#bo2 my beloved detested | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

kainissoable · 3 years ago

Text

Because this already long post absolutely needed to be longer by me adding my tuppence worth in, sorry Luke, but I’m with OP here. BO2 has a special place in my heart thanks to Umah Bisexual Awakening, but objectively it’s bloody awful. (Side note: the lip synch is terrible in English too and Shakespearean voice actors can’t save the dialogue. From what I’ve seen of the French version, you’re not getting a worse deal here)

While I agree that the only way to really enjoy BO2 is to read it as a parody of those Very Masculine games that end up unintentionally hilariously camp and gay, I think in reality it’s completely serious and just the apotheosis of this phenomenon. But I don’t think its many and glaring flaws make it without merit even when it’s played straight (ha!).

BO2 introduced a lot of really interesting ideas: the Seer as a half Hylden, half Vampire who was apparently neutral in the conflict and has a History with Vorador; the concept of the Eternal Prison; moral questions of siding with apex predators under crushing Victorian style capitalism; interest in one’s own people versus the good of the world; and so on. The problem is that every single idea was handled in the stupidest way possible and I hate it because it could have been good, dammit.

But for anyone reading this who wants to appreciate BO2, here’s a few ways to engage with it to get a better experience out of it:

Find a decent LP. Don’t play it yourself and it’s already 100% less awful because you’re not dealing with the bloody never ending fights

Wait a few months before thinking about it and you’ll have forgotten some of the hours of padding and the most painful writing choices

Follow Luke’s example and read it as satire of parody

Work under the assumption that every vampire you meet is one of Kain’s exes

Like my uncle, refuse to believe that this is anything but a PS1 game ans suddenly it’s not so miserably ugly

Experience it through the lens of your favourite controlled substance

Just listen to us talk about it and never play it for yourself. You might end up more confused, but the game you make in your head will probably be more fun

Blood Omen 2 Review

Hey everyone!

I know it's been a while since my last post, but Taonpest and I were busy finishing our Legacy of Kain Marathon with Blood Omen 2. And I've beaten Blood Omen 2, hell, I've COMPLETED IT by drinking every single character's blood and opening every chest from every chapter! And to anyone who wants to make a LoK marathon, do yourself a favor and skip this game. There's nothing for it.

When I started playing BO2, I thought it was fine. I thought it was one of the most basic action game you would find on PS2 and I was fine with this. But that impression of low-budget yearly action game soon dissipated and became motoneous, frustrating and overall boring. Just to make things clear, I played the PS2 version of the game which is apparently considered the worst port of that game. And you wouldn't know how overjoyed I was when I read that.

One thing that strikes the eye is the graphics. They're okay for a 2002 PS2 game, but, the atmosphere, the aesthetic. There's nothing LoK about it. I know it's technically supposed to be a transition between Blood Omen and Soul Reaver, but to me, it looked more like a WarHammer Fantasy look-alike. The characters are...what they are. Kain and his massive man-tits looks pretty okay, but Vorador looks like an estranged cousin of Shrek who decided to live in the sewers instead of the swamps. Janos looks good. Another thing that sort of annoyed me were the FMV cutscenes. Soul Reaver and its sequel had beautiful FMVs that set the tone of the game and hyped you up. Unlike Soul Reaver, BO2's FMVs were made with the in-game models which makes some shots absolutely ridiculous. Once again, I like to think this is a budget stuff that happened.

Then, there's the actual game and story. Gee, I wonder what the plot could be this time. Oh? It's another revenge story, what a surprise. No surprise here, the story is not only barely existant, but somehow, even the dialogues are actually terrible. All that poesy and Shakespearian-talk from the previous entries? Gone. And it tries so hard to be serious that it's actually hilarious.

The actual gameplay can go fuck itself. The fighting mechanics especially are the biggest pain in the ass. It's clunky and unresponsive and most annoying of all repeating way too much. Every single fight (with the exception of some bosses) are down to the exact same method. You parry 3 to 5 attacks, dodge, attack, knock your enemy down, wait for him to recover, rince and repeat. So imagine spending hours doing the exact same thing with boring puzzles and frustrating platform sequences. I did like the Eternal Prison however with its claustrophobic approach that kinda reminded me of Resident Evil. And then Magnus came in, and what could have lead to a Nemesis-like encounter just fell flat because the AI in this game is as dumb as a brick, which means there are no actual consequences for you to mess around with Magnus. This leads to the boss fights, and if you've played any Legacy of Kain game then you won't be surprised when I tell you that they suck. If Soul Reaver's bosses are on the same level as Crash Bandicoot then Blood Omen 2 is Wrath of Cortex. They are that bad.

I guess I should also mention the sound. Just so you know we played the game in French. Jean Barney and Benoît Allemane reprised their respective roles from the previous Soul Reaver installments (Vorador and Janos for Barney and Kain for Allemane) and it's great to hear them again. We also get VAs new to the franchise like the amazing Phillipe Dumond (voice-over actor of Keith David in French) as the Sarafan Lord and basicaly almost every male NPC from the game.

