The Fighters of Soul Calibur: Meet the Freak Show

First off, before I get accused of bashing, I would like to say that I'm a fan of fighting games, especially the Soul Calibur games.  They are some of the easiest games to pick up and play, with enough depth and fun factor to keep you coming back for years.  In a game a such as Soul Calibur, where the battle between good and evil is always present, mainly due to two magical swords, you expect to see a certain degree of mystical character design.  Soul Calibur definitely provides the mystical characters, such as the ghost pirate Cervantes and the possessed knight Nightmare.

Cervantes

Nightmare

However, the Soul Calibur games are also home to many freakish characters, and that is what I'm here to talk about: the top 3 freaks of the Soul Calibur games.

3. Yoshimitsu

Yoshimitsu is just as much a badass as he is a freaky character.  Does this ninja let the loss of his arm stop him or even slow him down?  Not a chance, he shows his skill by wearing a prosthetic and using it as his primary sword-wielding arm.

Now the reason I put him into the freak category is mainly because of his fighting style and his personality in general.  While uttering strange ninja-ish cries, he performs moves such as using his sword like a pogo-stick and bouncing all around, or flying through the air by spinning the sword like a helicopter blade (and sometimes using the little flag attached to his back), or even spinning himself around like a ballerina until he collapses from making himself dizzy.  Victories usually result in him sitting in some awkward pose and making strange noises that can't really be described.

2. Necrid (Soul Calibur II only)

Now we're really starting to move into freak territory.  This not-so-jolly green giant made only one appearance in the Soul Calibur series, and due to low popularity we probably won't be seeing him again.  Besides being laughable in appearance, he speaks his own unintelligible language consisting of growls and mumbles, which can also earn some laughs from time to time.  His in-game story is pretty bland, he was a mighty warrior who happened to come across some shards of the evil sword Soul Edge, which then turned him into the Hulk's little brother.  After all these years I still can't figure out what the deal is with the lava spotlight strapped to his chest, but due to strange design he earns the 2nd spot on this freaky list.

1. Voldo 

Voldo is hands down the strangest character in all the Soul Calibur games.  Words cannot describe how odd it is to see this character in motion, even watching him stand idle is a weird experience.  Voldo is blind and mute, and only speaks through eery hissing sounds and the occasional moan.  His fighting style is as unorthodox as you can imagine, with a variety of movements that you would never expect a human to perform.  Yes, as hard as it is to believe, especially after seeing Voldo's animations, he is human.  See for yourself why I have crowned Voldo the king of Soul Calibur freaks.


And that wraps up our look at the freaks of the Soul Calibur series.  Until next time, happy fighting!

Strange News in Gaming

In "exciting" news, Excalibur Publishing Limited has released their thrilling game titled Street Cleaning Simulator!  Who needs Grand Theft Auto, with it's fast cars, police chases, and all-out carnage?  Excalibur Publishing claims that you'd rather be cruising the streets at a comfortable 5 MPH pace, scrubbing away dirt, fast food wrappers, and all other exciting pieces of trash.

Seriously, whenever I think that developers are running out of ideas, along comes a group of developers to prove that yes, they are indeed running out of ideas.  I understand the existence of other simulation games; railroad simulators have a generous following, and obviously flight simulators are very popular.  But why did someone need to develop a street cleaning simulation?  You are marketing to a very small, if non-existent niche here.  Judging from the harsh review courtesy of Gamespot, it's as if the developers figured nobody was going to purchase this game anyway and put no effort into creating a polished simulation.

Street Cleaning Simulator, coming to a bargain bin near you.

Tingle: The Man-Elf From Your Worst Nightmares

When you stop to think about it, the Legend of Zelda games have some genuinely creepy characters.  People have plenty to fear from these games, be it Ooccoo from Twilight Princess, the Redeads from Ocarina of Time, and probably the most feared character of them all: Tingle.

Tingle first appeared to haunt our nightmares in Majora's Mask for the N64,  where he desperately wants to be a fairy.  He has become so delusional that he thinks wearing green full-body spandex, acting extremely flamboyant, and flying around with the help of a balloon tied to his waist has magically transformed him.  Sadly the only way to receive maps for certain areas of the game are by buying them through Tingle, so for most of us, this creature was unavoidable.

