Out of nowhere Monty Oum rushes out part 5 of his CG-animated pet project only a few weeks after part 4 was posted.
In this installment Monty eases off on the action a bit and builds on the narrative started in part 3. The Kasumi clones (taken from DOA2) arc appears to be capped off. And the Tifa's saga continues in Kill Bill fashion. In fact, I jokingly thought to myself, "taking a page out of the Ninja Gaiden 2 gore-fest, are we?" when guess who makes a cameo appearance before the end of the clip
Download it at Gametrailers in HD or of course...
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Monty Oum's Dead Fantasy III and IV
Labels:
Dead Fantasy,
watching,
web
Last year Monty Oum, a maniacal genius of action choreography and animation unleashed Dead Fantasy. It was a bold experiment merging fan-favourite franchises DOA and Final Fantasy in an crazy Matrix-inspired show-down. The first chapter was successfully cut together a dynamic tag-team fight scene while the second took things even further by turning up the difficulty on the action-photography by throwing up to 6 additional characters into the mix for a head-spinning 10 minutes of animation.
Previously it was a bit difficult to tell, but Monty Oum hasn't ripped the character models from source, these are custom. In the third installment the experiment introduces new edit tricks (feels kind of like watching a movie trailer) and more detail on the facial expressions as reducing the number characters helps us get a closer look. Tifa's design looks like a half-way between her Advent Children appearance and her original FFVII face... it's a little unsettling but that's not what we're here for.
http://www.gametrailers.com/video/dead-fantasy-monty-oum/52613
In the fourth installment (which Monty Oum surprised us with by posting only a few weeks after the 3rd chapter was released), the environment is new and improved. Ocean, grass fields, and lonely desert roads surround our heroes. The wide open spaces also allow for some vast camera swings as Yuna goes back to her classic costume for some Summoner action.
http://www.gametrailers.com/player/52837.html
From what I gather this is all just a pet project for Monty Oum as I hear he's got a pretty sweet industry job since the Dead Fantasy debut. I hope he doesn't drop this project because he's got some serious fans on Gametrailers.com
Previously it was a bit difficult to tell, but Monty Oum hasn't ripped the character models from source, these are custom. In the third installment the experiment introduces new edit tricks (feels kind of like watching a movie trailer) and more detail on the facial expressions as reducing the number characters helps us get a closer look. Tifa's design looks like a half-way between her Advent Children appearance and her original FFVII face... it's a little unsettling but that's not what we're here for.
http://www.gametrailers.com/video/dead-fantasy-monty-oum/52613
In the fourth installment (which Monty Oum surprised us with by posting only a few weeks after the 3rd chapter was released), the environment is new and improved. Ocean, grass fields, and lonely desert roads surround our heroes. The wide open spaces also allow for some vast camera swings as Yuna goes back to her classic costume for some Summoner action.
http://www.gametrailers.com/player/52837.html
From what I gather this is all just a pet project for Monty Oum as I hear he's got a pretty sweet industry job since the Dead Fantasy debut. I hope he doesn't drop this project because he's got some serious fans on Gametrailers.com
Monday, July 20, 2009
Lament for Lunar
Labels:
gaming
To mark the 40th anniversary of the Apollo lunar landing, I will take this time to lament the Lunar game franchise. Lunar is possibly the saddest franchise in gaming. It came and went and then came again huge... and then went again. It tried and failed for a three-peat. You probably missed Lunar. But for those of us lucky enough to have experienced The Silver Star Story, it was amazing and here are some pics of my copy of it.
The games were originally Sega CD releases. One of the early attempts at using CD for console gaming, this was a Genesis add-on drive. The games were packed epics and featured lengthy cut-scenes to drive the plot. Many years later, the games were remade and featured full-frame anime cinematics to bring everything to life.
Silver Star Story Complete came on 2 game discs, an audio CD soundtrack with songs and all the rerecorded music, and a PS1-proprietary format disc that played a half-hour behind-the-scenes video. The box also contained a hardback manual featuring a partial walkthrough and a cloth map of the fictional world.
The sequel, Eternal Blue Complete, also made a return engagement with even more ridiculousness. It included a box of stuff like a soundtrack CD and a replica medallion worn by the heroine.Sadly, that was the final hurrah for Lunar. When "Dragon Song" appeared on DS, it was so far removed from that time-line, it was hardly recognizable anymore. In fact, I think the saddest thing about this is that the remakes video renders were so good (beyond 16-bit, but before DVD existed). As it was, the game was English-only including dubbed songs (while the singer has a sweet voice, she had some very awkward lyrics to work with). It would be another few years before I managed to find MP3s of the Japanese songs. The Lunar franchise is a relic of the 90's and we can only wonder if it will ever rise again.
The games were originally Sega CD releases. One of the early attempts at using CD for console gaming, this was a Genesis add-on drive. The games were packed epics and featured lengthy cut-scenes to drive the plot. Many years later, the games were remade and featured full-frame anime cinematics to bring everything to life.
Silver Star Story Complete came on 2 game discs, an audio CD soundtrack with songs and all the rerecorded music, and a PS1-proprietary format disc that played a half-hour behind-the-scenes video. The box also contained a hardback manual featuring a partial walkthrough and a cloth map of the fictional world.
The sequel, Eternal Blue Complete, also made a return engagement with even more ridiculousness. It included a box of stuff like a soundtrack CD and a replica medallion worn by the heroine.Sadly, that was the final hurrah for Lunar. When "Dragon Song" appeared on DS, it was so far removed from that time-line, it was hardly recognizable anymore. In fact, I think the saddest thing about this is that the remakes video renders were so good (beyond 16-bit, but before DVD existed). As it was, the game was English-only including dubbed songs (while the singer has a sweet voice, she had some very awkward lyrics to work with). It would be another few years before I managed to find MP3s of the Japanese songs. The Lunar franchise is a relic of the 90's and we can only wonder if it will ever rise again.
Sunday, July 12, 2009
Sunday, July 05, 2009
Imperial Guard Valkyrie 3
Easily the most irritating assembly of every vehicle kit I've ever built in my life, is the cockpit. You reach a point where everything is down to an art-form and a science. But every kit throws a little something different at you. The Valkyrie is no different.
As with many cockpit assemblies, the Valkyrie uses the usual "fake legs" pilot figures. These pilots have no feet. They're just torsos with arms and heads. The tough choice tackling a new sculpt is trying to figure out what you can get away with because you know certain bits will be forever hidden from view once it's done.
As you can see, the most visible parts are the heads and the control panels. In fact, you could mostly get away with base-coating the arms entirely. That said, as is typical, the easiest way to work with a cockpit is to do the paint details by dry-brushing before putting the assembly into the rest of the nose of the vehicle.
Also to note, the biggest display screen on the RIO's panel? Just use a bit of yellow to fake some tactical info. When the canopy is in place you'll barely be able to tell what's there anyway.
As with many cockpit assemblies, the Valkyrie uses the usual "fake legs" pilot figures. These pilots have no feet. They're just torsos with arms and heads. The tough choice tackling a new sculpt is trying to figure out what you can get away with because you know certain bits will be forever hidden from view once it's done.
As you can see, the most visible parts are the heads and the control panels. In fact, you could mostly get away with base-coating the arms entirely. That said, as is typical, the easiest way to work with a cockpit is to do the paint details by dry-brushing before putting the assembly into the rest of the nose of the vehicle.
Also to note, the biggest display screen on the RIO's panel? Just use a bit of yellow to fake some tactical info. When the canopy is in place you'll barely be able to tell what's there anyway.
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