Hello there readers.
Today I have chosen to go with the stock option for this blog prompt. For my chosen word from the reading chapters, I have chosen Pranks. This is because this really hits home with me. This is because in the game Dark Souls 2, when I play through it, and I die I often say “damn you game, you trolled me. Much like in the reading about “Cat mario” or Syobon Action.
Dark Souls has a way of tricking the player into multiple deaths until that player figures out the routines of the bosses or the “mobs” which are the standard baddies one must face. For example, with the Lost Sinner boss, you can fight him in the dark, but this decreases your visibility, thus when he retreats before his attacks, you can’t lock on meaning that you can’t block in the correct direction. Much like the Mario from Hell, you have to take the counter-intuitive method of completion. So, in order to beat that boss you have to go and face another different boss, more like 5 bosses. It is a boss battle between you and 5 gargoyle bosses all locked into a small fighting area, VERY VERY DIFFICULT! This leads you to a keep, then you get a key to unlock 2 doors that lead you to fires you can light in order to illuminate the fighting area for the Lost Sinner. If you don’t go and fight those 5 bosses you will lose to the Sinner, I know, because before I found out about the other option I died, many…many…many times. But such is the way of the Dark Souls series. Then there are some not so obvious pranks that one must find out the hard way. Like with the Cat Mario, and invisible blocks you have to find and avoid. In Dark Souls 2, there is a section where you have to fight dragons, many many dragons! With that being said, there are objects you can destroy, they are dragon eggs. You can’t immediately see any repercussions for breaking them, and why not? They’re just eggs, so smash away! Well eventually you come to a part when you have to cross a windy bridge over a large gap. You decide to run across and seconds later the bridge gets attacked by a dragon and you fall to your death! It turns out that with one egg smashed you get a “crossing timer”. If you break no eggs you can cross the bridge without fear of attack. With one egg broken, you have 20 seconds. and the more you break, the less time you have to get across the bridge. But no where does it ever warn you, or tell you not to break the eggs. The whole idea behind Dark Souls is to die and learn, learn what you did wrong, and hope you don’t die on your next attempt. Just break first and die later. Anyway, that is my 2 cents on how pranks are important in games and how Dark Souls 2 relates to Syobon Action and the reading.
Thanks for reading!
Quin
Blogs I Commented on:
Jesse P: http://jessepearsondtc375.wordpress.com/2014/03/28/63/comment-page-1/#comment-9
Quin Robert 
Haha that is great and so frustrating at the same time. Rule one: Don’t touch the dragon eggs. I like how they integrate the crossing timer into how many dragon eggs you break. That’s actually pretty clever. And who would’ve guessed that you had to do that in order to get across. Pranks in games are frustrating, but at the same time, when you realize what it plays off of, you get one of those “Oh aha” moments when you feel like a total dumbass and then get right through.
Watch this gameplay of Psycho Mantis: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UfQakgpan3M
Metal Gear Solid has a boss called “Psycho Mantis”. The game released for the gamecube and he reads the players memory card and recites games you’ve played. (1:20ish). The only way to defeat this boss is by plugging your controller into the 2nd controller slot (or whichever one you aren’t you using now) because he reads the movements and actions of your controller. Who would’ve thought of that….?
Just food for thought.