And then, for reasons unknown, Nintendo decided that Tingle was a huge hit, and to the horror of gamers everywhere they made the choice to include him in many Zelda games following Majora's Mask.  I still remember thinking that after Majora's Mask I was done with that man-elf once and for all, only to cry in anguish upon finding him in The Oracle of Ages, floating around and staring at me with that creepy smile that would strike fear into the heart of Ganon.

As if that wasn't enough, Nintendo chose to torture us even more by upping the ante in the Wind Waker.  We not only get Tingle, but we get a location called Tingle Island that is entirely populated by Tingle clones!

Why did Nintendo do this to us?  Is it because Wind Waker is a game about sailing the open seas, so Nintendo wanted to include their version of the Bermuda Triangle?

Thankfully, Miyamoto decided to give us a break by not including the man-elf-satan in Twilight Princess, probably knowing that a game with both Tingle and Ooccoo would probably scare away most gamers from future Zelda games.  But it still doesn't excuse them from all the Tingle appearances in the past.  Until next time, Tingle, Tingle, Kooloo-Limpah!

Left 4 Dead Boomer Necklace

I thought this was a funny/strange idea for a necklace, so I had to share it!  Behold the Boomer necklace:

What better gift than a gigantic, dangerous sack of vomit?

The Final Fantasy Xperience: Where Main Character Design Goes Wrong

Ah the Final Fantasy series, just thinking of it evokes memories of epic quests, magical and technologically advanced worlds on the brink of destruction, and lately, sissy-boy main characters who do nothing but whine and complain.  What has happened to the leading characters in FF games?  We didn't have this problem in earlier games in the series.  I'm sure that when you first read the words "Final Fantasy" in this post, most of you immediately thought of Final Fantasy 7, with the badass leading character Cloud Strife.  This guy was pure awesome, the only character in the game able to face Sephiroth one-on-one and carve him to pieces.

It's time to kick ass and chew materia gum.

Side note: I'm not even going to touch the topic of the emo Cloud in the Final Fantasy: Advent Children movie; as far as I'm concerned, movies based on games are not canon and therefore do not exist.

Another character in the game who was almost equally as awesome as Cloud (and who was also my favorite character in the game) was Barret Wallace.

A Final Fantasy game with a party member who is basically Mr. T with a robotic machine gun arm?  How could anybody not like this?

So, now that we've set the bar for how awesome characters in Final Fantasy games can be, let's see how more recent FF games fall short with their main characters.

The one Final Fantasy game that has probably received the most ridicule due to character design is Final Fantasy X.  Let's just jump right to a picture of the main character Tidus to set the stage for this topic:

Is it a boy? A girl?

 Do you hear that?  It's the sound of all the Cloud Strife fans groaning in disgust simultaneously.  Tidus is the exact opposite of everything we expect from a strong leading character in a Final Fantasy game.  First and foremost, he never stops whining.  From the very beginning of the game, you are treated to nonstop complaints from his ridiculously annoying voice, where most of his dialogue sounds like something you'd hear from grade school brats throwing a tantrum.  It's as if the developers intended Tidus to originally be an obnoxious little girl but changed this at the very last minute, which would explain why most people at first glance can't even tell whether Tidus is a guy or girl.

 Speaking of the visual oddities of characters in Final Fantasy X, it would be unfair not to mention party member Wakka, the man with the laughable haircut.

Wakka finds your lack of hairspray disturbing

Wakka isn't anywhere near as annoying as Tidus, he's mainly just a naive, goofy character with a wannabe Rastafarian accent.  So besides his strange hairdo, there's not much to say here.

Now that I've mentioned hairdos in FFX, I might as well mention one more character before moving on, and that character is Maester Seymour.

Just look at that impossible hair, did the devs at Square think we could take this guy seriously with his triple claw hairdo?  He's one of the main villains of the game, yet instead of commanding respect and awe, he commands laughter and ridicule from gamers worldwide every time he makes an appearance.

