12/21/2023

I'm going to try and make this a bit more organised now instead of the stream-of-consciousness format I'd used before. Each piece of media is listed seperately.

Sally Face

First off: I'm still insanely into Sally Face. I got Sal's guitar tattooed on my leg a few weeks ago. I've replayed it multiple times and got close to 100%ing it when my steam decided I didn't need to keep that progress. Oh, well. On the bright (hopefully) side, there's a board game coming out for Sally Face and I got to play it at a convention. I also got to meet the artist for the board game and we shared art with eachother which is pretty sick.

The X-Files

I'm not sure if most people would consider The X-Files to be horror, but I'd say it certainly can be. The episode "Home"(s4e2) certainly was and I'd argue that the series is intentionally scary often. Going into it, I'm not sure why but I didn't realise how much of it isn't actually alien based. Sure, Mulder's main obsession is aliens but there's a lot of other things like demons, vampires, ghosts, and just about any 'monster' you can think of. The cold open of "Avatar"(s3e21) was so well done. It was beautifully shot and played out in a way that you'd be hard pressed to deny that The X-Files is a horror series. I loved that intro and made many of my non-fan friends watch it as well.

Jurassic Park

Another "arguably not horror" entry I've been enjoying is reading the novel of Jurassic Park. I haven't seen the movie since I was a kid (probably around 12?) so I don't remember most of the plot. I've been having trouble getting into the actual swing of the story for some reason. Just have too many other things that take my interest, but when I do read it, I love it. I don't think I ever realised how much of the story is anti capitalism and seems somewhat indirectly implying that there's a racial element to the hubris of Hammond. I'm about a 1/3rd of the way through at this point.

Coraline

Oh, I also re-watched Coraline for Halloween since I was going to be Wybie for Halloween and my buddy was being Coraline. I forgot how legitimately terrifying that movie is. I love it a lot and it makes me want to reread the book. I listened to an audio book of it leading up to Halloween while I was drawing. I even got my friend who'd never seen it to watch it with me and some others and suddenly, he seemed to understand why those of us who saw it as kids are that way (take that how you will).

Silent Hill

And now for something that's less of a ramble about my thoughts and more of a recommendation. I'll be very surprised if any readers here haven't at least heard of Silent Hill. I played the first four games of the series over the past year (and I think a bit before that as well?) and I'm in love with the universe of it. If you've somehow played Sally Face but not Silent Hill, I highly recommend it! The first has such a nostalgic style to it, being for the PS1. The music is legitimately unsettling to be and feels disorienting in the same way the town itself is. The story line itself is dark and very twisted. It has a certain vibe to it that reminds me of old mythology, feeling foreign and like it was based off of genuine beliefs and not a videogame made in 1999. The voice acting and visuals aren't great but they can be forgiven because of both the time and the fact that the story more than makes up for it. Silent Hill 2 is maybe the most popular game in the franchise. You know Pyramid Head? Yeah, he's from this one! The graphics have majorly improved in the jump from PS1 to PS2. The story is likewise amazingly written and heartwrenching. I also think Silent Hill 2's more meloncholy soundtrack fits the different feeling of this entry better. Where 1 was confusing and distressing, 2 is more about grief and trauma. The music approprietly fits that. 3... well, I don't want to give anything away about 3! I think it's best to go in blind but you should definitely play 1 first. The imagery on 3 is beautiful and if you're a fan of the aesthetics associated with Catholism, this game has that in spades. Now, the imagery isn't actually catholic, it just has that feeling to it. Plus, the protagonist we play as in that game is very likeable to me. She's witty, amusing, and, most of all, so sick of this weird haunted crap happening to her. This is a welcome change of pace from the previous game following the internal monologue of a man who is in a constant state of grief (reasonably so, but still!) The last one I've played at this point was Silent Hill 4: The Room. Silent Hill 2 felt very different from 1 but The Room feels like a different series. It took some getting used to but I still enjoyed it. The concept of being stuck anywhere is kind of terrifying in its own way. This game follows a guy who didn't really do anything wrong except for move into a cruddy apartment and now he's suffering for it. He's not, like, divinely destined to be in this story from what I can tell. He's just Some Dude who is now dealing with Kurt Cobain and Brendan Fraser's evil love child. I genuinely loved this game, even if some of it was a bit difficult for me. This game was less about puzzle solving, and more about fighting, which made it harder to win me over since I loved the puzzle aspects of 1-3. Still, I ended up enjoying the game and really liked a lot of the characters. The monster designs, something I love in the Silent Hill series, were amazing here too. I'm slightly obsessed with Twin Victim.

Omori

Well, I think it was shortly after I finished Sally Face that my friends decided I hadn't suffered enough and introduced me to the videogame Omori. Omori is an incredibly well made game with equal parts lovely and haunting visuals. If you're a fan of the anime aesthetic, you'll enjoy the look of the game as its clearly very inspired by it. It reminds me of other RPG maker games like The Witch's House (which I also recommend but its been so long since I played it that I couldn't write a very good review right now) and the mechanics took me a while to get used to but there's honestly not much penalty to being bad at the RPG fights. Its more story driven than gameplay driven. I don't want to spoil it and recommend going in blind, however I'd be remiss if I failed to warn you of the potentially triggering content. The game warns you itself that it has a lot of content relating to depression, anxiety, and suicide. It's not using that warning lightly, either. Depending on how the game is played, there's some incredibly grim and bleak depictions of suicide. That's my main warning for the game. Now, let's get to the fun part: the scares. There's visuals in this game that are so far into the uncanny valley, it may as well declare it a town. The surreal art is hard to describe but the best I can do is compare it to art work like that of Yuko Tatsushima or Junji Ito (both are artists I recommend but have to warn of their disturbing content and influences!) The game itself isn't gorey from what I recall. Most of what I remember is some blood and not even that much is present. The horror is much more psychologically based than a gore fest. Despite that, there's a depiction in game that, while not exactly gorey, is going to be listed on my gore fan page. It's stretching the definition by quite a bit but it's my website so I can do what I want.

6/29/2021

I haven't been watching a ton of new movies recently but I have been playing a horror video game: Sally Face. I've also finally started reading The Sandman (By Neil Gaiman) after meaning to for years. I'm not far into the comic but I'm enjoying it so far. The gore is esquisit and the universe is facinating. Plus I'm adoring the baby gargoyle.

I would warn against playing Sally Face for anyone who thinks they may be emotionally compromised by certain subjects. The game doesn't shy away from much and there's not really any warning before showing some horrific stuff (which is part of what intrigued me). It's a point and click adventure and I highly recommend it to any horror fans who are willing to put aside any sensibilities. Sally Face is featured in my favourite gore.