Halloween

What better way to end this month than to talk about Halloween itself?

I will spare you the details surrounding the long history of this celebration day, and rather focus on modern day activities itself surrounding the 31st of october.

Haunted house attractions have completely conquered theme parks whenever the day approaches, and subsequently, so called scare zones, scary stories and of course the actors themselves have made sure that this celebration is a lasting appeal.

Horror mazes have recently over the years also appeared more and more, which are sometimes based on famous media such as The Walking Dead, but they can also be entirely original and unexpected in their outcomes!

Movie marathons of people's favorite horror movies are also very common in this time of the year, whereas they either watch those, or instead go through entire series like Halloween, Friday the 13th, Saw and many others in order to absorb the domino effect from best to worst, quality wise.

Cosplaying creepy figures is enormously popular now too, with not only private parties encouraging people to do so, but other events like entire conventions too. It's too bad that the convention I wanted to visit this year once again as Billy the Puppet was canceled. I realy hope to amend and recover from this next year.

I myself have miraculously written 31 more blogs for this month, as I love to write and review about all kinds of stuff, and what way to better combine this with the theme of horror, than when it comes to talking about my other hobbies, which include gaming and cinema?

I'm surprised that this is the 4th year of me doing this already, as I honestly thought that I would run out of things to write about. But I can confirm already that I have enough content ready for the next year, so that means I will atleast definitely do this one more time!

Celebrate Halloween in your own way! Go trick or treating, scare people with pranks(although don't go too far, see the horror clown sighting news around the world.), visit creepy abandoned places, or conjure a ghost via a Ouija board, the choice is yours to make and to enjoy!

Happy Halloween, and until next time!

Zero Time Dilemma

 

The finale towards the Zero Escape trilogy, thanks to the support of fans including me, Zero Time Dilemma was able to get developed and released. And it ends with satisfaction on a large note.

It has been a big time adventure so to speak, where characters would had to shift with history and thoughts in order to reach the games´s twists and bendings. This time, it´s both a sequel and a prequel, plus the main game within the game is now called the Decision Game, where characters will have to decide on difficult choices in order to progress, or to have zero escape.

Fan favorites Junpei, Akane, Phi and Sigma return from Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors and Virtue´s Last Reward, while Diana, Q, Mira and Eric are more or less new faces. In order to uncover the truth, or various truths, the player and the characters will have to shift through several histories in order to reach the goal, understand the Decision Game´s principles and reveal Zero II´s true identity.

Zero Time Dilemma this time has integrated pleasant harmonic puzzle rooms in the sense that they make sense logically, but the lack of a hint system unlike previous entries makes it also the most challenging and cryptic, as there are plenty of passwords to pass through, next to the puzzle rooms themselves.

Another issue which was poorly received by the audience are the stiff and desynchronized animated cut scenes, where the lips would not always match what was being said, and the movement of the bodies would be unnatural. Other than those two negativities, it is the darkest and most mature of the trilogy, with heavy emotions and the traditional gore scenes amplifying your immersion with them.

Seeming as there are several big conclusions to reach, the comedy from 999 and to a lesser extent VLR has almost completely disappeared, but that´s okay. Connecting all of the dots with the reveal of Delta and his various aliases, Phi´s true parents and the whole framework of time travelling makes Zero Time Dilemma a very worthy ending to the trilogy, and it ends with ambiguity.

With a slick designed presentation it´s worth the trip, but personally I was dissapointed to see the new behavior and the new appearances of Junpei/Tenmyouji and Akane/June in particular, as if they were different persona's.

Rating: 8.4

The Walking Dead (TV), Five Years On

 

The success of the television adaptation of The Walking Dead comics has led us to present times with seven seasons, with the latest one having just started. Effectively, the series has set the new standard when it comes to slow moving zombies.

Unlike the satirical, parodical or political themes playing surrounding the zombies of George A. Romero, The Walking Dead rather sets the zombies back as background obstacles, as the show really is about making difficult moral choices about survival.

