We all know Bill Cosby as comedian and television actor, one that has made a few generations laugh at comedy skits about Moses and the Lord and other humours bits. Earlier this evening, I had the privilege of sitting down with a few friends to watch a movie starring this comedic gentleman, titled "Leonard: Part 6." Well, to begin with, the movie pokes fun at several things, the most obvious and ironic of them being the deconstruction of the iconic "Spy" movie genre, like Samuel Beckett deconstructed the Detective novel and regular story structure in Molloy. The goal of this particular post isn't to compare the two; rather, to divulge in how moronic and absurd the film is as a whole.
So, Bill Cosby's character, Leonard Parker, is a divorced ex-spy now restauranteer who must get back in the game when his ex-wife and daughter's lives are threatened by the evil Medusa Johnson, a vegtarian egotistical broad who tries to take over the state of California, using telepathic control over animals. First off, the movie has no five parts preceding it. The movie randomly has "Part 6" in the title to ensinuate the comedic notion of the film. This messes with your typical fiction series, because you can't really have the sixth segment without any preceding plot points to help viewers along the way. The story is narrated by Parker's faithful servant, who assists his master in every way possible. Also, to inhance the mundance portions of the film, crudely animated bullets and animal movements (Parker rides an ostrich later on in the film) make their way onto the screen, while famous classical pieces, like 1812 Overture, resound in the background. Now, I'd only heard of this film in passing, and for me, the silliest part has to be when Johnson's henchmen get third degree burns when meat patties are placed against their skin, as Parker tries to ward them off during the resurgance to save his ex-wife.
The film was made in 1987, which sounds like such a long time ago, but does a film have to be old in order to fool around with basic plot structure or advancements that border on insane? On IMDB.com, the film scored a 2.1 out of a possible 10 points, but in order to love this movie, as my friends seem to do, you have to be ready for all the Coca-Cola product placement and frogs lifting a full-sized automobile and throwing it into the nearby bay. I give credit to the director for taking a chance with a sure-fire flop, but the more important thing to consider is that fact a movie can just be "Part 6" without any prior engagements is cool, even if it appears to ruin the career of a loved and well-known comedian.
Here's the Youtube link for a sample scene from the beginning of the movie:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AD4bk776a-0
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
False Image Worship
Now I know Eric has talked about how Braveheart created a false image of Scottish history but there's a more prominent false image in our present day. In Japan there's a type of music called idol. Where young girls usually teenagers sing and dress up cute to attract a large male audience. But, in this time of technology there's a virtual or false image of this genre called Vocaloid. One vocaloid idol for instance, the very first, Hatsune Miku, has become a phenomenon in Japan and the anime community.
Here's a little information on Hatsune Miku from the vocaloid website: "'HATSUNE MIKU' is computer music software that enables users to create synthesized singing of unprecedented quality and remarkable realism by just typing in lyrics and melody. Powered by YAMAHA's VOCALOID(= Vocal + Android) technology, HATSUNE MIKU was developed by Crypton Future Media, Inc. in Sapporo, Japan, and released on August 31st, 2007. Since then, there have been more than 100,000 songs and movies about HATSUNE MIKU posted on popular video sharing websites such as YouTube and Nico-Nico-Douga(Japan)" (http://www.crypton.co.jp/mp/pages/prod/vocaloid/cv01_us.jsp).
Now worshiping a program by buying her music is all nice and dandy but Japan has gone a step further than that. Recently they've created a hologram of Hatsune Miku and she's been touring around Japan and even out of the country with a live band as backup. I find it odd that a program created out of real people's vocals has become such a popular thing in Japan. But, she does everything a real singer does and it's not like we're not used to lipsyncing anyways. I just think it shows how we can all conform to a certain image and forget what the person behind that image really is.
It just goes to show you that we see famous people or people in the entertainment world as public figures and not private people because I doubt people see an actor/actress as a person. They mainly associate the actor/actress with his/her roles not his/her behavior. Like in Mao II we blend people into a mass and can lose our individuality in the process. Below is the first song Hatsune Miku performed at her concert.
-Josh K.
Here's a little information on Hatsune Miku from the vocaloid website: "'HATSUNE MIKU' is computer music software that enables users to create synthesized singing of unprecedented quality and remarkable realism by just typing in lyrics and melody. Powered by YAMAHA's VOCALOID(= Vocal + Android) technology, HATSUNE MIKU was developed by Crypton Future Media, Inc. in Sapporo, Japan, and released on August 31st, 2007. Since then, there have been more than 100,000 songs and movies about HATSUNE MIKU posted on popular video sharing websites such as YouTube and Nico-Nico-Douga(Japan)" (http://www.crypton.co.jp/mp/pages/prod/vocaloid/cv01_us.jsp).
