Good day, dear inhabitants of the resource!
Surely every avid gamer periodically has the desire to play through one more game that has taken pride of place in his heart. And it doesn’t matter that it’s been studied inside and out and that it’s 20 years old at lunchtime, that it no longer amazes with amazing graphics, the gameplay features don’t seem so ingenious anymore, and it turns out that it can be completed in about five hours, it’s still expensive. Familiar story? So I had a desire to blow off the dust from the old console and run the rather worn disc with the game. To my surprise, I didn’t find a text article on this topic on the website, only a mention in the video, so I decided to correct this injustice. I suggest you remember the not very popular, but not bad game Koudelka from the PS1 era
It is impossible not to mention such a person as Hiroki Kikuta.
He was born into a family associated with creativity (his father was engaged in decorative pottery), so young Kikuta spends a lot of time in museums and exhibitions, looking at works of art, he is especially impressed by his visit to the World Exhibition in Osaka, where he contemplates downright innovative examples of architecture. In addition to architecture and sculpture, he is interested in music, inspired by the British rock band Emerson, Lake and Palmer. At the age of 12 he composed his first composition for acoustic guitar and lyrics. The guy understands that his vocal abilities are rather weak and that he will not become a great singer, but it’s the British musicians (again!) Electric Light Orchestra in the album Time emphasize synthesizers and demonstrate in all their glory the possibilities of electronic music, which amazes young Kikuta. He is also interested in quite ordinary things: anime, manga, playing Namco arcades.
In 1981, Kikuta began studying at Kansai University, Osaka for 3 years, and in a department far from music: religious studies, philosophy and cultural anthropology. Kikuta himself claims that through his studies he learned the fundamental connection between feeling, thinking and action. He shows himself to be a versatile personality: during his studies, he participates in the creation of anime in an amateur club, which is later shown at a science fiction convention.
After graduation, Kikuta worked for some time as a manga illustrator. Under the pseudonym Yuuki Ni Juu Roku, he sculpted his first creation, “Raven,” literally overnight (unfortunately, he couldn’t find any illustrations). Later he works on the series The Ghost in Machine Head (by the way, side by side with Shiro Masamune, the author of Ghost in the shell, widely known in narrow circles).
How an anime composer works in 1990 on The Great Adventures of Robin Hood and The Legend of Princess Snow White.
Realizing that his income is small and there is barely enough money to survive, Kikuta decides to try to get a job as a composer in some company developing computer games, since this market was developing rapidly and there was every chance to prove himself. First, he tries to get into Nihon Falcom Corporation (known for the YS and Legend of heroes series of games), but is rejected due to the lack of specialized musical education. Kikuta, without much hope, tries out for Square and manages to impress Nobuo Uematsu with his demo recording, who also approves of the young composer’s love for rock (and the competition for the vacancy, by the way, exceeded 100 people).
This is how Kikuta’s work at Square began. He works on games such as Final Fantasy IV (fixing in-game bugs), is responsible for sound effects in Romancing SaGa, and with Secret of Mana he acts as a composer.
Unlike many of his colleagues, he rejects generally accepted standards of tonality and rhythm, creating a completely unique soundtrack. Moreover, he delved into technical aspects, sampled, participated in file compression.
He enjoys complete freedom in his actions and often the soundtrack is ready before the development of the game is completed, which is due to the isolation of the Uematsu department in contrast to other companies. The turning point in Kikuta’s work at Square was the work on Soukaigi, which was supposed to be released on PlayStation. He wanted to make the most of the PS’s capabilities and saturate the game with the most lively, rich sound. The soundtrack was a success, but the game was not a success and Kikuta decided to leave the company and direct the next project himself.
The newly minted game designer had enough ambitions and ideas, so he enlisted the financial support of SNK Corporation and began founding the company Sacnoth (By the way, there is an in-game Easter egg associated with the name of the company. In the story of Edward John Plunkett Dunsany, an Irish writer (aka Lord Dunsany) “A Fortress Invincible Except for Sacnoth” from the collection “Stories of the Seer,” the sword of Sacnoth appears, with which only one can kill the hellish warrior Ghaznak. In the game Koudelka, this sword is the most powerful weapon in the game, and one of the game characters is named Edward Plunkett). When developing a new game, Kikuta works as a screenwriter, concept designer, producer and, of course, composer (Kojima, log in!). He wants to create a serious, mature, dark title with a deep story and move away from the classic turn-based jRPG combat system. The setting of the future game is outlined quite quickly: England in 1900, an abandoned monastery where devilry is going on. Kikuta approached the study of the era very meticulously (according to his own assurances, he read about a hundred books about Victorian England, Benedict and Franciscan monasteries, especially inspired by Umberto Eco’s novel “The Name of the Rose”), studied the works of photographers Bob Carlos Clark and Jan Saudek (I don’t post their work, because.To. quite a few nude models) and personally visited Wales. The game designer also wrote a minimalistic score interspersed with choral singing in order to emphasize the gloomy monastic atmosphere.
