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Same Name, Different Game and other YouTube shows from me

ShakeWell

Slam Master
(he, etc.)
I love Legacy of Kain! I found that first game enthralling and it sold me on the franchise for a long time.

I also felt like the only person I knew who was playing it. It felt like a hidden gem I had found, at the time.

I'll just say you should hold on to that nostalgia and not revisit it, because it's ROUGH to go back to now.

My older brother and I played Blood Omen for about as long as it took to killed by a bunch of guys outside a tavern or some other kind of building. We had a lot more fun with Soul Reaver, with it's Zelda/Tomb Raider exploration and puzzles combined with the very-good-for-the -time voice acting and writing. It would be cool to see some sort of Re-master of those games, as we only played the first SR and I've wondered over the years where the story went after the giant To Be Continued.

I'm honestly a bit surprised that Square "We Reissue Every Game We've Ever Made Because Money" Enix hasn't done any kind of re-release, tbh.

Worth watching just for an underlit Roger rising from the bottom of the frame and uttering the blood. Please tell him he is in fact my favorite video game-playing blue puppet.

I bet that colored lighting in the dungeons was pretty neato in '96.

Yeah, the lighting was definitely a selling point then, and I will let him know!
 

jpfriction

(He, Him)
Good video and glad to have my suspicions confirmed that it’s not worth revisiting.

I played it back when it was new. Abused the code that refills your health every few seconds in the later areas, gets pretty stingy with the human enemies by that point. Definitely remember the atrocious load times and purposely going through the items in the menu so I could hear Kain’s VA read all the item descriptions. He nailed that performance.

I think my favorite part was Kain quipping “what an odd little man” after killing one of the bosses, some dude who turned his girlfriend into a puppet or something.
 

fanboymaster

(He/Him)
Good video, I still like Blood Omen but it'd be nigh on impossible to say that it's worth going back to for anyone other than super dedicated early ps1 fans or LoK fans. I'd still argue Soul Reaver's a classic but even ignoring the taint of Dyack BO is hard to go back to. Tony Jay's pretty fun to hear in the game at least. Didn't know there'd been a tug of war over putting it on Saturn or PlayStation, made sense at the time but man that's... dodged a bit of a bullet.

As a bit of interest there was a point where Legacy of Kain almost got rebooted as a PS4 launch title and there's a fair4 bit of footage of that unannounced prototype, it's not even a case of "someone pitched it and no one bit" the developer (seeming Climax in this case) clearly seems to have spent a fair bit of time on it. The resultant game looks like it probably would have been fine but also like it would have pissed a lot of people off, that said, footage is fairly findable if you go looking for Legacy of Kain: Dead Sun
 

ShakeWell

Slam Master
(he, etc.)
Good video and glad to have my suspicions confirmed that it’s not worth revisiting.

I played it back when it was new. Abused the code that refills your health every few seconds in the later areas, gets pretty stingy with the human enemies by that point. Definitely remember the atrocious load times and purposely going through the items in the menu so I could hear Kain’s VA read all the item descriptions. He nailed that performance.

I think my favorite part was Kain quipping “what an odd little man” after killing one of the bosses, some dude who turned his girlfriend into a puppet or something.

The load times are just... untennable.

As a bit of interest there was a point where Legacy of Kain almost got rebooted as a PS4 launch title and there's a fair4 bit of footage of that unannounced prototype, it's not even a case of "someone pitched it and no one bit" the developer (seeming Climax in this case) clearly seems to have spent a fair bit of time on it. The resultant game looks like it probably would have been fine but also like it would have pissed a lot of people off, that said, footage is fairly findable if you go looking for Legacy of Kain: Dead Sun

Interesting...
 

Kishi

Little Waves
(They/Them)
Staff member
Moderator
It's interesting to think Soul Reaver and the rest of the series might not have happened if the first game hadn't done nearly as well just as a result of being on Saturn.
 

ShakeWell

Slam Master
(he, etc.)
Yeah, to say nothing of 3DO. (Though all of Crystal Dynamics' 3DO games eventually came to PS1.)
 

fanboymaster

(He/Him)
psx_turbo_eclipse_original_release.jpg
THE MORE YOU KILL THE BETTER YOU FEEL!
 

R.R. Bigman

Coolest Guy
That was great. I didn’t know an updated Maria mode was included in the Requiem collection version of Symphony. I might check that out since I have the collection but haven’t played Symphony on it due to the sacrilegious replacement of the endearingly bad original script and voice acting.
 

Peklo

Oh! Create!
(they/them, she/her)
the endearingly bad original script

Blaustein's script often gets treated with the same mocking and dismissive air as the voice acting, which I don't think is fair or reflective of the quality of work exhibited. He did a fantastic job of providing a concise, memorable in phrasing, and theatrically potent treatment of the material that brings the narrative to life. Importantly, he also knew how to walk the line between translation and localization, injecting alternative literary or media allusions in place of others, or simply adding his own bit of personalization to some. Cube of Zoe forever.