Now worshiping a program by buying her music is all nice and dandy but Japan has gone a step further than that. Recently they've created a hologram of Hatsune Miku and she's been touring around Japan and even out of the country with a live band as backup. I find it odd that a program created out of real people's vocals has become such a popular thing in Japan. But, she does everything a real singer does and it's not like we're not used to lipsyncing anyways. I just think it shows how we can all conform to a certain image and forget what the person behind that image really is.
It just goes to show you that we see famous people or people in the entertainment world as public figures and not private people because I doubt people see an actor/actress as a person. They mainly associate the actor/actress with his/her roles not his/her behavior. Like in Mao II we blend people into a mass and can lose our individuality in the process. Below is the first song Hatsune Miku performed at her concert.
-Josh K.
5 Fingers to a 6 Fingered Instrument...
The Embed was disabled, so I wasn't able to give you a video that I find both impressive and disgusting:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mB3ZIHS63Lo
I'm an avid player of the Rock Band series and enjoy playing a fake guitar every now and then, because I sure as hell can't play a regular one. However, the video gives viewers a great sense of what certain simulacra has given humanity - a chance to be a rock star in your pajamas, without all the girls, drugs, or annoying agents. (If I'm repeating any former posts in regards to video games, please don't hesistate to call me out). What does remain is the ego factor involved with these games; on Xbox Live, there are contests associated with weekly downloadable songs; a call is sent to players to achieve the highest score on the charts, where probably some 30-something living in his mother's basement is playing bass in your band instead of getting off his ass, going outside, and getting a job.
It's understandable if you have an actual musical instrument talent (I once played Bass and regular Clarinet for marching and concert band) - You actually commited notes to memory, like countless muscians before you and can play organized sheet music. Games like Rock Band and Guitar Hero keep flooding the store shelves, but when it comes to retaining their value, they suck completely (A copy of GH 3 in Gamestop I saw once would've cost me three bucks or something near there).
But why do people flock to virtual worlds like this? Is it because they can escape from the dulldrums of a meaningless life? Or, do they believe that this make-believe dimension is more realistic thant the one they live in now? That answer depends entirely on how you interpret Baudrillard. One thing is definetely for sure: I won't be simulating this my life time:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mB3ZIHS63Lo
I'm an avid player of the Rock Band series and enjoy playing a fake guitar every now and then, because I sure as hell can't play a regular one. However, the video gives viewers a great sense of what certain simulacra has given humanity - a chance to be a rock star in your pajamas, without all the girls, drugs, or annoying agents. (If I'm repeating any former posts in regards to video games, please don't hesistate to call me out). What does remain is the ego factor involved with these games; on Xbox Live, there are contests associated with weekly downloadable songs; a call is sent to players to achieve the highest score on the charts, where probably some 30-something living in his mother's basement is playing bass in your band instead of getting off his ass, going outside, and getting a job.
It's understandable if you have an actual musical instrument talent (I once played Bass and regular Clarinet for marching and concert band) - You actually commited notes to memory, like countless muscians before you and can play organized sheet music. Games like Rock Band and Guitar Hero keep flooding the store shelves, but when it comes to retaining their value, they suck completely (A copy of GH 3 in Gamestop I saw once would've cost me three bucks or something near there).
But why do people flock to virtual worlds like this? Is it because they can escape from the dulldrums of a meaningless life? Or, do they believe that this make-believe dimension is more realistic thant the one they live in now? That answer depends entirely on how you interpret Baudrillard. One thing is definetely for sure: I won't be simulating this my life time:
Paradigm City - The New San Narciso?
As I was completing my final paper, I came across a source that depicted Oedipa Maas as a Detective character, the main protagonist from The Crying of Lot 49. She does try to solve the truth of Tristero on her way to co-executing the will, using sleuthing skills she more or less obtains along the way, like "the private eye in any long-ago radio drama, believing all you needed was grit, resourcefulness, exemption from hidebound cops' rules, to solve any great mystery" (Pynchon, 100). It also reminded me of an Anime series where a character goes after a personal truth in the same manner, but for more darker reasons.
But before I can explain him to you, I must explain the premise of the series.
