Episode 6 – PAC-MAN: Circle
Continuing on from the first batch of episodes is maybe the strangest interpretation of a video game among this batch. It’s certainly a bold move to take such a well known game and strip it down to the barest of core concepts. But when you think about Pac Man, there really isn’t much of a story. Eat pellets, get chased by ghosts, occassionally get powerful enough to eat the ghosts. Repeat.
Typing all that out makes me that’s exactly what they did when coming up with the idea for this one. They broke the idea down to the extreme basics and then built it back up. What we got was something unlike anything you would ever expect from something inspired by Pac Man.
It would have been very easy to play it safe and either do some kind of modern day version of the old cartoon or been very meta about the game and do something around it. I’m still not sure how I feel about it. I liked that they took a big swing on this one. Regardless, it is definitely one to check out if only to wonder what kind of fever dreams led to it.
Episode 7 – Crossfire: Good Conflict
This probably shows the best version of the various team versus team shooters of any of them. Again, I wasn’t familar with the actual gameplay, but it was easy to figure out. You have two teams, one whose job is to take the target to the drop-off point while the other team is trying to retreive the target prior to that happening. What follows is a very fun game of shoot’em up cat and mouse being played by two groups not all that different.
The key take away is that neither side are the bad guys and neither side are the good guys either. In this instance they find themselves on opposites sides of a conflict, but that may not be the case in a future assignment.
Episode 8 – Armored Core: Asset Management
I really liked how we see this story through the eyes of a Pilot who has been through it. He’s someone who drowns himself in booze to silence the horrors in his head… not an easy task when the voice is an AI implant. Even as a somewhat washed out Pilot, he still gets some jobs, but the real question is whether he has the skills anymore.
Taking to the skies, he attempts to outthink and outmanuever the opposing pilots as they are more powerful and faster than his own mech.
I could see something larger coming out of this story… something that would evoke the veterans whose last war might be too far in the mirror, but they don’t know how to give up the rush. Even if they no longer know what they are fighting for… or who might be friend or foe.
Episode 9 – The Outer Worlds: The Company We Keep
I love the idea of Amos, this orphan who has absolutely no one to care about him, until he meets Felicity. They are best friends, but she longs to do important things, and he just wants to be important to her. When she leaves, he volunteers to be a test subject for all sorts of things just in the hope to see her once again.
This small person is the only true voice throughout the entire episode. He gives honest feedback on some very gruesome drugs/techniques/etc. A strange light in a world that seems to only become darker and darker every day.
One of the best episodes of the season that goes from moments that make you ache for Amos and laugh out loud in the next.
Episode 10 – Mega Man: Start
Mega Man was one of those games for the Nintendo that I’d rent for a weekend, and do my very best to run through every world, defeat every villain I could, and hopefully do it without getting too much sleep. I loved the various villains and learning which order was best to tackle them was not only a trial and error type of thing, but it made you feel very accomplished afterward.
With this episode, it acts as a true origin story for how Rock (Mega Man) got his mission in the first place. The animation is excellent, and I actually had to shake my head at the idea Dr. Light has been creating robot after robot in an attempt to stop the previous rampaging robot. Each time just adding to the destruction and chaos happening in Mega City.
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I’ll end it there. They released the last 7 episodes yesterday, so I need to block out some more time to watch them (and I still have 3 from the first batch to talk about as well).
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John McGuire is the writer of the sci-fi novel: The Echo Effect.
He is also the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!
Click here to join John’s mailing list and receive preview chapters of upcoming novels, behind the scenes looks at new comics, and free short stories.
His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow Empire, Tales from Vigilante City, Beyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.
He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com
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