Ok enough of the freaks from Final Fantasy X with their whiny voices and laughable haircuts.  There is one more character from recent Final Fantasy games that must be mentioned, Vaan from Final Fantasy 12.  He's absolutely pointless in the main story and contributes nothing in grand scheme of things apart from making small observations here and there.  Vaan is just a homeless kid tagging along for the ride while delivering lines (in mostly monotone, probably should have placed him in my article about bad voice acting) that you'll neither remember nor care about.

And believe me, when I refer to Vaan as "he," I'm using the term as loosely as possible, because it's seriously hard to tell what Vaan is.  Square seems to have gone overboard with the uber-sissyness of this character.  Looking back at Final Fantasy 7, would you ever have believed that Square would develop a FF game with this he/she kid as the "main" character?  To be fair though, since Vaan doesn't speak very often, he automatically isn't as annoying as Tidus, and he tends not to whine anywhere near as much, which is also a plus.

This concludes the What the hell was Square thinking moment.

A Strange Moment in Gaming History

This installment of A Strange Moment in Gaming History is a piece of shit, literally.  I'm talking about none other than The Great Mighty Poo from Conker's Bad Fur day for the Nintendo 64.

Who would have thought that something so strange as a sentient, steaming pile of crap could be among the best features of the Conker game?

The Great Mighty Poo is the ruler of Poo Mountain, which is essentially a pile of shit even bigger than the gigantic Poo himself, although it is not "alive" like he is.  The residents of this mountain include dung beetles who happily tunnel through the mountain, rolling up balls of dung which they later feast on (along with swearing at Conker and attacking him if he gets too close).

The lovely sight of Poo Mountain

Eventually Conker reaches a point where he has to do battle with the Mighty Poo, and here is where we find that not only is the Mighty Poo a living pile of crap (with sweet corn kernels for teeth, ugh), he is a singing pile of crap, an opera singer no less!  I kid you not!



In order to defeat this dangerous, opera singing shitbag, Conker must throw rolls of toilet paper into the Mighty Poo's mouth during opportune times of his song.  When all is said and done, we find that the Poo has been sitting on top of a toilet bowl this whole time, and Conker merely has to flush him away, making us say goodbye to one of the strangest and most hilarious aspects of the game.

This concludes another installment of A Strange Moment in Gaming History, if you have a strange gaming moment that you would like to see featured, feel free to send it to strangegaming86@yahoo.com

Historically Bad Voice Acting in Games

We've all played a game or two in our lives that has made us either cringe or bust out laughing (or both) upon reaching a cutscene.  I don't know about you, but when I'm watching a cutscene, I like to feel at least some immersion in the game world.   Even if it's a comical world such as in the Sonic Adventure games, the voice actors should at least give us the impression that they are trying to do their jobs.  But alas, in too many cases we have received some of the most cringe-worthy voice acting in gaming history.




Now that is some uninspiring voice acting!  And since we are on the topic of awkward, monotone-ish voiceovers, you know that I'm going to bring up Capcom.  The Resident Evil games are notorious for providing bland, uninspired, and as a result hilarious voice acting (Jill sandwich anyone?).



Were the actors even trying? How could Capcom let this pass inspection knowing that laughing at cutscenes in a survival horror is a sure way to break the mood?  To their credit, recent Resident Evil games have improved their voiceovers, although it appears that the character of Albert Wesker will always remain over the top, as he should be!

Now, to finish off this small roundup of bad voice acting, we have to go somewhere that is absolutely painful to even think of.  Games whose mere mention makes Nintendo fans scream in rage and anguish before clutching their copies of A Link to the Past for comfort.  The games I speak of are....The CD-i Zelda Games!

Judging by this pose and hairstyle, I don't even want to know what he has to say.

Besides the fact that the gameplay in these CD-i versions of Zelda has no redeeming features, the cutscenes are jaw-dropping bad.  I can't even express the horror of these cutscenes.  The most obvious blasphemy to Nintendo fans (besides the fact that these games were made) is that the developers gave the famously silent Link a speaking role, and to add insult to injury, Link and all the other characters were voiced by amateur actors who obviously had no freaking idea what they were doing!



Seeing as we've hit rock bottom with the CD-i Zelda cutscenes, this is as good a time as any to wrap up this segment of Historically Bad Voice Acting in Games.

If you know of more cringe-worthy cutscenes that you would like featured in this blog, feel free to drop an email to: strangegaming86@yahoo.com