The Anime series I'm referencing is titled "The Big O." It takes place within the confines of Paradigm City, a domed metropolis situatied in a world that was affected by a cataclysmic event that happened 40 Years ago, and in the aftermath, every citizen and android lost their memories of anything that happened prior to that day. Our main character is Paradigm's top negotiator Roger Smith. He's a respectful gentleman who solves his clients' cases and essentially protects the city when the local police force can't, which is when a giant monster or robot happens to be stomping around for one reason or another. In those situations, Roger utilizes his own giant robot, referenced heavily as a Megadeus, called Big O. Together, they keep things in order. However, the character I wish to analyze is a villain of the series who tries to instill a certain kind of fear within Paradigm's citizens.
The mummy-looking man featured here goes by the name of Schwarzwald. Before he donned this persona, he was Michael Seebach, a newspaper reporter for Paradigm Press. Like Oedipa Maas, he became obsessed with finding the truth of things he was reporting; more specifically, his interest in the Event of 40 Years ago and that possibly, megadeuses were involved somewhere in the Event's process. The research nearly cost him his life, leaving him forever disfigured. He wishes to spread his findings to others in Paradigm, to expose Paradigm Corporation, the government of the city, for trying to get citizens to forget their pasts and deny the reality of the city's nature regarding the Event and for silencing him (they try to pay him off with a generous severance pay). Roger Smith is given the assignment of negotiating with him, but is called "a corrupt dog on the city's leash," for accepting the case designed to exponge his words of "Truth," something that must be known to Paradigm's inhabitants. There are three instances in the series where Schwarzwald appears:
1. In Episode 4, viewers first learn of the maniacal villain. He explains himself for diving down this apocalyptic rabbit hole, in pursuit of memories and things associated with the Event of 40 Years ago. Roger Smith is able to subdue him, but in the process, it's presumed that he dies in a fire before the episode's end.
2. In Episode 8, viewers see Schwarzwald getting serious about his claim of spreading the Truth, by inniating a Megadeus fire-fight inside a dome against Roger and Big O with a robot of his own - Big Duo. There is a significant amount of property damage. The battle ends with Big Duo being blown apart and a defeated Schwarzwald questioning a critical concept that develops later in the series regarding those giant robots.
3. In the 2nd season of the series, in Episode 17, Schwarzwald tries one more time to spread the truth, this time spreading his propoganda to the people, though he himself physically leaves the city for the wastelands of the desert, where he ultimately dies. However, from the desert comes a Megadeus associated with his propoganda: The Leviathan (After which the episode is titled). Throughout the remainder of the episode, he rants in voice-over fashion about ideals spawned from a three and a half minute speech he provides at the beginning, in a dire attempt to gain the audience he so desperately sought. The snake-like robot does make it to Paradigm City and Roger is able to defeat it before more damge can be done.
Provided below is that speech from Episode 17. Enjoy. (Note - Roger is in the Black robot, Schwarzwald in the Red one. The woman in the beach chair is a prominent female character in the series named Angel)
But before I can explain him to you, I must explain the premise of the series.
The Anime series I'm referencing is titled "The Big O." It takes place within the confines of Paradigm City, a domed metropolis situatied in a world that was affected by a cataclysmic event that happened 40 Years ago, and in the aftermath, every citizen and android lost their memories of anything that happened prior to that day. Our main character is Paradigm's top negotiator Roger Smith. He's a respectful gentleman who solves his clients' cases and essentially protects the city when the local police force can't, which is when a giant monster or robot happens to be stomping around for one reason or another. In those situations, Roger utilizes his own giant robot, referenced heavily as a Megadeus, called Big O. Together, they keep things in order. However, the character I wish to analyze is a villain of the series who tries to instill a certain kind of fear within Paradigm's citizens.
The mummy-looking man featured here goes by the name of Schwarzwald. Before he donned this persona, he was Michael Seebach, a newspaper reporter for Paradigm Press. Like Oedipa Maas, he became obsessed with finding the truth of things he was reporting; more specifically, his interest in the Event of 40 Years ago and that possibly, megadeuses were involved somewhere in the Event's process. The research nearly cost him his life, leaving him forever disfigured. He wishes to spread his findings to others in Paradigm, to expose Paradigm Corporation, the government of the city, for trying to get citizens to forget their pasts and deny the reality of the city's nature regarding the Event and for silencing him (they try to pay him off with a generous severance pay). Roger Smith is given the assignment of negotiating with him, but is called "a corrupt dog on the city's leash," for accepting the case designed to exponge his words of "Truth," something that must be known to Paradigm's inhabitants. There are three instances in the series where Schwarzwald appears:
1. In Episode 4, viewers first learn of the maniacal villain. He explains himself for diving down this apocalyptic rabbit hole, in pursuit of memories and things associated with the Event of 40 Years ago. Roger Smith is able to subdue him, but in the process, it's presumed that he dies in a fire before the episode's end.
