Saturday 31 December 2016

Three from 2016

In all honesty, 2016 has been a bit of a shitshow. You don't need much knowledge of me to work out why. But maybe the underlying air of depression pervading through the year has made the nicer moments nicer still. Or maybe they didn't need to be as nice to be considered nice. I can't be sure right now, but there were some very bright spots in the year too. With all that happened, it kind of fell to nostalgia and the feeling of Japan to lift the spirits. 3 moments of joy that I can remember from 2016:

Game: Rez Infinite
In 2001 Rez was released. In 2016, it was finally realised.
http://walletsandswords.blogspot.com/2016/10/rez-infinite.html
I spent much of the tail end of 2016 thinking "I should be in Rez right now, not here". A reality that was both virtual and unmistakably of a different world than the one we inhabit. Nothing was close to Rez in the year, nothing at all.

Film: Your Name
Your Name was released quite late in the year which may affect how I feel about it but it is also one of the very few films that I have paid to see at the cinema more than once (I believe the last was Black Swan) which must mean it meant something to me.
http://walletsandswords.blogspot.com/2016/12/your-name-kimi-no-na-wa-2016.html
It is an object lesson in how to bring the texture of Japan to the screen and that was enough for me. A cleaned up, lush version of reality was kind of a nice thing to see.
I guess Victoria was the only other film in contention as it was such an intoxicating mix of the ingredients of Berlin.

Misc: September in Japan
My trip to Japan in September was very much an exercise in nostalgia as I joyously met up with quite a few old friends and it was very nice to do so.  It was pleasant not just because my friends are lovely but it also reminded me of a time when I was a little bit more lovely myself. It was a strangely comfortable trip - a familiarity and comfort that made me feel a little uncomfortable upon landing in Osaka.
The use of a brilliant JR West Rail Pass made it a trip of rediscovering some of my less well-known parts of the country and allowed a lot of train travel which was a constant of joy.
The second was April 14th which now seems like such a long time ago, but I can't forget the unforgettable. The last few moments of the Liverpool vs Borussia Dortmund game were sensational in the Kop where I was lucky enough to be. Liverpool may not have won the Europa League that season, but they reminded me of why I fell in love with football and the second half of that game had an atmosphere that I can't put into words. The spine-tingling renditions of YNWA to start and end the game made it even more memorable.

Thursday 15 December 2016

The Last Guardian / Hitokui no Ōwashi Trico (人喰いの大鷲トリコ)

Games are generally about you making characters move but there are some, like The Last Guardian, that aim to flip that statement to make the characters move you. Fumito Ueda has, remarkably, made only three videogames inclusive of his latest, yet he is fairly recognised as a special talent. 

To say that The Last Guardian has been delayed may be an understatement in gaming terms and it started active development in 2007[1], a little after the Playstation 3 was released. Games can take a long time to make, this is true, and gargantuan games such as GTA 5 will take 3 years or so of active development but these are truly massive worlds that are created. Niche, more artistic games with little likelihood of breakout success do not take this long - and the time is much harder to justify when the revenue is not likely to be blockbuster level[2]. And to understand why people have been eagerly waiting for The Last Guardian, what Ueda's earlier games Ico and Shadow Of The Colossus (both available in remastered form on both PS3 and the lesser known Playstation Now service) were needs to be explained, at least briefly. 
Ico is a puzzle platformer with a single interesting mechanic that transforms it into a classic. You play as a child escaping a crumbling castle but also helping another prisoner within the castle - a slightly older, but still young, princess with whom you cannot talk to. The princess is scared and quite weak - as are you but as this is relative, you must protect her from the black, smudgy demons and the environment to escape together. The interesting mechanic of helping others is effected using your hands and so, by taking her hand, you are connected in a way that speech cannot do. It is a remarkably affecting dynamic and the slight tug of the princess, Yorda, is superbly realised in a way that was incomparable at the time. A game unlike games for gamers that only gamers knew about. In 2001, this did not necessarily great spell commercial success although it was critically acclaimed.

A few years later came the semi-connected Shadow of The Colossus which was unmistakably of the same stable. With a little more marketing, this was a more successful game commercially and also critically which revolved around a mechanic of defeating 16 large monsters in a variety of ways in order to try to save a young lady. Again, you were not alone and this time your companion was a horse, named Agro, that would help you travel the vast distances more quickly. In many ways, this was a more traditional game with combat and a defined level structure but it soon created a mythology around it based on the beautifully realised art direction.
Both of these games tried to create emotional connections within the player that were not usually explored within the industry at the time and so have left lasting impressions on many of those fortunate enough to have played them. It does also mean that, if you didn't get that connection, Ueda’s games could be seen as empty and trite -  a camp which a proportion of players will always fall into.

And so, to The Last Guardian -  another game that is standalone yet imbued with the worlds of Ico and Shadow of The Colossus through the whole piece. The game starts with the protagonist, a small boy, passed out next to a rather dangerous looking beast - a beast called (or the species is) “Trico”[3] that looks hurt and angry. Coming near it does not please it yet there are spears jabbed into it that look like they need removing. How could you gain the trust of the beast, to help it? At this point, I think the fact that the protagonist is a small child makes much more sense as children do generally believe in the goodness of animals so he goes off to find food for the beast. The beast’s food, in a nod to the fact it is a game, comes in the form of silver barrels of which there are a few dotted around. Once the beast is sated and released, the journey can begin as the two of you build a bond over time and attempt to escape from wherever you are together, as a team. Trico is still wary of you and so you must continue to build trust with food and kindness (as with Agro in SOTC, you can calm Trico with a pet or a stroke) as you journey on.

The gameplay is simple and reminiscent of Ico with the puzzles fairly simple combinations of doors and levers but spiced up with a huge catlike chicken thing that helps and hinders you throughout. The puzzles do have some combat elements sometimes but Trico is a beast by action and name and will deal with foes violently and with genuine anger when they cross his path - it is your role to ensure that they do get seen by Trico. The enemies make Trico go berserk[4] and point to a historic reason for that level of rage and apparent revenge. Ico is a template for this game due to it falling into the same genre but it could be seen as a flipped arrangement with you playing the princess role and Trico the protector. Watching Trico defending you is a sight to behold and in an entertainment form which places such importance on agency, it is interesting to lose that at points to let something else be awesome. You do have to be careful at these stages too, as he can also lash out a little too indiscriminately.
The game continues in this vein (as usual, I will not be too specific about the journey) as you attempt to escape from the ruins in which you find yourself but much of the formula for the next 10-15 hours is set within the first few minutes which evolves over time as your bond with Trico adapts and changes. 

