Stage 3 - Part 7 - "I really, REALLY love Medieval Fantasy games"

So I was looking to expand my gaming experiences beyond "duck, shoot and boom"; looking through the demos on XBLM left a lot to be desired, which was depressing, but I did find intrigue in a particular title, Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning. Now I do not venture fully into the fantasy world often; the last time I took a tour, I fought a dragon and traded the game in within 24 hours*, previous to that I believe it was Baldur's Gate. Every now and then I dip a toe in, take a look around, get a pang of deja vu and leave again.

During the demo of Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning, it suddenly hit me why I had never really embraced this genre sooner, and why I could never get truly stuck in like the rest of the 'nerdomites' (My word... it's mine).

IN ORDER TO VALIDATE THE FOLLOWING STATEMENT

Endless Possibilities
For one, as the genre could communicate, it has limitless possibilities on its design, theme, presentation, even in-game language and context. You remember Kameo? You could transform into loads of different species of crazy animals and monsters. Well, those days aren't over; of course there are going to be gigantic worlds with forestation everywhere, and caves, and then a village, and maybe a house on its own with a lonely person in it. Of course there will be some deserted run down village which has been "deserted for years", and dungeons with giant bugs in it. I mean, come on, there's creativity and imagination at play, to some extent I think they're abusing it.

The Names
My favourite part by a long way are the names. Names that somehow appear to translate to "Grand Warrior of the West Country" or "The Great Wizard of the Top 3 Tallest Mountains in the Region", when really they probably have a unique formula for generating these names that have absolutely no meaning at all. I picture a building where they have several private booths set up; each booth with a male and female participant, and either a table, or a glass of freshly squeezed lemon juice with the bitter skin of oranges, or black pepper and really hard mathematical equations to solve... you ready for this?

In the room with the table, the participant, with the recording equipment in place, is to kick the corner of the table and ultimately stub his/her toe, and blurt out any sort of semi-profane words they can think of. These are noted and split into categories of Good, Bad, Elven, Human, etc. For example:

"SHIIIIII-HAAAAA" - Shia - Queen of "X" - Good (???), possibly neutral

"FUKSHI-OOOOO" - Fookshio - Wanderer - Willing to team up with you, specialist in close combat and stealth

The participants with the juice/skin mixture, would be blindfolded, and made to drink the liquid and very much do the same: "EEERRRRRRGH-EEEHTH!", "AAAAHMMLAAAAMLAAAM". The black pepper and maths? Well, try it yourself. Out loud, solve an equation with black pepper sat under your nose. You get the idea.

The Story
So you start of as a stranger, lost, probably in a cave somewhere, with no idea how you got there, what you're doing there and why you should care. You walk for some time, and you come across an NPC who suddenly freezes and goes "My God! You are real", or "The Gods were right, you returned!", or "You are alive! The prophecies have manifested to be true", or "He exists... All this time... How can this be?", or "Everyone told me you were dead, that you could never return, well, they'll see who is mad now!". You're standing there like, "DUH! Of course I'm the fucking ONE, that guy you've been searching for or whatever, otherwise this would be a really dull game! Geeeeeeeez... so why am I the one? What's going on?"; the game then proceeds to leave you in the dark until the very end where you fight some dude who knew all along that he was going to fight you, heaven forbid he did not choose the START of the fucking game, and then you're all like "OOOOOOOOOOOHHH!".

Of course, along the way you may join a guild, help some people kill some stuff and delve a little too further into someone's personal life than you should be comfortable with. Seriously, these designers a-BUSE their freedom of creativity. Or they used this.

The Apparel/Armory
I actually think this is clever. Hundreds of developers, hundreds of titles, and yet they all unite in the naming and design of gear and weaponry up until the very last few minutes of the game where you grab the "Sword of (Insert World Name Here)". You know you are in it for the long haul when you rape a corpse of its clothing, coins and the odd rat hide, and for the next 30 minutes you are picking up "Dirty Leggings", "Worn Gloves", "Tattered Cloth". Then, oh? What's this? Steel Plated Gauntlets? Hello there! Iron Dagger? Ooh! What next? Could it be? Oh, yes it is, the Crossbow. Huzzah!

But we cannot ever forget the magic. The elements need always play a part, for that I have nothing. Personally, I see elemental magic as the girl who flashes her pants "accidentally" at house parties and gets "wasted" so she can be "taken advantage of". She probably would not be missed, but it wouldn't really be a proper party without her. You go girl.

Outside the Game
Perhaps this is personal to me, but I had a rather traumatic experience as a child wherein I turned up to a school play dressed for the wrong show. Everyone saw me, I cried, everyone saw me cry, I think I took more of the attention of the audience than the play itself. It was harrowing. I believe it is because of this I hate costumes, dressing up, fancy dress, and all the sort. I cannot stand it. Even on other people. This is actually true by the way, if you ever have the pleasure of meeting one of my friends they will tell you, I hate fancy dress. It is because of this, that cosplayers could seen as the halo topped nuns and priests in my personal emporium of goodness and pleasantries. Why not dress as a wizard? Why not dress as a warrior? Oooh, which generic race are you? Awesome! I bet it feels amazing to know you look like a jester from a medieval dungeon of freaks, while on the inside there is a nagging voice questioning how every tiny decision and turn of events have brought you twisting and winding to the moment where you look in the mirror at a party and go... "I am Druxlor, Mage of Umbtka. I can't wait to drink till my make up melts off my face and some dude shoves a carrot up my arse while I'm passed out."

Oh, and finally, "I used to hate jokes that never changed or evolved or were never funny in the first place... then I took an arrow to the joke..."

*Please send all hate mail to twentyfiveand0@hotmail.co.uk

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