2. In Episode 8, viewers see Schwarzwald getting serious about his claim of spreading the Truth, by inniating a Megadeus fire-fight inside a dome against Roger and Big O with a robot of his own - Big Duo. There is a significant amount of property damage. The battle ends with Big Duo being blown apart and a defeated Schwarzwald questioning a critical concept that develops later in the series regarding those giant robots.
3. In the 2nd season of the series, in Episode 17, Schwarzwald tries one more time to spread the truth, this time spreading his propoganda to the people, though he himself physically leaves the city for the wastelands of the desert, where he ultimately dies. However, from the desert comes a Megadeus associated with his propoganda: The Leviathan (After which the episode is titled). Throughout the remainder of the episode, he rants in voice-over fashion about ideals spawned from a three and a half minute speech he provides at the beginning, in a dire attempt to gain the audience he so desperately sought. The snake-like robot does make it to Paradigm City and Roger is able to defeat it before more damge can be done.
Provided below is that speech from Episode 17. Enjoy. (Note - Roger is in the Black robot, Schwarzwald in the Red one. The woman in the beach chair is a prominent female character in the series named Angel)
A new era for storytelling: Smart Games
In this post, following G-Hero's Alan Wake discussion, I am going to address what I like to call "Smart games" and how they are impacting the world of video games and making some game design companies rethink before they launch their game(s).
Gaming has come along way. From eating tiny orbs and fruits with a little yellow man and his wife while being chased by ghosts(?) to high octane first person shooters and even now where the controller is no longer needed and the body of the player becomes the remote (Kinect). Gaming has broken from the traditional form of storytelling and allows the player to experience the story instead of only reading and interpreting it. In the beginning, games like Mario and duck hunter gave the world of gaming a bad name. Yes they were loads of fun to play and experience but they lacked a sense of narrative and carried no worth after the control was put down. The player would simply turn on the console, play the game, loose or win, then replay it or shut it off. This left no room for any sort of educational value or even any attempt to entertain the player with a well thought out and written story. These games had little worth in the eyes of academics or parents who saw gaming, and still do today, as a waste of time. But gaming has proved itself worthy and after all, playing a well scripted game is like watching a film except you, the player, are in control of the story and the characters within it.
Eventually game designers caught onto the idea of writing better story lines for their games with hopes to attract more people into the gaming craze. People who would see video games a silly hobbies or means to waste perfectly good time to read or watch a film. Games such as Zelda, Halo, and Medal of Honor brought about new methods to tell a great story while keeping the player enthralled into the game and enjoying him/herself all the while. But even still, during a time where graphics and gameplay had made a landmark statement by improving tenfold since the previous consoles such as Sega Saturn. Nintendo 64 and the Playstation and evolved into systems such as the xbox360 and the PS3. Using these new and intense operating systems, gamers were now immersed into worlds far more graphically enhanced than in the past.
Gaming has become the new frontier for story telling. Not as an absolute but as a new doorway into the vast methods of storytelling. As spoken word turned into literature and literature into film and film into video games (obviously not directly), video games have now evolved into "smart games" a.k.a. well-scripted gaming experiences.
An example of this sort of game would be Bioware's Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2. Mass Effect or M.E. has revolutionized the way gaming companies form, create, an tell the story of games by introducing the concept of you, as the player, as the hero. YOU are required to make choices that can shape or misshape the world, in this case the entire galaxy and then some. YOU are in charge of a team that can only function if you have taken the time to talk with each and every character. The game is full of characters both human and alien and the graphics alone make this game a landmark achievement for visual aesthetics in a video game. But the real genius of the game comes from the script which the player has a wide selection on different variations of response for each dialogue moment throughout the entire game. This brings a whole new dynamic to gaming. Allowing the player to feel as though they are truly communicating with each person they come across and having these conversations that may ripple across the game and the story, which can be altered all the way to the end-- in other words if you as the player d not make the right choices throughout the game or take the time to assemble a proper team then you may die in the last segment of the story.
Also, games such as Mass Effect and other smart games whose designers and producers have hired voice actors both celebrity and free lance enhance the feeling of gameplay and truly bring out a "realness" in the dialogue.
