In my restless dreams...I see that town...Silent Hill.2

Silent Hill is a series I am kind of getting into now, since my brother got me both Silent Hill 2 and 3, and I heard that these are some of the scariest games available. Holy crap, they were right...but I'm getting ahead of myself right now. This is the review for Silent Hill 2 if you haven't noticed yet, and I will be covering the PS2 Greatest Hits version, which has a new scenario, new weapons, a new ending, and improved graphics. Now, Konami have pretty much made the first three games their baby, and it really shows. Sadly, I haven't played the first Silent Hill, but the sequel isn't a DIRECT sequel, meaning you don't need to know the story of the first game. Speaking of which...



Silent Hill 2 has a very compelling story, one that actually makes you want to play through the game just to see what happens, and not for the horrors, but trust me - you'll be a bed wetter by the time you beat it. The story is that your character, James Sunderland, receives a letter from his wife Mary, telling him that she is waiting for him in their "special place" in Silent Hill. The weird thing is, Mary was very sick and died two years ago. James goes to the town Silent Hill to find the truth behind that letter and see if Mary is still somehow alive. Along the way, you meet up with an...interesting cast of characters, to say the least. From a fat guy that seems a LITTLE off his rocker named Eddie, to an annoying little brat that impedes your progress for the most part named Laura. The four of them all have their own reasons for walking the streets of this nightmare town, and the emotion and fear they show all really help involve you in the story and get closer to the characters. There's also a couple of good plot twists in the game, including one of the saddest moments of any game I've played near the end of the game. All in all, the game's story is fantastic - one of the most intriguing of any games I've ever played. Just don't look at an FAQ for the game while playing... It spoils the good parts...I learned that the hard way. :(










The games environments and enemies are what makes this seem like a REAL Silent Hill game. When outside, you can barely see 2 feet in front of you due to the fog, or due to the darkness of the indoor environments. When you CAN see it, it is all dark and at times, gruesome. There's blood on the streets and on the walls when inside, along with quite a bit of disturbing scenery in every area in the game at one point or another. The enemies are the things that your darkest nightmares of made of. From a faceless man that's wearing what seems like to be a straitjacket that is bonded to his skin, and slithers along the ground when knocked down*which looks a lot like this

*, to a pair of mannequin legs attached to another pair of mannequin legs *hard to describe, sorry.*, to the legendary monster that you might recognize...









Yes. I am talking about Pyramid Head. When he shows up, you see him doing something very disturbing, and I actually went "HOLY SHIT!" when I saw it. Now aside from the monsters and creepy imagery, The graphics are all around great. The game has a sort of filter effect, making it look grainy, like an old movie, to some extent. The character models look nice, and so do the weapons. The cutscenes - of course - are where the game really shines, making it look as real as the damned game can get. The facial expressions are what Konami seemed to take extra care with, making each character fully emotional. You can tell they're scared and in their own personal version of hell, like James is.









Now, the sound and music of this game are very effective. Apparently, all the music and sound effects were done by one man - Akira Yamaoka. Let me be the...well, I'm sure I'm not the first person to congratulate you on a job very well fucking done. The music, when it's there, fits the mood PERFECTLY. And the sound effects... whether it was the chilling moans in the hallways, the sudden loud bangs once in a while, or the creepy radio static, It's all just perfect and adds even MORE to the ALREADY wonderful atmosphere of the town of restless dreams.








Oh my. I've gone this far into the review without talking about the gameplay. Well, it plays kind of like a survival horror. You run around a scary area, shoot or hit creepy enemies, solve mind bending puzzles, and enjoy a good scare once in a while. The combat system is much more fun than in resident evil, which you just stand there like a god damn idiot. In Silent Hill, you can side step, move in any direction while in combat mode, and even have Melee weapons that don't suck! As a matter of fact, the very first weapon you get is a freaking piece of wood with a nail sticking out of it! My friend said that's retarted, but i say NOW THIS IS SURVIVAL FREAKING HORROR. YOU CAN EVEN CENTER THE CAMERA BEHIND YOU! NO MORE HORRIBLE CAMERA ANGLES! The puzzles are also really interesting. When you start the game, you can choose the difficulty for the action and the riddles separately. While I haven't tried Hard riddle mode, the normal riddles can occasionally require quite a bit of brainpower, due to the riddles they offer. On hard, they're COMPLETELY cryptic and you have to read it several times and try to understand the hidden meaning. The game also has quite a bit of replay value. There are 6 endings, three difficulty settings for action, four for the riddles which is only unlockable if you beat Hard riddle, two extra items you get when you beat the game, and it's just fun and perfect for late night gaming sessions and Halloween nights.









