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animorphslj2010-10-03 11:38 pm
sylverlining.livejournal.com) wrote in animorphslj2010-10-03 11:38 pm
Entry tags:
Know The Secret, Know the Lulz
Oh man. I recently got on the biggest nostalgia kick of my life a few days ago. I spent hours watching 90's cartoon openings on Youtube (BEETLEJUICE! MEN IN BLACK! GARGOYLES! PEPPER ANN!) and all of this came to a boiling head when I dug through my closet... and found my 10-year-old copy of "Know The Secret" for PC. Happy dorky joy was had. Installation was instant.
Lulz were had.
This game walks the fine, fine line between "so bad it's good" and "so bad it's horrible," and I just had to share. I hope you guys know what I'm talking about here, because...
The hilarity, man. The lulz are just TOO GOOD to ignore.
Please tell me you guys have played this thing too. Somebody has to have. But just in case you haven't, "Know The Secret" is one of the only Animorphs games that I'm aware of, made in 2000. You can play as Jake, Rachel, Cassie and Marco, and Tobias is your... super-special guide through it. He's your Na'vi. Except way less annoying, and doesn't go "Hey! Listen!" and make you want to kill him with a flyswatter.
I... have noticed several... very, very odd things, that lead me to believe that this game was made by someone with only the vaguest notion of how Animorphs works. Not even taking truly strange graphics into account...
1) Why does Rachel have a gorilla morph, and Marco does not?
2) Why is Marco wearing the quintessential Nerd Ensemble that he wouldn't be caught dead in?
3) Why is there a large, floating key behind Cassie's barn, opening a mysterious silver box filled with energy bars?
4) Why are there FREAKING HORK-BAJIR IN HER BARN, apparently holographic or something, and NOBODY THINKS THIS IS STRANGE?
5) Where the hell is Ax?
6) Why is it so incredibly easy to simply waltz right up to a squirrel, pick it up and acquire it (with a weird blue glowing spiral animation)?
Now, #5 has been answered a bit. When I was a kid, I was LIVID about this, going "OMG WHERE'S AX, WHY CAN'T YOU PLAY AS AX, DO THEY JUST HATE HIM?" And now I see... no, no they do not hate Ax. The old, incredibly wonky CG of the time simply couldn't begin to animate him in a million years, so they left him out with no mention rather than even try. Well, maybe in ten years they could, now I bet it'd rock.
But in the opening sequence, in the little Tobias voice-over explaining it all...
"Well, you can stop wondering [about aliens invading Earth.] It really happened."
*insert most unintentionally hilarious rendering of a yeerk ever, that just POPS RIGHT UP on the screen*
"...But before the Andalite forces failed, a brave prince, Elfangor-"
*single most laughable image of an Andalite - this thing looks like it was drawn by a 5-year-old with 3D rendering software*
"Blah blah blah, Vice Principal Chapman...
*utterly ridiculous face of a bald, turtle-like guy with a red-orange Mario mustache, who looks like he's perpetually about to say "OH NOES, I MAKE ACCIDENT IN PANTS..."
And the best part? The Tobias voiceover is so SINCERE, so SERIOUS, while these horrible, hilarious images are splashing across the screen... I could't stop laughing like a maniac for a good five minutes. Then again when in the beginning cutscene Marco is all "DUUUDE IT'S LIKE TOTALLY SUMMER VACATION, WE SHOULD BE HAVING FUUUUNNN WHO CARES ABOUT THE YEERKS-" because just - just - agh!
And this little gem of UTTERLY RICH UNDERSTANDING OF THESE CHARACTERS AND ALL OF THEIR SUBTLETIES:
Cassie: It's so great to see some people still caring about animals!
Marco: Oh, I love animals, they're delicious!
Rachel: *in sitcom-exaggerated voice* "MAAAARR-COOOOO!"
But now... Animation and CG snarking aside, horrible voiceovers aside, questionable-at-best understanding of the books aside... I love this thing. I really do. It's FUN, it's nostalgic as hell, and it's somehow really cute. I find the music, and something about the lighting and color palette to be really, really soothing for some reason. I don't even know if this was the desired effect, but it's NICE. In true 'so-bad-it's-good' fashion, even as I'm laughing at the sheer fail of it all... it's FOND laughter. In a 'Bless them, they tried' kind of way.
