The Last of Us--What is the measure of a zombie?

With the success of the The Walking Dead (both the show and Image comic book), and video games like Left 4 Dead (and Call of Duty!  Even Call of Duty has to have zombies now!) we are in a Zombie Renaissance.  Naughty Dog's The Last of Us does it a little differently however. 

The story starts off in Texas in the year 2013.  It's the lead character Joel's birthday and his 12-year-old daughter presents him with a watch as a gift.  When he ask her where she got the money for such a present she facetiously responds, "Drugs, I sell hardcore drugs."   These are the two main things the player will come to expect from The Last of Us, realistic, human interactions, and smart-ass teenagers.

Of course as any savvy player who paid attention to the promotional material before the release of The Last of Us might have noticed, we didn't see this character Sarah--which means of course, Sarah was destined to die early on.  Not ten minutes into the disease-ridden apocalypse, Joel, his brother Tommy, and Sarah are running through the streets of Austin when they're stopped by a soldier wielding an assault rifle.  Radio orders tell him to execute the fleeing group in case they are infected.  Bullets are fired, Joel survives, Tommy takes out the military man, but unfortunately little Sarah does not make it in one of the most traumatic openings to a video game ever. 

What is the definition of a zombie?  In the original context, zombies were a part of the Haitian tradition--magically resurrected dead who followed the commands of a voodoo master.  The modern day zombie has been redefined thanks to George Romero and his film Night of the Living Dead in which the mindless hordes of walking corpses were controlled by nothing but their hunger for living flesh.

 The infected humans that appear in The Last of Us are technically not zombies as they are not undead--though they function in similar ways.  One must be alive to become infected by the fungus that causes the disease--and oh what a fungus it is.

The Infected--like zombies, but less handsome.
The Last of Us

Because Mother Nature has a love-hate relationship with all living things she decided to handcraft cordyceps, a bizarre fungus that enters inside various insects, causes them to behave sporadically (pun!), until the bug dies and the fungus grows throughout them.  Worse yet is the corpse burst into spores infecting other insects around it.




"So I was just hoppin' along when...aaaaah! Aaaaah!  What is this John Carpenter horror growing from within me!?"      

In reality cordyceps have no affect on humans--but being as twisted as Mother Nature herself--Naughty Dog's developers thought the concept of such a fungus that infects humans would make for a great video game.  Instead of killing humans however it keeps them in that crazed sporadic state as their skulls and bodies mutate over time.

The Last of Us takes a unique approach to the zombie/zombie-esque apocalypse in a few ways. 

• While the first few minutes of the game take place in 2013, the majority of the story is set in 2033, it is rare to get a glimpse into an end of days infection scenario.  Typically such stories follow the origins of the outbreak.  In this story however it is fascinating to see how humans live with the outbreak in the long run.  We see a young Joel briefly as a gentle architect who loves his daughter, then we flash-forward to a brutal grizzled Joel who is now a smuggler.

• The government has not collapsed completely as it usually does in end of the world scenarios.  They're still around, in a way they have more power than ever.  They now enforce draconian rules to keep the healthy folks within quarantine zones, and the infected on the outside.

• Similarly to The Walking Dead and 28 Days Later (which features zombie-esque creatures infected by the Rage Virus) at the end of the day, the biggest threat isn't the roaming monsters, it's competing against violent human beings for survival.  This is implemented into the gameplay as you must switch between quietly sneaking past The Infected, and having shoot-outs with bandits (referred to as hunters) who want to rob you of everything you've got...including your life.

Luckily for the player, Joel happens to be a very violent human being, if he wasn't he wouldn't have come this far.  His latest smuggling job is to protect and escort Ellie--a teenage girl with an adorable potty-mouth-- who is mysteriously immune to the cordycep virus.

Joel is a people person.
The Last of Us

It's a cross-country journey to get to a medical facility run by an anti-government group known as The Fireflies.  It is through Ellie that they hope to find a cure for the infection that will save humankind.  The experience is full of emotion, Joel is very gruff, and cold toward Ellie initially.  He's become a man who's shielded himself from emotion.  Worse yet, now he has to spend time with a teenage girl who reminds him of what he's lost.

There is a clever correlation between the storyline and in-game combat.  The closer Joel and Ellie become, the more she is willing to do for her grouchy friend in a scrap.  For example if Joel finds himself struggling in a fight with a Hunter, Ellie might sneak-up and use that pocket knife she's always carrying to stab the bad guy in his side.  When their relationship grows even stronger, she might hop on top of that baddie and stab him to death like a little murder-monkey. 