In a way, after just 3 games, it is interesting that Ueda has such a coherent style that is easy to replicate yet is not replicated by others. The bloom, over-saturated lighting and solitude seems so simple to create but it is not done by anyone else. The Last Guardian is a game and should be judged on that basis but it is not really like other games. The industry has moved on hugely from the point where Ico was a breath of truly fresh air to an industry of indies that attempt to capture much of the ethos. Ico fleshed out a skeleton of a fairly simple set of gameplay mechanics with an atmosphere that felt markedly different to the competition. It wasn't particularly hard and aimed to funnel you through a batch of puzzles that would make you wonder for only a short while. In retrospect, it was a 3rd person "walking simulator"[5] before it became a genre. The change in the industry that makes the game both standout and, maybe, leaves it flailing, is the cottage industry of atmospheric games. In 2001 and 2005, there was a single proper price point for games - full price (and discounted as they got older). That necessitates a certain weight to your game with many seeing a nice, solid experience as needing fifteen hours. The walking simulators and indie games that often seem to get good coverage are often far shorter. 3-5 hours is a good length for this which means that you have a tight experience with no real need to expand the mechanic too much. The question is whether TLG can really justify itself on these terms.
I enjoyed The Last Guardian tremendously but I cannot be sure how much of that was just a desire to enjoy it after so long and just having the opportunity to enjoy a game without cynicism. The start, which is in an enclosed space, sets the whole game up very well and the art style is evocative, as Ueda’s work always is, of a faded grandeur that asks as many questions as an environment can do. So much is left to your own interpretation in terms of the architecture and design that it will doubtless be pored over by fans for years to come. Trico is a charming creature and the bond between the two of you is expertly crafted and realised with the way that you both help each other. He, or she, is at turns angry or playful or docile or perky. Each Trico is a little different, apparently, depending on how you treat it and so mine was quite obedient as I regularly stopped to care for it. I have read complaints about Trico being frustratingly selfish and stubborn but I am a very caring gamer, so I did not have these issues. The world created is beguiling and welcoming but that is only half of the story - and it is the other half of the gameplay mechanics that may leave some unsatisfied.

Ueda’s games are rooted in the early 2000’s and things which were acceptable then are not as freely accepted now. The most common complaint is that the camera is difficult to control which is not something that I had any difficulty with at all. Most modern games follow a template of control that has been refined of left stick to move and right stick to rotate the camera - and this retained in The Last Guardian. The difference is that it is not as smooth (and this is obviously by design) and quick as in other games using a dreamy, floaty camera that does not always see you central. Your character, as a child, either scampers or tiptoes which has also caused complaint as people expect a different type of control. Most ridiculously, in my opinion, a regular complaint is also that the buttons are not as expected - because the “X” button is not the jump button. I think, due to the way all games seem to be so customizable and so fall into the template of design, this has caused unhappiness but I think this is misplaced. I am used to learning the controls of a game and see no issue with this but I recognise that others might. I had no issues with any of these gameplay mechanics and think they are overblown, but it is worth mentioning[6].
The puzzles are simple enough but I did sit there perplexed for decent stretches of time which is both refreshing and a little frustrating as the puzzles are quite linear. Again, I am happy to not have it all handed to me on a plate so I appreciate that sense of discovery and “eureka” but there is something a little disappointing about the fact there appears to be single solutions. 
Overall, The Last Guardian is definitely a delightful highlight for me with the overall thrust of the game and story easily enough to propel the game through the hiccups in mechanics which are still quite rare. I would recommend to anyone interested as it will either be something that grabs you or it will, at least, be a game that you are not going to replicate.
The Last Guardian is a PS4 exclusive and can be purchased on the Playstation Store or in shops -  the trailer is below:


1. Fairly recently, there have been a number of big Japanese games that have finally seen the light of day after incredibly long development times - metal gear solid V spent x years in development which also resulted in the creator falling out with, and then leaving, his employer Konami. Final Fantasy XV has been in development for the best part of a decade. Last Guardian is published by Sony and was originally designed for the ps3.
2. Global sales on the PS2 for both of his earlier games was about 2m combined).
3. Team Ico have created three games: Ico could be the Japanese word for 1. The project name for SOTC was “Nico” which can translate as two. Trico sort of follows this convention although tri is not the Japanese for 3, the intention is clear.
4. Berserk is also is a Final Fantasy status affliction that makes characters attack constantly without considering other options - highly appropriate here.
5. This has become, almost, an implicit term of criticism for the number of games, such as Everybody's Gone to the Rapture, that eschew much combat for, instead, the joy of traversing an area or building intrigue. As games have become more popular, the market for games has widened but, as in so much of life in 2016, those that had it all their own way before don't seem to like opportunities for other people to do things that they can already do. This is a very interesting article about that..
6. To be honest, a lot of gamers are very vocal about these kinds of things and I think they let themselves dislike things for slight drops in quality.

Saturday 10 December 2016

Capsule Hotel: This is the point (カプセルホテル) [pt 2]

Yesterday's future was where modernity was born and Modernity is about efficiency. This future of yesterday can be seen in the architecture and shapes of the recent past - so aged now but so modern then. 
The space race was a defining element of modernity and the sleek, white shapes of orbiting spacecraft were recreated using sleek, gloss, white plastic to form bulbous shapes in objects around us. Post-war, Japan's most famous technological breakthrough was decidedly ground-based but the Shinkansen did involve travelling at high speeds and bringing modern life to far-reaching places. And it did so being white and sleek, cutting through the air like a bullet. It typified the space age view of optimism and speed. And what could be more in keeping with this drive for efficiency than the hugely effective use of space for sleep? We sleep while lying down… and we sleep with our eyes closed in the dark. Ergo, who needs extra space when sleeping? High vaulted ceilings are an extravagant frippery. Colour schemes and lighting design? Needlessly decadent. This was the future[1].