Indeed, throughout the seasons, which have settings beyond urban cities such as the farm getting overrun in 2, or the prison being a temporary base for 3&4, Rick's human group grows and declines in numbers, as death scenes come and go in all sizes.

There have been so many dramatic and gory scenes involving not only zombies going down, but plenty of humans too, that I seriously have lost count as to what my favorite of anyone of them would be at the moment. Naturally, Season 7's opening episode is the one sticking with me the most right now.

The show also has seen plenty of intimidating, cruel and nasty villains, including the cannibals group, the Governor of Woodbury, Daryl's brother Merle, and the latest involves the Saviors, led by Negan, who easily stole the spotlight.

I'm glad to see The Walking Dead being so highly succesful. The zombies look absolutely great at times, as does the intense dialogue heating up between the humans. The action is stunning, as is the drama, and there really is no other zombie television series out there with such a high caliber as this.

Rating: 8.0

Dark Souls III

 

The consistent and constant high value of the Souls franchise has easily transitioned over into the newest consoles and high end PC’s, and the latest entry has become the best selling and in my opinion the most endurable yet.

Which means that From Software continues to impress by it’s sheer amount of polish, content and so on per title, and even though they went off the track with the magnificent Bloodborne, Dark Souls III sits proudly alongside it’s beloved brethren.

With many references towards Dark Souls, Dark Souls II and even glimpses of Demon’s Souls, alongside borrowing some aesthetics from Bloodborne, it is up to you to link the fire again, no matter how cryptic the curious world and lore can be.

The soundtrack is arguably the strongest seen yet, as each boss has a unique song accompanying it, and the main theme is highly respected by many. I have once again died hundreds of times, but that feeling of endurance is as perfect at it comes, because the overall quality of level design, enemy design, methodical combat, multiplayer aspects, setting, subtle objects and so on make Dark Souls III a very rich world and it’s easily consumed by the rabid yet passionate community.

 

 

 

Invading, summoning and leaving messages remains valuable, addictive and mischievous to be used, and there are plenty of builds to justify several runs, such as focusing on sorcery, or faith, or dexterity, or strength etc. .

Although it’s not the strongest boss lineup, some of my new favorites include Aldrich, Oceiros and Lothric. There are plenty of NPC’s and mysterious quests to tackle into, not to mention rare items, creative new illusory walls and other secrets that even the community has yet to fInd.

And with the inevitable brilliant as usual DLC being in development, Dark Souls III is more alive(or Hollow) than ever, and it’s a great action RPG by all means. If it ain’t broke, improve upon it!

Rating: 8.7

The Modern Age of Horror Cinema

For now, I consider modern horror filmmaking to start in the 90's, where the genre had a few gems still getting released, but the general public was getting tired, until Scream(1996) rejuvenated interest back, with a slasher revival and making parodies.

The early 00's/2000's saw an increased interest into Japanese horror, and their subsequent remakes being arguably even better. The most famous examples are The Ring and The Grudge, which recently got a Freddy VS. Jason kind of flick in regards to the iconic supernatural spooks.

This decade towards the end of it also saw the rise of the French Wave, where a surprising amount of terrific good French horror was released. Highlights in here include Inside(2007), High Tension(2003) and one of my all time favorites, Martyrs(2008).

New horror icons also slowly started rising, with Jigsaw and his puppet alter ego Billy being the most recognizable in the Saw series. Another well known franchise became Paranormal Activity, although both of them have definitely seen the peak of their success already.

And then there's the future of horror cinema to ponder about. How many remakes, prequels and sequels need to be directed still until we get to see a nice amount of titles, instead of hopefully getting 1 good project each year, such as Insidious(2010), Sinister(2012), The Conjuring(2013) and The Babadook(2014)?

I really look forward towards seeing new upcoming successful horror films, because I can very well understand how hard it can be to achieve something truly frightening in this age of the internet, where 9 out of 10 horror movies are really not worth anyone's time.

Yume 2kki

 

Yume 2kki is the unofficial sequel to Yume Nikki.

