The ReDead of Hyrule

                I’ve told you all about my first horror game love, “Resident Evil.”  She is my first love even if she may not show it.  I was always given tough love by her in the way of a screen repeatedly telling me “You are dead,” but that has never deterred my feelings.  If everyone can keep a secret though, I have something to admit.  “Resident Evil” wasn’t the first game to scare me as a child.  That award goes to the brilliant masterpiece “The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.”

This game is a masterpiece.

                Now, reader, you might be thinking right now, “The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of time?  How in the hell did that game scare you?”  To this question I ask that you put this into some perspective.  “Ocarina of Time” came out in 1998.  At the time of its release I was a mere seven years old.  With being just the tender age of seven, it was quite possible for anything to scare me.  New animals, weird bugs, bumps in the night, clowns, everything has the capacity to scare a child under the right circumstances especially old people.  Everyone knows that the reason an old person’s skins sags is because it is being pulled to the underworld.  I’m getting a little off topic now.  Basically, all you must know is that “Ocarina of Time” boasted one such circumstance.

As a child, old people are terrifying creatures.

                “Ocarina of Time” is possibly the greatest game of all time, and that is not a term that gets thrown around lightly.  Its level design, gameplay mechanics, graphics, and sound created new benchmarks in the realm of video games.  The variety in its design and levels is absolutely astounding and makes the game a delight to play even to this day.  This variety is helped along by a clever time travel mechanic built into the game.  You play as Link and he is the “hero of time.”  At a certain point in the game you gain the ability to use the Master Sword, which, when brandished from its pedestal in the Temple of Time, will cast you seven years into the future.  When you awaken, Link is now a full-fledged adult and every place in the land of Hyrule has drastically changed.

The pleasant atmosphere of Hyrule Castle Town.

                One of the most drastic changes to the territory is Hyrule Castle Town.  As a youth, Link visits Castle Town multiple times interacting with the cheerful inhabitants and buying their goods.  Everyone in Castle Town is colorful and more than happy to help you out.  A good portion of the game makes you repeatedly have to run through this area or do quests for its people.  You get to know them and enjoy their little quirks.  When you get thrown seven years into the future, nothing in the town is the same.

Castle Town has seen better days when Link revisits it in the future.

                When Link leaves the Temple of Time as an adult and enters Castle Town for the first time, it is a shocking contrast to what had been there.  All the buildings are tattered shells of their past life and the worst part of all is the town’s inhabitants.  The pleasant people of Castle Town have been turned into creatures called Redeads.  These hideous creatures are characterized by horribly emaciated bodies and wear wooden masks on their face with deep sunken eyes.  All that could go through my head was that these were the zombified remains of the people who had always been so kind to me.  It is impossible to not have them get the jump on you the first time you run through the town.

"WHY DOES HE WEAR THE MASK?"

                Redeads have an ability that paralyzes Link with a blood-curdling screech that causes terror to set in.  Within this time of paralyisis, a Redead will slowly shamble over to you and proceed to jump latch onto your body and eat at your head.  The zombie character literally is trying to eat your brains.  It is a terrifying thing for a seven year old to witness.  Even worse is the fact that Redeads will actually stop and eat the dead remains of another Redead you may have killed.  The most frightening part of an encounter with one of these creatures is the fact that it just leaves you feeling helpless.  With just a scream you become nothing more than a piece of meat waiting to be gnawed on.  I was terrified of them as a child and did my best to avoid the forsaken hell hole that was Castle Town.

                Now as an adult I find my fear of these creatures somewhat silly, but they do still leave me with a feeling of helplessness at times which I despise.  They are easily known to be some of the most horrific creatures in the Zelda universe and that is why they made it to my blog post.  The first creatures to teach me that zombies crave brains cannot be easily forgotten.

Thanks for reading everyone!  Be sure to sound off in the comments section and let me know what you have thought of my blog posts so far.  Any criticism, constructive or even soul crushingly brutal, is appreciated so let me have it.  If I have entertained you, be sure to follow me on Twitter.  I am @nevstorm5 and most the time I talk about excessively nerdy things and vie for everyone’s approval.  Be ready for my blog post next week which will be about the brand new video game “Resident Evil 6.”  Until then keep your pants dry, folks.

