Gwhee is Born & Nostalgic Games

This is a place for game design inspiration and art. Ideas, opinions and the like. This blog is for college, more specifically the course of Animation in Games & Media.

To start things off on a high note, I'm going to express my love for nostalgic games that consumed my entire childhood. That includes Spyro, Crash Bandicoot, Ratchet & Clank, Kingdom Hearts, Klonoa & Dark Cloud. I could go on. When I was very young, I bought a bunch of PlayStation demo discs from my cousin for 50p. He got them from his magazines and found no use for them so I wasted years of my life replaying the very short demos over and over and experiencing brief moments of fantastic games I'd never possibly hope to afford. In particular, the games that stood out to me the most and stayed in my mind up until a few years ago (When I could afford them!) were Klonoa 2 and Dark Cloud. To this day, when I mention either game, I often get little response or recognition. If it's this easy to remain oblivious to some of the best games I have ever played, then I can't imagine how many I've missed out on and how hard they must be to find. And afford, sadly.

The best thing about Dark Cloud is the customization from rebuilding a lost town. You visit a single house in a barren land and speak to an elderly man who sends you out on an adventure to find the pieces of the town and the people lost in a nearby dungeon. When I played this demo at the age of 10 and found my way into the dungeon, I was too scared to move because of the daunting music and distant footsteps. This isn't nearly as scary when you attempt the game seven years later.

Enemies spawn in random places each level of the dungeon and are hard to avoid as, if you hope to progress, you should be collecting every last thing they drop. Not only are the enemies difficult to get rid of, but your weapon weakens with every hit and you must stay hydrated. The levels are randomly generated and will have areas to drink from but at the rate of dehydration,  it's a good idea to stay equipped with bottles of water. There are ten levels of the dungeon and each level has five areas and parts of the lost town (houses, people, common household items) which results in lengthy addictive repetitive gameplay. And after all of that hard work, weapon repairing, town rebuilding and and a few ridiculously difficult boss battles, you gain access to a forest area which gives you just as many hours of play, if not more to continue doing the same thing! By then your town is starting to look like a real community and you can see all your hard work has paid off, which keeps you coming back.

Onto the design aspect of the game, which is something I should've addressed before going off on a tangent. Like most games created around the time of this gem, the textures aren't too wonderful and you'll most likely encounter glitches. Regardless of this, the characters and setting are charming and have a fitting soundtrack. Admittedly, the protagonist (Toan) Is the worst of the bunch with his typical link-esque appearance but the boss enemies have some strong cultural styles that really reinforce that fantasy feeling you initially get. The player is given varying styles of fantasy with the setting from the bright happy town to the moody dark dungeons and as time passes, the setting completely transforms the feeling of the game with only the use of lighting and soundtrack.

I highly recommend this game if you have enough time and patience to play it. I've yet to meet somebody who's even heard of it. It's tedious and difficult but very rewarding and from day one, will stay in the back of your mind for as long as you haven't completed it.