Well its that time again, a little bit older, a little bit wiser and what ever else that comes with getting ancient.
Its been far too long since my last blog (although i say that every time) but this time is no exception
For this one I'm gonna countdown some of my favorite game soundtracks for the occasion. Each will also have a few sample soundtracks that highlight the music as well, so give those a listen. Most of these are from my favorite games so that's to be expected i guess, i know im gonna feel like i left one or two out though.
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The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
What can i say that hasnt already beeen said about the masterful arrangements in this game, there timeless and catchy as heck. From the moment you step out onto hyrule field your bombarded with uplifting and exciting tunes. And it only gets better from the outset as each land has varying themes and music types.
Samples:
Forrest Temple
Gerudo Valley
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Soul Calibur 2
One of the most underrated soundtracks in gaming this is fantastic. Big sweeping orchestral music at its finest, and it perfectly suits the mood of nearly every fight. Some are subtle and ominous which are the ones i really enjoy.
Samples:
Raise Thy Sword
Destiny Awaits No One
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Mystical Ninja Starring Goemon
Many of these are very happy go lucky types of themes, but they are just so dang catchy. All reflect the culture of the series with Japanese flute tracks and the like. This one is severely overlooked IMO, I still hum some of these to this day.
Samples:
Gourmet Submarine Castle
Festival Temple
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Super Mario 64
Ah good old mario, in the sound and music department he never lets me down. This has got to be one of the most nostalgic soundtracks for me, each theme conveys the feeling of a great adventure.
Samples:
Dire Dire Docks
Ultimate Bowser
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Castlevania: Dracula X chronicles
Come on great music is practically laid out right in the title of nearly every castlevania game. Heavy metal and a combination of gothic cathedral type music is just what the doctor ordered. All together castlevania has one of the best soundtracks in any series so it was hard to narrow it down to just one soundtrack in this series, but i feel since this one had a mix of many of the greats it i had to choose it.
samples:
Dreams of Triumph
Bloody Tears
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Final Fantasy 7
Arguably (and IMO) this has got to be uematsu's best work to date. From the beginning to the end this track list has got it all, dark themes, happy ones, etc. Even for those who don't like the game in question you cant deny how much effort and love was put into every note of this games score, it truly stands as one of the best.
Samples:
Boss Battle
Cid's Theme
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Megaman X4
Mechanical and robit sounding themes are the recipe for this electronic boogaloo, and it has more heart than any other in the series id say. More so than any other megman game in the series this ones music has definitely stood out for me, the only other that even comes close is megman 2 and X.
Samples:
Storm Owl
Cyber Peacock
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Gaming update
Catherine
So since my last blog vie beaten Catherine, and it was pretty good. Very different as far as any game i have ever played goes. While i only played through one time i could definitely tell this game was meant for a lot of replay value. I started another file to try to get another ending but felt that i should take a break from it since i was still seeing block puzzles when i closed my eyes. One thing i noticed was that the game really keeps you in suspense so as to keep you coming back for more. But with this it also feels like it kinda holds a rabbit and carrot kind of relationship in that it dangles the little bits of story over you so that you really have to work hard during those puzzles, and believe me some of them are very hard. I haven't gotten back to it since then but overall i enjoyed the game, nice change of pace and definitely a superb presentation with excellent visuals and voice acting.
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One other thing is that i seemed to have more dreams than usual while playing the game. Could be an influence of the game and its dream locals but i don't know seems a bit strange… hope I'm not a sheep while i sleep.
Strange Dream
Let me share one of those dreams here, and i must say its one of the most vivid dreams vie had in a long time.
It started off as i went into my house through the front door, i noticed no one was home. As i went further back in i found the kitchen a mess like someone was making a ton of food there before i got home yet no one cleaned up the mess. Heres where it gets weird, i soon notice my tv is gone and in its place is what i think was a washing machine or open vat full of ramen or chow mein, which puzzled me. I walked around wondering ok whats going, i then started heading for the front door and my house seemed to have changed. Upon going out the front door i noticed i was at someone elses house and it was in a court where as i live on a street. A family was out front unloading stuff from their car as if they returned from a trip, i soon panicked and figured i was in someone elses house by accident. As i walked out real fast not making eye contact with them i heard the father yell out "oh we got home just after he robbed us blind", note this sounded like the neighbor kahn from king of the hill so i assume they were asian.
No one seemed to persue me as i walked off fast into an alley way that turned into a dirt road with pine trees. The time of day changed from night to sunset (i noticed all my dreams are in darkness though for some reason), and during this the pathway led to a neon city courtyard with floating hexagons above the ground and tons of people walking through the area. As this was happening i noticed a girl floating on top of one of the floating platforms above all the people who didnt see her for some reason, she signaled to me. As i moved towards her she started hopping from each platform leading me somewhere, the only way i could describe her was something like kairi from kingdom hearts 2. After a bit she stopped and lowered down to me, she grabbed my hand and helped me up onto the platform. From there we could see the whole city and eventually we floated over to a giant computer screen, she had me place my hand on a scanner that for some reason had a roulette wheel with teen titan characters on it. When they all lined up a automatic door like at a store opened to our right and she pulled my arm as we ran towards the doorway. The light from the doorway was incredibly bright, she seemed to be very happy and so was I. Then before i could make it through the door i heard a sound, and it was very familiar. I soon awoke to my phone ringing with its metal gear codec sound, my cousin was calling me to get a ride to work. Man talk about bad timing, i tried to go back to sleep after but it was no use. It seems i will never figure out the meaning of that dream or what i was being led to, but its one that i will never forget.