I Hate Babies

                A game does not always have to be a straight horror game to have some seriously creepy, fear inducing moments.  Sometimes it can just have one or two bosses that are so twisted it makes you never want to play that level again.  A moment like this arose during the 4^th and 6^th stage of the game “Catherine.”

Vincent during his nightmares.

                “Catherine” is one of the most unique games I have ever played.  It fits into its own unique genre of game that is a puzzle-platformer psychological horror adventure game (that is a mouthful).  In the game, you control a man named Vincent Brooks who is beginning to have strange nightmares after his girlfriend, Katherine, begins to talk to him about marriage and commitment.  Matters become even worse for him one night after he accidentally has an affair with a girl named Catherine that he met one night while drinking, which causes his nightmares to become even more intense.  During the daytime, he drinks, converses with friends and tries to handle his relationships with Catherine and Katherine, but during the nighttime, he must run for his life inside of his nightmares in order to stay alive.

Catherine (left) and Katherine (right) are complete opposites.

                The premise of the game deals with Vincent and his major commitment issues and really makes you wonder what you would do in a similar situation.  There are many times where you have to answer relationship questions for Vincent and they can make you feel like a pretty crappy person after you answer some of them.  It is a lot headier than what I went in expecting but I absolutely loved it.  The actual platforming sequences come during the nighttime chapters of the game when you have to guide Vincent up a tower of blocks while they slowly fall out from under you.  The puzzling towers are absolutely brutal in their design and have a steep learning curve.  I died, and died, and died, and continued to die until I watched some more instructional videos online and finally began to get the hang of it.  Being able to complete the regular tower scaling levels started to give me a great sense of accomplishment, but each time that happened the developers had some curveball waiting to hammer me back down and keep me in my place (which usually meant falling to my bloody and violent death).  These curveballs usually consisted of a gigantic boss creature appearing to chase you up the tower; the worst one appeared on night four.

I became very well acquainted with this screen.

                The day before night four your real girlfriend, Katherine, tells you that she is pregnant.  This scares the hell out of Vincent, as it would any non-married individual with commitment issues, and causes some seriously twisted nightmares during the night.  As I finally reached the last stage in night four I was greeted with one of the most gruesome creatures I had seen in a game: a gigantic looking hell baby.  Pales skin, white eyes lacking pupils, noticeable veins popping out, and blood curdling screams of, “DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAADDDDDYYYYYYYY,” all come from this baby and it is the thing of my nightmares.  I hate babies.  Babies are just like having to take care of a constant drunk person: they puke and pee on themselves, cry uncontrollably, have mood swings out the ***, look hideous, and are just generally unlikeable in my eyes.  So when a video game has a gigantic baby chasing me while shooting tremors up a tower to knock me to my baby induced death, I can truthfully say it is the thing of my nightmares.

The evil devil baby with his intimidating pacifier.

                This hell child crushed me to a bloody pulp repeatedly all the while screaming, “DON’T LEAVE MEEEEEEEE,” while I desperately tried to do just that.  When I finally reached the top of the tower and was greeted with a cutscene of the baby being fried into oblivion by a blinding light, I was overjoyed.  I had escaped the evil baby death, but my joy did not get to last long.  Just two nighttime stages later, the game actually managed to top itself on the “twisted as hell” scale.  The baby of my nightmares had returned, but this time he was covered in a bloody half robotic mess and wielding a chainsaw of all things.  I do not know what staff member on the development team came up with this idea, but I know that if I ever meet him I will proceed to swiftly kick him in the nuts.

Who gives a child a chainsaw?!

                This baby was somehow even more unrelenting than the first.  All the same attributes and blood curdling screams were present, but now the baby could use his not-so-baby-like chainsaw to cut away at parts of the level and throw giant stones at me.  Death was once again my friend and we greeted each other as a man greets his ex, with indignation and awkwardness.  Finally being able to reach the top of the tower and fry this hell baby was even more rewarding than the first dead baby and when I watched it fall to its death, I was able to breathe a sigh of relief.