Through this gruesome expedition you'll be willing to commit all kinds of crazy acts of violence for this girl who feels more and more like a surrogate daughter--and when Joel finally refers to her as "baby girl" like he did to Sarah 20 years ago, it's hard not to go misty-eyed.

     

No More Heroes--The Circle of Death pt.2--this game is for the Wii?

A motley crew of sociopaths

                                   


With its adult themes, No More Heroes debuting on the Nintendo Wii was an unusual choice giving the system's reputation for "kiddie" games.  Not to mention that it was created by a kooky director who typically wants to push video games in a more artistic direction.  From the start of the game Travis Touchdown says, "I know a lot of gamers out there who don't have much patience, 'least that's what Bishop the dude at the video store said."  The player is pushed into the bizarre plot at a breakneck speed.

We continue with assassin #4 Harvey Moiseiwitsch Volodarrskii who is a stage magician that resembles a certain Mindfreak!  Here Harvey presents violence as a theatrical form of entertainment, throwing knives into his lovely assistants during his performance.  Eventually he calls Travis to come up as a volunteer--not surprising since he's one of the only two people in the audience (the second being Sylvia Christel whom Travis is still hoping to score with). 

Harvey tells Travis Touchdown that he must owe his spectacular name to his parents.  "My parents are dead," Travis replies as he grins at the non-existent audience before him.  This is the first insight into Travis's backstory.   

The 3rd ranked match features the misandrous old woman known as Speed Buster.  The phallic imagery is through the roof here as her weapon of choice is an extremely elongated cannon which has a base that resembles a rooster's head.  Cock-a-doodle-doo!


Despite being a few blocks away from his target--Travis manages to close the gap and castrate the cannon--making up for the missed opportunity he has against prior assassin Letz Shake.  He approaches the now defenseless Speed Buster who has changed her harsh tone--Travis she deems a worthy man.  She kisses him on the cheek and wishes him farewell before he lops her head off.  It is a grisly form of character development as it is Travis's first time killing a female assassin.  Sylvia shows up to admire the decapitation stating in her French accent, "It is really cool how they all die," a jab at how we as gamers (and media consumers in general) have a thirst for blood when it comes to entertainment.


Ranked match #2 is the most bizarre encounter in the game.

--and that says a lot in a Suda 51 production

                                              

We meet Bad Girl in the basement of a baseball stadium beating bound men to death with a bat in some scary BDSM ritual.  Even Travis is puzzled by her sadistic behavior.  "You have no right to look at me like that!" she shouts at him as she sits on her couch--legs spread and panties clearly visible.  Is she talking to Travis or the player?

Travis Touchdown: You're no assassin, you're just a perverted killing maniac.

Bad Girl: In essence they're the same--don't go on thinking you're better than me.

Travis is disgusted with Bad Girl's actions.  Perhaps his character is developing...or maybe he's just a hypocrite who can't recognize the atrocities of his own ruthless behavior.


Finally Travis reaches #1.  In a desert he is approached by a man in black, cape blowing in the wind, dark helmet over his face.  This is Dark Star, and he claims to be Travis's father.

Also worth mentioning, he wields the biggest beam sword in the game.

Dark Star's false paternal claim causes Travis to search his memories for a moment and he thinks back to the day his real parents were killed. Our "hero" seems to have had a bit of amnesia.  He suddenly recalls that he didn't enlist in this string of death matches to be number one, he did it in hopes of finding the assassin who killed his family.  In his mental flashback, behind his parents' corpses stands a bloody blonde woman. 

Before Dark Star can make a move, a fist breaks through his chest killing him instantly.  The killer fist belongs to the blonde from Travis's nightmarish memories--Jeane, the girl who murdered his family.  But why?  Travis wants to know who she is and why she offed his mom and dad when he was younger.  She refuses at first claiming the story alone would raise the age rating for this video game even higher.

Travis tells her he'll fast forward through her story--sparing we gamers from its contents (remember earlier he claimed that gamers have no patience for this kind of thing).  Jeane's story is a tragic one--turns out she's Travis's half-sister, she was regularly molested by their father (who's indiscretions with Travis's mother drove Jeane's own mom to suicide), and eventually sold her body into prostitution--all before becoming the toughest assassin on the planet.  These are very serious plot points in the story, by having Travis fast forward through them, Suda 51 is challenging the player--are we really ready for mature story lines in video games? Sure we can handle the gore, the swearing, the half-naked chicks, but can we develop beyond this into deeper thematic elements?