Enjoyable video, ShakeWell! I've recently been dropping into the Saturn port because I've owned it for ages (picked up back when a lot of Saturn imports were cheaper...) and while its many caveats are known to anyone who has an ear for this stuff, in-person interaction is really the only way to ascertain how much any of it actually interferes with the play experience. The few seconds of loading while entering or exiting the menu are the most damning part about it on a technical level, and how the Saturn's controller layout necessitates the map function being nestled within the main status screen, easily doubling up the frequency of those intermissions. That's about the only absolute negative I have for it, because for a game like Symphony that so many of us regularly return to, the opportunity to view it through a slightly different set of presentational tools, which while can be seen as inherent downgrades, lend the experience just enough of an unexpected quality to justify the venture. Side-by-side comparisons and emulation or system video feed translated to an LCD screen also make its visuals far more of an apparent hindrance than I've found them to be in person, if one has the (admittedly rare) luxury of interacting with the game through native hardware, on a CRT, and with good video cables, and in my case I am doing all of those and running it through an RGB signal--a glow-up that any game benefits from. It's never going to be the version of choice for anyone, but its rare availability and increasingly detached nature from its original context I think has heightened the perception of the flaws in it. I'm glad it exists, while nominally agreeing about all the criticism that applies to it.
 

LBD_Nytetrayn

..and his little cat, too
(He/him)
Great video!

Still want to play the Saturn version someday, though, if only to try out Mega Maria.

Btw, sorry if I overlooked it, but does the PS4 release have PSP Maria?
 

ShakeWell

Slam Master
(he, etc.)
Enjoyable video, ShakeWell!

Thank you!

Side-by-side comparisons and emulation or system video feed translated to an LCD screen also make its visuals far more of an apparent hindrance than I've found them to be in person, if one has the (admittedly rare) luxury of interacting with the game through native hardware, on a CRT, and with good video cables, and in my case I am doing all of those and running it through an RGB signal--a glow-up that any game benefits from. It's never going to be the version of choice for anyone, but its rare availability and increasingly detached nature from its original context I think has heightened the perception of the flaws in it. I'm glad it exists, while nominally agreeing about all the criticism that applies to it.

This is largely true, I spent most time playing it on a PVM to capture (though the captures themselves obviously don't reflect this) and I tend to agree, though I think some of the Saturn's flaws (the distortion that makes Alucard a thicc boi, etc) would still show through, but it really is the loading and slowdown that do it. During the premiere, some folks did once again mention the fan patch that adds 4MB RAM support making it a much more pleasurable experience all-around. Once my Satiator arrives, I will have to test for myself.

Great video!

Still want to play the Saturn version someday, though, if only to try out Mega Maria.

Btw, sorry if I overlooked it, but does the PS4 release have PSP Maria?

Yes, I wasn't explicit I don't think, but it is the PSP version, only prettier.
 

Kishi

Little Waves
(They/Them)
Staff member
Moderator
Minor fact-check: The Saturn port was developed by KCE Nagoya, who also made Castlevania Legends. KCE Kobe did the N64 games and Circle of the Moon.

I couldn't stomach getting all the way through the PSP version when it came out, but along with its other issues, I recall the PSP's D-Pad also makes it much more difficult to pull off Alucard's spell commands. Soul Steal is a finicky input as it is, and I about shredded my thumb trying to do it on PSP.

Congrats on completing the PlayStation Celebration. I've really enjoyed it.
 

WildcatJF

Let's Pock (Art @szk_tencho)
(he / his / him)
Interesting episode Joe! If memory serves the Switch remake didn't start at $15 but $30 when it launched. Certainly among the more curious remake stories in modern gaming, both for how long it took and the subject being...well, this obscure arcade game.
 

WildcatJF

Let's Pock (Art @szk_tencho)
(he / his / him)
Tbh that's what I thought too, but when I researched it I found $30. I wouldn't be surprised if it started at $40, no one bought it, and by the time reviews came out it already got a price cut.
 

ShakeWell

Slam Master
(he, etc.)
Like I said in the video, I don't subscribe to "more game is more value" in 99% of cases, but a six-stage arcade game for $30? Hell no.
 

Johnny Unusual

(He/Him)
Great video. Never heard of Toki by name but the little ape walking around and spitting tickles a minor part of my memory. I don't think I played it but I must have seen it. As I commented on the comment section, I would kill for a remake of Trog! with new stop motion animation.
 

ShakeWell

Slam Master
(he, etc.)
My patrons wanted nostalgia, so get ready for a facefull when the new video premieres at 7pm central tonight!

 

WildcatJF

Let's Pock (Art @szk_tencho)
(he / his / him)
This is such a weird localization, haha. I plan to write about it soon, and will use your excellent vid as a source Joe! Great work!
 

LBD_Nytetrayn

..and his little cat, too
(He/him)
Great episode, and you didn't even go for the Super Mario Bros. 2 comparison! Well done!

You know, between your love of advergaming and my love of advergaming, it would be great if we could work together on something someday.
 

ShakeWell

Slam Master
(he, etc.)
Jim, a.k.a. Kid Shoryuken, asked me to do a guest video for his channel. It's about Gleylancer!

 
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