Speaking of Resident Evil, game such as that rely on cheap scares, like dogs jumping through a window. These games will fuck with your mind, making things you see disappear the next time you see it, cause loud noises when you very least expect it, and creep you out so much, your character's shadow scared the hell out of you! True story. To add to the creepy atmosphere, you find a broken radio early on in the game, when you find your the plank with the nail in it. It's broken, but it makes static whenever there are enemies around. With the static and the fog/darkness, you know there's something there, but don't know where or what it is. It's VERY unnerving...that's why James's shadow scared the crap out of me. XP

Well, I think i've gone over everything. Here, I'll just give the score, one more picture, and say Adieu.

Story - 10
Graphics - 9
Sound - 9
Game play - 9
Replay Value - Six endings. VERY HIGH.
Scare Factor - Thanks to this game, I piss the bed on a regular basis. I also have weird nightmares involving this game now, so I'd say pretty high, considering I hardly get scared by games.








I appreciate you taking the time out to read this. Now stop messing around and go buy this, you knuckleheads!

My current PS2 Collection

Well, my brother and I are going to swap systems soon, so I might as well get this out of the way before i get the Gamecube. I had to sell a lot of my games - about 30 - for reasons i do not want to explain, but i still have 50-something, so here we go.



AC/DC Rock Band Track Pack (Fucking fun on guitar.)
The Bard's Tale( Exciting and funny!)
Battlefield 2(Only really good online. Offline is kinda lame)
Burnout Dominator (Not as good as Takedown or Revenge, but an interesting addition. Although Avril Lavigne in four languages is extremely unnecessary
Castlevania: Lament Of Innocence (Devil May Cry and Castlevania. A match made in heaven. Or is that hell?)
Castle Shikigami 2 (My first bullet hell shmup. This is a fun one,too! Rather rare, though. Bought it for $15 at my local Price Chopper for Christmas.
Clocktower 3 (Fun and original horror game from Capcom. Not for everybody.)
Dead Or Alive 2: Hardcore ( Fun fighter. Buy it now.)
Deus Ex: The Conspiracy (Haven't played much, honestly. Seems cool)
Devil Kings (Epic Win.)
Disgaea: Hour Of Darkness (Epic-est win. My 512 hours of gameplay do not lie.)
Dirge Of Cerberus: Final Fantasy VII(Very...eh...average. Good for fans of FFVII, like my brother, who bought it.)
Final Fantasy X-2 (My brother bought it, not me. It's...ok. It's a Final Fantasy game, but mostly made up of women.)
Final Fantasy XII (Very cool)
Fire Pro Wrestling Returns (Played it once, couldn't get used to the grapple system.)
Ghost Recon Advanced War Fighter (Can't sell it because It's my brothers, but this game SUCKS)
Grandia II (Fun for the 30 minutes i played. I'll get back to it eventually)
Guilty Gear XX Accent Core (Nothing to say. Except 3 words. BUY IT NOW)
Guitar Hero III ( three fun songs. That's IT!)
Jade Cocoon 2 (Really fun RPG and a proper sequel to the awesomeness of Jade Cocoon)
Jak X Combat Racing (Burnout, only less balanced and with guns)
Killzone (pretty damn fun FPS, I must say.)
Max Payne 2: The Fall Of Max Payne( Haven't played much, but I might now, since MAX PAYNE 3 IS OUT SOON!)
Mortal Kombat Armageddon - Premium Edition (First PS2 game i got...even before I got the damn system. Pretty fun, but different. I like it.)
The Nightmare Of Druaga: Fushigino Dungeon (Hard to explain...but it's...ok)
Ninja Assault(Awesome game and one of the 2 lightgun games i own)
Onimusha 2 ( Awesome action adventure game by Capcom.)
Onimusha 3 (Read above)
Onimusha Blade Warriors (A super smash brothers-like game, but with onimusha characters, items, story, blah blah blah. Pretty fun. Especially with friends.)
Project: Snowblind (Fun FPS. Combat shielding FTW!)
The Punisher (I must admit, as a movie game, this is pretty good. I always thought the Punisher was cool.)
Red Faction ( ANOTHER Fun little FPS. One of the first PS2 games if i remember correctly)
Resident Evil Outbreak (Interesting gameplay, interesting scenarios, partner AI dumber than french toast, and online play that was axed a year ago. It's ok if you like RE, I guess.)
Resident Evil Outbreak File 2 (Read above)
Roadkill ( Twisted Metal + GTA = The baby made of win and god!)
Rygar (I see where God Of War got most of its gameplay from.)
Samurai Warriors (Dynasty Warriors in Feudal Japan. I always thought this would be awesome. Too bad there's only like, 12 or 13 characters. But that's what we have Warriors Orochi for.)
Serious Sam: The Next Encounter (A FPS that kind of plays like a Duke Nukem or Doom game from back in the day. Pick this up now. Not sure if Online play is still up.)
Shinobi ( One of the best platformers I have played on this system. Buy now.)
Silent Hill 2 (Review should be up either tomorrow or the day after)
Silent Hill 3 (Fun, but not as good as 2. Full review after SH2)
Smackdown Vs. Raw 2007 (Pretty fun.)
Smackdown Vs. Raw 2008 (shit)
Star Ocean: Till The End Of Time (So god damn awesome.)
The Thing (Mediocre.)
Tenchu: Wrath Of Heaven( Much better than Naruto - these guys are actual NINJA'S!)
Timesplitters (MOAR FPS? OKAI!!! *ahem* Sorry. This is a rather Average game, but without it, we wouldn't have the damn-near-perfect Timesplitters: Future Perfect *ironic :P *)
Urban Chaos: Riot Response (My last damn FPS, but it's a very good one. I beat it on Elite and am working on the Terror mode. I love this game. This review is going to be the third one.)
Urban Reign (VERY fun game with friends. Rather difficult story mode * EVEN ON EASY! WHAT THE HELL?*, big cast of characters and weapons, and 4 player brawls :D)
Valkyrie Profile 2: Silmeria (Fun RPG with the same unique attack system as the first, but the movement in battle is also unique, making for quite and interesting and fun experience. I still have yet to beat it.)
Vampire Night (The second - and better - of the two light gun games I own. I got this and the gun off ebay for $20 total. So worth it.)
Virtua Fighter 4: Evolution (VERY FUN FIGHTING GAME - UP THERE WITH SOUL CALIBUR III)
Virtua Quest (Painfully average action adventure. Still have yet to beat it.)
Wild Arms 3: I'm at the third dungeon right now. It seems cool and when you get in a battle while on horse back, I was breathless. o_o
Xenosaga Episode 1: Der Wille zur Macht( A German person I know on youtube helped me translate it. Here's what he said -
"Simply translated it just means "the will for power", but if you got it from any literature the sense might be different as I can guess it from the words right now. Basically someone collects all his courage and energy (at all cost) to get the power. Hope it helped.