As the fight begins between Travis and Jeane, the energy from the deceased Dark Star's sword sprouts an energy dragon which forms a circle from head to tail around the fighters. This is reminiscent of the ouroboros, the ancient symbol of the serpent eating its own tail expressing the cyclical nature of life.  Suddenly Dr. Peace's quote comes back to haunt us,

  The Ouroboros--The cyclical serpent--the dragon of destiny--looks hip on t-shirts

                     

  "The words reservations only apply only to those outside the circle--it's getting into that circle that matters."  Congratulations Travis you made it into this circle of death--you'll never need reservations again.  Notably, the circle shrinks tighter and tighter as the fight against Jeane continues.

Of course Travis comes out on top vanquishes his sister and retires happily as assassin #1...except for the fact that, that Henry bastard is still out there waiting to lock horns with Travis.  Before the game can end the player is forced to confront Henry in a final battle right outside the protagonist's motel room.  Here the villain reveals himself to be Travis's twin brother much to the main characters confusion.

Also Henry turns out to be Sylvia's husband.  Travis won't be sleeping with her anytime soon

  He responds, "Why would you bring up something like that at the last minute of the game?"

So in the past few minutes we learn that Travis has parents who were murdered, a half-sister, a twin brother--the plot is getting crazier by the moment but there's no end to the story in sight--our protagonist can't see his way out.  Like the hell bound cast in Sartre's No Exit, or Patrick Bateman at the end of American Psycho, there is no way out of this damn thing.

 Travis concludes "I want to bail but where the hell's the exit?  There's no way out is there?...Then let's find that exit they call Paradise."   Hey--Death Metal warned him.

No More Heroes--The Circle of Death pt.1

"I feel as if I'm looking at my future self. Mega bucks, big-ass house, fast cars, dining in style with a world class chef and a trusted nutritionist counting every calorie!"  Travis Touchdown's manic inner monologue races through his head as he battles rival assassin Death Metal.

    The plot to No More Heroes is intentionally simple.  Travis Touchdown is a broke otaku who manages to purchase a beam katana (with a very unorthodox recharge mechanic) on some internet auction site.  Naturally he decides to become an assassin and enters a series of ranked matches for depraved killers, sponsored by the United Assassins Association.  Starting at number 11, Travis wants to kill his way to number 1.  Oh--also if he succeeds to make it to first place, Sylvia Christel, a representative of the UAA, promises to sleep with him...probably...maybe--you know there's a crude name for the kind of person Sylvia is.

And I only have to kill 10 people for her?  Worth it!

In his battle with assassin #10, Travis sees the man he wants to be.  The tattooed Death Metal has got the mansion, the women, the money--he even has a bigger beam sword than Travis's.

Sometimes a beam sword is just a beam sword...but not in Travis's case.

   The moment Travis approaches Death Metal in his sweet villa, the seasoned killer gives him a warning.  While the younger one looks about his surroundings and believes this beach side home must be paradise, Death Metal corrects him, "This is no paradise," it's actually, "a place to die."
 
   After a well fought duel, Travis manages to lop off Heavy Metal's arms and just before decapitating him shouts "Here's your ticket to paradise old man!"


   #9 on this hit list is a gun tottin' corrupt detective (who has a striking resemblance to Charles Bronson) named Dr. Peace.  


   Peace starts an unexpected conversation with Travis about a meal he had last night at a fancy
restaurant--you know one of those kinds that are really hard to get into.  Dr. Peace explains,
"What's important is not the fact the reservations are hard to get, in fact no one gets reservations.  The words reservations only apply only to those outside the circle--it's getting into that circle that matters."

   And there's the important line to remember for later "it's getting into that circle that matters."  After a bloody battle in a baseball stadium of blade vs. bullets, Travis manages to finish off Dr. Peace by slashing open his abdomen.  Taunting his dying opponent he says "It's open mic night in hell old man, sing all you want down there."  For the record that's one assassin he sends to paradise, and another he's sending to hell.  Little does our hero know, the path he's on will lead him to a place that is neither Heaven nor Hell. 