One surprising thing about capsule hotels is how much everyone seems to know about them whilst simultaneously not having stayed in them. I had never stayed in a capsule until I stopped living in Japan and returned for a visit. I'm not sure that I know more than five people that have stayed in capsule hotels before - probably not even that.

A frustrating element of the nature of Japan is that it all seems so zany when you haven’t been. The things that you hear and see about Japan outside Japan are not usually particularly indicative of the mainstream[2] and the capsule hotel does fit into this trap. The concept of the capsule hotel fills a gap perfectly that it wants to and is aimed squarely at the "missed the last train" crowd. There are perfectly rational and simple reasons for their popularity as they often provide a place to rest before another day at work. Or a cheap place to stay before any type of morning appointment such as a flight or interview.

The factors in play here are:
  • A work culture that expects presenteeism beyond working hours into a drinking culture extending into evenings and nights.
  • An urban sprawl that enables, or allows, people to work quite far from their workplace[3].
  • Poor nighttime public transport contrasting with excellent daytime transport meaning that the chances of getting somewhere easily but not being able to return quite so easily are increased.
  • A vibrant night-time economy with large numbers of 24-hour establishments.
  • High costs of land in city centres.
A capsule hotel has two elements - a capsule and a hotel which represents both the public and the private nature of society. My original description of a capsule hotel is, therefore, a little misleading as it covers just the capsule part. And the capsule part is the zany bit that everyone knows about - the reason I love the capsule hotel is the non-capsule part of it.
Upon entering a capsule hotel[4], there are lockers for your shoes and you then give that locker key to the “front” reception staff. They then give you another key for another locker after you have checked in and paid. This second locker is for all of your belongings and this is where the aim of a capsule hotel is clear as these lockers are often quite small and rarely big enough for a suitcase. I have even stayed in one where the lockers were very thin and could only really hold the clothes that you were wearing. Yes, that’s right, your belongings that go into the locker also include the clothes that you are wearing - you are given a jinbei (effectively a set of pyjamas) for wearing around the hotel. As far as I am aware, this clothing is not optional. This is a remarkable lightening of your load.
Now, you are ready.

There are basically now three places you can go, as a guest, within the hotel: your capsule; the lounge area; the public bath.
My preferred order is public bath - lounge - capsule

Public bathing
The public bath is quite a common element of Japanese culture and is a true joy when done properly. There are many variants of the sento but at its basic level, it is a big hot bath that you soak in, communally. Many places have variations on this theme and so there may be multiple baths of different types but fundamentally, there is an area (often just next to the bathing area) to wash where there are pots and usually showers heads to use to wash yourself in that washing area. Again, usually, there are soaps and shampoos for you to use and often razors, toothbrushes and combs etc. The washing area is very important as you cannot be even marginally dirty when you enter the communal baths so I am personally quite conspicuous in this as I can only assume that other people may think that I would not be used to this. Once that has been done, you are free to soak in any of the baths. If we assume that we are at a more well-equipped one, then there will be baths with different water temperature (hot, cold and many temperatures in between), different chemicals or minerals, water jets and the ever strange electric current. People have their own preferences for which baths to go in and when but I find that the cold baths are a little less popular. One thing that I quite like is a soak in the cold water where I count to 100 and then to the hot water baths to feel the change. I would normally spend an hour or so in the baths but it is entirely variable.

Lounge
After a nice, relaxing soak in the bath, I then go to the lounge area. This is quite a catch-all term as many capsule hotels will have a separate restaurant/izakaya area with a la carte food for snacking or even for more substantial meals. Every single one that I have been to has also had a comic reading area as manga is a cultural phenomenon in Japan. In this instance, lounge really is the appropriate term as it will generally be a group of disparate, but very relaxed men lounging about in pyjamas reading or eating and drinking. In my experience, this has never been a rowdy at all and would often involve little interaction with each other - somewhat like young children playing next to each other before becoming sociable and socially mature.
The nature and amenities of the lounge can differ markedly but I think wi-fi will be fairly common and so many people will be doing the things that people do glued to their mobiles. I have also been to some with separate Internet cafes so even if you do not have a wi-fi enabled device, you can still check on the outside world. There is usually a TV or, in some cases personal recliners with a TV at each seat (and at-seat power) so you can lie back and watch. It really is a very relaxing environment and lying back in a jinbei with nary a care in the world, even if only for a few moments feels like an act of decadence in some ways. A cheap and lovely form of decadence.
Once I am feeling relaxed and ready to retire for the night I will go to the capsule room.

Sleeping quarters
The capsule itself is usually in a fairly large room with capsules along a corridor or a number of corridors. This is what you expect and so it is not particularly surprising – in fact, you have probably seen many pictures of this view and thought it looked a little clinical. As people can go there at any time, there will already be a number of capsules with curtains/blinds drawn and probably many empty ones. The capsules are usually in stacks of two and with the end facing into the corridor so that you go in at the “foot” end. The upper deck may be a little more tricky to enter via the stair-like ladder but it is not so high – you will be in a jimbei though…

Once into the capsule itself, there are usually a number of amenities in there too. Note, that there will not be any toiletries here as they would be in the bathing area so the things in there are usually just the pillow, covers and bedding. Usually, there are also electronics and every capsule I have been in has had a television and alarm controls – with others having PC, radio and other functions (which are often decided at the booking stage). There are not always headphones so often the TV sound will actually come from the speaker of the TV itself but it is not loud and I cannot say I have ever had a problem with hearing other TVs. I have, however, heard other people although not much. Luckily, as this is aimed at the domestic market, most people are pretty considerate when retiring for the night so I have never heard people coming back very late and loud although I can only assume that this does happen. I assume that you may also be able to hear other people snoring or suchlike but I have never noticed it. On that basis, a hotel I stayed in had a nice little extra of noise-cancelling headphones (I think earplugs can be asked for usually, anyway) which I did use.
Usually, people do not stay in capsule hotels to stay in bed (although they can be pretty comfortable depending on options) so there is a lot of movement in the mornings well before check out time and I have also been reminded of check out (remember, capsule hotels are not designed for multiple nights) by a very loud siren so that you are forced out of slumber to check out. It is worth remembering this depending on your plans the next day.