Co-developed by the anonymous people behind the Japanese 2chan, and referencing all of the major fangames surrounding the community, it is the most ambitious project because of it's large scale, and it is still getting updated.

You play as a character of ambiguous ethnicity, and will like I reviewed Yume Nikki and .flow before, wander through strange, surreal and nightmaristic hellish worlds, and the whole landscape so to speak is bigger and more confusing than ever.

With over 35 Effects to collect here and there, which let your character perform various effects, such as riding a bicycle, flying as a fairy and cutting up stuff with a chainsaw, you are once again thrown into an illogical world with zero dialogue, narration and sense.

Despite it's simple mechanics design as programmed from RPG Maker, the plain gameplay let's you feel all kinds of emotions, as the settings in particular might remind anyone of dealing with what looks to be dreams, memories and nightmares all intertwining with one another.

Game theories populate the subtle background and interpretations of each world, events and NPC's appearing, and the various endings make sure that the perspective and the experience of each player will be different upon getting through this.

The creepy vibes and the scary imagery range from inanimated objects and haunting trippy tunes, to abominations and hysterical sensations. The mood of each world can range from unnerving, to peaceful harmony.
 
Yume 2kki is an acquired taste, like the whole worshipment of Yume Nikki's legacy, but once you do embrace it, you too will be curious, scared and filled with a weird sense of coziness through aimlessly wandering through these sights, and somehow reach an end or two.

Rating: 7.3

Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky

You think you have seen it all regarding martial arts and gore combined? You think that you have seen plenty of crazy manga/animes? How about Hong Kong/Chinese prison flicks? Look no further than Riki-Oh then for good times.

Also known as the precursor towards the present famous One Punch Man, Riki-Oh is about Ricky who killed a man and leads the prisoners against the corrupt prison system with the wardens and the Gang of Four terrorizing all.

The Story of Ricky is actually one of the goriest flicks ever made, easily coming close towards the king of gore, which is Braindead(1992), directed by Peter Jackson. It's so over the top at times that it became an effective martial arts horror comedy.

Infamous scenes include literally punching through guts, meat and bones, falling on a board of spikes, an imploding body, and facing of against a grotesque transformed warden who eventually is meat grinded massively, and his head is left.

Definitely do not take this movie seriously, and I guarantee that you will have a good time, IF you have a heart for B-rated, nonsense adaptations. Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky is ridiculously easy to make fun of.

Rating: 6.5

Dr. Chaos

An NES game so average, and yet so abstract, that you can't help but try it out for curiosity sake.

Dr. Chaos is an action platformer with a horror theme playing around a mad scientist who went too far with creating quantum based warp zones, and unleashing horrific monsters for his brother to the rescue Michael Chaos to battle.

The game is split up into three segments; first are the hallways, which are the shortest ones experienced. They serve as hubs and checkpoints towards the other two segments, and feature nuisance enemies and a main theme that desperately tries to kick in, before you enter one of the many doors.

Now is where the most interesting segment plays out. A pseudo 3D interface appears where you are able to click on anything sticking out using the four commands of "OPEN", "GET", "GO" and "HIT". The first three have obvious results, while "HIT" implies interacting with walls and other areas in order to hit secret achievements.

Serving both as item collection phases, but most of all as mazes, the rooms segment are the most memorable in otherwise an average adventure, as they can also have unexpected visitors popping up, where you will have to kill them in order to proceed.

The last segment are the warp zones themselves, or long corridors as I would like to call them. These are more traditional based levels filled with enemies and a boss at the end. Upon defeating them, you obtain laser pieces which will ultimately be used against the final boss awaiting.

Unfortunately, backtracking is prominent, and when that's combined with the confusing aspect of the rooms segment as to "where the fuck do I go" kind of feelings come and go, you too will understand why the game simply isn't fondly remembered unlike the classics.

Dr. Chaos is a horrible night to have a curse. It has redundant songs playing, an unbalanced part of game design with the overpowered jump boots, and it will frustrate the shit out of you. And yet it's a perfect night to play it right now, with Halloween approaching.