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Bleach Soul Resurreccion
Got this game at the beginning of the month, figured if it was anything like Dynasty Warriors Gundam id enjoy it. As i said last time id lost quite a bit of my interest for bleach after all the long drug on fights and arcs in the manga and anime so i was hoping this could revitalize it a bit for me. Safe to say it didn't, this is a pretty bare bones game with even less variety than that of a dynasty warriors game. Your character gets one solid combo and a few super moves, that's it, and to top it off it dwindles down to fighting hollows with a bad lock on system. And to top it off the story mode is extremely short, i didn't think it would be a huge epic but something more than loose 13 missions would have been better. Anyway im sure a diehard bleach fan could still enjoy the leveling and mission mode of the game but for me it just didn't deliver, id say this is the one purchase i kinda regret this year.
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Zelda Skyward Sword Bundle
This was just announced so i barely had time to add it in, but I'm glad it landed right in time. This has definitely made the month for me, on top of the fact its got a fantastic cover it coming with the CD is just the icing on the cake.
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Mini-Rants
Capcom why have thou forsaken the?
Man where do i even begin, I'm not usually one to harbor extreme distaste for any game company but right now and as of the past few months capcom has garnered just that. Their practices have been shady for a while now but as most know the shat has literally hit the fan lately. First it was their DRM which for those who dont know that means their downloadable games can only be played with an active online connection, which in turn means you dont literally own the game because when the service shuts down its gone. The other issue seems to be their canceling of recent megaman games, such as megaman universe and megaman legends 3, the worst part being is that they blamed the fans for their lack of interest when the game had a huge following. And the one that pretty much pushed me over the edge would have to be Ultimate Marvel Vs Capcom 3. Not even 5 months later and there's already an update to the game i bought earlier this year for $70. I was let down by it as well but now the fact that its pretty much a beta for a better game is just unforgivable. All these things combined are what have caused my distaste for the company, which is a shame because I love capcoms franchises and ive always been a fan of theirs, but its just too hard to stay loyal when you get backhanded by them so much.
Square Enix's Static Art Design
This was mainly steamed by seeing the new FF13 2 trailers, which looks ok, but theres just been one thing thats been bothering me about final fantasy games for some time. And that is, will it ever have a different art direction? Seriously every game in the series now goes for the same graphical design in that everyone looks like semi photo realistic japanese people. What happened to the final fantasy games where every one would look distinctly different and could have some really wild character designs or strange looking worlds all together, i might be alone in this but it just makes each one in the series less appealing. FF9 was a good example of mixing it up, and i think its about time they do it again or this series will be doomed to a static graphic and art design forever.
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Collection Update
Got a few new things since last time, but to start it off ive really been getting back into marvel comics lately.
Im a huge Venom fan, I mean Huge, and iv'e liked the character since his initial appearance in the 80's (way before he became mainstream and messed up). I own almost every comic hes starred in or been a part of, so while i was cruising around the ultimate marvel vs capcom boards i noticed a lot of talk about the new venom and anti venom. So i decided it was time to get caught up to date, i went to my local comic book store "Bizzaro World" and picked up a few that i needed, the rest i bought on ebay.
(the comic book store ive been going to since i was a kid)
At first i was very apprehensiveat the thought of flash thompson as venom in this new take on the character, but so far its pretty good. In this series the venom suit is owned by the government and is given to spidermans old bully as a means to complete missions as a special forces agent. Its still in its run right now so it hasn't finished, the other series i checked out was the anti venom series following good old eddie brock and his new duds. Im a venom purist so the thought of anything but Original eddie brock venom bothers me (i hate mac gargen venom), but again i was taken back by how they handled brock as anti venom. Basically brock has terminal cancer and has auctioned off the venom suit a while back. He spends his days in a homeless shelter feeding people. The owner of the shelter is a mutant who has the power to heal people, he heals brock without him knowing that his white blood cells combine with the remnants of his symbiotic suit and in turn create anti venom, a version of venom with no weaknesses and all the powers he had before and more, including the power to heal anything. That power causes him to almost cure spiderman of this powers, he also loses his powers when anti venom is around as well. Ive definitely warmed up to how my favorite character has changed over the years and im eager to see where it goes from here. Thats pretty much the jist of it though, im glad i finally checked up on old venom after all this time.
Other than that i managed to get two new naruto figures, below is the master stars piece naruto figure. Quite a nice figure, and one i got for a good price since im sure it will inflate to ridiculous proportions at some point. The next figure i got is the small sasuke figure below him, got him off ebay.
And that should do it.