Hopefully, this has provided a little more detail on one of the apparently zany, yet entirely sensible, things about Japan – which is something the world needs more of.


1. Japanese has three alphabets and one is used almost exclusively for foreign, loan words which added sophistication and a certain je ne sais quoi. At a point in time, internationalism was the future and implicitly, katakana represented that international future. Capsule becoming kapuseru becoming カプセル.
2. One of the things that I was asked by many, many people when I went to Japan in 2003 was about the preponderance of vending machines selling dirty pants. Obviously, I had never seen them but I was told it was something in Japan. Looking back, I think it may have been that there was a machine that did this in one of the more interesting nightspots but this is no different to assuming that the kind of thing that happens in Soho in London is indicative of the mores of semi-rural Lincolnshire.
3. In many cases, the worker does not pay the costs to travel to the office but they are borne by the workplace - so the economics of living further away are changed.
4. All capsule hotels are not created equal and there are variations depending on the type of place. The examples I use are the most common and, where specific, this will be from experience at Fukuoka. Capsule hotels come in many forms and I recently stayed in one that was modelled after Business and First class travel in planes. It felt a little more sanitised and suitable for those worried by the appearance of seediness but I cannot say I liked it as much – it probably works for those wanting to give it a sort of go though.

Sunday 4 December 2016

Capsule Hotel: What is the point? (カプセルホテル) [pt 1]

Tokyo nightlife has all the elements of a 24-hour culture except one - transport. The public transport system, largely trains, in Tokyo (and most of the major cities in Japan) are things of wonder with highly effective and quick transit available around most of the individual "cities" that make up Tokyo. An equally interesting facet is the transport utilisation over a day of the trains and that there is really no evening peak[1] as people return from work and socialise fairly evenly over the evenings. I am not sure I ever really noticed the evening rush hour and it continues into the night - but not through to the morning. Many services stop at about midnight (often earlier) making the journey home a little earlier than it would often be in other major cities. The vast scale of the city means that it will often be a long time before you reach home even if you do leave at half eleven. The scale of the city also means that it will often be a hugely expensive last drink if you miss your last train. This makes the last train quite an amazing experience in many ways as I discovered on one of my first nights in the city. But what about if you don't have one of those amazing experiences and miss the last train? Some of the more common sleeping options are:

   (Business) Hotel
There are, of course, many hotels that can be found quite easily and there is even a common class of hotel which are simpler but still quite comfortable with decent service and beds called business hotels.

   Internet Cafe/Manga Kissa
The internet cafe in Japan is often booth based rather than “open” as in most places. Each booth is often quite dark (so you can choose the level of lighting) and separated away so you get your own space. There is often a set of headphones so the whole room is often fairly quiet and the pricing is usually available for quite long chunks of time - including overnight. Drinks are available from vending and on a drink bar basis so you can get refreshment as you want it. At the point of booking, there is usually a choice of seating and this will regularly include a flat reclining seat option. Many Internet cafes will also have a shower room within the cafe too as well as an extensive choice of manga to read too.

   Love Hotel
In many parts of the city, there are a number of Love hotels where you can rent a room for the night or for a “short stay” during the day. As the name suggests, the resting part of the stay is not often the prime reason for a stay here. There is a lot to be said about love hotels but they allow an easy stay in often convenient locations and so are an option whether a couple or not.

   Capsule Hotel
Sometimes, you just need to get some sleep so all you need is a bed and not many amenities so why not pack people into the available space. These will often be very conveniently located near stations and allow sleep in a lying down position - an option not always available at similar prices.

   Karaoke Box
A somewhat counter-intuitive example but there are Karaoke boxes everywhere and they are open late and allow you to book a room that will hopefully be soundproof and have room service. Japanese karaoke rooms are also paid for per person rather than per room so this can be surprisingly cost effective and you would normally get a room which has space to stretch out. The option for a sing isn’t too bad either.

Of these options, I think the one that hits the sweet-spot for me is Capsule Hotel which is a surprise for many -and that many is usually made up of people that don't quite understand why. And in part 2, I'll explain why [link to come later].

1. The morning peak in Tokyo is a thing of legend with begloved station attendants helping pack the high capacity, high-frequency trains that little bit more than would be otherwise possible. If you go, be wary when you see those gloves.

Thursday 1 December 2016

Your Name (君の名は / Kimi no Na wa) (2016)

Makoto Shinkai (of 5 centimeters per second fame) is either a one trick pony or a specialist in his field depending on whether you like what he does. I think he’s a specialist - in evocative visions of longing, hope and small-scale joys.

Your Name is a story somewhat in the vein of body-swapping classics like Big and Freaky Friday. Taki is a schoolboy living in Tokyo getting on by in the way that kids from Tokyo do - mixing school, part-time work and hanging out with friends in an enjoyable cocktail. Mizuha is a schoolgirl from a rural town called Itomori[1] getting on by in the way that kids from rural towns often do - splitting time between school, home and the journey between school and home. And, most importantly, longing to be somewhere more exciting - in this case Tokyo.