Despite the fact that Kikuta very clearly understood what kind of game he wanted to make, difficulties still arose: other developers were against the Action-RPG system and advocated for the classic time-tested turn-based approach. Kikuta wanted to give the player the ability to move around the battlefield and attack with IRT, inspired by the first part of Resident Evil (Funny enough, such a system is actually used in the 1999 game from Squaresoft “Parasite Eve 2”). Constant disputes and internal discontent led to Kikuta making concessions and the combat system in Koudelka remained turn-based and, in my opinion, was the game’s biggest problem.
As a result of the criticism, the game was received very restrainedly, sales were unsatisfactory and Hiroki Kikuta left the post of head of Sacnoth, which would soon change its name to Nautilus and give the world a series of games Shadow Hearts, which are not related in plot to Koudelka, but were undoubtedly inspired by it.
Such a sad and short story of Hiroki Kikuta as a game designer. He continues to create music, but I am deeply grateful to him for one single game made under his direction.
Actually, to the game itself.
Koudelka was conceived as a survivor-horror with RPG elements in the scenery of a gloomy monastery in Wales with a generous pinch of gypsy flavor (the main character Koudelka is a gypsy).
By the way, here seems to be another tribute from the game designer to the work of photographer Josef Koudelka. The time was well chosen – the 19th century with all its delights: the age of superstitions, prejudices and the occult. The script was clearly written under inspiration from novels read.
Polygonal character models move across perfectly rendered backdrops (just like in RE and FF). The atmosphere in the game is dark and mystical, which is very well emphasized by the soundtrack. The movement/search mode is replaced by random battles in a prepared arena. There is a character leveling system, in theory it is quite flexible, but this point is deceptive. Stunningly beautiful cinematic videos, thanks to which the game takes people 4 (!) disk, but goes through quite quickly. The characters are surprisingly well developed and look quite alive. The plot is quite coherent, without holes, and leaves no questions at the end.
A little more detail about all aspects:
Attention! I, of course, understand that the likelihood that the article will suddenly cause a widespread unbridled desire to dig up a console from grandma’s mezzanine and launch an old game is extremely small (about the same as the likelihood of a fire resist), but suddenly there is a person who is interested in Koudelka, then now everything that is possible will be shamelessly spoiled!
To the young gypsy Koudelka Iasant
, who has the abilities of a medium and can communicate with spirits, a woman named Elaine appears in a dream and beckons a gypsy girl to the old Nemeton monastery, which is located in Wales. Koudelka goes there to find out what the spirit wanted to show her. The fate of the main character before the events of the game can be learned from several issues of the manga of the same name (the girl was expelled from her camp due to fear of her supernatural abilities).
(The manga, as you can see, is never kind or rosy; it pokes a living person in the eye with scissors).
Upon arrival at the monastery, the main character meets the wounded young adventurer Edward
, who is driven into a corner by an unfriendly monster. Koudelka dashes off his adversary and teams up with the big guy to explore the monastery. Edward is a simple guy, he does not hide the fact that he climbed into the Nemeton monastery in search of valuable things and thrills, of which there is no shortage: the walls of the monastery are teeming with ghosts, chimeras and werewolves. The heroes soon meet an elderly couple (Ogden and Bessie),
who turn out to be the first friendly creatures in the monastery and are ready to feed the hungry, shelter the homeless, punish the innocent and encourage the uninvolved. Koudelka doesn’t like them at first sight and, as it turns out, for good reason: at night Edward almost dies from poison in the soup, which Bessie carefully added. But with the help of gypsy magic he survives and exploration of the building will continue. The elderly couple will try to carry out assassinations several more times as the game progresses. An elderly priest is found unconscious in the garden and joins the party.
His name is James and prime-casino.uk his motives for being in this God-forsaken place are still unclear.
The trio meets the thief Elias, who mentions some Emigre manuscript in the conversation. James confesses that he was sent by the Vatican to retrieve this long-lost document from the sacred library, which describes a Druid ritual to bring a dead person back to life.
