're the only known spieces that can have interspieces sex, and they also only give birth to Asari children.
They only have female bodies but are monogendered, which is a really many disslike the race, since they think they're herms as in having both kind of equipment or likewise. I don't think they're disgausting or anything though, rather the opposite.
She is a possible romance for both male and female Shepard and the one I always ended up with since Kaidan and Ashley are so plain.
Another character worth mentioning is Joke, the pilot on Normandy. He is a male human, with brittle bone syndrome and easily break a bone. But what makes him so nice is his sarcasm, teasing and messing with everyone.
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Now when I'm done with that, let us proceed to gameplay.
First to mention, the game is a TPS-RPG (Third Person Shooter - Role Playing Game), which is a really nice mix of genres of a game, makes is so much more dynamic and regualar roleplaying games which is either turnbased or similar.
You don't have any ammo but to compensate for that the weapons overheat and you can't shoot until they've cooled down. There's also a cover system that makes it nicer, that you can hide and take over from enemy fire. It is not just staning behind a wall or whatever, but the character leans against it and cover itself, also possible to shoot from the corner from walls or over craters.
Characters also have either biotic powers or tech abilites. Biotic as explained before, is a special kind of power and most strong in Asari, but other races also possess them. The power can do different things, lift the enemies, throw them away, stun them or likewise.
Tech is more technology based abilites, where you disrupt shields, overload the weapons and other things that will make the life for the enemy a living hell.
It is really fun to use biotics or tech, it creates a wider possability to kill and destroy your enemies. Since otherwise you would only shoot them, which would be limited.
A fun thing in Mass Effect was to explore remote worlds with Mako, a small tank that can get across more or less all terain. It was always really fun to drive around in it, all awesome tricks you could do. Sometimes I ended up doing a lot of wierd shit instead of exploring the worlds, so it was really entertaining.
Another thing that you could do was to encrypt things you found, like debris, artifacts and lockers. You had to press a sequence of buttons to unlock it and get the item(s). Which was nice something to strive for, especially to find hidden items and such.
What was so nice about it, was that you wasn't forced to go in one direction, had to take one planet after the other. You could explore the galaxies, remote planets, level up and get better equipment. Also do the sidequests for your characters. But it was never forced in one direction, but was more open, which was for the better and give a more uniqe gameplay, since you could do it differently every time.
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Another big thing that I think deserves a seperet section, is interaction with characters.
The thing I like the most and which made special was the interaction with the characters aboard the ship. You could talk and create relationship with all the characters aboard, and depending on how you did, they would think different about you.
With three out of those six, you could get a more intimate relationship and eventually get together with them. But all depended on how you did when interacted with them.
This is a funtion I find that most RPG games lack, and which makes this one more RPG and most ones out there. Because you have to do your part to get close to your team-mates instead of having it on auto.
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The worlds shouldn't be neglected, they played a big role in the game after all.
All the major worlds were uniqe and really interesting to explore. You could talk with character to find out more about the place, shop to aquirre better equipment.
All from Edem Prime, a former and supposedly really beautiful planet, to the Citadel, an artifcial enviroment to host a lot of people and different alien races, to Noveria, a planet that is constantly snowy, icy and sterile, to Feros who is run down and people is trying to establish a colony there.
They're all fun to explore and it's nice that they've taken their time to make them different. The only bad thing is the small worlds you explore in the Mako, because they're mostly the same places but with different textures. That could have done better, not that it ruined the gameplay.
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Graphics and sound is also something worth mentioning.
Mass Effect has really nice graphics, but for someone like me, I always find flaws and think most things could easily have made to look better. Some models looks a little pointy and could have had more work, also some textures could have have more time. Luckily the major things, like the main character, the Normandy and such have nice modeling and texturing and looks really nice.
The music in Mass Effect is really something, it sets the mood and get you into the game even more than before. Every music fit their setting and every event. It is there, you don't really concentrate to listen to it, but it play a big role to make the game even better.
Something I must compliment Mass Effect for is the Voice Acting. It is really, really, REALLY well done. Most english voice acting is average and uninteresting, but Mass Effects voice acting is everything but average. They've really bothered to sound belivable, to get the characters personality in the voices too.
For example, Kaidan have almost constant headaces and migranes, so he wispers a lot. Just such a thing is really good. And when the characters are angry, they sound genuily angry, same goes for when they get sad or upset. You're not only seeing it, you're hearing it to.
That makes the game so much better.
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There, I think I've covered everything important about the game and DAMN, it took me a long while to write this all x'D
Now you all better read this shit!
I will do a post about Mass Effect 2, but that's for another day when I find more time to write such a long post.
I also hope this was an interesting read about Mass Effect, both for those who have played it and those who want to play it or is just interested about it.
So, Vincent out for this time and I hope everyone else has a nice day/night or whatever! x'D
Friday, May 7, 2010
Opening the blog
Hello everyone out there!
Yes, I have gone all mainstream and gotten myself a blog. I guess it won't really hurt though, might even turn out to be fun to run my own blog.
I will mostly write posts regarding games, music, movies and anime. I will of course write posts regarding major events in my life, if I find it suitable for you little trolls on teh interwebs.
So I hope upcomming blogging days will go well!
Yes, I have gone all mainstream and gotten myself a blog. I guess it won't really hurt though, might even turn out to be fun to run my own blog.
I will mostly write posts regarding games, music, movies and anime. I will of course write posts regarding major events in my life, if I find it suitable for you little trolls on teh interwebs.
So I hope upcomming blogging days will go well!
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