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In this review, I will tell you about the cultural background, gameplay, plot and hidden ending of "SIFU", and share with you the shock and thoughts brought by this game.
A story before the game started
967, " Shaw Brothers " held a film director class. Among the many directors who graduated from this director class, a young man named Wu Siyuan was not famous at the time. But he still gained some fame in the Hong Kong film industry with two anti-hero martial arts kung fu films, including "Crazy Killer" and " "Killer Beach ".
But in that year, any movie released in Hong Kong could not avoid the siege of major companies such as Jiahe and Shaw Brothers . Wu Siyuan, who established the "Siyuan Pictures Company" in 1973, urgently needed a circle-breaking work to save himself. At that time, an unsuccessful martial arts director also wanted to prove with a movie directed by himself that his martial arts director level was definitely no worse than his brothers. So he worked together in "The Band of the Corps" and hit it off and decided to make a film that combines comedy and martial arts. And at this time, Wu Siyuan caught a fancy to a young martial arts actor who was called the "box office poison" through the movie " Shaolin Muren Lane ". So the producer who was eager to turn over, a martial arts director who was always unsuccessful, and a three-person who wanted to escape the existing environment gathered together and worked together to study together. Therefore, " Snake-shaped Diao Shou " directed by Yuan Heping and starring Jackie Chan was released.
So, after Bruce Lee , another "kung fu comedy" trend that influenced the world has since rushed to the world. The transition from martial arts to martial arts began to accelerate, and what does this have to do with the game "Master"? In the article " Zhihu ", the development team Slocap said, "The concept of "Master" was inspired by Jackie Chan's movie, and the theme of the game was also importantly influenced by Baimeiquan." The birth of "Master" was a successful exchange of Chinese culture's propaganda to the outside world. This exchange spanned time through images, affecting others on the other side of the world, and making them yearn for our culture. This is a game work created by the Slocap development team with respect and love for Chinese Kung Fu and Chinese culture.
The master and apprentice fight on rainy nights
The beginning of any story must give the protagonist a legitimate reason. Just like what is said in "The Record of Piaozhang": "The moon is dark and the murder is dark, and the wind is high and the fire is set on the sky." In the dark night, rainy days, the weapon-holding murderer, a small courtyard, a suspenseful opening. The player can operate the last boss of the game "Yang" from the beginning to lead his helper back to the master's sect and kill him. He has no grudges with these colleagues, and everything is just for the wooden box on the table behind the master.
After killing the blocked master, facing the master's child and his junior brother, "Yang" did not feel soft-hearted. With a look of his eyes, the accompanying pharmacist "Xiao" raised his hand and fell, and all the suspense remained in this endless heavy rain. Just waiting for the protagonist to wake up, the fatal wounds on his body disappeared, but there was a string of copper coins in his hand. The boy stared at his father's already cold body on the ground. We know that from now on, this revenge will be like igniting a deep underground coal mine. This flame will accumulate in the shadows until the murderer pays the price for everything he has done back then and will not stop until death.
It is worth mentioning that the development team's way of showing the growth of the protagonist is very innovative. The transition is not as stiff as suddenly growing up after a black screen, but rather, the two elements of "growth" and "preparation" for revenge are perfectly integrated.
A simple transition organically combines the obsession and fun introduction of the gameplay that is previewed in the mind to defeat the enemy again and again, creating a very cinematic picture and shot. This work does show the feeling of a "kung fu movie" from the beginning.
Unique growth and death
Because of the ability of the string of copper coins on the waist, we can all use the power of copper coins to rebirth in place after death, but "Master" is not a simple game. The game's death penalty is reflected by the disappearance and age of "copper coins": this game adopts a very unique growth mechanism, and after the player's health value reaches zero, he will fall down briefly, and his age will increase accordingly when he recovers again; and copper coins will dim with age and the increase in "deaths" until it breaks and disappears.
Each death will increase the protagonist's age. The most intuitive impact of age growth is: the vitality decreases and the attack power increases. In order to simulate a time feedback after continuous practice in reality, it really corresponds to the sentence:
And the combat skills that can be unlocked at different ages are also limited. Some skills can only be learned before the age of 39. If you exceed the limit, you cannot learn this. This should be especially important when playing. Of course, under the extremely strict difficulty setting of "Master", the game experience of this game is worthy of the title "Master", which also makes it possible that in the early stage of the game, we will probably go to nightclubs at the age of 20 and come out at the age of 70, and maintain a master's appearance every day. Because of this, in the death and rebirth of "Master", players also think about how to use limited lives and opportunities to improve their playing routes, and try to build a unique gameplay idea in the game.
Scene design full of "happiness"
As a "little fan" influenced by Jackie Chan, the development team also knows how to reasonably arrange the trade-offs between "entertainment" and "kung fu". In 1995, Jackie Chan used " Red Fan District " to completely open up the European and American markets, and completely faced his influence from Asia to the world. The "JACKIE CHAN" that makes good use of terrain props and is also agile, has also successfully promoted the "Chengshi Martial Arts" to the world. Because of this, if the game uses only one pair of hands, it will appear monotonous. Facing the enemy attacking the group, the wine bottles, steel pipes, wooden sticks, bricks, mops, wooden benches, and seats in the scene can all become handy weapons. The complex terrain can help us divide the scene and the enemy, and even the enemy can become our helpers to knock down the enemy, allowing us to knock down the enemies one by one while dodging.
