I'll explain the quote below later. And it is something like what you're thinking. "Pumpkin panty fortune telling! Here we go."
- The Fortune Teller in Queens (no relation)
It was an odd night in that Blockbuster. I was struck with a cold, or a flu, or Anthrax, or something. The United States had started striking Afghanistan, in response to the cowardly attacks on the World Trade Center, and the Pentagon. I thought renting a PS2 game would help me deal with my thoughts and feelings on the whole matter. Lo and behold, I saw Dark Cloud, and I thought...
"Just like those fucks of the Al-Qaeda (what kind of name is that?) have cast a Dark Cloud on the world (few hundred Tomahawk missles should fix that), I too will eradicate the Dark Cloud in this game by the sword that is my Playstation 2 controller!
Sadly, Dark Cloud is a complex fantasy adventure game aimed at younger audiences. Damn you, Dark Cloud!
Our story opens with a bunch of people doing a weird dance around a giant flaming jar. The jar bursts and releases forth a Dark Genie - the villain. He's kind of like a straight version of the Genie from Aladdin.
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Hey, here´s my Reagen impression! No wait, here´s me doing Popeye! No wait, see my movie Patch Adams! "Donner, party of five!" Ahahaha! AHHHA! I´m goin´ spastic, I tells ya! |
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I kind of wish I was as scary as that guy. I don´t mean looks, or evil, I mean more like a psychological thing. |
Hey, Genies are from the Middle East! So´s that bin Laden asshole! Maybe with a little creative juxtaposition, I can pretend that Osama bin Laden ate (no - stole!) one of those blueberries from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, and turned all big and purple! And like, got some powers somehow! And President Bush commissioned me to kick his ass! Yeah! It makes perfect sense!
Strangely too, the evil people in this game are the "Easterners". I´m not touching that one. Even stranger is that the Genie has been released by an evil general named, I kid you not, Flag. Who the fuck is named Flag? At this point I realized that the political implications of my juxtaposition were either staggering or nonexistent. Are we through the looking glass? Is this some big-ass conspiracy?
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Yes! |
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No! |
Oh Scully, you whacky skeptic! Now, when the Evil Genie attempts to destroy the world, a Fairy King seals pieces of it inside of magic bubbles, and commissions you, a human boy named Toan (great name, again) to collect all these pieces and put the world back the way it was. Unless the gay coalition is somehow building a shield generator a la Return of the Jedi to protect us from terrorism, I´d guess my metaphor is in ruins. Oh well.
Anyhow, Dark Cloud isn´t your average run-of-the-mill Legend of Zelda rip- uh, I mean, your average fantasy adventure game. There´s a LOT of innovation in it! No really - like the nine main modes of gameplay, I like to call:
Dungeon Mode: is where the action takes place. You and up to five allies (I´ll get to them later.) enter a dungeon full of monsters. Dungeons can be up to 16 floors deep (as far as I´ve gotten in the game) and are randomly generated. Not nearly as well as Diablo 2 pulled it off - where each time you re-enter a level it´s extraordinarily different. In Dark Cloud´s randomly-generated dungeons are very simplistic. You´ll recognize the general map structure through every level of the game. It´s just permutations of the same room types and halls. Here´s what I mean.
Let´s say I´m an architect, but I only know how to design three different rooms. If I build you a one-hundred room mansion, you´re probably gonna get annoyed that I only built you a house with 67 bathrooms, 32 kitchens, and one alcove. (Note: I have no idea what alcoves are, but mansions need ´em, dammit!)
The enemies are pretty repeticious, too. None really stand out from each other, except for the giant fish in the rock dungeon. Or the moving cartoon dog statue (named StatueDog). Well, the forest level did have 7 dwarves named Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, etc. I dunno - again, they´re all just different versions of each other. Dark Cloud´s monsters are different from each other in the way that New Kids on the Block, the Backstreet Boys, and... uh... the others, are different from each other.
Or to put it another way. One misshapen testicle may look different from another, but you don´t want them in your scrotum. Unless you don´t have a scrotum - in which case, you still wouldn´t want to keep a pair of them on your bureau. (I´ve dated some really interesting girls.)
Town Mode: Town Mode is where you walk around town, talk to the common folk, and engage in interesting banter. Banter like:
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Hello! |
| I heard you can find the magic necklace in the Cave of the Neverending Pants! |
Thanks, but I didn´t ask. Town Mode is standard video game fare, except for one big difference, which is...
Building Mode: Ever wish you could build your own town? Of course not! But you played SimCity anyway! Now you get to build your own Fantasy Adventure Town! Remember when I said that Fairy King Guy protected pieces of the world in little bubbles and you have to go find them? Well, you actually get to place them wherever you want. Parts of it are like a jigsaw puzzle - you put a house down on land, and then you have to fill the houses with their residents and furniture.
When one of my friends who owned the game told me about it, I thought it sounded dumb, but it is pretty cool. It´s kind of like a puzzle game in and of itself. And arranging the town is kind of like playing with Legos. Don´t believe me? Ask someone whose played The Sims. Yeah, it seems ridiculous that placing mirrors and lamps about a room wouldn´t be tedious and stupid, but damn I love - I mean some people love to do it!
And you get bonuses for completing houses (getting all their furniture and stuff), but so far there´s no bordello to build, so the bonuses are just extra weapons and shit. Boo!
Confused About Why This Game is Addicting Mode: I don´t get it. What I´ve described is the crux of the game, and I didn´t really have much very nice to say. So why the fuck can´t I stop playing it? I can think of a few reasons...