Greets, bpb"
As for the game, I didn't play much, but i got frustrated at one point and stopped...2 years ago. I'll start again when I get the PS2 back.)
Yakuza: (THIS IS SHENMUE, BUT WITH A DIFFERENT STORY, NO GAY SAILORS DRINKING MILK AT THE BAR, AND MUCH MORE COMBAT. SWEET.)


OK, that's my PS2 collection. I am very proud of it, and those are only summaries next to them. For the full review...well, you just have to wait. For my Ps1 collection, i have
Final Fantasy VII (Nothing needed to say. Not a big fan, though.)
Final Fantasy VIII (...No. Just...no.)
Final Fantasy IX (This makes up for FF 8. And then some. It's just that good.)
Star Ocean: The Second Story (Holy crap I love this game.)
And that's it. not a big collection, but I'm rather proud of. Especially since they all work perfectly.
And that's it for now. I will start the Silent Hill 2 review later tonight. I'm going to go play Onimusha Blade Warriors. Have a great day! :D

A research paper on the Dreamcast I did.

For the last essay thing for English this year was to do a research paper. The subject came to me damn-near immediately - the Dreamcast. I got a 198 out of 200 on this thing, so I made a good call :P. If you want to read it, it'll be further down, and the works cited page is included just for completion's sake.

DREAMCAST RESEARCH PAPER

The Dreamcast is a wonderful system, and the final attempt by Sega to gain power on the console market. I think if you search hard enough, you could learn something about this wonder, or you could just continue to read. If you keep reading, you can see the interesting history behind Sega, the specs of the system, the history of the system itself, ,the reasons it failed, it’s wide library of games, and what’s going on with it TODAY!