When the comrades get into the cathedral building, they are attacked by a powerful enemy – the Gargoyle and splits the party. Koudelka is forced to make her way alone through the corridors and ends up in a tastefully furnished torture room, where the hospitable owner of the monastery Ogden tries to behead her, but suddenly receives a bullet from his loving wife. Bessie will tell you that Ogden was a ship captain and bravely sailed the seas, but was subject to a human vice called drunkenness. And one day, being quite drunk, he caused a shipwreck in which his daughter died. The inconsolable father withdraws from the world and uses all his savings to buy a piece of land in Wales and settles with his wife in a monastery. One day, a young alchemist Patrick and his wife Elaine cross their threshold. The girl was sweet, meek and friendly, and consoled Ogden with quiet words, not believing that he had ruined many lives with his misdeed. Neither her husband nor the elderly couple doted on her. But one day robbers break into the monastery, Elaine is raped and killed. Heartbroken, Patrick fishes out a suspicious-looking manuscript from his wide trousers and promises to bring his beloved back to life, all it takes is a little blood. Ogden promises to help, and women in the area begin to disappear from year to year, whose fate no one is interested in (prostitutes, that is). They were beheaded, dismembered and their flesh and blood were filled into the vessel. In total, several hundred unfortunate courtesans ended up in this dark monastery. Mad Patrick performed an ancient Druid ritual, Elaine really returned to life, but only her body returned, without a soul. Patrick’s desire to reunite with his beloved becomes a reality: Elaine absorbs the scientist and they merge into one being. The game with the blood of the murdered also does not pass without a trace, and within the walls of the monastery the shadows of the creatures tortured within these walls come to life (and if you believe the records in the library, then before Ogden and Patrick the Inquisition was in full swing here and the number of victims is unknown).
After which the old woman unloads the gun into her head.
The gypsy gets out of a room littered with corpses and instruments of torture and ends up in a cemetery, where she meets Roger Bacon
(a real-life monk who lived in the 1200s, famous for his philosophical endeavors, mathematician, physicist, chemist, millionaire, philanthropist). For some phrases from the work “Opus majus” about the depravity of the clergy, he was subjected to public censure. accused of heresy and either arrested or fled). In the world of the game, Bacon was also involved in alchemy and warlocks, and before us in all its glory is an example of the successful use of the Emigre manuscript (I remind you that the game takes place at the end of the 19th century, t.e. grandfather lived for at least 600 years), but his mind is strong, but his body is failing: Bacon looks more like a mummy and looks harmless, in fact, we have before us the antagonist of the Shadow Hearts series of games, where he will go on rampage.
Koudelka reunites with his comrades and tells the story he heard from Bessie. James takes off his second mask: the mission to find the manuscript, entrusted to him by the Vatican, is secondary for him. He loved Elaine, but decided to devote himself to serving God, making a promise from the alchemist Patrick to take care of the woman they loved. Now he wants to help Elaine rest in peace.
The ascent to her lair begins and then three endings are possible (bad, conditionally bad and supposedly good).
What I like about the characters: they are not uniform in color, the black or white slider is not turned up to maximum. Everyone has their own motives, and there are probably no unequivocally positive ones here. The story of a lost loved one, it seems, is not new, but it is presented in a stylish, dark and bloody way.
As mentioned above, Kikuta was inspired by the Resident Evil series and wanted to combine the usual jRPG mechanics and move away from leisurely turn-based battles, but his idea was not approved and he had to make concessions and roll out a Tactical Role-Playing Game rather. While exploring locations, random battles will occur and we will be transferred to the battlefield 5*6 cells. Enemies and heroes start the battle on opposite ends of the field and the player has the opportunity to act (attack with a weapon, use magic/item or change weapons), move, wait, learn about the character’s condition or try to escape.
Moving around the battlefield implies the need to take a serious approach to the placement of fighters in cells (as in Final Fantasy Tactics, Front Mission and others like them), but the inability to go behind the enemy’s back reduces the interest in this part to nothing: the player cannot cross the line on which the enemy is standing. Accordingly, this also works in the opposite direction: you can’t reach the fragile Koudelka while Edward’s broad back looms in front of her. Yes, the character can be knocked down and thrown back, but battles often don’t last that long.
Weapons in the game can be divided into three types:
1. Melee (brass knuckles, knives, swords, axes, clubs/hammers (a water pipe was also included here for all Sileny Hill fans). With this weapon you can attack an enemy that is located on an adjacent cell with the character.
2. Medium-range weapons (spears). You can bravely peek out from behind Edward and poke at the enemy one cell from the hero.
3. Ranged weapons (pistols, shotguns, crossbows). With its help, you can attack the enemy anywhere on the battlefield without moving, but it consumes ammunition and requires reloading during the battle, which will take one turn.