Rating: 6.3

Phantasm

I'm gonna do something unconventional. I will review the first and the last parts of this series only. The other 3 are basically more of the same, and should be watched if you like either of these. I recently also saw the remastered edition of the first.

Phantasm is about a group of friends dealing with the bizarre and supernatural acts of The Tall Man, played by the late Angus Scrimm,  who is a grave robber and has an arsenal of weapons, nightmares and weapons .

With a recognizable main theme playing out, this late 70's horror has creative scary scenes, including hooded dwarf midgets, an alter woman ego of The Tall Man, and tiny metal flying spheres which can attach onto victims and drill their blood out in gruesome manner.

The film feels asymmetrical and disoriented in a good way, because it has nightmare esque scenes happening which confuse the protagonists. It's both a cheesy and a conventional horror which remains underrated, and it has one of the best endings of the 70's.

EHEHEHEHE, BOOOOOOYYY!

Rating: 6.5

Reggie, Mike and Jody must co-operate and battle The Tall Man one more time in Angus Scrimm's final acting role in part V named Ravager. Focusing on Reggie this time, he goes through various illogical scenes happening which depict fragments of previous entries, and nightmares.

The mortician undertaker unleashes his zombie henchmen and weapons again which all return, and the mood of the film felt like a parodic horror comedy, and yet it still remains faithful and conscious of what makes Phantasm work.

If you happen to be a die hard fan, unlike me, you must be quite sad to hear that after a whopping 37 years, the franchise finally ends, but atleast with satisfaction, because the main cast returns one more time to invite you to the nightmare world of Phantasm, even with a low budget.

And thus another one bites the dust. Rest in pieces.

Rating: 6.0

Mortal Kombat

Forget about Mortal Kombat XL, X or even the 2011 reboot. Let's go back to the past and go all the way back to the very first title in this long running franchise, which became infamous for being so bloody and brutal.

Created by Ed Boon and John Tobias, Mortal Kombat stormed the arcade audience because of the trademark Fatalities and the realistic digitized graphics, portraying the characters as frightfully authentic, but the real joy comes from the gameplay.

The story is about Liu Kang entering a Mortal Kombat tournament in order to stop an evil sorcerer named Shang Tsung from getting ahold of too many souls in order to feed himself further, and by subsequently saving Earth.

The fighting is 2D based with punch, kick and throw options to input, but all of the fighters have special abilities as well, such as Liu Kang performing a flying bicycle kick and Scorpion throwing a hook to keep the combat interesting.

The Fatalities ended opponents in gruesome ways, whereby players would had to input a secret combination of buttons in order to trigger them. In fact, the whole franchise basically reeks not only of Fatalities, but secrets, unlockables and hidden fighters as well.

Having been ported to a vast number of different platforms, I fondly remember the SNES and arcade versions most of all, despite the former infamously having no blood available as animation, but sweat animations instead whenever opponents would get hit or die.

Mortal Kombat is a fan favorite as a brand and easily recognized even today and still going strong, but the very first title simply isn't as good as later ones, as it's direct sequel would already improve on it's formula dramatically. And yet, we shouldn't forget about the inceptions, as without them, one could never improve.

The Conjuring 2

 

James Wan is a household name for horror by now, as he has proved with films like Saw(2004), Insidious(2010) and The Conjuring(2013), which are all some of my most favorite titles ever in the whole genre.

This sequel has a few connections, but takes a new direction with it's plot and the tiny setting of a family house where another demonic presence plagues them, and our returning protagonists Ed and Loraine Warren.

The buildup was successful, and the scares have a few unexpected jump scares, a detour in the form of The Crooked Man, mixed up with typical ghost mythos and a wheeze of demonology. It has also spawned another upcoming spin-off movie.

It's not one of Wan's best, but without a doubt does The Conjuring 2 respect it's genre and keeps the quality high. A haunted house has been seen many times by now, but it's all abut the middle part of the story where horror elements can remain flexible and even innovative at times.