First, let’s start off with the history of the gaming company that developed the Dreamcast – Sega. If you were a gamer in the mid – eighties, early – nineties, you would have known about the competition between Nintendo and Sega. Nintendo brought back the popularity of Video Games with the invention of the Nintendo Entertainment System, also known as the NES. Sega wanted in on the action, so they created the Sega Master System. Sega did this whenever Nintendo made a new system, for example – when Nintendo made the Super Nintendo – or the SNES – that’s when Sega released the Genesis. Sega was at the top of their game with 2 systems with a ton of great games for gamers of all styles. However, when they released the failed add-ons for the Genesis – the Sega CD and the Sega 32X – that’s when Sega started to lose their credibility. Nobody really liked the Sega CD because it was mostly terrible FMV games and people didn’t like the Sega 32X simply because it was released mere months before the Sega Saturn was released and only had about 42 games. Speaking of the Saturn, it DID have a nice little library of excellent games, but it wasn’t very well known, and was overshadowed by the Sony Playstation and the Nintendo 64. However, this is around the time when the Sega Dreamcast came out.

Now, the Sega Dreamcast was a powerful little system. It was the first video game console with 128 bit graphics – twice as powerful as the other 64 bit systems.(1) It was also the very first console to actually be able to go online and play games with other people across the globe. Earlier consoles have tried this, but they never went through with it.(2) The controller was able to hold the memory cards for the system. Speaking of which, the VMU (Virtual Memory Unit) memory cards are a very unique idea and is implemented very well. It’s one part memory card and one part portable game system. See, with games such as Power stone, you can unlock special mini-games that you can put onto your VMU and you can play it on the subway or on a long car ride or something, and if you get a certain score you can unlock special features in the main game. The VMU comes in several colors, and even special edition colors, same with the Dreamcast itself. The console also had four control ports for party games such as Power Stone 2 or Gauntlet Legends.

Let’s get into the history of this wonderful console. It started off rather poorly in Japan when it was first released in November 1998.(3) It only had three games, with Virtua Fighter 3TB being the only good one. Sega acted smart and waited another year, releasing it November in 1999. It was also a rather successful release with an incredible starting line up of games – Sonic Adventure, The House Of The Dead 2, Resident Evil: Code Veronica, Blue Stinger, Power Stone, and – one of the greatest games ever – Soul Caliber. It started with an awesome line up and it came out just around Christmas season, so it was the perfect time. However, sadly, the Dreamcast was discontinued in the year 2001, with the GD-ROM technology that the games use being discontinued in the year 2005. The Dreamcast may be gone, but not forgotten!

Well, the Dreamcast had a good run, but it eventually died out, as do all consoles eventually. One of the major reasons for its death was the Sony Playstation 2. It came out only a year later, and the Microsoft Xbox and Nintendo Gamecube a year after, means that the system came out either too late or too early. Another reason was the fact that the PS2 could also play DVD’s, while the Dreamcast could not. Another reason would be the non existent copy protection – anybody could go online, download a dreamcast game they wanted, and burn it on a blank CD – AND IT WOULD WORK PERFECTLY! Finally, it didn’t rack up in sales like it should have, due to Sega’s last three failed consoles. I swear, if it wasn’t for the PS2, Sega would be ruling the world right now like the PS2 did.

On a much lighter subject, the Dreamcast had quite a nice variety of games. Liked RPG’s? Well, there wasn’t much, but there was the Evolution series and one of my personal favorites – when it got ported to Gamecube, though – is Skies of Arcadia. Who doesn’t like the idea of being captain of a pirate crew on a ship that could fly? For fighting game fans, we had a huge selection – from 2-D games such as Capcom VS. SNK 2 and Marvel VS. Capcom 2 to 3-D incredibleness such as Virtua Fighter 3TB and Soul Caliber – which many people say is their favorite game ever. Sega also has a small, but interesting set of peripherals for certain games. If you managed to get your hands on a Light Gun, you could have a better time with the arcade Light Gun shooters… all two of them released in America – Confidential Mission and The House of the Dead 2. Love bass fishing? Then pick up Sega’s fishing rod controller! It not only makes the whole fishing experience cooler and more realistic, it also works for some other games if you’re willing to try. The only other three peripherals I can think of are the Maracas for Samba De Amigo, the Microphone you put in the controller’s second VMU slot used only for the game Seaman, and the Dreamcast keyboard used in games such as Phantasy Star Online, Quake 3 Arena, and Unreal Tournament. All together, there were about two hundred and fifty games released on the Dreamcast in America.(1) Impressive, isn’t it?