And man, there's just something kind of nice about watching a little Tobias hawk-sprite fly around in your laptop screen. It's a little bit of what sweet dreams are made of.
UH, SO YEAH - DISCUSS!
Lulz were had.
This game walks the fine, fine line between "so bad it's good" and "so bad it's horrible," and I just had to share. I hope you guys know what I'm talking about here, because...
The hilarity, man. The lulz are just TOO GOOD to ignore.
Please tell me you guys have played this thing too. Somebody has to have. But just in case you haven't, "Know The Secret" is one of the only Animorphs games that I'm aware of, made in 2000. You can play as Jake, Rachel, Cassie and Marco, and Tobias is your... super-special guide through it. He's your Na'vi. Except way less annoying, and doesn't go "Hey! Listen!" and make you want to kill him with a flyswatter.
I... have noticed several... very, very odd things, that lead me to believe that this game was made by someone with only the vaguest notion of how Animorphs works. Not even taking truly strange graphics into account...
1) Why does Rachel have a gorilla morph, and Marco does not?
2) Why is Marco wearing the quintessential Nerd Ensemble that he wouldn't be caught dead in?
3) Why is there a large, floating key behind Cassie's barn, opening a mysterious silver box filled with energy bars?
4) Why are there FREAKING HORK-BAJIR IN HER BARN, apparently holographic or something, and NOBODY THINKS THIS IS STRANGE?
5) Where the hell is Ax?
6) Why is it so incredibly easy to simply waltz right up to a squirrel, pick it up and acquire it (with a weird blue glowing spiral animation)?
Now, #5 has been answered a bit. When I was a kid, I was LIVID about this, going "OMG WHERE'S AX, WHY CAN'T YOU PLAY AS AX, DO THEY JUST HATE HIM?" And now I see... no, no they do not hate Ax. The old, incredibly wonky CG of the time simply couldn't begin to animate him in a million years, so they left him out with no mention rather than even try. Well, maybe in ten years they could, now I bet it'd rock.
But in the opening sequence, in the little Tobias voice-over explaining it all...
"Well, you can stop wondering [about aliens invading Earth.] It really happened."
*insert most unintentionally hilarious rendering of a yeerk ever, that just POPS RIGHT UP on the screen*
"...But before the Andalite forces failed, a brave prince, Elfangor-"
*single most laughable image of an Andalite - this thing looks like it was drawn by a 5-year-old with 3D rendering software*
"Blah blah blah, Vice Principal Chapman...
*utterly ridiculous face of a bald, turtle-like guy with a red-orange Mario mustache, who looks like he's perpetually about to say "OH NOES, I MAKE ACCIDENT IN PANTS..."
And the best part? The Tobias voiceover is so SINCERE, so SERIOUS, while these horrible, hilarious images are splashing across the screen... I could't stop laughing like a maniac for a good five minutes. Then again when in the beginning cutscene Marco is all "DUUUDE IT'S LIKE TOTALLY SUMMER VACATION, WE SHOULD BE HAVING FUUUUNNN WHO CARES ABOUT THE YEERKS-" because just - just - agh!
And this little gem of UTTERLY RICH UNDERSTANDING OF THESE CHARACTERS AND ALL OF THEIR SUBTLETIES:
Cassie: It's so great to see some people still caring about animals!
Marco: Oh, I love animals, they're delicious!
Rachel: *in sitcom-exaggerated voice* "MAAAARR-COOOOO!"
But now... Animation and CG snarking aside, horrible voiceovers aside, questionable-at-best understanding of the books aside... I love this thing. I really do. It's FUN, it's nostalgic as hell, and it's somehow really cute. I find the music, and something about the lighting and color palette to be really, really soothing for some reason. I don't even know if this was the desired effect, but it's NICE. In true 'so-bad-it's-good' fashion, even as I'm laughing at the sheer fail of it all... it's FOND laughter. In a 'Bless them, they tried' kind of way.
And man, there's just something kind of nice about watching a little Tobias hawk-sprite fly around in your laptop screen. It's a little bit of what sweet dreams are made of.
UH, SO YEAH - DISCUSS!