Weapons can also have elemental damage (fire, water, wind, earth, darkness, light, secret (steals MP from enemies) and vampiric (in the original Vital, steals HP). The idea is as old as time: we hit a fire-breathing enemy with a water weapon, beat one shrouded in darkness with a lightsaber, and treat the evil one fluttering in the upper layers of the ether with a blow from the one blessed by the power of the earth with brass knuckles, but monsters sometimes have a pleasant blue tint, hinting at belonging to the water element, and sometimes the adversary crawls out into battle in a gray-brown-boogly color and a blow with a flaming pipe heals him for a couple hundred health points. Here are complaints about the graphical capabilities of the PS1 and the author’s quite logical desire to make the game as gloomy and dark as possible, so that the opponents do not look like parrots with all the colors of the rainbow and do not evoke a sympathetic smile.
Also, each character has a level of proficiency in one or another weapon or magic (maximum level of pumping is 3). A more advanced evocation skill allows you to land two or three hits on an enemy, and more powerful magic attacks two or three enemies in the same line. Everything would be fine, but weapons in the game tend to break at the most inopportune moment and if the player becomes attached to swords, he risks ending up with Edward the Samurai in the party and an inventory full of axes.
As already mentioned, the game has 8 parameters that improve with each level:
Strength (to hit harder), vitality (to be healthier), agility (responsible for the accuracy of attacks), speed (affects the order and frequency of moves in battle), intelligence (power of magical attacks), piety (amount of MP and protection from magic), intelligence (accuracy and time of preparation of spells), luck (affects everything and nothing at the same time).And it seems like a fairly standard set that allows you to flexibly customize the characters to suit yourself, but in reality, you can only concoct something interesting from James, since Koudelka is clearly a magician, and Edward is a fighter to the core. The priest can become both a good caster and a good hitter, but personally, he always broke my weapon almost from the first blow(
The enemies pleased us with their design and variety: there are giant insects, half-torn corpses, ghosts, and demons. These creatures definitely don’t make you want to laugh.
A thief who sneaked into the monastery and was killed within its walls, who continued to wander within its walls. Along the ceiling.
To summarize regarding the battles: battles can cause some difficulties only at the beginning of the game, when there are few weapons, skills are not pumped up and there are few healing items (by the way, health in the game is restored by bread and cheese, and whiskey resurrects characters who have fallen in battle. Kikuta-san knows something in this life!) and the weapon threatens to break, and there is no other one in the inventory yet, a couple more bosses can drink the gamer’s blood, but otherwise, from a certain point in the game, the enemy risks not waiting for his turn and being killed literally by one of Koudelka’s spells or Edward’s mighty blow. Considering that to complete one turn you need to press a lot of buttons, and the attack/spell casting animations are very leisurely, then it becomes simply boring to fight, you want to suppress a yawn and continue exploring the monastery. Let’s be strict, but fair, like King Solomon: battles are the weakest part of the game (but this does not mean that they cannot be captivating).
Although Kikuta’s experience as a game designer can be called ambiguous, it is blasphemy to deny that he is an amazing composer and musician. What the game really delights with is compositions that are surprisingly in place and complement what is happening on the screen.
For example, this theme sounds in the very first battle:
music.youtube.com/watch?v=xZ4xykzR1SU&feature=share
Gypsy motifs, rhythmic beats of drums and tambourines do not let you forget that a battle is going on.
Also a very dynamic (especially from the middle) composition, but more alarming, where there was more room for brass.
Ubi Caritas et Amor will not let you forget that the setting of the game is a monastery and will please your ears with a pure church choir performing a cappella parts.
music.youtube.com/watch?v=OnZ4zq3lbKo&feature=share
Some are just good.
It is worth honestly noting that it is during movement that the music almost does not sound; it appears either during battles or cutscenes, which are also worth talking about separately.
Cinematic videos are precisely the reason why the game takes up four whole discs with a total running time of five to six hours. They are very beautiful visually and professionally voiced, without minute pauses between phrases and ridiculous hand gestures (I couldn’t help but remember Resident Evil and Dino Crisis, though?). Plus, all the plot details are told in them, and this is the very moment when skipping the video insert in the game is blasphemy.
The end result was a very ambiguous game: with rather bland combat (not hopeless, it could have been made a little more interesting, livelier and more complex), with excellent location design and bestiary, with a dark plot in the spirit of a detective thriller, with wonderful musical accompaniment. Everything together is guaranteed to create a sticky, mysterious atmosphere and the player wants to plunge headlong into the history of the inhospitable monastery and the player is guaranteed a short but memorable journey.
Were used to write the text:
1.Archived interview with Kikuta:
2.Kikuta’s profile from vgmonline.net
3.English wiki.
To all courageous people who read to the end – a plus for karma and free chakra cleaning.