Rating: 7.5

I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream

 

Based on a short novel published in 1967 by Harlan Ellison, this point and click adventure has a grim tone and a dark presentation, and with it's sci-fi horror background, it surely will spook your imagination.

At least, if you had experienced it in 1995. I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream has disturbing ethical choices to be made, but nowadays it can be considered an exceptional horror title from the 90's which actually expanded on the overall plot of the short novel.

AM, the supercomputer created after another world war broke loose between the U.S.A., the U.S.S.R. and China, entraps and tortures the last 5 living human characters for over a hundred years, and then finally lets them play a "game" with it. Selecting their scenarios can be done in any order, and they all take place in different time era's.

The adventures are implied to be metaphorical, which reflect back on the character's weaknesses. The chapters portray moral and ethical dilemmas dealing with dark topics like genocide, rape, paranoia and fanaticism.

It has the unique feature(apart from arcade video games) to be unwinnable, because this was a decision made by the creator of the story. It's not entirely unwinnable, but rather, the story can only end badly despite their being different outcomes.

Gameplay wise, it's nothing special, you've got your classic inventory screen, your various choices of interacting with the environment, objects and NPC's, and there are dialogue trees available. The game also employs impressive voice acting for it's time.

One odd feature sticking out is the so called spiritual barometer. It symbolically represents the character's mood and moral status. If you perform good deeds through the journeys, you will increase your chance at destroying AM. If you perform evil deeds, you will fall further down into hell.

Can't say I have a favorite adventure sticking out, as all five of them seemed to do just fine on their own merits. The final adventure afterwards triggers how it will all end, and for the most of us, they all seem to have an annoying afterthought, which is intended.

I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream has been on my to do list for years merely because of it's weird title alone, and after beating it, I can say that I did not miss out on much, as there are better point and click adventure games out there.

Still, if you dig psychological sci-fi horrors full of despair, check this out.

Rating: 6.9

The Classic Age of Horror Cinema

Last year, I wrote about the Silent Age and the Golden Age of Horror Cinema. They focused on the earliest films towards the ones released in the 70´s and 80´s. Of course, the way I label them is entirely subjective, and the same goes for the next time period.

The Classic Age of Horror Cinema reaches out in my opinion from the 30´s towards the 60´s, where enough innovative flicks have been directed, produced, edited and shown on the silver screen in order to influence and inspire present films.

King Kong(1933) is a milestone in filmmaking which truly impressed me with it's production values, originality and brave direction and paved the way for Creature Features to come out, which remain highly popular in Japan.

The gothic horror subgenre involves vampires primarily, and they usually have suspenseful settings and plots to immerse into. World famously, Bela Lugosi and Christopher Lee in their respective Dracula portrayals(1931 and 1958) dominate the first thing that people think of when speaking of gothic horror.

The Universal Monsters Studios and the Hammer company managed to roughly over 3 decades populate not only Dracula, but his partners in horror as well, including Frankenstein's monster, The Mummy, The Wolf Man, Creature from the Black Lagoon and my personal favorite, The Invisible Man.

The 50's saw the rise of doomsday and monster pandemonium flicks, which usually involved giant versions of animals, and/or silly stories involving nuclear deterrences and radiations. Admittedly, the 50's aren't a favorite of mine when speaking of horror cinema.

The 60's gave rise to prototypes of the slasher subgenre, with Psycho(1960) remaining another remarkable film to have changed the landscape of horror cinema. Other highly influential titles include the birth of the modern zombie in Night of the Living Dead(1968), and fear of the unknown in The Haunting(1963).

The Classic Age of Horror Cinema is a vast space of unsettling features with enough content to provide for anyone interested in digger deeper down the horror hole. Although I only talked about the most popular titles, and modern young audiences most likely won't feel or appreciate them, you should definitely give the ones I mentioned a try if nothing else interests you from this age.

Fatal Frame III & V

I am unable to play part IV, also known as Mask of the Lunar Eclipse, simply because it only got released in Japan. Therefore, I am focusing on the remaining two main titles instead, and I might, just might, play IV one day.