It's games like these, like Mass Effect and other games like Assassins Creed (1 & 2) that address a high demand for proper story telling in a game that brings video gamers away from being judged for wasting time playing some meaningless game with no plot and instead transporting them into a story, as film can do, and immerse the player, virtually, into a story that they play a part in and feel at the end like they have either learned something new about the real world or enjoyed a great story such as the feeling once gets when finishing a great film or fine work of literature.
Nick
Mass Effect website incase you wondering or curious:
Mass Effect 2 trailer
James Jean: A Love Letter
The art style that I believe James Jean practices is something that may artists in this medium have found themselves achieving careers in. Things like video game art, both in concept and in-game. Things like story boarding for films both live action and animated. There are so many new mediums for fine artists and animators to pursue. Even the world of graphic design has become invaded by illustrators who wouldn't mind their characters and art style promoting a certain product or company. James Jean is a perfect example of this. First, making the covers for Fables for 75+ issues (that means he created 75+ original covers for every issue and thats not counting the concept art in the back which he also took part in). After that James Jean found himself being asked by companies like Prada and an AIDS awareness campaign where he made posters for condoms, which are amazing if you can find them. For Prada, Jean illustrated several posters as well as animating a short film showing off a Prada clothing line that features his art printed on shoes, shirts and jackets. James Jean accepted these commissions while continuing to draw for fables and attending comic-con and some how, amongst all of that, he still found time to draw in his moleskins and paint for himself.
James Jean's art features surrealistic narratives that feel as though they move across the canvas when no one is looking. Some of his earlier work shows off his perfection in realism and his later work reflects the more experimental edge that sets him apart from most modern and many classical artists. The works contain an essences of rawness, they float in a space that can be both haunting and inviting all at once like the first plunge we take upon entering a dream. These pieces of Art challenge what it means to draw and paint works that may appear like the fan art from some game or the concept art from a movie but are actually original images. Artists such as James Jean take on the experimental realm and illustrate our dreams so that we may look upon them and remember where our minds took us the night before while we slept. In a time where art is being molded into so many different shapes, it is a relief to see new artists who approach classic art with open arms while wielding their surreal imagination simultaneously. If you enjoy James Jean then I highly recommend a footstep-follower of his named Joao Ruas. I would also recommend subscribing to magazines like Juxtapoz and Hi Fructose.
Nick
James Jean:
Joao Ruas
Are you afraid of the Dark? Alan Wake is... (Warning - Contains Spoilers)
The Poe song "Haunted," when mentioned in a previous class, reminded me of an action suspense thriller video game called "Alan Wake." What you are about to see is my interpretation of how I think the game is a form of post-modernistic story-telling.
1. The levels of the game itself are formatted into "episodes," like a bizarre television show. They all begin with "Previously, on Alan Wake," and a cinematic flashback reminding you of events you've completed so far. The levels end with a present cinematic sequence and then fades to a mock title screen, while playing a song from the in-game soundtrack. Poe's "Haunted" specifically plays after you beat the second "episode," in which Alan meets his wife's kidnapper in the deep dark woods and saves his literary agent and friend from a flock of evil birds (more about that later). Other songs include David Bowie's "Major Tom," Poets of the Fall's "War," and Roy Orbison's "In Dreams." The main game is six episodes long, plus two Downloadable Content Episodes, which continue the plot after the main game ends.
2. The plot arc of the game is something straight out of a horror novel. Alan Wake, a once famous writer, and his wife Alice arrive in the sleepy secluded town of Bright Falls, where they're on vacation from the big city. In the first episode, Alice, who has a phobia of the dark, is taken by the antagonistic ethereal presence called The Dark Presence, which comes from an ethereal world called the Dark Place. This force can consume people and birds and turn them into mindless thralls, which are the main enemies you encounter (outside of large, possessed machinery that the Dark Presence can manipulate). The rest of the game is about finding and rescuing Alice, while at the same time learning about what the Dark Presence is and what it's capable of.
3. 90% of the game takes place at night-time. You will also be by yourself 95% of the time throughout the game. Your only method of sight is a flashlight, which also burns away the darkness inside your enemies, making them vulnerable to your weapons, which include a pistol, hunting rifle, and in some spots, a flare gun and search light. Your enemies are possessed people of size and stature (the bigger they are, the harder they are to kill). And when you're walking around in the woods, in the game's completely beautifully rendered environments, wind blowing through the trees and rocks falling at random will scare the crap out of you. The contrast of light and dark in the game is paramount, obviously because you're trying to beat back the Dark Presence with light.