The film starts following Mizuha through her day and getting some strange reactions as a result of her odd behaviour on the previous day - which she cannot remember at all. She does, however remember a vivid dream of being a handsome schoolboy in Tokyo. And tracking back to Taki, he has a similar reaction where his friends remember him being a little different the previous day. Eventually, both Mizuha and Taki realise that this is no dream and that they are body swapping - this is really happening - and so start to draw up some rules about how to act within each other’s bodies. The interesting thing about this particular body-swap is that unlike the other films mentioned, there is also a gender swap which is dealt with quite well and with decent comic effect at times. As the film goes on, you can sense the acceptance of each other’s lives and they begin to have a little more fun with it all and these scenes are nice slices of lives as Mizuha shows her desire to leave the small town and Taki getting quite used to the smalltown joys of intimate friendships.
The start of the film, showing the joys of being wide eyed and bushy tailed in Tokyo, is supremely engaging. This may be partially to do with my enjoyment of the city, and my memories of feeling a little similar, but it captures that feeling really well in a way that is a little intoxicating. Shinkai has a staccato editing style which helps this a bit and it makes the film feel dense and full of fun. That excitement at the little details of being in a big city are things that I can definitely relate to and it is nice to see the details of living in a city shown positively rather than being the negatives that are outweighed by the big ticket cool stuff. The artwork is always, consistently exceptional with really warm and clean pictures throughout using a mixture of 3D animation and 2D animation that feels hand drawn and full of character for the duration of the film. Most of the locations are drawn from real life and I always get a little kick out of seeing these drawn depictions of places that I know or little features that I like. I have a real fondness for the way that the front doors of apartments are shown and the little details around sliding doors opening or the sound effects of rural and urban life as they add so much to the life of any given scene. It is these little details that light up the film and I cannot be certain that this will not be specific to me as it felt so natsukashii[2] (nostalgic), but the atmosphere throughout the film felt so alive with the sense of Japan. Or, at least, my sense of Japan. This opening felt so joyous and left me smiling contentedly through the exposition phase of the film that it carried me through to the end. The story itself takes quite a few turns and I would say a few were unexpected for me but there are a few bits which are a little confusing which could lose you. Letting the film wash over you is advised, it comes together at the end and there is a classic Fight Club style decompression "changeover"[3] at some point in the middle.
Shinkai’s stock in trade is long-distance relationships (whether romantic or platonic) and so the way that the relationship grows across the distance of two towns and leads to one looking for the other is the start of the plot. Without going into the plot too much, the science-fiction elements of the story are subtle and do not impinge on the narrative particularly as the body swapping is covered at the beginning. Depictions of school life are two-a-penny in Japan so the fact that it is represented in a fresh way in Your Name is no small achievement although this is less important if you do not watch many Japanese films, of course. These elements, mixed together with the astonishing visuals create a wonderful world for the characters to inhabit which they do with fun and curiosity. I would really recommend this film to almost anybody for so many reasons. It is an easy watch as it is not particularly heavy yet it feels relatively smart and is very accessible as Japanese animation goes as it mixes light comedy in to the story with likeable characters that act quite normally. This is slice-of-life anime with a bit of plot thrown in which feels like a more mature version of Shinkai’s earlier, more textural films.

The trailer is below, and will probably give you all you need to know in terms of the visual style. Do try and watch it.          

1. Itomori is actually a fictional town in Gifu prefecture but appears to be based on the features of a number of different towns around Japan. It is not quite the “everytown” as first depicted as it has some quite exceptional scenery.
2. Forgive me for the use of Japanese, but this is one of those few situations when the foreign word seems to convey that sense better than the translation.
3. It's called a changeover. The movie goes on, and nobody in the audience has any idea.

Sunday 30 October 2016

Rez Infinite

"You shoot, you get sound effects, sound effects become the music, and you feel a trance. You feel good."
Rez is a classic of its type but what that type is can be a hard thing to pin down. Made by Tetsuya Mizuguchi in 2001, it has the slightly strange distinction of being the first game on Sony's PlayStation 2 from Sega and so it could be seen as either the end or the beginning of a brave new chapter. When working on the concept, he felt the aim would be the initial quote[1]:
"I wanted to make a shooter. But not a shooting shooter game. You shoot, you get sound effects, sound effects become the music, and you feel a trance. You feel good. Many people love shooting games. Many people love music. They love going to clubs, screaming, getting high. The power of music is very strong. Maybe this is too abstract, but we want to change something. So we needed a big shock. Anyway, let's start to make this. It's an experiment. I had then a small team, three to four people, some designers and programmers."
And simplistically, this is the case. That is the skeleton of the game but there is some classic Sega arcade-style gameplay to get there too.
The germination process for Rez is interesting and the game itself is supposedly about synaesthesia and is a partial attempt to recreate the effects for people that do not have it. The director, Tetsuya Mizuguchi, has also stated that it is inspired by the work of Russian painter Wassily Kandinsky which brought forward the idea of synaesthesia.

The basic genre at the gameplay level is that it is a corridor shooter - your avatar travels along and must get to the end of the stage whilst being attacked by all and sundry. Shooting is achieved by pressing and releasing the shoot button after targeting and locking on to the enemy. As you can lock on to a maximum of 8 different targets, you can float the target around until you have 8 lock-ons for more destruction. The subtleties of the scoring mechanic means that each shot is worth more points when it is part of a chain of up to eight so it is preferable to shoot 8 things down in one go than separately. This is relatively similar to a number of other on-rail shooters such as Panzer Dragoon and Sin & Punishment. The difference is that the shooting is to the beat of the music so the enemies will all be shot down on the beat (emitting different sounds as they do so), of whichever track is playing - creating a different interpretation of the music. As you progress through a particular stage, you enter different levels by shooting down particular elements in the level which will take you up a level and each level is progressively more complex in both visual and sonic terms. The start of a particular stage will usually be quite sparse until you add on the levels by the end so that it is a more detailed soundtrack and visage by the end of the stage and the boss sections. 
It is a simple game that is more about enjoyment than mastery but at this, it is superb. The game itself is neither too difficult nor, with 5 main stages, too long and the market for these kinds of games was not big. 
I have a lot of fondness for Rez on the PS2[2] yet it did not sell so well for the fact that it was kind of niche. As this was in the era of Sega simultaneously dying yet putting out some of their very best games, it was entirely in keeping with their plight and why gaming was about to get both bigger and more boring in the next few years.

Rez Infinite is a remaster of this old game which has been upgraded in a simple sense by moving to the PS4 with higher resolution presentation. If the models have been altered, it is not noticeably so but the art direction of Rez is not about higher polygon counts and greater detail. As the story is about hacking into a computer system, it is styled in that hacker aesthetic of the late 90's and it holds up today. Mainly because that hacker aesthetic is married with the kind of electronica[3] look that was also prevalent at the time. Rez had already had remastering on the Xbox 360 so what stops this being a waste of time?
The release of Rez Infinite just happens to coincide with the release of PlayStation VR and that headset lets you go into the world of Rez in an immersive sense as never before. Rez encouraged immersion from the very start with the suggestion of using headphones or surround sound at the beginning and even the release of a "Trance Vibrator"[4] that replicated the vibration from the controller. PlayStation VR takes that immersion on a few layers and is a truly excellent recreation of what must have been in Mizuguchi's mind at the time. The synchronous nature of everything happening is captured beautifully within the headset and this idea of being the music is really wonderfully realised. It is as clear and clean a demonstration of "games as art" as I have seen. And really, that should have said "had seen" because it has been bettered now. Time waits for no man and Rez in VR is bettered within moments by Rez Infinite's endgame - an additional stage called Area X.