   Through his matches we learn a little bit about Travis.  Though he may be callow and stupid, he does have his own honor code.  He has a tendency to spare his female combatants--a problem considering 5 out of 10 of his opponents are women.  He spares the young girl Shinobu (#8) claiming it's due to her inexperience--though later we'll learn better.


  #7 is a hilarious (and pathetic) deconstruction of the superhero concept named Destroyman.  His dual identity, mild mannered mailman one moment--psychotic superhero the next, appears to be a mockery of what video gamers themselves experience.  As gamers we're always taking on personas of heroes and badassess who live lives we can only dream of.

  During the fight Destroyman's tough guy persona is soon seen to be a facade, he's just as wimpy as he was in his mail carrier uniform as he begs for mercy.  It's all too appropriate symbolism when Travis bisects the coward with his beam katana.

   Just look at that uniform--he got what he deserved

During his match with #6, Holly Summers an interesting line of dialogue occurs between the lead and the female assassin he's fighting.

Holly Summers: Death is the only truth. You are still a mere bud.

Travis Touchdown: That's not a good thing you know, seeking meaning in everything, especially killing.  That's a bad habit among smart little girls these days.

 Feels like a direct challenge to the player's sensibilities doesn't it?  Is the game's creator, Suda 51, questioning our values when it comes to media consumption?


   For the most part Travis makes his way through the ranked assassins without a hitch until he gets to #5, Letz Shake and his giant robot which resembles a large...well you can figure it out I'm sure.  Before the otaku can even take a swing at the robot and its master, a man comes flying down from the sky with his own beam sword and slices Letz Shake and his phallic machine in half. 

The intruder goes by Henry and he is every gamer's worst nightmare.  By slicing Travis's target in half he has castrated him.  Worse yet, before Touchdown gets to counter with an attack, Henry has vanished--but don't worry he'll be back.    



to be continued...

Bioshock Infinite: Weird Science, Creepy-Cool Twins, and Parallel Universes

"The lord forgives everything, but I'm just a prophet so I don't have to." When the mad cult leader Zachary Comstock booms this phrase to the player in his introduction, they know they've come to a bad place.

  The year is 1912 and you are former Pinkerton detective turned private eye, Booker DeWitt.  His current employers give him a mission with a reward far too tempting to turn down.  He is to go to the segregated city of Columbia, a fantastical land in the sky that literally took off into the air seceding from The United States after The Civil War. This all occurred under the watchful eye of the prophet Father Comstock. 

“Bring us the girl, and wipe away the debt” is the mysterious phrase Booker hears over and over.  If he goes to Columbia and rescues an imprisoned girl named Elizabeth from the clutches of Comstock and returns her safely to New York, his immense gambling debt will be cleared.

  The moment DeWitt arrives to the city in the sky we immediately know things aren’t going to be that simple.  The city itself is a jingoistic society filled with classism, racism,... pretty much any negative-isms you can imagine.  On top of that, the captive victim herself, Elizabeth, who we learn is being observed and experimented on like a guinea pig, has the ability to create “tears” or small portals into alternate universes. 

Multiple dimensions and endless possibilities play a pivotal role in the game, hence the title Bioshock Infinite.  The idea that in reality we exist in one universe among many is not one that is completely implausible.  It may be possible to learn someday whether alternate dimensions exist thanks to the Large Hadron Collider.

                          The Hadron Collider waits patiently underground contemplating whether to enlighten humankind...or destroy it.

Early on in Columbia, we meet a pair of bizarre characters, the Lutece twins, Rosalind and Robert (though really I should be putting “twins” in sarcastic quotes).  Crucial to the plot, Rosalind’s scientific research into quantum levitation are what allow the city of Columbia to float in the sky.  Not twins in the true sense, during her experiments into the multiverse, Rosalind found another version of herself…only this version was born with a Y chromosome and went by the name Robert.  They decide to live together in the same universe as siblings. 

  As proper physicist, they even give their own gory take on the thought experiment Schrödinger's cat.

Or less gory when compared to Einstein’s gunpowder version.

                                              That sick, sick bastard...

"Bring us the girl, and wipe away the debt."  In Bioshock Infinite there is always something bigger happening beneath the surface. Elizabeth isn't just a kidnapped victim, Booker DeWitt is more than a washed-up Pinkerton detective, and that"debt" he wants wiped away goes far deeper than gambling.

Check out the official site here: http://www.bioshockinfinite.com/home