The fact is, that none of the elements in the game are terribly original. The whole thing plays like a dumbed down version of The Legend of Zelda: The Ocinara of Time, the randomized dungeons are a retarded take-off of Diablo 2. The kickass weapons system is the same as Vagrant Story´s with less customizability, and even the fishing game is a poor knock-off of Zelda.
But maybe that´s the cool thing. Dark Cloud takes great elements from other games (well, not the fishing), and simplifies them, into something that any Special Olympics kid can win a Gold Medal in! A Gold Medal of fun and camaraderie, as opposed to the cheating, lying, and backstabbing of the Special Olympics. Or of corporate politics - I always confuse the two.
Seriously though, it´s simple fun - challenging at times, yeah, but it´s something to take your mind off things - just like masturbating to things you´ve already masturbated to. Think about it - I bet that simile was a lot more accurate than you first thought.
Weapons Mode: This is interesting. Weapons have a lot of upgradeability. You can add gems to them to enhace their inherent power, or add new powers. You can combine weapons to form new hybrid weapons. Weapons can also gain Absorption Points and be upgraded, absorbing the gems you´ve added.
So if your weapon is a bucket of shrimp, you can add an ice gem to it. When you absorb enough points by bashing enemies like the Taliban in the face with your bucket of shrimp, you can upgrade it to something like a Bucket of Frozen Shrimp. Actually, it´ll be called the "Bucket of Shrimp + 1" which you might think means 2 buckets of shrimp, but if you remember algebra, it means frozen shrimp. No, really. It´s like Pythagorean Theorem - Like a² + b² = Seafood. Those whacky Greeks!
Weapons also have a thing called WHp, which I don´t have to tell you stands for Wet Horse Points. When you hit an enemy, like say, the Taliban, your Bucket of Shrimp´s Wet Horse Points decrease. When they reach zero, your bucket breaks and is gone forever. Now what are you gonna do? You´re facing the Taliban, and you don´t even have any frozen shrimp, you dingbat!
Okay, this is getting too insane even for me. The point is periodically, you have to repair your weapons with handy Repair Powder. I think I saw an infomercial about it.
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Don´t let your weapons run out of Horse Points! Use smooth, fast acting Acme Repair Powder! Order now, and you´ll get a special applier! What do you say if I lowered the price from the initial $60 down to $35?!? |
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BOOOOO!!!! |
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That´s it! Fuck all you people! I try to sell you something and come down on the price and all you do is boo my ass! Fuck this! I´m going to Correspondence School, to learn VCR Repair and MAKE SOMETHING OF MY LIFE!!! |
Well, I don´t know about you, but I didn´t see that coming.
Worry About Anthrax Mode: This is the point where you hear on CNN that flu-like symptoms are symptomatic of Anthrax, and you start realizing you could die and you´ve wasted your life on video games...
This was easily, my least favorite part of Dark Cloud. Screw you for making me get self-reflective, Dark Cloud!
Duel Mode: Duel Mode is pretty silly. You get into a special fight with someone, and a bunch of Playstation controller buttons scroll across the screen. Just like in real duels, you have to hit the correct buttons as they pass through a line on screen, kind of like those weird dancing games that you want to play, but are way too embarassed to.
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What´s stupid is, that while I´m sure the duel looked very cool, I was so busy concentrating on what buttons to hit and the timing, I couldn´t see what the hell was going on. I guess this is one of those games you should play when an audience is coming over to watch you play video games. Preferably an audience of hot girls who either get off on watching video games, or don´t understand what´s going on. So, Russian Mail-Order Brides it is!
Fishing Mode: I keep telling game designers over and over and over again. I don´t want to just play a game where I´m having fun. I want it broken up with fishing! Goddamn you, why? Why? Why can´t there be more fishing? Not only in games, but in real life? Please.
[At this point, I begin sobbing.]
Sorry. Yeah, fishing is kind of dumb. You pick your bait, and put it in the water. You wait for a fish to grab and, you get fishing points. Trade your fishing points in for weapons and magic stuff. Don´t look at me. I´ve played video games for about 20 years, and I´ve still never gotten used to shit like that.
But it´s a side quest, one that you don´t need to keep going, but it helps take your mind off things, and very occasionally can help you in life. Like masturbating to things you´ve masturbated to before. If you think about it, that simile was far less accurate than last time. So I should have spent more time thinking about what I say before I say it. Whatever.
Dark Cloud has a host of cool characters. Like Toan, the main character. He doesn't speak, he sort of just gestures. Outside of him being really nice saving people and all, he's sort of boring. Or Xiao, a cat you magically transform into a half cat, half girl.
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You are great! |
Right. There´s a fat guy named Goro, no relation to the four-armed guy from Mortal Kombat. Which is a shame because I think we would have kicked ass in Dark Cloud. Then there´s Ruby, the female genie, whose your standard video game eye candy character. (Shrug.)
Downloading Porn Mode: Now, this is absolutely true. No exaggeration. When you go to the fortune teller in Queens (no relation), she tells your fortune by jumping on your head. She´s wearing a skirt. Your head ends up under the skirt as she outcries: "Pumpkin panty fortune telling! Here we go."
I would like to congratulate Dark Cloud for winning Slow Beef´s annual Most Disturbing Thing I´ve seen in a Playstation 2 game. (I don´t have a screenshot of this, by the way.) So at this point, if you´re like me, you´ll blink in amazement, throw your Playstation 2 controller in the air in exasperation, and say "Fuck this game! I´m downloading porn!"
Besides that, Dark Cloud is certainly worth a rent, or a buy with a discount. Especially if you´re an adventure game fan. Or a fishing one!