Now, you may not know this, but the Dreamcast is, in reality, still alive and kicking! As a matter of fact, the good folks over at the Dreamcast Junkyard on blogspot call it the “undead console”, and I agree! First, there were still official games for Dreamcast being released once a year in Japan… until Sega discontinued the GD-ROM technology. However, due to the copy protection the console has tons of homebrew out there – to ports of games like Doom and Quake to original games to Beats Of Rage mods*. I myself have downloaded QUITE a bit of homebrew in the past month or two and burned them to a disc and I’m impressed by what the community could do. Speaking of which, while the GD-ROM technology has been cancelled, there is a company called Red Spot Games who are still making independent games for the system burned on regular blank CD’s. Two years ago, they made a shoot-em-up called Last Hope, and last they year, they released Wind And Water: Puzzle Battles, which is obviously a puzzle game. (3) There is also a company name Hucast that have been making another shoot-em-up for about two years now called DUX. (4) Now you can see why the term “Undead Console” is so fitting for the system.

Now, I hope you have learned a lot about Sega’s final trek into consoles – this was their last one and now they’re just game developers. However, the community is keeping this system alive! You have learned everything I have learned about this wonderful system. Now, if you go to your neighborhood game store – not Gamestop or anything like that, something small – chances are you could find a Dreamcast there for about $20 like my friend did, or you could go on Ebay. Either way, I suggest you do something and pick up this piece of gaming history today! Thank you for reading and have a great day or night.

* = Beats of Rage is a homebrew re-creation of the first Streets Of Rage game. The creator also released the source code so that anybody could make take it and make an entirely new game with the same engine. There are tons of them online, and a lot of them are modified in order to be burned to a disc and played on the Dreamcast. Games include – Ed, Edd, N’ Eddy: Nightmare On Ed Street, Beats Of Rage Delux, and Splatterhouse Trilogy.

Works Cited - Had to dumb down some of the links, so i made them school-friendly :P

(1)= http://www.cyberiapc.com/vgg/sega_dreamcast.htm This is where I got the Specs for the system and where I learned that “250 games were released in the US, 150 in Japan and 26 were exclusively released in Europe.”

(2)= I found this fact out about a year ago in an old issue of Game Informer.

(3)= http://the-dreamcast-junkyard.blogspot.com/2008/11/happy-10th-birthday-dreamcast.html They DO curse there, so I’ll just put it here censored.

“Admittedly they probably should have released it a bit later as the games available on day one weren't exactly all too exciting: they got Virtua Fighter 3tb (early versions of this game had some nasty bugs), Godzilla Generations (bad), July (bad), an d PenPen (not bad, but not a system seller). That's it.”

He DOES say the S word instead of bad, and I mean the BAD S word… but you can read it if you want. It’s actually a really interesting site involving the Dreamcast. They also don’t curse much, if I remember.

For the second time (3) comes up, here’s the passage.

“Still, while the Dreamcast wasn't quite so hot in Japan as it was for a short while over here, there has been a small hardcore gamers market for it for many years after its supposed shelf-death. Last year we saw two final retail releases in the form of Trigger Heart Exelica and Karous, and we also saw the debut for German-based indie publisher Redspotgames, who released Last Hope last year and has just released Wind and Water Puzzle Battles, just in time for this anniversary.”

Keep in mind, this post was on Wednesday, November 26, 2008

(4) = http://the-dreamcast-junkyard.blogspot.com/2008/12/lame-dux.html Um, the last paragraph and the two lines after that have a lot of curses, but here’s a blog post about Dux.

Here we go!

Hello all who stumbled upon this page! It's Goldskarr here, with a blog about...VIDEO GAMES. Surprise surprise! Here I will post an occasional review or a link to a blog that I find interesting and video game related. For my first one, we have pretty much the only blog i could find *as if I actually spent more than a minute looking.* that is about the incredible Dreamcast. It's a shame the system, died out... http://the-dreamcast-junkyard.blogspot.com/ Check that out when you can. Well, I suppose I'll let you go. I should get to work on my second review - Silent Hill 2, considering I beat that three days ago. Have a nice day.