                “Catherine” helped to solidify my disdain for babies.  Now when someone tells me they are pregnant, I can only conjure up the image of a chainsaw wielding child growing inside their placenta.  If pro-choice advocates used this baby in their campaigns, I would never disagree with them.  This is a game I will not so easily forget.

Located below are videos of each tower level featuring the hell baby.  The second video should be started at about 6:17 to see the demon wielding chainsaw baby.

My First Zombie Infested Mansion

No one ever forgets their first: first crush, first kiss, first love, first time I played a video game with a zombie infested mansion that still makes me feel like a scared little child.  That last item may be a little more specific than the rest, but you get the picture.  “Resident Evil,” is the first horror game I ever played, and to this day I still have trouble sitting down and playing it.  The claustrophobic nature of the mansion and being restricted to tight corridors with ridiculously clunky controls makes for a terrifying, tension filled game.  Before I get into the description of the first moment that caused uncomfortable warmth below my waist, I need to set the mood.

                I play my horror games in a very particular way.  It seems wrong to play a game that is supposed to frighten you in the middle of the day.  Playing a scary game with sunlight shining outside is like watching “Halloween” with “The Muppets” soundtrack playing.  Picture it in your mind.  Michael Myers slowly chasing Laurie Strode down a hallway while the song “Man or Muppet” blares from the speakers.  It completely takes away from the experience and is not conducive to building tension.  So at a young age I made a decision to only play horror games in the dead of night far away from the distraction of people.  This makes for a more immersive experience especially when playing a game that relies heavily on atmosphere, such as “Resident Evil.”

                “Resident Evil” begins with a cutscene showing how odd, grisly murders began popping up in a place called Raccoon City.  These murders seem to have originated from a stereotypically huge mansion on the outskirts of the city.  As my team approaches the mansion, they are attacked by zombie looking Dobermans that desire nothing more than to eat our flesh and bury our bones. To avoid being dog food, my team sprints for the mansion and then the horror begins.

The mansion of my nightmares.

                Now there are many things inside this mansion that cause terror and shrill screams to be a common thing, but one of the worst parts is the fact that the dogs who chased me in here continue to be a nuisance throughout the game.  They enter the courtyard or garden areas of the house and chase me.  In one of my more embarrassingly stupid moments, I even opened the door to the outside that the dogs had just chased me through in the cutscene before.  I don’t know what I expected to happen, but I can say with certainty that I didn’t expect the dogs to just be waiting outside the door.  It was a pitiful moment for me and video games, but the worst moment with the dogs came about an hour in to the game.

The hallway...

                I entered a room with a long hallway that was built like an L curve.  The room was well lit but very silent.  As I ran past the first window a tiny chipping sound was heard as a piece of the window fell onto the floor.  Immediately, I flipped around with my gun raised expecting the worst, but nothing happened.    

I am so ready for this!

Any moment now...

Well, I guess nothing's there...

             After what was probably ten minutes of waiting, I shrugged my shoulders and continued on my merry way through the rest of the mansion.  At a certain point, my mind let me forget about the odd chipping noise from that window and as I backtracked through the hallway all hell broke loose.  My fear of the hellish dogs was well founded because somehow the zombie Doberman had learned to jump through windows!   

OH SWEET JESUS!

The first time this happened to me, I was 12 years old.  It was like 12 year old me had sat down on a thumbtack.  I screamed and jumped violently in my seat as I tried to make my character run for her dear life.  Needless to say, the dogs mauled me.

This scene had two consequences: one, I wet my pants, two, I will never trust any windows ever again.  “Resident Evil” has forever ruined windows for me along with many other things, but we’ll get to that in later posts.  For now, just remember to never trust Dobermans or windows.

Before I finish, please watch these videos.  Start the "Resident Evil" intro cutscene first and at about 25 seconds hit play on the "Man or Muppet" video with the cutscene muted.  You'll get a feeling of what I mean by having the wrong mood.  Enjoy!