Area X is an adjunct to Rez with a subtly different outlook leading to a vastly and fundamentally different experience. Where Rez presents an on-rails experience par excellence, Area X takes those rails away and gives you a freedom to swim through the ether. It is a freedom that is difficult to put into words but the way that it is managed is by simply allowing you to thrust forward or float backwards in space at will with direction handled by your head direction. Where Rez allowed one dimension of movement - along the corridor, Area X adds the next two yet retains the atmosphere and feels entirely natural. The feeling of swimming through space is quite beautifully achieved and is exhilarating with its ease and visuals. And this brings us to the second subtle, yet fundamental change - the visuals. Wireframe graphics in Rez became more detailed as layers were added but were made up of clean, clear polygons but Area X switches these out for particle-based models and in many cases, the particles stay as dots floating space allowing you to join the dots. This makes a huge difference to the ethereal sense of the whole of Area X. Again, I am not convinced that words or even pure visuals can do justice to the sense of swimming in that world.
Of course, Rez is about the music as much as anything else and the soundtrack for Area X manages to be different to the main body of the game providing the sense of an epilogue and of the night ending with a trance and vocals combination that works so well that it becomes quite an emotional and even spiritual time in there. The use of sound, visuals and tying that in seamlessly to your own movements is a truly intoxicating and otherworldly experience. 

Rez Infinite is an incredible experience and game and I am not honestly sure that anything will be the same again.


It has, however, made me feel a slight sadness[5] when playing this particular game and that was the thought that this frankly brain altering experience was one that barely anyone I knew would also have. And it would be through choice as this kind of thing, so they have always been encouraged to think, was not for them. It really should be - it is hugely accessible and short. Search it out.

It can be played with or without VR and bought on the PlayStation Store here [link].



1. This is from a very interesting interview with Eurogamer. Mizuguchi has an amazing career, and it is he who gave Sega driving game dominance in the arcades with Sega Rally.
2. It was not quite good/big enough to be my "R" in my A-Z games blog series but was very much thought of and added as another "R" [link]. Ironically, I think Rez Infinite may be the third glimpse of the future where 1 and 2 were from Ridge Racer. I also referenced it as a very pure form of game in my post about Tokyo Jungle [link].
3. The game itself is also apparently named after the Underworld track Rez which has a great video that formed some inspiration.
4. This was a separate item that plugged into the USB on the PS2 and could be strapped to your person to allow the music to vibrate over you in the way that the controller already did. I have one and found that strapping to my back gave a very cohesive experience. It was not a high unit seller but there is a lot of talk about it as a result [link]. 
5. This is on top of the normal annoying sense of sadness that I get and have just termed as Newtonian happiness (due to the equal and opposite reaction) - each moment of joy in life is tempered by the fact and knowledge that it is merely a fleeting respite. 

Tuesday 13 September 2016

Busan

Busan is the second biggest city in South Korea - and that I found out by looking it up. South Korea is not that well-known in the UK and most of my knowledge, as ever, comes from sport and usually football. Luckily, I also know a little about gaming[1] in South Korea but I cannot see how this could be in any way useful. South Korea hosted the first Olympics (Summer, obviously the Winter ones aren’t real) that I can remember in 1988 and also hosted the first ever shared World Cup with Japan in 2002. As a result, the cities of Seoul (Olympic host city) and Daegu (was a city that I could only assume England played in, but actually they did not -it must have had an impressive stadium) are lodged in my mind. As it happens, I do know Busan from holding a film festival (BIFF is an Asia focused film festival) but not much more. A lack of knowledge can usually be overcome with a search for some knowledge so I looked it up. And there it was, amongst other things - Busan is the second biggest city in South Korea and has a ferry service to Japan. Who needs more knowledge than that?

Hong Kong airport is stuck out in the middle of the sea and this allows it to run, without causing problems[2] , as a 24hr airport so I got a flight to Busan departing at 2am and arriving at about 6am. This was going to be the start of a run of early morning starts, as I had planned it, but that is very much my style so I was[3] ready for it.
Busan reminded me a lot of Japan initially although this was probably due to my limited frames of reference. I landed in daylight, which was nice and then took the metro to the hotel. I love getting the metros in new cities but it was not the most convenient of journeys although I was going to a fairly central location - it was very close to Busan station.

Once I got to the hotel to drop my bags off, they told me that I could check in too, which I was very surprised at so early in the morning but I was not going to complain. I dropped my bags in the room and thought I’d have a bit of a lie down for a rest. And then had a bit of a nap - which was not my plan as the nap stretched on a little longer than I wanted. A lot longer and it was afternoon once I was up.
Eventually, the nap was abated and I stepped out. I had noticed that there was a “hop-on” around the city bus service which seemed like a good way of seeing things and getting off to interesting points. I got out a little late so there were not so many buses left to go but I got one (more a coach) and we were driven around.

Busan felt remarkably industrial to me and I was actually a little shocked at the scale of it. The area around the train station was a fairly standard, pedestrianised area but once we got moving on the bus there were mainly big highways for lots of traffic and the scale did not feel particularly human. It was quite overwhelming in a way as it felt like we were on the way to somewhere rather than at a destination itself. In a way, we were on our way somewhere as the bus took us some distance away from the train station over a couple of bridges via the port areas to another part of the city for sightseeing, but was there anything to actually sightsee? Busan has a number of beaches around the city so the first place I stopped was Haeundae Beach to have a little walk along the sandy beach. It was a pretty cloudy day so it was actually quite pleasant to walk but it was also, effectively, a large high-rise area too. I don't really know what to do on beaches so I didn't stay very long and got on another bus to the area around the Museum of Modern Art which I didn't enter but walked around. It wasn't particularly interesting and the scale of Busan really struck me. It really lacked intimacy although some of the sculptures were quite nice. From there, I took the bus to the UN Memorial (to the Korean War) park. This was a pleasant place to walk around and, inside, felt somewhat human in scale but it wasn't particularly memorable.

