Melbu Frahma

So, the Magic Carpet port came today. And... yeah, kind of bad, although a lot better than the Descent port was. Still doesn't compare to the original, really.

I feel like a "Yeah, but what would you put IN the dick's mouth?" joke is warranted here.

Yeah, I use my laptop speakers when I'm not using the headphones, too. I know it means I miss out on the super low freq stuff, but unless I'm in hardcore music listening mode, it's good enough for me.

I use a pair of Sony MDR-V150s I was given for my birthday years ago. Battered, and the rubber(?) stuff that covers the actual ear phones is beginning to flake off, but still very, very good for how much they cost.

Ditto, lol. And yeah, why is this in Comp?

Those exist still? wat

You're forgetting games like Spec Ops: The Line, which took one of my most hated tropes in gaming and purposefully chose to base its game around it, so as to critically examine it and the mentality it spawns. Smart writers are more than capable of doing that, with as much subtlety - or even more so - as the writers for that game did. Which is not to say that some writers are carelessly using these tropes because they're easy, btw.

Yeah, that's pretty messed up. Funny fact, if given a choice between a male or female create-your-own character, I usually pick the female, because I find the dialogue options tend to be more interesting.

This + Transistor reveal = made my week.

Gotta say, looks good. Although I'm wondering if the narrator'll show up again.

I was married in November, if that counts.

Yep. That, or it makes me think of my Gameboy.

I, too, really... enjoy tin whistle riffs...

Just popped in to point out another good female protagonist I haven't seen mentioned: Meetra Surik. Resume the discussion.

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+1 to aaaaalll of this.

Honestly, don't see why not. I know they don't have problems with commissioned work here, although I've never seen anyone commission a remix per ce. And I know there's been competitions with definite prizes before - the FF6 competitions both featured prizes, as I recall; sound libraries, mostly, I believe. You might have to make it something other than actual money, though. Still. Best check with a staff member to be sure. Hopefully one'll wander in here and let you know.

No. Everything happened within the game's engine in the original. EDIT: Actually, that's not strictly true. There were... oh, what, five? six?... painting-style monologues in the original. But no, the animated cutscenes I believe you're referring to weren't.

I think there's an important distinction that can be drawn from this, that game writers could use to make the damsel/kidnapping scenario fresh and different: make the situation, not the person, helpless. Or hopeless, if you prefer. To wit: In most Mario games, Peach sits around doing jack all. I mean, seriously, she might as well bake a cake for Mario to eat when he arrives, for all she accomplishes on her own. She is a helpless character, because that's how the game writers made her. But what if they introduced some sort of element into the game to give Peach some sort of agency over her situation... say, optional and EXTREMELY hard side levels that you're allowed to play at the end of each world as Peach, wherein she manages to break free from Bowser and attempts to escape. She never actually succeeds, of course, but what if however far she gets determines the strength of enemies Mario has to face - if she gets pretty far, for instance, maybe Bowser has to pull back troops from the world Mario's at now to reinforce his guard on Peach. All of a sudden, Peach is a lot more sympathetic of a character. Or, to use an example that's actually in a game: Alma, from Final Fantasy Tactics. We see several times that Alma isn't useless, that her skills are more geared toward supporting other fighters, or toward using her heart/brain to persuade people toward her viewpoint. So when she's kidnapped, our first thought isn't, "Sigh, not another 'save the helpless girl' mission, game makers," it's, "Well, in all fairness, it's kind of hard for a cleric to take on several demon-infused holy knights without any kind of foot soldier back-up, but I bet when her brother gets here with his troops she's going to help him kick the bad guys' ass." It's still the same old trope, but because it's clear that Alma is a capable individual who just helped fight off several attacks before her kidnapping, it doesn't affect our view of her as a character nearly as much. You know what DiD game I'd like to see? Start out with your typical girl gets kidnapped, prophesized hero must free her... then at the halfway point, have hero free the girl, only to be killed by the big baddie. The second half of the game you play as the girl, who in spite of the Neo-wannabe being dead and the prophecy being failed, is determined to try to stop the big baddie herself. Starting with this seemingly helpless individual who slowly has to become tougher and demonstrate how capable she is in a pinch, all while dealing with the emotional fallout of her brother/friend/boyfriend's death and the strong likelihood that she can't actually beat the big baddie (since, again, Neo's dead) but won't give up in spite of that. Now that's a damsel I'd love to watch.

Well, and I gotta say, once I got over that, I still enjoyed the game quite thoroughly, if not as much as the original. Although in all fairness, in most games I just kind of mentally mute the voice acting anyway - I'm an old school, let me read my dialogue darn you! kind of guy.

Really, it's what Riversound said. Some albums are open to the public, some aren't. Probably the best thing you can do is go to the Recruit/Collab forum, and the Project forum, and look for albums that interest you that have openings, then whip up a WIP of some kind and show it to the director of that album. And of course, refine your craft in the WIP forums. I look forward to seeing you on an OCR album someday! A fellow Playstation kid! Aside from the gameboy and whatever I could get to work in Dos and Win 95, that was all I had growing up, too. Don't worry about unlurking all at once, either; ease your way in, if you want. Welcome back to the site!

Rose arguably rescues the main character Dart twice in Legend of Dragoon, once in the opening sequence, and (arguably) once at sea (although that second time immediately follows Dart trying to rescue her, to be fair.) In fact, she's one of my favorite female characters (see my avatar), because she's far stronger emotionally than any of the men in her game (except maybe Lavitz), and even when she does have vulnerable moments they don't cheapen her as a character, but further emphasize how strong her resolve and personality are. Which is actually a bit weird, considering that she's cast opposite Shana, who's a pretty bad DiD in about 97% of the game. Also, another strong female character that I'm surprised no one's mentioned (although I might have missed it, tbh) is Naiji, from Aquaria. And I, too, refused to play that horrible Other M. Once I found out the direction they took her character, my intentions of purchasing the game were instantly gone.

Needs more Final Fantasy remixes. /troll Seriously though, thrilled to see this get a legit, full release. Congrats to everyone who put in the hard work to make this eight-year project come to fruition.

Yeah, it made me put the game down and walk away when I realized she was doing some of the voice work.

See, I never really felt like the graphics were that bad. TBH, they didn't even look that bad on my 32-inch when I tried the port (and that's the port, too, not the original.) But I have seriously considered getting it for the PC, too. I just don't want to have to find a compatible joystick, and get ahold of a keyboard with a num pad (because I use the num pad for the majority of my flight control.) This has all got me thinking. I ordered the Magic Carpet PS1 port about two days before I came across the Descent port, and now I'm kind of worried the flight controls on it are going to suck, too. I guess I'll find out when it arrives in a few days.