After learning some specific skills, the protagonist can kick other items in the scene to make the enemy fall to the ground quickly, and can also push the stunned miscellaneous soldiers to the wall or piles of people to cause secondary damage. The interaction of these scenes is an important factor in the entire game having a "reality" like a street fight.
Since the game cannot be saved freely, if you want to reduce the age of the character, you need to replay the previous level and reduce the number of deaths. This strict "maintenance" method requires us to leave more opportunities to the boss rather than the enemies along the way. This also means that sometimes we need to challenge the same level repeatedly to improve our proficiency, the construction of the level and the strategy of dealing with the enemy.
Of course, blindly making things difficult for players is not a wise approach. "Perform" and "Decryption" to "add" the game difficulty and repetition. This 1+12 approach is the key point to ensure the player's gaming experience. The development team accurately grasped this pain point for players and bound the "key" and "clues" and "elite enemies" to clear the level shortcuts, so that players can not only pass the level with combos with ease, but also will not easily miss the development team's "love" for players .
When you work hard again, you can use the shortcut to skip some combat scenes.This point in is most obvious in the third and fourth levels. The excessively lengthy process can easily cause the protagonist's health to decline sharply, and it will also affect the enthusiasm for repeating . , but skipping the combat process is not the best choice, because in addition to being able to upgrade when rebirth, the "upgrade point" mainly based on the jade seal is also the key to our ability to continuously accumulate under several levels and finally defeat "Yang" at the end. Is fighting the boss in order to maintain a healthier state? or to accumulate state first to face the boss? This is a question that requires players to weigh themselves.
Hard Bridge Hard Horse Real Kung Fu
game's combat system is based on the traditional Chinese kung fu White Eye Fist. This set of boxing techniques originated in the late Ming Dynasty and was said to be created by Taoist Master Bai Mei in Emei Mountain in Sichuan. Its characteristics are strong and fierce, with coherent moves and wide routes. Almost all the fighting in "Master" is basically indoors. This close-fitting boxing method can accurately interpret the point of "fist to flesh" in the game.
game designed a "stamina value" similar to the "Sekiro" posture bar, and allows us to avoid some unblockable attacks through quick dodging. But dodging alone is not enough. If we don’t fully hit the boss’s endurance bar or empty the blood bar, we will not be able to enter the next stage. Therefore, blocking at critical moments has become a necessary skill for the game to pass the level. However, it is not easy to block the attack perfectly every time, because every blocking will increase the player’s endurance bar, and only by completing perfect dodging can we quickly clear it.
This requires us to learn to attack rhythms against different enemies, defeat the enemy with strong and fierce white-eyed boxing in the dodge block, and cooperate with the camera mobilization during the attack, so that the execution of rich movements in the game has a stable, accurate and ruthless texture.
And various skills learned after accumulated experience, such as: elbow, sweeping legs, round kick and other kung fu moves (it should be noted that the unlocking of skills is not permanent, but only takes effect in the authorities, unless the skill is unlocked five times in a row. ); is used in combination with various weapons, so that whether it is facing a group of attacks or facing the boss's battle, offense and defense are like dancing on the tip of a knife to turn the tables.
In addition to the excellent game action system, "Master" adopts the art style of Low Poly (low polygon). This low-detail, multi-faceted combination and highly rendered art style makes the game have a retro but close to "realistic" style. This charming modeling design of
allows the scene to be rich but not messy, making the "slums" hidden in the bamboo forest, the compact drum beats, the "night club" with treacherous light and shadow, the white, solemn, trendy and avant-garde "art gallery", the modern "building" and the "jingxin Hall" far away from the silent and mysterious city, provide players with five different scenes, and the changes in architecture and character styles are also different.
These scenes combined with the combat system can shape a very "scene-oriented" and "dramatic" battle scene. This combination is the catalyst for maximizing the physical sense of the game's combat.
Drawing the sword and roaring, and taking revenge
"Master" tells a very traditional story of chasing and revenge, and the development team also made a "master move" in the final processing. As the game continues to advance, we can use the clues we collected to restore the whole story. The protagonist's obsession with revenge "Drinking ice for ten years is hard to cool and passionate" is definitely the guarantee of the charm of the game's plot.
Especially for a person who only needs to fight against all enemies in one day. There are no allies, but there are enemies who cannot see the edge in front of him. All he can rely on is his own kung fu and a mysterious pendant. The countless difficulties along the way have made every mistake he made to pay a lot of time.
But revenge is just a never-ending cycle.When we defeat each other in the same way on a rainy night, think about our years of preparations, and the fight along the way dissipated with Yang who could not rise up. The emptiness of all support being suddenly taken away, leaving the protagonist's eyes with confusion without a trace of joy of revenge.