One of the famous[4] aspects of Busan is that it has a very active port area with good connections to other countries, such as Japan, to allow it to trade easily. Busan has a huge container port but the best thing for me as a tourist that a port like this gives is fish.
Near the sea, Jagalchi Fish Market is a popular spot to have fresh fish so I thought it would be a good place to eat dinner. Heading there at night on foot, it was far quieter than I expected and it seemed that many of the stalls in the covered market were closed. Even so, some were open so I found one and tried to make myself understood. Busan, being so close to Japan, has many Japanese speakers too to cater for the tourists but the elderly staff that were still present were not apparently bilingual. In fact, they kind of gave the air of not necessarily being monolingual either. They were, however, welcoming and tried very hard to explain what they sold and how I should order one of their platters which was reasonably priced and quite tasty. A lot of the fish available was served raw and there was a big hot pot to cook the other bits which the ladies in the restaurant showed me how to use. I was pretty pleased with the meal and would definitely recommend a visit for both the atmosphere of the fish market and the food itself.

The second day was one to enjoy the cityscape and although the weather was not ideal, I wasn't about to spend the day indoors.
A little bit of research suggested the coast might offer a nice walk so I made my way to () which felt like it was designed for a lot of people. I'd guess on sunny weekends that it would be a full and fun kind of place. Maybe it could still be fun when it wasn't sunny. As ever, you always need an exit strategy and I had booked my train out of Busan for the evening to arrive in Seoul at night so I knew my constraints. On my way to this park around the lighthouse, I decided to take the bus as this would be another adventure of sorts but walked part of the way.

The weather did not make it the most pleasant of walks but I walked around the Busan Tower park (Yongdusan Park) nonetheless. It was quiet and there was (potentially) a good view from the park itself but visibility wasn’t great. I wandered around and through BIFF plaza to the bus and then onto the Yeongdo Lighthouse. It was a local bus, and not brilliantly signposted (for me, anyway) so I worked out where to disembark from checking my location on Google Maps.
It was actually really quite empty around the walk to the lighthouse and I saw only a few people. I quite enjoyed that fact for this morning. It was grey, wet and windy but that felt totally appropriate for the area around a lighthouse. It was pretty photogenic, anyway.

I made my way, next, to Gamcheon Cultural Village, a steeply situated “village” within Busan that looked colourful and enticing. Well, in the photos taken in sunshine, anyway. This wasn’t massively far from the area that my bus had returned to so I made my way there. It felt out of the way and as I walked, I got the feeling of a local community that was a bit isolated in spite of proximity and good connections. As it got steeper, it felt like an area that wasn’t the same as Busan. Again, it was not a busy place and it felt a little deserted. It made me wonder if it was on the tourist trail and how different it must be with throngs of people. It was a pretty little place but not enough to take me into the evening so I made my way to Gwangalli Beach before my train to Seoul.

I was never great at managing the flow of time and I spent a little too long at the beach (having lost something there…) doing not much except looking out to the Sea of Japan. That meant I got to my hotel a bit later than I wanted to in order to collect my luggage. I’m not really sure why I do this to myself.

I rushed to the train station in order to get my ticket - I was cutting it very fine and had to run with my luggage which was not the easiest thing to do with asthma. I did make it to the counter and the staff kindly showed me exactly where to go so that I could run straight onto the train - just in time. Well, I thought it was just in time but the train did not start moving as expected. In fact, it stayed there for quite some time and I was very confused. I was so confused that I had my confused face on and so asked a less confused Korean girl why we were stationary. She giggled with her friend and responded that she did not understand me. Then she whipped out her phone (of course she did not, she had it in her hand already like any self-respecting Korean girl) and showed me a map of Korea and said some stuff that I did not understand. She then looked to the theoretically useful Google translate (this is a lot better than it used to be and it is better than Yahoo was in 2003 [link]) but I could not work it out - the pair of them tried - which I appreciated and then another man came and spoke to me in English and explained that there had been an earthquake so the train was not going to move. My confused face became one of concern (it may have retained a little of the confusion too - I think that part of my facial expression was always there) as he explained that the train would not be going to Seoul tonight and that I could try and find another way later. An option, but one that I did not really have so I spoke to another person and they told me that we would be going later - but we had the option of trying to find another way ourselves. I am a big fan of high-speed travel but, once we started moving, I realised that we had been speed limited as a result of the earthquake and we would not be travelling at the expected 300 kph. Seoul is not close and we had departed late so I had no real sense of when we would arrive and what to do when I got there. I knew I would at least be arriving in Seoul’s centre though - surely that would be easy…
I arrived in Seoul at 2am.

1. I do not actually know much about gaming in South Korea but I understand that they have a rabid fanbase for some PC games and there is a market for watching them played at a high level. I am not sure that I have ever, knowingly, played a Korean video game -they are a curio to me in all honesty.
2. The other way of not causing problems, especially in the Middle East, is to not particularly care about the problems caused by the noise of night flights and so ignore them. This is much easier in countries that are not exactly democratic.
3. I wasn’t that ready for it. I was tired and there was only really one way to resolve that.
4. well, you know… better known.




Sunday 11 September 2016

Hong Kong stopover

I think Hong Kong Airport is a marvel of design really - it is so remarkably unremarkable. In transportation, I think there are two schools of thought with the design of airports where it is either a destination in itself or it is merely a staging post and I think Hong Kong airport goes for the latter. This does not mean that it is not architecturally interesting but it just doesn't get in the way - it feels transparent. As I was staying somewhere[1] on the island, I took the train to my quarters to drop my luggage and attempted to make something of the evening. The train station in the airport is very much integrated into the airport exit and so I bought my ticket and made my way. Unremarkable.