Unlike SR1 & 2 however, I thought the French Dub to be very hit or miss, making the poor dialogue looking even more dumber than it already is. I like to think this because of direction issues (voice acting for video games in France is very different than in the U.S or Japan) because you couldn't sound as deadpan and monotone as Uma. Maybe this is an adaptation choice? I don't know, but this makes her death scene almost funny to watch. Allemane is playing his dialogue in his usual Kain-fashion (though slightly less "jovial") but some of his lines sound wrong. And then, there is the actor that actually outshines Benoît Allemane: Phillipe Dumond. This man is 90% of the game's dialogue and each time, he delivers especially as the Sarafan Lord. There's also something weird around the end of the game where Vorador changes voice actors in the same cutscene or even mid-sentence. I think the voice-acting for this game was rushed.

That's all I'll say about Blood Omen 2. This game made me feel empty. It actually made me wish I played games I don't like because I think the problem comes from me and not the games themselves.

Blood Omen 2 is a 3/10/. Stay out of its net, brethrens.

P.S: I wish I could stream games, but I don't have the setting nor the actual physical place to do it.

#bo2 #chit chat #meta #bo2 my beloved detested

19 notes · View notes

fullmoondagger · 3 years ago

Text

I’m so sorry but I am legally obligated to defend this game with my life;

Blood Omen 2 is good actually! :-)

Disclaimer I know its your opinion, I am writing this in the most playful and light hearted way possible, I just really like BO2 for some deranged reason :>

First of all I think you completely missed the comical potential of the game, from its bugs, its miserable dialogue and the more than absurd story. I think it’s a necessary instalment of the Legacy of Kain series for these reasons exactly.

I played BO2 on PC between Soul Reaver 2 and Defiance because I needed a break from getting my heart blended into mush and BO2 was VERY welcome at that time. I had no idea what to expect going and I fell in love with the more modern setting, the characters (as wrongly written as they were) and the story completely against my will.

Just like it’s hilarious and refreshing to see Link in the dreaded Faces of Evil, or hear Mario and Luigi’s iconic dialogues in Mario Hotel (there are several similarities between these and BO2 in terms of voice acting/french translation I’ll bring up later), Blood Omen 2 generously gifts us with our favorite characters in a very new, low budget and almost parody-like setting.

Parody?, you may repeat in your head. You read me right :) I don’t think the devs took themselves too seriously to begin with, nor were given the means to create a game that would have been “up to the LoK standards”, and I don’t think they would have been able to anyways. First of all they didn’t have Amy Hennig, the writer and director in (part of Blood Omen? I think) both Soul Reavers and Defiance(my detested) in their team, so you can throw the good characters and writing out the window, and they were a completely different team than Soul Reaver, as BO2 was developped alongside both SR titles. And honestly the stupidly edgy names/setting/designs, that cut from the final game line of dialogue that i cant stop thinking about that i cant link directly but its the second one, how everything is so cliché and Off, the comically long blood draining moments in the late parts of the game may not be intentional but it does give me the vibe of. We’re making a game but lets not take it too seriously and just make something that may not be good but at least funny, and honestly thats delicious.

Yes the game is kinda ugly! Embrace it! Adore it! The four fingered toothless humans still haunt me and give me shivers of disgust everytime I see one in game (currently replaying it for the third time), and Vorador is. Well. Yea. And I don’t think a single piece of furniture is at the right scale nor in a logical place, and it makes everything so much more fascinating honestly.

I agree with you that the gameplay was not stellar, boring at times, but I’m honestly more into slow paced easy to manipulate games and I sincerely find BO2 Kain easier to operate than any of the boys in Defiance. (Might just be me) and the AI is fun to exploit and figure out. I do wish the abilities you gain through the game were more useful, sneaking around in the mist is lots of fun.

OK now. the Voice acting.

Both in english and french we were lucky to get the same voice actors as the rest of the series which is INSANE and awesome. You get to hear the real voices saying the stupidest, absurdest lines, and even badly translated in french! Just like in Hotel Mario my beloved. I think the bad translations at times bring out la french touch (Markousse.... God I won’t ever get over this. Markousse and Boswor solidarity) which makes things infinitely funnier, esp when Taon told me that mister Allemane also dubbed King Harkinian in the Zelda CDI games. It gives BO2 a youtube poop vibe against its will and i think thats amazing. All three of these games are shamed and mocked and made fun of and I think that’s neat :) Makes for good comparisons.

Umah’s death scene is VERY fascinating to me because it’s like. It’s horror. You have the kick in the nuts of Umah dying for no reason, Kain behaving like a fucking toddler in a scene that IS emotional but its so BAD that I couldn’t stop laughing like a hyena and I felt HORRIBLE and DEVASTATED while pissing myself laughing and I think that was BRILLIANT, as unintentional as it might have been.

The whole game was rushed, had the budget of a roll of tape, five wrinkled pieces of printer paper and two(2) crayola markers in the color of your choice and that’s what makes it so special to me :)

Conclusion: I don’t think BO2 is necessary to play to fully understand the bigger story LoK offers, but if you wanna have a good laugh and enjoy sweet time w friends while visiting characters you know and love in a VERY different light, I think it’s simply delightful (when it doesn’t crash so bad it makes me have to shut my laptop off) and a good way to spend time :)