If the ending ends here, then "Master" is definitely a standard "independent fun tour", but the development team uses another way to explain the cycle of revenge, in order to interpret the "martial arts" and "martial ethics" they understand.
(Although the plot is inconvenient to reveal too much, in order to talk to everyone about my views on the game, I will leave my views on the second "forgive" ending at the end of this paragraph. If friends who do not want to be spoiled in advance, they can choose to skip the ending after seeing this)
Why is the forgiveness ending of this game easier for players to accept?
The success of a story, in addition to the protagonist's shaping, is also essential. We must understand the motivation of the villain's actions. Only by comprehensively demonstrating the villain's behavior logic can we prove the correctness of the protagonist.
The five villains portrayed in "Master", except for the two "pharmacist" and "Shawn", the other three have their own miserable past or are implementing their own opinions.
Eight years ago, in order to use the earth talisman guarded by his father to treat his seriously ill wife and daughter, Yang wanted to use stealing to save his wife and daughter after being rejected. He was eventually found expelled from the sect, and his wife and daughter were also seriously ill and died. So he led a group of men who were dissatisfied with the conservative method of the "Guardian" and killed a group of guardians and became the new heirs.
For eight years, Yang has also tried to cure diseases and save people with earth talismans, and wants to implement his firm will to "use talismans to benefit the world", but if the worst comes, everything has a cause and effect. Although he cures many patients, some lives have paid the price for his behavior. The more people he saves, the more people there will be misfortune and even death in other parts of the world. It is precisely because of this that this villain image has a new flesh and blood from the traditional villain, and also lays the foundation for the "forgiveness ending".
When we got clues to the "Five Ethics" in Yang's office, the plot that the development team wanted to convey to us really began. When we defeat several bosses several times, the plot will hint to us, and this hint is just a guide. The development team understands the player's need to kill his enemies with his hands, and understands that "the confidence in forgiveness is based on strength." This kind of storytelling guide is vivid but not stiff. We do not have to force the producer's personal wishes, but we can also have a new experience.
Forgiveness in the ending of Wude is to trigger two executions. If you want to take the forgiveness route, what we need is repeated challenges, or even multi-week goal to brush the level. It also shows that under the high-difficulty boss battle in "Master", my defeat this time was not accidental, but my repeated challenges and training with ease.
Because of this, the previous impulse to kill the enemy has been digested in repeated defeats, and can truly examine whether everything they have done is really worth it, and whether there is a better possibility of choosing to forgive themselves. This makes forgiveness even more valuable. It proves to the players that I feel that this forgiveness is not a whim, but a real life-and-death battle. Martial arts and virtue have reached this state. "Forgiveness is to believe and give a chance to atone for sins. Not killing means that it can still be punished for reoffending." The carrot and stick have been completely grasped.
So choosing to forgive will not make players feel frustrated, but will be satisfied with their own technical improvement, be able to easily deal with powerful enemies, be pleased with changes in their mood, and retain freshness. This is very smart.Moreover, the new ending CG creates a master style of "seeing all the mountains at a glance"
Conclusion
This work is not perfect, and there are still some regrets that affect the experience. In addition to the difficulty and difficulty, the problem of perspective shift when facing multiple enemies often makes players stuck in a very unfavorable perspective, affecting the current operation. However, this problem does not conceal its merits. This is still a game worth buying at the original price, and it is still a successful cultural exchange in terms of connotation and plot. Benjamin, the martial arts instructor of Slocap, of the development team of Slocap, is a white-eyed boxer who earnestly studied under the White-eyed Boxing Master Liu Weixin and opened a martial arts school in France to teach apprentices. Benjamin's experience in learning boxing was not smooth. He believed that Master Liu Weixin did not accept him as his disciple at the beginning because he was influenced by the idea of "transmitting the inside but not the outside" in Chinese Kung Fu. But before Benjamin returned to France, he moved Liu Weixin with a sentence "One day is your teacher, one lifelong father" and finally successfully became a disciple and became a master named "Liu Ben". Finally, Liu Weixin, as a master, also began to learn the native language of his disciple Benjamin. This story of deep love between master and apprentice is also the best reflection of the name of "Master".
Especially when Master Liu Weixin watched the "Master" game display on B.C. The idea that "people who practice martial arts have the rightness but do not dominate others" was perfectly integrated into the game by the development team. The transformation of the protagonist from "apprentice" to "master" vividly demonstrates the "five virtues" of benevolence, wisdom, etiquette, righteousness and faith.
I have always believed that in addition to the cultural display of itself, cultural confidence also needs to attract people from other cultural backgrounds to learn and understand, and display it correctly through our own way. In "Master", which is aimed at Chinese and overseas players, it uses a subtle and blank approach in the choice of good and evil. After many weeks, all the collected clues were pieced together into the final truth, so that we can make our own judgments and choices. Just do this, and it really only needs to do this. At this moment, we players completely enter our story and make the choices we deserve.
This is the thorough understanding of martial arts and Taoism, a communication between two cultures, a truly "battle between man and benevolence" that can be understood by players.
This is exactly what Slocap tells our story in their way.
Is this just the protagonist's victory?
No, it is also a victory for martial arts!