4. Outside of the plot arc of the game, Alan Wake's journey is partially a "text" that has been "authored" by another creative person - a fictional character named Thomas Zaine. He appears to you in an old fashioned diver's suit, and is the physical manifestation of light in the game, where as the Dark Presence is manifested as a woman in a mourning dress and veil. Zaine was a poet who tried to resurect his dead wife using the power of the Dark Presence, infusing it in his poetry to make the action happen (long before Wake arrives in the game). However, because his resurrected wife was tainted by the Dark Presence, he undid his action, but gave his life in the process. The spirit of Zaine comes forward later in the game, providing Wake a page he wrote, describing how Alan would defeat the Dark Presence.
* Before meeting or hearing about Thomas Zaine, at the start of the 2nd episode, players come across pieces of a manuscript Wake wrote, but had no memory of writing. These pieces relate to events that have already happened, while others are major foreshadowing elements of events to come.
The game itself spent five years in post production, so the game could be completed to its utmost potential, so players could feel like they were the protagonists of a deranged and wild suspense film. Exclusively for the XBOX 360, Alan Wake is hidden gem that takes convential gaming and morphs it into a surreal, complex story that has made it into one of my favorite all time games.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=auw3_z9EyRg
1. The levels of the game itself are formatted into "episodes," like a bizarre television show. They all begin with "Previously, on Alan Wake," and a cinematic flashback reminding you of events you've completed so far. The levels end with a present cinematic sequence and then fades to a mock title screen, while playing a song from the in-game soundtrack. Poe's "Haunted" specifically plays after you beat the second "episode," in which Alan meets his wife's kidnapper in the deep dark woods and saves his literary agent and friend from a flock of evil birds (more about that later). Other songs include David Bowie's "Major Tom," Poets of the Fall's "War," and Roy Orbison's "In Dreams." The main game is six episodes long, plus two Downloadable Content Episodes, which continue the plot after the main game ends.
2. The plot arc of the game is something straight out of a horror novel. Alan Wake, a once famous writer, and his wife Alice arrive in the sleepy secluded town of Bright Falls, where they're on vacation from the big city. In the first episode, Alice, who has a phobia of the dark, is taken by the antagonistic ethereal presence called The Dark Presence, which comes from an ethereal world called the Dark Place. This force can consume people and birds and turn them into mindless thralls, which are the main enemies you encounter (outside of large, possessed machinery that the Dark Presence can manipulate). The rest of the game is about finding and rescuing Alice, while at the same time learning about what the Dark Presence is and what it's capable of.
3. 90% of the game takes place at night-time. You will also be by yourself 95% of the time throughout the game. Your only method of sight is a flashlight, which also burns away the darkness inside your enemies, making them vulnerable to your weapons, which include a pistol, hunting rifle, and in some spots, a flare gun and search light. Your enemies are possessed people of size and stature (the bigger they are, the harder they are to kill). And when you're walking around in the woods, in the game's completely beautifully rendered environments, wind blowing through the trees and rocks falling at random will scare the crap out of you. The contrast of light and dark in the game is paramount, obviously because you're trying to beat back the Dark Presence with light.
4. Outside of the plot arc of the game, Alan Wake's journey is partially a "text" that has been "authored" by another creative person - a fictional character named Thomas Zaine. He appears to you in an old fashioned diver's suit, and is the physical manifestation of light in the game, where as the Dark Presence is manifested as a woman in a mourning dress and veil. Zaine was a poet who tried to resurect his dead wife using the power of the Dark Presence, infusing it in his poetry to make the action happen (long before Wake arrives in the game). However, because his resurrected wife was tainted by the Dark Presence, he undid his action, but gave his life in the process. The spirit of Zaine comes forward later in the game, providing Wake a page he wrote, describing how Alan would defeat the Dark Presence.
* Before meeting or hearing about Thomas Zaine, at the start of the 2nd episode, players come across pieces of a manuscript Wake wrote, but had no memory of writing. These pieces relate to events that have already happened, while others are major foreshadowing elements of events to come.
The game itself spent five years in post production, so the game could be completed to its utmost potential, so players could feel like they were the protagonists of a deranged and wild suspense film. Exclusively for the XBOX 360, Alan Wake is hidden gem that takes convential gaming and morphs it into a surreal, complex story that has made it into one of my favorite all time games.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=auw3_z9EyRg
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