The Tormented introduces a new cast while old characters return from Fatal Frame and Crimson Butterfly. A new sinister location named the Manor of Sleep binds the main characters Rei Kurosawa and Miku Hinasaki, and they will have to work together to uncover what is happening.

Fatal Frame III is a faithful sequel with similar mechanics, themes and gameplay, while the premise focuses on dreams and nightmares, while the obvious main enemy remains ghosts. The Camera Obscura continues to be a fun tool to use.

The scare factor has turned up the jump scare factor higher than other titles, allowing for a more tense experience. It's a long journey where confusion might come as to how to progress further, but it's worthwhile to reach the end.

Rating: 7.8

The fifth installment, a central suicidal theme is playing, and plenty of ghosts’s death scenes can be seen when touching them after defeat. The character models are impressive, the personalities, not so much.

A very repetitive pacing and gameplay, underwhelming lore and frankly too much lying notes hinder Maiden of Black Water. The countless amounts of doors and door animations to be seen and clunky camera controls when looking around also add lots of fuel to the fire.

Still, the gamepad functionality is used well and the atmosphere is good although not as dark at II, nor are the ghosts really scary, except for during the Thirteenth Drop chapter.

Fatal Frame: Maiden of Black Water is still worthwhile in the end, but the game’s flaws, length and pacing will turn many gamers and even fans away.

Rating: 7.5

The House of the Dead

 

Ah, this brings me back to my youth.

As a kid, I have gone to Spain for vacation with my family for many years, to the point that I got sick and redundant from it, reflecting back on it as a teenager. Still, there were plenty of reasons to find enjoyment in the south, such as beaches, food, girls and arcades.

That last one in particular filled me up with excitement with regards to my eyes getting visually stimulated of all of the machines performing their magic, such as pinball machines, fighting machines, racing machines and shooter machines, or more specifically, light gun machines.

The House of the Dead is one of two on-rails based shooters from the arcades of which I have fond memories, the other one is Time Crisis. The first part is your typical entacklement onto the zombie phenomena in that there is a mad doctor who wants to unleash his hellish experiments.

Two agents track down his mansion and basically walk through it and the subsequent areas in order to rescue and to stop the madness. Gameplay consists primarily of shooting your enemies on screen, while reloading with the gun controllers off screen.

There are multiple routes to takes, and the game has alternative endings. It's a modest and fun attempt at combining horror with on-rail shooting, and I like it. The sequel towards it however remains the most popular, and even now, I discovered it being playable in Tokyo, Japan.

2's plot takes us beyond the horror of the first, by introducing more variants of zombies, and new enemies and bosses such as Strength and the Emperor, while the final boss The Magician returns for more challenge. Goldman as the villain is infamous for his terrible voice acting, actually the whole game is.

It remains my favorite to replay through as there are again multiple routes to take, and I felt that co-operation mode in here is the most entertaining and engaging, as The House of the Dead 2 is easily one of my most cherished arcade memories.

The House of the Dead III is set in a post-apocalyptic future and features different implementations of branching paths, reloading and obtaining bonus points and extra lives. The art style and graphics aren't as effective as the previous two.

III feels more faster paced and removes the concept of saving civilians, which is too bad, but on the other hand it features a final boss where my thumbs would literally go numb from hitting the shooting button so much, which makes it an endurance fight.

As for part 4 however, I have never played it, as I don't own a PS3, and I have never seen an arcade machine for it save for my trip in Tokyo, but I simply had no time for it then. I'm sure that it's a fine addition to the series.

Finally, there is also The House of the Dead: Overkill. It takes a new approach regarding style and substance, and it really felt like a grindhouse movie, except in the form of a video game then, with elements reminding me of Quentin Tarantino movies.

Overkill has easily the most enemies to kill and a high score system to accompany that, but it also made it a very repetitive game despite the game's various locations you will undertake. It's still the standard on rail shooting formula.

The game's vulgarity and black comedy jokes make up for this redundance though, and since it feels so different from previous entries, Overkill remains a recommendation, and for some it is a favorite in the series.