Hong Kong island is connected to the mainland in countless ways but the most historic is the Star Ferry which continues to cross even though it is no longer the most convenient way to travel for most. My travels are rarely about convenience but this time, briefly, it would be and I took the MTR across to Kowloon for some dinner and a walk along the main road and to some night markets. I did go to the ferry terminal and make a crossing on the way back to the island though - this was an integral part of the trip.
Hong Kong is unmistakably Chinese but when I first came all those years ago, I laboured under the misapprehension that it would be terribly English around these parts. With a nod to the (recent at the time) colonial past, I had breezily assumed that English would be very easily used and looked forward to being a little more comfortable in getting around than I had been. I was wrong. Repeatedly. As I wandered around Kowloon looking for something to eat, the neon was bright, the people were plentiful and I very much knew that I was in Hong Kong. The Hong Kong of both imagination and memory.
The next day was my only truly unbroken day in Hong Kong so I decided to try to see a bit more of the territory than I had before and one thing that I had not done in Hong Kong before was to see the slightly less urban parts. Hong Kong island itself is an intriguing geographical point stuck where it is and is not really that well suited to the mass development that it has undergone compared to other places. I would not go as far as saying that there are unspoiled areas of the island but the Shek O Country Park does afford the opportunity to do some hiking with pretty convenient transport available. I won't lie that the end of the line status was also appealing, of course. So the MTR to the end of the line took me to, of course again, a shopping centre that I got a bit lost in before I found my way out to the path to the park. the park was not brilliantly signposted and did involve a walk through a visually interesting elevated cemetery (or Ossarium) which was suitably grey for the weather. The park had a relatively well-known path called the Dragon's Back which I decided to walk. There were not too many people there on a wet weekday so I rather enjoyed it to myself with only a podcast[2] or two for company. The walk was pretty fun although the variable weather did mean that I found myself getting a little wet - but then also drying out fairly quickly. There were some other people walking but very few and I only bumped into them at designated viewpoints. The variable weather also meant that I could see some of the same landscapes with quite different views which was a bit of a bonus. The park itself is quite green and to see out to all the other islands is definitely a thing worth doing.
I made my way to the exit and waited at the bus stop and checked the timetable - the buses did not seem particularly frequent. Not long after a minivan came beeping along the road quite rapidly and then stopping at the bus stop also quite rapidly. The door opened and the driver motioned to come in. I said in English that I was waiting for whichever bus I had seen on the bus stop sign and he motioned again to get on. I did, but I did not pay a fee and was told, in English, "later". I should have been wary. I was a bit wary. There were other people on the bus and they looked like they didn't know each other so I felt like it was probably OK.
The minibus picked up speed and I wondered whether it was going to be OK. The other passengers seemed fine and I saw a big led display number stuck at the front shooting up in value - this must have been the speed of the minibus. It felt a lot faster down the hill along a semi-winding road in a minibus though but that speed indicator, strangely enough, made me feel much safer as looking out of the window really did not...
Fortunately, the bus ended up exactly where I wanted to go - back to the end of the line and I paid a small fee to the bus driver to get off (he was effectively holding me hostage).
The end of the line is also the beginning, of course, and I had wanted to ride the rails from one end to another (I wasn't really going to go to the other end, but pretty close). After a spot of lunch and a quick look around the harbour and park, I settled onto the tram on the top deck. There aren't many places to get a double deck tram and it seemed a great way to soak in the city's atmosphere while still moving toward where I was meant to be in the evening.
The trip takes about 90 mins and does show quite a variety of communities from the less salubrious outskirts to the central portion of the city home to global commercial entities. The connection between them, other than the tramline, of course, is that they are all densely populated.
A quick skip across the water took me back to Kowloon where I was due to meet a friend outside the mosque.
This friend had recently moved to the city and seemed to be in that first flush of excitement and intrigue which is always a little intoxicating to be around. We made our way to, and through, the unknown to go to a dim sum place. A lot of Chinese food is pretty piggy so I really was not convinced that this would be a fruitful journey but we went to this shop which had been recommended for them. They had rather sweet scraps of paper that they'd given by the mosque requesting halal and no pig which would protect and enable them to go somewhere safe in the knowledge that it would be OK. It was not OK. Having waited for about half an hour to be seated, we looked at the menu and carefully decided on the options as we were hurried by the staff, in true Hong Kong style. The selections seemed pretty solid but once my friend handed over her little scrap of paper, the waitress became a little annoyed. She took our pencil and crossed off all the things that were not halal - basically the whole menu. Disappointed, we walked out to try and find another place. I wasn't in control so I didn't really mind but I'm sort of used to sniffing out somewhere interesting but my friend was much more hung up on a recommended restaurant or something that felt known. We eventually found somewhere but I don't remember it well. It was fine. Absolutely fine.
It was nice to see my friend that had recently moved. She seemed well and excited to have made the move to a new country and alive with the opportunity but a little stressed, also, with the burdens of choice. They had not yet moved into their own place and were staying in a temporary apartment while they worked out the city. I guess that is pretty exciting.
After dinner, I returned over the water - it was a lovely evening and I thought it wise to take the star ferry which gave a lovely view as we were crossing.
The weather was not going to hold out over the few days so I knew I needed something undercover. I sort of knew that. But I also knew I wanted to see things so I made my way to Kowloon and encountered an astonishing downpour. The rain was truly torrential and that made it a sight to behold. I got very wet, but at the same time, quite enjoyed the visual splendour of Hong Kong Bay in these conditions - I'd not seen anything like it before.
Like a fool, in that rain, I decided to make my way to Lan Tau Island, via boat, which is home to a huge Buddha. It was popular with tourists and so did still have quite a few visitors but it was not teeming with them. It was, however, teeming with water. From the boat, I got a bus to the Buddha which was not exactly full of people.
The area around the Buddha, Ngong Ping village, has been made a little more tourist friendly by making much of it appear to be a theme park version of the olden times - a little like Spirited Away. The Buddha itself is breathtaking and there are plenty of other small sights to see including many statues and a Monastery - all worth a few moments of your time.
The cable car took me back to a train station so it was fairly easy to get back to "Central". I had a flight to Busan early in the morning/late at night but my "host" was also returning so we thought it would be nice to meet up for dinner. I went back to get my stuff sorted and pack it off at the city air terminal (always a great idea) before dinner which was at a Cantonese restaurant. My friend was supposed to be coming to Japan too so we did a little catching up and also confirmed what we were doing (my plans had changed a bit after the ferry cancellation). It was short but sweet before I departed for the airport - which is barely even worth remarking on. My flight to Busan was at 2am - so I would arrive early but would it be bright-eyed and bushy-tailed?

CLICK HERE FOR (many) HONG KONG PHOTOS




1. I was staying at a friend's place while the friend was not, rather strangely.
2. In these situations, I find good podcasts to be the perfect companion as they are both interesting and easily interruptible which is not often a combination that you get with humans.