The House of the Dead as a franchise is experienced the best at the arcades, but can also welcome players back at home with platforms such as the Personal Computer, the Nintendo Wii and the PlayStation 3. I'm also aware that there exist bizarre spin-offs such as The Typing of the Dead.

Don't Breathe

 

When three young burglars decide to rob a blind and sick army veteran of his wealth in order to escape their current established lives, the job seems almost too simple at first hand, but then they discover that you should never judge a situation by it's looks.

Don't Breathe is a suspenseful and thrilling movie which felt like a combination of the horrific Collector movies(The Collector and The Collection), and a touch of the Home Alone films, except that it's easily the most realistic.

Having been co-produced by Sam Raimi, the film is well edited and has creative turns of how the plot starts getting more tense, while making sure that you will get to see the full tour of this small and apparent abandoned house.

Victims will be made, and there is a darker side surrounding the army veteran, and it's not just because he is hunting on the thieves. Sound is an important factor for it involves avoiding a blind man, but eventually the choreography gets worse.

Don't Breathe has various genres including crime and thriller, but it involves enough horror for it to be included on this year's october. It lives up to the objective score it gets from critics and viewers, and it shouldn't be missed.

Rating: 7.0

Phantasmagoria

 

A creative and ambitious horror project from the mid 90's, designed by Roberta Williams, who is the co-founder of Sierra Entertainment. Phantasmagoria is another memory as a young kid which used to haunt me.

Combining 3D graphics with live action, similar to The 7th Guest and The 11th Hour, the caliber regarding the overall quality however is better in my opinion. This point and click adventure might look dated today, but back in the day, it was a controversial entry.

Sex, gore and general spookiness made it a memorably video game, especially when one looks at plenty of the dead scenes involved, plus there's enough foreboding, cat scares and mystery to keep you company.

Granted, it's a short playthrough, especially when you know what to do, and the easy puzzles plus the really helphul red skeleton in the corner who can examine items and spell out hints for you makes this a casual invitation from a gameplay experience, but I liked this.

It oozes a 90's feeling with the silly acting, the presentation and the silly music, plus there are several ways to deal with puzzles and the climax towards the ending can vary too. The story is basically about stopping an evil curse and the demon it emits inside possessed bodies.

It's also easy to go unnoticed of various scary events including more death scenes and supernatural stuff, so it's advisable to explore and backtrack to rooms as you go through the chapters, they are worth seeing.

Phantasmagoria is effective, uncommon and nowadays both goofy and gory to experience. It certainly is a well known title of the 90's, at it stands out as both a comedy and a horror, depending on the player.

Rating: 7.0

A personal guilty pleasure of mine, A Puzzle of Flesh as a sequel is not canonically connected, but improves upon the formula with a better user interface, better acting, a more sinister story and a more evil soundtrack.

It's especially a special case to me, as my brother used to scare me as a kid while showing off some scary and bloody scenes. Your playable character this time is Curtis, a technical writer at a conspiracy company who happens to be bisexual and many people like him.

The story unfolds as Curtis starts experiencing strange hallucination scenes and other oddities while performing his daily routine of work, home and several romances. Meanwhile, mysterious murders start happening, and 1 co-worker has the tendency to go completely wild.

The scares are many, varied and better in my opinion, ranging from hallucinations and evil voices, to supernatural alien activity and gory deaths. The climax is neat as it features 5 scenes where you will have to act quickly, or else you will die.

That final scene is the one I remember the most as a kid, as a young Curtis tells his insane mom that he loves her, and starts hugging. Other than that, the story went too crazy with it's alien elements, but I liked the rest of the plot.

A Puzzle of Flesh might actually surprise you with the amount of content, secrets and easter eggs it provides during the short stay you will be at WynTech. It's an FMV horror game that isn't shy with showing off with more sexual and gory content than it's predecessor.

Rating: 7.2

Stranger Things

 

Main Theme

The latest horror hit is Stranger Things, whose inspiration clearly comes from science fiction and adventures like E.T., X-files, Stand by Me and Close Encounters of the Third Kind, while it's direction is a mix between Stephen King and Stephen Spielberg.

Rendering a true homage and throwback to the 80's in general, I definitely loved the great horror movie poster references like The Evil Dead, Jaws and The Thing appearing over the private rooms, and I felt the same with the main theme, which is like a lost John Carpenter song with heavy synthesizers.

The acting of the young kids is very impressive as I felt immersed by how much they cared about each other and the world they live at Hawkins, Indiana. Winona Ryder also played a compelling role as a worrying mother.

It's too early to really consider it as a great TV series seeming as I only saw season 1 for now, but I can't wait to see more! The supernatural environments and the creature design are well done and the "Carrie" effects kept me watching, especially that one moment when a kid was floating in the air!

 

Jim Hopper played a supportive and determined role of uncovering the conspiracy and the supernatural, while the same goes for Charlie Heaton and Natalia Dyer too. But the true stars of the show are of course the 3 boys looking for their lost friend, and Eleven, the mysterious girl.

Toothless in particular stroke me as a character, really being energetic, caring and such while maintaining a balance between rational and irrational remarks throughout. Cursing and swearing around each other during tense times is clearly the cool thing to do around 1983.

Stranger Things feels nostalgic in a modern take from a bygone era from which I was born, and it's one of those television flicks which is very easy to watch through because it's so wonderfully directed and filmed and acted by the people behind and in front of the camera.

Rating: 8.0

Thriller

Might just as well take this horror opportunity and proclaim that Michael Jackson is the only musical figure so far which has truly impressed me with his career and his political messages he gave towards them.

Thriller as an album remains the best selling one in the history of the music industry, for it has world favorite songs including Beat It and The Girl Is Mine, but seeming as we are in the month of October, let's concentrate on the namesake song Thriller.

Having been produced as an obvious horror setting, it features Michael in a narrative feature, before it changes into a choreographed dance routine song with the genres Disco and Funk popping out, while director John Landis handled the music video itself, most well known for An American Werewolf in London.

The zombies following Jackson's lead is the most famous moment of the whole deal, and it's a nice touch that Vincent Price also included his voice with one of if not the most famous evil laugh in horror history.

Furthermore, the lyrics, the effects, the sounds and themes all support of it being a thriller night, a tenseful scary nightmare happening, and it ends with a questionable ending for the narration, revealing that Michael was a werewolf all along.

Thriller is a brave direction for somehow making it all work impressively without giving the impression that it's a comical situation we are dealing with here. It's also at this moment the very first song I have ever reviewed.

I'm not sure even sure how to rate songs or albums yet. Will I go for 4 stars(****), a scale from 1 to 10, or something different? Who knows, I just might start reviewing even more mediums in the future.

Five Nights at Freddy's 3

Jump scares. Why not make a rapid whole franchise consisting of them, and make a profit? As I previously said last year, I congratulate Scott Cawthon for his success, but at the same time, I think that it saturated and hurt the genre.

Five Nights at Freddy's 3 branches in a new direction regarding gameplay in that you do not only have to monitor a security camera system now(of which there are 2 this time), but you will have to use audio as well to track the animatronics, and keep the ventilation system in check, or you will experience hallucinations.

The game takes place at Fazbear's Fright, which is a former Freddy Fazbear Entertainment restaurant capitalizing on the incidents which happened in the two previous games, which is of course actual animatronics going nuts.

The fact that you gotta monitor and be on standby for several subsystems arguably makes part 3 a more psychological stressful situation simply because there are more options. Unfortunately, the systems can also crash, so you will have to reboot them in order to keep things running smoothly.

Of course, the impending and effective approach of the animatronics and the phantoms is present. The unknown factor has thus deepened, and the game keeps the tradition in place with making players uncomfortable.

Aside from developing a lore(ish) environment and being perfect material for streaming Let's Plays, Five Night's at Freddy's 3 is actually more tame and stale in the scare factor compared to 1 and 2, and despite being a more sophisticated experience, by now, the overall quality of the series is going down.

Rating: 7.3